June 14, 2024
By Wolfgang MÜNCHAU
When the leaders of the big countries have nothing important to say, the leaders of the small countries fill the void. It was always thus in the EU. We therefore don’t blame the formidable Kaja Kallas for speaking her mind on Russia and Ukraine. Her country spends more per capita than any other country in the world on aid for Ukraine. Her own family has suffered from Russian oppression. She has every right to speak up.
Her positions get widely reported in the media. Outsiders, however, should understand that these are absolutely not the position of the Ukraine’s western allies. At what appeared to be a casual chat, she declared the split-up of Russia into smaller states as an explicit western war goal. Previously, she tried to construct the biggest straw man that has ever been seen in European politics: if Russia wins the war, she said, there could be up to 30m Ukrainian refugees who would descend all over Europe. If that does not scare us, what else will?
The west does not have an agreed war goal in Ukraine. But the one thing Americans, and all the large European countries, agree on is that they don’t want to send troops to Ukraine, they don’t want to erect a no-fly zone, and they don’t seek regime change in Russia.
Olaf Scholz, for example, never says Ukraine must win. He says Russia must not win. He would, we presume, like a settlement on terms that are deemed favourable to Ukraine, though he does not tell us what he means by that. As Germany is the largest European supporter of Ukraine in absolute terms, and likely to become more important as the role of the US diminishes, we would assume that Germany’s own war goal will matter. Even with a change of government after the next year’s elections, we don’t think that the position of Germany would shift fundamentally. Friedrich Merz would be open to sending cruise missiles to Ukraine, but on the big picture, they are all aligned.
Her warnings about refugees is a form a scare-mongering that nobody takes seriously, if only because the most likely outcome of this war is a draw, not a total Russian victory. We hear a lot of warnings that Europe must step up its defences, or Vladimir Putin would invade our countries too. Having vastly underestimated Putin, we are not overestimating him.
That said, a strong case be made for more defence spending, and for more efficient defence spending. But to frame this debate as a scare story won’t get us anywhere.
When Kallas talks about regime change in Russia, she ends up strengthening opponents of Nato in the west. She appears to reaffirms what they always tell us – that Nato is a western conspiracy to take over the world. It falls into the not-helpful category.
Original article: EuroIntelligence
Source: https://strategic-culture.su/news/2024/06/14/how-not-to-dismantle-russia/
Emma Olive 