Zelenskyy on security guarantees: If Ukraine is not in NATO, there is no way to finance and arm million-strong army
Pravda Ukraine
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy believes that one of the main issues in negotiations with allies in the context of security guarantees should be the issue of arming and financing Ukraine’s million-strong army. Zelenskyy rhetorically asks what will happen to Ukraine’s army if the country is not guaranteed NATO membership.
Source: Zelenskyy in an interview with Polish media
Quote from Zelenskyy: “I have a simple question, for example, we are not yet in NATO and diplomacy has gone. I have a question: Ukraine has a million-strong army, and now our partners are helping us, but where will we find the money and weapons to maintain a million-strong army?
This is a fact. If you don’t have NATO [support], air defence, support, a general fleet, etc., you have to rely on yourself. Today, there is no bigger army in Europe than the Ukrainian army. This is not said [to boast] of our advantage, it’s that it’s very, very expensive.”
Details: The president said that, first of all, Ukraine needs security guarantees for peace, but this requires preventing escalation. He considers that this should be taken into account to prevent Russia from preparing for another attack.
Zelenskyy believes that Ukraine needs NATO, weapons, and other support to guarantee its security.
After a meeting with the Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk on 15 January, he said that one of the security guarantees could be the deployment of peacekeepers to Ukraine, but that this issue is still under general discussion with the allies. Zelenskyy also announced that he would discuss peacekeepers with the UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who arrived in Kyiv on 16 January.
The president also added that Europe is currently unable to fight Russia without the Ukrainian army. He said the Russian army is larger than the entire EU army: “Bigger, with more weapons, more people and more audacity… Without the Ukrainian army, the EU army has no chances [to win – ed.], unfortunately.”
Background:
- Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that the Ukrainian army currently consists of 880,000 soldiers defending the whole country. Ukrainian forces are facing 600,000 Russian troops on their territory.
- Zelenskyy also stated that Ukraine currently produces about 33-34% of all the weapons the country needs per year. Before the full-scale Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, this figure was less than 10%.
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