An analysis of Russia - Ukraine relations
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Russia-Ukraine relations 2022 - An analysis
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- The story: In recent months, the world has been treated to headlines like - Russia increases its military presence along the Ukrainian border; Russia trying to install a puppet regime in Ukraine – UK; London warns sanctions; Moscow calls comments ‘Disinformation’; Germany’s Navy chief resigns after suggesting Putin ‘deserved respect’, etc. The delicate Russia-Ukraine issue is again in focus.
- Introduction: Ukraine is a country twice the size of the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is situated between Russia and Europe, and was part of the Soviet Union until 1991. Since then, it has been a less-than-perfect democracy with a very weak economy and foreign policy that wavered between being pro-Russian and pro-European. It is, till date, not a member of the European Union, though it is working towards it. President Putin of Russia dislikes the very idea.
- Crimea annexed: Russia annexed Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in 2014 after the overthrow of a pro-Russian government in Ukraine. It has supported pro-Russian rebels who control parts of eastern Ukraine after they fought a bloody war with government forces. At present Russia has made a raft of demands to Western governments, including that Ukraine should never join NATO. There are fears that the conflict, which cost at least 13,000 lives and caused at least two million people to flee their homes, may reignite, with the Russian military openly intervening.
- History of the conflict: Ukraine has a very long history of being subjugated by outside powers and a very short history of national independence. It was mainly ruled by Russia. In the 1700s, Russian leader Catherine the Great began "Russifying" Ukraine. At some points in the 1800s, the Ukrainian language was banned outright. In the 1930s, Soviet leader Josef Stalin caused a famine in Ukraine that killed several million Ukrainians, mostly in the east. He then repopulated the area with ethnic Russians. In the 1940s, Stalin forcibly relocated the ethnic Tatars who dominated Crimea's population, replacing them with Russians as well.
- For most of this process, Russia focused overwhelmingly on the east, which has vast coal, iron, and some of the most fertile farmland on earth. Ukraine's linguistic dividing line matches up almost perfectly with the line between its farmland in the east and forestland in the west.
- One in six Ukrainians is actually an ethnic Russian. One in three speaks Russian as their native language (the other two-thirds speak Ukrainian natively). Much of the country's media is in Russian. In November 2013, President Viktor Yanukovych rejected a deal for greater integration with the European Union, sparking mass protests, which Yanukovych attempted to put down violently.
- Russia backed Yanukovych, while the US and Europe supported the protesters. Lots of Ukrainians despise Russia and want nothing to do with it. But there's also a significant proportion of Ukrainians whose families have substantial connections to Russia, who may remember the Soviet era fondly.
- This national identity crisis has been centuries in the making, and it is a big issue today. In Feb 2014, anti-government protests toppled the government and ran Yanukovych out of the country. Russia, trying to salvage its lost influence in Ukraine, invaded and annexed Crimea the next month.
- In April 2014, pro-Russia separatist rebels began seizing territory in eastern Ukraine. Fighting between the rebels and the Ukrainian military intensified, the rebels started losing, and, in August, the Russian army overtly invaded eastern Ukraine to support the rebels.
- Crimea: It is considered by most of the world to be a region of Ukraine that's under hostile Russian occupation. Russia considers it a rightful and historical region of Russia that it helped to liberate in March 2014. Geographically, it is a peninsula in the Black Sea with a location so strategically important that it has been fought over for centuries.
- Eastern Ukraine: The conflict in eastern Ukraine began in April 2014 with low-level fighting between the Ukrainian military and Russian-backed separatist rebels who seized some towns in predominantly Russian-speaking eastern Ukraine. It has since escalated to outright-if-undeclared war between Russia and Ukraine.
- Why Russia interested in Ukraine: First is history. Ukraine was a part of the USSR which broke up in 1991. Then comes culture. Ukraine has a lot of native Russian-speakers and ethnic Russians. Russians have long felt a special historical connection to Ukraine, which plays a central role in Russian national mythology.
- US and Europe actions: Russia may well have seen this crisis as a make-or-break moment for its special connection to Ukraine and wanted to intervene lest it loses Ukraine permanently. It wants to prevent Ukraine from breaking away from Russian influence and falling under what Moscow sees as an ever-encroaching Western conspiracy to encircle Russia with hostile governments. The present development can be seen as new dimensions between US-Russia and US-Europe relations.
- Summary: Russia may well have seen this crisis as a make-or-break moment for its special connection to Ukraine and wanted to intervene lest it loses Ukraine permanently. It wants to prevent Ukraine from breaking away from Russian influence and falling under what Moscow sees as an ever-encroaching Western conspiracy to encircle Russia with hostile governments. The present development can be seen as new dimensions between US-Russia and US-Europe relations.
- EXAM QUESTIONS: (1) Why does the Russia-West equation matter to India? Give reasons. (2) Russia's present elevation of Ukraine issue is partly because of its cultural connection with Ukraine and partly because of insecurity arising from the West's actions. Critically analyse the case.
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