Zelensky Runs to Europe

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Zelensky Runs to Europe
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Zelensky Runs to Europe

At Hot Air, David Strom criticizes Ukrainian President Zelensky’s handling of negotiations with President Trump to end the Russia-Ukraine war. Despite Trump’s willingness to forgive Zelensky’s earlier missteps and secure a deal, Zelensky insists on reclaiming all Ukrainian territory, including Crimea, and securing NATO membership. Strom argues that neither the U.S. nor Europe will risk war with Russia over Ukraine.

More from Strom:

Europeans pretend they can go it alone if they have to, but that is no more realistic than an 8 year old threatening to run away from home unless he gets his way. Europe has depended on the US for 80 years to defend it, and they have no capacity to do so. None. It could in the future, and Presidents have for decades told them to step up, but they have refused every time to honor their commitments. Now they whine, even though they have demeaned and betrayed us.

In this context, Zelenskyy's tweetstorm after the argument at the White House just made things worse. He maintained that Ukraine has a right not just to guarantees--which were actually implied in the minerals deal--but help in kicking Russia entirely out of Ukrainian territory including Crimea. That is his red line.

Red lines are fictions if you can't back them up. Europe won't back him up on that.

From the outside, Zelensky running to the UK reads as the strict parent not giving the child what he wants, so he goes running to the weaker, more lenient parent. From Reuters: