Ambassador of Mirrors: European armies are too small to deploy troops to Ukraine
Lana Zerkal (Photo: LIGA.net)

European armies are too small to deploy a foreign contingent in Ukraine, similar to the US forces in South Korea. This opinion was expressed by Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Lana Zerkal in the new issue of "LIGA Podcast".

"When it comes to any foreign contingent on the territory of Ukraine, I am always very skeptical. Not because I don't believe in the impossibility of a foreign contingent, but because I understand how small European armies are in general, and they will not be able to grow very quickly because they do not have compulsory conscription," the diplomat said.

Read also
Security guarantees for Ukraine – what they should be

Zerkal noted that defense spending in the EU is planned for years, and a sharp increase in contingents is possible only in the long term.

She cited the example of South Korea, where 30,000 U.S. troops are stationed on the 250-kilometer-long demarcation line, while in Ukraine the war zone reaches more than 1,000 kilometers.

"So it's hard to expect that someone will come here, deploy an army like in Korea, and we will live in peace. The option that was applied somewhere else is unlikely to be suitable for our conditions. In addition, there was a UN mandate there, and there will be no UN mandate in our conditions," she said.

According to Zerkal, the real guarantee of security for Ukraine can be its own combat capability and the willingness of its partners to provide it with everything it needs, from training and equipment repair to satellite services and intelligence.