{"id":1201,"date":"2025-01-27T14:49:52","date_gmt":"2025-01-27T15:49:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/?p=1201"},"modified":"2025-01-27T16:13:42","modified_gmt":"2025-01-27T16:13:42","slug":"heres-why-eu-leaders-really-want-to-send-troops-to-ukraine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/27\/heres-why-eu-leaders-really-want-to-send-troops-to-ukraine\/","title":{"rendered":"Here\u2019s why EU leaders really want to send troops to Ukraine"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fearing being excluded by Trump, Kiev\u2019s European backers see \u2018boots on the ground\u2019 as a political foothold in the crisis<\/strong><\/p>\n

Nothing is certain regarding the Ukraine conflict. Except two things: Russia is winning and, under new ownership, the US leadership is searching for a novel approach. As Russian foreign policy heavyweight Sergey Ryabkov has noted, there is now a window of opportunity<\/a> for a compromise to, in essence, help end this senseless conflict and restore some normalcy to US-Russian relations and thus global politics as well. But that window is small and will not be open forever.<\/p>\n

Beyond that, things remain murky. Is the end to this madness finally in sight? Will Washington now translate its declared intention to change course into negotiating positions that Moscow can take seriously? Those would have to include \u2013 as a minimum \u2013 territorial losses and genuine neutrality for Ukraine, as well as a robust sense that any peace is made to last.<\/p>\n

Last but not least, will the West compel Kiev to accept such a realistic settlement? \u2018Nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine\u2019<\/em> may still sound terribly nice to those selfish enough to mistake international politics for a virtue-signaling beauty contest. Yet \u2013 like the daft, hypocritical cant of \u2018agency\u2019 \u2013 it was never true in the first place, has served to shield the Western abuse of Ukraine and Ukrainians, and must be abandoned if this meatgrinder of a conflict is to end.<\/p>\n

Or could everything turn out the other way around? Could Western and especially US hardliners still prevail? Whispering into Trump\u2019s ear that \u2018winning\u2019 will just take a bigger, Trumpier push, with even more money and arms for the Kiev regime and more economic warfare against Russia, and that making peace would actually cost more<\/a> than continuing the proxy war? Yes, the first is pure wishful thinking, going against all recent experience; the second is an absurd non-argument sitting on top of a mountain of false premises; and yet, this nonsense is still all too popular in the West, which has a habit of building its foreign policy on illusions.<\/p>\n

Washington\u2019s recent signaling has been ambiguous enough, whether by design or clumsiness, to raise hopes among the many remaining diehards in the West. The British Telegraph<\/a>, for instance, is fantasizing about \u201cTrump\u2019s playbook for bringing Putin to his knees\u201d<\/em>; the Washington Post<\/a> interprets the new American president\u2019s recent (online) speech at the Davos World Economic Forum as \u201cputting the onus on Russia\u201d<\/em>; and the New York Times<\/a> desperately sifts through Trump\u2019s words for anything that is harsh about Russia or its president, Vladimir Putin.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n Read more<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\n \"RCH
Ukraine \u00fcber alles: Berlin proves it will support Kiev to its own detriment<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/blockquote>\n

In the end, all of the above will probably turn out to be nothing but clutching at straws. While any Washington-Moscow negotiations are bound to be complicated, a return to the demented mutism of the Biden administration is unlikely. Communication will become the default again, as it should be among sane adults. And as long as there is no foul play \u2013 an assassination of Donald Trump, for instance \u2013 the US will, in one way or the other, extricate itself from the Ukraine conflict. If only because Trump is, at heart, a businessman, and will not throw good money after bad. It\u2019s a harsh, cold reasoning, but if it leads to the right results \u2013 an end to senseless fighting and unnecessary dying \u2013 then it will have to do.<\/p>\n

