By ADM — March 24, 2022
This essay is intended as a brief overview of the geopolitical, cultural, historical, and military dimensions involved in the Russian war with Ukraine, the latest major phase of which began on February 24, 2022. Topics include the political origins of this war in the 1990s; the philosophy underlying it; the likelihood of imminent nuclear escalation; and a potential path to resolution. The intended audience is people who are interested in the war, what’s happening, and why it started, but who don’t follow these issues closely. I wanted to write this in early February, but I’ve been busy with work and parenting. 🤷
Historical Context
Prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union in late 1991, Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia and many other republics were part of the Soviet Union, aka the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Throughout much of the existence of the USSR, particularly after World War II and as it developed nuclear weapons and initially won “the space race,” the USSR enjoyed a status as a global “superpower” on relatively equal footing with the United States and China. In competition with the United States and China for global power and influence, despite its far weaker economy, the USSR’s status was exemplified by being the chief antagonist of the United States and other western countries in the Cold War.
Under the leadership of Mikhail Gorbachev (still alive!) in the late 1980s, the USSR began to move away from Marxism/Leninism until the various republics under the control or influence of the Soviet Union began to break away, and soon the USSR collapsed, with each member Republic eventually emerging as its own sovereign nation. This included Ukraine, which declared itself independent of the USSR in August 1991.
From the Western perspective, the West celebrated its victory in the Cold War and heralded the emerging social democracies in Eastern Europe. But our “victory” meant there was also a loser, and that loser was Russia, as its power and influence quickly evaporated, its economy was in shambles, and the country struggled to right itself while also contending with its new image not as a global superpower, but as a weak nation. Russians, who had spent their entire lives on equal footing in geopolitics with the US, felt this wound to their national pride deeply. Eventually, this shame coalesced into anger and resentment directed at Gorbachev and his successor, Boris Yeltsin, whom many Russians came to regard — and still regard — as a corrupt bumbler responsible for the failure for Russia to rise again from the ashes of the Soviet Union.
As is often the case in history when a country feels this type of shame and weakness, a new leader will arise with nationalist rhetoric and promise to restore the former glory of the country. In Russia’s case, this was Vladimir Putin.
Putin took office in 2000, gradually accruing and exercising additional power for himself and Russia. One major development in this effort occurred in 2008 with Russia’s invasion of Georgia, a sovereign nation and formerly a part of the USSR. The invasion of Georgia in many ways was a precursor and a trial run for what would later happen with Ukraine.
Meanwhile throughout the early 2000s, Ukraine deeply struggled with being caught in the middle, geographically and geopolitically, between the East (Russia) and the West (Western Europe and the US). Following a rigged election in 2004, in which the pro-Russian side claimed victory for their candidate, Viktor Yanukovych, Ukraine’s “Orange Revolution” followed, and Western-leaning Viktor Yushchenko won a re-vote and became president of Ukraine.
For Putin, this was a problem: a country of 40 million people right next door was aligning itself with Western Europe, and escaping the orbit of Russia. In Putin’s view, this was not merely a political and economic threat: it was a military one. Should Ukraine move far enough under the influence of the West, it could eventually become a member of NATO, in which case Ukraine’s military interests would be directly in opposition to Russia’s. Putin represented that Ukraine (like Poland) could become home to NATO bases, operations, and eventually nuclear capabilities, and this was a risk he could not tolerate. (Just as the US responded during the Cuban Missile Crisis when in 1962 the USSR moved nuclear weapons to Cuba, just 90 miles away from the US mainland.)
Hijinx ensued as Putin used his power to influence the internal affairs of Ukraine to his advantage: Yushchenko was infamously poisoned with dioxin, disfiguring his face and nearly killing him. Yuschenko’s longtime foe, the Russian-leaning Viktor Yanukovych took over, until the Ukrainian people had enough of the repression and alignment with Russia, and took to the streets in the Maidan Square protests of 2014, again ousting Yanukovych, who fled the country by plane to Russia.
Following this second popular revolution, Putin was determined to force Ukraine back under Russia’s influence, as he could not tolerate the alternative. He sent thinly-disguised Russian troops masquerading as Ukrainian separatists (popularly described as “Little Green Men”) to Ukraine’s East to align with and support a weak separatist movement, and in parallel, took over Crimea, which had been Ukrainian territory since 1954. Thus began the Russo-Ukrainian war which continues to this day. It is estimated that before 2022, as many as 14,000 people had died in the 8-year conflict, including more than 3,000 civilians.
