A course to Ukraine’s victory is still possible: Western thought leaders warn against a “new Munich Agreement” for Ukraine ahead of the U.S. election. A Russian missile strike kills six and injures 24 others in Zaporizhzhia. Ukraine reports the first military engagement with North Korean troops in Kursk, the FT says.
Course to Ukraine’s victory is still possible: Western thought leaders warn against a “new Munich Agreement” for Ukraine ahead of U.S. election
Ukraine has resisted full-scale Russian aggression for nearly a thousand days. But as the U.S. election approaches, Ukraine and its allies face a threat of the 1938 Munich Agreement repeating itself, whoever wins the race. Yet, another course is possible, which can lead to Ukraine winning the war against Russia.
So states an open letter signed by more than 100 Western politicians, academicians, military officials, journalists and other thought leaders. The letter points to a “twin strategic danger” in light of the U.S. election. “The first is that an incoming Trump administration will attempt to impose a deal with Russia detrimental to Ukraine’s interests, and to European security. The second is that an incoming Harris administration will continue with the policies of stasis and red lines, which have to date withheld the capabilities with which Ukraine could win the war,” it says.
“In this scenario, the fatalism of key European governments who refuse to believe Ukraine can win, and are tempted to commit – at best – only to the bolstering of NATO defence in response to a Ukrainian defeat, could become decisive within the alliance, while damaging its credibility,” it proceeds.
“In both cases the parallels with the 1938 Munich Agreement are clear: it would be a false ‘peace’ achieved through European acquiescence in the dismembering of a sovereign state,” the letter states, adding that: “It would be likely to lead to a wider and even more destructive war.”
The signatories of this appeal are convinced that a third course is possible, which can lead to Ukraine’s survival as a sovereign state and Russia’s defeat.
“The route to Ukrainian victory still exists. This is well understood in defence ministries across European NATO states,” the signatories say.
“The course of action we propose is, for a coalition of willing nations within NATO to commit to enhance military and financial support to Kyiv and to recommit to the aim of a sovereign Ukraine within its borders recognised by international law, focused around a clear strategy and theory of victory,” the letter states.
Those who want to act, can, the signatories assert. “The means to victory do not require sign-off at the level of the 32-country NATO alliance but can be provided by a coalition of willing powers, including all those committed to Ukraine’s recovery of its currently occupied territory and then to providing Kyiv with real security guarantees,” they say.
“This is necessary to avoid any immediate detrimental effects in Ukraine after the election, which would aid Russia, to live up to our alliance commitments and to take responsibility for our own security,” the open letter affirms.
Read the full text here.
Russian missile strike kills six, injures 24 others in Zaporizhzhia
A Russian missile attack on Zaporizhzhia on Tuesday morning killed six people, injured 24 others and damaged a critical infrastructure facility, head of the Zaporizhzhia regional military administration, Ivan Fedorov said.
A fire broke out as a result of the strike. Authorities did not say what the facility was.
Ukraine reports first military engagement with North Korean troops in Kursk, FT says
Ukrainian officials cited by the Financial Times (FT) said on Monday that their forces had fired at North Korean soldiers in combat for the first time since their deployment.
The senior Ukrainian intelligence official declined to provide specifics about the first military engagement between his country’s forces and the North Koreans. But he said that it occurred within Russia’s Kursk region, where Ukraine controls about 600 sq km of territory, or a little more than half of what it previously held following the summer incursion that took Moscow by surprise.
Ukraine’s military intelligence directorate, the GUR, said over the weekend that Russia had armed the North Korean troops in Kursk with 60mm mortars, assault rifles, machine guns, sniper rifles, anti-tank guided missiles and shoulder-launched anti-tank rocket launchers.
The GUR said some were also provided with night-vision devices and thermal imagers. A few hundred troops from North Korea’s special forces have also been deployed in Kursk.
“The first military units of the DPRK [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea] have already come under fire in Kursk,” Andriy Kovalenko, Ukraine’s top counter-disinformation official within the national security council, said on Telegram.
Ukrainian officials and military analysts have raised questions about the quality and combat effectiveness of the North Korean troops, with most being described as inexperienced, low-ranking soldiers. “We will know soon” how well they can fight, said one of the officials on Monday.
Another senior Ukrainian official told the FT that Moscow was already providing military technologies to Pyongyang to help with its missile programmes, as well as “money”.
In Moscow, Russian President Vladimir Putin met North Korea’s foreign minister, Choe Son-hui, in the Kremlin on Monday.
The foreign minister last week said North Korea had “no doubt whatsoever that under the wise leadership of the honourable Russian President Vladimir Putin, the Russian army and people will surely achieve a great victory in their sacred struggle to defend the sovereign rights and security of their state”.
Putin has not confirmed the North Korean deployment but he hinted at it last month, indicating it fell under the security provisions in the treaty.
US and South Korean officials last week confirmed Ukraine’s assessment that about 8,000 North Korean troops were sent to Kursk last month to help Russia’s army push Ukrainian forces out of the territory they have occupied since August. Senior Ukrainian intelligence officials told the FT that the forces were in barracks about 50km from the Ukrainian border and preparing to enter the fight within “days”.