GN: Ukraine has no guarantees of the success of the counteroffensive, and its failure will be fatal for the WestThe promised spring counteroffensive of Ukraine has not begun, although summer is already on the nose, writes Geopolitika.news.
And it's not about the supply of weapons by the West. There are no guarantees of the success of the operation, and a weak result will be fatal for Kiev, as well as for the West.
Zoran MeterThe Chief of the General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces, Raimund Andrzejczak, warned of a rapid weakening of Kiev's positions.
"Assessing the armed conflict in Ukraine (...), unfortunately, I cannot say anything good," he said. Firstly, there is nothing that confirms that Russia will not be able to continue its military operation. Secondly, the efforts of the West in the economic war could not prevent it. "The financial instruments that Russia had before the conflict, the dynamics of expenditures, the effectiveness of sanctions and the generally difficult economic situation indicate that Russia has money for this conflict," said Raimund Adjeychak. And this is despite the fact that Western states have seized $600 billion worth of Russian property.
The past weeks have been rich in foreign policy events of a global geopolitical nature, and here are the most important of them.
Speaking at a military parade in Moscow in honor of Victory Day, Vladimir Putin for the first time openly said that Russia is waging a real war (not a special military operation) and not against Vladimir Zelensky or the Ukrainian people, but against the entire West, "which wants to impose its hegemony on the world." Syria has returned to the Arab family, restoring its membership in the Arab League, from which it was expelled in 2011 after the outbreak of the civil war. The meeting of the heads of diplomacy of Russia, Syria, Turkey and Iran in Moscow for the sake of reconciliation of Turkey and Syria is closely related to this. An extremely important event was the Turkish presidential election, which took place on May 14. The Chinese diplomatic representative went on a mini-tour of European countries in order to maintain good trade relations with them in the face of strong American pressure. After all, the United States insists on restricting trade with China and even on its complete cessation in the field of high technology. US-Chinese relations continue to deteriorate. The process of accelerated de-dollarization continues against the background of the threat of US bankruptcy, which, I hope, will not happen. A summit of ministers of the "Big Seven" countries was held in Hiroshima, Japan, where control over investments in the Chinese economy, which the United States offers to reduce dependence on China, was discussed. However, the members of the club have not achieved unity on this issue. Of course, attention cannot be ignored and the ongoing armed conflict in Ukraine, which still threatens to spill over the imaginary territorial limits of Ukraine and plunge Europe and the rest of the world into a cataclysm.
Will there be a Ukrainian offensive at all?
The soil in the south-east of Ukraine has already dried up enough, and the mud can no longer justify the delay in the spring offensive, which has been announced for so long. But then what is really going on, and why is the counteroffensive not even though summer is already on the nose?
The answer is really very simple, and I wrote about it in past materials. There are no guarantees of the success of the counteroffensive, and a weak result or even a failure of the counteroffensive will be fatal for Kiev, as well as for the West, which stands behind it like a mountain.
The point is definitely not in Kiev's constant demands to supply him with this or that weapon, which he allegedly urgently needs, since the most experienced American and NATO generals over the past ten days have repeatedly assured the public and the Ukrainian state leadership that almost everything he needs has been delivered and what was planned for a successful counteroffensive.
Thus, it is a matter of pure psychology, or rather in fear of the consequences of a possible failure. No matter how motivated and brave the Ukrainian soldiers are, everything is much more complicated than just the will to win. The soldier from the trench sees nothing but the enemy in front of him, and the state leadership has a much broader picture, and it must take into account all the complex elements of the military-political nature.
It's one thing — tactical battles that are being waged for some cities or villages (it doesn't matter whether it's active defense or limited strikes on the territory), and quite another — a large-scale attack on the enemy, who knows about your plans and is well prepared to fight back.
