Day: March 9, 2022
Blatant falsehoods parading as diplomacy
Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland tweeted today:
Pleased to speak with Serbian President @avucic to thank Serbia for its support for Ukraine, ongoing efforts to address the humanitarian crisis, and commitment to regional stability. We welcome Serbia’s good relations with neighbors & continued progress along its European path.
It would be hard to write two sentences with more misconceptions.
Other than the volunteers joining pro-Russian forces there, Serbia has offered Ukraine little. Belgrade voted for the General Assembly resolution denouncing Russian aggression. Serbia has also said it will accept Ukrainian refugees, but how many and through what channels is unclear. If it were to accept them in the same proportion as its adveraries in Kosovo, the number would be upwards of 15,000. Belgrade has also promised medical assistance, but when, where, and how is unclear.
What is clear is that Serbia has refused to join international sanctions against Russia, despite its commitment to align its foreign policy with the EU. This is nothing new. At last count, the EU viewed Serbia as 56% aligned, far less than its neighbors. Albania and Montenegro were fully aligned, with North Macedonia at 96% and Bosnia and Herzegovina at 70%.
Serbia is a primary factor in regional instability, not stability. Its leadership is calling for a “Serbian world,” analogous to Russian President Putin’s calls for a “Russian world.” That is one of the goals that precipitated the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Serbia’s Montenegrin, Macedonian, and Kosovo neighbors were already nervous about Belgrade’s massive re-armament before the Ukraine war. They now need to worry about whether Serbian President Vucic will, like Putin, claim genocide against co-nationals and invade one or more of the neighbors. Serbia’s relations with its neighbors, in whose internal politics it interferes, are notably lousy, not good.
Serbia is basically stalled on its EU accession path, for good reasons. While it implements the technical requirements, it lacks a free press and independent judiciary as well as a serious effort at transitional justice. Petrit Selimi (@Petrit), a Serbian-speaking Kosovar, tweets daily on the Serbian press. Today’s delicacies:
Here’s today’s Vesti, which has a front page big focus on “USA bringing plague to Europe”. In small letters you can read about how China and Russia have found proof USA and #Ukraine have developed many diseases to use against Russians in the war. Quite sick.
(2) oldest newspaper in #Serbia, owned now by governments is asking on front page “Who is collecting DNA of Russians”. It’s another conspiracy theory peddled by #Moscow & #Belgrade that Ukrainians & Americans have collected Russian DNA for special biological warfare. Silly stuff.
(3) Another known tabloid, famous for warmongering, hateful propaganda since 1980s, reports proudly “#Russia building its own world in East.” This is done to counter “Washington threats” and is “new global architecture”. A sinister, murderous version of @MacaesBruno’s Euroasia.
(4) the tragedy in Serbian media scene is that former liberal media have all now become affiliates or serventa of #Serbia government. B92 daily starts with Russian version of the war events in #Ukraine. Today they report Moscow lies on how “Ukraine planned for war in March”.
To be fair, one still finds pockets of smaller newspapers, regional web portals which are independent & try to counter official pro-Russian propaganda in #Serbia. NGOs protested against war in #Ukraine. However the dominant media are beholden to forces supporting death & mayhem.
@Petrit
I’m well aware that diplomats sometimes feel they have to say nice things about foreign leaders in order to bring them around. But this is a case of blatant falsehoods parading as diplomacy. #fail
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Humanitarian corridors are a bad idea too, but what’s better?
I’ve already said that a no fly zone won’t fly. It risks bringing the US into direct conflict with Russia. That’s a bad idea because the escalatory ladder could end in a nuclear exchange. That would be far worse, especially for Americans, than anything happening now.
Humanitarian corridors are target-rich
Another much-ballyhooed proposal would establish humanitarian corridors for the safe evacuation of civilians from population centers. They too are not a good idea. For the Russians, any territory on which adversaries gather to evacuate is a target-rich environment. They have demonstrated unequivocally in Syria that they will attack evacuation routes. They have already done it again in Ukraine in recent days. The Red Cross has said one designated humanitarian corridor leading out of Mariupol is mined.
Far better would be an international effort to stop the shelling that gives rise to the humanitarian corridors proposal. Mariupol is under siege. The Russian army is shelling the city’s civilian areas, targeting among other things hospitals:
Both the siege and the shelling are war crimes. International humanitarian law permits attacks only on belligerents, not civilians, the means to supply them, or medical services.
Stopping the sieges
How to get the Russians to stop? Ideally, the Russian commanders would have refused to shell civilian areas or lay siege to population centers. They know full well those are war crimes. Since they have not seen fit to do the right thing, every Western general who knows one of them should be calling to object. Russian commanders should understand that for the rest of their lives professional soldiers will view them as war criminals, not colleagues.
That isn’t likely to work, so we come to military solutions. The Ukrainian army would break the sieges if it could. One possible move would be airdropping humanitarian supplies. This too doesn’t work well. It is hard to target them to the right people. The planes carrying the supplies are the flying equivalent of sitting ducks. They are slow. They don’t carry much. Lacking their own active defenses, they are vulnerable, especially as they descend to drop supplies.
If the Russians won’t agree to stand off, the transport planes would need to be protected. That is not a pretty picture. It is also one that could lead to direct conflict between the Russians and NATO.
Another possibility is for the Ukrainians to surrender some population centers to enhance the defense of others. That is apparently what they did at the beginning of the war when they moved air defenses from the south to Kyiv. This would risk losing more of the southern coast, including Odesa. It is not an attractive proposition. But if it were to lead to a major defeat of Russian forces aimed at besieging Kyiv it might be worth the cost. Abandoning Kyiv to enhance defense of Odesa is too risky. Once the capital is gone, defeat can’t be far off.
Only winning will save the civilians
The Ukrainians face an adversary who doesn’t care about international humanitarian law. Winning the war quickly would save the most civilians. That isn’t likely. The Russian offensive has stalled, so Putin will double down. Odds are the Russians will continue waging their war of aggression, targeting of civilians, and besieging of population centers. Humanitarian corridors are a bad idea, but what’s better?
PS: Here for your viewing pleasure is a little something about Foreign Minister Lavrov, who is supposed to be negotiating humanitarian corridors:
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Stevenson’s army, March 9
I like a good kielbasa, but look at this:
– VP Harris goes to Poland today, just as the snafu over fighters to Ukraine emerges.
– USG was surprised and unhappy over Poland’s announcement.
– Poland now agrees this has to be a unanimous NATO decision.
– Russian propaganda at home assessed by NYT and by FP.
– Heads of IC give open testimony to House Intelligence Committee. And here’s the DNI’s unclassified annual report.
– Meanwhile, deal reached on spending bills–$1.5 trillion, including $13.6 billion for Ukraine. But also includes short term CR until next Tuesday to allow time for Senate action.
– Interesting analyses: Why Russia is bad at urban warfare, lessons from USMC.
– What Taiwan should learn from Ukraine.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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