[ Redux ] Ukraine, Dance Macabre of European Arms
Our article published on March, 6, 2022. EU member states, not the Union itself, will fund and supply Ukraine’s weapons, creating a time bomb amid legal uncertainties and scant oversight.
This essay was first published in French on March, 6, 2022, two weeks following the outbreak of hostilities in Ukraine. It elucidated the reasons why neither the Euro-Atlantic community nor Ukraine could reasonably aspire to victory. The West, it contended, stood as a passionate bystander, bereft of existential stakes or a cogent strategic framework. Subsequent events have borne out our prognosis—a foresight shared by others within the discerning few. One is left to ponder: what accounts for the estrangement of Western leaders from the stark realities before them? Who are these peole? Are we, perchance, unwitting participants in a grand transatlantic tableau—a Seinfeld-like pageant of sublime nothingness (except for the dead and the money)?
This essay seeks to situate the delivery of €450 million in weaponry to Ukraine—presented as a collective endeavor of the European Union—within its appropriate geopolitical and historical context, thereby enabling a comprehensive understanding of its implications, scale, and ramifications. The Ukrainian crisis defies reduction to a facile narrative of nice Ukrainians pitted against bad Russians; it is a matter of singular complexity, demanding a nuanced appraisal. To that end, this analysis commences with two foundational observations and a succinct recapitulation of the conflict’s genesis, establishing the necessary framework for debate. Such an approach, though extensive, is indispensable; though intricate, it is inescapable.
First Preliminary Observation: The Geostrategic Framework
This narrative might be likened to the fable of the frog aspiring to rival the ox in stature—or, more aptly, the mosquito presuming its sting might outmatch the bear’s claw.
Over the past quarter-century, Europe has relinquished its status as the fulcrum of global affairs—a shift presaged by the Asian financial crisis of 1997–1998. Observers of that period will recall how, with rare exceptions, the nations of East and Southeast Asia eschewed the prescriptions of the International Monetary Fund and other Western-led institutions. Confronted with a crisis precipitated by macroeconomic distortions—the legacy of vast Western capital inflows through the 1980s and 1990s—Asia charted its own course to recovery. It was amidst this upheaval that the “BRIC” constellation—Brazil, Russia, India, and China—coalesced, orchestrating a concerted response to shield Russia and Latin America from the contagion’s reach.
Professor John J. Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago has offered a cogent and unassailable dissection of American foreign policy, underscoring a bipartisan constancy: Europe no longer commands the strategic foreground. The election of Donald Trump, secured against the entrenched machineries of both Democratic and Republican establishments, introduced inflexions to this trajectory—yet these remained anomalies, not a reorientation.
This is not to pronounce Europe’s decline, but to acknowledge a natural and inevitable rebalancing of the global order. The world’s center of gravity has drifted eastward, relegating Europe to the periphery. Yet, the response of European leaders has been one of petulance—an obstinate adherence to the notion that the European Union’s scale alone can perpetuate its relevance. Such a fixation on primacy, as if all must orbit around Europe, betrays a juvenile worldview, akin to an infant mesmerized by the mobile above its cradle. In the intricate lattice of contemporary geopolitics, genuine influence derives not from centrality, but from the dexterity to traverse and recalibrate the system’s myriad nodes.
The war in Ukraine has exposed the fragility of this antiquated paradigm. Moral posturing has obscured strategic clarity. European and Western leaders, confronted with the unraveling of a narrative sustained for three decades, have doubled down on an untenable course. Elevating a regional conflict into a global conflagration, they harbor the misguided conviction that Russia can be humbled, and their preeminence as the political and economic lodestar preserved. In this reckless escalation, they imperil the global economy, risking a recession not born of market dynamics but wrought by the devastation of infrastructure, spiraling energy costs, and surging commodity prices. Their guiding ethos appears to echo Louis XV: “Après nous, le déluge.” The rest of the world is unlikely to absolve them of this hubris.
Neither President Emmanuel Macron nor his fellow European leaders appear to have fully apprehended the profundity of the relationship between Russia and China—a bond that may well surpass, in both depth and mutual benefit, the oft-invoked “Franco-German partnership,” a construct largely sustained within the precincts of the French elite’s imagination. For two decades, Western policy has systematically propelled Russia and China into a closer embrace, only for us to express astonishment when their alliance solidifies without deference to our blessing.
