Zelenskyy Tells Davos Gathering Ukraine needs Tanks to Defeat Russia

N.Y. Daily News earlier in the tragedy.

With images of russia’s brutal murder of 45 innocent Ukrainian men, women and children in their homes still fresh in people’s minds and the 11-month Russo-Ukraine War raging, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told the World Economic Forum that free-world supplies of tanks and air defense systems should be delivered sooner in order to outpace russian attacks.

Tanks and air defense systems are the key arms needed to defeat russian aggression and save Europe.

Zelenskyy, who addressed the elite gathering of world leaders and corporate executives in the Swiss ski resort of Davos on January 18 via video link, called for the world to speed up deliveries of weapons, declaring that Ukraine is standing strong and committed despite daily bloody fighting in eastern Ukraine. However, he said the West has to recognize that “tyranny is outpacing democracies” and urged world leaders to act faster.

“The time the free world uses to think is used by the terrorist state to kill,” Zelenskyy said. “The supplies of Western tanks must outpace another invasion of Russian tanks.”

Ukraine – armed forces, government and people – remains motivated to continue battling the russian invasion, now in its 11th month, and vanquishing the aggressor, he said, but complained that its allies have repeatedly been too “hesitant” to act to confront russia, even if they eventually make the right call.

Zelenskyy did not specifically mention Germany, but Ukraine has repeatedly called on Berlin to send German-manufactured advanced Leopard 2 tanks.

Zelenskyy express pleasure to hear that former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger has undergone a significant transformation in his view on Ukrainian membership of NATO. Kissinger, who spoke virtually to the World Economic Forum on January 17, said russia’s invasion shows there is no longer a point to keeping Ukraine out of NATO and membership for Ukraine would be an “appropriate outcome.”
Kissinger’s revised opinion is “very important to put political pressure on russia” to stop its aggression, Zelenskyy said, adding that Kyiv still believes that NATO membership is the best guarantee for its security.

Ukraine’s First Lady Olena Zelenska also was doing her part to help promote Ukraine’s case before the world audience. She pressed world leaders and corporate executives in Switzerland to exercise their influence against a russian invasion that is leaving children dying and the world struggling with food insecurity.

As the first anniversary of the war nears, Zelenska said parents in Ukraine are in tears watching doctors trying to save their children, farmers are afraid to return to their fields filled with mines and “we cannot allow a new Chornobyl to happen.”

“What you all have in common is that you are genuinely influential,” Zelenska told attendees. “But there is something that separates you, namely that not all of you use this influence, or sometimes use it in a way that separates you even more.”

As for the Zelenskyy’s point that Ukraine’s membership in NATO is the best guarantee of its security, Prime Minister Sanna Marin of Finland said she hopes the West has learned its lessons on how to deal with russia. If Ukraine had been a NATO member, there would not be a war in the country now, Marin said on January 17 in Davos. She said this was why Finland and Sweden had applied for NATO membership. “We want to become a member of NATO because we don't ever again want war in Finland. We have been at war with russia before,” Marin said.

Kissinger’s epiphany about NATO and Ukraine is a significant development, which, hopefully, will push hesitant countries to actively support Ukraine against russia. Countries that have tanks, armored fighting vehicles, armored personnel carriers, air defense systems and other military materiel should provide them to Ukraine so Ukrainian soldiers, sailors and pilots can defeat russia and protect Europe.