Britain and France say they want to send European troops to Ukraine as “peacekeepers” if a ceasefire should be achieved.   

So far, however, only Britain and France seem interested in contributing “boots on the ground” and “planes in the sky” to the so-called “coalition of the willing.” 

But even if there were to be a long-term ceasefire, there is almost zero chance that British or French forces would ever deploy to Ukraine. That’s because in order to establish a true peacekeeping force, both sides of a conflict must agree. 

Russia has made it abundantly clear for some time now that under no circumstances would it accept NATO troops near the war zone posing as so-called peacekeepers.

In fact, Moscow has warned that British, French or any NATO forces without a U.N. mandate would be seen instead as co-belligerents with Ukraine — the only side that would welcome them. 

A legally-acceptable peacekeeping force can only be set up through the auspices of the United Nations.  And that is because agreement is needed among the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, the body that establishes U.N. peacekeeping missions.

That means that both sides in this conflict — the United States, Britain and France on one side, and Russia on the other — must agree to set it up. Under U.N. peacekeeping practice, no nation that has had a hand in the conflict can contribute troops to the U.N. force. 

That’s why you’d see Bangladeshi, Nepalese, Indian, Irish, and Brazil soldiers keeping the peace in Ukraine, once the killing ends. (Sweden has been a big contributor in past missions but it has now joined NATO.)

This week, Russian President Vladimir Putin raised the possibility of U.N. participation in an arrangement for peace for the first time.  He floated the idea of the U.N. providing a temporary administration of Ukraine to hold elections for a government with whom Russia could complete a peace deal.

It’s hard to imagine the British, the French or the U.S. not vetoing that. All of this, of course, is a long way off.

Euro Dead End

European leaders know that the only chance Ukraine has to win the war is direct participation by NATO forces, which could lead to World War III and the end of the world. 

That’s why NATO hasn’t been so foolish to try it. To make sure, Putin has from the start of Russia’s entry into the war in February 2022 warned NATO that Russia was ready to use its nuclear arsenal if NATO attacked it. 

That was portrayed hysterically in Western media as Putin “threatening” nuclear war on the West, when it was instead a warning which has prevented NATO from doing anything stupid that could lead to the ultimate disaster. 

The British-French proposal then to send “peacekeepers” to Ukraine is totally unrealistic and has only one aim: the public relations value of keeping various European political careers afloat:  

Ursula von der Leyen, EU Commission president who acts (and is treated) like an elected head of state except Europe is not a state and she was not elected by the people. She said Russia was in “tatters” and that its desperate military was reduced to using “washing machine” parts for repairs.

She’s moved all her chips onto the “Ukraine Victory” box and can’t back down now. So she and the others on this list encourage the deaths of many more Ukrainians, knowing full well that the longer the war goes on the worse deal Ukraine will get. But it’s about them (and destroying Russia), not Ukraine.

Emmanuel Macron has been playing a weird game on Ukraine since the months leading up to Russia’s large-scale intervention in 2022. He visited Moscow practicing the now lost art of diplomacy trying to avert a larger conflict. (And now at least he’s open to a U.N. peacekeeping mission.)

Two years ago he privately advised Volodymyr Zelensky at a dinner in Paris with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to give up and take the best deal:  Ukraine had lost the war. Even Germany and France, long-time mortal enemies on the continent, had reconciled and Ukraine would have to do the same with Russia. 

Yet he’s trying to prolong the war he now knows Ukraine is losing even worse than before.  

Keir Starmer. Though he has only been in office nine months, he has already invested a huge amount of political capital in Ukraine, risking the ire of Britons dependent on the government for help to survive with his expenditures to Kiev. And why?  Like too many British prime ministers, he looks in the mirror and sees Winston Churchill. Thus the rhetoric about “boots” and “planes” in Ukraine. 

It turned out to be all bluster. There’ll be no peacekeepers without the U.N. and no Ukrainian defeat that can be dressed up as victory.

But the British governments preceding Starmer invested heavily in the new Great Game of weakening and overthrowing the Russian government. How can he give up now?

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