In this context, the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine that occurred in February 2022 is not a surprising consequence of all the preceding events, most especially the 2014 invasion of eastern Ukraine.
Political Philosophy Underlying the War
At bottom, Putin’s efforts to destabilize and take over Ukraine are about restoring and exerting the former power of Russia on the world stage. It is important to understand that Putin and many Russians still acutely feel the pain of defeat in the Cold War and resent being a secondary power. Nationalism is a powerful force in many countries and among many leaders, and Russia is one of the great examples of this: it is through Russian nationalism that Putin obtained, expanded, and maintained power.
Indeed, perhaps one of the greatest errors the US made in managing Russia diplomatically was when President Barack Obama pointedly referred to Russia as merely “a regional power” after it invaded Ukraine in 2014. It was foolish to unnecessarily poke Russian pride like this. At the time, I had no doubt Putin would desire to make Obama eat his words. It was a catastrophically bad, but deliberate, choice of words.
The vision of restoring Russia to its former glory is the central factor in Putin’s worldview, and this necessarily involves reunifying surrounding countries into the Russian empire. This philosophy is embraced and fully articulated by the Russian fascist and political philosopher Alexander Dugin, who not only calls for a “New Russia” and Euro-Asian empire, but also lays out the strategy for achieving it. Dugin is not a fringe figure in Russia: his work has been taught at the most prestigious military school for officers. Dugin denies the political and cultural identity of Ukraine, and called for Putin to take over Crimea in 2014.
Following Dugin, Putin’s rhetoric on Ukraine in the run-up to the 2022 invasion was alarming, and focused on 3 concepts: “denazification” of Ukraine, “demilitarization” of Ukraine, and the denial of Ukraine’s political and cultural identity.
Denazification. While Western analysts pointlessly refute Putin’s characterization of Ukraine as being led by Nazis and, with exasperation, repeat that Ukraine’s president is Jewish, it is important to understand that Putin does not literally mean Ukraine is run by Nazis. He is simply using the specter of Nazism as a metaphor and symbol to gain popular support in Russia for the war by tapping into Russians’ nostalgic pride over defeating the Western attack on Russia in World War II, namely against the Nazis. For Putin today, “denazification” just means “deWesternizing” Ukraine — metaphorically speaking, those who support Ukraine’s Western alignment are against Russia (and as Putin claims to see it, the existence of the Russian state) and are therefore “Nazis.” The Nazi concepts of German nationalism, purification of the Aryan race, and anti-Semitism have nothing to do with any of it, and so US media spending time explaining that President Zelenskyy is Jewish, etc., is just a waste of breath and a distraction from the underlying causes and Putin’s real reasons for the invasion. Unfortunately, the violent measures Putin is using to “denazify” Ukraine are far from metaphorical, and denazification is truly and literally a purge.
Demilitarization. From Putin’s point of view, as long as Ukraine has a strong military and is leaning in the direction of the West, it is a military threat to Russia. Recall that only a couple months ago, Ukraine was still interested in obtaining NATO membership, meaning that — again in Putin’s view — Ukraine’s military assets would be positioned against Russian interests. As Putin’s vision is to reunify surrounding countries by invading them, a military campaign that NATO would eventually have to intervene in, he could not allow that to happen. Therefore, it became his imperative to destroy Ukraine’s military capabilities, and the primary way to do that is to attack Ukraine. Recall that immediately prior to the war, Russia’s faux “negotiating” position was that Ukraine had to demilitarize itself — which would only further weaken it against Russia’s impending aggression. Like the rest of the world, Putin thought that demilitarization of Ukraine would be easily achieved. As subsequent events showed, he was badly mistaken. This led to the change of tactics, and Russia’s losses on the battlefield against Ukraine’s army led to the deliberate shelling and destruction of civilian targets in Ukraine: one way to “demilitarize” Ukraine is to disable Ukraine’s ability to operate as a civil society and to destroy its public and private infrastructure, and to attempt to force a surrender through the slaughter of thousands of civilians across the country.
Denial of Ukraine’s Identity. To justify the invasion of Ukraine and the erasure of its political sovereignty, it is necessary for Putin to delegitimize the concept of Ukrainian identity. As such, Putin asserts that Ukraine is territorially historically Russian, that the sovereignty of Ukraine is unwarranted, and both the borders and the concept of a Ukrainian identity are unjustified. Through this logic, it follows that Russia is justified in having “a Ukraine without any Ukrainians,” as the mayor of one besieged Ukrainian city put it. Putin’s talking points that the invasion is a “special military operation” to back the pro-Russian separatists have largely been accepted by everyday Russians, and this hinges on the concept that Ukrainian identity is a myth, and those who assert it are “Nazis” aligned with the West and against Russia and Russians. Sadly, and indeed terrifyingly, this amounts to a dehumanization of the Ukrainian people and an assertion that the Ukrainian state need not exist: by extension, this philosophy opens the door to a “cleansing” of Ukraine by nuclear attack.
