Had the US wanted to deploy NATO forces to that crumbling former Soviet Republic, then it would have done so immediately after Zelensky asked to join NATO late last month or at least under the cover of G7 peacekeepers in response to his second related plea on Tuesday. Instead, the Ukrainian leader was made to look like a fool after begging for the same thing twice only to be rejected each time.
Zelensky’s been feeling pretty uncomfortable lately after NATO rejected his demand for immediate membership late last month following Novorossiya’s reunification with its historical Russian Motherland. He assumed that they’d swiftly accept his crumbling former Soviet Republic into that bloc, just like he also mistakenly thought that bombing the Crimean Bridge and threatening Belarus would somehow give his side a strategic edge over Russia. Following his latest miscalculations, the Ukrainian leader is now more desperate than ever for direct NATO protection, hence his latest disguised plea to the bloc.
He told the G7 during a virtual speech on Tuesday that they should deploy peacekeepers to his country’s northern border with Belarus. Just like his demand for immediate NATO membership was rejected, so too was his latest one, with that group’s joint statement not even dignifying him with a response. Biden also walked back his recent political fearmongering about the Armageddon on that exact same day, therefore suggesting an increased reluctance by that declining unipolar hegemon to get any more directly involved in the Ukrainian Conflict after Russia’s latest countrywide bombing campaign.
Nobody should interpret these developments as implying that America is preparing to hang Kiev out to dry, but just that it won’t proverbially let the “tail wag the dog”. Washington remains in full control of its proxy when it comes to determining its military-strategic decisions. For reasons that are likely related to the upcoming midterms early next month, the US doesn’t want to risk a war with Russia by miscalculation throughout the course of NATO’s proxy war on that newly restored world power via its neighbor.
For these reasons, it’s twice rejected Zelensky’s appeal for direct NATO support, both the first one that he openly made to that anti-Russian bloc as well as the second connected to deploying its forces to Ukraine’s northern border with Belarus under the cover of G7 peacekeepers. The divergent desires of proxy and patron in this respect might have come as a surprise for some, who assumed that they’re always on the same page about everything. That’s clearly not the case though as those two interconnected cases prove.
What’s happening is that Washington and Kiev are drifting a bit apart nowadays as the latter becomes more desperate in the face of Moscow’s muscular response to recent setbacks. The US knows that Russia means business and isn’t willing to put its own troops’ lives on the line, let alone its civilians’ in the worst-case scenario of a nuclear war between those two by miscalculation, just to save some Ukrainians from being thrown into the meatgrinder. Zelensky, however, seems to have believed his side’s own propaganda about the US’ so-called “unconditional support” to any extent that’s required.
The reality is that there are very clear lines to what the US will do, at least for the time being as proven by recent developments. Had it wanted to deploy NATO forces to that crumbling former Soviet Republic, then it would have done so immediately after Zelensky asked to join NATO late last month or at least under the cover of G7 peacekeepers in response to his second related plea on Tuesday. Instead, the Ukrainian leader was made to look like a fool after begging for the same thing twice only to be rejected each time.
I heard on NPR radio this morning something about a call for a UN peacekeeping force around the Zaporizhzhia NPP. What is going on here?
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Fe2PQVqaAAE0E6J?format=jpg