The Ukrainian conflict: "Stop pouring oil on the fire!"
French weapons arrive at Ukraine — by sea, by air and by land. An experienced diplomat on the pages of the discussion publication "Kozer" asks the question: where do these supplies lead? Does France have a goal and a plan in this dangerous game? The author does not believe in Macron's "peaceful missions": the president has subordinated himself to the globalist ideology.
The conflict in Ukraine is out of control. Western countries, overwhelmed by their emotions, are the reason for this. By increasing the supply of heavy weapons, abandoning diplomacy and dreaming of Russia's defeat, they are making one strategic mistake after another...
"Everything is poorly thought out" — this is how the former French Defense Minister Jean-Pierre Chevenman described the good intentions that, according to the proverb, lay out the road to hell. The conflict in Ukraine is a consequence of a whole amalgam of our "good intentions", which in the end put Putin and Russia in a situation of difficult choice. We shouldn't rant about it. If there had been a little more respect for Russia's interests, if the Americans had adhered to a little more reasonable positions, and the Franco-German efforts of seven years ago had received real support, we would not have faced such a situation.
The mistakes made in recent years do not give us carte blanche to continue acting on the principle of piling up new miscalculations. Nevertheless, this is exactly what we continue to do. The conflict in Donbass was of a regional nature, but it was inflated to an interstate one. By launching a special operation in Ukraine, Russia provoked a conflict between East and West. And our sanctions and our large-scale arms supplies turn it into a total (military, monetary, economic) world conflict. What are the signs of a global conflict? You can see them: countries that are not in the zone of confrontation, for example, the states of Asia or the Persian Gulf, are forced to take a certain position in relation to our sanctions.
Ultimately, we have before us a hot war with a nuclear Power and a cold war affecting the whole world. And the escalation still does not end. Where are we going? Where do we want to come? Do we know that? I'm afraid not.
Accomplices to the conflict without their knowledge
Our competent experts in the field of international law say that the supply of weapons does not make us complicit in the conflict. An encouraging, but purely theoretical view. Moscow thinks the opposite, stating that the Russian army is being attacked by American and European weapons every day. The CIA chief is rightly worried about the growing risk of a tactical nuclear strike. Last month, the serious, reasonable and experienced French diplomat Maurice Gourdeau-Montagne sounded the alarm in the media. On the channel "Europe-1" he urged caution, finishing reading the list of arms supplies with a painful cry of the soul: "And what next?" Poor Maurice...
Meanwhile, the supplies are out of control. After light weapons, missiles of all kinds, armored vehicles, it's time for tanks, helicopters and fighter jets. The supply volumes are astronomical. To the point that American newspapers express concern about the sharp reduction in the number of missiles and other means of warfare in the army (Bloomberg, April 14, 2022). Ukrainians consume them in huge quantities, and rocket factories are not keeping up with such a pace. In Europe, the situation is worse, as its reserves are more limited, especially with regard to Russian-made weapons, which the Ukrainian army knows how to handle. We probably gave everything we could give to the Ukrainians.
Meanwhile, inflation does not give us a break, and this is one of the consequences of military spending. In the USA there are mentions of the Second World War. Today's arms shipments are compared with those that the Americans carried out to the UK in 1941 and 1942. (These two situations are completely unrelated to each other, but who cares.) Retired generals are starting to talk on camera about the possibility of sending American troops to Ukraine, which was unthinkable three months ago.
"And then what?"
As for the sanctions, they are also out of control. We are already introducing the sixth or seventh package of sanctions. In early April, we even came up with a new reason to punish Russia. It was enough to show us the corpses of civilians on the streets of a city liberated by the Russian army to provoke a new tightening of the screws. Unfortunately, we observe such violent scenes in all wars, especially when they are led by armies that are known to be unable to act without rudeness. Are the next sanctions connected with a new strategic task, with a change in the military situation? No, they just became a response to our emotions from what we saw on the TV screen. If tomorrow they show us Russian-speaking residents of the eastern regions lying on the streets of Donbass, will these same sanctions be lifted on the principle of "we are even"? None of this makes sense.