China, both in tangible support and strategic intent, serves as Russia’s indispensable bulwark in its confrontation with Ukraine—reveling in the opportunity to compel the United States to redirect its momentum from the Indo-Pacific to the European theater, a conflagration Beijing has materially abetted. Concurrently, the United States demonstrates a readiness to foment disorder and strife across our continent, intent on forestalling any prospect of deeper European Union alignment with the Eurasian sphere. European leaders, ever acquiescent, furnish the means to facilitate this strategy. The cost, inevitably, will be borne by the citizens of Europe.
Second Preliminary Observation: The Institutional Architecture
The European Union rests upon a triadic institutional foundation.
The European Council, comprising heads of state or government from member states, stands as the EU’s preeminent decision-making authority. It is presided over by a permanent president, in tandem with the leader of the member state holding the rotating EU presidency.
The European Parliament exercises its principal mandate through approving the EU budget and supervising its execution, while sharing legislative co-decision powers with the Council across 85 designated domains of European law.
The European Commission, tasked with the formulation of EU policies and legislation, serves as the administrative backbone, ensuring member states’ adherence to treaties and legal obligations—though it wields no decision-making prerogative.
Matters of foreign policy, security, and defense reside firmly within the purview of the Council. The European Union, it must be emphasized, is not a sovereign entity but an intergovernmental construct, with sovereignty retained exclusively by its member states.
The 2011 Lisbon Treaty ushered in a novel and intricate apparatus: the European External Action Service (EEAS), ostensibly an EU foreign ministry for an organization lacking sovereign status. This reform wrested oversight of external relations—alongside elements of development and international cooperation—from the Commission, vesting it in the Council. The EEAS subsumed the Council’s prior mechanisms for common security and defense policy, as well as the Situation and Intelligence Center (IntCen). The consequence has been a pronounced eclipsing of the Commission’s once-dominant stature, both within the Union and on the global stage—a shift accompanied by bureaucratic rivalries exacerbated by clashing egos at the apex of power.
Since assuming office, Ursula von der Leyen, President of the Commission, has courted contention. Lacking the mandate of a head of state, she has nonetheless adopted the posture of one, straining the boundaries of EU treaties and precipitating recurrent frictions. Her recent assertion that Ukraine’s destiny lies within the European Union—despite membership procedures being the sole prerogative of member states—ignited indignation across multiple capitals. Charles Michel, President of the European Council, issued a restrained yet pointed rejoinder, noting the existence of “different opinions and sensitivities”—a diplomatic admonition underscoring her overreach.
The EU’s leadership today is mired in disarray. The Commission President encroaches upon the Council’s domain, much to the latter’s chagrin, while the French rotating presidency has drifted without direction or substance—seemingly engineered as a mere prop for Emmanuel Macron’s reelection bid.
Third Preliminary Observation: The Recent Genesis of the Conflict
The portrayal of Vladimir Putin as a deranged tyrant, a modern reincarnation of Adolf Hitler, or both, lacks evidentiary grounding. Russia’s assault on Ukraine is indisputable—an act illicit and in flagrant breach of the United Nations Charter. Yet, as in any armed conflict, responsibility is rarely unilateral. To comprehend, and potentially resolve, such a crisis, identifying the underlying catalyst—the "cause of the cause"—proves more critical than merely designating the initial aggressor.
Clausewitz’s dictum endures: war is the extension of politics by other means. Addressing the Ukrainian conflict necessitates discerning the political imperatives that precipitated the resort to force—a decision anchored in antecedent political dynamics and a sequence of events perceived by the aggressor as justification. No leader—be they autocrat or democrat—awakes to impulsively order an invasion. Such an act reflects a calculated political intent, executed through meticulously orchestrated military operations or, in extremis, as an urgent response to existential threats, with its human, diplomatic, and economic toll weighed against strategic ends. American neoconservatives have long championed the doctrine of preventive war—a precept, grounded in fabricated intelligence, that underpinned the illegal and far more devastating invasion of Iraq relative to the present Ukrainian theater.
The most cogent and thoroughly substantiated examination of the Ukraine war’s proximate origins emerges from the work of journalist Aaron Maté, whose years-long investigation yields a meticulous two-part analysis (the second forthcoming). Maté delineates the mechanisms precipitating this conflict, spotlighting the West’s—particularly the United States’—considerable culpability, without exonerating Russia’s aggression.
