At Some Point, Something Will Have to Be Done About Russia

I am, and this feeling has been intensifying since 2020. I come from Belarus, so for me, the war did not start in 2022, but two years earlier. At that time, protests broke out in Belarus and Lukashenko's authoritarian regime turned into a neo-totalitarian regime. All this is very closely linked to the war in Ukraine.

'The West is to blame for everything that is happening in Ukraine' ‒ the proponents of realism theory have been arguing this since the beginning of the war. According to their narrative, NATO's eastward expansion and the promise of Alliance membership to Ukraine and Georgia constituted an encroachment on Russia's sphere of influence. US and EU support for democratic movements in post-Soviet countries is nothing more than an attempt to draw them into the Western orbit. Russia, the realists argue, felt threatened in its own backyard, so it was obvious that it would want to clean house. Can we send this school of thought to the trash heap of history already?

This should have been done a long time ago, although I am sure many will disagree. The realists assume that Moscow is a rational, predictable actor driven by considerations of its own security. What we observed in 2022 completely contradicts this.

And even so, leading realists like John Mearsheimer continue to believe that in seeking control of Ukraine, Putin acted rationally.

From a military strategy perspective, the invasion was a disaster. Many military analysts viewed the attempted takeover of Kyiv as a brash, reckless brawl resulting from a complete lack of understanding of Ukraine and the West, as well as an inability to predict their reaction. Today, there is no longer any doubt that Russia's behaviour was irrational and devoid of pragmatism.

In such a case, why is the realist theory still quite popular?

Part of the intellectual establishment in Russia loves people like Mearsheimer because they provide theoretical justification for the Kremlin's ambitions. The fact that an American scientist confirms Russian claims is not only a kind of an alibi, but also provides superb fodder for the propaganda machine. In turn, supporters of the realism theory in the West simply do not understand what is happening inside Russia. They underestimate the role that resentment and complexes play in the survival of a decaying authoritarian regime.

The realists also made an a priori assumption that the fate of Ukraine was of no strategic interest to the West. How could they have been so wrong?

As a matter of fact, I don't think they made a mistake when they said that Ukraine was not a priority for the West. The fact is that for years, the European Union has been focusing on the Balkan countries, seeing them as future members. It treated the post-Soviet countries as a gray zone ‒ the Eastern Partnership was created for them, but they were not offered clear membership prospects. It was Putin who made Ukraine a priority for the West. The Russian invasion was a blatant violation of international law: an overt launch of a war of conquest, no longer disguised as any kind of hybrid operation, such as the occupation of Crimea or military intervention in Donbas. This time, Western politicians could not tell their voters: yes, Russia is bad, but this conflict is not so clear-cut, there are some aspects of a civil war present. Now everything was clear. Allowing Russia to take control of Ukraine would mean the collapse of the existing order. It would be the undoing of everything we have believed in since 1945.

Some argue that in today’s world politics, there is even a revival of liberalism taking place. Yet again, there is much talk of common Western values that must be defended. US President Joe Biden portrays the war in Ukraine as a struggle between democracy and authoritarianism. A succession of artillery and tank deliveries are rushing towards Kyiv, and his allies repeatedly state that when it comes to military aid, nothing is ruled out.

I don't see this as a sign of a liberal internationalism revival. It is more of an awareness that Russia cannot be allowed to win because it would undermine the remnants of regional and international order. This has little in common with the days of interventionism, when the US and its allies would swoop into Afghanistan and Iraq and subsequently build institutions there. For many years, the West made concessions to Russia. It would tolerate the occupation of Crimea, the intervention in Georgia; it would accept the Minsk agreements forcing concessions on Kyiv. And we all know very well what lessons authoritarian regimes learn from appeasement policies. And finally, the West got pushed to the wall. We do not know how the situation in Ukraine will play out. Besides, it's not just about Ukraine ‒ at some point something will have to be done about Russia.

What can be done about Russia?

Well, that is the million-dollar question, isn’t it? How do you subdue a regime that cannot be defeated militarily because it wields a nuclear threat? There are many scenarios on the table. One of them assumes that Russia would disintegrate by implosion, just like the Soviet Union. In such a scenario, a debate would be necessary on how to manage and stabilise the process. Or perhaps nothing like that will happen? Then it would be necessary to consider how to face this threat, how to make sure that the same story does not happen again. I don't have an answer to that. At this point, probably nobody does.

