As long as Russia claims to dominate Europe, there will only be security from Russia and no security with Russia, says political scientist Thomas Jäger. He considers the demand for security guarantees for Russia to be absurd. “A power that has a nuclear second-strike capability is not threatened. That’s why no one is threatening the United States.”
ntv.de: US Secretary of State Blinken assumes that Russia will seek a sham ceasefire because it is not making any military progress at the moment – only to attack again later. How can Ukraine tell if Russia is interested in serious negotiations?
Thomas Jäger: If it gives up the annexations. This is the central point where everything ultimately breaks. Russia has declared Ukrainian territory as Russian. Ukraine insists that this territory remains Ukrainian. If this area is to be negotiated, Russian forces would have to release it.
Are there no conceivable negotiations in which the front line is initially frozen?
At the moment, that would be in Russia’s interests. Then Russia would not have conquered all of Ukraine, but it would have built a land bridge to Crimea. Russia would then try to stabilize this area politically and finally incorporate it. In my view, it is inconceivable that Ukraine would agree to such conditions.
French President Macron recently spoke about the fact that the West must also give Russia “security guarantees” if Moscow “one day comes back to the negotiating table.” What security guarantees could that be?
From a European point of view, the issue at the moment is not security guarantees for Russia, but security guarantees in front of Russia. Russia does not need security guarantees either, for the simple reason that no one is threatening Russia. Macron picked up a Russian term. “Security guarantees” presupposes that Russia is threatened.
Macron said an important issue for Putin is the “fear that NATO will be on his doorstep and that weapons will be deployed that threaten Russia’s security”.
That Russia is threatened by weapons is not to be seen at all. A power that has a nuclear second strike capability will not be threatened. That’s why nobody threatens the USA. These powers cannot be defeated militarily on their own territory. The 1997 NATO-Russia Founding Act stipulated that NATO may not maintain any permanent military infrastructure in Eastern Europe. NATO stuck to it until 2014, until the annexation of Crimea and the Donbass war. Russia did not need security guarantees either before or after.
There are politicians and political scientists in Germany who consider security guarantees for Russia to be legitimate. Do they all talk after their mouths in Russia?
In any case, they use Russian narratives. There are probably very different reasons why they do this. But it corresponds to the Russian narrative, which turns the actual aggressor into a threatened country. Anyone who says Russia needs security guarantees is assuming that NATO is a threat to Russia. In this logic, Russia is only defending itself. This is exactly what Russian propaganda wants to suggest: in this narrative, Ukraine is not fighting a defensive battle against Russia, but Russia is fighting NATO.
You said that security guarantees from Russia are now at stake. For decades, classic German foreign policy has strived for – and in some cases still dreams of – a European peace order that includes Russia. Is this realistic?
A European peace order with Russia presupposes that this nationalist and imperialist willingness to use violence disappears in Russia. Russia must give up its claim to political dominance in Europe. Then Russia can be integrated into a European security order – just as France and Germany once claimed to dominate Europe. Despite their differences, both are nations with an imperialist past. Anyone who does not break with such a past cannot be part of the European peace order. As long as Russia claims to dominate Europe, there is only security from Russia and no security with Russia.
Should negotiations with Russia come about, Ukraine will also demand security guarantees. What could they look like?
This is the second point on which negotiations have not progressed so far. We have already mentioned the first: Who owns the territory? The second is: who will ensure the sovereignty of Ukraine? Only those who are willing to wage war against Russia can ensure the security of Ukraine. This is no country in the world because Russia is a nuclear power. Ukraine can only be safe if it is included in the nuclear deterrent against Russia.
Contractually regulated security guarantees would not suffice?
The Budapest Memorandum has just turned 28 years old. Among other things, Russia had guaranteed Ukraine’s territorial integrity in exchange for Ukraine’s relinquishment of all Soviet-era nuclear weapons. Russia has not adhered to this treaty. Why should Russia stick to future agreements on the security of its neighbors?
So the only hope left for Ukrainians is NATO membership if they want to live in a safe environment?
Yes. If Ukraine had joined NATO in 2008, this war would not exist.
Angela Merkel says: If NATO had offered Ukraine membership back then, Russia would have invaded the country in 2008.
Merkel also said she knew how Putin thinks. And yet, since 2008, it has increased its dependency on Russian energy supplies, while still allowing the German armed forces to languish.
Chancellor Scholz announced in an article in the magazine “Foreign Affairs” that Germany wanted to “take responsibility for one of the main guarantors of security in Europe”. Is that believable?
no The EU is the only international actor that wants to play a part in global politics but cannot defend itself. The European security order is not guaranteed by the EU; the USA has been doing that since 1945. Scholz has already stated that Germany is willing to participate in security guarantees for Ukraine. How this is supposed to work remained completely cloudy. The situation is similar with its current announcement. If you look at reality, the Bundeswehr has ammunition for two days. In nine months, the defense minister has not been able to initiate orders. That is the security policy reality in Germany at the moment.
Hubertus Volmer spoke to Thomas Jäger
