A Fork in Europe’s Road. By Srdja Trifkovic.
In the fourth month of Russia’s “special military operation” in Ukraine, it seems evident that Vladimir Putin cannot win …
At the same time, it is clear that Russia … will not agree to end the war on humiliating terms that would entail its permanent abdication of great-power status. Faced with such a prospect, the leadership in the Kremlin, even a post-Putinist one, would rather raise the odds.
Europe, or that major part of it that belongs to the political West — NATO and the EU — faces a choice of historical magnitude. Will it opt for the Viennese 1815 formula of treating the wayward power, for all its rashness, as a permanent and necessary player in the postwar European order? Or will it succumb to the pressure from Washington — reinforced by the globalist nomenklatura in Brussels — to seek the outcome based on Versailles 1919, which would see Russia not only humbled but permanently crippled?
These two options were presented in unusually clear terms at the World Economic Forum in Davos on May 24 by two influential figures: the 99-year-old former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and Ursula von der Leyen, who has been the unelected president of the European Commission — the EU de facto government — since the end of 2019.
The 1815 template, after the defeat of Napoleonic France:
Kissinger said that Ukraine should cede territory to Russia to help end the conflict. He urged the U.S. and the West not to seek a humiliating defeat for Russia in Ukraine as it could worsen Europe’s long-term stability. Reminding his audience that “Russia has been an essential part of Europe for 400 years now … in some cases as a guarantor or instrument with which to restore the European balance,” and asking them not to be swept up “in the mood of the moment,” Kissinger urged the West to convince Ukraine to accept a negotiated agreement. In addition, he stressed that Russia should not be forced into a permanent alliance with China. …
The 1919 template, after the defeat of Germany in WWI:
Ursula von der Leyen, by contrast, told global leaders in Davos that the war is not only “a matter of Ukraine’s survival” or “an issue of European security” but also “a task for the entire global community.” While condemning Putin’s “destructive fury,” she allowed the possibility that Russia could one day recover its place in Europe, but only if it “finds its way back to democracy, the rule of law and respect for the international rules-based order.” In other words, Russia must establish a Western-style regime at home and accept Western dominance abroad.
Von der Leyen’s position was supported by none other than George Soros, the currency speculator extraordinaire. He told the Forum that victory in the war against Putin’s Russia was necessary to “save civilization” and urged the West to provide Ukraine with everything it needs to prevail. …
A difficult choice, because we need our our cultural and civilizational enemies to win the military campaign in order to preserve peace:
A rational person should be instinctively inclined to reject any word of advice by the philanthropist from hell or by the European Union’s top bureaucrat. They are both in cahoots with the hegemonic clique that devises American foreign policy, and which uses Joe Biden as its façade. …
The EU apparat and the globalist visionaries like Soros also support Europe’s suicidal immigration policy, which, if continued, will lead to demographic replacement of the European nations with the teeming multitudes from the other side of the Mediterranean. That is a pleasing prospect to the Davos elite, and canceling Russia as the last major bastion of non-postmodernized Europe is therefore mandatory.
The Russophobia embodied by von der Leyen and Soros goes way beyond condemning Putin’s regime; they loathe all things Russian. Theirs is a remarkable mixture of hostility and repulsion that is primarily culturally motivated rather than geopolitically driven.
If Russia continues to be treated as the ultimate Other, to be excluded from the European security architecture and treated as an Asiatic pariah, Europe’s demise will be accelerated, and its recovery difficult to envisage. That much is clear to Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, a staunch defender of all things truly European. Putin’s Ukraine blunder notwithstanding, Orbán sees in Russia a natural ally in his struggle to preserve the authenticity of his nation, its traditions, and its social and state institutions against the twin threats of the EU machine in Brussels and the U.S. foreign policy community in Washington, D.C. …
Realists recognize that Europe cannot and will not be peaceful and stable if one of its major powers is treated with studied contempt or outright hostility. …
Today’s Russia remains a key player in the European state system. It has legitimate security interests, which have not lost their validity despite Putin’s blunders. A lasting peace needs to be built on this fact. The alternative is to treat Russia in 2022 the way Germany was treated in 1919, most probably with similarly tragic long-term consequences.
It will be decided on the battlefield, then the culture vultures will fight and spin the outcomes.
hat-tip Stephen Neil
