Context: Star-Crossed States
At the end of 1991, the Soviet Union fell and, for the first time in centuries, Ukraine won free of Russian dominance. Disarming their nukes and delineating their borders by Soviet-era standards, they have foresworn great power politics for introspection. To simplify, Ukraine is split between citizens in her east and south who speak Russian, consider themselves Russian, or sympathise with Russia, versus those in the north and west (including the capital Kyiv) who see themselves as Ukrainians first and reject Russia in favour of Europe. In 2014, a revolution ousted a pro-Russian oligarch, reaffirmed democracy, and set the country on a drift towards NATO and the EU.
Dictator Vladimir Putin has ruled Russia for two-thirds of its post-Soviet history. He took advantage of the turbulence to invade and seize Crimea, a historically Russian region that Ukraine administered for part of the Soviet era. In Donbass, a region on the eastern edge of Ukraine around the size of Bosnia, separatist republics Donetsk and Luhansk, with Russian support, began a frozen conflict against the Ukrainian military.
These divisions have come to a head with a second, shocking incursion, far wider in scope than the first. Even dictators do not just invade other countries. This is not normal, not since World War II. The shock is still sinking in, in spite of the prolonged buildup that took us to this place. Are Putin’s goals as bold as his actions? Let’s step through five scenarios for what he wants.
1. Status quo ante bellum
To be clear, Russia does not want to leave Ukraine untouched and unchanged. This is instead the possibility that Russia is prevented from changing the current situation. The West could intervene and scare him off. That’s extraordinarily unlikely. In the worst case, Russia might fight back with nuclear weapons; at minimum, war would jeopardise oil imports and threaten rich economies. Weighed against that, the fate of Ukraine is insignificant to all who lie far from Russia’s borders. Putin himself has already taken his biggest gamble in his two decades as dictator by risking a wider war. His confidence that he can get what he wants by force is unlikely to waver.
The other chance is that Russians might rise up and at least force him to pull out, or threaten the very regime. That also borders on implausible. Well-educated, internationalist urban Russians may be protesting on international news cameras, but plenty of Russians buy the nationalist propaganda the regime puts out, and a dictatorship is defined by marginalising the impact of public opposition. If Russia should somehow lose or at least draw this war, then so long as Putin or his like stays in power, Ukraine can be expected to race towards NATO and the EU for her protection.
2. A favourable continuity
Putin can undoubtedly now take a couple of easy wins. He can push Ukraine out of Donetsk and Luhansk and establish those republics as truly independent and functioning on their own. He can also coerce Ukraine into accepting that they will never join NATO or the EU, and into limits on the size of their military. The obvious question that remains for Ukraine in that scenario is whether they can believe Russia is done with them, or if this merely sets the stage for a third invasion, where the West is even less likely to come to their defence. Viewed from the opposite direction, the question for Putin is: why stop there? He is winning this war, fast, and he can have so much more if he wants.
3. Reunification
Putin's approach to separatist republics has been inconsistent. Despite invading Georgia in 2008, he has left their pro-Russian polities de facto independent. On the other hand, the "Republic of Crimea" only lasted a couple of sleeps before becoming part of Russia. Annexing Donetsk and Luhansk would make logical sense along the same lines as Crimea.
Doing so would be especially essential if Putin wants to take more land than that. You could describe Ukraine as having a "Ruskie Belt", from the port of Odessa near the Romanian border, to north of Crimea, where the River Dnieper empties into the Black Sea, across to Donbass. If Putin wants more Russians in Russia, these are the places to go and take. That comes with the added benefit of pushing back the boundaries of Ukraine, a potential future enemy, from Crimea, solidifying his power over the Black Sea.
Finally, Putin has begun to openly toy with the idea of regime change in Kyiv. I'm sceptical of his public confidence - to install a pro-Russian president by force would surely go unaccepted by many Ukrainians, and his hostility to the "Kyiv regime" seems more an excuse to take land than a genuine moral crusade, based on lies and self-interest as it is. Nonetheless, Ukraine has had pro-Russian presidents before, and another one would suit his interests. Anything beyond Russian reintegration and regime change is, in my view, moving out of the realm of plausibility, but let’s talk worst-case scenario.
4. The whole hog
The Russian military has invaded from Crimea, Donbass, Belarus, and elsewhere along the border. Within days, they are already threatening Kyiv and Kharkiv, and NATO is refusing to even enforce a no-fly zone (as they last did over Libya). Putin can occupy the entire country. What happens if the dictator of one of the world’s largest and most powerful states, acting unopposed, announces his intent to annex all 600,000 square kilometres of Ukraine? (For reference, that’s larger than France and near Madagascar.)
This would immediately invite a whole host of issues. The west and north will be the most hostile to Russian rule, which will require the most repression. In turn, that makes it harder for the rest of the world to write off their fate, increasing the risk of genuinely damaging sanctions against Russia (such as on oil) and of a guerilla war with Western support. Between Afghanistan and Chechnya, Russia well knows the cost of getting bogged down, though whether they have learnt is in doubt.
Putin would also be provoking terror across the former Soviet Union. Such an annexation would be premised on his stated belief that Ukraine has no real-world legitimacy as a state, having been created by inane and ahistorical Soviet decision-making. What does that say about his loyal ally, Belarus? About Russian partners across Central Asia? What message does that send to the Baltic states, all NATO members? Such an act would destabilise a wide range of relationships as they run for cover and look for allies to protect them from Soviet hyperrevanchism. This reading relies on the recent interpretation of Putin’s speech declaring war as revealing his sanity deteriorating and emotion clouding his usually poised mind. He appears genuinely dedicated to restoring the bounds and powers of the Russian Empire. If he is rational, he knows there is no need to rush to take all Ukraine at once. If he really wants it, he can always slice off some more now and come back for the rest later.
Conclusion: Bwana asifiwe
Kenya’s Ambassador to the UN, Martin Kimani, had some choice words for Putin. To summarize: the world is littered with errors and oddities of history still governing our lives today. The way we redress them is not with force. While a bit rich coming from the Kenyan government (which has tried to seize southern Somalia), he was right. Russia should never even have seized Crimea (a very Russian province that probably belongs with that country), let alone gone after the rest of Ukraine, a country with a rich cultural, linguistic and political history of her own.
Kimani spoke to the UN, whose Security Council features Russia as a permanent member of the Security Council (that seat itself being another historical relic of the Soviet era). They will not stand up for Ukraine. Ukraine is not a part of NATO, and the US and the rest of us are not willing to gamble everything for Ukraine the way we once did for 40s Europe, or for Korea. All Ukraine has is itself, and as much as I believe in them to put up a stiff fight, they cannot stop Russia in the end.
That makes Putin as much the master of their destiny as he is the boss of his own country, where his victory will no doubt retrench his reign and prompt an outpouring of patriotic praise and support for their President. We still do not understand this cryptic KGB alum, this imperial-Soviet revanchist, this mafiya oligarch writ large, well enough to know what he will do next. How far he dares to go will perhaps be the definitive clue to solve the Putin puzzle. By then it will be too late.
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