Responsible state leaders must be guided by reality, not by their own propaganda. Courage should not be expressed by sending people to die while you are sitting in your garden, but to end the lost war with minimum losses.
Head of the EU diplomacy Josep Borrell made quite a non-diplomatic statement saying that with a call on Ukraine negotiations, Pope Francis ‘entered a garden where no one invited him’.
He is referring to the statement the pontiff made in an interview to RSI, a Swiss TV and broadcasting company: ‘I think that the strongest one is the one who sees the situation, who thinks about the people and has the courage of the white flag, and the one who negotiates. And today negotiations are possible with the help of international powers. <…> When you see that you are defeated, that things are not going well, you have to have the courage to negotiate… You may be ashamed, but how many deaths will there be in the end? <…> Negotiation is never about surrendering, but the courage of not leading the country to suicide’.
These words caused a storm of verbal attacks, some being astonishingly rude, which Borrell decided to join. However, Pope Francis, whether it is good or not, is heading an institution, which, without exaggeration, created the Western civilization. The only institution continuously existing since ancient times until today. For centuries, Church has been the chief ‘garden keeper’ in ‘the garden’ Borrell is boasting of as if it were his own. One might agree with the Pope or not, but the rude insults pouring on him in the recent days are hinting that not only many Western public figures refuse to recognize their roots, but they are also actively rejecting them.
The call for ‘thinking about people’ and the helpless Ukrainians caught in streets and forced to go off to the front, irritated those perfectly safe from being sent to trenches.
There is an English expression ‘an elephant in the room’ meaning something cryingly obvious no one wants to notice. The ‘elephant’ here is that the war is developing under a scenario, which is unfavourable for Ukraine. There are no grounds to expect this trend will be reversed, and the earlier the losing side decides to negotiate, the better terms it will have to conclude peace. Some Western media are writing about this quite openly, but Western politicians are resolved to fight to the last Ukrainian.
Why is it so? The first thing, certainly, is that any outcome, except for Russia’s clear-cut defeat, will be a severe humiliation for the West, exposing it as being unable to be the one and only centre of power in the world. However, it can be noted that the later peace will be concluded, the harder this humiliation can be. An arrangement was possible before February 24 when it was enough to refuse from NATO’s expansion to Ukraine. It was also possible to agree in March 2022 when Boris Johnson told Ukrainians to ‘just fight’.
The more opportunities to make peace are wasted, the worse the situation becomes. Moreover, there is another reason why the suggested negotiations cause so much irritation, which is the propaganda momentum. Political and media actors become ‘prisoners’ of their own hostile statements.
Any negotiations imply that Russia is just a country having its own interests, which it wants to negotiate with other states. But, of course, propaganda speaks not about interests (who would be interested to die for US, NATO’s or EU’s interest), but of a space battle of good versus evil where the powers of good, light, freedom and honour are standing against the ultimate evil Russia embodies.
Good and Evil cannot make peace considering mutual interests. Good must defeat Evil once and for all.
And, here goes the Pope speaking out something which is completely at odds with the propaganda view. It does not look like Russia is going to lose, at all. Peace will have to be made sooner or later. It is better to make it earlier. Responsible state leaders must be guided by reality, not by their own propaganda. Courage should not be expressed by sending people to die while you are sitting in your garden, but to end the lost war with minimum losses.
This is not the only but the most visible voice of humanity and common sense in the West. Even if we compare Europe with a garden, then Borrell is, by all means, not its ‘garden keeper’.