As for NATO membership, it seems unthinkable as long as Ukraine remains at war with Russia.
“I don’t think any NATO country thinks that a country that is at war in Russia can join NATO,” said Petri Hakkarainen, chief foreign policy adviser to Niinisto, the Finnish president.
This is a European dilemma that seems to be developing. “A frozen conflict suits Putin,” said Mr. Delattre, the French ambassador to Germany. “A partially occupied, dysfunctional Ukraine cannot advance to Europe. So of the three possible outcomes to the war – a Ukrainian victory, a Russian victory and a stalemate – two are in Putin’s favor.
Of course, an increasingly repressive Russia under heavy sanctions and a leader despised by the rest of the Western world, with no path to economic reconstruction, would also suffer a prolonged conflict. long. But the limits to the Russians’ ability to absorb pain are not easily discernible.
“Russia is not willing to lose, and human lives are not important to Putin, so they can continue the war for a long time,” Kuusela said. “Ukraine will continue to fight as long as the West supports it.”
He pauses before concluding, “It’s going to be a tough stalemate.”
Germany re-imagined
The contrast between the narratives of Poland and Germany after World War II, old enemies and still tense partners, is striking. Poland has never been less acutely aware of the threat posed by Russia. Guilty Germany bought cheap Russian gas and dismissed Putin’s threats.
Anti-German sentiment has spread throughout Poland, which considers Berlin to be too hesitant to support Ukraine, to the point of German fickleness, at least in the eyes of the ruling populist party. Ethnicity, currently the central topic of this year’s Polish parliamentary elections.
Europe’s unity in the face of war does not mean that the rifts have disappeared. Nowhere is the war in Ukraine more challenging or transformative than in Germany.
