By Richard Rozwadowski
Ukrainian soldiers load a wounded man aboard a helicopter, near the eastern Ukrainian city of Shchastya, Lugansk region, on August 18, 2014.
The starting point in pre-EuroMaidan Ukraine was that it was a completely peaceful country and there were no separatist movements.
I worked in Crimea in 2007-2008 and it was very peaceful, but the Russians were already handing out passports to any Ukrainians who wanted them. However, we need to understand Russia’s point of view, though we may disagree with it.
The accession of 10 new member states – Poland, Hungary, Estonia, Latvia, etc. – to the European Union 10 years ago was a remarkable achievement that history will judge as a unique moment, while Russia was in chaos after the USSR disbanded, governed by Mikhail Gorbachev.
Russia has one word for the "near abroad" and another for "abroad."
This is a fundamental distinction and "near abroad" means Russia’s sphere of influence and control. Russia has never accepted Ukraine's independence. Former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice wrote in March this year about meeting Putin in 2004: “Vladimir Putin and I were standing in his office at the presidential dacha in late 2004 when (then-Prime Minister Viktor) Yanukovych suddenly appeared from a back room. Putin wanted to get to the point. He’s my man, Ukraine is ours — and don’t forget it."
Russia, under Putin, has overcome the chaotic Boris Yeltsin years and developed economically, but this has largely been due to energy prices.
The first big mistake the West made was a failure to support Yulia Tymoshenko sufficiently in Ukraine's 2010 presidential elections and allow Yanukovych to sneak in. Whilst Tymoshenko has clearly made a fortune from politics, she was far less corrupt than Yanukovych and was making some reforms.
Putin’s established view of the West and, in particular, Europe, is that it is corrupt and primarily interested in money and it is a society full of homosexuals and peodophiles. The "defection" of former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder to Gazprom as well as many other examples such as Sepp Blatter, who runs the world's most influential football governing body FIFA, and all the Swiss bankers reinforce this view.
Russia is growing, getting stronger and is macho. It is important to understand this – it means that Putin sees sanctions as a test of Russia’s strength and also, as everywhere, allows his cronies to make even more money from overcoming the sanctions. More sanctions means Russia’s resistance to negotiations becomes stronger.
The West thinks there are some basic rules, but as Russian chess grandmaster and anti-Putin activist Garry Kasparov tweeted, "I was playing chess with my 4-year-old daughter and she got bored after four moves and put my queen in her mouth and said “I won.”
Putin and his associates' core interests are the only rule for Russia, while the country's own interest comes afterwards. There was no point in allowing Russia to join the World Trade Organization as they have never respected its rules.
The next critical EU's mistake was to "up the ante" and propose the free trade deal to Ukraine, which was presented as the nation’s choice between Russia and the EU, and then, even worse, to upgrade it into the Association Agreement. Another way to do this was through preliminary negotiations with Russia and without any intentions to provide opportunities for Ukraine's future membership in the EU or NATO.
The EuroMaidan Revolution was primarily initiated by people who were completely fed up with Yanukovych’s huge and open corruption and contempt for the people and, of course, their desire to be closer to the EU as the second major reason. Putin’s regime is highly corrupt, but he has allowed the Russian economy to develop whereas Yanukovych took all the money and it now seems that over 70 percent of the banks in Ukraine were controlled by his "family."
Putin’s nightmare would be a free and developing Ukraine as that would inevitably lead to a similar EuroMaidan Revolution in Russia, sooner or later. Putin these days sees Yanukovych as his biggest mistake and is encouraging him to fund the separatists, but will dump him when it'll be necessary.
Former U.S. President George W. Bush’s forays into Iraq and Afghanistan also legitimized military intervention against foreign countries on the pretext of action against terrorists, so the West turned a blind eye on Chechnya which emboldened Putin to invade Georgia. Will Russia now openly invade Ukraine and how much of it?
The West has played its sanctions card and consistently said there is "no military option". This is an open invitation to Putin to invade, either through "peacekeepers" or to protect ethnic Russians in Ukraine. I am not a military strategist, but if they "cross the red line" of invasion the West will react with lots of rhetoric like threats to take away the 2018 World Cup from Russia and isolate it.
Therefore, if and when they invade, it's likely for them go to immediately to Kyiv, Kherson, Odesa (major Black Sea port) and Lviv as that is the heart of Ukraine’s identity and protest movement. Lviv is some 60 kilometers away from the EU border.
Can an invasion be stopped?
Bullies can only be stopped by force. Just as Yanukovych would never go peacefully, Putin will carve up Ukraine, Moldova and then move onto the Baltics and Poland which will then test NATO’s resolve. One option would be a United Nations'decision to send peacekeepers to Ukraine, especially on the Russian border, and create a no-fly zone. It will likely lead to Russia also sending peacekeepers which could have enormous consequences.
This should have been done when Russia annexed Crimea.
Can the conflict be settled through negotiations? One of the reasons for Russia to go for much more territory is that it strengthens their negotiating position. A probable solution – mostly between Putin and Germany's Angela Merkel – would be "peace" based on three to five western oblasts (Galicia first of all), joining the EU and Russia keeping control over the rest and all sides would drop their sanctions towards each other.
However, at what point is the West going to put its feet down at the border between Poland and Ukraine?
If Putin invades Ukraine, it will mean a hysterical massive exodus to the West of literally millions of people. Estimates already say that 20,000 to 70,000 people from the country's east already came to Lviv and even more to Kyiv. Millions of Ukrainians are packing. Are Poland and the EU prepared for this? Or will Poland be forced by the EU to stop people trying to cross the border by force..?
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Richard Rozwadowski has been working on agricultural policy and projects for 10 years in Ukraine and 25 years in Central and Eastern Europe.
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