From the position of traditionally neutral Switzerland, how would you describe the Russian-Ukrainian war, how much struggles affect a peaceful Alpine country?
– besides for historical reasons, I am a staunch defender of Swiss neutrality. This means that we must strengthen our defence capabilities and that we will not participate in any war that is not directed against Switzerland. We do not engage in a policy of sanctions and we do not support any of the fighting parties. At the same time, we see that our government is increasingly abandoning this neutrality. The communicative of our media and the communication of our political strategy say: Putin is the devil, so the West, America, Europe, Switzerland must aid Ukraine fight the Kremlin monster. Standing on 1 side of the conflict is very dangerous for a country that considers itself neutral in terms of identity.
How would you qualify a war in Ukraine? 2 neighbouring countries, 2 erstwhile russian republics, America, the West or even the NATO War?
– I think this is simply a very complicated historical conflict, with many different aspects. fundamentally behind the war lies the deep crisis between 2 Slavic states, 2 erstwhile russian republics. Let us add to this the fact that another large powers, the United States, are supporting Ukraine in the fight with immense forces, i.e. it is indirectly active in conflict. The threat of war is aggravated by the fact that each side is convinced that she must win, only she can win. This applies to both the West and Ukrainians and Russians. The situation created thus creates an atmosphere akin to what it was during planet War I. Even then, each side was convinced that only he could be the winner. due to this atmosphere, we request to talk about peace. I'm an optimist after all. I must believe that the United States and the West may effort to find a political solution.
Why do you see why the West became so active in the war in Ukraine?
– It is in the interests of American power policy to support Ukraine militarily, to bring it closer to NATO and thus weaken or exert force on Russia. This is the tactics of the US's Cold War abroad policy, or weakening Russia, which can thus plunge into crisis, so that it will lose the position of a large power. Overly close European-Russian economical cooperation over the last decade has besides damaged American interests. These efforts are not fresh due to the fact that the plan was developed by the late Zbigniew Brzeziński, who was the chief advisor to US president Jimmy Carter for National safety from 1977 to 1981. He wrote "Big Chessboard", in which he stated, among others, that Russian influences in Ukraine should be prevented, Moscow weakened. Of course, the geopolitical strategy is besides accompanied by a material interest, the United States makes immense amounts of money in this war, transfers quite a few weapons to Ukraine, sells arms to Europe, and as a consequence of sanctions, America besides provides energy to Europe. This means that in addition to the fighting nations, Europe is the large loser in this conflict. The sanctions have not broken Russia, this strategy is not working. I personally do not believe that Russia can be defeated on the battlefield. So there can be no another solution, in my opinion, than peace. The safety interests of Russia must besides be taken into account in peace. The Americans made a large mistake ignoring Russian safety aspects after the Cold War ended. Putin repeatedly repeated over the past 15 years that Ukraine is simply a red line, if the West tries to subdue Ukraine, it will lead to war. To the Russians, Ukraine is like Cuba to America during the Cold War. But Kennedy and Khrushchev negotiated with each another to avoid atomic warfare. The thing is, Biden won't negociate with Putin, which creates a very dangerous situation. A change of head is needed as shortly as possible. Peace must be contained by political means...
The old continent for a long time did not care about military development, created a planet of dreams built on illusions. erstwhile Trump arrived in Europe, he said that people here should spend more money on the improvement of the armed forces due to the fact that Putin is like Siberian winter, comes suddenly, it takes quite a few time and it is very cold. Europe must wake up. Putin himself is reality. An aggressive attack by the Russian president a year ago caused panic in Europe. Many people felt that they were not safe due to the fact that their country, their army, was weak. Putin's war put an end to the optimism of the West, and many thought that European civilization could besides end, so we must return to a policy of common sense and have a strong army.
You say Putin should be negotiated. But who should negociate with Putin? United States, NATO, EU or Ukrainians? If America or 2 another global organizations were negotiating with Putin, they would think they were part of the war, as they are. Is that inactive a real scenario?
Europeans say we did not want this war. But Europe's prestige is very low compared to Russia and the United States, which act like an elephant in a porcelain store. The West cannot negociate with Putin over Ukrainian heads. The situation is not simple at all. Let us remember that there has been a civilian war in Ukraine for 8 years, since 2014. About 14,000 people, native Russian-speaking residents, died in Donbasa. This has been completely ignored by Western media. During this time, the West said it wanted to make peace through the Minsk agreements. Now, how do those who were in power declare? erstwhile German Chancellor Angela Merkel, erstwhile French president Francois Hollande, erstwhile Ukrainian chief of state Petro Poroshenko: we never truly wanted to make peace with Russia, we just wanted to buy time to modernise and prepare the Ukrainian army. And they did it all in public. We were deceived and betrayed. Who would negociate with those countries whose leaders lied? Who'll trust them then? That's a very hard question. I hope that reality will prevail over ideology. As long as Trump was president of the United States, the chances of peace were high. I truly believe that if Trump had returned to the White House, the chances of peace would have been much greater. Trump would have the strength to negociate with Putin.
Behind: Magyar Hirlpap
photo public domain
Roger Köppel is simply a associate of the Swiss Parliament and editor-in-chief of the conservative weekly Die Weltwoche