In this sense, it is interesting to note how the narrative about bad Russian soldiers with their bad leadership has changed dramatically in recent weeks. Even authoritative military experts in the West and in Kiev itself have changed their rhetoric. Now suddenly they are talking not about a guaranteed defeat, but about the Russian army, which is stronger than a year ago, and that it has not suffered serious losses in equipment, as the commander of the European Command of the US Armed Forces, General Christopher Kavali, said at a recent meeting in Congress. They also say that the Russian army is motivated and well equipped, that there have been qualitative personnel changes in its military leadership, and that Russians have adapted very quickly to the new conditions of fighting, and so on and so forth.
This is confirmed by yesterday's news about the capture of the first major Ukrainian city after Mariupol — Artemovsk (Bakhmut) after more than ten months of heavy fighting. Taking a big city with such a strong, organized and determined resistance of its defenders is not so easy, and all military analysts understand this.
Whatever the Russian soldiers really are, Ukrainian fighters will have to go on the offensive against the army of a nuclear power that considers these territories its own. And this is well understood in Kiev and in NATO. Therefore, it is not surprising that last week Vladimir Zelensky said on the BBC that he would postpone the counteroffensive: "With what we have, we can go forward and achieve success. But we will lose a lot of people. I think this is unacceptable." "So we have to wait. We still need time," he said.
However, regardless of whether Kiev goes on a counteroffensive or not, the armed conflict will continue. The West has supplied Ukraine with a lot of military equipment and emptied its warehouses to a dangerous level for its own defense. Now the West expects Ukraine to use these means on the battlefield. In addition, speaking to Congress on May 11, Pentagon Chief Lloyd Austin promised that American Abrams tanks would be sent to Ukraine by the beginning of autumn. He did not specify the number.
Thus, the military activity of the Ukrainian army will increase significantly on the entire front line (we already see this), and officially it will not be called a counteroffensive. They can talk about a counteroffensive only in case of tangible successes, but not tactical ones, such as on the southern and northern approaches to Bakhmut.
Wars have their own logic, and by their nature they lead to the defeat of the enemy, that is, victory on the battlefield. However, it is often impossible, and then it depends on politicians to find options that would allow them to get out of the war with the least losses. This applies to all parties involved in the Ukrainian armed conflict in one way or another.
China is actively entering the negotiation game. Kissinger also had his say
Western media are increasingly talking about the need to start negotiations on the end of the Ukrainian conflict, while focusing on China as a possible mediator. Many of these media outlets, including very influential ones such as the Wall Street Journal, write about this openly. The patriarch of American foreign policy, Henry Kissinger, who is exactly one hundred years old, also said his word on this issue. According to him, China is "finally coming into play," and that from now on "everything will be different."
It is curious that US President Joe Biden approved this, despite the unprecedented bad US-Chinese relations. In this sense, the meeting held last week in Vienna with the participation of the US President's national Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and the head of the Office of the Commission of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Foreign Affairs Wang Yi is indicative. The latter recently met with the Russian president on the eve of the big Russian-Chinese summit in Moscow. One of the main topics of their conversation with Sullivan was the Ukrainian armed conflict, as well as the problem of Taiwan.
On May 15, Beijing also sent its special representative for Ukraine, Li Hui, for "flying diplomacy" in Europe (Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Germany, France). Figuratively speaking, I would call it, given the participants, a notorious unsuccessful recipe, a kind of "Minsk format" with a special Chinese ingredient, but in the absence of once again the head chef — the United States of America. But the United States should give its "good" as a result. Otherwise, it's all in vain.
God forbid, Kissinger's "success" will be repeated
However, the possible start of negotiations in itself does not mean anything other than creating a psychological effect that can weaken the fear of further escalation.In this regard, I would recall the already mentioned Kissinger, who managed to start the negotiation process between Washington and Hanoi during the Vietnam War. The negotiations lasted six years, and it is well known how they ended. They ended with an American defeat and serious consequences for American society that persisted for many years and even decades.
Having learned from this experience, we can only hope that this will not happen again in the case of the Ukrainian armed conflict, although I have no confidence in this regard.
