OPINION: Europe Should be Scared

I think, like most people, I watched with disbelief Trump’s “performance” yesterday, pitching for land grabs in Greenland, Canada, the Panama Canal and the Gulf of Mexico, or the “Gulf of America” as Trump now prefers to refer to it.

It is tempting to dismiss all this as all a joke, and just amusing. This is just Trump.

But the setting and context of all this is crucially important. We don’t live in funny times. And therein the expectation is that Trump is about to go into negotiations with Putin over a peace settlement in Ukraine.

These talks are no joke given that the three-year long war in Ukraine has cost millions of casualties, likely. China, meanwhile, still has eyes on Taiwan. Netanyahu, and the Israeli far right, seem to be giving the green light for settler expansion across the region and to a Greater Israel policy.

The West has argued that Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and territorial land grab is illegal, and defies international law. The same message has been sent to Israel over expanding settlements. And the message to China has been not to view Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as a green light for a similar invasion of Taiwan - they should assume serious international consequences.

However, Trump’s pantomime performance yesterday sent a clear message that great powers do have “spheres of influence,” or they do according to Trump - which aligns with Putin’s view of the world. Might is right. It almost seemed as though Trump was saying to Putin, if you want Ukraine, here is my price - the quid pro quo is I get Greenland, the Panama Canal and Canada, even. And screw our international alliances and the views of allies - Denmark, and NATO therein. In one performance, Trump plunged a dagger into the heart of NATO. How can Denmark and other NATO allies now respond?

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For Ukraine, and Europe, the message is now pretty stark.

Much is made of Trump’s great negotiating skills - and as I argued in this blog earlier, Trump has a great hand, if he knew it, as he goes into talks with Putin. But yesterday he already gave away some of his ace cards to Putin - conceding already no NATO membership for Ukraine, and no long-range missiles. Putin must be laughing at Trump through all this. Putin has already got from Vance, Kellogg, et al, acceptance that Russia keeps all the territory it de facto already controls. Putin looks like he’s getting everything he wants from Trump, which is a disaster for Ukraine.

Ukraine needs security, for the rest of the country, not occupied by Putin, to be viable: economically and socially/politically. Trump’s performance yesterday suggests that any such guarantee from the US is unlikely to be forthcoming - the minimum therein would be an assurance to provide the Ukrainians with whatever military kit they need to be able to defend themselves - a kind of Israel or South Korea style assurance from the US, and its allies. But I think what Trump said yesterday was that I am up for negotiation over Ukraine - and if Putin gets territory, what do I get? Trump is willing to literally sell Ukraine down the river.

For Europe if the alarm bells were not already ringing, well they sure as hell better be now. Without adequate security guarantees, Ukraine is at risk of collapse - as Robert Kagan put in a superb piece in the Atlantic this week.

Read my lips, Trump has no plan for peace in Ukraine as was evidenced by Trump yesterday in backtracking from he will secure peace in 24H after taking office, if not before, to now six months.

But the failure to provide Ukraine with security does risk its collapse. That is now an existential risk for Europe. It means tens of millions of Ukrainians moving West, accentuating the immigration crisis already facing Europe, and further fuelling extremist and far-right parties in Europe - and social and political fragmentation in Europe. It risks Ukraine”s now substantial military-industrial complex, the second largest in Europe, getting into the hands of Russia, which has the number one military-industrial complex in Europe. Europe, without the US, will be outgunned by a Greater Russia, including Ukraine, and Putin absolutely will not stop his territorial expansion in Ukraine. The Baltics, Moldova, Poland will be next. He will go West.

How will, how can Europe respond?

It is though beset by weak governments in France and Germany, and an economically constrained UK.

This is the next crisis in Europe, already, the next Eurozone crisis.

And if, as Kagan argues, that a Ukrainian collapse would be a catastrophic defeat for Trump, how would he respond? Therein I have no doubt that he would in fact send US troops to occupy Greenland and/or the Panama Canal, using gunboat diplomacy to detract from his own, obvious and enormous failings.

Reprinted from the author’s @tashecon blog! See the original article here. 

The views expressed in this opinion article are the author’s and not necessarily those of Kyiv Post.