Are the Leopards bringing the West closer to a war with Russia? Experts say no
For Maria R. Sahuquillo from Brussels.
Javelin anti-tank missiles, 155mm howitzers, Himars rocket launchers, Patriot anti-aircraft systems, light tanks, Challenger, Leopard 2 and Abrams tanks. The rise and power of Western military aid to Ukraine to defend against Russian invasion has heated debate over the degree of involvement of allied countries in the war, and whether a potential direct conflict is near. Angered by the invasion to strip Ukraine of its sovereignty, the Kremlin has raised the tone of its accusations of the Atlantic Alliance, insisting that the latest shipments imply that NATO is at war with Russia in Ukraine, through the troops of kyiv armed with allied military material; a “proxy war” [por intermediación]”. The Kremlin’s rhetoric is followed by some European sectors, but international law protects countries that support Ukraine with weapons to defend itself. And with that they do not consider themselves part of the conflict. The red line is to put military boots on the ground. A perspective that the allied countries are preparing to move away.
This week, after Germany and the United States announced the shipment of powerful and modern tanks to Ukraine as part of a large joint Allied effort, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, considered one of the submarines of Russian President Vladimir Putin in the EU and NATO, charged against the new support. “If you send weapons and finance the year-round budget of one of the parties to the conflict and consider sending more and more modern weapons, then you can say what you want, you are part of the war,” Orbán said. “It started when the Germans said they were willing to send helmets. Now we are on battle tanks and they are already talking about airplanes, ”he remarked.
Russia has boiled these days with a related argument, following some statements by the German Foreign Minister, Annalena Baerbock, manipulated by the Putin government to defend that Berlin and NATO are belligerent parties in the war. “We are fighting a war against Russia, and not with each other,” said the minister at the Council of Europe, in English. Moscow asked for clarification and the spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zajárova, assured on her Telegram channel that the statements prove that the West is waging “a premeditated war against Russia.”
In the photograph, which is from Reuters, residents of Kostiantynivka, in the Ukrainian province of Donetsk, this Saturday in front of the houses destroyed by Russian bombing.
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