The bloc had aimed to send billions in military aid and artillery ammunition to Kyiv, but member countries split on the plan.
BRUSSELS — Europe’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, had high hopes of being able to mobilize as much as €40 billion of military aid to shore up Ukraine’s position on the battlefield and strengthen its hand in upcoming talks with Russia.
But as EU leaders wound up their gathering in Brussels on Thursday, the plan lay in tatters — not quite dead, but dramatically downgraded from its original ambition.
The problems started, several EU diplomats said, from the plan’s inception when the former Estonian prime minister failed to win prior buy-in from crucial stakeholders. The process had been “botched up,” one of the diplomats summarized.
The original formulation of the “Kallas plan” had been to ship Ukraine at least 1.5 million rounds of artillery ammunition in 2025. That idea, presented last month, was shot down by a Hungarian veto. Then she tried again, banking on a coalition of willing states to dig into their weapons stores and national coffers to deliver up to €40 billion in military aid to Ukraine this year.
Unfortunately for Kallas — and for Ukraine — her plan didn’t survive impact with the reality of a European Union where interest in making sacrifices for Kyiv varies dramatically from country to country.
Southern nations — much further from the Russian threat — are less eager than those in the east or the north. But in the end, even France, the bloc’s biggest military power, balked at giving a thumbs-up to the aid package.
It wasn’t for lack of trying on Kallas’s part.
On Wednesday she wrote to foreign and defense ministers proposing a far more modest plan, calling “as the first step” for the provision of 2 million rounds of large-caliber artillery ammunition to Ukraine.
“The realistic plan would be the €5 billion for the ammunition and that’s what we’re working on right now,” she told reporters before the start of the leaders’ meeting. “This amount of ammunition is available on the market and could be delivered in 2025.”
Her call was echoed by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who told leaders via video link: “We need funds for artillery shells and would really appreciate Europe’s support with at least €5 billion as soon as possible.”
But despite being significantly downsized from her original ambition, even this effort has so far failed to garner sufficient support.
Kallas’s attempt to salvage her plan by reducing its scope came after ambassadors from France, Italy and Slovakia delivered a blow on Wednesday, stressing that the plan should only call on countries to contribute on a “voluntary basis,” thereby reducing pressure to participate.
The problem was not just that some countries simply don’t want to give more to Ukraine, mentioning budget issues, or that others prefer to deliver their aid bilaterally. It was also that before presenting her plan and asking member states to put more money on the table, Kallas failed to properly consult them.
“She still behaves like a prime minister, she has’t realized that she has now a different job,” a Central European diplomat said.
Another key error was not lining up support from key countries like France, as well as top officials like Bjorn Seibert, the powerful aide to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, according to three EU diplomats.
Kallas’s failure to push through her plan underlines the difficulty of corralling all 27 countries in a common direction.
The blow to Kallas’s authority is evident. “If you say everywhere, as she does and she’s right, that we need to maintain unity, then you also have to prepare such important initiatives in a unity manner,” a senior EU diplomat complained.
“This should have been discussed.”
It’s not clear what happens from here with her arms effort, but Ukraine still has the overwhelming backing of EU countries.
In what’s becoming something of a habit, 26 countries minus Hungary approved a joint statement on Ukraine, reaffirming “continued and unwavering support for Ukraine’s independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity,” as well as promising to “continue to provide Ukraine with regular and predictable financial support.”
Hungarian PM Viktor Orbán was left alone.
“Orbán chose isolation and a path of illiberal democracy against the obvious interest of the EU and, in fact, Hungary,” one diplomat said.
The effort to help Ukraine continues next week. French President Emmanuel Macron said that a “coalition of willing countries” will hold a summit on Ukraine next Thursday in Paris, with Zelenskyy also attending.
