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When Henry Kissinger gives advice on ending the Ukraine conflict, the West should listen — Analysis

The realpolitik veteran schools today’s ideologues, but they won’t like the lesson

Today’s Western diplomats are mostly responsible for the escalating tensions between Russia and Ukraine. And now the grandmaster of realpolitik — that is, foreign relations shaped by pragmatism and on-the-ground truth rather than wishful thinking — has just delivered a rhetorical blow to NATO’s ambitions over Ukraine.

This week, Henry Kissinger (the Nixon-era US secretary to state, and an international political legend) turns 99. His advice on how to end the conflict in Ukraine was offered via videoconference by him at the World Economic Forum held in Davos.

“Parties should be brought to peace talks within the next two months. Ukraine should’ve been a bridge between Europe and Russia, but now, as the relationships are reshaped, we may enter a space where the dividing line is redrawn and Russia is entirely isolated,”Kissinger stated this in conversation with Klaus Schwab, founder of WEF and executive chair.  

It seems that Russia’s goal is to separate Europe from Russia. To do this, Russia must arm and support Ukrainian fighters in order to act as NATO proxies. Washington would be able to explain the reason it is so invested ideologically and financially in the conflict.

A EU-Ukraine Russia axis could be as competitive as Washington and Beijing on the international playing field. The Atlantist leaders at Brussels, along with their Russophobic allies, have chosen dated Cold War ideologie over long-term economic and political interest of their own citizens. It would serve their best interests to normalize relations across the European continent and increase cooperation. 

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“We are facing a situation now where Russia could alienate itself completely from Europe and seek a permanent alliance elsewhere,” Kissinger said. “This may lead to Cold War-like diplomatic distances, which will set us back decades. Long-term peace should be our goal.Most likely, Russia will be able to reach a more positive relationship with China.

The end result could be a stronger military-industrial bloc in competition with the US for economic and political influence worldwide and a loss of clout for the EU, which would simply be reduced to a less influential partner of Washington’s, with less autonomy than it would have enjoyed had it not subordinated all of its interests to Washington and had instead maintained a more independent and balanced position.

Kissinger’s decades of experience in global affairs at the highest level as an advisor to heads of state, governments, and multinational corporations, and as an advocate of pragmatic solutions to sticky global problems, all give weight to his advice for any global crisis. 

Kissinger, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of his work in the negotiation of an end to Vietnam War bloodshed with North Vietnamese troops under the presidency of Republican President Richard Nixon (US), served as secretary of state and national safety advisor to Nixon. Before that, he was an advisor to Democratic president John F. Kennedy. If he’s urging a rapid resolution to the conflict in Ukraine, it’s informed by his professional experience. He sees some similarities between Vietnam and Ukraine. 

Kissinger’s solution for ending the territorial disputes between Russia and Ukraine is unlikely to please the current American foreign policy establishment. “Ideally, the dividing line should be a return to the status quo ante. Pursuing the war beyond that point will not be about the freedom of Ukraine, but a new war against Russia itself,”Kissinger claimed that the “with the “status quo ante” referring to leaving Crimea, Lugansk, and Donetsk under Russia’s control. 

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Once again, “most admired man in America”, according to Gallup polls from 1973, 1974, and 1975, in the wake of peace in Vietnam, Kissinger has often wandered off Washington’s beaten foreign policy path. His blueprint was the basis for the US-China cooperation. He also opposed NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia under former President Bill Clinton. “The rejection of long-range strategy explains how it was possible to slide into the Kosovo conflict without adequate consideration of all its implications—especially the visceral reaction of almost all nations of the world against the new NATO doctrine of humanitarian intervention,”Kissinger made the following statement in a 1999 Newsweek article. 

Kissinger’s remarks accurately foreshadowed the military interventions of NATO member nations elsewhere under humanitarian pretexts — such as Syria, Libya, and now against Russia via Ukraine — for the ultimate purpose of regime change. In the same way, Kissinger predicted that there would be so much resistance to these Western wars despite all of their hype and spin. Although attention spans and news cycles may have shortened since Kissinger’s diplomatic heyday, some people can still grasp that ideologically driven conflicts can engender long-term negative systemic repercussions that more than outweigh whatever short-term satisfaction may be derived from sparking an ideologically driven conflict.

The sooner those who are feeding the current chaos can clue into Kissinger’s advice, the better off we’ll all be in mitigating the inevitable subsequent diplomatic, economic, and political hangover. 

Statements, opinions and views expressed in this column do not reflect those of RT.

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