Settling the War in Ukraine: A Wakeup Call for the European Union!

Conflicts are never solved of their own accord. 

They are usually settled by the stronger powers and their settlements are imposed on the smaller or weaker powers.

That is the norm in history, and it will be no different regarding settling the war between Ukraine and Russia.

US President Donald Trump called Russian President Vladimir Putin last week to begin "negotiations" regarding a peace settlement for Russia's war against Ukraine.

Neither the European Union nor Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy were informed beforehand.

Neither was the United Kingdom.

So much for the much touted (by the UK, anyway) "Special Relationship" between the US and they.

They were informed of the phone call after the fact and erupted with righteous indignation.

They all expected to be part of the so-called "peace process" and have seats at the negotiating table.

They were all bypassed and were not invited.

The negotiations began this week in Saudi Arabia, which is neither in nor of Europe, between the representatives of the US and Russian governments.

Last week, at the Munich Security Conference, The US's representatives made it abundantly clear that Ukraine cannot expect to return to its pre-2014 boundaries, nor be part of NATO, nor be a part of the European Union.

This echoes Russia's position regarding Ukraine.

Furthermore, the US has stated that there will be no American troops as part of any peacekeeping mission, which angered the European Union.

Russia stated it wants no peacekeeping mission at all stationed in postwar Ukraine, especially military units from the European Union.

Finally, President Trump stated that Ukraine may become Russian, or it may not become Russian someday.

Putin expects to absorb Ukraine entirely someday to recreate the old Soviet Union, at least on its border with western Europe.

He already has Belarus under his thumb. Ukraine and Moldova will complete the process in the southwest.

Slovakia, Hungary, Austria and Romania already swing in the Russian orbit and are anti-Ukraine, despite the pronouncements of the European Union's leadership in Brussels, effectively hamstringing any efforts of NATO to involve itself in the war.

Any "settlement" regarding the war in Ukraine should be viewed as temporary at best.

President Trump is largely unconcerned with Europe and sees China as the major US foe. Concessions to Russia regarding Ukraine clearly are being used to break Putin's dependence on China.

Zelenskyy has little to offer the US to counter Russia's demands.

True, he has promised President Trump the rights to Ukraine's rare earth deposits, but those are mostly in the territories already conquered by Russia, and Russia won't give those up.

As for the European Union? They have finally woken from their long, smug slumber only to find themselves ignored on the world stage regarding an issue that impacts them dangerously.

I have a soft spot for the European Union. I always imagined them to be a confederation of European states, an economic powerhouse of nations combined together to promote peace, prosperity, freedom and democratic rule, militarily strong enough to protect itself from incursions by people such as Putin.

The reality is not particularly encouraging.

The success of the European Union and its quickness to include almost all of the states of the former Soviet Bloc was predicated upon its reliance on the US's economic and military might in the form of NATO.

There is no European Union Army. There are national military units of the individual state that comprise the European Union, but no coordination among them for their mutual defense in case of outside aggression.

Even worse is the diversity of military materiel among these states, making coordination even more difficult among them.

So, they relied upon NATO,

And President Trump is not exactly gung-ho on NATO, already warning the states comprising the European Union that they had better increase their defense budgets.

Or else.

So, what has the European Union been doing since Russia's invasion of Crimea in 2014, which was a prelude to their invasion of Ukraine in 2022?

Nothing, really.

They loudly condemned Russia, and imposed sanctions on her that really didn't affect her, while continuing to do business with her.

To be sure, Crimea was never historically part of Ukraine, having been given it by Khrushchev only in the 1960's.

Still, the European Union and the US did nothing about it.

Nobody sent in troops to Ukraine to assist her in reconquering that territory.

They didn't need NATO to do that, but they didn't want to anger Putin.

When the Biden regime made a muddle of the US's withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021, Putin saw how weak the western alliance really was and gambled that it wouldn't too strenuously oppose his conquest of Eastern and Southeastern Ukraine, so he invaded and snapped up nearly a quarter of Ukraine's territory.

The west, somewhat alarmed, imposed more sanctions on Russia that didn't affect her ability wage war and sent aid in the form of money and war materiel to Ukraine, while forbidding Zelenskyy for using such weapons for offensive action against Russian territory, while Russia was unencumbered by such restraints.

The reason was that Biden's America and the European Union were afraid of Putin's nuclear saber rattling and that he might turn his weapons against them.

That the Biden crime family would fear Russia is understandable. They had already sold-out America to China and therefore saw Russia as a powerful enemy.

The European Union hoped to isolate and shame Russia without enraging Putin enough to use nuclear weapons against them.

It didn't work.

So more Ukrainian soldiers and civilians died, as did Russian soldiers.

And roughly a quarter of Ukraine's population fled to the west, millions ending up in Germany, who was the second largest contributor to Ukraine after the US.

THAT kindness helped to destroy the German economy and helped bring down its government in November.

And, frankly, there was something pathetic and downright comical about Zelenskyy flying all over the world in his army fatigues, begging bowl in hand, while Ursula von der Leyen, head honcho of the European Union talked of Ukraine winning the war, while proposing Ukraine's inclusion into the union and NATO.

Such aid continued to flow pretty regularly with Ukraine continuing to lose ground and lives to the Russian onslaught until Donald Trump won the US presidency in November 2024.

The Donald is no fan of the pretensions of the European Union nor of the Labour government of "Sir" Keir Starmer of the UK,

President Trump made it clear that he would negotiate a "peace" in Ukraine with Russia, which might have made the European Union nervous, but they still did nothing.

Then came the shock of being bypassed at the peace negotiations that began in Saudi Arabia this week.

Still, outside of an "emergency meeting" in Paris to discuss the issue and increase their demands of being at the negotiating table, they have come up with nothing, except their unrealistic expectations that restores Ukraine's territory pro ante bellum, security guarantees of Ukraine's independent status in the future and its inclusion in the European Union and NATO.

None of which the European Union has the power to do, especially since some of its member states are pro-Russian in outlook, as already stated.

Their weakness has been made manifest and there's nothing for the leaders of the European Union to do but shriek their protests against the high-handed dealings of Trump and Putin.

Ultimately, peace WILL be imposed on Ukraine. A quarter of its territory will be ceded to Russia. The Zelenskyy regime will be replaced by one friendlier to Putin, like that of Belarus.

And there's not a damned thing that the European Union can do about it.

Except to protest loudly.

But then, who is really going to listen to them?

It woke out of its slumber far too late, and it had better look to defend itself.

Depending on the US, and NATO, isn't going to cut it anymore.