MONOKULTUR

Det var min vens præcise konklusion  da han sendte mig linket til den russiske spasmagers telefonfis med vores udenrigsminister. Trods den tydelige russiske accent antog Løkke at han talte med en afrikaner. Man kan sige, at det udtrykker en prisværdig åbensindethed hos den tidligere Venstreformand, men i den virkelige verden er etniske stereotyper rettidig omhu.

Der er også den mulighed, at Løkke ved, at han taler med ‘russerne’ og på den måde fortæller, at Vesten er nødt til at tage sig stærke og resolutte ud, men har erkendt nederlaget. Lidt som da Obama befølte den daværende russiske udenrigsminister på knæet og sagde, at han skulle vente til efter det amerikanske præsidentvalg, til da havde han mere albuerum. Vi er seje på overfladen men bløde indeni.

Our position is that we should uphold strong sanctions against Russia. By now the ukrainians are trying to establish their own corridor – they haven’t been very successful so far – I think that’s the way to go. And then I think it is important that Denmark and other european countries step up terms of investments in Africa. (…)

We’ll also increase our soft power that we enhance our common approach towards Africa. We had this global gateway initiative. I think it is important that we are moving forward from giving speeches to actually deliver terms of concrete investments etc. That’s my point of departure. (…)

I don’t think [Forårsoffensiven] has failed, but obviously it hasn’t been as successful as on could have wished. Our position is that we should support Ukraine, that’s why Denmark have taken the position of donating 19 F-16 fighter jets within the next coming years. (…)

But it is very clear that Russia are counting on some kind of Ukraine-fatigue in the long run (…) that they can outwait Europe, that they are looking forward to the presidential election in the US next year. It’s not easy for me to predict, but at some point I guess that the ukrainian president adjust to the situation and declare that this is now the time to start the negotiations. (…)

And then of course, when the day arise, when there will be peace negotiations or the war will come to an end we will support Ukraine in the new security architecture to prevent Russia for attacking again and we will also do our utmost to include them in the european family, even though – honestly speaking –  the will be very, very, very difficult. It’s the largest country in Europe, it will come with a huge impact if they suddenly become members of the european union. But nevertheless due to geopolitical reasons that will be our approach.

But it is not up to me to declare that this war can not be won by Ukraine.

Det er ikke op til Løkke at erklære at Ukraine ikke kan vinde krigen – det er op til nogen andre at erklære at Ukraine ikke kan vinde krigen. Uanset hvem det er op til at erklære at Ukraine ikke kan vinde krigen, står det fast med Løkkes ord, at Ukraine ikke kan vinde krigen.

Løkkes næsten totale afvisning af ‘rump state’ Ukraines fremtidige medlemskab af EU fortæller, at Ukraine grundlæggende aldrig var vores interesse. Det handlede om russerne. I 2015 forudsagde Mearsheimer herunder, et foredrag jeg har brugt tidligere, mere eller mindre situationen, som Løkke erkender at den ser ud i dag. At Rusland har taget den del af Ukraine, der dels er russisk orienteret, og som samtidig ligger ned til Sortehavet og således beskytter Krim halvøen fra at blive isoleret. Det var, hvad der var USAs og NATOs intentioner.

“Zelensky feels betrayed by his Western allies” skriver Times i en artikel, der lægger krigen i graven.

Twenty months into the war, about a fifth of Ukraine’s territory remains under Russian occupation. Tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians have been killed, and Zelensky can feel during his travels that global interest in the war has slackened. So has the level of international support. “The scariest thing is that part of the world got used to the war in Ukraine,” he says. “Exhaustion with the war rolls along like a wave. You see it in the United States, in Europe. And we see that as soon as they start to get a little tired, it becomes like a show to them: ‘I can’t watch this rerun for the 10th time.’”

– whatever… Om den forårsoffensiv, som Løkke ikke synes var mislykket, men dog skuffende, skriver Times at den “has proceeded at an excruciating pace and with enormous losses”. 

