The professor believes that the EU and NATO are the two most successful institutions in history in terms of common foreign policy. However, European foreign policy is largely dependent on the relationship with the United States. He said that Europeans have accepted a world in which the security of European states is ensured by America. “In return, the Europeans do what the US wants them to do in terms of foreign policy,” he noted. So Europe does not have an independent foreign policy. According to the professor, this is not a healthy relationship.
It is said that Europe will never become a regional hegemon, certainly not without the USA. According to him, the USA is the glue that holds Europe together, and if Europeans had to take care of themselves, Germany, for example, would have to ensure its own security, and that would cause dissatisfaction among neighboring states. That’s why European states like American security, because they don’t have to compete with each other and can get rich instead. But this creates dependence and the need to listen to the US. NATO’s expansion into Ukraine is a perfect example, Mearsheimer says, recalling how Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy opposed it in 2008, saying it would be a disaster, but the US got its way. If they had been able to resist the USA back then, Europe would not be in today’s trouble, he also estimated.
If the USA were to leave Europe, Europe would fall apart, according to the professor, and each state would have to make its own foreign policy. “The Europeans are in a terrible situation where they have to follow the dictates of the United States to keep the Americans in Europe,” he said. He says that there is no good solution, he believes that it is not in Europe’s interest to break away from the USA and that the interest in having the protective umbrella of the USA over our heads is deep. However, the Europeans should push back more when the Americans come up with stupid proposals.
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“I think it would make sense if France, Germany and European countries were to prevent the expansion of NATO and put more pressure on the US to end the Ukraine war much sooner. After she started. But they did not push, they are following the Americans, and it will turn out that the Russians will win in Ukraine, which will have really negative consequences for NATO and Europe in general,” he estimated.
What consequences? NATO staked its reputation on the conflict. And if the Russians win and the Ukrainians lose, it will be a big blow and it will weaken the alliance and cause divisions in it. For example, between France and Germany or Hungary and other countries. Not to mention that Europeans would begin to question the transatlantic bond, the ability of Americans to make the right decisions and protect them. “So I think there will be a lot of negative consequences when it becomes clear what kind of failure happened in Ukraine. Which happened,” he declared.
However, according to him, the failure in Ukraine will not lead to the fact that Russia decides to continue after Ukraine. “This is a myth that has been spread in the West to strengthen the ongoing support for Ukraine,” he noted, adding that many people in Europe and the US have already understood that support for Ukraine is counterproductive.
That is why it hardens in its threats and Russia is presented as the second incarnation of the USSR or the Third Reich, which, if not stopped, will conquer Europe all the way to Dunkirk. “This is nonsense, the Russians have no military capabilities and no interest in conquering all of Ukraine. It is important to realize this. People are talking about conquering lands beyond Ukraine? There is no evidence that they want to conquer all of Ukraine,” he said. And that’s what the secret services say? Mearsheimer brushed it off, saying that if the Secret Service had actually discovered it, it would have been leaked long ago.
According to him, the Russians do not want to attack NATO countries and get into a war with the United States. “That would be stupid. That’s why the Russians never showed interest in conquering the Baltic states. The Russians are interested in one thing, that Ukraine is not in NATO. They are not interested in conquering countries in Eastern Europe. They’ve been there, they’ve done it and it didn’t turn out very well. The Russians after 1989 were happy to withdraw from Eastern Europe. Occupying and governing Eastern Europe was a nightmare. They had to invade Hungary in 1956, they had to invade Czechoslovakia in 1968, suppress the German rebellion in 1953, deal with countries like Romania and Albania, which were constantly giving them trouble,” the professor calculated, adding that the Russians know that occupying the territory , where people don’t like them, leads to riots and trouble. Problems that aren’t worth it.
Photogallery: – Convoy of freedom
He also spoke about the enlargement of the European Union. In his opinion, the EU should stop expanding and definitely not expand into countries like Ukraine or Belarus. The future of the EU depends on NATO, he says. After the election of Donald Trump, there is little likelihood that NATO will be weakened or abolished. And then Europe would have a problem, not even because of the threat from Russia, but because of the power rivalry in providing security.
According to John Mearsheimer, even China would not be able to convince Russia to withdraw from Ukraine, because Ukraine in NATO is considered by Russia as a security threat.
At the end, he was asked to say something positive. But the professor refused. “I have nothing positive. I think the situation will get worse. And I think most people don’t know what kind of trouble we’re in. As I said, I think the Russians will win in Ukraine. I think it will have negative consequences for Europe, it will do a lot of damage in NATO. I think nationalism is on the rise all over the world. I think the liberal regimes in Europe that thrived in the one superpower era are in trouble. If you look at domestic politics in the USA, how Donald Trump views democracy, it is clear that the USA also has a problem…” he said and continued that there will be problems in the Middle East, between Iran and Israel, and also in Europe and for Americans especially important, even in Southeast Asia.
“There are so many ways we can end up in trouble, and it’s hard to say how to fix these problems,” he said, adding that if it were easy, solutions would already be being talked about.
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Ukraine (War in Ukraine)
Reports from the battlefield are difficult to verify in real time, regardless of whether they come from any side of the conflict. Both warring parties, for understandable reasons, may release completely or partially false (misleading) information.
PL editorial content discussing this conflict can be found on this page.
author: Karel Šebesta
