Swimming in Strange Water
Russia, Ukraine, Europe and the US
There’s a quote that’s attributed to Lenin that we all know. “There are decades where nothing happens, and there are weeks you go shopping…” or was that Gucci Mane? Either way, this was one of those weeks. For better or worse, the world as we know it will never be the same.
The Catalyst
I was passively listening to a YouTube video once as I swept my kitchen floor. The narrator was saying something along the lines of “What if the reason we haven’t seen aliens is because the universe is more predatory than we think? This would mean the best way to survive is to be as quiet as possible, because there are beings out there that are unimaginably dangerous.” That thought gave me pause because it makes complete sense and it’s in line with what we know about nature.
The saga kicked off last week with U.S. Vice President JD Vance giving a historic speech to European leaders at the Munich Security Conference. Vance had many criticisms for different countries, including Romania’s constitutional court annulling the first round of their presidential elections due to alleged Russian interference. “If your democracy can be destroyed with a few hundred thousand dollars of digital advertising from a foreign country, then it wasn’t very strong to begin with,” Vance said. This obviously angered the European leaders because, from their perspective, they’re probably thinking, “Why does this guy with relatively zero political experience think he can tell us what to do?” From Romania’s perspective, this message was coming from a guy whose administration claims one of their previous elections was stolen to this day. Essentially the pot calling the kettle black. This speech and a previous one from US secretary of defense Peter Hegseth made Europe question their dependence on US security. Some even questioned if the US would respond to a NATO article 5.
This set the tone for the first face-to-face meeting on Tuesday afternoon between the Trump administration and Russian officials. This meeting lasted four hours and did not include any Ukrainian or European representatives.
Later that day at a press conference at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, U.S. President Trump shocked the world. He claimed the President of Ukraine was at 4% approval and should hold elections if he wants a seat at the table. Due to the war, Ukraine is under martial law. Ukrainian law prohibits elections when the country is under martial law. A common Russian propaganda technique over the past two years is continuously asking why Ukraine is not having elections. They already know the answer, but their goal is to trick people into thinking Ukraine doesn’t have a democracy. When Trump repeated these talking points, it sent a shock through the world.
But wait, there’s more.
Trump also claimed that Ukraine should have never started the war and should have made a deal.
The deal that was offered to the U.S. by the Russians was along the lines of a veto on future NATO membership for Ukraine, the removal of U.S. nuclear weapons from Europe, and the withdrawal of NATO from Poland and from the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. Obviously, this was not a good faith attempt to make a deal, and the U.S. rejected all of it.
After these statements from Trump, social media was set ablaze. Why is the leader of the free world repeating Russian talking points?
The First Law
After all of Trump’s comments, we figured out that allegedly on Feb. 12, his administration offered Zelenskyy a deal where Ukraine would provide the U.S. with 50% of the revenue (up to $500 billion?) from some of its minerals, oil, gas, ports, and more, to pay for the aid they received over the past three years. The U.S. draft didn’t include any security guarantees for Ukraine. Zelenskyy declined the deal and allegedly sent a revised proposal to the U.S., but they also declined it.
Ukraine is now in an interesting position: the party that’s supposed to be negotiating peace on its behalf is now being predatory towards it and repeating its adversary’s talking points.
Trust between the two parties has eroded, and when trust is gone, negotiating anything is difficult, if not outright impossible. If your lawyer started to use your opposition’s arguments against you in a courtroom, would you allow him to continue representing your interests?
Ukraine finds itself between two mob bosses and the question is survival.
European leaders are now scrambling to save the situation. Poland, France, and the UK are set to meet with Trump next week. Unfortunately, I believe the situation has passed the point of no return.
The 38th Parallel
Why are the Europeans and the West as a whole so worried? One is security, especially for eastern European countries. If Russia takes over Ukraine, there’s a fear that they will move on to conquering other countries. Two is ideology. In the Cold War, the U.S. fought all over the globe, including Korea and Vietnam, to stop the spread of communism. After decades of fighting and intense competition, the Soviet Union collapsed and Democracy won. This war is also seen as a battle of ideologies, democratic countries teamed together to help Ukraine win against a larger autocratic regime. Countries all over Africa have fallen to autocrats over the past few years. Will democracy win this one, or is it the era of autocracy?
If democracy is this weak and can’t win, why even have it?