Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine, William Taylor, has called on Washington to send more military weapons systems to Ukraine. In comments on Feb. 17, he also said that Ukraine needs much more financial and economic support from the West at such a critical time for Ukraine.
Taylor, who served as Ambassador to Ukraine from 2006-2009 and then returned as chargé d’affaires in 2019-2020, said that while the world is focused on the military peril that Russia poses, Putin has already destabilized Ukraine by jarring its economy through various threats and actions.
Speaking during a briefing organized by the US-Ukraine Business Council, Taylor said that the US and NATO need to “dramatically increase” direct military support for Ukraine and move many more US and NATO troops into NATO countries on its eastern flank.
Referring to how the Kremlin’s saber-rattling and military build-up has impacted Ukraine’s economy, Taylor called for a massive increase in financial and economic support. He said that while the US offer of $1 billion in sovereign debt guarantees was a good start, Ukraine needed much more.
“We need the European Union to step up, too” Taylor explained.
Swedish economist Anders Aslund, writing for the Atlantic Council on Feb. 16, said that the Russian military build-up and threat of invasion has caused the annual yields on Ukraine’s Eurobonds to rise above 10 percent, “depriving the country of access to financial markets.”
Aslund explained that the Kremlin’s escalation has also frozen all domestic and foreign investment and forced insurance companies to either cancel or dramatically raise the cost of covering everything from merchant shipping to commercial flights. The Russian threat has also depreciated the Ukrainian currency, the hryvnia
Taylor noted that there would be a price to pay should Putin attack Ukraine, going beyond any sanctions that the West may impose on Russia. This would include large-scale demonstrations in Russia that could destabilize the country. He noted that many young Russian soldiers would die and come home in body bags.
“The Russian people are not eager for war,“
explained the US ambassador. “[Putin] has been warned by Russian military officials [of the possibility of internal dissent destabilizing the country].”
Taylor also suggested that Russians opposed to an invasion of Ukraine might even organize a color revolution like those that toppled leaders in Egypt and Georgia.
Taylor agreed with pronouncements by US leaders that preemptive sanctions against Russia would be less effective as a deterrent than the threat of sanctions.
“If [Putin] knows that we’ve shot our sanctions gun, then that is no longer an effective weapon,” Taylor said.
He reiterated the US narrative that Nord Stream 2, the Russian pipeline project that would bring natural gas from Russia to Germany through the Baltic Sea, would be dead should Russia invade Ukraine. And he noted a curious irony should that happen.
“That would mean that Russian gas and oil would have to continue to flow through Ukraine. So they won’t want to destroy that pipeline. Russia depends a lot on these revenues so if they cut themselves off, they are in trouble,” explained the former US Ambassador.
