{"id":45534,"date":"2022-03-29T18:52:03","date_gmt":"2022-03-29T16:52:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/libmod.de\/?p=45534"},"modified":"2022-03-30T11:08:15","modified_gmt":"2022-03-30T09:08:15","slug":"beck-never-again-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/libmod.de\/en\/beck-never-again-war\/","title":{"rendered":"Ukraine and us: Never again war?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Photo: IMAGO \/\u200b Olaf Schuelke<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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So far, the people of Ukraine have borne the burden of the war all alone. For the German precept of \u201cnever again\u201d, this is a reality shock, comments Marieluise Beck.<\/h2>\n

What does \u201cNever again\u201d mean to you?<\/p>\n

That question was posed to members of the German Bundestag by an exhausted and disap\u00adpointed President Zelensky.<\/p>\n

That same \u201cnever again\u201d was also at the heart of the debate about military inter\u00advention amongst the Greens.  The four wars that followed the collapse of Yugoslavia subjected their party to a stress test with the potential to tear it apart. The first of these was so short, it was easy to turn a blind eye, but then came the atroc\u00adities in Vukovar and the bombardment of Dubrovnik, there was no overlooking those, and then, in the final act, the mass killing of Bosnians.<\/p>\n

This mass murder was carried out by paramil\u00aditary combatants and units of the former Yugoslavian Army, which had secured a weapons stockpile of the latter for use in the war against the Bosnians. The forces defending Bosnia had effec\u00adtively no access to military equipment.<\/p>\n

In trainers in war<\/h3>\n

In line with the watchword \u201cno weapons to conflict zones\u201d, the Western world laid an embargo on the region. This didn\u2019t bother the Serbian fighters even one tiny bit. The ones it did impact were the victims. They were unable to defend themselves: the embargo prevented them from building up an army that could put up anything approaching a defence. I still remember those young men well, in their gym shoes, without helmets or vests.<\/p>\n

The West sat back and watched this going on for quite some time.  Until the drama of Srebrenica put an end to the watching. Eight thousand young men, hardly more than children, were delivered into the hands of their murderers in an UN-desig\u00adnated \u201csafe zone\u201d, which wasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

This came as a shocking blast of reality for all those who had thought that the mantra \u201cNever again\u201d alone would be enough to stand up against the evil in the world.  It was \u2013 and we should not forget this either \u2013 Marek Edelman, a Jew who survived the Warsaw Ghetto, who asked the inter\u00adna\u00adtional community to intervene, long before Srebrenica.  And then it came: the end of the funda\u00admental \u201cno\u201d to weapons for use in self-defence or the protection of others. NATO\u2019s defence mission went on for ten days.  How many lives might have been saved had the decision to act been taken earlier?<\/p>\n

Four years later, it was Kosovo\u2019s turn. Again, the OSCE was the first to get involved. Unarmed, and as observers. They counted the military convoys deployed from Belgrade. The first groups of Kosovar refugees set out south\u00adwards, on the trek to Macedonia. The first mass graves were discovered. The UN had no mechanism for the prevention of yet another genocide. This obvious paradox was resolved through unilateral action on NATO\u2019s part. Not unequiv\u00ado\u00adcally legit\u00adimate under inter\u00adna\u00adtional law, justified by the conviction that it is necessary to prevent a possible genocide.<\/p>\n

From Yalta to the Maidan<\/h3>\n

A jump back in time: The collapse of the Soviet Union resulted in the return of indepen\u00addence to countries that had previ\u00adously been part of the Soviet empire or separate members of the Warsaw  Pact. Countries that had disap\u00adpeared behind the \u201cYalta divide\u201d suddenly reappeared on the political map: Poland, Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, and Ukraine \u2013 countries that were seldom seen in the West as separate entities at all while they were still under the umbrella of the Soviet Union. Especially Ukraine. Yet Ukraine made itself noticed, taking its place among the other countries striving for freedom that had once been granted as unwilling vassals to Stalin. 2004, the \u201cOrange Revolution\u201d: a president installed in office in a rigged election is given the boot. A populace buffeted by disap\u00adpointment returns him to office four years later though.<\/p>\n

Maidan 2014: A big public festival. At first. Russian rock bands perform Western politi\u00adcians\u2019 stream in, cheering the crowds on stage and mingling with them. Did even one of them begin to under\u00adstand that this encour\u00adagement was giving rise to a respon\u00adsi\u00adbility? A respon\u00adsi\u00adbility to stand with the Ukrainians if the festival were to become an inferno?<\/p>\n

It did not stop with Crimea<\/h3>\n

The annex\u00adation of Crimea. A coup de main. Not bloody, but still brutal. At least in the aftermath, when the Crimean Tartars were robbed of their rights and their culture \u2013 a second time, after their depor\u00adtation by Stalin. And with the arrests of those unwilling to bow to the will of the Russian regime.<\/p>\n

