German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron told Ukrainian President Vodlymyr Zelensky that he should start thinking about peace talks with Moscow, The Wall Street Journal reported.
The message was delivered to Zelensky when he had dinner with Scholz and Macron in Paris earlier this month. According to people familiar with the meeting, they told Zelensky that even mortal enemies like France and Germany had to make peace after World War II.
Unlike most Western leaders, Scholz and Macron maintained contact with Russian President Vladimir Putin throughout the war. Macron has repeatedly discussed the idea of a peace deal with Russia that would have to take into account Moscow’s concerns, although he’s still calling for a Ukrainian offensive to retake more territory.
“What we need now is for Ukraine to launch a military offensive which pushes back the Russian front in order to open the way for a return to negotiations,” Macron said at the Munich Security Conference.
The Journal report said that while France and Germany favor the idea of peace talks, they also support a British-proposed plan that would significantly deepen Western military cooperation with a post-war Ukraine. British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak presented the blueprint for an agreement this week that would give Kyiv access to more advanced NATO equipment.
The idea of the agreement would be to build up Ukraine’s military after the war as a deterrence to a future Russian invasion instead of providing Kyiv with a war guarantee like NATO’s Article 5.
The UK has been more hawkish than France and Germany, but the Journal report said Sunak backs the idea of the deal being used to incentivize Ukraine to go to the negotiating table. He wants the plan on the agenda at a NATO meeting in July and hopes Ukraine can recapture territory before then.
Sunak’s plan would guarantee that Ukraine would continue receiving military aid and training after the war, and the British are open to sending fighter jets to Kyiv, which could be a non-starter for talks with Moscow. Putin and other Russian officials have said that the more advanced and the longer the range of weapons the West sends into Ukraine, the more territory they will try to take.
I remember Zelinsky campaigned on a Peace platform only to toss the baby out with the bathwater.
I also remember that Vlad had a little viz a viz with Emanuel before the entire shebang launched us all dangerously close to MAD – Perhaps he had something on Macron that would make Biden’s penchant for sniffing look positively pale in comparison – I know that Macron also likes to sniff however it’s not hair.
Ok peace talks are all good and that’s what should be happening right now instead of sending weapons and funds which are only ever going to prolong this made in USA conflict while simultaneously lining the pockets of the effing financial elite.
Warmongering and war profiteering ought to be a crime – in some countries it is while in others it isn’t this is how the Neocons of this world are able to make a career out of provoking conflicts…. and then get the kick backs.
So while the majority of our so called politicians are made from rubber and therefore spineless they ought to bend over just as easily to the masses demanding that they stop playing with our lives instead of catering to the rich and powerful aka the cabal of the financial elite.
The “masses” are too enamored with their cellphones, video games, watching non-journalism feed them news they want to hear, NFL football (flyovers to dazzle the eyes). Just look at the attendance at the Rage Against War. The United States of Amnesia is what we are.
I think of how the German people during the 2nd ww were for the majority utterly brainwashed and simply had no idea that what they were supporting was completely evil and sadistic.
Compare that with what’s being fed to the masses in the US today via the MSM and there’s not much difference.
Quote by William Casey comes to mind, I harbor a feeling that you know which one.
So have you ever read this article?
[21 Century – Rogue Foreign Policy: ‘From Nazis to Neocons’]
It might be interesting….
Other than the Western press repeating the press releases of the security services of the US/EU that Putin planned to take the entire country, it appears that his Spring “offensive” is more of one to consolidate his gains and insert enough troops to occupy and control what he controls now.
I know this will upset Biden’s and the Democrats’ plans to run a war campaign (if you want to Joe to do appearences and talk to reporters you are in league with Putin or a racist) but what will they do once Putin announces he’s accomplished what he wanted (not what we are told he wants; that crap is just war propaganda)?
He announces, “it’s over”, he wants to talk and China starts dangling huge amounts of rebuilding money as an insentive/bribes?
It also seems to be a plan for attrition, like the original German plan for the Verdun campaign as an example. It is chewing up the remaining forces of Ukraine. What comes after that? Probably even Putin has left crossing that bridge until reached.
That war is old school East European warfare at its worst. I even doubt Putin actually was trying to truly take Kiev. It sure seemed it was a action to move troops away from the area he still holds ( Ukraine does not have a endless supply of troops like Putin has) with the Spring offensive is to consolidate his gains.
Ukraine’s demands that Russia has to withdraw to 1991 borders to end the war is pure insanity to the point of mental illness.
Too late for China. Blackrock and others have already been there. From the American Conservative: https://www.theamericanconservative.com/blackrock-plots-to-buy-ukraine/
Preventing that was Russia’s reason for launching the attack. Refusing to compromise on that build up was how the West ensured it would come to a fight. So this is more of the same, dressed up to look different for wary domestic audiences.
Even Trump gave Ukraine Javelin rockets. We can thank Shrub for beginning the process of withdrawing from treaties with Russia that would keep us safe (beginning with withdrawal from the ABM Treaty), culminating with Trump withdrawing from the INF Treaty.
“Refusing to compromise on that build up was how the West ensured it would come to a fight.”
