As negotiations loom for resolving the Ukraine issue, the German media bark at the ghost of “Yalta 2.0” — a reference to the Yalta Conference in February 1945 where the “Big Three” — Stalin, Roosevelt, and Churchill — settled the post-war world order.
However, this comparison misses the mark. The current focus is solely on Ukraine and the long-overdue resolution of a conflict that was foolish and suicidal, especially for Ukraine itself. U.S. President Trump is absolutely correct in blaming Kiev for starting the war nearly three years ago, reminding them, “You should have never started it. You could have made a deal.” Everyone knows this, except, of course, the German mainstream media. Anyone with a clear mind could understand as early as 2022 that Russia could not tolerate a NATO appendage at its doorstep. Now, the end is in sight, and the lamentation is loud. It is to be hoped that Ukraine will now be sustainably neutralized as a source of unrest. Otherwise, the war will “heat up” again in a few years. Trump seems to realize this as well.
Thus, the proper historical comparison is not Yalta but the Munich Agreement of 1938. Czechoslovakia, established by the Western powers after World War One as a frontline state against Germany, harassed the Germans who had been living in the Sudetenland for centuries in a similar way that Ukraine has harassed the ethnic Russian population in the Donbas. Hitler, in cooperation with Great Britain, France, and Italy, swiftly incorporated the Sudetenland with its 3.3 million Germans. Therefore, the annexation of Crimea in 2014 was as justified as the reintegration of the Donbas now.
The good news is that the Yalta post-war order is obsolete. None other than the U.S. President is currently setting aside the long-jealously guarded principle of the immutability of borders. For eighty years, Europeans have been deceiving themselves. Of course, borders can be changed if they are unjust and trample on the right of peoples to self-determination. This was the case in Czechoslovakia after 1918 as much as in the artificial state of Kiev after 2014. But no injustice lasts forever — a good message for us Germans, too. It’s finally getting interesting again.
(Translated from the German)
