𝐀 ‘𝐥𝐨𝐧𝐠 𝐰𝐚𝐫’ 𝐢𝐧 𝐔𝐤𝐫𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐮𝐧𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐞 – 𝐩𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐭𝐚𝐥𝐤𝐬 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐞𝐝𝐞𝐝 𝐧𝐨𝐰

 

Morning Star, 19 September, 2023

NATO’S remobilised chief Jens Stoltenberg told us over the weekend to “prepare for a long war in Ukraine.”

This is an admission by the Nato secretary-general that the much-heralded Ukrainian offensive is failing and that even more of Ukraine’s youth must die in what is now commonly described as the “meat grinder” in the south and east of the country.

Stoltenberg said at the alliance’s July summit that Ukraine had “moved closer to Nato.” Whether he grasps the irony of his comment that “when this war ends, we need security guarantees for Ukraine. Otherwise, history could repeat itself,” is an unknown.

It was precisely Russia’s anxiety about its own security that lies at the centre of this conflict.

If Ukraine and the Nato powers had implemented the Minsk agreements Ukraine would have retained its territorial integrity, remained outside of Nato and have benefited from a guaranteed peace in central and eastern Europe and the economic growth that is transforming the central Asian landmass, but from which Europe is isolated because of the sanctions regime against Russia which has sent our energy costs skyrocketing.

In fact, the Nato summit was where the divisions over the alliance’s formal strategy emerged, with Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria each with their own concerns about the direction of the conflict, with Poland heading a bloc that refuses to allow Ukrainian dumping of its cereal production and Germany insisting on civil society reforms and an end to corruption.

Prominent among French President Emmanuel Macron’s proposals for a larger EU and Nato was a clear recognition that a failure of the Ukraine offensive would necessarily entail both a re-evaluation of support for Ukraine and a negotiated compromise with Vladimir Putin.

That moment, as the Stop the War Coalition, has argued for many months is now nearing.

Stop the War, meeting over the weekend, has been a voice of reason and humanity in a narrative characterised by a pronounced indifference to the human cost of a war fought in the service of the US strategic drive to punish Russia and challenge China’s growing influence and economic power.

According to the UN High Commission for Refugees, as of last week, there are 6,199,700 Ukrainian refugees abroad. Just under three million fled to Russia and over 20,000 to Belarus. Six million economic migrants left Ukraine before the war and the population is greatly reduced.

The country is an economic ruin, with its state budget buttressed by a punishing mixture of subventions and loans that will need to be repaid.

Only 9.5 million Ukrainians have a job — six to seven million if state employees are excluded. These must support the remaining 23m people including pensioners, children, students, the unemployed and dependants. The fertility rate has fallen below 1.0 since the war started.

On highly speculative US figures alone, half-a-million Russian and Ukrainian military personnel have died or been wounded. Neither country gives credible figures and the US estimate that Russian figures dwarf the Ukraine body count seems counterintuitive given that the Russians are currently fighting an artillery war behind minefields and with air superiority.

The US says 70,000 Ukrainian soldiers have died and 120,000 wounded. Who knows? No propaganda estimate, especially the US, can be trusted, but one Ukrainian commander is quoted this week as saying that the recently mobilised troops are suffering 90 per cent losses.

This is a tremendous human tragedy that demands a ceasefire and negotiations.

Those who insist on preconditions for a ceasefire and negotiations — and who thus anticipate an unlikely victory or an unending war to the last Ukrainian — and who say Putin doesn’t want negotiations, need to ask themselves how it is that he is in accord with Nato’s strategy.

Put him on the spot. Offer a ceasefire and talks without preconditions.

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https://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/article/e/long-war-ukraine-unthinkable-peace-talks-are-needed-now