Every day brought a sense of serious, historic events and decisions that will not only decide who will win the biggest land war between two countries in Europe since World War II, but will shape the course of the rest of the 21st century. US President Joe Biden said on Thursday that two months of fighting in the war sparked by the unprovoked invasion of Russian President Vladimir Putin had brought the world to a critical juncture. “Throughout our history, we have learned that when dictators do not pay the price for their aggression, they cause more chaos and engage in more aggression,” Biden said. “They keep moving. And the costs, the threats to America and the world, keep rising. We can’t let that happen.” British Foreign Secretary Liz Trace was harsher: “Geopolitics is back.” Within days, a new awareness dawned in Washington, Europe, Kyiv and Moscow. The war is now turning into a long, bitter struggle, which is likely to cost thousands more lives and tens of billions of dollars. The US strategy is now clear and public – to weaken Russia to reduce its global threat. There are new signs of the Kremlin’s desire to eradicate Ukrainian culture by pulverizing eastern and southern cities. And Putin unleashed a new front – the energy war – as he cut off gas supplies to Bulgaria and Poland in what the EU quickly called “blackmail.” As these conflicting goals came to the fore, nuclear rhetoric intensified again, with Russia seeking to warn of the implied power of its vast arsenal and Washington trying to avoid a gradual cycle that could lead to an imminent collapse. . The massacre in Ukraine, meanwhile, continues. Heavy attacks and sieges of civilian areas foreshadowed Russia’s new offensive in the south and east – battles that could decide whether Ukraine survives as a nation. However, this week also brought the first signs that Russians accused of atrocities could face accountability. But the troubling fact that there is no credible diplomatic route to end the war was revealed when Russian missiles landed in Kyiv on Thursday, while UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was still in the city on a seemingly futile mission, which had begun in vain. week with tense talks with Putin.
A WAR THAT IS BEING PERFORMED
A visit to Kyiv by US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and Secretary of State Anthony Blinken on Sunday’s blackout set the stage for a week in which the West plunged deeper into what looks like a proxy war. Russia.
“We want to see Russia weakened to the point where it can not do what it did when it invaded Ukraine,” Austin said after returning from Poland. Blinken outlined a long-term future that should have competed with the powerful man in the Kremlin, saying there would be an independent, sovereign Ukraine “far more than there would be a Vladimir Putin.” The United States has backed its new strategic clarity by bringing together key global defense ministers in Germany and committing to monthly meetings to assess the government’s needs in Kyiv. These moves fueled a growing sense that the war in Ukraine would not end soon. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said on Thursday that the war could “last for months and years”. Tras, meanwhile, has called for expanded US and Western military assistance to protect against Russian expansion – calling for the arming of nations in the Western Balkans and the non-NATO states of Georgia and Moldova. Russia has responded to a tough Western strategy by taking its own steps to widen the fray of the conflict by cutting off gas exports to Poland and Bulgaria after refusing to participate in a sanctions program to pay their ruble bills. A further escalation of the energy war could bring Europe into recession. The catastrophic global effects of the war, meanwhile, were highlighted when the World Bank warned of the worst commodity shock in 50 years. Russia and Ukraine are major producers of coal, oil, gas and cooking oils, and the budgets of millions of people around the world are about to be hit. The possible failure of this summer’s harvest in Ukraine – a major source of wheat and corn for the world – could push food prices into a new inflationary spiral and fuel greater food insecurity. In the US, higher prices could have a big impact on the November midterm elections. Biden closed the week by reforming the world by revealing an emergency $ 33 billion request to Congress for weapons, financial support and humanitarian aid to Ukraine, warning: “The cost of this fight is not cheap.”
The President’s request stressed that the war in Ukraine is not just a decisive step of his government, but that the events of the last few days will provoke political, economic and geopolitical chain reactions that will be impossible to predict and difficult to control.
NUCLEAR SLAUGHTER
The strategic expansion of the war was accompanied by a new round of disturbing nuclear rhetoric from Moscow. While the occasional debate over the use of the world’s most dangerous weapons may have been designed to intimidate Western peoples, he nevertheless stressed the possibility of a catastrophic clash between the world’s two most powerful nuclear nations – the United States and Russia. will exist as long as the war lasts. Some US experts dismiss the harsh debate over Russia as a sign that Putin is frustrated with the failure to meet his strategic goals in Ukraine. But it also serves as a reminder to Western leaders that a massive arms injection into Ukraine could run counter to Putin’s hard-to-define red lines and cause a dangerous escalation. And there are fears that if pushed into a corner, Putin could develop one of Russia’s lesser-than-usual tactical nuclear weapons on the battlefield in Ukraine.
As the United States took a tougher line on the war – weakening Russia’s military power – Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov once again resorted to the well-known Russian tactic of talking about nuclear war, warning: “The danger is real and should not be. to underestimate it. “ For the United States, Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley told CNN that Russia should not launch such inflammatory rhetoric. He said it was “completely irresponsible” for any senior leader of a nuclear power to start “firing a nuclear sword”. But Putin was not listening. After many times dark warnings about the power of Russia’s nuclear arsenal at the beginning of the war, the Russian President was back in it. He said there would be a “lightning fast” response from Russia if other countries intervened in Ukraine. “We have all the tools for that – for which no one can brag. And we will not brag. We will use it if necessary. And I want everyone to know,” he told lawmakers in St. Petersburg. All of this led Biden to warn of the danger of such rhetoric. “No one should make unnecessary comments about the use of nuclear weapons or the need to use them,” Biden told the White House on Thursday. Bitter exchanges such as those between Russia and the United States have pushed relations between the two countries “in depth,” US Ambassador to Russia John Sullivan told CNN on Thursday.
SFERIO BECOMES WORSE
Russia’s attempt to take control of eastern and southern Ukraine and strangle the country by cutting off access to the Black Sea – – a new phase of Moscow’s war strategy after failing to occupy Kyiv – is intensifying. But one thing has not changed. The Ukrainian people bear the brunt of the horror as an expression of Putin’s determination and toughness. Russian soldiers are apparently also paying a heavy price for their leader’s obsession with Ukraine.
The Ukrainian military said on Thursday that Russian forces were firing heavily on several fronts. They are pursuing achievements in the Izium region of eastern Ukraine and are trying to move through the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. In another indication that the war could last much longer, a senior U.S. defense official said Russian forces were only making “slow and gradual” progress in the Donbas area, in part because of logistics and maintenance problems. But Russia’s attacks on civilians continue to provoke horrific carnage. Ivan Fedorov, the mayor of the city of Melitopol, warned this week that Putin’s forces wanted to “kill the entire Ukrainian nation.” Meanwhile, a CNN team toured the city of Kharkov in northeastern Ukraine, which is under constant Russian bombardment, and discovered a major disaster. A shocking new estimate from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees predicts that 8.3 million refugees are now expected to leave the country. By Monday, 5.2 million had already left. Putin’s harsh contempt for life is not limited to the Ukrainians who are the target of his weapons. British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said on Monday that about 15,000 Russian soldiers had been killed in Ukraine in just over two months. In another promising note, there were indications this week that the Russians could face some responsibility for obvious war crimes. A drone video verified and geographically located by CNN shows Russian vehicles on the streets near the bodies of civilians killed in Bucha, outside Kyiv. The evidence could help refute Russian denials that their troops cold-bloodedly executed Ukrainians. And Ukraine’s attorney general, Iryna Venediktova, said on Thursday that 10 Russian soldiers had been identified as allegedly involved in the torture of civilians in the city.
THE DIPLOMA IS COLD
The great diplomatic …
