Is Volodymyr Zelensky Going Out of Fashion?

In an ironic twist, the week that Volodymyr Zelensky and his wife posed for a photo shoot in the world’s most iconic fashion magazine may have marked the time that the omnipresent Ukrainian president started falling out of fashion.By the time the Vogue issue featuring the Zelenskys came out last month, there were already hints of flagging enthusiasm for Ukraine’s leader in some quarters including, possibly, the White House.Just days after the Vogue controversy — should the leader of a country at war take time to be photographed by Annie Leibovitz? — Thomas Friedman suggested in the New York Times that “there is deep mistrust between the White House and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky.”While the focus of Mr. Friedman’s column was Speaker Pelosi and Taiwan, that claim, along with one that “U.S. officials are a lot more concerned about Ukraine’s leadership than they are letting on,” generated intrigue but did not come out of the blue.Prior to it, in July, a Republican congresswoman of Indiana, Victoria Spartz, complained about Mr. Zelensky’s record on rooting out corruption and questioned the wisdom of his choice of chief of staff, Andriy Yermak. In a letter to President Biden, the Ukraine-born Ms. Spartz wrote that the “lack of appointment of the anti-corruption prosecutor, concerns raised by our military personnel and defense contractors, as well as some NATO allies, raise national security concerns and require proper attention.”It would not be unusual for the domestic or international policies of Washington and Kyiv to be out of perfect alignment: Even the closest of allies can have disagreements. There seems, though, to be a piling on effect since the Times piece was published.This appears to be happening not so much despite Mr. Zelensky’s acquired celebrity since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February but because of it, as the fame may have obscured leadership shortcomings that only now, six months after the world changed, are coming under greater scrutiny. Writing in Newsweek last week, a former adviser to President Trump, Steve Cortes, took unambiguous aim at Mr. Zelensky: “Putin is a thug and Zelensky is a corrupt autocrat,” Mr. Cortes wrote, adding, “American taxpayers borrow tens of billions of dollars their country does not have, to send fortunes to the unaccountable leader of a corrupt country, all to escalate a war in which America has no vital national interest. Oh, and during a recession with runaway inflation at home.”Mr. Cortes also cited a recent CBS News report that “much of the billions of dollars of military aid that the U.S. is sending to Ukraine doesn’t make it to the front lines.” In that report, an unnamed operative in Ukraine estimated that 30 percent of military aid “reaches its final destination.”If that is true (the network deleted a tweet about that claim), it raises serious questions not only about where the rest of the assistance is going, but about Mr. Zelensky’s management skills or lack thereof.Could things be any worse? In a time of war, it seems yes. The South China Morning Post, arguably the most credible newspaper in Communist China, reported that Mr. Zelensky has been seeking “direct talks” with China’s Xi Jinping to help end the Russian invasion and, as troublingly, to support reconstruction efforts in Ukraine.That the democratically elected leader of Ukraine wishes for a war in his country to be over as soon as possible is understandable. Courting Beijing, though, could lead to political meddling in Europe from one of America’s chief adversaries.Would Mr. Zelensky also like to see Mr. Xi offer security guarantees to Ukraine as part of an eventual peace deal? Even more than commercial intrusion, that prospect should set off alarm bells on both sides of the political aisle in Washington. It is not just Washington that is registering concerns about some of Mr. Zelensky’s maneuvers. The initial frostiness with which President Macron treated Mr. Zelensky early on in the war, in marked contrast with the French president’s repeated attempts at a kind of rapprochement with Vladimir Putin, never really thawed.It is now reverberating across many European capitals, with the notable exception of London. Ukraine’s attack on a Russian airbase in Crimea last week has raised the hackles of some on the Continent, regardless of the fact that Russia illegally annexed the strategic peninsula in 2014.It has led to concerns, even from some of Europe’s most anti-Putin voices, that Mr. Zelensky is now playing with a fire that might ignite the whole Continent. While there is no question in Europe that Ukraine has the right to take back what belongs to it, the reality is more nuanced.In the eight years since Russia annexed Crimea, with the tacit acquiescence of the West despite sanctions against Moscow, the region has barely registered a blip on the European map — and that is the way that Brussels and Paris and Rome like it.Leaders in key NATO member countries do not want to be seen as soft on Russian aggression, but they also want a leader in Kyiv who can balance the imperative for national survival with pragmatism. As everyone knows, fashion is fleeting — only time will tell if Mr. Zelensky truly has what it takes to bring a lasting victory to Ukraine.

Is Volodymyr Zelensky Going Out of Fashion?

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