Dzmitry Bandarenka: Both Putin And Trump Will Have To Acknowledge This

Europe already has two strong leaders — Zelensky and Zaluzhny.

Where is President Donald Trump leading the US? Will America remain the world's hegemon? Will Ukraine stand strong? Which bloc will Belarus join? The Charter97.org website posed these and other questions to Dzmitry Bandarenka , the coordinator of the European Belarus Civil Campaign.

— American assistance to Ukraine has been stopped at the moment. Will Ukraine stand strong?

— Ukraine will certainly survive, because it has the most powerful army in Europe and combat experience that no army among democratic countries has. If Ukraine had lost, it would have been cut off from the Black Sea. It is quite clear that under the guise of negotiations, Putin wants to seize Odesa. After such actions, the seizure of the Baltic coast to Kaliningrad would have been predetermined. European countries understand this danger, so such a scenario will not be allowed. Europe is waking up.

Trump wants to get an economic benefit, to look good in the eyes of his voters, who are not very strong in international politics and geopolitics. If this option were implemented, it would certainly be an image catastrophe for Trump and America. Therefore, the United States will not allow such a defeat of Ukraine.

As we can see, things are done not only "the wrong way" in Russia but also in the West. I hope common sense will prevail, Russia will not get what it wants, and Ukraine will stand and strengthen.

— US President Donald Trump has been in power for only 44 days, but during this time he managed to make so many statements and actions that many already doubt that America is part of the West. Have you been able to discern, amid the "white noise" we read and hear every day from across the ocean, where the US is headed?

— I must say that for many decades America was the world's policeman. In 1945, the US GDP was more than 50% of the gross domestic product of all countries on Earth. Today, the US GDP remains huge — more than $27 trillion, but this is only more than 26% of the world economy.

There is such a thing as hegemonistic cycles. The theory is that there is a change of hegemony in the world in about a hundred years. When the hegemon has no advantage, and there is a country that is ready to challenge, trade wars, protectionist measures, retreat from global trade begin.

We are witnessing all this now. If the US is together with its allies from the EU, whose GDP is $18 trillion, the UK, which has $4 trillion, plus Canada, Japan, Australia, other democratic countries, then America can remain a world hegemon, but in coalition with democratic countries.

Whatever Trump says, the United States remains the leader of the democratic world. If he tries to overturn these perennial alliances, America will suffer. It is clear that China is challenging the United States both globally and in the Pacific region, in an effort to return Taiwan "to its harbor". Without the help of NATO allies, the United States will not be able to confront China.

We observe Trump's style of running the country live — through PR methods and cheap populist and propaganda steps. Eventually, he will face reality, and US policy will become more sober. Of course, I do not exclude that if the current administration manages to break the system, it will be a blow to the whole of America. We see an increase in duties not only for China, but also for its closest allies — Mexico, Canada and, possibly, the EU. Where will this lead? To higher prices in the United States, the breakdown of technological chains and the fall in American GDP. Mexico and Canada, this is a blow to American companies that are there and produce goods that are competitive around the world. If they return to the United States, it means that competitiveness will be reduced.

— Trump's inner circle says that the goal of the U.S. is to do a "reverse Kissinger"—to pull Russia away from China and then jointly counter Beijing. Is it possible?

— The West has been trying to tear Lukashenka away from Russia for many years. On the one hand, great efforts were not made for this, on the other hand, there was an opportunity to tear not Lukashenko away from Russia, but Belarus, making it democratic.

I think that it is impossible to tear Putin's Russia and people who are ideologically close to him away from China. Russia or several democratic countries that may arise on its territory in the future — yes.

So far, Putin has been defeated everywhere because of his fatal rule. In the Baltic Sea — Finland and Sweden joined NATO, Putin lost to Turkey in the Caucasus and Syria. It seems to be friends with Erdogan, but two such defeats. In 2004, Putin was forced to give the go-ahead for NATO expansion — the Baltic States, Central Europe and some other states joined the Alliance.

Failures and a desire for confrontation with the West led him to depend on China. Today, Russia's energy resources can only go to China and India, and Europe is lost. The United States may talk about friendship, but in fact it has largely replaced gas supplies to the EU, and partly Russian oil, and this will continue.

