From Paris
There is lead over the sky of Europe and an invasion as “imminent” as a ghost that runs through the rhetoric of the White House without, for now, any of the 120,000 soldiers stationed on the border having crossed the line between Russia and Ukraine. The distance between Russia and the West has become so long like the table that separated the Russian president Vladimir Putin and the French Emmanuel Macron during the dialogue that both held last Monday in Moscow and during which Putin put between the two una mesa kilometer because Macron refused to take a PCR test in Moscow. That theatrical extension translates perfectly the increase in tension between the two blocks, despite the ongoing negotiations encouraged by Emmanuel Macron and the summary made in Paris of the French president’s tour, which included Ukraine and Germany. Sources from the presidential palace allege that this diplomatic tour achieved “its objectives.” Doesn’t seem to be the case.
Are you wolf?
The United States continued with its so-called “preventive strategy” which consists of saying “be careful, the wolf is coming”. Biden warned his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin on Saturday that Washington and its allies will give a “decisive response” with serious costs if Moscow decides to invade Ukraine. “President Biden made it clear that if Russia undertakes a new invasion of Ukraine, the United States, together with its allies and partners, will respond decisively”said a statement from the White House after the telephone conversation between the two leaders.
Secretary of State Anthony Blinken reinforced his president’s words: “We continue to see very worrying signs of Russian escalation, including the arrival of new forces on the borders with Ukraine,” he told a news conference on Saturday.
Meanwhile Russia mobilized an imposing military apparatus in the course of the “Determination 2022” military exercises that it is carrying out together with Belarus until February 20. It is precisely these maneuvers that are unfolding at the gates of Ukraine that have altered what seemed to be heading towards a tough and complex negotiation.
From there came a series of high-tension decisions: the administration of Joe Biden reiterated his call for US citizens in Ukraine to leave the country “within the next 24-48 hours.” The United Kingdom, Denmark, Norway, Estonia, Latvia, Holland, Spain, Japan, Canada, Australia, Israel and South Korea then did the same, while neither France nor the European Union opted for that path.
Through its spokesman for external relations of the European Commission, Peter Stano, the EU clarified “we are not evacuating”. However, Germany and France along with the United States warned that they would adopt “swift and drastic sanctions” in the event that Russia invaded Ukraine, according to the spokesman for German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
Dialogue and military escalation
After Joe Biden, Emmanuel Macron spoke with Putin on the phone this Saturday, February 12, and reiterated that “a sincere dialogue is not compatible with a military escalation.” In turn, Putin called the accusation that Russia is preparing an invasion of Ukraine “provocative speculation” during his conversation with his French counterpart, the Kremlin said in a statement. The Kremlin considers that this accusation and these military means create “preconditions for possible aggressive actions by the Ukrainian forces in the Donbass”a region in eastern Ukraine where Russia has supported armed separatists for eight years.
At the end of this almost two-hour conversation, the two heads of state expressed their “willingness to continue the dialogue” in order to solve the two pending problems: on the one hand, the negotiations with the separatists in Eastern Ukraine who control the Donbass region, on the other the central issue of all this mess, that is, the conditions of security and stability in Europe that must include Russia, which was never done.
Despite the joint threats directed at Russia, there remains a difference in the analysis of dangerousness. In Washington’s official vocabulary, the occupation of Ukraine is “imminent” while the European approach is less drastic. Even In Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky distanced himself from Washington when he said US warnings of an “imminent” attack “caused panic and did not help the Ukrainians. Today, the best friend of our enemies is panic in our country. All this information (the invasion) does not help us”.
war trumpets
The trumpets of war sounded again after no progress was noted during the negotiations that took place on Thursday and Friday in Germany between Russia, Ukraine, Germany and France. The French presidency described this new round of negotiations as “long and difficult”. The current crisis depends very much both on the design of a new European security architecture — Russia has always been excluded — whose axis is the non-extension of NATO towards the countries of Eastern Europe, and on the negotiations between Ukraine and the Donbass separatists.
In 2014, the so-called “Minsk agreement” was signed, but subsequent agreements were never finalized and both parties have been fighting a war that, according to UN figures, has already caused 15,000 deaths. Russia is seeking to prevent the West from militarily backing Ukrainian forces fighting separatists and is demanding that negotiations take place without the mediation of Western capitals.
Earlier in the week, French President Emmanuel Macron traveled to Russia, Ukraine and then Germany in order to keep the dialogue between Russia and the West on track. Upon his return, he was optimistic, but on Friday, February 11, the optimism vanished with the impossibility for Ukraine and the separatists in the East to negotiate new conditions.
“Provocative Speculations”
Vladimir Putin today seems to have many more cards in his hand than Westerners. In November he began stationing troops on the borders with Ukraine and on January 18 he announced joint exercises with Belarus.
That was the red line from which the United States began to speak of an “imminent” occupation without that imminence having an immediate calendar. The last thing Joe Biden’s administration said is that the Russian president could move troops into Ukraine between now and February 20, that is, the end of the Winter Olympics. Moscow considers these warnings to be “provocative speculation”.
Europeans are trapped between the logic of a war that the United States sees as certain and the urgency of maintaining reasonable balances in the West by negotiating with a country like Russia.an ally of China, while the US administration seems more interested in unleashing the conflict.