November 25, 2023
We already know that Ukraine, in early April 2022, rejected to make peace with Russia. We know this from talks by the former prime minister of Israel Naftali Bennet, from the former Turkish foreign minister, from former chancellor of Germany Gerhard Schroeder as well as from reporting from Ukraine.
But only now do we hear the same story from a Ukrainian official:
Lord Bebo @MyLordBebo - 21:45 UTC · Nov 24, 2023🇺🇦🇷🇺🚨‼️ BOMBSHELL: Ukraine admits that Russia only wanted neutrality from them!
Russia wanted Ukraine to be neutral like Finland was! But Ukraine was not sure if they can trust it and then Boris Johnson came and said:
-> “We will not sign anything, let’s do war!”I knew it!
video
The video in the tweet above has English subtitles. It is part of a Ukrainian TV interview with the the leader of the Servant of the People parliament faction David Arakhamia by the journalist Natalia Moseychuk. In March and April 2022 Arkhamia had led the Ukrainian delegation at peace talks with the Russians in Belarus and Turkey.
There is video on Youtube with an announcement of the interview, but not of the interview itself.
Arnault Bertrand relays here what was said:
- He confirms that Russia’s principal goal for the war wasn’t to invade the whole of Ukraine but to force Ukraine to become a neutral country that would not be part of NATO: “[Russia] really hoped almost to the last moment that they would force us to sign such an agreement so that we would take neutrality. It was the most important thing for them. They were prepared to end the war if we agreed to, – as Finland once did, – neutrality, and committed that we would not join NATO. In fact, this was the key point. Everything else was simply rhetoric and political ‘seasoning’ about denazification, the Russian-speaking population and blah-blah-blah."- When asked why Ukraine did not agree to this, here’s what he says: “First, in order to agree to this point, it is necessary to change the Constitution. Our path to NATO is written in the Constitution. Secondly, there was no confidence in the Russians that they would do it. This could only be done if there were security guarantees. We could not sign something, step away, everyone would relax there, and then they would [invade] even more prepared – because they had, in fact, gone in unprepared for such a resistance. Therefore, we could only explore this route when there is absolute certainty that this will not happen again. There is no such certainty. Moreover, when we returned from Istanbul, Boris Johnson came to Kyiv and said that we would not sign anything with them at all, and let's just fight.”
Strana also reports, in Russian, of the interview and comments (machine translation):
Why did the Ukrainian authorities refuse such a lucrative contract in the spring of 2022?Arahamia makes two arguments: First, it was necessary to change the Constitution, and secondly, there was no confidence in the Russians that they would fulfill the agreements.
Both arguments are ambiguous, to put it mildly. Yes, it is forbidden to change the Constitution during martial law, but if you wanted to, you could find a way out here – after all, this is a technical problem if there is political will (and since the Ukrainian authorities were negotiating about this at all, they saw some options). And as for trust, this is an even stranger thesis, since according to the agreement, it was not Ukraine that was supposed to withdraw troops, but Russia. Moreover, in exchange only for a decision on neutral status, which could then be replayed at any time. Therefore, in this case, the question of trust and "throw-not throw" was primarily before Moscow, and not before Kiev.
Later, the Ukrainian authorities called another reason for the refusal-the tragedy in Bucha. However, if we recall Zelensky's statements at that time, he immediately after the tragedy said that negotiations with the Russian Federation should still be conducted.
"Each such tragedy, each such Butch will beat you on the hands in certain negotiations. But we need to find opportunities for such steps, " Zelensky said on April 5, 2022. And only later did his statements become more categorical.
The arguments are bogus and the real reason why Zelenski rejected the agreement is a different one:
Therefore, usually, among the main motives of the president to refuse to conclude agreements with Putin in 2022, they call the fact that he (perhaps influenced by the arguments and promises of Western allies) came to the conclusion that Russia is not ready for a big war, and therefore Ukraine, with the help of the West, can completely defeat the Russian army and dictate to Moscow their own terms of peace, which would provide for the withdrawal of Russian troops to the borders of 1991, the payment of reparations, and so on.That is, figuratively speaking, Zelensky chose instead of a titmouse in his hands, a crane in the sky.
At the same time, all those who remember the situation at the beginning of April 2022 find it hard to believe that the Ukrainian authorities could have been so optimistic then.
...
In such circumstances, it seems almost improbable that Zelensky could refuse the extremely attractive "tit-for-tat" in the form of Russia's withdrawal of troops from almost all the occupied territories of Ukraine without a fight, believing in the possibility of receiving a "crane" in the form of Moscow's surrender (which, as is known, has not yet happened).There must have been some force majeure circumstances that prompted Kiev to reject such favorable conditions for ending the war in the spring of 2022.
What these circumstances are becomes clear from the same interview with Arahamia.
He said that the then British Prime Minister Boris Johnson came to Kiev and said that "we will not sign anything with them at all, let's just fight."
The question arises-what exactly did Johnson mean by "we will not sign anything with them"? The answer here may be one – Western countries refused to give joint guarantees of Ukraine's security with Russia, which were supposed to be attached to the peace treaty and the neutral status agreement.
Arakhamia also said this directly in an interview: "The Western allies advised us not to agree to ephemeral security guarantees, which at that time could not be given at all."
Recall that security guarantees under the then plan were supposed to be given by Russia, leading Western countries and a number of other major world powers. But if the NATO countries refused to give guarantees and only the Russian Federation and, possibly, China and Turkey would give them, then this would actually mean a complete break in Ukraine's relations with the Western world. What Zelensky, of course, could not do.
In other words, it was the position of the Western allies "let's just fight" that had a decisive influence on the decision of the Ukrainian authorities to abandon the agreements with the Russian Federation in the spring of 2022.
Several hundred thousand Ukrainian men and ten thousands of Russian ones are now dead. All because U.S. and UK politicians, primarily Biden and Johnson, desired to "weaken Russia".
Russia is now stronger than it has been in early 2022. Its economy is growing while Europe's is stagnating at best. To make peace now with Russia will cost Ukraine some 20+% of the country. In April 2022 it could have regained control over all of it except for Crimea.
Now it is too late:
As for the position of Kiev, Arakhamia once again stated it in the same interview, saying that the negotiations are not profitable at the moment, since "our negotiating position is very bad." But who does time work for? If in 2022 it was possible to end the war by liberating almost the entire territory of the country without a fight in exchange for a neutral status, now there are no such options. And the alternative is quite different – a long war with all its victims and risks, or peace/truce along the front line with the actual consolidation of Russian control over the occupied territories (and, it is possible, this will also include additional requirements in the form of the same neutral status, for example). The main question is what will be the conditions and negotiating positions in the future and whether the Ukrainian authorities have a clear understanding that they will not be even worse than they are now.
The question I have is why is this coming out now?
What have Zelenski and the leader of his party faction agreed to finally let the Ukrainian people know what had happened. Do they hope that Ukrainians will blame the West and not those in Ukraine who decided to follow it? Do they prepare their people for a turn towards Russia?
Let me know what you think of this.
Posted by b on November 25, 2023 at 15:31 UTC | Permalink