It is also our war

Putin can still win the war, what he can never win is peace. He can win the war, it is not impossible for him to do so because despite the aid Ukraine receives, the disparity of forces on the ground is overwhelming and soon the 300,000 reservists called up by Moscow and others the Wagner Group is recruiting from the country's teeming prisons will join the front lines in exchange for freedom without charge if they fight in its ranks for six months... and survive. Many seem to accept. They are all being trained at full throttle and that points to a Russian offensive in the spring if not sooner, perhaps this time with Belarusian support. Now the Ukrainian offensive has slowed while the civilian population suffers unspeakably in a winter without electricity, heating, running water or food as part of Russia's strategy to break the spirit of resistance of the long-suffering Ukrainian people. Moscow does not seem to mind committing war crimes. 

If Russia were to win and Ukraine were to disappear from the map, swallowed up by Russia, which is not impossible either, the consequences would be terrible for the world and for Europe in particular because Moscow, emboldened, would threaten Poland and especially the Baltic States where there are also significant Russian minorities to "protect", not to mention the strategic port of Riga. For the same reasons Georgia and Moldova would be in danger because there are also Russian minorities there and this would send a bad example to others, such as Orban who also aspires to reunify the Hungarian minorities that were left outside his borders. Or Serbia itself, which aspires to hegemony in the Balkans. And inspired by the Russian example, which after all would have paid an acceptable price for its invasion, China could be encouraged to attack Taiwan and resolve other territorial disputes with India or Japan by force, North Korea could openly threaten its non-nuclear neighbours, and Iran could take the final step and become a nuclear power, which would unleash an arms race in the Middle East. 

This would be bad news because what would ensue if Russia imposes its will is a dangerous state of anomie caused by the decline of rules that have best governed the world better rather than worse from 1945 to the present day would decay and that would result in a free-for-all where the law of the jungle would be imposed without restraint. You know, the big fish that eats the small fish for the sole reason of its size. At stake here is not only Ukraine's existence as a sovereign country, but our own security and standard of living in an increasingly unequal and unfriendly world. 

That is what Zelensky has been telling the US Congress in a well-crafted and intelligent speech that began by recalling the Thirteen Colonies' own unequal struggle against the mighty British Empire, which was ultimately defeated, in an analogy with his country's current struggle against the Russian giant. He then recalled the leadership role expected of the United States today because global security has been indivisible since the 1975 Helsinki Final Act enshrining the inviolability of European borders and the subsequent 1990 Charter of Paris, both signed by the USSR, while it was Putin's own Russia that signed the 1994 Budapest Memorandum whereby Kiev handed over its nuclear arsenals to Moscow in exchange for Russian guarantees of its sovereignty, territorial integrity and inviolability of its borders. In this light, it seems like a joke. If pacts are not honoured in a world that is interdependent rather than interconnected, no one is or can be safe. Finally, Zelensky reminded Americans that their own domestic well-being is a consequence of their national security, and that national security depends not only on the strength of their arms but also on an international system based on equal rules for all, shared institutions, free trade and the free flow of ideas. All of which are in crisis today, and it should not be forgotten that, ultimately, the very security of Europe and the United States depends on the Straits of Hormuz, the Bab el Mandeb, Malacca, Suez and Panama being open, and that is just one example.

For the rest, Zelensky has returned from Washington amid imaginable and understandable security measures with the promise of receiving Patriot missile batteries and another package of almost 50 billion dollars in military aid (not charity but investment, he said) although he did not get - for now - even the planes, tanks and long-range missiles that he also asked for because the US is moving with leaden feet and wants to avoid putting Russia in an impossible situation.

For these reasons I am among those who believe that what is happening in Ukraine affects us directly and that Europe's security is being fought today on the battlefields of Kherson. And not only for economic reasons.

Jorge Dezcallar Ambassador of Spain