That US extrication, it bears emphasis, need not wait for a settlement with Russia or even the start of serious negotiations. Indeed, the extrication isn\u2019t one thing but a process, and it has already begun. First, immediately after Trump\u2019s inauguration, support to Ukraine was reduced, but military aid was still upheld. Not for long though. Only days later, Politico<\/a> reported that a second general order to suspend aid flows for 90 days also applied to military assistance for Kiev.<\/p>\n

But there is a catch. If the US distances itself from its lost proxy war, that does not necessarily mean that its clients and vassals in the EU and NATO will follow, at least not immediately. That is counterintuitive, admittedly. If EU leaders were rational, acting in their countries\u2019 best interest \u2013 and, in fact, that of Ukraine, too \u2013 they would not even consider going it alone. But then, if they were rational, they would have refused to join the US proxy war from the beginning and long have stopped listening sheepishly to bossy tirades by Ukraine past-best-by-date president Vladimir Zelensky. And yet they have just done it again at Davos<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So, instead of rationality, we now see unending affirmations that peace will not and must not come soon. Sorry Ukrainians, your European \u2018friends\u2019 believe you haven\u2019t done enough dying yet.\u00a0<\/p>\n

French President Emmanuel Macron, for one, seems to be going through a manic phase, again. Clearly with reference to Trump\u2019s very different ideas, the comically unpopular leader, whose ratings have just dived to a six-year low<\/a>, has declared that the Ukraine conflict will not end soon, \u201cneither today nor the day after today<\/a>.\u201d<\/em> German Foreign Minister Annalena ‘360 degrees’ Baerbock<\/a> is throwing tantrums when she can\u2019t have as many billions for Ukraine as she wants. UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer<\/a> \u2013 another European incumbent on very thin ice at home and with abysmal ratings<\/a> \u2013 has made his first pilgrimage to Kiev and concluded a 100-year partnership agreement with Ukraine, including a secret part and worth, again, billions and billions of pounds. Because, you see, Britain is doing so incredibly well at home \u2013 except not really. Take just one data point: British factories have just registered their worst slump in orders since Covid<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Against this Euro-Conga-on-the-Titanic backdrop, another upshot of the persistent European refusal to get real is re-emerging talk about sending large numbers of Western ground forces to Ukraine<\/a>, specifically from NATO-EU countries. True, Zelensky\u2019s demands at Davos for 200,000 troops \u2013 that\u2019s more than landed in Normandy on D-Day 1944, but why be modest when you are riding high in Kiev? \u2013 are ludicrous. Yet smaller but still substantial numbers \u2013 40,000 or so \u2013 are still under consideration.<\/p>\n

\n Read more<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\n \"FILE
No Western training can save Ukrainian conscripts from their own commanders<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/blockquote>\n

What exactly these troops would be doing in Ukraine remains hazy. They would not be a peacekeeping force because they would be siding with one party of the conflict, Ukraine. And yet, proponents of these schemes promise they would not be on the front lines fighting against Russia because they would either be introduced only after an end to the fighting, or they would somehow remain in the hinterland, thereby freeing up Ukrainian forces for the front.<\/p>\n

None of the above makes sense. As long as the fighting continues, there is no hinterland in the sense that the troops would be spared real fighting and dying, because Russian airstrikes can reach them everywhere even now, and, depending on further developments, so may Russian land forces in the future. Moreover, once these troops enter the country, Kiev would, of course, do its best to get them embroiled in great bloodshed, including by provocations and false flag operations. The aim would be to drag these \u2018allies\u2019 so deep into the quagmire that they wouldn\u2019t be able to get out again.<\/p>\n

Introducing boots on the grounds from NATO-EU countries after the fighting, however, won\u2019t work either. Russia is fighting to have a genuinely neutral Ukraine and will not agree; and as long as Russia does not agree, there won\u2019t be any end to the fighting. If these troops were to turn up anyhow, the conflict would start again. Indeed, Kiev would have an incentive to restart it once they are in Ukraine (see above).<\/p>\n

