Ukraine’s resilience is key to Europe’s collective security, says expert

This was stated to Espreso by Mykhailo Samus, Director of the New Geopolitics Research Network and co-founder of the Defense Information Consortium.

NATO is undergoing a crisis: the Alliance is not ready to act, and that is its greatest threat. “An organization that until recently was considered a guarantor of the security of democratic countries is increasingly turning into a passive bureaucratic structure that avoids mentioning the war in Europe, labels Russia a ‘threat’ rather than an enemy, and is afraid to irritate Trump with uncomfortable questions,” notes Mykhailo Samus.

According to him, the upcoming NATO Summit in The Hague, scheduled for late June, risks becoming a symbol of the end of the Alliance’s strategic leadership.

At the same time, the current situation, in the expert’s view, creates a window of opportunity for a new strategic development direction for Europe – the formation of a self-sufficient European component within or based on NATO. And Ukraine has every opportunity to become the vanguard of this transformation.

“Today, the need for strategic autonomy from the United States (including in the field of nuclear deterrence) and for equal participation in the Euro-Atlantic security system alongside the US is already evident,” the military expert emphasizes.

European united defense forces with their own command structure, logistics, and systems to deter aggressors are a crucial element of the new security architecture.

According to him, the key components of the European Defense Forces should form a “Eurosecurity triad”: deep-strike missile capabilities jointly developed by European countries and Ukraine (to guarantee destruction of key elements of Russian military infrastructure, at least in the European part of Russia); an effective multi-layered air defense system; and European nuclear deterrent forces.

An important aspect of this strategy is Ukraine’s maximum involvement, which would include: joint research and development; integration of Ukraine’s defense industry and utilization of Ukraine’s experience in producing advanced weapons systems tested in the war against Russia; and secure supply chains, meaning reduced dependency on external suppliers through the development of intra-European manufacturing capacity.

“In the context of NATO’s strategic crisis, Europe must take responsibility for its own security and defense by making a decision toward ensuring strategic autonomy in its security architecture through the creation of European Defense Forces. And Ukraine can become the vanguard of this new European defense architecture,” the expert concludes.