Ukraine Warns of Third World War if They Don’t Beat Russia

The global security system will be destroyed if Russia is allowed to prevail in Ukraine, leading to “many” new conflicts and a Third World War, that country warns while calling the U.S. to pass a major aid package.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal visited Washington D.C. to drum up support for the forthcoming votes on the “$100 billion foreign aid package” , and brought a message of looming disaster if it isn’t passed. Speaking to British state broadcaster the BBC in Washington, Shmyhal cautioned that allowing Russia to win would signal the multilateral international rules based order had collapsed which would trigger a surge in conflict.

Insisting the funding votes passing is absolutely crucial, Shmyhal said: “We need this money yesterday, not tomorrow, not today, but yesterday. If we will not protect… Ukraine will fall. The global, the global system of security will be destroyed… and all the world will need to find… a new system of security.”

If Ukraine loses its defensive war against Russia and there is no demonstration that “the aggressor” is punished, this will lead to wider conflict, the politician said. He told the broadcaster: “there will be many conflicts, many such kinds of wars, and in the end of the day, it could lead to the Third World War. Our mutual task is to protect democratic values, to protect the existing [post-Second World War] global security system, and bring long-term and sustainable peace on European continent. Russia must lose this war, the aggressor must be punished.”

Apocalyptic vision or not, Shmyhal reported that in conversations he’d had in Washington so far, “the congressmen have careful optimism for Saturday, so we share this optimism” about the aid votes.

Ukraine has frequently framed the question of the West continuing its support to its war effort as a matter of preventing larger future wars and attacks on NATO states by an emboldened Russia. President Volodymyr Zelensky said in December: “People in Europe won’t see any benefit if Moscow receives a pass from Brussels in the form of negativity towards Ukraine.

“Putin will surely use this against you personally, and against all of Europe. Don’t give him this first – and only – victory of the year.” NATO itself has also leant into this idea, with Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg saying “If Putin wins in Ukraine, there is real risk that his aggression will not end there. Our support is not charity. It is an investment in our security”.