Russia’s attack on Ukraine shows how the fate of democracy lies in the hands of the United States and Britain. It is these two countries that have trained and supplied Ukrainian soldiers with money and weapons since Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014. With that knowledge in mind, the Netherlands should strengthen ties with both and stay away from gossip about German-French EU troops, it wrote. Jelte Wiersmaright

Do we remember when the majority of British and Northern Irish voters voted in favor of Brexit in 2016? Suddenly it was about ‘the Englishman’. It was as if it was something dirty that had to be removed. And who talks about the ‘American condition’, means negative. It’s as if America is a ghost. But Britain and America have always proved essential to the survival of democracy, the rule of law and freedom.

The United States, Great Britain, and a number of other English-speaking countries are the only democracies that are serious about protecting Western values. This has also been seen in Ukraine recently. While Germany and France chatted about EU soldiers and chatted with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, it was the United States and Britain that allowed Ukraine to defend itself.

Ukraine driven by American and British training

Since the Russian annexation of Crimea (2014) by Putin, the United States and Britain have not only imposed the toughest sanctions, they have also said: stop, so far and no further. The Ukrainian army, which has been completely demoralized in 2014, is taken by the hand, tens of thousands of Ukrainian military personnel are trained, officers are trained and the Ukrainian command structure is modernized so that the armed forces will be at NATO level by 2020.

As a result, the depressed Ukrainians regained their spirits. In addition, new strategies were developed. Ukraine has experienced in the struggle since 2014 that it will never have enough manpower and firepower to resist a Russian invasion. Both the Russian and Ukrainian militaries used the same Soviet doctrine of direct confrontation and it was a matter of number of winners: Russia. In short, the new strategy meant that the Ukrainian army set out in small groups and high-quality American and British weapons to destroy Russian tanks, planes and helicopters.