What’s stopping Ukraine’s backers from giving it what it needs to properly defend itself? | DW News

What’s stopping Ukraine’s backers from giving it what it needs to properly defend itself? | DW News

US President Joe Biden has opened NATO’s 75th Anniversary Summit in Washington with a pledge of more air defense systems for Ukraine he’s offering keeve an additional Patriot system and says allies will provide dozens more anti-missile batteries this as Biden seeks to reassure allies at home and abroad that he’s up for the job as president doubts about his Fitness for office continue to plague his reelection campaign Biden’s offer to boost ke’s defenses came a day after the deadliest Spate of air strikes on Ukraine in months a major celebration but the mood appears more tense than festive the 75th Anniversary comes during one of the most challenging times for NATO Russia’s aggression against Ukraine for more than two years the alliance has been tested for its unity in continuous support of KF [Music] United States nearly two dozen Allied Partners have signed a bilateral security agreements with Ukraine and more countries will follow today I’m announcing the historic donation of air defense equipment for Ukraine the United States Germany the Netherlands Romania and Italy will provide Ukraine with the equipment for five additional strategic a defense systems and in the coming months the United States and our partners intend to provide Ukraine with dozens of additional Tactical Air Defense systems United States will make sure that when we export critical air defense interceptors Ukraine goes to the front of the line the decision could bring some long awaited relief for Ukraine am me intensified Russian attacks but it’s not just to boost for defense that Ukraine has been asking for imagine how much we can achieve when all limitations are lifted we can protect our cities from Russian guided booms if American leadership makes a step forward and allows us to destroy Russian military aircrafts on their basis and we can significantly limit Russian ACS in thousands Ukraine and push the occupier out of their if American leadership assist us with the necessary deep strike capabilities against Russian military and Logistics in our ukra and Prim and ziny wants such decisions to be made fast before the US elections this November the result of which could put both us support for Ukraine and even NATO itself into question for more on this we can talk now with fabris poer he is CEO of the consult rasos in global and a former director of policy planning at NATO thanks for being with us fabis Ukraine can certainly use the extra systems that NATO countries are offering but what it really wants is permission from its Partners to strike deeper into Russian territory is that not essential for Ukraine in order to repel the Russian invasion exactly I I think this is the story of uh the NATO leader including President Biden expecting the ukrainians to fight a war against a nuclear power with one hand tied behind their back and this is obviously encouraging news to hear what President Biden has announced the delivery of new Patriot systems more tactical air defense system to come in the next few weeks or months but this is really fundamentally playing defensive here and it’s just allowing Ukraine not to be defeated but it’s not uh helping Ukraine to win this war and this is really the difference or the dissonance between uh the ukrainians and those supporting Ukraine and the NATO leaders what is stopping Ukraine’s backers from giving it what it needs for Bree to properly defend itself is it the internal divisions among NATO countries or or fear of provoking Russia I think it’s the second uh point you you made uh fundamentally especially in Berlin and Washington there’s a great uh reluctance to uh uh contemplate possible escalation uh uh with Russia or VISA Russia uh and and sadly I think there’s almost more fear of a Russian defeat than of a Ukrainian defeat so that’s why until now we have seen this kind of very terita way of managing the war by making important decisions but every time six month too late or even 12 month too late compared to the last uh uh Russian escalation and and even though it has allowed the ukrainians to uh uh hold their more or less their line until now it has not been enough as we have seen over the last few days with the terrible attack against the children hospital it’s not enough to even contain Russia let alone defeat Russia and because fundamentally this fear of uh the possibility that if we were putting really our will and our resources and allowing ukrainians to strike where they need uh we could in fact inflict Russia a defeat on the Ukrainian uh soil and this is sometimes an largely an acceptable for some leaders especially in Washington and Berlin now as you know you’re a former director of policy planning at NATO as you know NATO declared in 2008 that Ukraine and Georgia will join the alliance sence now 16 years later many say that was an empty Reckless promise how do you see it I will not say Reckless and I will not say empty but it is indeed a promise that loses its credibility as time passes and and sadly uh the the the reality is the the following uh there are no other arrangements than NATO that can guarantee Ukraine its long-term sovereignty and the moment we are able to guarantee Ukraine’s long-term sovereignty this is game over for Vladimir Putin fundamentally what Putin is after is not so much kilometers square of territory it’s not only that it’s to undermine forever Ukraine’s sovereignty and we have the tool nato in our hands to actually uh uh respond to that but there is the same electons as you were we were discussing earlier especially coming from Berlin and Washington to take the risk of NATO membership which in fact is to take the risk of Peace on Ukrainian terms and this is where we are stuck now now NATO has grown quite a bit it’s uh it’s a huge Alliance President Biden says it’s the greatest defense Alliance in history but the US is NATO’s biggest contributor by far can we expect that same level of commitment fa from the US after November’s presidential election especially if the winner is Donald Trump well this is obviously speculation both on who will be the winner of the presidential election but also what will the winner do if it’s Donald Trump uh however I think the reality is and this goes over over many many years and many US presidents the Europeans have to show more value for us money and commitment and the numbers are better uh I think we’re talking about uh now uh 2third of the Allies who are spending uh up to 2% which is a big contrast from few years ago however I think the next Frontier for the Europeans is to show that this money that they are spending on paper is translating on the ground with more capacity to defend Europe where we are still lagging behind and still very dependent on the US is we’re talking a lot about European Defense but the reality is the Europeans cannot defend Europe and and I think it’s important for the Europeans to come forward to to with the next uh uh occupant of the White House on the 6th of January with a clear plan about how Europe in the next 5 10 years will be able to build enough capabilities and capacity that it can do the majority of Defending Europe including with the ukrainians I think if we had a plan like this there would be a more convincing