Victory over Russian Invaders of Ukraine Isn’t a Naïve Wish
The former captive nations are solidly in Ukraine’s corner because they know well Russian aggression, subjugation and repression. Old Europe which includes the NATO member-states fears it could be Russia’s next victim so it is putting up a strong front, offering Ukraine weapons and political support. They favor Ukraine’s perseverance and even victory in the face of Moscow’s threats but without forcing a humiliating defeat on Russia. The coalition of the willing European countries is supplying Ukraine with a wide assortment of weapons and aircraft.
On the other side is Russia, which hasn’t changed its stripes for centuries. It still regards Ukraine as the Hope Diamond of its fallen empire and its return to the fold is Russia’s number one sacred goal. Russia is prepared to run its tanks and incompetent army across Ukraine up to the Polish border, subjugate the country and annihilate everyone who resists captivity.
And then there is the United States and President Donald Trump. Washington’s fluctuating policies of helping Ukraine or not, of brokering, negotiating or forcing a truce is confounding all parties. His flippant observations that Zelenskyy and Putin want to fight more do not help the cause of peace. Everyone on the European side of the table is hoping for a meeting of all three elements. Trump believes Putin wants peace and is hopeful that a meeting will be held with all sides concerned but Putin is balking.
Ukraine is also eager to sit down and talk. Zelenskyy is very well aware of the human cost of Russia’s war against Ukraine with its daily bombardments and killings.
Putin launched his war against Ukrainians searching for Nazis, but he and his blundering, pathetic pack of cutthroats found a united nation of Ukrainian and non-Ukrainian speakers from east to west, of Catholic, Orthodox, Jewish, Protestant and Moslem Ukrainians, of professionals and farmers, of senior citizens and youth all committed to fight once more for the independence of their nation and country. He didn’t find Nazis. Today even Putin has abandoned that farcical quest and admitted that he simply wants Ukrainian land if he’s to agree to peace. Imagine a criminal, a war criminal making demands of his victim. Ukraine’s neighbors are rightfully scared that if Ukraine and the free world succumb to Putin’s demands, they will be the next dominoes to fall victim to Russian aggression.
However, negotiating a truce or ceasefire will result in at best a fragile peace. It is a foregone conclusion among Ukrainians and East Europeans that one day, like a phoenix, a temporarily quelled Russia will again wage war of conquest against Ukraine.
Trump has declared his opposition to defeating Russia in hopes of a peaceful stalemate between Ukraine and Russia. On the other hand, he insists that Ukraine must surrender parts of Ukrainian lands to Moscow in order to satiate its aggressive appetite. As for Crimea and Donbas, temporarily Russian occupied regions of Ukraine, Trump has categorically said Ukraine can forget about them. The American president as well as the Washington GOP establishment would rather see Ukraine go away quietly.
Ukraine is caught in the middle. Fortunately, the nation, government and President Zelenskyy, and military are united in their understanding of the mission. For them, victory over Russia is not a naïve wish. It is an achievable goal.
At a recent gathering of senior Ukrainian government officials and Ukrainian American civic leaders at the Ukrainian Institute of America in New York City, this point – victory – was enunciated.
Present were Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko, Andriy Yermak, head of the Office of the President, Minister of the Economy and Agriculture Oleksiy Sobolev, Ambassador Extraordinary Sergy Kyslytsya, and Ambassador to the United States Oksana Markarova.
In a brief overview of the issues at hand, Yermak, who is regarded as the most powerful official in Kyiv, unabashedly used the word “victory” in a sentence. I decided to pursue this in the Q&A and asked him to confirm that Ukraine’s victory over Russia is possible and it’s not a naïve wish of Ukrainians in Ukraine and around the world.
Yermak said, yes, and elaborated that all of Ukraine, led by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, is committed to that real end.
While the current global political climate is awaiting trilateral meetings, truces and ceasefires, for Ukraine they are merely steppingstones to victory and expelling Russian invaders from Ukraine. This will not be an immediate achievement, he continued, but rather it will be fulfilled over time.
Ukraine has the political and battlefield will and skills, weapons and unified national vision to realize this, he said. Furthermore, Zelenskyy is tenacious and unwavering in leading the nation to this objective.
Ukraine will also return to the native land all POWs, the bodies of the KIAs, and all stolen children will be returned to their heart-broken parents, he assured.
Yermak said Ukraine will even return to its national domain Crimea and Donbas, which emphatically clarifies Kyiv’s position against surrendering Ukrainian territory to the criminal aggressor. This will not happen overnight but rather it will be achieved in time.
Yermak’s message is encouraging for all Ukrainians everywhere. Ukrainian Americans can take this message of victory to President Trump, their elected representatives and the entire Washington establishment.
This message should be contrasted with the declarations emanating from the White House and The Kremlin. The latter certainly doesn’t want peace but rather it wants all of Ukraine and its citizens from the Caucasus to the Carpathians – nothing less. For the sake of his Nobel Peace Prize, Trump won’t stand in Moscow’s way.
Russian leaders say this regularly and Putin substantiates this. Sadly, Trump dangerously belittles or disregards this Russian assertion which resembles Hitler’s “Mein Kampf.”
High-ranking Russian officials, Putin and former President Dmitry Medvedev, have publicly denied Ukrainian statehood and promoted the military’s goal of inflicting “maximum defeat.” This has been interpreted as incitement to genocide.
in a June 2025 speech, Putin declared, “All of Ukraine is ours,” a statement that was widely interpreted as an affirmation of Russia’s imperialist and expansionist ambitions.
Russia’s top military leadership has announced that its campaign of large-scale strikes against Ukraine will continue into the coming months irrespective of negotiations, with offensive operations set to remain the central focus, Army General Valery Gerasimov, chief of the Russian General Staff and commander of Russia’s joint forces in Ukraine, stated on August 30. “The execution of tasks by the Joint Grouping of Forces will continue by conducting offensive operations. Today we will clarify the tasks for the groupings of troops on the directions for the autumn period,” he said.
The Russian Orthodox Church in March 2024 approved a document that called the invasion of Ukraine a “Holy War” aimed at extinguishing Ukrainian independence and imposing direct Russian rule. Patriarch Kirill has provided ideological justification for the war, framing it as a confrontation with a “decadent West” and claiming that dying in Ukraine “washes away” all sins. He also exonerates all Russians of the sin of murder when they kill Ukrainians.
Fortunately, while this is being played out, European defense ministers pledged Friday to ramp up support for Ukraine and increase pressure on Russia, a day after a Russian air assault on Kyiv killed 23 people and badly damaged a European diplomatic compound.
Outrage over the attack propelled Europe’s leaders to condemn Russia even before Friday’s meeting and call for tougher measures on Moscow like seizing frozen assets, further sanctions and increasing support for Ukraine’s military and membership in the European Union.
“Everybody understands that, considering how Putin is mocking the peace efforts, the only thing that works is pressure,” said Kaja Kallas, foreign policy chief for the European Union.
They also discussed European troops’ deployment in Ukraine to guarantee security and monitor a peace that seems distant as peace Russia appears to have stalled the efforts.
With the West at least, Ukraine is walking on a thin tightrope. Kyiv can’t outrightly snub Washington or else Trump will stop all political and military aid. But at least Ukraine has announced its national target for the world to know.
No comments:
Post a Comment