Growing Rift Over Further Arming Ukraine 'Jeopardizes EU Unity' - Report
© AFP 2023 / MIGUEL MEDINA
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Earlier, amid growing signs of waning support for funding Ukraine in several cash-strapped European capitals, Estonia’s Prime Minister Kaja Kallas used the platform of the Munich Security Conference to urge EU countries to supply Ukraine with weapons, no matter how depleted their own stockpiles might be.
There is a growing rift in Europe between the east and the west over continuing to aid the regime in Kiev, Bloomberg reported.
Germany, Spain, Italy, and others are being pressured to dip deeper into their own stocks of arms, regardless of the fact that propping up Ukraine has been exhausting their own defense capabilities.
Ukraine continues to fail on the battlefield, with the loss of its stronghold of Avdeyevka particularly painful for Kiev’s nationalists. Furthermore, Ukraine’s troops are also running critically low on stocks of artillery shells, feeding into the panicky sentiments gaining a foothold in diplomatic circles in countries that are staunch supporters of NATO’s proxy war against Russia. The latter are described as believing that once Moscow prevails in the Ukraine conflict, the entire “European integration project could be jeopardized,” with the aforementioned rift becoming “an indelible scar.”
Amid deepening fractures within the EU, governments in Western Europe “don’t understand that many in the east would never trust them again” if the Ukraine project fails, a top European official was cited warning. The West “doesn’t seem to get the urgency,” another official ostensibly said.
How to scrape together funds to prop up the Kiev regime while not letting the EU exhaust its own defense capabilities was one of the concerns at the Munich Security Conference last weekend. With countries like France eager to kick start Europe's own defense industry, as arming Ukraine has already resulted in depleted weapons and ammunition stocks, Eastern European countries are reportedly accusing the wealthier Western states of still not doing enough for Kiev.
Avdeyevka liberation: ‘Beginning of end of Ukrainian combat cohesion along entire front line’ – Scott Ritter
— Sputnik (@SputnikInt) February 21, 2024
Ukraine lost the battle for Avdeyevka for a number of reasons, but the most important is that they simply don't have the fire power necessary to stabilize the… pic.twitter.com/RThbbY55YS
After sending billions' worth of weapons to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s nationalist forces, the West is now facing a plethora of procurement problems. Last month, several EU leaders and officials admitted that a joint initiative to give Kiev the promised one million artillery rounds before the end of March 2024 would not make the deadline.
Furthermore, Eastern European countries are described as lamenting the procrastination over providing Ukraine with longer-range firepower.
Support for Ukraine is “looking fragmented,” the outlet underscored. It recalled that earlier in the week, EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs Josep Borrell was quoted as writing to ministers, urging to dig “further into your stock, where possible; placing orders by procuring on your own or – preferably – jointly from the European industry; buying ammunition immediately available on the market; or financing Ukrainian industry.”
However, countries such as France, Greece, and Cyprus are against dipping into EU funds to place orders with, for example, NATO ally Turkiye, according to cited sources.
19 February, 11:47 GMT
The Czech Republic's President Petr Pavel is reportedly ready to join forces with other proxy war hawks to source the ammunition. Last week, Estonia’s Prime Minister Kaja Kallas urged EU countries to supply Kiev with weapons no matter how drained their own stockpiles were, adding:
"Europe has done a lot and has to also do more. That is clear... I don’t see their warehouses, but if we, as a small country, still find things that we can send, I'm sure that the bigger countries also have things that they can give or send to Ukraine."
Earlier in February, the EU agreed on a €50 billion aid package for Ukraine. However, in the US, a foreign aid package that includes $60 billion for Ukraine is currently stuck in Congress. House Speaker Mike Johnson, highly critical of the bill, said that it failed to address outstanding border security issues. He pulled earlier scheduled votes on the bill, announcing a two-week recess until February 28.
Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski is also among the ranks of eager proponents of fueling the Ukraine crisis further by sending more aid to Zelensky’s regime.
In a sign of the growing resentment, one European official allegedly warned that their country would not purchase military hardware from France in the event that foot-dragging on aiding Ukraine results in a Russian victory. Procurements would instead be made from the US, UK, and Nordic nations, as “more trustworthy allies,” the unidentified individual stated.
The United States has transferred some $500,000 from illegally confiscated Russian assets to Estonia to provide assistance to Ukraine, the US Department of Justice said.
— Sputnik (@SputnikInt) February 17, 2024
The department claimed that the money will be used to restore the Ukrainian energy system.
One Eastern European NATO hawk fervidly pushing for greater aid to Ukraine is Lithuania.
“We cannot have half measures, we cannot be foot-dragging on this… This is the understanding in most of the Nordics and Baltics. This is the understanding in most of the eastern flank,” Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis was quoted as saying. He added:
“We could divert all the production that we have in the continent towards the military needs of Ukraine, we could pull up the resources so that we could be able to purchase even outside for the vital things that are needed in Ukraine such as ammunition if we’re unable to produce it ourselves… But the thing is that we cannot agree on that either.”
23 February, 22:32 GMT
