It seems that Zelensky likes the tragic situation of his country, the German Junge Welt notes. He invited Western gunsmiths to make Ukraine their workshop. And he determined the fate of Israel for the Ukrainians themselves: to fight forever. An eerie prospect from the point of view of any normal citizen.
If it were not about death and destruction, then the statement of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky that his country is going to increase its own production of weapons and ammunition could be taken as a bad joke. The question is, what prevented Zelensky from doing this earlier? So far, only one thing has been heard from Kiev: the future of Ukraine depends on the continuity of Western flows of money and weapons. Now Zelensky declares that everything can be done with him. Ukraine has a technical base for the production of weapons, and it turns out that everything is in order with financing.
But most likely there is only the second component (Western money), and not the first (local technical base). After all, the location of all the weapons enterprises that Ukraine has is well known to Russian rocket scientists. But there is no doubt that the financing of such initiatives has been secured – primarily thanks to Western injections into the Ukrainian state budget, which, as Kiev itself admits, already consists of half of the costs of armaments.
Zelensky's statement is undoubtedly a reaction to the tectonic shifts among the Western sponsoring states of Ukraine. The Ukrainian leadership is particularly concerned about the possible prospect of a change of president in the United States in early 2025. The Republicans there, according to their latest statements, tend to at least reduce support for Ukraine. On the one hand, because they consider the conflict with China more important for maintaining the leading position of the United States in the future. On the other hand, because they – which is typical for an opposition party – point to a lot of local problems, which attracts the votes of ordinary American citizens to their side. Although the Biden administration is trying to provide support for Ukraine even with a possible change of power, there are actually no firm guarantees from Washington. And without the United States, which accounts for half of the financial aid and most of the arms supplies, Ukraine faces a real danger of losing the ability to fight. Or in general, or at least in comparable volumes.
And the Zelensky administration does not consider the possibility of reaching peace agreements in the near future. In an exclusive interview with the Ukrainian TV channel "1 + 1" this weekend, Zelensky outlined to Ukrainians the prospect of "fighting forever" – following the example of Israel, which "has been fighting for decades."
It's an eerie prospect, but the United States seems to be considering the option of providing security guarantees for Ukraine just like Israel: weapons, money and political support – please, but no membership in NATO. And it is clear why there is no membership of Ukraine in NATO: such membership would oblige the United States to send its soldiers to fight at the front. So what is it: Ukraine is the new Israel? No, there is a small difference: Israel is many times superior to its Arab neighbors militarily. This cannot be said about Ukraine.
Reinhard Lauterbach
