FROM OUR REPORTER
MUNICH – If Volodymyr Zelenskyy goes on stage as always in camouflage and boots – and who knows whether he has promised himself when he will take them off – he lost Avdiivka a few hours ago. He ordered his generals to withdraw and hand the country over to the Russians, marking the second major Ukrainian defeat of the war. And he did it because the audience to which he speaks and which will applaud him by standing up has been denying him ammunition for six months. “Don’t ask Ukraine,” he says, “when the war will end.” Ask yourself why Putin can continue like this.” Then he concludes: “May our world, based on rules, never become yesterday’s world .” Ovation.
But more than Zelensky, Munich seems to be dominated by the guest who is not there. Vladimir Putin, trapped in Moscow, has ruthlessly taken over the scene, who knows whether by calculation or coincidence, and for this transatlantic audience – the “Davos of”. Security”, which celebrates its 60th anniversary with 180 ministers, then experts, technicians, journalists – it sent two terrible, criminal messages: the body of the enemy Navalny and the capture of Avdiivka.
Here at the Bayrischer Hof, where Putin said in 2006 that the end of the USSR was “the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century,” all his opponents flocked today: But what are they ready for?
Zelensky formulates the problem clearly. He addresses the US Congress, where Republicans have been blocking military aid for six months, and the Europeans: “Keep Ukraine in an “artificial” deficit in weapons, especially artillery (Message to the USA, ed. Red.) and skills for A large temporal radius (Message to the USA and Germany, editor's note) enabled Putin to adapt to the current intensity of the war.” And to Trump, who explains that he supports Putin will allow his re-election to “take whatever the hell he wants in Europe,” Zelensky sends an invitation from the stage: come to the front and see what war is, he will accompany it himself.
Responses from allies came from various forums. The least impressed was Chancellor Scholz, who called on everyone to donate more. He even rejected the US offer of $20 billion in military aid – for a $28 trillion economy. “Such an effort must be minimal.” Asked whether he was ready to grant the Taurus cruise missile system, which would allow an attack deep into Russian logistics, including in Crimea, he replied that he “the question is strange find”. NATO – he repeats – does not want to wage war against Russia.
The G7 foreign ministers also met under the chairmanship of Antonio Tajani, with Italy taking the lead this semester. They call on “the Russian authorities to fully clarify the circumstances” of Navalny’s death. But while on Friday Biden used the word “brutality,” Macron “gulag,” and Canada’s Trudeau “monster,” yesterday’s final statement called for “stopping the unacceptable persecution of political dissidents.” But he never mentions the word Putin. Which of the G7 countries has slowed down?
On the sidelines, at dinner, at the many side tables, there is fatigue and dissatisfaction. German newspapers say that Hillary Clinton described Biden's approach as too slow. The women were the most combative on stage. Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, who was “wanted” by Putin with an arrest warrant, countered the American isolationists: “We have already seen what it means not to stop the aggressor when you have the opportunity.” Ursula von der Leyen has announced that she If she becomes Commission President again, she will appoint an “EU Defense Commissioner”. Ideas, promises, time requests that Zelensky doesn't have. And all of this seems weak when spoken in the same room where, 24 hours earlier, a woman whose husband had just been killed had the courage to go on stage and challenge Putin. Because Aleksei would have wanted it that way.