Ever since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, comparisons to the Cold War have been rife...

I don’t find it an apt analogy. The differences are so numerous, they would be hard to count. The challenges are also quite different today than they were a few decades ago. Take, for instance, the role of nuclear weapons. In the 1970s they served the purpose of mutual deterrence, which guaranteed that neither side would attack the other directly, while limiting them to waging proxy wars. Today, Moscow is keen to resort to nuclear blackmail to force validation of its conquest of new territories.

I don't find this analogy compelling either, although many have even argued that we are living in a period of a 'new Cold War'. Perhaps it is nostalgia for a time of clear moral divisions: who is the good guy and who is the bad guy, where is the friend and where is the foe?

People tend to look for analogies that would help them to better understand new situations causing “ontological uncertainty”.

Meaning…?

What I mean by this is the anxiety of being lost in the world that emerges in the wake of a major change and the disruption of a previous routine. We try to suppress it by returning to familiar ideas and reference points from the past. This is an understandable reaction, but it doesn't always work. What it does, though, is give us a form of reassurance that we know what we are doing. I also think that it is underpinned by a certain psychological desire for a simpler, more predictable world. This is why we idealise the past. We may think, for example, that since the old world was bipolar, it was at the same time relatively stable and secure. However, in reality this was not the case, even though US presidents did not threaten to use nuclear weapons as Putin does. Besides, there were players such as, say, Yugoslavia and Romania, who eluded black and white divisions.

Today, one could probably say something similar about Hungary, for example.

Some governments play a game of opportunism. It reminds me of Lukashenko's behaviour. He never supports someone or stands against someone because he benefits from being 'in-between'. Even now ‒ he does participate in the war and at the same time he doesn't. It is a zone of perpetual ambivalence.

Has Russia underestimated how important Ukraine would be to the West, or, conversely, is it the West who have underestimated Ukraine's importance to Russia?

It may sound a bit strange, but Ukraine in itself is of no value to Russia.

How so? It was supposed to be a key element of Putin’s fantasy of the “Russkij mir”…

From Russia's point of view, Ukraine is a trophy in a macho game between powers, which the ageing authoritarian regime plays for its own macabre amusement. The people in Moscow believe they have the right to subjugate neighbouring countries, and the West should recognise this. Analysts come up with various explanations for Russia's behaviour, referring, for example, to economic interests or protecting the rights of Russian-speaking minorities, but no one in the Kremlin really cares what happens to Russians in Central Asian dictatorships like Uzbekistan or Turkmenistan ‒ even though their situation is incomparably worse than in Ukraine or the Baltic republics. Moreover, Moscow has no problem maintaining friendly relations with these regimes. Arguments about acting in defence of the 'brothers' in Donbass are as hypocritical as arguments about security and NATO enlargement. They are merely instruments in the great game against the West. Besides, knowledge of Ukraine or Belarus in Russia is minuscule.

Do you mean both the Kremlin and the public?

Yes. If it were not the case, Moscow would not have expected Kyiv to fall within three days. My experience in Belarus also confirms this. When protests broke out there in 2020, comments from the Russians made it very clear that they utterly failed to understand what was happening. Even pro-democratic liberals have shown at that time that their knowledge of the reality of the neighbouring country is practically nothing but stereotypes. Proximity ‒ geographical, cultural and linguistic ‒ creates a certain illusion of knowledge. 'We have controlled these territories for so many years, so what important thing could we possibly not know about them?' ‒ is a typically imperial approach. Russia has a colonial view of Ukraine and Belarus.

So Russia just cannot accept that they have agency?

Not just agency, but distinctiveness, their own internal dynamics. Many think that Russians are linked to Ukraine and Belarus by deep ties and specific goals. This is not quite true. They have their own imaginary world, with Russia on one side and the West on the other, supposedly contesting Russia’s right to the space in the middle. This is not just about spheres of influence, but also about a symbolic dimension that has more to do with Russian identity than security, economic interests, or minority rights.

Do you think that the united Western front on the issue of Ukraine will maintain unity?