A précis of Maté’s findings follows.
It is now incontrovertible that the “Euromaidan” uprising constituted a far-right coup, orchestrated by the United States. An intercepted February 4, 2014, telephone exchange—eighteen days prior to the coup—between Victoria Nuland, then Assistant Secretary of State, and the U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine, erases all ambiguity. (The recording also attests to Russia’s formidable signals intelligence prowess.) Nuland, now Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs and a stalwart neoconservative—married to Robert Kagan, a leading neocon theorist—boasts a storied career: national security advisor to Vice President Dick Cheney (2001–2005), U.S. Permanent Representative to NATO under George W. Bush (2005–2008), where she advanced the 2008 Bucharest Declaration pledging NATO membership to Ukraine and Georgia, and later Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs (2013–2017), with Ukraine as a focal point. Her tenure has been marked by unrelenting advocacy for U.S. interventionism, including pressuring a reluctant President Obama to arm Ukraine.
In the intercepted dialogue, Nuland and the ambassador are heard handpicking Arseniy Yatsenyuk as Ukraine’s prime minister—a choice actualized post-Maidan through a “false flag” massacre engineered to topple the democratically elected, pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych. Nuland’s curt “Fuck the EU” epitomizes her disdain for European allies. Orchestrating this coup were figures including then-Vice President Joe Biden, his chief of staff Antony Blinken (now Secretary of State), and advisor Jake Sullivan (now National Security Advisor), alongside Secretary of State John Kerry—all architects of a policy arc that later birthed “Russiagate,” a debunked narrative of Trump-Kremlin collusion now under criminal scrutiny.
Nuland’s current entanglement in allegations of chemical weapons research labs in Ukraine—echoing the Soviet-era Biopreparat legacy—further complicates the tableau, offering ample grist for speculation.
Europe’s Role Reconsidered
A confluence of independent and mutually reinforcing sources affirms that Germany and France possessed foreknowledge of the coup preparations in Ukraine, with indications that their external intelligence services may have extended support to the endeavor.
In 2014, Germany was under the stewardship of Chancellor Angela Merkel, with Frank-Walter Steinmeier as Foreign Minister and Ursula von der Leyen—yes, the same figure now prominent in Brussels—as Minister of Defense. In France, President François Hollande presided, flanked by Laurent Fabius as Foreign Minister and Jean-Yves Le Drian as Defense Minister. Emmanuel Macron, then Deputy Secretary-General at the Élysée Palace, was almost certainly apprised of these developments—it strains credulity to suggest otherwise. Strikingly, this cadre of leaders also shoulders accountability for the calamitous mismanagement of the Syrian conflict, a parallel that bears scrutiny.
François Hollande would do well to exercise restraint before admonishing the French populace to shun Russian gas—a policy that risks consigning the nation to a profound and protracted economic downfall. France, Ukraine, and the broader European project continue to grapple with the repercussions of Hollande’s ineptitude, with the ledger of consequences steadily mounting. His pursuit of regime change in Syria yielded disastrous outcomes, the price of which was acutely felt in 2015 on the streets of Paris and Nice—a sobering reminder of the stakes involved.
European Leaders Were Aware of U.S. Maneuvers
European leaders knew about the American plot. In another intercepted conversation from early March 2014 between Catherine Ashton, the then EU’s High Representative for Common Security and Defense Policy, and Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet, reveals that it was not President Viktor Yanukovych who ordered the shooting of protesters, but rather that it was executed by far-right militias linked to the Maidan movement.
Since this coup, which sparked a civil war in Donbas and Russia’s annexation of Crimea, Ukraine has been used as a tool to provoke Russia—a country that has never hesitated to retaliate. Having poured billions of dollars in military aid into Ukraine, the United States, true to form, has failed to keep these provocations below a critical threshold.
In 2019, Volodymyr Zelensky was installed as Ukraine’s leader. Elected on a peace platform, he quickly reversed course, escalating Ukrainian operations in Donbas to justify and sustain military support and keep the money flowing. This escalation also served as leverage to pressure NATO and the EU—both reluctant to admit Ukraine—by stoking fears of the “big bad Russian bear.” This blackmail was actively encouraged by the Biden administration and neoconservatives, who aim to reshape Europe as they failed to do in the Middle East.
Volodymyr Zelensky bears as much responsibility for Ukraine’s plight and the suffering of its people as Vladimir Putin does. He is now openly calling for a third world war.
