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Ukrainian president visited the US. Met Biden. Met Harris. Met Trump. But did he met his own goals?
The topic was discussed in an interview in UATV English with former British civil servant & advisor to the Foreign Minister of Ukraine Cormac Smith.
— So Zelenskyy visit United, the United States. That’s my first question. Emed Biden, Eman Trump, did he met his goals, you think? What do you think?
— You know, Henry, I’ve been, I’ve been talking about this over the last 24 hours with a number of friends, both in kievan, in some ukrainian embassies and also here in London. None of us can be too clear. It was without doubt, it was a very, very difficult trip for President Zelenskyy to make, and one that I will just say I think he carried out with the greatest of dignity, especially what must have been a very difficult meeting with the former President Trump.
Look, there were a number of things that I noted, and one was Joe Biden for the first time that I can remember using the phrase for Ukraine to win and saying that he would put that in the last four months of his administration, he wanted to put Ukraine in a place to win this war.
Now, he also, and you’ll excuse me if I read, because there’s a, if you’ve not read it, he released a statement from the White House and he talked about enhancing Ukraine’s long-range strike capabilities. I have decided to provide Ukraine with joint standoff weapons, long-range munition. Now, it’s not very clear what that means. You and I would hope that that means Atacams and also that he would have agreed with his British allies, Keir Starmer, to allow the Brits, to allow Ukraine to use Storm Shadow and also the French Scalp. There has been no announcement. And indeed, this is what I have expected and my friends have expected that there would be no announcement.
So I think what we are very much hoping for, and this is where I am at the moment, that there will have been, I hope there has been quiet permission to use at least storm shadow and maybe scalp, but certainly not to announce it. I have got to say, regardless of those words in President Biden’s statement, I am less hopeful on the permission to use atacams deep inside Russia.
— Well, if we talk in winning terms, in victory plan terms. So victory plan, like it seems to me, Cormac, like everyone has it, Brazil has it, China has a victory plan for Ukraine. Both Brazil and China has their joint venture of plans, whatever is the plan. So solely Ukraine has a legit right to choose what to call a victory, but can the west force Zelenskyy to call a victory what he considers, let’s say, put it mildly, not so much a victory, do you think?
— I don’t think the west can force ZelensKyy or more importantly, the ukrainian people to do anything, but it’s very easy for me to pontificate from my safe, comfortable home in London. I have a huge belief in the ukrainian people and I have believed that the ukrainian people, no matter what, will find a way to win. That will be. And, you know, we talk about victory. Well, there can be. I had this discussion the other day on another channel.
There can be only one just victory. And let’s be clear, that’s back to 1991 borders. There is absolutely no justification for what Russia has done, invading Donbas and annexing Crime, annexing Crimea in 2014 and the carnage they have caused.
So that is, that can be the only just victory. What we will see later on, we still have not heard the details of President Zelensky’s peace plan. We do know. What we do know is that it is about demonstrating to Putin that he simply does not have a path to victory. And this presumably in any negotiations, I would say next year at this stage, I can’t see negotiations happening this year before the us presidential elections. It’s about putting Ukraine in a stronger position.
But, you know, no matter how wise I try to be, I find myself being maximalist on this. There is, Russia has no right to hang on to 1 ukrainian land and they must be made pay some sort of reparations for the carnage and suffering.
— The world could always find, if not just and a justified reason to try to force Ukraine to make some concessions, you know? Well, take a look at the UN Security Council. I mean, these gents were looking for security while Russia was presiding over it. So, you know, nothing is clear. None of it is clear to me.
— Well, you know, we have had Joe Biden saying very clearly that he will do everything in his power by the end of his term to put Ukraine in a position to win. That is significant, I think, because the first time a major western leader has talked about Ukraine winning and not this absolute rubbish for as long as it takes. So that I noted, and I noted it as significant, it is really unfortunate that the american elections on the, is it the 5 November are fast approaching. And look, I’ve had people telling me for a year and a half, two years, oh, what Donald Trump says and what he will do in power will be very different.
What Donald Trump says and what he will do in power will be exactly the same. We need to, you know, obviously President Zelenskyy can’t mouth anything, but we need to really hope that Donald Trump does nothing, gain power because it will be very, very bad news for Ukraine. I’ve been saying this from the very beginning of this year, and it’ll also be bad news for Europe and the rest of us in the west.
— Do you believe, anyway, that Trump was forced to meet Zelenskyy because his ratings were down in a swinging state, whatever that means?
— No, I believe actually it was more of a trap for President Zelenskyy and one that I don’t think he had any choice but to attend. He had to, and he had to stand and listen to former President Trump lie and, you know, say some of the most outrageous things. And he had to, and, you know, he had to do so with, he had to do so with dignity.
I think if he had refused, I think if he had not met with Trump or refused to meet Trump, that Trump would have sought to have turned that even more to his advantage and to motivate the pro Kremlin, anti ukrainian part of the GOP, of which there is a significant number to say, look, I’m most likely going to be the next president of the United States and he wouldn’t even meet with me.
So I don’t think that President Zelenskyy had any choice. I think it was the most excruciating, difficult meeting for him to have to have. I think he did the right thing and I think the best he could have done. I think he comported himself with dignity, and that is all that can be said. This was an incredible, incredibly difficult trip for Volodymyr Zelenskyy. There is no answer yet on his peace plan. They are taking that away. There is no answer yet on the long range permissions and the other things. There is, however, a very very significant commitment of some,
I think, 26 billion of further us military aid to be drawn down immediately. So there are positives there. There’s no doubt about that. And we hear, for example, there’s another patriot battery and ammunition for that, which is going to be vital coming into the winter months when we know that Russia is going to press home its attack on civilian infrastructure and on Ukraine’s power infrastructure in particular. So, you know, talking to my diplomatic friends, they see the positives that have come out of this. There is still talk around the peace plan, and we have not heard the word no to the long range permissions. I’ve told you what I think the best of my judgment. I think that we may see silent permission given for the british storm shadow, unless I’m less confident for Atacams.
