Important Counter To Trump-Putin Narrative On Ukraine

(MENAFN- Asia Times) Well, it wasn't very noble and it flinched at the last moment from sending the powerful political message that the situation warranted. But the European Union's agreement to lend Ukraine 90 billion euros (US$105.5 billion) is nonetheless an important contribution to international justice, the pursuit of peace and the security of Europe.

Above all, the zero-interest loan means that Ukraine will be sufficiently financially viable to carry on defending itself for the next 1-2 years and even to produce the type and quantity of weapons that could push the invader back.

This averts the danger that in the talks now constantly going on between US President Donald Trump's team and Ukrainian and European officials, Ukraine would be forced to agree to capitulate for fear of a worse outcome later.

Ukraine can now afford to say no, and if peace talks ever do occur between Ukraine and Russia, they will now do so on a more equitable basis.

Vladimir Putin may think that EU leaders are“piglets” [a frequent alternative English translation of his Russian was“swine”], as he said this week, but the piglets have shown that they do have some punch.

The loan is in reality a grant, as Ukraine has to repay it only in the event that Russia agrees to pay reparations for the death and destruction its war has caused.

As the EU and 34 countries last week also signed a Council of Europe Convention establishing an International Claims Commission which will assess claims for compensation in Ukraine, there will now be an international mechanism capable of putting pressure on Russia.

There is zero chance of Russia paying reparations as long as Putin is in the Kremlin, but embarrassing it in front of the world would still be useful. Putin probably feels satisfied that his threats of retribution helped dissuade EU leaders from using the 210 billion euros of Russian central bank assets frozen in European bank accounts to directly finance Ukraine using Russian money.

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He was helped in that effort by the cowardly behavior of Belgium and Italy. For a man who has broken international law every day since he ordered his forces to invade Ukraine nearly four years ago, it must have been entertaining to hear the Belgian and Italian prime ministers plead international law as the main reason for their objections.

In the end, the European Commission's efforts to circumvent those objections made the frozen assets plan so complicated that joint borrowing looked simpler, even though that option too will now be complicated by the demand of Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic to be excluded from paying for the servicing of that debt.

Adding to the EU's common debt is controversial, but failing to finance Ukraine would have been a disaster.

The most important contribution this financing can make is to help change the narrative away from the Russian propaganda line that Ukraine is losing the war, a narrative that Trump has adopted and helped to reinforce.

The facts on the battlefield contradict this narrative, especially Ukraine's successful recapture this month of Kupyansk, a town Putin had boasted only days previously of seizing, and its successful attack on a Russian submarine in the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk.

Ukraine's difficulty is that it lacks the money, weapons and manpower to turn these sporadic successes into sustained campaigns capable of pushing back or seriously debilitating the enemy. That is where the EU money will help, hopefully with more to come in a year's time.

But alongside that money, there needs to be a loud and consistent effort to challenge another part of the Trump-Putin narrative, namely the idea that if only Ukraine were to give away a bit more territory, peace could be achieved.

One thing that can be said in praise of Putin is that he makes no secret of his ambitions. Anyone who still believes that he wants to make peace with Ukraine has just to read the speech he gave last week in which he reaffirmed his aim of reclaiming Russia's“historic lands” in the country that became independent in 1991 with the encouragement of his predecessor, Boris Yeltsin.

No one should delude themselves that with this phrase he is referring just to the 25% of the eastern Donbass region which his forces have failed to conquer and which in his recent talks with Trump's envoys he has demanded that Ukraine cede. To give away such a large land area and a formidable line of defense would be a shameful reward for four years of quite successfully keeping the invaders at bay.

But also, when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky argues that to give Putin the other 25% of the Donbass would just buy a pause while Russia rebuilt its military for a new attack, he is making an entirely valid point.

When Putin says he wants Russia's“historic lands” he means the whole country, for it is the whole country that was, historically, part of the Russian empire, not just the eastern areas where the Russian language predominates.

The big question now must be how Putin and Trump will react to the changed situation now that Ukraine's financial viability has been restored and that the Europeans have shown that they really can take a decision. So far, Putin has shown no sign of taking the American-led peace talks seriously, nor any interest in negotiating directly with Zelensky.

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It is possible, however, that Putin might now feel the need to show some proper interest, since instead of getting steadily weaker next year his Ukrainian opponents are now likely to become stronger. Russia might now become the combatant that needs to buy some time through a ceasefire, rather than the Ukrainians.

As for Trump, the only things that can be predicted with confidence is that he will continue to call for peace and continue to collude with Putin. We should note that last week he made his own version of the“historic lands” claim when he demanded that Venezuela should“return” the oil that it“stole” from America.

In fact, the United States has never owned any part of Venezuela: he was referring to a previous Venezuelan regime's nationalization of the country's oil fields during the 1970s. Plenty of countries, including Iran and Trump's friends in Saudi Arabia, have nationalized oil fields that had previously been owned and developed by American, British and other foreign oil companies.

For as long as Trump is president, the United States clearly has no intention of combating imperialism by its fellow great powers, unless its own national interests are threatened. But although his natural sympathies are with Putin, he also never likes to be on the losing side.

The EU's decision to finance Ukraine cannot guarantee that Kyiv will prevail. But it has tilted the balance of probability back in that direction.

This is the English original of an article originally published in Italian by La Stampa. It can also be found in English on Bill Emmott's Global View Substack. It is republished with permission.

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