Europe’s Futile Debate Over who Should Talk to Putin
As Russia targets Ukrainian civilians, European leaders should focus on supporting Kyiv through the winter. A commentary by Nathalie Tocci
Europeans are world champions at getting bogged down in trivialities. The pointless hand-wringing over the vexed question of who should speak to Vladimir Putin is a perfect illustration.
In foreign policy, Europe often has the right instincts. Despite its countless hypocrisies and double standards, particularly in the Middle East, it remains the international actor most attuned to values and international law.
This is especially true of the war in Ukraine. Despite the usual divisions, delays and hesitations, Europe has stayed the course through nearly five years of Russia’s full-scale invasion, and despite Donald Trump’s U-turn, which is set to continue, if not worsen, after the Republican party’s crushing defeat in the midterm elections.
Sanctions have been tightened, support for Kyiv has filled the gap left by Washington, and Ukraine’s EU accession process is moving forward.
But vision and strategy are diluted when Europe, with equal regularity, gets bogged down in trivialities. The discussions, divisions and unilateral moves over who should represent it at the negotiating table are yet another example.
In recent weeks, Finland’s president Alexander Stubb and Norway’s prime minister Jonas Gahr Støre have called Putin, sitting through yet another rambling lecture on Slavic history. The call, criticised by several European leaders, from Denmark’s Mette Frederiksen to Italy’s Giorgia Meloni, has reignited the debate over who should speak to the Kremlin.
Should it be Stubb and Støre, or someone else? Or perhaps the leaders of these smaller countries should pave the way for the E3: France, Germany and the UK? Or for the E5, including Italy and Poland? Should they instead represent the broader coalition of the willing?
And what role would that leave for the heads of the European institutions, from European Council president António Costa to European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, not to mention the high representative Kaja Kallas?
Put bluntly, it is a stupid debate. Not because it is necessarily divisive. European foreign policy is full of examples of a small group of countries, and their leaders, negotiating on behalf of the EU.
Sometimes, as with the Normandy format led by France and Germany on Ukraine, the experience has proved divisive and unsuccessful. At other times, as with the E3/EU negotiations on Iran’s nuclear programme, not only was a high degree of unity maintained among Europeans, but an agreement was reached in 2015, only to be wrecked by Trump.
Contact groups and coalitions of the willing are often useful, indeed necessary. And on Ukraine, both during the war and afterwards, when that day comes, it is the coalition of the willing that will play a leading role, both politically and militarily.
Debating who in Europe should talk to Putin is stupid because there is no point in doing so today. Those who try, such as Stubb and Støre, but before them French president Emmanuel Macron and then German chancellor Olaf Scholz, are mocked and humiliated. The same fate has befallen Trump and his ever-present pair of corrupt and unsuccessful negotiators, Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff.
Putin makes fools of them all not because he is strong. He is not. He does so simply because he cannot afford to end the war, either politically or economically.
One day the war will end, and before then it will be useful to decide who in Europe should speak to Moscow, whoever sits in the Kremlin. It will be useful because it is the Europeans, far more than the Americans, who hold the cards.
But that day is not today. For now, the priorities lie elsewhere. Winter is long and Russia, unable to advance on the battlefield, is venting its fury on Ukrainian civilians. European leaders would do well to focus exclusively on this, rather than give in to their own egos.
A previous version of this article was published by the Italian daily La Stampa
IEP Bocconi does not express opinions of its own. The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors. Any errors or omissions are the responsibility of the authors.
