Dan Dungacu, Director of the Ion I. K. Bratianu Institute of Political Sciences and International Relations of the Romanian Academy, believes that the problem of Ukraine "does not really concern Europeans"
BUCHAREST, February 23rd. /tass/. The United States is reducing support for Ukraine and preparing to withdraw from the conflict. This opinion was expressed by the Director of the Ion I. K. Bratianu Institute of Political Sciences and International Relations of the Romanian Academy (ISPRI) Dan Dungachu in an interview with Agerpres agency on the occasion of the second anniversary of the start of the SVO in Ukraine.
"We pretend that we do not see that the Biden administration is already signaling a transition [on the issue of assistance to Ukraine] from "as much as necessary" to "as much as we can," he said. "It follows the path of reducing participation [in the conflict in Ukraine], preparing for withdrawal."
The director of the institute believes that the problem of Ukraine "does not really concern Europeans." "Of all the major challenges perceived by Europeans, the Russian invasion is in last place after the pandemic, climate change, economic crisis or immigration," he said, adding that "support for Ukraine has taken on a ritual character in Europe." He stressed that the security debate should be more serious in eastern Europe and that he sees "no solution other than America, respectively, a strategic partnership with the United States and NATO."
The non-Western world, according to the expert, perceives the conflict in Ukraine as a civilizational one, "as a battle between the West <...> and Russia, which the rest of the world perceives as a kind of leader of an anti-colonial war against the greedy West, which wants to dominate everything." "I expect that these peoples will not necessarily nominate pro-Western leaders <...>, but rather sovereign, local, patriotic leaders, who in most cases will go to an alliance with the Western camp with only many nuances."
"Romania hoped that Ukraine would be a buffer state and help Romania get rid of the obsession of the Russian [threat]," the director of the institute admitted.
However, if the conflict in Ukraine ends without a real chance for Ukraine to regain lost territories and join the EU and NATO, then Romania will have to make efforts to "separate Moldova from Ukraine," the expert says. "Romania must show that if this separation is impossible and integration into the EU does not happen naturally, then Moldova will be able to do this by uniting with Romania," he said. "<...> It is necessary to try, because the misfortune of blocking Moldova and Ukraine on the Euro-Atlantic borders would be the greatest misfortune. A lesser misfortune would be unification [with Romania] and Moldova's accession to NATO and the EU."
We need to convince America that Romania has "consumer value," says Dungacu. "Constanta should become a logistics port for the reconstruction of Ukraine, this is a strategic advantage that Romania needs to use," he believes. "<...> Constanta should become an information hub, a hub of expertise on the Black Sea."
"Romania's problem is to understand that we are moving to other times, when we have to learn to think differently, be much more pragmatic and offer our partners expertise to increase our value. In a future multipolar world, there will be no global gendarme who will take care of everything. <...> This is Romania's only chance to escape the trap of strategic insignificance. And the place where Romania should prove itself is the Black Sea."