Possible Military and Geopolitical Developments and Outcomes
Pre-invasion, it was apparent that Putin’s strategy for Ukraine was to surround Ukraine with a large military force from all sides (including to the north, from Belarus); invade, rapidly topple the existing Ukrainian government; install a puppet regime willing to do Putin’s bidding; force the remainder of the country into submission; and then politically and formally align Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia into the next phase of what Dugin calls “Novorossiya” or “New Russia.” Putin no doubt thought that because the West had effectively little reaction to his prior invasion of Eastern Ukraine and annexation of Crimea, he would get away with it. By his calculus, the military victory would occur so quickly, it would be a fait accompli before the world even had time to react, and it would be impossible to undo, and the political dissolution of Ukraine would naturally follow.
Ukraine’s fierce resistance — which can now be considered a victory in the first phase of this war — spoiled Putin’s plan and strategy, and he’s left to reconsider his tactics and perhaps to reconsider his goals. Although at first glance, this may appear to be to Ukraine’s benefit, it will not be so entirely. This is because Russians and Putin are not defining “victory” or “positive outcomes” in the same way that Americans tend to do. We tend to look at wars and geopolitical skirmishes as events that one side “wins” and the other side “loses,” with clear outcomes all around. However, the Russian way of thinking is very different from our own: from the Russian point of view, you can win (achieve objectives) by destabilizing or disorienting the adversary, even if an outright “victory” is not clear.
This is as true in rhetoric and geopolitics as it is in war. For example, in Russia’s propaganda efforts, the goal is not to get the people to believe any one thing: the goal is to make it difficult to discern fact from fiction, and to confuse everyone so much, they don’t know what to believe. This is what makes people manipulable. For instance, the goal of the “denazification” rhetoric is not necessary to get Russians to sincerely believe that the Jewish leader of Ukraine is literally a Nazi. The goal is to get them to believe the concept enough that they will accept the war. If they happen to literally believe it, that’s fine. If they don’t take it literally but understand it to be a metaphor, that’s fine too. If they don’t even really think about it, but don’t object, that’s fine too. Such propaganda has the beneficial side effect of distracting the opponent, who attempts to rationalize or refute the propaganda, when the originators of that propaganda fully understand what it is, and meanwhile move on to the next argument or set of lies to see how well they work. (In this case, the “next set of lies” is the propaganda about biological and chemical weapons factories in Ukraine, which the right-wing media in the US has parroted, as exemplars of the Soviet concept of “useful idiots.”)
Similarly, a victory in Russia’s “demilitarization” effort may not look like what Americans generally think of as a military victory. Rather, by tying up, exhausting, and disabling Ukrainian military assets and making it difficult if not impossible for Ukrainians to effectively deploy those assets, Russia can nevertheless achieve its goal of demilitarization even without destroying those forces and even without a formal surrender. This is essentially what happened in the prior phase of this war (2014–2022) as Ukraine was politically and militarily engaged in the East to the point that it could not reasonably present itself as an attractive candidate for membership in NATO. Russia’s desired outcome was achieved, despite there being no clear victory.
A stalemate in the war now, which is where the situation seems headed, given Russian forces recently digging into positions and despite some successful Ukrainian counter-offensives in the last week or so, does not advantage Ukraine as much as it might superficially appear to. Rather, if Ukraine remains paralyzed politically, economically, and militarily, and is unable to return home its 2.5 million+ displaced citizens, it cannot function as an integral state and certainly not as a NATO ally. Again, this ambiguous state can be considered a kind of victory for Russia — a messy, costly victory, but a victory nonetheless.
Likely Military Developments. Several weeks ago in the early middle stages of the war to date, there was much talk about NATO establishing a no-fly zone over Ukraine. Although it seemed to be a desperate need at the time, and it probably was, it nonetheless would’ve been a strategic error for Ukraine, NATO, and the US to establish a no-fly zone.
The fundamental reason for this is that the effort would have been successful, but at too high of a cost for the West. Putin very clearly warned the West that any direct military action taken by NATO would be treated as an existential threat to Russia, and he would respond disproportionately. In other words, Putin was threatening a nuclear strike not only in Ukraine but against NATO.