I believe that in this case 'unity' is more of a spectrum. I would not dare to make predictions here. Under current conditions, the West's attitude towards the war in Ukraine is based on the lowest common denominator: we cannot allow Russia to wage overt aggressive war just like that, without consequences. The fault lines in Western unity were present right from the start, of which Hungary is a prime example.

Let's look beyond Europe then. How has war changed the international order?

I fear that we tend to be somewhat Eurocentric. The world has seen more than one war in the last decade, people have experienced immense suffering in places not so far from our continent, and yet, we have not asked ourselves the same question. On the other hand, Russia has launched a war of conquest, which is different from the civil wars in Syria or Libya. The principle of territorial integrity is fundamental to the international order. And with regard to Ukraine, most countries officially support it ‒ even countries friendly to Moscow, such as Iran and Serbia. But outside the West, there is no determination to put this principle into practice through sanctions. On the contrary, quite a few states are demonstrating anti-Western solidarity. Major players, such as China, are trying to stay on the sidelines or blame both sides in the conflict. Which also shows that hopes for some kind of a new, ”post-Western” international order ‒ a fashionable topic in recent years ‒ are an illusion. For who would guard and uphold it?

And did it seem like a plausible option before?

No, but it's a bit like Moscow's rationality: additional strong evidence against it has emerged. In this hypothetical multipolar world order, selfish motivations would eventually prevail too, as they have in case of its earlier versions. But of course it is understandable why this option is so appealing to many non-Westerners. Besides, multipolarity is one idea that Russia has actively promoted for many years.

How has Central Europe positioned itself amidst all this?

To start with, it must be recognised that Central Europe is not a homogenous whole. I have noticed that Poles tend to assume that everybody in the region shares their perspective. While it holds true for some countries, for others ‒ not so much. I also get the impression that Poland, being on the front line of European aid to Ukraine, is positioning itself as 'more Western than the West'. This is not new ‒ such an attitude corresponds to Polish geography, historical experience and culture. Certainly in the countries of the region, the invasion has brought to surface some difficult collective memories of the suffering inflicted on them by Russia, but there are different ways of reinterpreting the past in the current context. Besides the natural solidarity with the most recent victims of Russian imperialism, I see another trend: using the tragic past of Central Europe to present the countries of the region as small, defenceless, and therefore incapable of influencing the merciless game of the great powers. The implication is that they should stay out of trouble, remain neutral.

Is Ukraine's membership of NATO a more realistic prospect today than it was before the war?

Yes. Some important psychological barriers have been broken.

What barriers, specifically?

Ukraine and Moldova were officially granted the status of EU candidates. Thus, a tangible prospect of membership emerged, which was never a certainty before. From the perspective of the Eastern Partnership, both countries counted as ”European neighbours” who could apply for accession ‒ as opposed to ”neighbours of Europe” who do not have such a chance ‒ but in practice they were always in a grey zone. That is exactly what broke the barrier. The ultimate goal may be NATO. But even if it is, there is a long road ahead for Ukraine, full of practical obstacles.

What obstacles?

Let us start with the fact that there is still a war going on. Part of Ukrainian territory is under Russian occupation. If Ukraine were a NATO member, Kyiv could formally invoke Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty. Except what then? This does not mean that the Alliance states would have to immediately prepare for war ‒ the collective defence clause is more ambiguous than commonly thought. The unwritten assumption is that a military deployment would happen if Russia attacked Poland or the Baltic republics. Ukraine is something else. There are other possible scenarios, not envisaging NATO membership ‒ probably easier to materialise, as it will be difficult to win the support of some countries for Ukraine in NATO. Ukraine could, for example, obtain security guarantees by way of a bilateral agreement with the US.

Even briefly before the war, the option of Ukraine joining the Union, but not NATO ‒ like Austria ‒ was quite seriously considered in diplomatic circles.

This is the old debate about Finlandization of Ukraine, once proposed by Henry Kissinger, among others. Today, even he no longer thinks it is a good idea - while many have argued from the outset that believing Russia would treat Ukraine the way the Soviet Union treated Finland is simply naïve. ©℗

Allowing Russia to take control of Ukraine would mean the collapse of the existing order. It would be the undoing of everything we have believed in since 1945