The West must and easily can outspend Russia in Ukraine. The so-called Franco-German couple must lead and make a much more substantial military effort. The United States have spent more money on Ukraine than all European countries combined. Ukraine is Europe. Therefore, this war must be Europe’s top priority.
Germany, France and all other EU countries should spend at least 1% of GDP for Ukraine’s war effort against Putin’s Russia. The solidarity so far is largely insufficient, partly even lip service. Especially the German Chancelor Olaf Scholz and the French President Emmanuel Macron are not up to the job.
Although the relatively new German Minister of Defense Boris Pistorius doubled the country’s military effort for Ukraine, what is sent to Ukraine is by far not enough. For instance NATO countries in Europe have some 2,000 Leopard tanks. They should send at least 400 of them to Ukraine.
Olaf Scholz’ permanent grin (Dauergrinser) is not a credible policy ersatz. He lacks vision, strength, decisive action although he once promised to be a leader (Wer bei mir Führung bestellt, bekommt sie auch). Despite his famous Zeitenwende speech in February 2022 (!), so far, Scholz has still not delivered.
In fact, if there had not been massive pressure from within his coalition, from the German opposition and from within other EU countries as well as the USA, Olaf Scholz may never have sent weapons to Ukraine. His Social Democrats (SPD) are stuck in a failed, past policy which favored friendly relations with the Soviet Union and later Russia — the famous, subsequently rather infamous Ostpolitik by Chancellor Willy Brandt and his Russian envoy, go-between and later Putinversteher Egon Bahr.
If you read German, have a look at the article regarding President Steinmeier and his years as Putinversteher, taken from the enlightening and devastating book by Reinhard Bingener and Markus Wehner Die Moskau Connection about the SPD and Putin. Although Chancellor Scholz does not seem to be as compromised as others regarding his attitude towards Putin’s Russia, he has not fully understood the problem yet.
The French President Macron is internally weakened since the 2022 parliamentary election in which he lost the parliamentary majority due to a lackluster campaign. Emmanuel Marcon seems mainly preoccupied by not making Putin angry. He does not understand that only regime change in Russia can bring peace to Eastern Europe.
The economically third largest EU country Italy must do more too. One is already happy that the far-right leader Georgia Meloni is pro-Ukraine, pro-EU and pro-NATO, unlike most other far-right leaders in Italy and elsewhere in Europe. But kind words are not enough.
Putin’s thinks he has the greater staying power (längerer Atem) and, therefore, the West will finally give in regarding Ukraine. He has changed to a war economy (Kriegswirtschaft). His expection is understandable. The West, especially Europe, had one year to produce ammunition, canons, tanks, planes and more for and send them to Ukraine. But, so far, very little has been done. It’s probably not enough for a Ukrainian offensive and surely not enough in the long year, if Putin keeps on fighting.
It is one thing to defend your territory — which the Ukrainians did admirably well — and a totally different one to win territory back. According to a rule of thumb, the attacker need at least a 3:1 advantage in combat power, in troops and material, to break through a defensive line. And the Russian’s had one year to build a powerful system of defense.
Nevertheless, the situation is not hopeless for Ukraine. Their fighthers know they are fighting for their freedom, for their homeland and with partly modern equipment from the West, whereas many Russians don’t actually know what they are doing in Ukraine, their chain of command is rigid, the moral low, and the equipment outdated. However, for Putin — as for Staline during World War II — a life, including the life of a Soviet or Russian soldier does not count. In addition, the Russians potentially outnumber the Ukrainians. On the other side, the Ukrainians are determined to continue fighting. Therefore, the West should at least give full support to Ukraine. So far, they just seem to do what is the absolute minimum. Not enough for Ukraine to decisively push back Russia, but enough to withstand Putin’s pressure.
Both Scholz and Macron are extremely short-sighted. Germany is doing more than France — not only militarily, financially and by welcoming one million Ukrainian refugees in comparison with France’s roughly 120,000. But had they massively sent aid BEFORE the escalation of the war in February 2022 and early on in the war, Putin might have been pushed back. Now, Ukraine is totally ruined and dependent on Western financial aid too.
Should Russia permanently occupy the Crimean Peninsula as well as parts of Eastern and Southern Ukraine, this war will not end. Many Ukrainiens will be ready to fight a partisan war — this was clear from the start.
Furthermore, if Putin gets away with occupying the Crimea and parts of the Donbass, he will be tempted to apply “salami slicing” tactics, to take another and then another territory from Ukraine, maybe the vital port city of Odessa. Subsequently, Putin would want to get Moldova and Belarus “back” into what he considers the historic Russian empire. For the Russian dictator, there is no Ukrainian nation, no Ukrainian culture. He wants to whipe them out.
Appetite comes with eating. Subsequently, Putin may want to attack Georgia once again and, maybe in the longer run, even get all former Soviet Republics in Asia back into the empire. If he should be successful, he may want to get the former Baltic Republics “back”, although they are part of both NATO and the European Union, which would trigger NATO and EU collective security.
The war effort has partly ruined Russia. Without new oil and gas buyers who pay the full price — not discounted rates, below the world-market price, such as currently China, India, Turkey and others —, Putin will need new wars to mobilize Russians to stay on his side aka he needs the permanent revolution. It’s an unsustainable situation and, therefore, Russia will remain a destabilizing factor as long as the totally corrupt Putin siloviki system stays in place. Regime change is overdue.
If Putin succeeds, even just partly by keeping the Crimea and the Donbass territories he conquered in 2014, the right-wing populists in Europe will be further strenghtened, Eastern Europe further destabilized.
Macron is running around telling people Taiwan is not Europe’s problem, he is favoring the decoupling of Europe and the USA. This is both Putin’s and Xi Jingping’s wet dream. Without the US nuclear umbrella, notably Germany and Eastern European countries are “naked”, exposed to Russian nuclear blackmail.
If the West is divided and, therefore, the EU between East and West too, China too will have an easier game trying to impose it’s world vision. To prevent an authoritarian Asian century, the West must stick together. A free trade deal between the USA, the EU and other democracies around the globe would be one important step forward. The same holds true of a world-wide defense and security alliance uniting all democracies.
If Trump or a Trump-like candidate should come to power, the American aid for Ukraine could dwindle if not totally disappear despite the Budapest Memorandum — at least moral obligation to defend Ukraine’s territorial integrity for giving up the nuclear arsenal on Ukrainian territory after the demise of the Soviet Union, given by Russia, the UK and the USA.
Should Russia prevail, the signal to the rest of the world will be even clearer: without nuclear weapons, you are vulnerable; with nuclear weapons, nobody will attack you.
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P.S. Zeitenwende: Pistorius asked for additional €10 billion for the German army. However, the coalition decided that he will only get additional €1.7 billion for the 2024 budget. The increase will entirely be eaten up by higher salaries for soldiers and civilians working for the German military, according to a NZZ article.
Photograph on top by Sandro Halank via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.. Chancellor Olaf Scholz signing the coalition treaty between SPD, Greens and Liberals.
Article added on June 22, 2023 at 16:13 German time. Last update at 18:43.