NATO and the US repeatedly dismissed the idea of establishing a no-fly zone because they knew that (1) setting up a no-fly zone would literally mean shooting down Russian aircraft and destroying Russian anti-aircraft assets, probably in both Russia and Belarus, and (2) Putin’s response to that would be missile attacks on NATO members, which would necessarily drag the rest of NATO into the war.
Apart from the above, from a strictly military perspective, the establishment of a no-fly zone by NATO was not yet necessary because Ukraine had not yet exhausted its own ability to protect its skies, and — somewhat incredibly — even to today, Russia still hasn’t established air superiority over Ukraine. Ukraine only flies a limited number of sorties each day relative to its capacity, and is making good use of ground-based anti-aircraft equipment, the supply of which can be replenished by NATO countries without (yet) risking a dramatic escalation of the war by Russia.
For the immediate term, the likely military outcome of the war is a grind toward a stalemate during which large casualties will continue on both sides, particularly as Russia increases its attacks on civilian targets in an attempt to end the stalemate by breaking the will of the Ukrainian people. Unfortunately, unlike other leaders who might accept a stalemate, Putin is more likely to pursue a victory to end the war, but he now has limited tools available to him to do so. The remaining tools he does have are nuclear.
Nuclear Escalation. Putin will not allow himself to lose militarily. Putin placed his nuclear forces on alert weeks ago, not only as a provocation to the West, but in anticipation of what he now understands to be a prolonged engagement with Ukraine rather than the rapid victory he anticipated. Russia has run war games for this very scenario, and the steps are already planned. Prevailing wisdom is that if Putin feels Russia cannot win this war through conventional means, he will deploy a “tactical” (lower yield) nuclear weapon in a remote, unpopulated area such as over a nearby sea as a warning. Sadly, I don’t think he will spend his time with such a “demonstration” of power: the whole world already understands that Russia is a nuclear power with a deep arsenal. He has already warned the West and Ukraine, in so many words, that a nuclear strike is possible. He also knows that the risk of escalation is high, which would by definition mean a corresponding nuclear attack on Russia — which of course would result in a next round of attacks, and millions of people on both sides would be killed in a few hours, leaving China to pick up the pieces.
Everyone analyzing this situation must recognize that Putin does not follow or care about international “norms” against nuclear warfare. They are irrelevant: his only concern is Russia’s power and projection of that power.
Therefore, the calculated gamble that Putin is now making must be: Can I deploy a nuclear weapon against Ukraine that will give me the rapid “victory” in Ukraine that I want without risking a nuclear retaliation from NATO/the US? I believe the answer is yes: it is possible that Putin could deploy a “tactical” low-yield nuclear weapon in Ukraine in a populated area, forcing a surrender, and NATO — fearing a “world-ending” retaliation — would NOT respond with a nuclear strike of its own.
I’d like to emphasize that Putin has already warned us that a nuclear attack on Ukraine is possible: do not expect another warning. The attack will happen before anyone has a chance to further prepare for it. International nuclear treaties that Russia is a party to do not limit these smaller nuclear weapons, and Russian nuclear doctrine was altered in recent years to loosen restrictions on their use.
To avoid the outcome of a nuclear attack on Ukraine — something I believe is perhaps less than a few weeks away — the best we can hope for is that (1) the costs for Russians and Putin of the conventional war are so high that he is forced to the negotiating table and to de-escalate the war, or (2) the remnants of power remaining in the Kremlin and the FSB (former KGB) arrest and disempower Putin before he launches a nuclear attack. Time for both of these is running out, and neither seems likely.
A Negotiated Settlement. To be clear, the point of a negotiated settlement at this point is to avoid nuclear war. Zelenskyy seems aware of this, although he hasn’t said it: this would explain why he tends to make offers for peace terms via the media, appearing to negotiate against himself. Based on the adverse military and economic outcomes for Russia, Putin should have already negotiated an end to the war. That he hasn’t done so is cause for alarm, as it indicated that true to form, he will not pursue peace on anyone’s terms other than his own. A rational solution to the war would be: Ukraine cedes Crimea and the eastern “separatist” “Republics,” amends its constitution to adopt a position of neutrality and state that it will not join NATO; and Russia provides a guarantee of Ukrainian security (for whatever it’s worth). This would allow Putin to walk away with some claim to victory, and allow Ukraine to maintain its sovereignty and avoid a nuclear attack. There’s not much public evidence that this is happening.
Note: Thanks for reading. Like I said when I wrote in November 2016 that Trump would refuse to accept the results of the November 2020 election if he lost, and would try to cling to power by any means: I hope I’m wrong!
