Zelensky’s message: Ukraine fights for good over evil
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Kyiv, Ukraine — Before Russia’s sweeping invasion of Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was often dismissed as a former comedian who stumbled into the job of head of state with a seemingly naïve promise to clean up Ukraine’s endemic corruption.
After a brief trip Tuesday to the bloodiest theater of war, he arrived in Washington on Wednesday a national hero and global superstar, having forged a style of leadership that combined personal daring with deft messages to serve his people at home and allies abroad collect.
This aura has served him and his country well so far. But Mr. Zelensky arrives in Washington at a crucial time for Ukraine, when his troops’ lightning counteroffensives launched this fall will be slowed. He will plead for more powerful weapons, which he believes Ukraine needs, but he will have to walk a fine line.
By taking a daring trip abroad during the war, he is trying to project strength and show confidence that Ukraine will ultimately prevail. But to plead for continued financial and military support, he must draw attention to the dire threat Ukraine still faces without seeming weak.
“President Zelenskyy wants to present this trip as a serious step forward in the war,” Volodymyr Ariev, an MP for the opposition European Solidarity Party, said in an interview. “It’s a pretty clear message that the alliance between the United States and Ukraine is upheld and is quite strong.”
In Ukraine, the visit was also seen as linked to the American political calendar, as control of the House of Representatives will shift to the Republican Party, some members of which have expressed skepticism about continuing to support Ukraine.
Another key goal of Mr. Zelensky, analysts say, is to maintain unified American support for the war and do whatever it takes to avoid it becoming a partisan affair.
“Zelensky should not maneuver between Democrats and Republicans,” said Yevhen Mahda, a political commentator in Kyiv, in an interview. “He should propose a new paradigm – the paradigm that Ukraine is today at the epicenter of the struggle between good and evil.
“And by supporting Ukraine, the United States is supporting good,” Mr Mahda added. “That is the necessary message.”
Mr. Zelensky, a former comedian, has always had a keen sense of image and storytelling in politics, as evidenced in his address to Congress after visiting the front lines in the eastern city of Bakhmut – with artillery blaring in the background.
“It’s an honor for me to be here today,” Zelenskyi told soldiers in Bakhmut, where Russia has been waging a bitter offensive for months. To those with children, he said: “I wish that your sun, that is, your children, shines for you, so that they motivate you to survive safely and to defend your families, our families, our entire state and the future of our children.” .”
At a press conference Wednesday with President Biden in Washington, where he personally made the case for more economic and military support, he had a similar message when asked what he wanted to say to the world: “I wish you peace,” he said, Switch from Ukrainian to English. “And you only understand it when the war is in your country.” He added, “I want you to see your kids when they go to university and see your kids.”
Analysts say Mr Zelensky is also keenly aware that he must boost the morale of his people, on whom millions will live without electricity, water or heat as winter approaches.
For the most part, however, Mr. Zelensky did not face political pressures at home and was free to tailor the trip to the need to replenish his military’s arsenal for war.
The United States is by far the largest foreign arms supplier to the Ukrainian army. But the Biden administration has carefully calibrated its aid to Ukraine, holding back longer-range weapons and more powerful weapons for fear of Ukrainian attacks on Russian territory that could draw NATO into the war.
Two successful Ukrainian counter-offensives in the north-east and south have run their course, and the Russian and Ukrainian armies are digging in along a new 600-mile front line. To sustain this progress, the Ukrainian military needs more advanced weapons systems, Ukrainian officials and analysts say.
Mr. Zelensky will have an opportunity to address U.S. lawmakers’ concerns about oversight of military and financial aid to Ukraine, and he could be pushed on domestic issues such as freedom of the press, fighting corruption and ensuring checks and balances between courts and executive branches.
But Mr. Zelensky’s primary goal, to present the war in clear terms of good and evil, will, he hopes, transcend American politics and “provide a sense of the rightness of his cause and a sense of what his people and soldiers feel.” , he said Yuri Makarov, editor-in-chief of the Ukrainian national broadcasting company.
Maria Varenikova contributed to the coverage from Kyiv.