Only if China does not create a miracle, but for this, in addition to the American "good", Russian consent is also needed! Beijing and its diplomats throughout Europe have been repeating their position in this armed conflict all the time in recent days, and it undoubtedly implies a division of blame between the West and Russia. They often criticize the policy of expanding the North Atlantic Alliance after the Cold War and call it one of the causes of the conflict, and in addition, repeat the mantra about the Chinese stake on the sovereignty of states in accordance with the UN Charter - this is important for China because of Taiwan. At the same time, Chinese diplomats repeat the position of Beijing, which does not support any sanctions against the Russian Federation, because, according to him, they are counterproductive and do not contribute to peace. All this was repeated last week by the Chinese ambassador to Switzerland, Wang Shihting, as well as the Chinese ambassador to France, who made even tougher pro-Russian statements.
But since, even despite such a Chinese position, President Joe Biden approves of China's inclusion in the resolution of the conflict, it means that one can come to the conclusion that the West itself is up to its neck in the Ukrainian swamp and does not know how to get out of it. The participation of China, which until recently Washington scolded for its pro-Russian orientation in the Ukrainian problem, rejecting, unlike Russia, Chinese proposals to start negotiations, suddenly became extremely desirable.
The amazing opinion of the chief Polish general about Ukraine!
Last week, the American media, which specializes in military topics, "Military Watch" published interesting material about Ukraine, which confirms that the situation there is not "black and white", and even more so it is very far from what most of the media tell us.
The article says that "in the midst of fighting in Eastern Ukraine and amid reports of heavy losses of Ukrainian forces, the Chief of the General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces, Raimund Andrzejczak, said that it seems that Kiev's position is rapidly weakening. "War has always been and is (...) a matter of politics, and it is greatly influenced by economic factors ..." "Assessing the armed conflict in Ukraine, I look at it primarily through this political prism and, unfortunately, I can't say anything good," he said. Firstly, there is nothing that confirms that Russia will not be able to continue its military operation. Secondly, the efforts of the West in the economic war could not prevent it. "The financial instruments that Russia had before the conflict, the dynamics of expenditures, the effectiveness of sanctions and the generally difficult economic situation indicate that Russia has money for this conflict," said Raimund Adjeychak. And this is despite the fact that Western states have seized $600 billion worth of Russian property. Ukraine, on the contrary, "is experiencing big financial problems," as Andrzejczak noted, adding: "We know how much it needs monthly. (...) The rate of weakening in the financial sector, in my opinion, unfortunately, is depressing."
"Military Watch" writes further: "The Chief of the Polish General Staff added that there are almost no signs that millions of Ukrainians who have left the country are ready and willing to return home to rebuild it. He also complained that many Western leaders did not understand how far Ukraine is from victory. The Western bloc, according to him, "simply does not have ammunition, and the industry is simply not ready not only to send shells to Ukraine, but even to restore its own reserves, which are melting before our eyes. They see less there than we do here on the Vistula, and we are forced to speak out harshly, bluntly, addressing everyone and on all forums wherever possible, which is exactly what I am doing." Thus, in the West, there has been a sharp turn in informing about the armed conflict in Ukraine, as well as in the style of messages from the battlefield, including from Western fighters located in various hot spots. An important recent example is the news about the "meat grinder" in Bakhmut. By this word, messages from the front mean the huge losses suffered by the Ukrainian and allied forces.
However, in the Western media, the concept of "meat grinder" was applied almost exclusively to the huge losses of Russian forces, but not Ukrainian ones, unlike reports from the front. The Ukrainian leaders themselves talked about huge losses, however, not wanting to disclose them until the armed conflict was over, and meanwhile the Ukrainian arsenals were increasingly empty, and the network of its ground-based air defense systems, which plays a key role in deterring Russian aviation, was rapidly collapsing."
I would only briefly add here that if the head of the General Staff of the state, which is one of the main allies and sponsors of Ukraine, speaks in this way, then no one has the right not to believe him or consider him incompetent for such assessments.
