Ukraine: An Explanation - Part 1
It is very unlikely that in the past few weeks you haven’t seen or heard anything about the situation in Ukraine, with the media machine working full time bombarding the population with constant war information i.e., war propaganda. In this article I will try to offer an unbiased presentation of the situation, its context, causes, and consequences. There will be a minimal number of projections or predictions in this, as only a fool would confidently predict the future of such a situation and we should always be wary of those that do so.
Situation:
Since Autumn 2021 Russian troops have been massing at the Ukrainian border reaching about 150,000 military personnel last February. With most of these on Russian land, but also in Belarus. On the other side, Ukraine and Eastern European NATO members such as Poland have been increasing their military capabilities and sending logistical support to Ukraine supported by the United States while more NATO and US troops have been deployed in support of Ukraine. This was widely covered by Western media on a day-to-day basis, sadly often not offering deep analysis and striving for neutrality, but following an obsession for shock escalation and game-like predictions.
Why did this large deployment of Russian troops occur on the Russian and Belarusian border? And what consequences followed from it? A deep analyse is necessary to answer these questions.
There are multiple reasons why a country would deploy troops at its border (e.g. training, defensive purpose, diplomacy, offense); the one that concerns us is the diplomatic reason, with a massive deployment to show-off military strength and readiness, and to put pressure on another country, openly as was the case when Russia deployed troops and showed its military exercises at the border on its media. When it became obvious there was no way for them to obtain what they wanted/needed, Russia announced a retreat of its forces to then attack Ukraine a couple of days later following the well known maskirovka strategy (Russian military deception), which can be conceived as the art of deceiving the enemy.
We must now dig a little deeper to understand the reasons for such important negotiations.
Context:
Since the fall of the Soviet Union, NATO has never stopped its Eastern expansion, even to countries bordering Russia, such as the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania (which joined in 2004), even though this goes against the orally given promise of not expanding NATO “an inch eastward” from Secretary of State James Baker to Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. NATO, as the largest military organisation on the planet accounts for a whopping $1.2T in defence spending (the sum of all military budgets of member states), with 69% of that coming from the US. With no other bloc balancing it out in this ever-increasing multipolar world, NATO has a clear domination on the world’s military affairs. Today, this territorial and strategic asymmetry is at the core of Russia’s claims of being encircled by the US and its allies.
This also explains why Russia has been calling for a stop to NATO’s expansion into Ukraine or Georgia, and to limitations on strategic missile systems in Europe for a better geopolitical balance. With NATO expanding to the East and the US still playing their global geopolitical game against Russia, the only allies Russia had in the region were Belarus and Ukraine. But, following the Maidan movements and the arrival of a pro-West government this started to change, even more with Zelensky’s government, pro-NATO and playing a part in the greater geopolitical game led by the US.
From a global strategic standpoint, Ukraine falling on NATO’s side would be a disaster, leaving only Belarus (surrounded by NATO) to support Russia in the region. This would result in more NATO troops, and potentially more strategic weapon systems on Russia’s borders, closer than ever from Moscow. Ukraine is a strategic point for security in Europe, whether it falls under the influence of NATO or Russia, it is imperative for both to control it to push strategic weapons further from the centre of each block and further inside the other side’s sphere of influence. It is of course much more important for Russia’s safety than the US’s.
To put its proposition forward Russia has tried to get closer to many European countries in the past 20 years, and achieved fairly good relations with some, such as Germany, resulting in projects like Nord Stream 1 and 2, bringing Russian gas into Europe at attractive prices. This was the best option for European nations to get gas cheaper, and cleaner than importing it from North America or the Middle East. But some Eastern European countries still see Russia as a threat for two reasons: 1) they experienced the harm of the Soviet rule and have a historical fear of their Eastern neighbour, 2) they have grown dependent on the US’s protection inside of NATO, in exchange for being a military platform for American troops hosting bases and the majority of the about 100,000 US troops in Europe.
Even if Western European countries are less concerned by this, the phenomenon of the UK is striking. It is on this matter much closer to the US than its European neighbours. Indeed, it struggles to move on from the old anti-Russian mindset of the Cold War, pushing other European governments against Russia and naming it as a threat, justifying American troops and bases in Europe even though it is not a strategic necessity for the UK. This is strange for Britain has an army comparable to the one of France, and also has its own nuclear deterrent, yet it still chooses to stay in the US’s fold, hosting six American military bases on its own soil as of today.
This anti-Russian mindset at the macro level also translates to the micro-level, as individuals can be influenced by the general mindset on this issue. Indeed, it is hard not to follow this even in countries such as Germany, a good recent example being the head of the German Navy Kay-Achim Schönbach forced to quit his position for stating well established facts that Putin’s Russia is looking for respect, and that Crimea would never come back to Ukraine.
Yet despite this political and geostrategic pressure from the US, the two main European powers (France and Germany) were undecided on how to approach the Ukrainian situation and did not escalate the rhetoric as fast as the Anglo-Saxon countries did. With pressure from both sides to control Ukraine, this resulted for years in an indirect conflict with Ukraine as proxy, being the centre of a communication and mediatic war.