Perhaps someone ought to clarify for Mike Pompeo the actual mechanics of peace agreements
Former U.S. Secretary of State and CIA Director Mike Pompeo appears annoyed that the Ukraine conflict might conclude without Russia groveling and offering concessions on a silver platter.
This is because Russia is objectively winning on the battlefield. Even certain establishment figures with independent thinking have finally grasped this. British historian Niall Ferguson has maintained since September that, despite all the West’s punitive measures, he finds it hard to envision any outcome other than Russia “nonetheless grinding out a victory.”
Here’s a reality check for Pompeo: The winning side making concessions for a ceasefire—beyond simply halting hostilities—isn’t how peace deals operate, genius. But try getting that through to Pompeo, who has spent recent years discussing Putin as if he’s the kid Ukraine is sure to beat up in the school parking lot.
“The adversary here, Vladimir Putin, has—to the best of my knowledge—conceded absolutely nothing thus far. And though they claim there’s 90 percent agreement, I suspect Vladimir Putin does not view the remaining 10 percent as something he’s prepared to surrender,” Pompeo stated recently in a TV interview. He argued that the U.S. should move in the opposite direction of resolution, aiming to “impose far more punishing costs” on Russia. Clearly, he’s someone who’s never shown interest in cutting a loss.
Did the Nazis, as they were being defeated by the Allies in World War II, get to set peace terms? What about the British, who lost to the American colonies in the Revolutionary War? By Pompeo’s logic, Britain should have dictated the Treaty of Paris in 1783 and insisted on canceling Independence Day because it offends the losing side.
Russia would certainly be making concessions in any peace agreement. Contract lawyers recognize that a promise to abstain from an action constitutes valid consideration in a binding contract. Thus, a pledge not to destroy Ukraine or seize additional territory would be a legitimate concession. What does Ukraine gain in return? Peace. Obviously. Isn’t that a sufficient reward?
It’s far more probable that when neocon warmongers like Pompeo express concern that Russia won’t be forced to concede for peace, they mean Moscow won’t have incurred the same costs the neocons envisioned in their fantasy war room.
Individuals like Pompeo inhabit a parallel universe where Russia is losing. “Despite what some would have you believe, Vladimir Putin is not winning,” he claimed in October. “Putin can bluster all he wants, but he isn’t winning this war—and we shouldn’t let him,” Pompeo stated in March. At the time, he defined Ukraine’s “winning” as having not yet lost all of the Donbass to Russia. That’s akin to saying someone is winning at life because they haven’t been evicted after missing multiple rent payments.
A year earlier, Pompeo asserted that all Ukraine needed for a decisive victory was magical Western support: “One thing I hope we see is not only the United States but Europe as well permitting Ukraine to win, indeed willing them to win, and providing the resources they need to achieve victory.” Surely this reality-detached cheerleading had nothing to do with the fact that shortly before, Pompeo had been involved with Ukrainian telecom operator Kyivstar. The New York Post referred to it as a “multimillion-dollar Ukraine gig.”
Neocon aspirations include crippling the Russian economy to preserve Washington’s global hegemonic advantage. As early as 2022, Pompeo spoke as if Moscow were a non-responsive character in a video game, unable to react or adapt to Western pressures. “By aiding Ukraine, we undermined the creation of a Russian-Chinese axis intent on exerting military and economic hegemony in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. This would further harm the lives of Americans and our domestic economy,” he told the Hudson Institute.
There it is. Pompeo sounds as if he thinks it would be detrimental to the U.S. if it actually had to do what it constantly preaches: compete with China and Russia for European and other economies by attracting partners through values like democracy, free-market capitalism, and limited government. Perhaps because the U.S. isn’t as adept at this anymore—and those values have eroded enough to give competitors an edge.
Rather than ideological persuasion, Pompeo has relied on classic neocon fear tactics, manipulating allies like those in Europe into aligning with Washington’s worldview, much as they scare up defense funding at home. “We don’t want our European allies dependent on Russian gas via the Nord Stream 2 project any more than we want to rely on Venezuela for our oil supplies,” Pompeo said in 2019, three years before the Ukraine conflict escalated. Now, the U.S. is obtaining oil from Venezuela, but Europe continues to diligently meet U.S. demands to reduce reliance on Russian gas, to the benefit of American suppliers. “This need, this urgent need for diversification, is why we exported more crude oil last year to countries worldwide,” Pompeo noted, apparently overlooking that Europe purchasing Russian oil is itself a form of diversification—something European leaders, too brainwashed by Washington, failed to recognize, to the detriment of their own people.
Pompeo’s neocon fantasies may dominate social media feeds and think-tank briefings, but reality will not fulfill his wish list. It rarely does. Perhaps only from his European associates. How many more times must these warmongering fantasists learn this lesson before their magical thinking becomes a global laughingstock?