Syria on the Dneiper

 

I was asked my opinion of Ukraine recently, and I offered the Russian perspective on the basis that the airwaves are swamped with the alternative and, more importantly, it’s important to know where your opponent is coming from. First of all, I’m not buying the knee-jerk view that Putin is a deranged psychopath in a hurry; he’s not a messianic communist, and I think he’s realistic enough to know there is no chance of resurrecting the old ‘Soviet empire.’ I think though he is a nationalist, and that is probably the key to the tragedy and my worse fear of all, that we may have another Syria on our doorstep.   

I hesitate to step on enflamed passions but, in my view, there are two scenarios: best case and worst case. 

If  we look at it from Putin’s perspective, Kiev would be important to him. It was, in a sense, the birthplace of Russia, the country getting its name from the early Vikings who established a trading post there in the mid C9th. They were called Rus by Arab traders and the name stuck. For centuries it’s been part of Russia either as a constituent of a Tsarist empire or as part of the Soviet Union. Eastern Ukraine is still largely Slavic, Russian in culture, religion, and language. 

When the Soviet Union collapsed at the end of the C20th, America/Europe promised not to take advantage and that NATO would not spread eastwards with the potential to threaten Russia. Despite the objections of seasoned White House advisers and senior members of the American government, this understanding was broken, and since then Estonia, Lithuania, Rumania, Poland and Czech/Slovakia have all joined NATO, and despite the denials, Ukraine was clearly next on the list. 

Of course, each of these countries have the right to apply for membership, from their sense it makes sense. What’s not generally said is that NATO has the right to refuse, and this was the understanding when the Soviet empire broke up. In Putin’s view, it is a case of now or never to stop NATO and the EU’s steady eastwards expansion, especially when the cards are currently in his hands. It’s also more than mere paranoia on his part. Hardwired into Russian thinking is the experience of two world wars when each time Germany saw Ukraine as ‘living space’ a source of raw materials, as well as a gateway into Russia. 

After the horror of the Napoleonic Wars, European statesmen realised the dangers of nationalism and in the interests of a peace that lasted much of the century respected each other’s backyard. We continue to respect America’s ‘backyard’ when it comes to South America. A case in point is the 1962 Cuban crisis when Russia sent missiles to Castro’s Cuba  a hundred miles or so from Florida. Kennedy threatened nuclear war over the issue and Russia backed down. Less publicly reported, America also backed down by removing their missiles from Turkey, all of them pointing at Russia.  

So what now? The best-case scenario offers two possibilities: a) Putin exploits a short-term success as a negotiating lever into the ‘Finlandisation’ of Ukraine, a large Switzerland if you will, and with the ‘Russian’ eastern provinces having a role in a decentralised constitution as a checkpoint against veering too far to the West.

b) It is possible Russia will attempt to take and hold on to Kiev, using the River Dnieper as a boundary. The large flat plains of Eastern Ukraine would be easier to control than the more urbanised and western orientated western Ukraine. Neither of these would be seen as best case scenarios by many Ukranians. The problem is the alternative could be far worse

The worst-case scenario is a long and protracted war, mutilation and bloodshed, where outside vested interests exploit nationalist fervour but themselves avoid the full agony of war. Syria immediately comes to mind, once a diverse but prosperous country at ease with itself because it had little choice under the Assad despotism. Then we got involved – from a safe distance of course supplying bellicose language, support and equipment, along with the likes of Sunnis, Shiites, Isis, Al Qaida and latterly Russia and Iran, all with their various interests and axes to grind. 

Putin is accused of being a danger to world peace, his regime a corrupt collection of kleptomaniacs. True or not, in terms of our respective elites, the words pots and kettles come to mind, and we have a record of using others to further our ends. Sometimes it backfires. 

It may be American power has reached its highwater mark and Ukraine is on the fault line of a tectonic shift as Russia pushes back. Whatever the case, the innocent suffer. One can hope that the oncoming economic damage, volatile electorates and political repercussions in Europe as a whole will concentrate minds, and that Putin has a rational aim. One can only hope statesmen react with intelligence and not soundbites or a slide into the Syrian nightmare.