Placatory words are spoken by many here though: one had to under\u00adstand how essential Crimea was to the heart and soul of the Russian people. They were way off base. It wasn\u2019t only about Crimea. Putin\u2019s forces crossed the border, prepared by the GRU and assisted by a fifth column of bandits and shady characters.<\/p>\n

It was not NATO that encircled Russia. Russia encircled Ukraine<\/p>\n

Putin does not bother with trying to disguise his inten\u00adtions. Ukraine, he says, is an inalienable part of the common history, culture, of the \u201cspiritual space\u201d. For those willing to look, it was plain to see: Putin was not going to let it rest at that.  The inalienable part that had strayed, the  \u201cbrother people\u201d, must return to the empire. Like the Erl-King: \u2026 boy, if you are unwilling, then force I\u2019ll employ.<\/p>\n

Slowly but surely, this force took shape around Ukraine, according to a systematic and strate\u00adgi\u00adcally consistent plan.<\/p>\n

Quiet Tones from Berlin<\/h3>\n

It was not NATO that encircled Russia. Russia encircled Ukraine. To the north, in Belarus, to the east along the border with southern Russia, to the south over the Black Sea.<\/p>\n

These prepa\u00adra\u00adtions for war, only flimsily disguised as manoeuvres, were accepted. The second pipeline through the Baltic Sea continued to be presented through a rose-tinted lens as purely a business project. The foreign-policy experts were monitoring the troop deploy\u00adments \u201cwith concern\u201d. A statement is issued describing an attack on Ukraine as unacceptable. It remains unclear what that was supposed to mean.<\/p>\n

It was the USA that began to voice the opinion, in increas\u00adingly clear language, that Putin was going to order the attack on Ukraine.  A flurry of shuttle diplomacy, with little effect.  They all made the pilgrimage to him \u2013 one at a time, needless to say. Audiences were granted in tsarist style. Everyone returned from Moscow with empty hands. Bottom line: Putin couldn\u2019t have cared less about what was being offered to him in the way of dialogue. He wanted Ukraine. Ukraine is not part of NATO, so NATO assis\u00adtance was out of the question, and weapons were not to be supplied to crisis zones \u2013 or so said the German doctrine, and others.<\/p>\n

The terror should be visible<\/h3>\n

What happened after that is well known. The events in Mariupol, for instance. According to an initial expert legal opinion by Prof. Otto Luchter\u00adhandt, they meet the legal defin\u00adition of genocide. For over two weeks now, 350,000 people have been living under siege, deprived of electricity, heat, food and water. Bombs are being delib\u00ader\u00adately aimed at civilian targets. The Russian shelling makes flight impossible.<\/p>\n

A reign of terror has descended over the country. There is no attempt to hide it: it is supposed to be visible. The aim is to wear down the population\u2019s resolve and morale. A paedi\u00adatric clinic in Lviv has to resort to triaging because medical resources are in such short supply: just for one minute, imagine what that must be like.<\/p>\n

There is no doubt: since the Maidan, the Ukrainian army has grown from a small group of experi\u00adenced soldiers who had inter\u00adna\u00adtional deploy\u00adments under their belts into a regular army. A regular army that is poorly equipped, though, and nowhere near a match for the Russian army.<\/p>\n

The German Government stuck to its principle of not sending weapons to crisis zones for far too long. Now, we are watching a desperate defensive war being fought by inade\u00adquately equipped men and women, unexpectedly stubborn men and women paying a bloody toll to hold the Russian troops at bay but who are doing it \u2013 so far. How much longer can they keep this up?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s time for a down payment<\/h3>\n

The Jewish president of Ukraine begs the world for modern military equipment. Because the less well-equipped his fighters are, the more of them will die. The less they can do to hinder the butchers, the more civilians will lose their lives. It sounds histrionic when the Ukrainians insist that they are fighting for our freedom, too. But the Georgians, Moldovans, the people of the Baltic countries and the Poles know full well what they mean.<\/p>\n

Ukraine\u2019s defeat would bring the Russian military to Poland\u2019s border. Iskander missiles with nuclear warheads would draw even closer to us. And what happens if Ukraine isn\u2019t enough to satiate Putin? What if he keeps wanting more? Georgia and Moldavia are a given, a Republika Srpska and Serbia in the Balkans, and then perhaps he\u2019ll decide to take the Baltics after all? The corridor connecting these vulnerable countries to other EU and NATO members is only 65-kilometres wide.<\/p>\n

Is this truly only the Ukrainians\u2019 fight? What happened to \u201cNever again\u201d?<\/p>\n

The \u201cwatershed moment\u201d is here. The chancellor speaks of necessary defence, of military precau\u00adtions. Appar\u00adently, the threat of war and the notion that Russia poses a genuine danger are no longer being dismissed as unreal\u00adistic. The reality is already here for Ukrainians.  Should they manage to win, our security will be assured. A hundred billion euros to invest in a new Bundeswehr. It is time to pay an instalment to those who are bearing the burden of the war for us. Give them what they need in order to do so. Our own security is also at stake.<\/p>\n

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