Speak to My Colt, My Head Is Sick
One needs not possess exceptional acumen to discern the foreordained conclusion of this conflict: Ukraine will be “neutralized”, one way or another.
For fifteen years, Russia has issued unequivocal warnings that Ukraine’s militarization and prospective NATO accession constitute an existential threat—one sufficient to warrant armed intervention. The Kremlin has recently articulated its terms for a ceasefire: Ukraine must cede recognition of Russian sovereignty over Crimea, affirm autonomy for the Donbas, and enshrine constitutional neutrality. These demands underscore a delimited strategic objective, misread by a chorus of self-styled experts who prophesied a Soviet resurrection, unchecked Russian imperialism, or regime upheaval. Vladimir Putin’s aims betray no such grandiosity—conquering or administering a nation spanning 600,000 square kilometers with a mere 120,000 troops defies military logic. By comparison, France marshaled 938,000 soldiers in Algeria in 1962, excluding gendarmerie forces.
Russia has effectively prevailed because Ukraine does not represent an existential imperative for either the United States or the member states of the European Union—a cause no one would stake lives upon. The West’s defeat was sealed in 2014, when it failed to guarantee Ukraine’s frontiers, permitting Russia’s annexation of Crimea—a fait accompli belatedly acknowledged by President Zelensky himself. Tragically, Ukraine’s neutralization will be exacted through devastation.
Why, then, allocate €450 million in weaponry to prolong a conflict already lost, amplifying the toll in lives and destruction? The answer lies in a Western leadership cadre—spearheaded by Emmanuel Macron—bereft of strategic foresight, tethered instead to a distorted, virtual apprehension of reality. Much as they uncritically embraced the counsel of Big Pharma and McKinsey during the Covid-19 pandemic, they now parrot a prefabricated U.S. narrative ill-suited to the Ukrainian context. These decisions—ephemeral palliatives and performative gestures—disregard their ramifications. When viewed alongside our first preliminary observation, the scale of this strategic ineptitude becomes starkly apparent.
The imposition of economic sanctions—ill-conceived and counterproductive—to address a fundamentally political challenge exemplifies the same folly. By transforming a regional crisis into a global one, these measures have eroded the dwindling international confidence in the West. What central banker would now entrust reserves to dollars or euros, subject to arbitrary confiscation?
No rigorous evaluation of the sanctions’ repercussions preceded their enactment. For instance, the exclusion of Russian banks from SWIFT was enacted without regard for its impact on the over-the-counter derivatives market—options, swaps, and futures—that underpins global commodity trading. The volume and composition of derivatives held by Russian financial institutions remain opaque, rendering the cascading effects on settlements, reliant on issuing banks, incalculable. Those banks, in turn, lack the data to calibrate coverage for defaults precipitated by our own design. Consequently, systemic risk to Western financial systems has surged exponentially.
Now, to the matter of armaments.
The Ukrainian government’s policy of arming civilians is a grievous misstep. Such individuals, transformed into irregular combatants devoid of meaningful military capacity, serve as little more than human shields or immediate casualties—a tactic with dire humanitarian implications.
The precipitous commitment of €450 million in arms to Ukraine—hastened by U.S. insistence and Macron’s determination to substantiate, at any cost, his ethereal vision of European sovereignty—belies a deeper incoherence. Unless…
Does Hillary Clinton harbor ambitions of reprising the Cold War-era Afghanistan playbook within the heart of Europe, overlooking the sobering precedent of a far smaller, less resourced, and modestly equipped insurgency that stalemated the United States and NATO for two decades? That campaign’s denouement—a withdrawal marked by disarray and ignominy—rendered the defeat all the more acute. At an estimated cost of $200 million per day across twenty years, the endeavor stands as a profligate misadventure. One can only imagine the sentiments of American taxpayers.
The €450 million arms package represents a boon for European military establishments, which stand to divest themselves of surplus small arms at a profit, while defense industries seize the opportunity to restock with state-of-the-art equipment.
Within the European Union, the production and commerce of military equipment andweapons are subject to stringent prohibitions. Entities or individuals engaged in such activities require state-issued permits, while arms exports fall under the rigorous oversight of the 2016 Arms Trade Treaty, to which all EU member states are parties. Exporters must secure licenses, and importers are obliged to furnish end-user certificates alongside guarantees against re-exportation.
