Wang Yi Makes a Peace Proposal on Ukraine

Lotsa Luck

Wang Yi, China’s top diplomat, has had a meeting with President Vladimir Putin in Moscow. Prior to that, Wang Yi met with US Secretary of State Tony Blinken, with the Ukrainian foreign minister and with NATO members. He presented a peace plan, although it has not yet been made public.

Bloomberg news reports that the plan includes “a call for territorial integrity to be respected, as well as a proposal on the security of nuclear facilities, and a ban on the use of biological and chemical weapons.”

The plan apparently does not address the issue of NATO’s presence in Ukraine, or of the territories Russia has already annexed. Nor does it have anything to say about the disposition the the Ukrainian and Russian forces. It is, of course, possible there is a lot more to the proposal that has yet to be revealed.

In any case, Wang Yi’s proposal has about zero chance of success. The US and China are at considerable odds these days, although Biden is working to fix that by downplaying the balloon incidents, calling the latter three that were shot down meteorological.

But Biden stumbled after he made his statement on the balloon to the Washington DC Press Corps. As he walked away from the podium with his handlers, Biden remarked (not understanding the microphones were still on),“Do you think they [the press] bought any of that bullshit” Answer: “Totally” Biden: “Yeah these guys will believe anything, let’s get out of here.”

Whatever Biden may have hoped to achieve with China was offset by his faking it when it came to the balloons. The story is all over Twitter (including the video), so it will soon be reflected in pressure from Congress on US policy regarding the Chinese.

But US policy is also quite a mess when it comes to Ukraine. Biden wants the Russians to leave Ukraine, pull their troops out, admit defeat, and surrender up those military officers and soldiers who may have committed unspecified war crimes. The Russians have already retaliated by moving toward indicting Ukrainians for war crimes.

The essence of the Biden/NATO policy is to break the back of the Russians and maybe even get regime change in Moscow. For sure the CIA and other European spy and disinformation operations are intently focused on that objective.

Most of the time, however, wars are won on the battlefield. Yes it is true that national leaders have, from time to time, been overthrown or murdered, something that the US has dirty hands in arranging or supporting the murder of Ngo Dinh Diem in South Vietnam in 1963, the killing of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, and the arrest and subsequent trial and hanging of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in 2006. No doubt there were others. (We won’t mention poison cigars for Fidel Castro.) The Russians too have played the same kind of game, even going so far as supporting the killing of the US Ambassador to Afghanistan Adolph Dubs, in 1979.

In review the military situation in Ukraine, from all appearances the Russians have not only improved in bringing effective force to bear on the Ukrainian army, but have weakened Ukraine’s fighting capability seriously. The situation continues to deteriorate as Ukraine continues to lose men, and its ground and air defenses have been degraded. It is hard to say if a tipping point in the war has been reached, but Moscow must think so. Otherwise Putin would have offered a softer line in his remarks on the anniversary of the Russian “special military operation.”

Washington still is convinced Ukraine is winning, a proposition that is mostly wishful thinking. If the Zelensky government collapses, or the battlefield losses in Ukraine become unsustainable, Washington will face a humiliating situation that is best avoided. It could lead to foolish and reckless actions that might trigger a war in Europe that NATO would have serious difficulty winning because NATO is unprepared. Isn’t it a strange kettle of fish the that most pro-war and vociferous of the NATO members, the UK, is the least ready to capably even defend British territory. In the big picture NATO, including the US, is rapidly running out of ammunition. If the war cannot be prolonged, the outcome for Washington and NATO is grim.

The way out would be to embrace some kind of realistic peace initiative, meaning the US has to open communications channels at a high level with Moscow. But, as Wang Yi is about to learn, any chance of that happening is unlikely, given the latest declarations of Biden in Kviv and Warsaw.