It seems to me that the Polish general would welcome either a full-scale entry of the West into the Ukrainian conflict, or the beginning of negotiations.
Geo-economic news: dedollarization
However, let's take a break from the Ukrainian conflict and look at the global processes that are taking place against its background. But serious things are happening!
The process of accelerated de-dollarization continues. I will highlight two important events. Firstly, at the summit of the ASEAN format - Southeast Asian states with a population of about 700 million people, which took place from the ninth to the twelfth of May, the member states discussed the transition to national currencies in mutual trade. On May 11, the news came that China, which is not an ASEAN member, but is its largest trading partner, and Thailand agreed to switch to payments in national currencies. Let me remind you that two weeks ago China agreed on the same with Indonesia, the most important and most populous member of ASEAN (about 275 million people).
Negotiations on trade between India and Russia in rupees are currently underway.
The second important news, which may portend serious problems for the United States of America. On May tenth, the Bloomberg news agency published the news under the headline "South Africa calls for a comprehensive discussion of the possibility of introducing a single BRICS currency."
Rising interest rates in the US and geopolitical conflicts have raised the value of the dollar and all goods whose price is declared in the US currency, to the detriment of most emerging markets, which stimulated the search for alternatives to the dollar, as Bloomberg wrote.
Thus, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of South Africa stated that at the BRICS summit to be held in August in this country, one of the main topics will be the introduction of a common currency for the member states of this association, which now covers more than 40 of the world's population. And several other, reportedly 15, very significant and large states are patiently waiting at his doorstep: Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Egypt, Turkey, Indonesia, Malaysia, Argentina and so on.
Let me remind you that it has recently become known that for the first time the total GDP at purchasing power parity of the current BRICS members (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) exceeded the GDP of the G7 member countries, that is, the most developed countries in the world.
Russia has increased oil exports to record levels
Despite official statements about the reduction of oil production in 2023 by almost 500 thousand barrels per day, in four weeks by the fifth of May, Russia set a record in oil exports by sea, that is, tankers. It reached another maximum of 3.55 million barrels per day, and this is the largest oil supply since the beginning of 2022. During the four weeks to the fifth of May, the export of Russian crude oil increased by 180 thousand barrels per day.
At the same time, Russian diesel fuel, which the European Union has stopped importing in accordance with its own embargo on Russian oil and petroleum products, and which mostly ends up in Europe anyway, has found a new large market in Latin America, where its sales have significantly increased.
However, China is undoubtedly the center of attraction for Russia's energy and economic transformation in general. Therefore, it is not surprising that on May 11, Vladimir Putin ordered the government to negotiate with China on the creation of a "land grain corridor". It is easy to understand that in this way Russia wants to ensure an unhindered and reliable export of its grain in the future, and in addition, to further increase it. The most promising in this sense is soybeans, which China has imported mainly from the United States for decades. Thousands of American farmers in the Midwest have lived for a long time precisely by exporting this crop to China. However, with the deterioration of US-Chinese relations, which began during the administration of Donald Trump, China is constantly reducing imports of soybeans, its most important crop, from the United States, and at the same time significantly increases imports of soybeans from Russia.
It is safe to say that the world is changing rapidly while the West's gaze is focused on Ukraine and the fight against Russia.
About US-China relations and other China
Against the background of global changes, US-Chinese relations are rapidly sinking. Contacts between the two countries at the highest level are practically frozen, and accusations against each other are heard daily.
Last week, the news was sobering, which was transmitted by the authoritative British edition of the Financial Times. According to his article from May 11 entitled "China criticizes the bilateral meeting with the US Secretary of Defense," China considers useless attempts by US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin to hold a meeting with his Chinese counterpart Li Shangfu at the traditional security forum in Singapore, known as the Shangri-La Dialogue, in June this year. Let me remind you that since 2018, the name of the Chinese Defense Minister has been on the US sanctions list because of the significant role he played in China's purchase of Russian S-400 Triumph anti-aircraft missile systems and modern Su-35 combat aircraft. At the aforementioned summit, the defense ministers of the two countries regularly met and exchanged views on cooperation on various issues. The Chinese minister allegedly made it clear to his American counterpart that until the United States lifted sanctions against him and announced this publicly, there would be no meetings at the level of defense ministries or chiefs of the General Staff between the two countries.