In Brussels, during the French EU presidency, an audacious proposal emerged: to channel funding for Ukrainian arms through the European Peace Facility (EPF). The irony of this nomenclature escapes no one.
In the lexicon of EU governance, the EPF is designated an “off-budget instrument”—a fund sustained by member state contributions proportionate to their GDP, excluded from the Union’s formal budget, and intended to underwrite military and defense assistance. Its off-budget status reflects a fundamental truth: defense remains beyond the EU’s competencies, rendering notions of “European defense” as illusory as the oft-touted “European sovereignty.”
The €450 million arms commitment is not, in fact, financed by the EU itself but by its member states. Nor does the EU procure or dispatch these weapons—member states shoulder that burden. The official narrative asserting otherwise is, quite simply, a flat-out lie.
We reached out to the EEAS, which provided a written confirmation as follows:
"The Union is financing the delivery of weapons to Ukraine through EU member states."
Regarding the logistics, the EEAS further elaborated in writing:
"The European Peace Facility (EPF) will reimburse eligible war materiel purchased and delivered by member states. The EPF committee, comprising all member states, will determine the list of equipment eligible for this assistance. A compensation unit within the EU Military Staff has been set up to track Ukrainian requests and needs, as well as our offers. This unit will assist the EPF committee in evaluating reimbursement claims."
In effect, EU member states have established what amounts to an arms bazaar—a marketplace for military surplus. The arrangement evokes echoes of the United Nations’ oil-for-food program, a labyrinthine mechanism imposed on Iraq following the Second Gulf War. Yet here, the currency is weaponry, and the price is measured in the blood of Ukrainians and Russians alike.
The EFP scheme is primed for malfeasance and opaque transactions. Consider a plausible scenario: a member state offloads surplus arms to a commercial intermediary, repurchases them at an inflated price for onward transfer to Ukraine, and subsequently seeks reimbursement from the EPF. With defense transactions exempt from public procurement oversight and frequently cloaked in confidentiality, profits accrue with minimal to no scrutiny.
Some may decry this assessment as unduly cynical. Yet the imprint of the French EU presidency is unmistakable. Amid a national election cycle, President Macron is eager to tout European sovereignty and defense as concrete triumphs attributable to his foresight and determination. The reality, however, falls short of the rhetoric—a venture more illusory than substantive.
A more streamlined and efficacious alternative would have entailed the creation of a covert operational unit, detached from EU institutional frameworks, harnessing pooled intelligence resources to orchestrate discreet arms transfers. For the 27 EU member states, a €450 million outlay is, in any case, pocket change.
A further concern looms large: to our knowledge, no mechanisms have been instituted to monitor the disposition of weapons dispatched to Ukraine. Precise inquiries from our side posed to the European External Action Service yielded evasive responses, while the French Ministry of Defense offered no clarification.
Ukraine, a nation long beset by corruption, harbors formidable transnational criminal networks—entities both violent and deeply entrenched within the legitimate economy. These organizations command sophisticated logistical capabilities and leverage local banks, often controlled by amenable oligarchs, to launder proceeds. The Yugoslav wars of the 1990s are still the cause of the supply to European criminal underworlds with military-grade armaments. Envision, then, a near-future scenario: a crew targeting armored cash transports with Panzerfaust 3 launchers sourced directly from Bundeswehr stockpiles.
Contemplate further the prospect of these arms being diverted for substantial profit to other theaters of conflict—South Sudan, the Sahel, or beyond. More alarming still is the potential for jihadist factions to acquire man-portable air-defense systems (MANPADS), such as the reported 1,500 FIM-92 Stingers supplied by Germany and the Netherlands. This is no mere conjecture; Ukraine has historically served as a sanctuary for jihadists from the Caucasus and elsewhere. Mohamed Louizi’s sobering analysis, referenced below, offers a disquieting glimpse into this peril.
A Pivotal Escalation: The Provision of Combat Aircraft to Ukraine
At the heart of this discourse lies a proposition of singular gravity: the delivery of fighter jets to Ukraine. The practical impediments are immediate and formidable. Ukrainian pilots lack training on Western aircraft and their sophisticated weapons systems a transition demanding no less than a year of intensive, dedicated instruction. Concurrently, European air forces possess scant inventories of Soviet-era platforms. Poland, Bulgaria, and Slovakia maintain modest fleets of MiG-29s and Sukhoi Su-25s—relics of a bygone era, now over four decades old and nearing obsolescence as they are progressively decommissioned.