The cold will also make military advances more difficult, locking down the front lines at least until the spring. But Zelensky has refused to accept that. “Freezing the war, to me, means losing it,” he says. Before the winter sets in, his aides warned me to expect major changes in their military strategy and a major shake-up in the President’s team. At least one minister would need to be fired, along with a senior general in charge of the counteroffensive, they said, to ensure accountability for Ukraine’s slow progress at the front. “We’re not moving forward,” says one of Zelensky’s close aides. Some front-line commanders, he continues, have begun refusing orders to advance, even when they came directly from the office of the President. “They just want to sit in the trenches and hold the line,” he says. “But we can’t win a war that way.”

When I raised these claims with a senior military officer, he said that some commanders have little choice in second-guessing orders from the top. At one point in early October, he said, the political leadership in Kyiv demanded an operation to “retake” the city of Horlivka, a strategic outpost in eastern Ukraine that the Russians have held and fiercely defended for nearly a decade. The answer came back in the form of a question: With what? “They don’t have the men or the weapons,” says the officer. “Where are the weapons? Where is the artillery? Where are the new recruits?”

In some branches of the military, the shortage of personnel has become even more dire than the deficit in arms and ammunition. One of Zelensky’s close aides tells me that even if the U.S. and its allies come through with all the weapons they have pledged, “we don’t have the men to use them.” 

Since the start of the invasion, Ukraine has refused to release official counts of dead and wounded. But according to U.S. and European estimates, the toll has long surpassed 100,000 on each side of the war. It has eroded the ranks of Ukraine’s armed forces so badly that draft offices have been forced to call up ever older personnel, raising the average age of a soldier in Ukraine to around 43 years. “They’re grown men now, and they aren’t that healthy to begin with,” says the close aide to Zelensky. “This is Ukraine. Not Scandinavia.”

EU gav automatisk asyl til flygtninge fra Ukraine, da krigen startede. Da det ikke er til at få troværdige tal for noget som helst, vil jeg blot nævne ganske anekdotisk, at både på mit arbejde, hvor en del af et plejehjem er omdannet til små lejligheder for ukrainere og i min lokale Rema 1000, er mange ukrainske mænd i den våbenføre alder. Hvis det er et generelt billede på den ukrainske flygtningestrøm, har EU reduceret rekrutteringsgrundlaget for den hær, man betaler for at bekæmpe russerne. Vores ledere er lige så dumme, som de er amoralske.

Ukraine er i den russiske interessesfære, ikke vores. Samuel Huntington skrev i sin Civilisationernes Sammenstød, at brudzonerne mellem civilisationerne indeholdt det største konfliktpotentiale. Så hvad forestillede Vesten sig, da de besluttede sig for at at brække en stor bid af den ortodokse civilisation af til sig selv?

NATOs formand Jens Stoltenberg blabrede det lige ud, krigen i Ukraine er udløst af Vestens insisteren på at udvide NATO. Polens Duda betegner Ukraine som en druknende mand, som man skal holde sig fra, hvis ikke man vil trækkes med i dybet. 

Republikanske Senator Lindsey Graham sagde til Zeleski “And the Russians are dying. It’s the best money we have ever spend!” Det samme med hans præsident Joe Biden, der på spørgsmålet om Bakmut var faldet svarede

“Bakmut is a discussion of whether or not it is lost or whatever. And while the truth of the matter is, the russians have suffered over a hundred thousand casualties in Bakmut. It’s hard to make up!”

“Whatever”, russere dør, det er det vigtige. Ukrainere der dør, bliver ikke nævnt, de er gratis. Men det er Vesten der drænes for penge og militært isenkram. Ukraines regering er korrupt og en del penge må være fosset ned i alle de forkerte menneskers lommer, der vil stå styrket i fremtidens ukrainske samfund. Derfor er meget, meget, meget svært at forestille sig dem som medlem af EU. “People are stealing like there’s no tomorrow.” og hvem vil have dem som medlemmer?

Alle, der dræbes i krigen fra nu af, dræbes helt meningsløst. 

Krigen handlede om, at afskære Rusland fra Sortehavet, med ukrainske liv som indsats. Det var hvad ukraine kunne tilbyde, deres unge mænd som slagtekvæg for et primært amerikansk militærindustrielt kompleks skyld, der ikke er blevet færdig med den Kolde Krig. Ukraine kunne ikke bruges til andet – en matrikel fyldt med slagtekvæg. Resten af Ukraine bliver det meget, meget, meget svært at bruge til noget.