Valerii Zaluzhnyi: The old world order has been destroyed

Speech by the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine to the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland, Commander-in-Chief of Ukraine (2021–2024) Valerii Zaluzhnyi at the Security Conference at Chatham House, March 6, 2025

Source: Ukrainska Pravda

It is very important to be here, in this room, and to lead a discussion about our, I emphasize – our common future. I would like to once again highlight that the time when you could just observe everything happening in Ukraine, perhaps worry about us, is now over.

Some of you might have predicted all this, some understood these changes that have come, only today – it doesn’t matter now. The main thing is that here and now we need to understand what all of us should do next.

So, let’s start with, perhaps, the most important thing that needs to be discussed – the concept of world order. Simply put – the alignment of forces in world politics. There is no time or need now to talk about how and how many times this world order has changed. Let’s just go back to the Yalta Conference of 1945, where the leaders of the three victorious powers decided the future of the post-war world.

They completed the formation of the new world order on August 2, 1945, in Potsdam, where they finally decided the future (at least for more than four decades). Then began a war that went down in history as the “Cold War.” This era ended in 1991 with the collapse of the USSR and the end of the bipolar confrontation.

The world continued to live in this old world order for some time, still based on the foundations of the Yalta-Potsdam system of international relations. Even in a unipolar world, the United States managed to maintain peace and stability in the world by force. Sometimes force was substituted with money, but the world lived in a stable system. And this happened even against the backdrop of an increasing number of states in the world that seemingly chose their own future.

Everything changed on February 10, 2007, when Russian President Putin, a year before the end of his second presidential term, spoke at the Munich Security Conference. This speech can be considered a turning point in revising the existing world order system. “No one feels safe, no one can hide behind international law as if behind a stone wall,” he said.

Perhaps the West made a huge mistake by not paying attention to Putin’s warnings and did not adapt in any way to the coming era, because of which we are gathered here today.

In 2008, Putin started a war in Georgia, in 2014 – in Ukraine. And in 2022, he attacked Ukraine with all possible means. 18 years ago, Putin said, or rather warned, that the unipolar model, which is actually aimed exclusively at serving the interests of the United States and a select circle of states, is not viable. He also said then that China, India, and other developing countries would become perhaps the most important economies in the world as a result of transformation.

Perhaps today we can see how countries from Asia, Africa, and Latin America are trying to define the global agenda. And what about Ukraine? Ukraine enthusiastically entered the fight and was able not only to give a worthy rebuff to the enemy but also to prove and defend its subjectivity in forming the world order system.

It was through Ukraine, which seemingly lost the ability to solve the problem of war on its own in 2023, mainly due to the fears of our partners, that forced Russia to openly create the so-called Axis – the Axis of Evil. Who is part of this Axis – you all understand perfectly. And it was then, back in 2024, when these countries were concluding strategic agreements, that it was necessary to consider whether this was a continuation of the policy of revising the current world order system.

Of course, it is difficult for Ukraine to fight alone, even with the help of partners, against the Axis of Evil, but it is fighting. The war in Ukraine gained even more global scale. Its results could have been predicted. They are relevant today as well. After all, both the United States, China, Russia, and Europe were unprepared for a war of this level of intensity.

Human and economic losses in Ukraine, spending resources on war, migration, sanctions policy, lack of cheap energy resources and markets, as well as other problems have become a colossal economic burden for the economies of all sides involved in the war, slowing down their development and creating risks of already global crises.

After all, the war in Ukraine has practically exhausted the economic and industrial “margin of strength” in most countries, especially Russia, the United States, and Europe. They really lack resources to continue military actions, while the deployment of weapons production turned out to be excessive if agreements to end hostilities were reached.

Thus, we can assert that there are formal reasons for revising the world order today. The starting point for such a revision, of course, can be considered the future end of the war in Ukraine and the formation of a new world order precisely according to its results. Indeed, the old world order itself is already almost completely destroyed today. For example, it is obvious today that the White House has questioned the unity of the Western world. In addition, Washington is already trying to shift the security and defence of Europe to their own forces, without the United States.

Such actions probably make it possible to assume that NATO may cease to exist. A series of negotiations between the United States and Russia, whose leader has been issued an arrest warrant, states the fact that the White House is taking more and more steps towards the Kremlin regime, perfectly understanding that in this case, Europe could become the new target for Russia. An undeniable factor of this is the decision, for example, of the US Cyber Command to cease any planning directed against Russia.

It is obvious that Washington’s non-recognition of Russia’s aggression is also a new challenge not only for Ukraine but also for Europe. So, this is enough to understand that not only Russia and the Axis of Evil are trying to destroy the world order, but the United States is also effectively destroying it completely.

I would like to emphasize once again that the destruction of the old world order is also taking place against the backdrop of rapid technological development. We can absolutely state that the Russian-Ukrainian war has become a catalyst for the development of, first of all, military technologies, which will probably become the basis of future global security. Because it is these changes that have occurred on the fields of the Russian-Ukrainian war that have led to a global crisis in operational art and doctrines, including those of NATO. Classic large-scale operations with incredible resource expenditure have not just lost relevance but have even become suicidal. But only Ukraine and the Axis of Evil know this.

Whether all the players who want a new world order are ready for this, or whether they need another war to understand it, is still unknown. It is known for certain that the technological breakthrough has occurred not only in the military field but also in all others, which will require restructuring the economies of leading countries. Accordingly, the need and priorities in the extraction of minerals have also changed. Does the last statement remind you of something familiar from history? Time will tell.

But still, Ukraine. In this difficult situation, Ukraine, thanks to its ability to resist during the full-scale war, has indeed become a subject of international politics. Ukraine must be reckoned with. This is already clear to everyone, even to very powerful states. Ukraine has not lost its independence. Despite the change in the strategy of enemies and the threats from friends, Ukraine is fighting, even when it seemed impossible, and is quite effectively defeating the enemy.

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