The United States, the architect of this audacious initiative, has proffered an enticing inducement: discounted F-35s, F/A-18 Hornets, and F-16s to these nations, sweetened by the proceeds from the disposal of their antiquated fleets—costs conveniently invoiced to the European Peace Facility (EPF).
Having established an arms bazaar, we now witness the emergence of a veritable fighter jet flea market. Yet a critical question persists: can these aging airframes, burdened by obsolescence, contend with Russia’s markedly advanced designs and cutting-edge armaments? Against the formidable lattice of Russian anti-aircraft defenses, their prospects appear negligible.
Nevertheless, the Ukrainian Air Force has boldly asserted that these aircraft will not only be delivered but deployed in combat operations by Ukrainian pilots—operating, it is claimed, from bases in Poland. Such a move would constitute an unambiguous act of war by NATO against Russia, a threshold with profound implications for the Alliance’s cohesion and the broader geopolitical order.
Poland and Bulgaria have exercised commendable prudence in declining this proposal, a decision reflective of sober strategic judgment.
The BFMTV journalist question—ridiculed across France after questioning how these aircrafts would reach Ukraine, only to receive the retort, “Planes fly, you know”—was far from frivolous. The operational reality is stark: upon crossing into Ukrainian airspace, these jets would be swiftly acquired by Russian radar systems and neutralized the moment they enter striking range—a near-certain outcome given Moscow’s advanced air defense capabilities.
Terrestrial delivery of armaments presents an equally daunting challenge. While Ukraine’s borders with Poland and Romania remain permeable, facilitating some measure of transit, Hungary has steadfastly barred the passage of weapons through its territory. Russia’s formidable satellite surveillance and intelligence apparatus—capable, as evidenced, of penetrating Ukraine’s diplomatic delegations—maintains meticulous oversight of NATO installations, border zones, and troop dispositions. The instant a consignment is mobilized, it becomes a target for tracking, destruction, or interception.
Multiple independent and mutually reinforcing sources indicate that weapons ostensibly “delivered” to Ukraine are, in practice, being deposited at NATO facilities in Poland. From these staging points, the onus falls upon Ukrainian forces—abetted by discreet Western intermediaries—to ferry them to the front lines. For the present, reports suggest these “delivered” arms languish in hangars, concealed from scrutiny, reaching Ukrainian combatants at a halting, incremental pace.
War, in its unvarnished reality, is neither a public relations exercise nor a propaganda spectacle. It defies the tidy blueprints of technocrats ensconced in the comfortable confines of Brussels’ European district.
The Reign of Hysteria in Western Crisis Response
In the West, crisis management has succumbed to a pervasive state of hysteria. European leaders have demonstrated an alarming inability to maintain composure or withstand the imperatives of a United States master driven exclusively by its own strategic calculus. This pattern, eerily reminiscent of the Covid-19 response, now unfolds with far graver human consequence.
The commitment of €450 million in weaponry to Ukraine exposes the fragility of the European Union’s edifice—a structure undermined by the very architects who aspire to elevate it further. Emmanuel Macron’s aspiration for Europe as a global power assumes the guise of an adolescent reverie—a nascent figure practicing a Davos address before a mirror.
Through deft communicative sleight-of-hand, the EU seeks to assert a role un sanctioned by its treaties, establishing precedents and faits accomplis intended to compel their eventual enshrinement in European jurisprudence. This maneuver—disloyal and institutionally discordant—reflects a reckless disregard for the citizens it purports to serve.
Such brinkmanship carries profound peril, not least amid the economic turmoil these sanctions are poised to unleash—a burden to be borne disproportionately by Europe. Beyond an energy shock surpassing the severity of the 1973 oil crisis, it may precipitatethe eurozone’s disintegration. Escalating interest rates and financial disintermediation, exacerbated by Russia’s exclusion from SWIFT, paves the way a crisis evocative of 2007–2008. Unlike the failures of Lehman Brothers or AIG, where insolvency stemmed from inherent deficiencies, here the incapacity of Russian banks to fulfill obligations is a deliberate artifact of Western design.
In effect, the European Union has ignited the fuse of a thermonuclear economic device beneath its own foundations—yet it lacks the means to defuse the impending detonation.