With the backing of other world leaders, President Obama effectively set a one-month deadline for Moscow to reverse its intervention in Ukraine and help quash a pro-Russian separatist uprising or else he said it would face international sanctions far more severe than anything it had endured so far.
Mr. Obama and other leaders of seven major democracies meeting here demanded that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia recognize and negotiate directly with the newly elected leader of Ukraine, stop the flow of fighters and arms across the border and press separatists to disarm, relinquish seized public buildings and join talks with the central authorities in Kiev.
“Russia continues to have a responsibility to convince them to end their violence, lay down their weapons and enter into a dialogue with the Ukrainian government,” Mr. Obama said at a news conference alongside Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain after a meeting of leaders of the Group of 7 industrial powers. “On the other hand, if Russia’s provocations continue, it’s clear from our discussions here that the G-7 nations are ready to impose additional costs on Russia.”
For the first time, Mr. Obama laid out a time frame, saying that the process could not drag out.
“We will have a chance to see what Mr. Putin does over the next two, three, four weeks,” Mr. Obama said, “and if he remains on the current course, then we’ve already indicated what kinds of actions that we’re prepared to take.”There are several problems with this ultimatum, the first of which is the obvious schizophrenia of demanding that Russian military forces abandon the border with Ukraine, which they did, only now to in effect say that they must return in order to staunch the flow of fighters and weapons to the citizens of Donbass.
But even more fundamental than this schizophrenia is the hallucinogenic notion that Moscow somehow has command and control of what is a civil war in the Ukrainian southeast. If you have ever lived in a community that has been put under assault by state security forces (as I have, during the 1999 Seattle WTO ministerial), you know that no direction from on high is necessary. When someone or something is setting off bombs in your neighbor and shooting at people walking on the street, you leave your home and confront the attacker. This is as natural as any other animal function.
So for the G-7 to lay all blame at Putin's feet while ignoring the atrocities committed by the ruling Junta in Kiev -- the massacres in Odessa and in Mariupol; the siege of Slovyansk; the aerial bombardment of downtown Luhansk; the terrorism of a marauding National Guard chock full of Right Sector neo-Nazis -- is absurd. It denies any human agency to the citizens of Donbass.
The only conclusion one can draw is that the West enjoyed some success, or at least it believes it did, in backing Moscow off the Ukrainian border and softening the Russian tone toward Kiev. Now the West wants to press on. The U.S./EU power elite feel, have some inside dope, that the Kremlin is wobbly in the face of further sanctions.
This brings us to the main problem with this one-month deadline: There is no real support within Europe to wage a trade war with Russia. The historic EU elections a couple weeks back that delivered the core ruling parties a stunning rebuke in country after country was based on the profound failure of neoliberal austerity-based economics to deliver growth and put people to work as well as a sense that Brussels was relaunching the Cold War. Obviously none of this has been internalized by leaders of the G-7. It is full speed ahead.
But the reality remains that nowhere in Europe will corporations write off huge investments in Russia to please Washington. To any informed observer the trajectory of growth is to the East not the West. Businessmen will not sacrifice future growth and profits in order to maintain American hegemony in Europe.
This is a game of chicken that the U.S. will not win.
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