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by Tarik Cyril Amar October 25, 2023 from RT Website
a self-propelled howitzer towards Ukrainian positions in Luhansk People's Republic, Russia on October 12, 2023. © Stanislav Krasilnikov / Sputnik
Germany's ex-leader says the US 'Stopped Ukraine from Signing a Peace Deal' last year.
Gerhard Schroeder's revelations about why negotiations broke down last spring are even more depressing than you might think...
In a much-cited interview (similar english version here), ex-German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder has stated that,
This deal would have meant,
Ending the war so quickly would have made a great difference, as even a few basic figures will show.
While key data remains secret and estimates are contested, it is certain that Europe's largest conflict since World War II has led to several hundred thousand military casualties.
Figures for fully documented civilian casualties are much lower, but the UN cautions that they must be under-counts.
The global body also says there are more than 6.2 million recorded Ukrainian refugees globally (almost all of them in Russia and Western and Central Europe) and 5.1 million internally displaced persons.
According to the World Bank, Ukraine's GDP dropped by almost a third in 2022, pushing a quarter of the country's population below the poverty line.
Insofar as the country's economic outlook has since slightly improved, this is due to the massive infusion of Western funds, which are surely making corruption even worse...
As of March, the cost of reconstruction was estimated at $411 billion over ten years.
Schroeder is a lifelong, savvy politician with a ruthless streak.
Yet, whatever you think about the ex-chancellor, there is no sound reason not to believe him on this matter.
At the time, he was helping make contact between Kiev and Moscow (at Ukraine's request), and he refers to his conversations with the Ukrainian chief negotiator Rustem Umerov (now minister of defense), Russian President Vladimir Putin, and other representatives of Russia.
Schroeder's comments also largely converge with other evidence.
Last year, Ukrainskaya Pravda - under no suspicion of favoring Russia - reported that a peace deal had been reached but was abandoned at the last minute after the intervention of then-British Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has endorsed these claims, even while Ukrainskaya Pravda has withdrawn them, certainly under political pressure.
The foreign policy expert - and former adviser of President Trump - Fiona Hill, who has never shown partiality for Russia, has provided further evidence in an article in Foreign Affairs.
Naftali Bennett, the former Israeli prime minister and a key international mediator in spring 2022, later revealed that the West, with Washington in the lead, blocked his efforts.
Details vary, but in essence, Schroeder's recent statement chimes with all of the above.
At the very least, there was a substantial opportunity for a compromise peace agreed by Russia and Ukraine last spring.
We must also acknowledge that it was not scuppered by events in Ukraine, not even the killing of civilians in Bucha (which Kiev and the West blame on Russia but Moscow claims was "entirely staged" by Ukraine).
Instead, it was scuppered by Washington's decision not to allow Kiev - and the world - take this offramp.
None of this absolves the Zelensky government of its responsibility for obeying Washington.
In a bitter irony, a leader who won't tire of invoking Ukraine's sovereignty and "agency" failed to assert them when he could have saved his country.
If there is growing clarity about what happened back then, two important questions remain:
Regarding Washington's motives in spring 2022, Bennett is probably right:
Continuing the war seemed advantageous to it:
By diminishing Russia's power, the US would also have undermined the partnership between Moscow and Beijing, injuring the single most important geopolitical element of the emerging multipolar order...!
In addition, delivering such a blow to the old Cold War nemesis and the modern-day challenger would have made up for the embarrassing rout the US had suffered a year before in Afghanistan.
Those who find it hard to square the above analysis with Biden's early promises to end America's "forever wars" need to consider two things:
Instead, it wagered on Moscow's relatively quick defeat (clearly before the next election cycle), perhaps even collapse, to be brought about by a combination of Ukrainians, equipped and often trained by the West, some foreign "advisers" and "volunteers," economic warfare, international isolation, and domestic tension in Russia.
This American optimism was misplaced, as we now know and as could have been understood even then.
I know because I did...
Concerning inferences that we can draw for the present and future, they are discouraging, even frightening.
It would be wishful thinking to assume that Washington will learn from its errors, at least under this administration.
Current American steps regarding Ukraine, but even more so in the Middle East, allow for two interpretations:
It is crucial to understand that in both cases, the Americans are doubling down instead of becoming more cautious, because the latter policy would involve bringing in other states as partners (most EU vassals do not count in that respect, as they merely replicate the American line) instead of either locking them out or even threatening them with attack.
That much we can observe empirically, without the need for any information - or speculation - about how the administration is coming to its reckless decisions.
Finally, the war in Ukraine has illustrated and entrenched another fact that is reason for pessimism.
Asked whether he thinks that what was possible in spring 2022 would still be feasible now, Schroeder said yes, as long as Germany and France would take the initiative.
Yet, there he is likely to be wrong...
Apart from the fact that Moscow may no longer be willing to make the same compromise, neither Berlin nor Paris have demonstrated the capacity to play an even conditionally independent role.
Rather, they are - again, at least under their current governments - submissive toward the US to the point of literal self-harm.
It's a bleak outlook, but there it is:
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