— If the west won’t allow Ukraine to use its weapons and defend itself from russian aggression right now, then the west would inevitably end up doing the same thing on its own in a way bigger war. Do you agree on that?
— I agree absolutely. And I think I’ve even said to you before, but I said on another channel earlier this week, it’s very simple. Twelve words. It’s our money and guns today or our daughters and sons tomorrow. And, you know, if history as thought is one thing, its appeasement and cowardice does not work. And again, weve seen the latest bluff from Putin saying that he is rewriting his nuclear doctrine, which already said if the motherland was invaded, they would use nuclear weapons.
I dont believe he will resort to nuclear weapons. And a lot of people I speak to who are far more experienced than I, both ex military men and ex diplomats, do not believe and have never believed that he would use it. But it does seem that this puts the frighteners on a lot of western leaders.
But, of course, the other thing that we cannot underestimate, and I’ve got to say I have sympathy for the Biden administration, is they’re coming up to one of the most critical and closely fought elections in us history. And this is an election which will have grave consequences, not just for the United States, I believe, but for the free world and certainly for us in Europe as well as Ukraine.
And I think, you know, I can’t second guess the advisors around Joe Biden. But I think they will be, they will be placing their feet very, very carefully in terms of how they think any decision, decision or statement is going to reflect on the chances of a democratic president winning in November.
And that is something. As much as I’ve been frustrated with Joe Biden and I’ve been hugely frustrated with Jake Sullivan, that is something that I find myself having some sympathy for. It’s a very, very difficult situation they find themselves in. But, you know, we should have, I mean, how ridiculous is it that they are almost, that the western leaders are almost protecting, you know, russian airfields and missile bases? More exactly, they are protecting ukrainian hospitals. We know another hospital was hit only two days ago and a number of people killed and energy infrastructure and other civilian targets.
— But Cormac, how quickly Jake Sullivan changes. It’s not the change of heart anyway, but that’s the change of language. When Zelenskyy visited a plant in Pennsylvania. Well, he’s just not, he’s frustrated. He’s so worried that whatever it was like undermining a campaign or whatever he said. So it looks like anyone has an influence on United States elections, Putin, Zelenskyy, everyone. But just Jake Sullivan doesn’t know about that. So I’m not sure where the west is going with his talks of escalation, but that’s the topic that we can talk, like, forever, you know, because it seems to me, and to you, I know it for sure, that appeasing the monster only leads to more monstrosity. That’s it. As simple as that.
— Well, can we remember, and I always quoted, can we remember what Winston Churchill said, that appeasers are the ones who feed crocodiles hoping they will be eaten?
Putin cares nothing for diplomacy or the rules based order or the right or wrong way to do things. He is set on might makes right.
And if we do not ensure that Ukraine can defeat Putin, which Ukraine can, if we give them the weapons they need and take the handcuffs off, this is a wolf that is already at our door, but is going to do a lot of damage in our house.
And it will make the point that indeed a point in history that we thought we left behind. And when I was studying history in secondary school and politics and economics in university in the 1980s, I believed that these were things that we were reading in the history books from the second world war and so forth. This is bringing right back to us the fact that what’s on the line is, does, might make right. You and I don’t want to live in a world where might makes right.
But if Putin is allowed win, that is the doctrine which rises up again. I’ve been trying to articulate for well over a year since, almost since I’ve been speaking to you, the greater threat, not only the threat to Ukraine, but even, and many don’t, we don’t care about Ukraine and care sufficiently about Ukraine, how this is actually in all of our interest. And people seem to have, both citizens and leaders seem to, it seems to be a mixture of having their heads buried in the sand and I’ve got to say, cowardice, moral cowardice.
— The last question for today, second peace summit. Do you believe Russia will attend? It will be present there in any form in any way?
— I really don’t know. It depends on what Russia sees in its interest. I don’t expect that Russia will enter any peace summit in good honour, no doubt about that. Every single agreement that Russia has ever made with Ukraine, or to do with Ukraine, from the Budapest memorandum to the Helsinki final act and many others, they have broken and they have spat on.
So, I mean, I think, you know, I go back and I am, to an extent, at the moment, I’m trying to be positive. And when I speak to some of my ukrainian friends, I say, look, it’s my job to be optimistic, to put forward as positive a view about Ukraine as I can. So I cling to straws and I cling to the straw of Biden using, I think for the first time, the words that, you know, for Ukraine to win and putting Ukraine in a position, using his last four months to put Ukraine in a position to win this and to demonstrate to Putin that there is no path to victory.
But the other thing that I look to is Ukraine, because I said Ukraine will find a way to win. And I believe that with all my heart. But, you know, Ukraine has made great steps to developing its own arms industry, and we know that there are deals going on with western partners to aid that. And we see increasingly that despite the prohibition on using western supplied long range missiles, that Ukraine is using its own drones and missiles to hit. You know, only last week was it, or earlier on this week, we saw a Munich missions dump with an estimated three months worth of artillery shells. That was some fireworks shell, wasn’t it? So, you know, Ukraine is having a lot of battlefield success.
We risk grabbing defeat from the jaws of victory. It is probably time to put the boot in if we have the moral courage in the west.
No Ukrainian is asking for a drop of our blood. As Oleksii Reznikov said back in 2021, we don’t want your boots on the ground. Give us the weapons we need. We’ll do our own fighting, for God’s sake. I believe Ukraine will find a way to win.
Read also: Ukraine needs more military capabilities. Interview with Paul Smith
