We have already experienced a historic opportunity that presented itself to the community of Central and Eastern Europe and which, if properly exploited, could have changed the balance of power and the fate of our continent. On the location of the European periphery or semi-periphery, our policy could have won three things and been remembered for decades as a historical turn: Russia could have suffered a defeat in this war, Poland and Ukraine could have achieved lasting rapprochement, an alliance could form with the potential for independence, and in our country it could have achieved independence for the first time, the third time a government of the independence option was formed. We lost three times.
First of all: Russia is undefeated
Each of these failures had a very similar cause: political unpreparedness. The Ukrainians could really drive the Russians out of their territory, which they showed not only with the brilliant defense of Kiev, Chernihiv and Kharkov, but also with the summer counter-offensive in 2022, in which they took most of the Kharkov region with a few blows recaptured and occupied Kherson. . However, the political unpreparedness of American Democrats was palpable. First, they did not want to transfer “offensive weapons,” aircraft, tanks, and Himars; everything was carried out in phases for fear of the “risk of escalation” created by Russian disinformation. So Ukraine got enough to defend itself, but not enough to win. Russia has therefore expanded to the northern coast of the Black Sea and there is no indication that it will be displaced from there.
Secondly: the course from Kiev to Germany
The second defeat exposed Ukraine’s immaturity. While the dream of the European Union is justified for a post-Soviet country surrounded by the influence of oligarchs, the trust Kiev placed in Berlin and Brussels last summer is blind and short-sighted. Since the arrival of the new German ambassador, Martin Jaeger, in the capital of Ukraine in mid-July 2022, members of the government have been influenced so effectively that barely a day after the meeting with the German diplomat, they were able to dance to the tune of the Berlin politics. Naturally betting on a stronger partner may seem right, but the sin of the Ukrainian international elections is the ever-temporary choice of a “stronger partner,” which ultimately subjugates or abandons Ukraine.. In the latest “Network Weekly” Prof. Volodymyr Sklokin explains: “Ukrainians are very Euro-enthusiastic, and for us a better ally seems to be a country that can introduce us to the European Union more quickly.” That is, Germany.
Third: the Poles are on their way to Tusk
The third defeat is the Polish electoral defeat. Society succumbed to hysteria and demonization of conservative politicians and gave power not only to dilettantes, but simply to representatives of foreign interests. Tired of the eternal quarrels with EU structures, under pressure from Western partners and dragged by the media controlled from other countries, the Poles decided that Donald Tusk, Szymon Hołownia and the rest would give them the protection of the most important Polish saint: the peace. Here too, the political immaturity was the political immaturity of the Poles.
A missed historical opportunity
This exam, which we failed on all three points, is now behind us, the ‘window of opportunity’ has closed. The Russians occupy several percent of Ukraine’s territory, and literally no one in the West offers a position of spectacular military support to the defending country. Six months after the invasion, Kiev decided that Poland was too weak – and today the country perhaps considers it too independent – to pin its autonomous hopes on it, and the new government on the Vistula River began a frenzied series of destroying the country in the name of hatred towards political opponents.
The taste of defeat is so bitter that all three problems had to be overcome. The Polish-Ukrainian rapprochement with a defeated and wounded Russia and its continued course for independence on the Vistula River could push the history of Central and Eastern Europe towards a subjectivity not seen here since the 17th century. An additional irony of fate is the fact that this turn in history, from which Poland could have emerged so much stronger, goes virtually unnoticed.. It is somewhat reminiscent of the Seven Years’ War (1756-1763), which was supposed to bring Prussia to its knees and increase the influence of the Polish king Augustus III, the Saxons in the Empire, but which ended with the destruction of Saxony and the total passivity of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which did not realize that a historic opportunity had just slipped under the noses of the Poles.
Today we live peacefully, as if nothing important has happened, but the consequences of once again bowing to the ill-fated fate of Poland and Ukraine will slowly ripen and noticeably affect us – and our independence.
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Source: wPolityce