The ongoing Russia-Ukraine war has no parallel in history. No country has ever invaded another country, which is in no position to deliver the outcome that the aggressor desires, even if the latter is vanquished or even destroyed. The security guarantees that Russia wants can be given only by the US and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) which are not in the war. No disproportionately powerful nation has ever bogged down for nearly a month in a much weaker neighbouring country without attaining its objectives.

Why Russia invaded Ukraine?

When the Soviet Union broke up in the early 1990s, Ukraine, a former Soviet republic, had the third largest atomic arsenal in the world. The United States and Russia worked with Ukraine to denuclearize the country, and  Kyiv gave its hundreds of nuclear warheads back to Russia in exchange for security assurances that protected it from a potential Russian attack.

Those assurances were put to the test in 2014, when Russia invaded Ukraine. Russia annexed the Crimean Peninsula and backed a rebellion led by pro-Russia separatists in the eastern Donbas region

The Russia-Ukraine crisis is a continuation of the one that began in 2014. But recent political developments within Ukraine, the US, Europe, and Russia help explain why Putin might have felt it is the time to act.

On February 23, 2022,  Russian President Vladimir Putin said that a “special military operation” would begin in Ukraine. Russia amassed tens of thousands of troops along the Ukrainian border, an act of aggression that could spiral into the largest military conflict on European soil in decades.

The conflict is about the future of Ukraine. But Ukraine is also a larger stage for Russia to try to reassert its influence in Europe and the world, and for Putin to cement his legacy. He knew that his war could lead to tens of thousands of civilian deaths, a European refugee crisis, and a response from Western allies that includes tough sanctions affecting the global economy. 

A war being attributed to a single individual is not unheard of in history. But, in this case, one does not hear anything about a Politburo or a group of generals advising him, though some Russian generals seem to have perished on account of the war. There are theories that the war is being fought in Putin’s mind, which has been shaped by the KGB. His warnings to traitors of a natural and necessary self-purification of society for the sake of the country are ominous in this context.

Russia’s demands

Russia presented the US with a list of demands, some of which were non-starters for Washington and NATO. Putin demanded that NATO stop its eastward expansion and deny membership to Ukraine, and that NATO roll back troop deployment in countries that had joined after 1997, which would turn back the clock on decades of measures for European security. 

Ukraine’s drift toward Europe and NATO

Ukraine is not joining NATO in the near future, and US President Joe Biden has stated as such. The core of the NATO treaty is Article 5, a commitment that an attack on any NATO country is treated as an attack on the entire alliance — meaning any Russian military engagement of a hypothetical NATO-member Ukraine would theoretically bring Moscow into conflict with the US, the UK, France, and the 27 other NATO members.

Public opinion in Ukraine has also strongly swayed support for ascension into Western bodies like the European Union and NATO. That may have left Russia feeling as though it has exhausted all of its political and diplomatic tools to bring Ukraine back into the fold.

“Moscow security elites feel that they have to act now because if they don’t, military cooperation between NATO and Ukraine will become even more intense and even more sophisticated,” said the German Council on Foreign Relations.

Putin tested the waters on Ukraine in the spring of 2021, amassing troops on its own borders and elicited a quick response from the US and NATO by way of dire warnings of a strong response.

The White House is holding out the hope of a diplomatic resolution, even as it has imposed debilitating sanctions against Russia, sending money and weapons to Ukraine, and boosting America’s military presence in Eastern Europe. 

Russia handed Washington its list of “legally binding security guarantees, including a ban on Ukrainian NATO membership, and demanded answers in writing.

In their response, the US and NATO rejected any deal on NATO membership.

President Putin has been shifting the goal posts of his demands. He began with security guarantees by demanding that NATO should not extend eastwards, but ended up with nostalgic thoughts about the glory of the Soviet Union and putting the blame for the collapse of the Soviet Union on Lenin, Stalin, Brezhnev and Gorbachev for giving nationalities to the Republics and by giving them discretion to secede from the Soviet Union. 

