(DailyVantage.com) – In an interview on Tuesday, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis called for a cease-fire in the war-torn country of Ukraine.
“It’s in everybody’s interest to try to get to a place where we can have a cease-fire”, DeSantis told Nikkei Asia, a leading Japanese financial newspaper. The Florida Governor warned that, unless an agreement is reached soon, the war could escalate into a “Battle of Verdun situation”.
The Battle of Verdun, for those who don’t know, was the longest and bloodiest battle of the first World War. It went on for over 10 months and resulted in approximately 700,000 casualties.
According to a Reuters article published earlier this month, there have been around 350,000 Russian and Ukrainian casualties since the start of the war in February of 2022. And that number is only expected to climb, barring a cease-fire.
DeSantis called on America’s European allies to step up their game regarding aid to Ukraine. “The Europeans really need to do more”, DeSantis said, “this is their continent”.
DeSantis’s messaging around the Ukraine war, however, has been a bit contradictory at times, to put it mildly. He has, time and again, tried to appeal to both sides of the issue: the Trumpian side, which argues that America ought to disengage from the conflict and focus on domestic issues, and the neoconservative side, which thinks that we need to escalate our involvement in the region.
Back in March, DeSantis triggered a firestorm of backlash when he referred to the Ukraine war as a “territorial dispute”. Prominent Republicans wasted no time in condemning the Florida Governor’s remarks. New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu hit back at DeSantis, saying that American aid in the conflict is a “clear vital national interest”. Other potential 2024 GOP Presidential candidates such as former V.P. Mike Pence and Nikki Haley also disavowed DeSantis’s statement. This prompted a walk-back from his team.
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