We declare red lines for ourselves, but not for Russia. We publicly tie our own hands while leaving Putin free to pillage, rape and destroy. We create strategic transparency, not strategic ambiguity. It's time to change course. 🧵
Putin is prepared to cross borders, subvert democratic governments, ignore treaties and rewrite the past in an attempt to legitimise the invasion and annexation of his so-called “lands of historic Russian interest”. 🧵
Putin threatens NATO with nuclear missiles, trains his armed forces for invasions, puts his economy into war mode, uses chemical weapons and orders assassinations on NATO soil. He has weaponised migrants, engaged in cyber attacks and launched disinformation campaigns. 🧵
And what about our response? We have taken every opportunity to declare what we are NOT going to do. We have imposed red lines on ourselves and announced them openly, while our adversary operates without any. 🧵
We are an open book to Putin, he expects that tomorrow will bring neither Taurus nor ATACMS nor even sufficient amounts of ammunition. He wakes up every day knowing there will be no strategic dilemmas that would shift his calculations, either on the battlefield or beyond. 🧵
If anyone thinks Putin has regard for our gestures of restraint and alters his behaviour accordingly, they are choosing to live in an illusion. He perceives caution as weakness and an invitation to keep going. 🧵
Russia retains the initiative and continues escalating. Our failure to meet this strategy with a sufficient response is the reason for the escalation, not a path to de-escalation. This is the main reason for anxiety on the eastern flank that Putin might test Article 5. 🧵
Our unilateral attempts at de-escalation are not leading to the de-escalation of anything. If we do not change our approach, we might find ourselves dealing with a seismic geopolitical disaster. And a global one, at that. 🧵
Therefore it is imperative to change our approach, embrace strategic ambiguity, break taboos and include all available options in our toolkit. Such suggestions should be welcomed, not dismissed. 🧵
If we think defeat can be limited to Ukraine, and Putin will have no further ambitions, we have a very harsh lesson coming. But if we want Ukraine to win we must keep everything we have on the table. Fin. /🧵
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