In the past weeks in particular, he has shrewdly refined from the Cold War Playbook: make things look real that are fabricated, but appeal to power-brokers or influential groups in the West by making things look as if they are changing, when they are actually remaining the same.
But that brief truce is core to the wider illusion that a “real” peace deal is doable. It is easily sold to a propagandised Russian public, amplified by the official national Orthodox church as a sign that the atheist former KGB officer in the Kremlin has “got” religion.
The increased use of chemical weapons in the past months and horrific use of cluster munitions in two vast assaults on civilians on Palm Sunday killed over 35 people, injured scores more and were intended to terrorise. That, for anyone tempted to write glowingly about the revival of Russia’s love of religion, is the true story of this Easter.
He has weakness to consider too – Volodymyr Zelensky has gritted his teeth and accepted the necessity of signing a minerals deal with the US, whose ramifications can be dealt with over the coming decades. It is the price – erratic but essential – for any form of continuing support, but it is an inconvenience to Moscow. Because it suggests that Washington will defend some form of autonomy in Kyiv.
The answer is simple: don’t stop supporting Ukraine in practical and political terms. A large part of Russia’s aim to extract Ukraine from the major geo-political conversation is to wear away western support – and especially, test countries like Germany and Spain, where public feeling is more indifferent towards the invaded country. Memories of Russia’s role in past conflicts in Europe play into scare tactics about the risks of opposing Moscow, when the far greater one is to accept intimidation.
square NEWS AnalysisHow Putin's violation of Ukraine ceasefire shows Trump has failed again
Read More
As Kaja Kallas, the former Estonian leader, pointed out, “Members States [of] the European Union have contributed more than €23bn to Ukraine.”
My belief – having lived through the cycle of truces, limited ceasefires and a reversion to numerous conflicts on the Russian periphery and in the Balkans, is that there will be no durable peace until there is a reason for Moscow to accept the continued existence of Ukraine as any sort of sovereign state.
Even in cynical terms it is a buffer against the highly likely expansionist tendency of Russia and its desire to destabilize the Balkans and inflict damage on western democracies by feeding misinformation campaigns and leveraging far-right, far-left and pretty much far-anything grievance machines in politics.
It means pivoting tactics, but not abandoning strategy. It means tolerating a lot of paradox and vanity emanating from Team Trump, but keeping a steady course with a wide range of European allies and the UK, all of whom now have commanding self-interested reasons to stick together and begin to plan a future in which the US may be an ally in the background, but not a pillar of Europe’s freedom.
Anne McElvoy is co-host of Politics at Sam and Anne’s
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Under Putin, there will never be a real Ukraine peace-deal )
Also on site :