Nobody Wants Western Troops on the Ground in Ukraine: German Defense Head
German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said Friday that the recent talk about Western boots on the ground in Ukraine is bunk and there is no serious consideration for such a move.
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He was asked about recent comments by French President Emmanuel Macron, and said, “Nobody really wants to have boots on the ground in Ukraine,” RT, the Russian outlet, said.
He said any more talk about Western troops in Ukraine should end.
“Nobody is now supporting ‘boots on the ground,’” he said.
Kaja Kallas, the Estonian prime minister who has been compared to Margaret Thatcher for her relentless warmongering against Russia, told reporters last week that everything is on the table when it comes to helping Ukraine defend itself.
Kallas, who dreams of being the head of NATO, made the comments after Macron said he couldn’t rule out French forces fighting in Ukraine.
She said NATO leaders must consider all options and she said Macron’s comments tell Russia “that we are not ruling out different things,” she told Politico. “Because all the countries have understood that we have to do everything so that Ukraine wins and Russia loses this war.”
The Politico report noted that most larger countries made clear that there are no plans to send their troops into Ukraine to line up against the Russians, which would be the official start to World War III.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz ruled out both German and NATO forces from entering the fight in Ukraine.
Smaller Baltic countries, like Lithuania, we’re not so quick to reject such an idea.
Gabrielius Landsbergis, Vilnius’s foreign minister, also addressed Macron’s comments and said: “nothing can be taken off the table, no option can be rejected out of hand.”
Macron said the defeat of Russia is “indispensable to the security and stability of Europe.”
Konstantin Kosachev, the vice speaker of Russia’s upper chamber, said the result of French troops fighting in Ukraine could be catastrophic.
“This is the line beyond which it’s no longer just NATO’s involvement in the war – this has been happening for a long time, but can be interpreted as the alliance entering direct hostilities, or even as a declaration of war,” Kosachev posted on Telegram, according to RT.
Kallas told Sky News that Europe should not be afraid of its own power.
“Russia is saying this or that step is escalation, but defense is not escalation,” she said. “I’m saying we should have all options on the table. What more can we do in order to really help Ukraine win?”
Kallas warned last March that there was growing concern that peace could break out in Ukraine if the West starts pushing Kyiv to appease Russia after its illegal invasion. Urmas Reinsalu, the Estonian foreign minister, said at the time that Ukraine either needs to join NATO after the war or receive nuclear weapons if there’s any hope of coexisting with Russia in the future.
TRENDPOST: It’s hard to take the pro-war comments from a president who oversees a country that can be invaded by Hoboken, N.J. seriously. Estonia’s military ranks 108 out of 142 in world military ranking, according to the 2022 Global Firepower Review. (The U.S. is ranked first and Russia second.)
Kallas, who has been pushing for the U.S. to intervene in Ukraine’s fight against Russia since the beginning of the war, warned that NATO has five years to prepare for an all-out war with Russia, a claim that Moscow brushed aside.
Jens Stoltenberg told Welt Am Sonntag, the German newspaper, in an interview published 10 February that the West does not want war with Moscow, but still “prepare ourselves for a confrontation that could last decades,” according to The Kyiv Independent.
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U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin told the House Armed Services Committee last week that he believed NATO would join the fight if Ukraine fails.