Where Biden and Putin agree
The Ukraine war is nowhere near an end. Matthew Partridge reports
On the one-year anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, US president Joe Biden and Russian leader Vladimir Putin “laid out radically different visions” of the ongoing war in major speeches, says The New York Times. Biden blamed Putin “for dragging Europe back to brutality on a scale not seen since World War II”; Putin blamed the US and its allies for turning the conflict in Ukraine into a “global confrontation”. Both leaders agreed, however, that the conflict is nowhere near an end. Putin also announced that Russia would “suspend its participation in the New START nuclear-arms control treaty”, the last major agreement with the US still being honoured.
A dangerous escalation?
Putin’s latest move shows that the West should be worried about escalating the situation, says Arta Moeini on UnHerd. Limited Western military support for Kyiv with the aim of creating “an attritional, frozen conflict” is one thing. Providing advanced weapon systems and longrange missiles, as it is increasingly willing to do, “is not only unwise, but increasingly suicidal” as such “explicitly hostile support could escalate the proxy war into a direct, conventional war” between Russia and the West. Attempts to regain Crimea could even provoke Russia into going nuclear as it regards “its strategic stronghold in the Black Sea as an existential imperative”.
Putin’s decision to withdraw from the START treaty is certainly “unwelcome”, as its demise could “set in train a new arms race, bringing to an end five decades of efforts to limit nuclear stockpiles”, says The Times. But the treaty “was in deep trouble” even before Putin spoke, and the fact that Russia “is currently struggling to equip its own army” raises doubts “about its ability to enter a new arms race”. The best solution to Putin’s “sabre-rattling” is for the West to “focus on strengthening its deterrence”, while continuing to help Ukraine “secure its sovereignty and territorial integrity”.
China weighs its next move
Meanwhile, there are concerns that China may be about to get involved, says Owen Matthews in The Spectator. Until now, Beijing has shown “impressive restraint” by limiting itself to “Kremlin-leaning neutrality” rather than explicit support for Moscow. It had clearly decided that it has “far more to lose from openly siding with Moscow than it stands to gain”. This calculation may be changing. Beijing has hinted at a peace plan and the US is worried that China is “considering providing lethal support” to Russia –there are already signs that Beijing is supplying operational intelligence to the Kremlin-affiliated Wagner Group.
Another indication that Chinese promises of neutrality aren’t all they are cracked up to be comes from the fact that Russia has managed to increase its imports of semiconductors and microchips by 34% despite toughened controls, with Beijing accounting for much of this total, says Robert Clark in The Telegraph. Chinese firms are now sending body armour, helmets, and other non-lethal military equipment directly to the Russian front. The West must now determine how to counter a “covert ramping of Chinese military aid”.