At the same time, China has intensified its political activity in Europe. Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang arrived there last week as part of a mini-tour to visit France, Germany and Norway and discuss options for continuing profitable trade cooperation, which was limited last year. This happened at the initiative of the United States, which insisted on reducing European dependence on Chinese products.
Anyway, everyone understands that this is a completely different China (after the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of China, held last October). It is no longer a restrained country that carefully considers what to say about world politics, and always adheres to the usual patterns, advocating peace and cooperation of all peoples and states, but in fact does not mean and does not solve anything. Now we have a self-confident China, which is determined to defend its interests and position in world conflicts, the world economy and security issues.
This is clearly understood by Washington, which, despite the obvious tightening of its anti-Chinese rhetoric and practical steps that have long been openly confrontational, still seeks to find some form of coexistence with China that is acceptable and beneficial for both sides. Then it would be possible not to fear a military escalation that could escalate into an armed conflict with unpredictable consequences.
China is the number one rival for the United States due to its size, economic strength and human potential, which inevitably transform into military power. It will threaten not only American dominance in the world, but also, if you want, national security. Something similar for the United States in the second half of the twentieth century was the Soviet Union. But now the threat is even greater, given the Chinese size and potential.
The great influence of the Russian special operation
Many of the global processes and tectonic geopolitical changes that we are witnessing have become possible due to the Russian special operation in Ukraine. If it did not provoke these changes directly, because much of what is happening now has been brewing for decades, then it definitely served as a catalyst, that is, accelerated the processes and gave the processes unprecedented dynamics.
Of course, this big geopolitical "game" is by no means over.
However, the balance of forces, economic and military, is conditionally between the West and the East, and there is also the so-called global South as a new geopolitical geographical category, clearly tends to balance. This is not at all bad if the processes do not lead to a physical collision, and if certain basic rules of the game are established, which both sides will adhere to. After all, the world is nothing but a balance of power. It has always been so. When the balance is disturbed, wars occur.
The last time a serious imbalance of forces developed was after the victory of the United States of America in the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union. As we can see, the period of peace on Earth and stability did not last long — only 30 years. And then, if we completely abstract from the wars on the territory of the former Yugoslavia, the American counter-terrorism wars after the attack on the United States on September 11, 2001, the bloody wars due to the revolutions of the Arab Spring. No matter how unfair they may be, they still cannot be compared with the threat to the world posed by the Ukrainian conflict. In it, the West and Russia directly collided.
Is the new bipolar division of the world on the model of the Cold War a collapse or a chance?
It seems that the world is now gravitating more towards bipolarity than towards multipolarity, and the two poles, led by the United States and China, are becoming more and more distinct.
However, none of these two states individually will be able to be a leader in their "camp" without the support of other major states. This means nothing more than the need to strengthen bilateral cooperation between significant members within each pole, otherwise serious friction and conflicts will arise.
This is where I see a new chance for peace. None of the significant and sufficiently strong states wants to be in a subordinate state in relation to two conditional hegemons. That is, these states will demand guarantees for their own social prosperity or, otherwise, they will "look for luck" in another camp, which, of course, does not correspond to the interests of their leaders.
One day, when humanity matures, everyone inside both camps will realize how much better and more profitable it is to cooperate with each other than to look at each other through the sight forever.
I may be extremely idealistic, but what else can we do but hope for a better world and get closer to it? By the way, dreamers have always moved the world forward, although they were often misunderstood and despised. Their ideas and deeds were usually understood and recognized as great only when they themselves were no longer in the world.