and a more positive conversation what do you see as the main challenges that NATO will face in the coming years and particularly How concerned do you think NATO should be about growing military cooperation between China Russia Iran and North Korea it should be uh uh very uh deeply concerned about this metastasing uh Alliance of of the the the autocracies uh which is a fact of the war and Russia’s need to uh basically reach to its autocratic friends for for more bombs and more Munitions to kill more Ukrainian people this is a very sad reality of this war so we will have the front is not just uh on the eastern border of NATO but the front is now almost globalized and we will have to think globally that doesn’t mean NATO will have to be everywhere and everything but it means it will have to have strategies to respond to possible threat that might not come necessarily from the East but might come from different domains and different theaters that’s one thing second I think this is all about what we do at home and this is coming back to the big other big challenge of NATO in the next few years and the next Secretary General Mark Rutter will have to face that his internal divisions and internal doubts it’s not just divisions it’s doubts within the NATO population about the need to spend more the need to be on a pre-war footing and I think that would be the big challenge fa thank you very much for your ins sites that was P poier CEO of rosmos and Global thanks a lot let’s talk to our correspondent in ke Nick connley Nick how is Ukraine responding to the signals coming from the NATO Summit look Terry I think the bigger problem here is that Ukraine hasn’t heard a convincing story as to what is different this time around compared to last year’s Summit in vnus where Ukraine didn’t get a convincing road map to members ship uh it seems like the NATO countries are trying to look for some kind of new fudge some kind of new uh kind of wording to explain that yes Ukraine will join and that’s definitely going to happen but when don’t ask us that is a major problem seen from here because this is not about this current phase of the war right no one in Ukraine expects NATO troops to turn up on the front lines in eastern Ukraine but for the future this is vital because without security guarantees there is a big question mark about whether the millions of Ukraine refugees who are already in Europe will ever come back without having some kind of certainty that Russia can’t invade again and even for people here once the borders are open you might have millions of people still in the country because of those limitations on men leaving leaving because they just don’t think it’s worth trying to build a future in a country that could potentially come under attack so soon again so this is crucial from a Ukrainian perspective in the ’90s Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons that it inherited from the Soviet Union in return for security guarantees that turned out to be pretty much worthless so there is a real push here that you this is a country that longer term will not put up will not agree to anything less than security guarantees and uh I think there’s the broader question of do NATO members want to see Ukraine win or is it just about stopping Ukraine losing and that was what we heard ziny there asking for permission to use Us weapons against Russian targets further away from the border to really go after those uh airports military airports and other targets right now Ukraine is only allowed to hit targets about 100 km from that border and you know that decision on its own could make a huge difference and allow Ukraine to make it that much harder for Russia to attack this country so Ukraine clearly wants NATO membership but it also needs weapons uh NATO member states have promised more air defense systems for Ukraine is that the main thing that Ukraine wants right now in terms of weapons sure that is the most pressing kind of part of the Ukrainian wish list you’ve seen those images yesterday that even Kiev even the capital with the most uh dense network of air defenses is still so vulnerable and you’re still so unable to really prevent those Russian missiles getting through if Russia sends a lot in one go but again this is pretty disappointing all of these pledges that we’ve heard from Washington these are all things we knew about before these are things that have been trailed in advance Germany already handing over that Patriot system that was basically reann anced in Washington so yes this does significantly improve Ukraine’s ability to defend itself but it is not new and it is not on a scale that would really put an end this problem I think the big remaining question mark is whether those Israeli Patriot systems that have been mothed eight of them we believe if they were to make their way to Ukraine that would then add up to what Ukraine currently has and would really allow that map to be closed and most major cities to be protected is President zalinski concerned that us support for Ukraine and by extension NATO support could decline after the US presidential election in November Nick certainly there is panic in the city here in Kev about second Trump presidency not only because we’ve had his campaign coming up with ideas how they think they can end this war in 24 hours basically by pushing Ukraine as Ukraine would see to capitulate to hand over big sades of territory to Vladimir Putin but also there’s history here you’ll remember Trump’s first impeachment was about him trying him and his team trying to push volim zinski to basically create compromising news stories about Hunter Biden his uh business dealings in Ukraine to help Trump in his us political battles so there is real bad blood there and real fear I think it’s about damage limitation right now reaching out to more mainstream Republicans hoping that they will influence Trump and his team to try and kind of pull back on some of those most extreme ideas but there is huge worry here and there’s a real hope that now some of these measures to try and institutionalize support for Ukraine put it on a NATO level rather than having it all organized by the US military things that Trump could row back in a hurry and the Hope basically to try and get as much Aid here and to get as many structures in place before a potential Trump presidency Nick thank you so much that was our correspondent Nick Conley in ke

US President Joe Biden has opened NATO’s 75th anniversary summit in Washington with a pledge of more air defense systems for Ukraine. He’s offering Kyiv an additional Patriot system and says allies will provide dozens more anti-missile batteries. This as Biden seeks to reassure allies at home and abroad that he’s up for the job of president. Doubts about his fitness for office continue to plague his re-election campaign. Biden’s offer to boost Kyiv’s defenses came a day after the deadliest spate of air strikes on Ukraine in months.

For more on this, we talk to Fabrice Pothier. He is CEO of the consultancy Rasmussen Global and a former Director of Policy Planning at NATO.

And we talk to DW’s Nick Connolly is in Kyiv.

00:00 US President Biden opens NATO’s 75th anniversary summit in Washington
02:55 Interview with Fabrice Pothier, former Director of Policy Planning at NATO
10:36 Talk with DW Correspondent Nick Connolly

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