Circus

Amidst the absolute chaos of a Witkoff-stamped Russian psyop-as-peace plan, discussion is filled with anger at Washington and at Moscow. But the one actor that escapes the level of outrage it actually deserves is Europe. Europe has the most to lose (barring Ukraine), the most responsibility, and the fewest excuses. Yet it has chosen paralysis while others determine the fate of our continent.

The original Dmitriev proposal read like a boorishly obvious trap designed to weaken Ukraine and prepare for a future war. Yet even that awfulness wasn’t enough to garner ringing endorsements from the Kremlin. Putin eventually mustered up a bit of unconvincing enthusiasm. Russian telegram muttered about betrayal and ‘goals of the SMO’. Since then, Ukraine and the US Secretary of State have decidedly altered the plan. So I imagine the next step is for Russia to reject it.

All of which is useful insofar as it solves the immediate problem of this dreadful plan. But it still leaves us with an ever more pressing issue: how to agree a ceasefire that Ukraine really does need. Instead of seriously engaging with that question, the Europeans produced a counter proposal so weightless it might as well have been crowdsourced on social media. Although that is unfair, “Russia should just leave Ukraine though” is at least internally consistent as a position. Insisting on Ukrainian sovereignty and then saying Russia should be able to impose an ‘800,000’ troops limit and not ‘600,000’ is just bizarre. Europe is not behaving like a serious geopolitical actor.

By the middle of 2023, the signs were already clear that the war was developing according to a difficult trajectory. I remember privately raising questions about what a Ukrainian defeat would mean for Europe. Admittedly, I was doing it because I hoped that by examining the consequences, European leaders would change their approach. I still hope that.

Back then, those conversations were often dismissed or treated as a kind of political contamination. Policymakers preferred to congratulate themselves for proving Russia wrong about Western fickleness. But Russia was right: Western resolve was exactly as fragile as Moscow believed. Bluntly, even in 2022 we only supported Ukrainians because they fought like heroes from Norse myth and got results. We didn’t support them because it was the morally right thing to do.

In the interim, I have struggled to find any deep and serious internal government work on what happens if Ukraine loses. Instead, everyone is busy playing fantasy ceasefire, sometimes with even more absurd questions about ‘post-Ukraine Russia’.

Like me, European officials are very good at complaining. They complain about Washington. They complain about Kyiv. They complain about each other. But complaint is not policy. Action is.

Europe refuses to use frozen Russian assets. It refuses to commit to sustained mass-scale financing for Ukrainian defence production. It refuses to engage with viable plans like even a partial SkyShield. It refuses to confront the political costs of real support. The so-called coalition of the willing is willing to do absolutely nothing of any importance. Defence budgets rise in theory and get spent on nonsense we can only pray will work. Meanwhile, Ukrainian factories - or those unlucky enough not to be fuelling the rampant corruption around the Office of the President - live hand to mouth. There is continual battlefield innovation that is never scaled, or is scaled only in Russia. Europe needs to deliver massive R&D investments into the only country that knows how to fight: Ukraine.

Unfortunately, wars aren’t won by issuing statements of concern.

Europe is a spectator to its own security

Ukraine desperately needs a ceasefire, but not the ones Russia (via Witkoff or not) is offering. The country is exhausted; manpower is worryingly low; trust in military administration (as opposed to the heroes fighting) is thin. Everyone hates the Territorial Recruitment Centres that take men from the street. Kyiv’s internal problems, including serious alleged and proven corruption around the Office of the President, make the situation harder. These are all the more reason Europe must step up and apply some muscle, not step back.

Meanwhile, Washington is an embarrassing circus. Nobody knows what is going on and Floridian realtors rewrite treaties and thirty-year-long security architectures via the Google Translate function. I have had sympathy for European efforts to court Trump on the assumption that they were buying much-needed time (admittedly after a good decade and a half of ignoring U.S. presidents telling us they were pivoting from Europe) to develop and implement a strategy. In fairness, there are sprouting signs of strategy but that isn’t enough. Too much, including PURL has largely been reactive to the U.S.’ whims. Nobody believes in their own charm as much as a Western European diplomat so perhaps some officials really thought they might win the U.S. around. For the rest, it is probably a more basic case of avoidance dressed up as diplomacy.

In their talks with Secretary Rubio, the Ukrainians didn’t bother discussing the European counter plan. And why should they? Europe has allowed itself to be sidelined to the point where its own security is now being negotiated without it.

A better plan is possible, of course, one that protects Ukrainian sovereignty and European security. But it requires Europe to pay actual costs, political, financial, and strategic, and Europe is not willing to do that, or not enough European leaders are. Too many European governments still behave as if losing Ukraine would be unfortunate but manageable. This is fantasy. The destruction of Ukraine would reshape Europe’s security architecture for decades, and not in Europe’s favour.

Nothing about Europe’s position today was inevitable. It is the product of decisions not taken, responsibilities avoided, and illusions clung to for too long. It is the product of arrogance, of not realising Ukraine is the only security guarantee this continent has, and of a bizarre teleological liberalism that sees liberal democracy has somehow feted to win out according to the laws of history.

If Europe continues down this path, a settlement will eventually be imposed that reflects the interests of Putin and whichever Americans happen to be influential at that moment. Europe will then complain loudly and indignantly, as if it played no part in the outcome.

We do not need more European complaints. Europe’s problem is not that it lacks options. It is that it refuses to use them.