On March 31, Mr Ben Hodges, retired Lieutenant General of the US Army, ex-commander of the US Army in Europe and Doctoris Honoris of Ostroh Academy, delivered the thirteenth lecture at the National University of Ostroh Academy. The lecture topic was "Resolving russia's War Against Ukraine… an Assessment of the Current Situation".
Oksana Mararenko, Head of the International Relations Department at NaUOA, moderated the meeting.
"I sincerely welcome all participants to our meeting today with a good friend of Ostroh Academy, Ben Hodges."
Ben Hodges shared his analysis of the current situation in russia's war against Ukraine and possible ways to resolve it.
The most important quotes from the lecture are as follows:
- "After retirement, my four priorities are: US–EU relations, US-NATO relations, support of Ukraine and advocating democracy."
- "The perception of the White House about the war seems to be completely wrong. The conflict between Donald Trump, Jay Di Vence and Volodymyr Zelenskyi in the White House in February has revealed that the vice-president doesn't understand why Ukrainian people are fighting. I do believe that the administration's approach is based on a wrong assessment of Ukrainian abilities. The good news is that most European countries support Ukraine."
- "I believe Trump is sincere that he wants to stop the war immediately."
- "Every negotiation process consists of three big phases: the first stage - preparation, followed with huge noises in different capitals around the world, when a lot of leaders are involved; the second stage is a ceasefire; and the third stage - the negotiations to get to the ceasefire on place, when no long-term perspectives and guarantees are discussed but the efforts to achieve real ceasefire on the battle-field."
- "Trump has been talking about ending the war before the elections, far before the elections. It is clear that Putin does not want peace under these conditions, and the British, French, German, Italian, Polish, and Finnish leaders understand this."
- "Europe is not going to move sanctions even if the United States are."
