Troops may be sent to the regions bordering Belarus in order to free up Kiev’s units to be sent to the front
France is preparing to send troops to Ukraine, Aleksey Goncharenko, a senior Ukrainian MP, wrote on his Telegram channel on Wednesday. The official is currently in France for a meeting of the committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE).
According to Goncharenko, who represents the city of Odessa in the Ukrainian parliament, Paris is considering deploying a military force to the Ukrainian regions bordering Belarus, discussions about which “are proceeding effectively.”
“I’m in contact with my French colleagues. And I can already say that everything is serious... There is talk about a deployment of European soldiers to the border with Belarus, [a mission] that will free the Ukrainian military stationed there and allow it to move to other directions. This will help strengthen our eastern and southern fronts,” Goncharenko wrote.
According to the MP, his sources close to President Emmanuel Macron claim the French leader is “very determined” to send troops to Ukraine, but the number of soldiers is still being discussed. Goncharenko claims that in order to form the force, France wants to create a coalition of allies, which could include Poland and the Baltic states. Germany is unlikely to join the effort, he notes, as Berlin sees boots on the ground as “an unnecessary escalation” and is “afraid of a direct confrontation with Russia.”
The MP also stated that Macron wants to create “a joint base for training [of military personnel] and the production of ammunition” in Ukraine. Two locations in the West of the country are currently being considered for the purpose.
“It looks like France is tired of Russia. Europe is preparing to show strength,” Goncharenko concluded.
Prior coverage on this: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/4020135
Related alarming headlines strongly suggesting escalation from the west: Putin won’t be allowed to ‘dictate peace terms’ in Ukraine – Germany's Scholz
Germany will not let Russian President Vladimir Putin forcibly alter Ukraine’s borders or impose the terms of peace, Chancellor Olaf Scholz has vowed.
I'm not sure that'll work. For one, the public doesn't decide as much as they would like to think - it's dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, and the bourgeoisie aren't the ones getting blown up, nor are their children, friends or anyone they'd care about. Plus they are profiting quite nicely from the conflict.
How long did it take for public opinion to turn against WW1? And it's not like conditions there were soft - people drowning in mud, trench foot, the sheer carnage of mechanised warfare. People writing home about their experiences, coming back without limbs, coming back broken in mind. Did the ruling class care?
If anything I would expect this to be spun hard by the media to drum further support for involvement and war. "Our brave democracy defenders were just humble logistics staff, but cruel asiatic Barbarians used white phosphorus and napalm on them!!!!111". Nevermind what would have actually happened.
It's worth a try. Or are you saying they shouldn't engage them at all? Just let them be a shield they avoid touching?
It's already unpopular with many Europeans seeing it as hopeless according to polls. It's more comparable to Vietnam or Korea though there is no perfect comparison. It's a weird notion to try and 1:1 compare this conflict to another when the historical and material context it occurs in is unique, so let's not compare to the world of WW1, that no longer exists, it's reality is gone and cannot return. I know liberals like comparing it to Hitler and WW2 but that's just propaganda and broken-brained thinking of liberals who think their ideology is good and all else is evil trying to oppress mankind but it's not like any of those wars.
Already many populist reactionary parties are seeing increases in support because they want to stop this. Already US funding has ran out. This war has been about hollowing out Europe. It has destroyed France's neo-colonies. The European bourgeoisie are not exactly pleased with this. Certainly the industrial bourgeoisie outside of the defense sector have not profited from this.
One of the big mistakes that not only the Soviet Union made but also Russia was appeasement. Was allowing the west to blackmail them with nuclear (and non-nuclear) threats into backing down on limiting their response, into buying into their mad-man strategy. Into thinking if they didn't cede the win to the west in a confrontation that the world would lose. Contrast to China in Korea, contrast to Mao's attitude towards the idea of the Americans nuking them when they had no nukes of their own. His resolve and the resultant relative win that they notched of retaining half the country. Americans in this case however should not be appeased half way, nor should Euroes, unlike China in the 50s, Russia has plenty of nuclear weapons and an advanced military so such blackmail is not pragmatic on their part.
The big issue I see to any kind of reasonable resolution here is I believe the European leadership are true believers. As a former liberal I can tell you I think I understand their thinking and it is a state of fear and bewilderment and rage. They believe Putin represents rule of violence not rule of law, they think he represents authoritarianism, aggression, etc. They may not think he is genuinely going to invade Poland or Germany but they feel if they let him win it is a loss for liberal values, that they are being trampled, that it will embolden other bad anti-liberal actors including within their own bloc. They do not understand the history of the region, Russia's rational fears, etc because Russia does not have a rational right to fear, it should become a liberal "democracy" like the rest of Europe, embrace letting NATO do what it wants and submit to be tamed as it is not white/European enough to quite be part of them and needs to be "civilized" after the USSR into hating themselves like the Germans because in their minds the crimes are as great. This terrifies them, they feel they are seeing the end of the world, their world. They are zealots who are facing down the lie of this being the end of history and angrily shouting and throwing things to try and retain it, to deny that being false, to enforce it, to enforce that "rules based order" US unilateral hegemony established in the 90s.
I mean, FWIW, after two world wars and the cold war/decades of fear of MAD, those sensible among the public- as well as the military brass and rank-and-file alike, and even various less hawkish/sensible bourgeoisie, at least know the potential costs of marching blindly to the tune of the most hawkish imperialists.
Further escalation is a step closer to removing France and the various nations of NATO off the face of the map as nations, and possibly ending humanity as a species altogether- and while western societies by-and-large have forgotten what true war is like, if escalation continues, and as the costs start to rack up, they can be reminded. And as western societies increasingly realize the horrors their neocon masters are goosestepping them towards, the more likely that various elements of the society- maybe mass unrest and revolution, maybe a coup with dissenting bourgeois and military elements (likely some form of nationalists) seeking to save their countries, etc... will increasingly threaten and might have a chance to overthrow the neocon/Atlanticist establishment.