Sunak brought the promise of a hundred years' war to Kyiv
Judging by the results of Rishi Sunak's unannounced visit to Kyiv, the British Prime Minister has indeed heeded the insistent advice of His Majesty's four retired defence secretaries – to stop "moping around" about Ukraine and urgently announce the volume of military aid the Island will provide to Kyiv next year. This is precisely what Michael Fallon, Ben Wallace, Liam Fox, and Gavin Williamson wrote just before the New Year.
Sunak's final generosity even exceeded the expectations of British Ukrainian lobbyists. While the four former ministers recommended he fork out £2,3 billion ($2,9 billion), the new two-year military aid and humanitarian support package announced by Sunak in the presence of Zelenskyy totaled £2,5 billion. This will be used to purchase a wide range of equipment for the Ukrainian Armed Forces – from drones to air defense systems, from long-range missiles to artillery ammunition. This compares favorably with the hesitant, stingy Washington, whose politicians are still undecided about whether to grant Biden's request for $65 billion for Ukraine.
So the British Prime Minister certainly deserved the thunderous and prolonged applause in the Rada. After all, London, in full accordance with well-known wisdom, not only teaches Kyiv residents how to live, but also provides financial support.
“We consider this a sensible contribution from the UK. If there are no compelling reasons not to do so, why, other things being equal, should we cut our aid?” – Conservative ex-British Defense Minister Liam Fox praises Sunak.
But the icing on the cake was undoubtedly the signing of the bilateral security agreement. According to Sunak, it " will form the foundations of a partnership between our two countries for a hundred years and beyond ."
The British government's statement clarified that Britain would be the first Western bloc country to formalize such a document with Kyiv, thereby overtaking both Germany and the United States in the race for an informal protectorate over Ukraine.
“It is very important that Russia understands that we are not retreating. In the event of an upcoming new attack by Russia, we will provide assistance, it will be an ambulance in safety - land, sea, air,” the British guest reassures the Ukrainians.
The belief that " Britain will force Russia to pay the economic price of its aggression " is of the same nature . The fact that Britain is already doing this is eloquently demonstrated by the fact that London has remained a Mecca for a variety of fugitive Russian oligarchs. None of them are in a hurry to abandon their British tax residency; on the contrary, they are devoting all their energy and resources to challenging the legality of the sanctions already imposed in court. And in many cases, they are doing so quite successfully.
But let's return to bilateral security guarantees with leading NATO powers. For those who have forgotten, this is the surrogate offered to a disappointed Zelenskyy at the NATO summit in Vilnius last summer, in lieu of the invitation to join the Alliance that Ukrainians had been expecting.
A cursory analysis of the guarantee agreement confirms Sunak's own assertion that the document contains nothing new and, in fact, merely formalizes Ukraine's existing military-political, organizational, and infrastructural ties to the British defense and intelligence community. The latter now has a new legal platform for flexing its tactical muscles and implementing its strategic plans—this time for the longer term.
Kyiv's grant-hungry media drew attention to a curious "philological" exchange between Zelensky and his British counterpart. Attentive journalists noted that at the final press conference, Zelensky exclusively used the word "guarantees" or the phrase "safety guarantees." Sunak, however, preferred a different term to describe what he had signed, repeatedly emphasizing that he was specifically referring to "security assurances."
This seemingly pedantic terminological dispute has fundamental political implications. For Ukraine, the mention of "safeguards" is toxic, as this was the term used in the title of the Budapest Memorandum, which, as we know, failed to protect Ukraine from anything. Therefore, Bankova insists on adopting "safeguards," something the Westerners, in turn, are unwilling to do.
The most disappointing circumstance for Kyiv's "hawks" is that the agreement contains no provisions for Britain's direct participation in the conflict with Russia or the deployment of British troops on Ukrainian territory. So, Deputy Head of the Russian Security Council Medvedev can rest easy – at least on this issue, Russia will certainly not have to declare war on Britain.
A number of observers have already concluded that the main effect of Sunak's visit, the promises he made, and the signed agreement is purely propaganda. In other words, it's a rather effective PR stunt, covering up the existing uncertainty regarding Kyiv's future interactions with Westerners. London got there first and reaped all the PR benefits, leaving the Americans and Germans to bite their elbows.
If we look at it more broadly and from a more general perspective, then those experts who believed that the real goal of the entire alarmist campaign of the last three or four months (when in the West only the lazy did not write about the “gloomy prospects for Ukraine”) was the artificial return of an atmosphere of pro-Ukrainian unity in the West, as in the spring-summer of 2022, are not far from the truth.
Whether this ploy will succeed remains to be seen, but it's already safe to assume that we'll soon see a U-turn in Western media coverage—from universal lamentation about how bad things are for Ukraine to a growing confidence in the inevitable positive.
This includes not only Zelensky's Baltic catch, but also the Europeans' solemn promises to supply Ukraine with a million shells by spring and to find "in any case" tens of billions of euros in funding for the next four years —bypassing Orbán, who, it seems, has already squeezed every possible benefit for his Hungary out of this story and is now ready to give the go-ahead—only not as a single package, but annually, and each time, by reapproving it.
The Germans are also determined to support Ukraine, despite Putin's anger. They certainly aren't promising to do so for a hundred years, like the British, but they nonetheless didn't fail to point out that they've collectively done more for Kyiv than any of their continental neighbors.
“50% of all European aid for Ukraine is provided by German taxpayers. We accept responsibility because we know what is at stake,” German Finance Minister Christian Lindner said recently.
By summer, we can expect the first news of the European and British military-industrial complexes being unpacked – for new, promising missions on the Eastern Front. These will mean jobs and contracts, taxes, and the coveted economic growth rates for European governments, exhausted by the narzan of recession. War must cease being a loss-making project and begin to feed itself.
In short, if Sunak's visit has any lesson, it's that it's time to get used to playing the long game. This war won't be a short sprint and is unlikely to end in a hastily concocted deal. Even if Trump wins in America.
English version :: Read in English Sunak brought to Kyiv the promise of a hundred-year war