View from London: Ukraine is on its own – Europe is all talk, no action

Pic.: publics

Macron’s promise of boots on the ground is an empty show of solidarity that Putin will never allow, ‘The Telegraph’ writes.

Europe is lying to Ukraine. There will be no troops coming to its rescue. Recent meeting of the Coalition of the Willing yielded much bold talk – including an agreement in principle to what French president Emmanuel Macron called “reassurance forces in Ukraine.”

But there’s just one problem with Macron’s plan, and his name is Vladimir Putin. Europe’s leaders have refused to talk to the Kremlin since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion – which may explain why they seem not to have heard Putin’s often-repeated message that he adamantly opposes the idea of a NATO military presence in Ukraine. Indeed it’s abundantly clear that first and foremost among Putin’s justifications for his invasion was to prevent Ukraine’s Westward drift and to cut off its association with NATO.

That makes Macron’s plan for putting European boots on the ground part of the problem, not part of the solution. Putin will never agree to NATO peacekeepers, so why are the Europeans even talking about them? The only answer is another empty show of “solidarity” with Volodymyr Zelensky, who did a great deal of glad-handing and hugging of his European friends.

But in truth Zelensky – and all Ukrainians – have good reason to be very angry at their allies in the EU. Yes, European and US military aid has helped Ukraine to fight the much larger Russian army to a standstill. But the story of the three and a half year war has been one of constant delays and inadequate supplies. When it comes to making good on Canadian then-prime minister Justin Trudeau’s 2022 promise to provide Kyiv with “whatever it needs for as long as it takes”, the West has consistently been a day late and a dollar short.

The same logic allies to the hare-brained scheme of European peacekeepers. Despite Macron’s championing of the Ukraine “reassurance force”, some 68 per cent of French respondents have told pollsters that they oppose putting their troops in harm’s way if hostilities are still ongoing. But the only point of an armed deterrence force is that it has to be a credible military threat, ready to fight and die if needed. And while 26 of the 35 Western countries participating in recent Coalition of the Willing have notionally agreed to “deploy troops or to provide assets to support peacekeepers in the air or at sea,” note well the weasel word “or”. Many leaders seem willing to back up peacekeepers. Just how many are willing to send their voters’ children to die for Ukraine remains to be seen.

Perhaps what was most significant about recent Coalition of the Willing meeting was what was not said. Gone was any talk of Ukraine’s Nato membership. That’s one key Kremlin demand met. And if we decipher Ursula von der Leyen’s summary of the security guarantees focused on making Ukraine into “a steel porcupine”, that means that when it comes to facing down future Russian aggression, Kyiv is on its own – while its allies keep a safe distance.

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