“If this war does not end by mid-April, it risks spiraling out of control. So far there has been a stalemate in negotiations and on the ground. Now it seems that something can be moved on the negotiating level. A first ceasefire would not hinder the negotiation “.
This is the analysis of Alessandro Politi, Director of the NATO Defense College Foundation, a private think tank, officially recognized by NATO.
Politi, in an interview with the Agi, continues: “The Russians have already opened the corridor between the Donbas and the Crimea. Mariupol has been cut into slices like an apple. The hope is that Mariupol’s success will allow Putin to present the operation as a victory and thus lead to a ceasefireIt does not seem to me that the Russians want to attack Kiev and Odessa. They can bomb but conquering the two cities would be very complicated. One landing from the sea would not be enough to conquer Odessa. The Russians in the north of Ukraine have so far been playing cards. The Russian military has a working side, but also many poorly usable conscripts. Then there are the Ukrainians who defend their homeland with valor, even if Mariupol, Kherson and Melitopol are already lost “.
Would Ukrainian President Zelensky agree to sign an agreement with the loss of control of Mariupol? “The Ukrainians – says Politi – have already accepted a basis of neutrality: not to enter NATO and not have foreign military bases on their territory. EU membership remains possible. Zelensky, however, must resolve the fact that his Constitution is written by the 2019 the prospect of joining NATO. The request for a referendum on a possible agreement is not just a matter of tactics. To change the Constitution it would take a two-thirds majority of the Parliament. Zelensky today has more than 75% of the consensus, but a any Leonine pact with Russia would make him lose a lot of credibility “.
Politi does not take it for granted that the Ukrainian parliament will be able to approve a peace agreement. “In 2014 – says Politi – it was the Ukrainian right that made possible agreements fail. The dynamics of extremist positions also play a role in the governments of Moscow and Kiev”. However, Politi believes that Russia did not shine in this war.
“NATO spends ten times more on defense than Russia – says the director of the NATO Defense College Foundation – if they did not have a practically equal nuclear power, there would be no match between NATO and Russia. Analysts believe that in a hypothetical aggression with weapons conventional Russia would only be able to occupy the Baltic countries, but not Poland. The United States might ask: ‘If the Ukrainians stood up for themselves, why couldn’t the Europeans do better alone?’ “.
“The war in Chechnya – continues Politi to the Agi – lasted ten years and we are talking about a patch of land. Even in Syria the hardest part of the conflict was left to the local militias and Assad’s men. In Georgia it was a easy counterattack “. According to the analyst, negotiations between Ukrainians and Russians will continue in Turkey. “In the eyes of Kiev and Moscow, it is a reasonably neutral NATO country – states Politi – much better than the Belarusian border”.