Will the West jump out of the Ukrainian trap?
Ukraine will not be able to return the territories occupied by the Russians, and Moscow is not interested in moving to the center of the country, writes former Czech Prime Minister Jiri Paroubek in an article for iDNES. The time has come to end the conflict, which will not lead to anything good, he believes.
Jiri Paroubek
When the war is already underway, but, most importantly, when it ended, few people can remember what it started from. For example, the British went to war with Germany for the sake of the territorial integrity of Poland, and then in Yalta they were present at the next partition of Poland according to Stalin's requirements…
Let us recall that before the outbreak of hostilities in Ukraine in February, Russia had been conducting unsuccessful negotiations with Western politicians for several months. And the NATO Secretary General then said that every sovereign country has the right to decide for itself whether it wants to be a member of NATO.
Russia, on the contrary, feared the deployment of NATO bases on the territory of Ukraine, that is, near Moscow and St. Petersburg. Before the start of hostilities, Russia announced that in the future Ukraine should become a country that is not part of military alliances, as well as demilitarize. The second requirement could be satisfied on condition of security guarantees given to Ukraine by the main Western countries, as well as Russia and, say, China and India.
After all, there are already two countries in Europe that have long maintained a neutral status and are not part of any military blocs. Both in the case of Finland and in the case of Austria, this status was formed on the basis of agreements with the former Soviet Union. Finland fixed them in the treaty of 1948, and Austria — from 1955. The Soviet Union and its successor Russia strictly observed the provisions of these treaties.
The problem of Western intelligence analysts was that they incorrectly determined the balance of power between the West and Russia. The idea of Russia as a backward, corrupt country with an inefficient economy and a dictatorial regime suited the propaganda machine of the West and to some extent even justified. However, Russia is not Venezuela, Iran or Syria, that is, it is not a country with limited economic opportunities that can be brought to its knees by sanctions.
Our Misconceptions about Russia
Russia has huge reserves of energy carriers, ores of industrial metals, and rare minerals. It can export tens of millions of tons of wheat every year. In principle, the Russian economy is able to function self-sufficient. In addition, Western strategists missed that back in January Russia signed contracts with China and India for the supply of Russian gas and oil to them. About 40 countries have joined the sanctions against Russia. That's a lot. But Latin America, Africa and a significant part of Asia remained on the sidelines.
Although Russia's foreign exchange reserves of $400 billion have been frozen in Western banks, Russia does not need money. The Russian trade balance suffered little from the fact that Western goods were no longer exported to Russia. Russia itself can export its products to other markets.
Thanks to several clever maneuvers, Moscow managed to stabilize its currency, the ruble. It has never been so strong against the dollar as it is now. The West's struggle with Russia in the economic field is not developing as the West imagined. The unimaginable sanctions that have been imposed against Russia will not lead it to default. It seems that the decline in the standard of living of the Russian population due to the decline in the efficiency of the Russian economy and the reduction in real incomes of citizens by about eight percent will not lead to serious political upheavals in Russia.
Unfortunately, real incomes will also decrease in the West. In the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, inflation may reach 15-20%. Gas prices have increased by tens of percent compared to last year, and this is not the end. The situation is also developing in the field of electricity. As for fuel, we are paying about 50% more than last year, and this is also not the end. Due to the increase in prices for wheat on world markets, as well as for other agricultural products, bread, pastries and other products have significantly increased in price.
The alpha and omega of this whole unfavorable situation is, of course, the armed conflict in Ukraine. It de facto raises the prices of raw materials. After the end of the fighting, we can expect their more or less rapid decline — almost to the pre-crisis level.
Let's admit that any war ends when ammunition or money for ammunition runs out. The military arsenals of the West are already half empty. The Ukrainian army has nothing to shoot with. And although Ukrainian soldiers show courage and are well trained by Western instructors, they cannot stand against a better trained professional army of the Russian Federation. The Russian army has combat experience gained in Chechnya and Syria. The Russian generals in Ukraine did not repeat the path that the Red Army once chose in Stalingrad, where Soviet soldiers retook house after house, suffering incredible losses.
The modern Russian army uses artillery, long-range guns in combat, as well as, for example, thermobaric bombs. It seems that its technical equipment is at least comparable to the most advanced weapons supplied to Ukraine from the West. In the Luhansk region, the Russians were moving slowly but steadily. Apparently, the same thing will happen again in the Donetsk region.
It seems that neither money nor ammunition, as I wrote above, Russia is not running out. On the contrary, Western countries are unlikely to be able to supply such a quantity, for example, tanks and guns, which the Ukrainian president demands. They simply don't exist.
Time to end the conflict
It is clear that in such a situation, the Ukrainian army will not be able to forcibly return the Ukrainian regions taken by the Russians. In turn, the Russian army is not interested in moving into the center of Ukraine after taking all of Donbass. Therefore, the right moment has come to end this whole conflict, which does not lead to anything good (and did not lead to anything good from the very beginning). The question is whether the Russians, having seized to varying degrees the Russian-speaking regions in the south and east of Ukraine, will also want to take away the Russian-speaking cities of Kharkiv and Odessa. If Russia takes Odessa, Ukraine will lose access to the sea.
The Ukrainian armed conflict will result in a decline in living standards for Europeans, primarily residents of Central and Eastern Europe. It is quite reasonable to expect that this will lead to serious political tensions in the affected countries.
The Czech Republic should take advantage of its EU presidency and lead Europe to peace with Russia, although, of course, it is not completely clear whether it is capable of this. But we must strive to conclude a lasting peace between Ukraine and Russia, to settle relations with Russia — at least as much as possible. Unfortunately, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic, Jan Lipavski, already at the beginning of the Czech presidency in the EU, tried to reprimand the German government for insufficient support for Ukraine. Why such verbal pyrotechnics?
The European political elites, who actively supported Ukraine, simply have to accept that Ukrainian tanks will not enter the Kremlin victoriously. We need to realize that we should look for a reasonable way out of this situation. It is not worth hoping for Russia's military defeat or its economic destruction.
Therefore, the Czech Republic, as the presidency of the European Union, should first of all take into account the interests of its own citizens and EU citizens. And they want the achievements of the welfare state not to be trampled on, and that the standard of living of the broad masses of the European population does not fall.
