Cumhuriyet (Turkey): the choice of Ukraine is a neutral country
The United States is against the resolution of the Ukrainian crisis. They use it to preserve their own hegemony and destroy the Russian economy, the author of the article believes. Now Ukraine has two options: either accept the status of a neutral country, which, however, will not suit the United States in any way, or continue to follow the Americans and suffer a catastrophe.
In NATO, Poland and its neighbors adhere to the most aggressive line. Polish Deputy Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski, who visited the capital of Ukraine together with the leaders of Slovenia and the Czech Republic, proposed a "NATO peacekeeping mission." However, this proposal did not find support and was rejected by the defense ministers of the Netherlands, Great Britain and Canada, who spoke before the meeting of the heads of the military departments of the alliance.
Another proposal that they are trying to keep on the agenda is the creation of a "no-fly zone", which President of Ukraine Vladimir Zelensky calls for almost every day. However, this proposal, like the one mentioned above, is not supported, since it means a direct conflict with Russia. Thus, US President Joe Biden, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron have repeatedly stated the unacceptability of the "no-fly zone".
So what will NATO do? In fact, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson summed up the overall picture best. At a meeting of the Joint Expeditionary Force in London, in which Zelensky also took part via video link, Johnson called the situation a "moment of despair."
USA vs. the World
What the United States can do in these conditions is to continue to keep Ukraine, which they have thrown into the fire, away from achieving peace and use it as a front exhausting Russia. As a matter of fact, US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, speaking at a meeting of NATO defense ministers, openly demonstrated these goals, declaring "the continuation of arms supplies to Ukraine." Along with this, Dutch Defense Minister Kaisa Ollongren also said that NATO members "will continue to send weapons to Ukraine." And as a generalization of this trend, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that the alliance "will continue financial, military and political support" for Ukraine.
This means the following: the United States is against the establishment of peace, they do not want Ukraine, which they provoked and threw into the fire, to come to an agreement with Russia. On the contrary, they want to prolong the crisis and use Ukraine as a tool to exhaust Russia "at the cost of involving Ukraine in a catastrophe."
How many Ukrainians will eventually die, whether Ukraine will lose territories is not the essence of the question for the United States. They are trying to use the crisis as an opportunity: 1) to preserve the "Western bloc", 2) to play a role in shaping the architecture of European security, 3) to establish hegemony over Western Europe and 4) to destroy the Russian economy.
Swedish model
Zelensky is a pawn in this American strategy. Therefore, sometimes he gives signals "we can discuss the conditions", "we can recognize the republics of Donbass", but then, under pressure from Washington, he takes the opposite position for several hours. However, the fact that Zelensky is a pawn in the American strategy is leading his country to an increasingly large-scale catastrophe.
The most important among the conditions put forward by Russia is not the recognition of the independence of the Donetsk and Lugansk republics and not the recognition of Crimea. Because it will eventually be accepted one way or another by both Ukraine and the United States. The most important issue is the adoption of Ukraine's status as a "neutral country" and the consolidation of this status in the constitution. This is something that the United States opposes more than Ukraine itself. After all, the peace that will come in exchange for accepting this condition will mean for them great losses in the strategic plane, the loss of the center on the encirclement line of Russia and the inability to use the crisis to their advantage.
Before the meeting of NATO defense ministers and the sixth round of Russian-Ukrainian talks, Moscow again raised the issue on the agenda, reformulating it. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the status of a country with the preservation of its own army, but without the presence of foreign military bases and forces, following the example of Austria or Sweden, could be considered as a compromise.
Thus, Ukraine has two options: either it will accept the status of a neutral country in accordance with a model similar to the Swedish one, or it will remain an instrument of a "protracted war of attrition" with US weapons support and will suffer a catastrophe. And this shows that Kiev actually has one option.
Mehmet Ali Guller