Western sanctions on Russia

The decision of the US and NATO to fight a devastating war with sanctions alone is another new feature of this war. But the sanctions have gone beyond the worst warnings of CAATSA (Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act), which are hurting not only the target nation, but also a host of unintended victims, including the sanctioning countries themselves. If this war were to be won with sanctions alone, it would be the emergence of a new kind of warfare, which may be more merciful, but more widespread in its consequence.

This is also perhaps the first major war being fought on the Internet by propaganda and counter-propaganda by some of the most technologically advanced nations of the world. This is totally unbalanced as the sanctions have deprived Russia of many platforms for propaganda. Since Putin’s aggression is becoming more and more ineffective on the ground and the cyber space is not available to him, he has been driven to threaten the use of nuclear weapons. If Putin ever uses nuclear weapons, he will be remembered as the only one in history who will have used it against intolerable propaganda and sanctions. 

What is China’s stand?

For the major powers of the world, the war presents unprecedented choices. China’s “no limits” alliance with Russia seems to be weakening as days pass. It sees the Ukraine war as a rehearsal for the fight for Taiwan. In his conversation with Biden, Xi Jinping spoke at length on the issue and expressed concern that some in the US were sending danger signals on Taiwan, hinting that there was room for exploring how firm the US will be in the event of Chinese action on Taiwan.

China seems to believe that Putin may be unable to achieve his expected goals, which puts Russia in a tight spot. Launching a nuclear war would put Russia on the opposite side of the whole world and is therefore unwinnable. Some Chinese analysts believe that “at this point, Putin’s best option is to end the war decently through peace talks, which requires Ukraine to make substantial concessions. However, what is not attainable on the battlefield is also difficult to obtain at the negotiating table. In any case, this military action constitutes an irreversible mistake.” China may well be learning from this war a lesson with regard to its intentions towards Taiwan.

Mounting pressure on India

India is under pressure to dilute its policy of abstention as the war rages on. While everyone realises that India has vital interests in Russia, its new alignment with China raises questions of more vital interests in safeguarding our democratic credentials. We cannot discount the public opinion against Russia by attributing it to western propaganda. Australia’s assurance that the Quad understands the Indian position is no great comfort for India. Now that the biggest challenge India faced in the early part of the war in the form of rescuing Indians stranded in the war zone has ended, a more critical appraisal of our position is needed. A war like no other warrants a solution like no other.

Where is the war heading?

Since this is an exceptional war, its end will also be exceptional. A conventional surrender either by Putin or Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is unthinkable. It is likely  that the war will be prolonged beyond expectations interrupted only by some pretence of negotiations. 

Russia and even NATO virtually ignored the offer of Zelensky to give up its ambition to join NATO and to reintegrate the two provinces, which declared independence and got recognised by Russia. In other words, no one knows how to end this war. It remains as meaningless today as it was on February 24, 2022. As Biden prepares to leave for Europe to consult NATO leaders, the possibility of a wider conflict comes into view.

The unique features of this war do not end there. The David and Goliath story resurrected three days after the war began, ostensibly because the expected blitzkrieg did not happen. Indeed, we saw the rise of David beyond all proportions. Never have we seen a war in which the underdog became a valiant hero even when he was alive. Whether it was because of a grand plan, which went awry or the triumph of a strategy to conquer without undue damage to life and property is yet to be determined. 

Where have we seen a President fighting for his own survival getting access to the Parliaments of the world and receiving a standing ovation? These cannot be accidents of history. These must be the harbingers of a new world order. These must be the birth pangs of a configuration of nation states never witnessed before in history. The world cannot be unaware of the likelihood of the emergence of a powerful authoritarian leadership if Putin wins with the support of China. The future of the world will depend on when the West will decide to enter the war to preserve its predominance.

After nearly a month of war, marked by massive loss of lives and property and a global economic upheaval, there is no solution in sight. The situation is likely to escalate further and take the world to the brink of a larger war. Intense diplomacy and a sense of accommodation on all sides are required to save mankind from the scourge of another devastating war.

(T.P. Sreenivasan is a former Indian diplomat. The views expressed here are personal.)

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