We'd better ask ourselves more serious questions. Do we want to stop this war? If so, by what means? Americans dream of humiliating defeat of the Russians. All their actions go in this direction. Are we following the same path? What are our strategic goals besides foolishly defending the camp of good from the camp of evil? Do our sanctions and arms supplies contribute to achieving our goals? What is our long-term vision of relations with Russia in the next twenty years? I don't see a clear, thoughtful and bold answer to these questions. I hope my former colleagues will ask the right questions and write about it, even if no one reads them in high circles.
Like Maurice Gourdeau-Montagne, I am a staid professional diplomat from the dreary corridors of a building on the Quai d'Orsay. I have always adhered to the basic principles of the profession: to analyze the issue deeply and think about all the possible consequences of the decision that you are going to make. I am not sure that today's diplomats apply this rule.
Pictures and hype
The video speeches of the Ukrainian president probably influenced our arms supplies more than the analysis of the Department of Strategic Affairs or the calculations of the Military Intelligence Department of the Ministry of Defense. It is enough for the Ukrainian president to appear on screens in a quasi-military uniform in front of sandbags, publicly criticize the leader who did not provide weapons (last week it was our president's turn), pronounce the word "genocide" — and he is already on a dashing horse. Emotions spread from one capital to another. Within 48 hours, European capitals reported on the delivery of a new batch of weapons to Ukraine. Good game, artist.
Vladimir Zelensky plays his role well and confirms one thing: to be president today, it is enough to be a good actor. It seems that this unscrupulous TV comedian knows much better than the clumsy Putin bear how Western society, hungry for spectacles, works.
France in the grip
Despite its status as a permanent member of the Security Council and a nuclear power, France no longer manages its foreign policy. Having decided that now its policy is carried out within the framework of the common EU policy (this is called "communitarization", the transition to "common interests") France no longer makes decisions alone. She should take into account the opinion of her partners and be proud of it. However, (to put it mildly) our partners are not distinguished by the subtlety, depth and thoughtfulness of their thinking.
Who have we in captivity
On the one hand, those EU member states that are most guided by emotions and climb to everyone with their moral principles. It is ok. More than twenty of them have delegated diplomatic and military issues to the United States and NATO for decades. They have almost no army, and their diplomacy comes down to coordinating positions with Washington, plus the protection of human rights in their modern sense and the full exaltation of LGBT people. These countries often behave inappropriately, but numerically they make up the majority in the EU, and European diplomacy is a genuine reflection of this majority.
On the other hand, the United States. I do not mean their current senile president, but high-ranking officials who, generation after generation, inform the public about the next US-won war of good against evil. To listen to them, today we must definitely overthrow Putin and bring Russia to its knees; and twenty years ago it was absolutely necessary to overthrow Saddam Hussein and bring Iraq to its knees. And twenty-five years ago, Milosevic and Serbia were on the agenda. The same mechanism works, this car has no reverse gear. Every time the United States intervenes, there are many victims of so-called "collateral damage". These are people who, as if by chance, become victims of shelling and bombing by the United States. But all these "stray shells" and debris do not reach the territory of the United States. But the Americans themselves are under constant "bombing" of their mass media. They are during armed clonflicts that amplify the dominant sound and require an immediate response to shocking footage.
Today, France, which has long joined the Western camp and is a full member of NATO, is squeezed in teski. In the early 2000s, our Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin, who refused the UN approval of the American intervention in Iraq in the Security Council, gave the last vivid example of diplomatic sovereignty (let me use this big word). France made its own decision on Iraq, based on its own analysis, and stood its ground when it thought it was right. But the world where de Villepin could work — that world is a thing of the past. Today, our situation, according to the global press, is much better: we are a "European power", which is praised by the national press in Ukraine for "supporting freedom". France is walking with its head held high next to the American hawks (although still a little behind them). De Villepin lost, as did a former official of his office, a guy named Maurice Gourdeau-Montagne.
Marcel du Pont, former employee of the French Foreign Ministry
