Give Ukraine what it needs to fight but also prepare the way for peace
Afew people, who really should know better, still think that it would be a good idea for Nato to try to impose a no-fly zone over Ukraine and start World War Three. Most people realise that this fight has to be done by the Ukrainians themselves – and after my brief visit to the west of the country in the last few days, I can assure you that they are up for it. But we must provide the materials of war and play a part in looking after their populations, including refugees.
Among those I met were a Ukrainian three-star general who quotes Herodotus, Marx, Sting and Churchill. He explained that what the country needs most are air-defence systems. If the Russians dominate the skies, Ukrainian forces are doomed.
In my notebook I have their shopping list of systems: they even know which countries have them available. For example, Finland recently upgraded its air-defence system, and warehoused the old one. The Ukrainians want the trailers and boxes of this Buk air-defence system as they know this equipment already.
Yesterday the same general was on the phone calling anyone who would listen to ask Poland to provide 70 Soviet-era MIGs for Ukrainian pilots.
So far the US and UK have led in the provision of air-defence and anti-tank weapons. More than 20 other nations are also helping. It will not have escaped the notice of Russia’s satellites and spies that there are a lot of military transport aircraft landing and taking off at airfields in south-east Poland – another departed as my Ryanair flight was boarding for Stansted.
On the Polish side of the Ukrainian border, armed police serve hot drinks and food to arriving refugees. A million have crossed already, and Europe can expect many more – although most will go home eventually to their families, as Ukrainian men of military age are not being allowed to leave.
It is the refugees who are destroying
the Russian narrative that the invaders are there to help the Ukrainian people. The world needs to frame this conflict in humanitarian as well as military terms. With only five nations supporting Russia at the UN, in time might it be possible for the UN (not Nato) to establish a massive humanitarian safe enclave in the west of Ukraine – if Kyiv, the north, east and south remain frozen under the Kremlin’s jackboot and the Ukrainian government effectively goes into exile?
From what I saw – and felt – the Ukrainians have that critical “moral component” in war, and will fight even if not equipped: when we met volunteers queuing for the fight, many were disappointed to be turned away for lack of military experience – being told there were not enough guns.
Russian military actions are war crimes. Adml Chris Parry, a former director-general at the Ministry of Defence, argues that an important part of the world’s strategy should now be to shine a light on Putin’s innermost circle, his war cabinet of KGB/GRU
alumni: wealthy men for whom the collapse of the Soviet empire was the defining moment of their lives. As well as Putin, the names Patrushev, Bortnikov, Naryshkin and Shoigu must become infamous and synonymous with the words Nuremberg and The Hague.
The Americans brilliantly used the publication of secret intelligence to warn of the Russian preparations for
unprovoked offensive war. Perhaps now we should publish a few intercepted phone calls to leave these people in little doubt that, if they want liberty after Putin, this madness must stop. At the very least this might restrain the violence on the ground.
At some point, to end this violence, a “Golden Bridge” will need to be constructed for Putin to walk away without total loss of face. Hideously, the bridge may have to reflect the reality on the ground and dictate the freezing of territory taken.
It might include Nato addressing Putin’s fears – and Nato addressing its possible mistake in moving its border so much closer to Russia’s since the end of the Cold War.
This does not need to be forever. In 10 or 20 years Russians may tire of being held back by industrial levels of corruption, and want a bit of what Europe has. In the same time frame, Putin’s war cabinet – average age 68 – will be dead.