New Slovak PM: "The Western strategy in Ukraine has been a complete failure"

"It is time for the Slavs to stop fighting each other for the geopolitical interests of others"

The new “left-populist” Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico published an impressive op-ed in the local newspaper Pravda. Here’s a translation of some excerpts:

From the very beginning of the conflict in Ukraine, I rejected a black-and-white vision, as desired in Washington or Brussels. The war in Ukraine has its roots in 2014 and in the development of the Ukrainian political scene and its relationship with fellow citizens of Russian nationality. And, of course, in the total influence of the US on everything that happened in 2014, and has been happening since. Let’s imagine, for example, that the entire Department of Defense of Mexico, as a neighbouring country of the US, as well as it political leaders, including its president, were under the complete control of Russia.

Russia responded to the security situation and Ukraine’s pressure to join NATO by violating international law, using military force without an international mandate. Big countries often do that — see the US invasion of Iraq. And the West, instead of immediately making every effort to achieve a quick ceasefire, at the beginning of 2022, when Ukraine had lost less than a tenth of its territory, made a huge mistake. It incorrectly evaluated the use of Russian military force as an opportunity to bring Russia to its knees. One look at history. Russia was invaded by Hitler in June 1941, but the Western Allies did not open a second front until the summer of 1944, when the outcome of the war was clearly in favour of the former USSR.