Of course, NATO-EU states already have black ops operators and mercenaries on the ground. But while Moscow has wisely decided not to take this degree of intervention as a reason for attacking beyond Ukraine, regular forces in large numbers would obviously be a different matter. The proponents of this type of deployment argue that the US contingent in South Korea and KFOR troops in Kosovo (of all places!) show that these deployments are possible without further escalation. This, too, is nonsense. KFOR\u2019s presence is based on several 1999 agreements and, crucially, a UN Security Council resolution (1244). Its sad but very low fatalities (213 as of 2019<\/a>), some caused by accidents, cannot remotely be compared with what would happen to NATO-EU troops clashing with the Russian Army; finally, those KFOR casualties that did not come from accidents, and were not inflicted by a state\u2019s regular forces but by protesters and irregulars. A scenario in which thousands of EU troops die in a fight with the regular army of a nuclear-armed Russia is incomparable.<\/p>\n

Regarding the US troops in South Korea, their presence is based on a mutual defense treaty concluded in 1953. Again, exactly the type of arrangement Moscow will not accept. And also one that the NATO-Europeans would be very wise to shy away from, because, once again, it would suck them deep into the next war. Finally, obvious but worth stating: Those US forces in South Korea have the backing of the US. They are a classical tripwire. Attack them, and face the whole US military. EU forces would not have US backing; and if Europeans want to underwrite such a tripwire with their own flimsy armies, they are suicidal.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If large-scale deployment of EU boots on the ground is such an obviously bad idea, why will it not finally go away? There are really only two possible answers: Either those dreaming such dreams are really so shortsighted and irresponsible (think Kaja Kallas and similar intellectual lightweights) or they are not quite honest about their motives. In reality, we are probably dealing with both.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Regarding the genuinely confused, let\u2019s not waste time on them. But what about those who are really after something else? What could that be? Here is a plausible guess. The talk about sending major contingents to Ukraine has two real aims, one targeting the new American leadership and the other, Ukrainian domestic politics.<\/p>\n

\n Read more<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\n \"FILE
Position of strength: Here\u2019s why Putin\u2019s Direct Line was so important<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/blockquote>\n

With regard to Washington, the real purpose of speculating about EU ground troops is a desperate attempt to secure Brussels a say in the coming negotiations between the US and Russia. And there, the Europeans are right about one thing: They may well be excluded, which will be an ironic outcome after their self-destructive obedience toward the Biden administration. But there\u2019s a new sheriff in town now, and he might well cut them loose no less than Ukraine.<\/p>\n

In Ukraine, the real purpose is to exert outside influence on the sore issue of mobilization: Ukraine is running out of cannon fodder, as observers as different as the new US secretary of state, Marco Rubio,<\/a> and the slavishly NATO-ist German magazine Spiegel<\/a> now admit. Mobilization of those who are still there is a creeping catastrophe; its violence and the mass evasion practiced by its victims<\/a> demonstrating every day that many Ukrainians have had enough. The Zelensky regime\u2019s proposed answer is to lower the mobilization age even further, to 18. Importantly, this is supposed to happen even if there is peace.<\/p>\n

And would it not be convenient for this type of policy to point to troops from the West and tell unwilling draftees and their families: Look, if even those foreigners are coming to help, how can you stay at home? Yet they are unlikely to ever turn up. Once again, Ukrainians will be fed bloated rhetoric about and by false friends from the West \u2013 to, in the end, be left alone to keep dying and lose more territory. The way out of this is not more of the same. Even if it could work \u2013 which it cannot \u2013 NATO-EU mass deployment would only make everything worse. Because the real way out of this is a compromise with Russia \u2013 and the deployment of Western troops would prevent that compromise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fearing being excluded by Trump, Kiev\u2019s European backers see \u2018boots on the ground\u2019 as a political foothold in the crisis Nothing is certain regarding the Ukraine conflict. Except two things: Russia is winning and, under new ownership, the US leadership is searching for a novel approach. As Russian foreign policy heavyweight Sergey Ryabkov has noted,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1203,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1201"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1201\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1208,"href":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1201\/revisions\/1208"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.developeternal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}