Trump, let's just say, did not have big victories during his first term either. An unsuccessful attempt to seduce Kim Jong-un , a secret agreement with the Taliban at Camp David without the participation of the government in Kabul, which led to the flight from Afghanistan, failure in Syria and Iraq, which moved into the zone of influence of Russia, Iran and its satellites.

Now two unsuccessful managers want to be friends. On the other hand, whatever the intentions of the most influential person in the world — the US president — America's economic power remains a factor that everyone will have to reckon with. Of the promises made by Trump, the most beneficial for us would be lowering oil prices and building the "Golden Dome"—a state-of-the-art air defense system. These actions would really cripple Russia economically.

— For many years, people have pointed out that Europe lacks politicians of the caliber of Thatcher, Churchill, and de Gaulle. In recent days, we have seen many ambitious statements from Europeans. Should we wait for decisive action, and, most importantly, are there leaders who are ready to implement them?

— If we proceed from the real situation, the Europeans realized that the United States would not guarantee their security under Trump. Inevitably, it will be necessary to increase military spending — investments in defence, defence industry, the army will increase.

If we talk about leaders, there is one today. This is President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky . No wonder many people call him the “new Churchill”. Europeans are well aware that today Ukraine protects not only itself, but also the EU and its values. I would say that there is another European leader — General Valery Zaluzhny .

My friend Andrie Sannikov expressed the following idea: the West will inevitably try to use the Ukrainian army to strengthen the entire European defence. If steps are taken to create their own European force that guarantees security, then there is already a trained Ukrainian army. General Zaluzhny can become one of the commanders of this European army. There are already two leaders.

From Poland, the European leader could be Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski , who is a global person in terms of both biography and intelligence.

Of course, the engine of the European economy is Germany, where the ambitious Friedrich Merz came to power, who is a successful businessman who understands that it is necessary to ensure the security of his own investments. France and the United Kingdom remain nuclear-armed countries in Europe. Their leaders, Emmanuel Macron and Keir Starmer , have been behaving very decently lately. It is their umbrella that can protect Europeans. There is already talk that France may deploy nuclear weapons on the territory of its allies. I do not exclude that it may appear in Poland or Romania, which will be a serious deterrent.

I will say that we live in an epoch-making time. Europe will inevitably be a center of economic and military and political power. Normal relations with America will remain, because of the geopolitical interest of the United States — the main maritime power in the world — in maintaining Europe as its springboard in Eurasia. No one canceled the main laws of geopolitics: if the World Island, which includes Eurasia and Africa, falls under the control of authoritarian or dictatorial regimes, this will also become a threat to the United States.

The European Union should grow up and build muscles, which is what is happening today.

— Where will Belarus appear? Now we are talking about Belarus more as an object of all these geopolitical changes, is there a chance to become a subject?

— Belarus has the following choice: either we are part of the totalitarian world of China and Russia, or we are part of the Euro-Atlantic civilization. In our situation, we need to realize what choice to make. We will not be able to exist between these giants, and no one wants their children and grandchildren to live under totalitarianism. We have already passed this stage. Belarus was able to break out of this hell for some time, so today we must be part of Europe.

In geopolitics, there is an economic, military, political struggle, a struggle on land, at sea, in the air, but today the struggle of ideas, the struggle on the Internet is also important. We can do this every day by interacting with the population, our friends and acquaintances. This can be done at a more serious level, if we are talking about journalists of patriotic media, a lot can also be done on a personal level. After all, we see that some bloggers, even Belarusian ones, today do more than the media, which have been supported by the US State Department for decades.

If we make our choice, then at the moment when Russia's weakening occurs (and it will inevitably happen, because it is weak both economically and demographically, all countries on its southern border are experiencing a demographic boom), Belarus must take clear and consistent steps. Belarusian elites should already imagine today what they will do so that we become a normal country of the European Union and the Euro-Atlantic bloc. Let NATO be modernized, but if we find ourselves in the European security system, Belarusians will be sufficiently protected. Today, the subjectivity of Belarus is the subjectivity of strong media, individual political centers and strong people.

2020 showed the aspirations of Belarusians. Even despite the loss, Belarus inertially remains an international subject. All our neighbors, European countries, say that without a free Belarus, Europe will not be complete.

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