Professor Margaret MacMillan (“The art of the peace deal”, The Weekend Essay, Life & Arts, March 1) comes up short in analysing the war in Ukraine and peacemaking efforts. Donald Trump has reached out to Russia’s Vladimir Putin, not as a gift — “Trump has given him a stature and credibility that he does not deserve” — but because Russia will inevitably again be a major power.
In the George HW Bush and Clinton administrations (when I was Clinton’s ambassador to Nato) everyone who wasn’t denying Russia’s inevitable future power and stature understood this. We had a high degree of success in working with Russia. Then, US neocons from 2000 onwards drove Nato enlargement beyond the point that any nation (Russia) could tolerate — just as the US couldn’t tolerate the USSR-Cuba alliance (“Bay of Pigs”), communists in Grenada, and now Trump on China in Panama.
This was compounded by George W Bush’s pressure on allies (Bucharest 2008) to promise membership in Nato for Ukraine and Georgia. This was, in fact, the moment of Nato’s commitment to membership — that’s what the words meant. Many of us warned against the consequences, but successive administrations, including Trump 1, repeated this provocative formula.
MacMillan argues that Trump gave away to Putin points that should instead have been reserved for peace talks. Yet what did Trump give away? It is clear to everyone that Ukraine can only regain total control of its lost territories through force of arms, which no ally will support. Also, Nato membership takes consensus — ie all 32 allies. Despite statements by some of Nato’s leading powers, that consensus will never be achieved. If membership were possible, then Nato allies would have troops in Ukraine now!
As much as Europeans might do militarily, it has been clear for decades that only the US can deal with Russia. Every European leader knows that (possibly with the exception of France’s Emmanuel Macron). Hence most supported the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq and sent troops to Afghanistan: precisely to keep the US from being diverted from its central requirement (as seen by the allies) of coping with Russia. Thus, in the absence of a US guarantee of Ukraine’s security, which Trump has ruled out, it will continue to be vulnerable, despite other terms of a peace deal and what Europeans are willing to do.
It is necessary to begin with the facts and analysis of today’s circumstances, not those of earlier periods of European history.
Ambassador Robert E Hunter
Washington, DC, US