1/ Yup – predictable and again-and-again predicted – by battle hardened Cold Warriors, no less.
2/ The double-issue being – as has been written – not just future ‘Ukraine in NATO,’ but present ‘NATO in Ukraine.’
“What we need now is for Ukraine to launch a military offensive which pushes back the Russian front in order to open the way for a return to negotiations,” Macron said at the Munich Security Conference.
First, the stupidity of more killing before we talk peace and then talk as though there were negotiations at any point.
Of course. Kill more people, waste more money. Perfect course of action. Really???
“the stupidity of more killing before we talk peace and then talk as though there were negotiations at any point.”
True…given the unliklihood Macron meant “returning to” the 1-month-in, March-April 22 negotiations the West scuttled before…
Yes, I should have been more specific. I was speaking of Macron and France.
Negotiations, negotiations. After last refusal to negotiate, Russia gave up. And as a warning — four Russian populated regions are now incorporated into Russia.
At present, they are cleaning up those four from the remaining Ukrainian forces, as well as doing massve reconstruction all around. Demolishing and cleaning rubble, repairing sound buildings building new buildings, rail, roads, bridges, ports, hospitals, new supply chains for everything, frim food to vehicles, from medicine to gas stations.
It is utterly absurd that in todays time of glibal connectivity we have so thoroughly blocked information on what is happening in these areas.
What is next? There are four other areas that would prefer beingbpart of Russia not a mess like Ukraine, It would be simpler to have those vote and chosewhere they wish to live. But in the absence of anything rational, war will continue, Any escallation on part of Ukraine will bringRussia’s escalation. And few more regions may go.
As Zelenski just fired the commander of land forces -/ let us see what happens,
What was the reason? None stated. But look at the sequence. Tge Commander of land forces just visited Bakhmut. As Asia Times reported, Ukraine is in technical encirclement but Zemenski would not withdraw. Unlike Russia, Zelenski cares not about soldiers. About 29,000 of them are in danger. It is possible that the man hinted “withdrawal”, and Zelenski sacked him, It is possible that he would be blamed for losses.
Oh for heaven sake! Negotiations to end the war were set last year, until Boris (apt name) appeared.
“The message was delivered to Zelensky when he had dinner with Scholz and Macron in Paris earlier this month.”
Anonymous sources report that the German and French leaders had taken the precaution of seating themselves at right angles to Zelensky and US Under Secretary Nuland at the dinner table – and so were only ‘misted’ when the Ukrainian President and Nuland spurted out their wine.
Good one. 😉
Sad thing is — it is probably true!
WSJ has it wrong: France and Germany are simply following Washington’s lead – repeating the US’s already stated ‘settle with big NATO presence after’ message
1/ So the ‘news’ here is:
a/ France and Germany proposed to Ukraine a negotiated settlement in which Ukraine got lots of post-war NATO weaponry.
b/ According to the 2/24 WSJ article referred to, the purpose of this communication was as an “incentive” to “get” Ukraine to “start peace talks with Russia later this year.”
h ttps://archive.is/tu2DM#selection-373.33-377.130
c/ Macron also endorsed the idea of Ukraine going on the offensive to take back land in advance.
c/ Notably, there is a July NATO meeting where England proposed this ‘proposal’ be aired – so there’s a nonbinding ‘timeline’ for the idea.
2/ In the WSJ’s take, this proposal runs counter to recent “comments by…Biden and other Western leaders, who called for unity to counter what they termed Russian aggression. None mentioned the prospect of Kyiv opening talks with Moscow in the near future.”
3/ But that is not true – the French and German statements do NOT run contrary to Washington DC:
About 2 weeks ago, the Washington Post reported the White House is encouraging Ukraine to go all out militarily ahead of the expectation that it will negotiate over the summer: “Biden’s aides say they are pursuing the best course of action: empowering Ukraine to retake as much territory as possible in coming months before sitting down with Putin at the negotiating table.”
h ttps://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/02/13/us-ukraine-war-critical-moment/
[note – ’12 foot wall’ may be able to get you over this if it’s paywalled]
4/ So what’s really going on is that France and Germany are now being the ‘additional messengers’ of a proposal that evidently the US conceived and communicated to Ukraine first – ie, following the US lead, doubtless after the US asked them to.
Exactly.
Zelenski of course got voted into power on a peace platform. The total betrayal of the working class in Ukraine is no different than anywhere else in the western world.
The Russian MOD is fighting a very successful war of attrition disarming NATO (Ukraine was disarmed in March), tank by tank, artillery by artillery, air defense by air defense.
NATO overall has accumulated the following equipment losses;
390 Aircraft, 211 helicopters, 3248 UAV’s, 406 Anti Aircraft systems, 8058 tanks inc. APC’s, 1045 multiple rocket launchers, 4228 rocket launchers and 8574 military automotive equipment.
What the empire looses in the Ukraine, they loose for the final Russian attack on NATO. Remember Russia attacked Ukraine just as NATO was about to unleash in the Donbass. Russia has shown they will pre-emptively attack to defend the Motherland when the time is dictated by events on the ground.