Faced with Putin, response or defeat

While the electoral farce designed to perpetuate Vladimir Putin on the Kremlin throne began in Russia, the leaders of Germany, France and Poland held a meeting in Berlin to send a message of unity in support of the attacked Ukraine.

In the EU there is a broad political consensus on the need to take consistent steps to improve our ability to support Kiev and guarantee our own future security in a context that features a resilient Kremlin and an evanescent White House.

The consensus encompasses social democratic, popular or liberal forces - such as the three leaders of the Weimar triangle meeting in Berlin.

However, significant discrepancies and cumbersome processes complicate the path when circumstances demand urgent action.

It is likely that the outcome of the war will be decided by what is done in these months.

As for the underlying consensus, it is seen in the facts.

Germany, with a social democratic chancellor at the helm, is leading a powerful increase in military spending and spearheading military aid to Ukraine from within the EU.

France, with a liberal president, is showing determination to the point of refusing to rule out a possible sending of soldiers to Ukraine in the future.

The European Commission, headed by the popular Ursula von der Leyen, is pushing, among other things, a new Defense industrial strategy;

The high representative of Foreign Affairs and Security, the social democrat Josep Borrell, is among the most eloquent and effective promoters of the idea that it is necessary to make efforts, and urgently, to support Kiev in its defense and rise to the transcendental challenge that we face.

This consensus lies around a widely shared idea: giving up the military effort does not lead to peace, but to defeat.

This was stated by Macron in a televised interview in France on Thursday.

The president, author of a regrettable turn to the right on immigration matters, is right in this, expressing a concept in which the vast majority of the European political spectrum agrees.

Of course there are minor parties, representatives of major parties and in general an appreciable segment of European society who feel an understandable reluctance towards the prospect of rearmament.

But those citizens with legitimate misgivings should first consider that it is up to the Ukrainians to decide their future, and they rightly do not want to give in to aggression with a possible pact that, in addition to granting an amputation, would not provide any guarantee of future peace.

And then they should ask themselves if we should leave them stranded in their resistance and if it is from weakness that peace can be achieved today in Ukraine and guaranteed tomorrow in Europe when on the other side there is not Gandhi, but Putin, a subject for whom only perspective of losing, not respect for the pacts, seems to be an inhibiting circumstance.

If, with dwindling American aid, we Europeans do not reinforce our support for kyiv, it is most likely that Moscow will opt for subjugating Ukraine—its long-standing desire—not for stopping and negotiating.

And if he subjugates Ukraine, can we trust that from then on we will have a pacifist Kremlin?

Sitting back and waiting for him while Russia is a war economy and Trump can win in the US is taking a big risk, to say the least.

Except for the shareholders of arms companies, almost all of us dislike having to spend on weapons instead of putting everything into hospitals and schools.

But the situation is what it is.

Ukraine suffers, its resistance falters.

And, in a sector like defense, decisions about new supplies or production take months – or years – to materialize.

Much suggests that leaders understand the sense of urgency.

At the Berlin meeting, Scholz said there was agreement to use interest collected on Russia's frozen assets to help Ukraine.

The Commission approved this week a new military assistance fund for kyiv worth 5 billion, and another 500 million to promote ammunition production capacity.

But between announcements and facts there is distance.

And strategic consensus does not dissipate tactical dissent.

There are disagreements on how to raise the much needed money - for example, whether to resort to a common debt issue -, on how to spend it - how much on effective weapons available on the market, wherever, and how much on European production that guarantees autonomy for us. medium and long term—, or about how to help Kiev specifically.

Macron talks tough, but France has provided much less aid to Ukraine than Germany, even taking into account the different size of GDP, and stopped the necessary purchase of material outside the EU.

Scholz has done a lot, but his hesitations—often saying no at first and accepting later—and those of others have lost precious time.

Ukraine continues to defend itself and manages to inflict considerable damage on Russia.

But their situation is fragile.

Very fragile.

Every week matters.

Nothing ensures that the paralysis of US aid will be unblocked.

If there is no change of step, a reversal, the conflict will gradually move closer to a defeat for kyiv than to a just peace.

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