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Crimea as a bargaining chip: US expert considers end-of-war deal possible – but NATO skeptical

2023-03-23T17:36:56.147Z


A political scientist from the USA considers a peace plan in the Ukraine war to be conceivable. The Crimea could become the sticking point.


A political scientist from the USA considers a peace plan in the Ukraine war to be conceivable.

The Crimea could become the sticking point.

Kiev/Moscow - Crimea is of enormous importance for both sides in the Ukraine war.

For many years, the Black Sea Peninsula has been a hotly disputed issue between Russia and Ukraine.

After the illegal annexation by Russia, Russian President Vladimir Putin made it absolutely clear in a speech on March 18, 2014 that there could be no turning back: “Crimea belongs to Russia.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is similarly determined.

Again and again he reaffirms Ukraine's claim to the peninsula.

“This is our country.

These are our people.

That's our story," he said, for example, at the end of February.

With the return of Crimea, peace will be restored.

"We will bring the Ukrainian flag back to every corner of Ukraine." Recently, Kiev's secret service said that the latest attack was a harbinger of the end of the Russian occupation.

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Sevastopol is the largest city on the Crimean Peninsula and the main base of Russia's Black Sea Fleet.

© imago/Denis Pomortsev

Crimea could become a sticking point in the Ukraine war

In fact, Crimea seems to be becoming the sticking point in the Ukraine war.

According to a US expert, it could play a key role in the coming months and become something of a bargaining chip in a deal between Russia and Ukraine.

In an interview with the Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ),

the American political scientist James D. Fearon, who the Pentagon brought in as an advisor after the invasion, explained

that agreements about Crimea are also conceivable: “Crimea should be presented as a red line : This is a negotiation strategy – and not a god-given thing.

In any negotiation, the parties first say what they want.

Of course that doesn't match.

That is why there is war in the first place.”

Basically, Fearon said, there are very few conflicts in which the things the parties are arguing about are literally indivisible.

The territorial control of an area in particular is “clearly divisible”.

Zelenskyy's declaration that Ukraine wants to recapture the entire Ukrainian state territory, including Crimea, can therefore be understood as the beginning of the negotiations: "Clausewitz said this famous sentence that the war is a continuation of politics by other means.

This also means that war itself is a negotiation process.”

Pictures of the Ukraine war: great horror and small moments of happiness

Pictures of the Ukraine war: great horror and small moments of happiness

According to NATO, arms deliveries to Ukraine will still be necessary for a long time

However, NATO remains skeptical when it comes to negotiations.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg swore the West would have to arm Ukraine for a long time to come.

Putin has no plans for peace in Ukraine, he told the British newspaper

Guardian

.

"Putin isn't planning for peace, he's planning for more war." That's why the West must be prepared to continue supplying Kiev with weapons for a long time to come.

Stoltenberg said that with equipment provided by the West, Ukrainians would be able to "take back territory and liberate more and more land" that Russia captured after the February 2022 invasion.

The aim is to "enable the Ukrainians to launch an offensive and retake territory".

Stoltenberg did not comment on Crimea.

In an interview with 

IPPEN.MEDIA

he warned

Austrian political scientist Gerhard Mangott recently warned that a "endangerment" to Crimea could tempt Putin to use tactical nuclear weapons.

US expert James D. Fearon also sees this danger.

The US government assumes that the use of a tactical nuclear bomb would be possible.

And when?

"In a scenario in which the Russian army collapses and Crimea is suddenly in danger," said Fearon in the

NZZ

interview.

It's not very likely, but the risk isn't zero either.

(cs) 

List of rubrics: © imago/Denis Pomortsev

Source: merkur

All news articles on 2023-03-23

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