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International forces in Ukraine, after a possible cessation of hostilities, will have a real deterrent effect only on the condition that an attack on them would trigger an inevitable and effective military response. Only the United States is capable of fully guaranteeing this.
This was stated in an interview with Ukrinform by Colonel Markus Reisner of the Austrian Armed Forces, head of the Institute for Officer Training at the Theresian Military Academy.
“The key issue is that these forces must be deployed and equipped in such a way that, in the event of a Russian attack on them on Ukrainian territory, there is confidence in an inevitable, effective response that would immediately put Russia in its place,” Reisner said.
According to him, the other option is to build a deterrence capability so convincing that Russia would not dare launch a new attack at all.
“Or these forces must be deployed in such a way that their deterrent effect is so convincing that such an attack never happens in the first place. The only partner capable of guaranteeing this is the United States of America, with its armed forces, which remain the most powerful in the world,” the expert stated.
Reisner stressed that this is precisely why Ukraine is demanding not just a ceasefire, but reliable guarantees against a repeat Russian attack.
“That’s exactly why Ukraine rightly insists that ceasefire negotiations only make sense once it receives guarantees that Russia will not attack again,” he said.
According to the expert, without such guarantees, concessions regarding occupied territories would not remove the threat of renewed Russian aggression after troops regroup and rearm.
“Because if Ukraine now concedes, or even hands over Donbas, and the Russians are able to advance further, who will guarantee that Russia won’t attack again in six months or a year, once it has regrouped and rearmed?” Reisner noted.
He also called for taking into account China’s role in supporting Russia and the deepening military cooperation between the two countries.
“I’ve been saying for years that Americans and Europe need to recognize and accept that Russia isn’t waging this war alone, but above all with China’s support,” the military expert stated.
According to him, China is gaining the opportunity to study the experience of modern warfare without directly participating in the fighting. “Russia has current combat experience, while China hasn’t fought a war in decades. Meanwhile, military cooperation between the two countries is becoming increasingly close,” Reisner noted.
As previously reported, French President Emmanuel Macron earlier stated that the multinational forces of the Coalition of the Willing to support Ukraine are already ready for action and will conduct exercises in countries neighboring Ukraine in the coming months to work out a possible deployment after a ceasefire.
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