Europe must stop ducking responsibility on Ukraine defence

Henry Ergas concludes that with Ukraine, we are at the point where “compromise risks veering into capitulation”, like the Munich Agreement with Hitler (“ ‘Capitulation’ on Ukraine will haunt free world”, 21/2).

If European states want to secure a viable future for Ukraine and be taken seriously, they should put their money where their mouth is and send troops to fight on the Ukrainian frontline. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has at least said he is willing to send British peacekeepers and admitted that this could put troops in “harm’s way” if Putin attacks again.

Why don’t the UK, Germany, France, Italy and other NATO countries commit to send their fighting forces? That at least has some chance of stopping Putin, a war criminal, in his tracks and hasten the end of a war that’s entering its fourth year.

Let’s also give some priority in our thinking to Taiwan.

Xi Jinping must be thinking he would be greater than Mao if he decided, based on Trump’s reckless policy to whitewash Putin’s crimes in Ukraine, that he could get away with conquering Taiwan or possibly doing some kind of deal over it.

Anthony Bergin, Reid, ACT

Henry Ergas’s column contains a warning. But, a few years after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the cold warrior Ronald Reagan did detente with the powerful USSR – and the Western media mind-meld celebrated the end of the Cold War.

A few years after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, another hero of the right, Donald Trump, tries to do detente with a much weaker Russia – and the Western media mind-meld warns of appeasement and the new Munich. The idea that a badly weakened Russia, bogged down in Donbas, is capable of dominating eastern and central Europe is risible. The US is right to end this war that has been a debacle for the West and pivot to Asia to focus on the more menacing threat in China.

Tom Switzer, Cammeray, NSW

We must hold our unfriendly fire on the Donald Trump folly until we witness all the outcomes of his bizarre art of the deal (“President is playing a dangerous game that risks credibility”, 21/2).

Some good is already trickling through: Europe is manning up and Zelensky’s popularity is climbing, and even his opposition seems to be uniting behind him.

If Trump had a moment of vindictive madness (probably based on his perception that Zelensky supported Biden), what beset Keir Starmer in promising British “boots on the ground” for a future Ukraine (when they haven’t got them and can’t afford it)?

Betty Cockman, Dongara, WA

We are on the edge of a turning point in history (“Trump’s Ukraine rhetoric a dangerous turning point”, Editorial, 21/2).

Donald Trump should be reminded that his showmanship-style presidency based on the character from his show The Apprentice is not suitable for the leader of the free world. Conservative statesmanlike qualities, similar to late US president John F. Kennedy’s approach, are required to negotiate outcomes that should favour the victim, and not the perpetrator or aggressor or dictator, as is the case with Trump favouring Putin.

This is not a Hollywood show. These are real people and there are no retakes, if Trump gets it wrong. Trump should be warned. It is not a case of whatever it takes for peace, when dealing with tyrants such as Putin, who are not rational. Give them an inch (Ukraine) and they will take a mile. Or, sadly, it may be Poland again, as was the case in 1939.

Susan McLochlan, Caboolture South, Qld

If Donald Trump sells Ukraine down the river, it will be the most recent in a long line of perfidious US acts. The Clinton administration bullied Ukraine into signing the Budapest Memorandum, by which all its nuclear warheads were given up in return for a US guarantee of its sovereign borders. The Obama administration did nothing when Russia breached that memorandum by invading Crimea.

I am hopeful that Trump’s antics are a way of piling maximum pressure on Europe to look after its own backyard. Trump is correct in saying that Europe has been bludging off US military might for too long. Europe can certainly take over from the US the major role in supporting Ukraine. So far it has simply decided to duck its responsibilities.

Doug Galbraith, Coffs Harbour, NSW