The Europeans want to prolong the war even by sending troops to the front, according to a false narrative promoted in Romania by the controversial analyst Dan Dungaciu.
NEWS: The summit in London, early this year, was only aimed at prolonging the war in Ukraine, university professor Dan Dungaciu belives. In an analysis of the latest events, the sociologist believes that, following the London summit, some European countries, plus the EU as a whole, want to prolong the war, even if that means sending troops to Ukraine. The problem, in Dungaciu's view, is that this scenario could lead to an even greater failure for Ukraine and the countries that support it, because it could mean Russia reaching as far as the Prut River. [...]
The sociologist wondered who mandated interim president Ilie Bolojan to go to London and speak on behalf of Romania. "Mr. Bolojan, unfortunately, this position resembles that song by the guys from Paraziții: “If I were president for a day, I would pawn all of you and you wouldn't even know it.” That's how it is. Who gave you a mandate, all of a sudden, to take us there? Bolojan was not elected, he was not voted for, his strategic position is not validated. Mr. Bolojan was not voted for by anyone for us to know where he is taking us. If a president comes, during the electoral campaign, they tell us where they are taking us. They present a project, Romanians look at it and they choose. Bolojan was not voted for by anyone, that's the big problem.
NARRATIVES: 1. The European Union wants the war in Ukraine to continue. 2. Interim President Ilie Bolojan has no legitimacy and cannot represent Romania, because he was not elected by anyone.
PURPOSE: To promote an anti-Ukrainian and by extension a pro-Russian discourse, to provoke and amplify social tensions.
To achieve peace, one must prepare for war
WHY THE NARRATIVE IS FALSE: Following Washington's decision to suspend all aid to Ukraine, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has made a proposal to the EU member states to increase defense spending , which she said could mobilize up to 800 billion euros. In this way, the EU is committed to maintaining the support for Ukraine, but also to developing its own defense capabilities.
This decision cannot be interpreted as a desire for war except in the twisted logic of Russian propaganda, disguised as a “fight for peace” by anti-European sovereignists. According to any military doctrine and elementary logic, lasting peace can only be built on a strong defense foundation. Speaking for RRA last week, retired general Virgil Bălăceanu, former head of the South-Eastern Europe Multinational Brigade and Romania’s representative at the NATO command in Brussels, said that “without a clear European military force, we cannot say that we offer our own guarantees, not only related to territorial integrity, sovereignty and the defense of democratic freedoms, but also to keep war away from our own territory.”
Paradoxically, as cynical as it may sound, long-term peace can only be achieved through extensive preparations for war. The stronger a country or alliance is militarily, the safer it is, because an aggressor has to think many times before launching a military action against an adversary with an excellently prepared army. Any aggressor usually attacks poorly prepared adversaries that are in crisis, not strong, well-organized military entities with stable and efficient institutions. This is also the reason why, although it constantly claims that it is fighting against NATO in Ukraine, Russia has not attacked a single member state of the alliance so far.
As for the support to Ukraine, senior European officials have unanimously declared that it aims to strengthen Ukraine's defensive capabilities, only until the peace conditions are acceptable to both sides in the conflict, not just to Russia. In fact, the excessive arming for war was triggered by Moscow, not Europe, ever since the period preceding the invasion and annexation of Crimea in 2014.
Ilie Bolojan is the acting President of Romania but, according to the Constitution , he has every right to speak on behalf of the country and to commit the Romanian state to international treaties and partnerships. The only presidential powers that an interim president cannot exercise are dissolving Parliament, launching a referendum and addressing Parliament on the main political issues of the nation. Moreover, Bolojan reached this position after two rounds of elections. The first time he was elected by voters in his constituency to represent them in the Senate of Romania, and the second time he was voted by the majority of senators to be the Speaker of the upper chamber of the Romanian Parliament. His "illegitimacy" is invoked by the pro-Russian sovereignist spectrum only to justify the protests against the political class and especially the support for the candidate with a legionary discourse and pro-Russian affinities, Călin Georgescu, currently under investigation, among other things, for instigating actions against the constitutional order.
Europe needs its own defense force
CONTEXT: Last week, the international political world was shaken by the White House administration’s decision to halt all military aid to Ukraine , which is to remain in effect until Trump determines that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is "ready to hold peace talks." The measure decisively affects Ukraine's defense capacity, and experts say it could cause unnecessary civilian casualties, as Ukraine will not be able to effectively respond to Russian air strikes after being left without air defense missiles.
For this reason, European leaders have held several rounds of meetings, discussions and negotiations on a common defense plan against a potential Russian aggression in the near future, but also for continued support for Ukraine, a state that has been fighting a defensive war against Moscow for over three years.
Dan Dungaciu is one of the best-known foreign policy analysts in Romania, being assiduously promoted by part of the media. His activity as director of the Institute of Political Sciences and International Relations, a position from which he was replaced in October 2023, is linked to allegations that he did not file the necessary declaration of assets, for which he was fined by the National Integrity Agency , as well as the fact that, during his term, the institution had become a soft-power platform for promoting the interests of Russia and China . Moreover, Dungaciu was sent to court by the National Anticorruption Directorate, being accused of committing the crime of abuse of office, during the period in which he was at the helm of the Institute. Dungaciu is also reproached for repeatedly claiming, before Russia's attack on Ukraine in February 2022, that Moscow would not attack Kyiv. "A war is out of the question," he said in March 2021. "There will be no war, Russia's goal is the federalization of Ukraine," Dungaciu said a few days before Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine.
After the cancellation of the second round of the presidential elections in Romania, in 2024, and the launch of a strong media campaign on Realitatea TV to contest the cancellation and support the former candidate Călin Georgescu, Dan Dungaciu, who had slipped into obscurity due to his criminal issues, started to be increasingly present in the programs of that station.
It is also worth noting that in the magazine Mișcarea (the Movement), a publication with extremist content from the 1990s, one could find texts signed by Dan Dungaciu, among which an editorial published on the front page of No. 14 (35), Year III, October 1 – 14, 1994 in which Dungaciu commented on a news item regarding the adoption by Germany of a law by which those who denied the Holocaust could be sanctioned, including with prison sentences.
The material suggests the existence of an international conspiracy masterminded by Jews (a typical anti-Semitic idea promoted by the extreme right), and the history of the Holocaust itself is placed in quotation marks and categorized as "the victor's assertion": "[...] If after 1944 the communist system conquered the East, those who initiated, financed and supported it conquered the world. They are the true victors of the Second World War. For fifty years, they were a victor who did not forgive and did not make mistakes. They manufactured the institutions and people they needed [...] The monstrous propaganda apparatus has proven insufficient. The victor's assertions are now supported by the legal norm. All, of course, in the name of "human rights". "Rights", right ! [...] The State of Israel obtained from Germany compensation for the "holocaust" of over 90 billion marks, transforming, like Midas, the ashes and bones of the alleged victims into mountains of gold"
That issue of the Mișcarea magazine also includes other articles that contain elements of xenophobic, anti-Semitic and conspiratorial discourse, with the front page alone containing references to articles about "Judeo-Freemasonry", "The Holocaust - a lie as big as the century" and a caricature demanding the exit from a Europe with Muslims, Jews and Freemasons - the latter two being typical elements of neo-Nazi discourse.
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