Defusing Ukraine

By John O'Sullivan & Tamás Orbán

Thursday, February 03, 2022

 

Maybe the best approach to dealing with the Ukraine crisis — involving as it does the possibilities of a Russian invasion, widening divisions within NATO, and the conflict spreading outward — is that of a bomb-disposal officer. He has the technical task of separating the fuse from the bomb without accidentally triggering the bomb. His chances of success are greater than 90 percent, but there is a 5 percent chance of an explosion. That would kill the expert, the intended victims in the building, his friends and supporters who came to help, and by a curious circumstance the terrorist who planted the bomb earlier but has to stay behind in order to maintain his cover story that he too is a bomb-disposal expert. All of them sincerely hope that the bomb will not explode, including the terrorist who wonders about the wisdom of planting the bomb in the first place, but the real bomb-disposal officer warns that actually defusing it will be a very complicated technical task.

 

In the real world, Ukraine’s unexploded bomb is composed of two elements. The first is the set of diplomatic demands that Russia published in mid December as its terms for establishing a new security structure in Central and Eastern Europe (or what used to be the Soviet bloc). These are extraordinary demands that call, inter alia, for NATO to remove troops and weapons from countries that joined the alliance after 1997 — namely, almost all of Eastern Europe, including Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, and the Baltic states. These claims go well beyond Ukraine and amount to first reversing the outcome of the Cold War and then limiting the ability of NATO to assist its former members — by placing limitations on how and where their troops and weapons can be placed, i.e., far from Russian territory. Their spirit is a reversion to the cruder versions of 19th-century power politics.

 

The bomb’s second element is the implied threat that if Russia’s demands are neither accepted nor rewarded with satisfactory concessions, then Russia will invade Ukraine. That threat seems to have weight both because Russia’s demands were accompanied by a warning that “military-technical” measures would be taken if they were rejected and because Russian forces have been assembling in force on the Ukrainian border.

 

Taken together, these two elements are explosive in a way that each alone might not be. If the West were to accept Putin’s demands, it would be like signing an unfavorable peace treaty after a defeat. And while the Soviet Union lost the Cold War, the West has not lost the peace that followed. At the same time, the real possibility that Russia in pursuit of such extreme demands might soon invade a peaceful neighbor with all the advanced weaponry of modern wars has deeply shocked everyone on the European continent.

 

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To be sure, reactions from Western Europe, Central Europe, and America differ. Countries such as Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, and Romania all joined NATO mainly for protection against Russia. NATO also — rather than the EU — made installing democratic and market reforms a condition of NATO entry, which made the region a “zone of prosperity and stability” in just over a decade. Nor is there anything like Warsaw Pact nostalgia. Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and the Balkans were never part of Russia’s historical “near abroad” but members of the Austro-Hungarian empire. The experience of being “liberated” or “occupied” by the Soviet Union from 1945 to 1989 confirmed existing anti-Russian sentiments because it was the same experience of totalitarian repression. Or as the old joke went: The Hungarians received as a curse what the Poles and Czechs received as a gift. Of all the former Soviet satellites, Bulgaria was probably the most pro-Russian; today, there is strong support there for membership in NATO as well as the EU. All of which means that Putin’s threats have made people more afraid of Russia, more grateful for NATO’s protection, and more nervous of conflict and instability in the region. All of them are keen to demonstrate that they’re loyal and effective NATO members willing to crank up their defense spending. That can’t be what Putin wanted.

 

Western Europe was initially more ambivalent. For different reasons, both France and Germany prioritize relations with Russia (and Putin) over those with the Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries. France under Macron wants Euro­pean strategic autonomy and a special relationship with Russia; Germany seeks to maintain its economic and commercial links with Russia, especially its imports of Russian oil and gas. Both take toward the CEE nations a variation on Neville Chamberlain’s view of Czechoslovakia — they are faraway countries of which we hear too much. If France, Germany, and Italy had their way, the Ukraine crisis would probably be resolved by a diplomatic compromise that gave Putin more than he has now — for instance, volunteering a formal acknowledgment that Ukraine could never join NATO — and that enabled him to claim a victory for his blitzkrieg threats. But France, Germany, and Italy have run up against a surprising level of resistance to any such appeasement from NATO and its member states, with Spain sending ships to the Black Sea, the Dutch reversing their decision not to send arms to Ukraine, the Brits airlifting arms to Ukraine but having to avoid German airspace to do so, and in general NATO members showing some spine. Again, that can’t be what Putin wanted.

 

That revival of NATO’s morale in both halves of Europe is also a threat to another of Putin’s aims — to separate Europe from America diplomatically and politically by drawing France and Germany into a new all-European security structure (or what the Soviets used to call “our common Euro­pean home”). Putin enjoyed very limited success with the Franco-German-Russo-Ukrainian quartet that under the oversight of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) negotiated the second Minsk accord, which attempted to stop the fighting in Ukraine’s eastern region between Ukrainian troops and separatist militias stiffened by Russian “volunteers.” Not a single provision of the Minsk II agreement, which was effectively a cease-fire, has been implemented; the fighting never stopped; and in retrospect, it looks like diplomatic time-wasting to camouflage Russia’s moves to wage an undeclared war. Now that Russia has again ramped up tensions over Ukraine, French ambitions seem to be evolving into an approach that stresses a stronger European role within a common Western strategy in NATO but that also would have room for future Minsk accords. Germany meanwhile needs greater political calm before it can pursue its commercial pacifism wholeheartedly. In short, the United States and Europe seem to be moving to support each other in a policy that combines military aid for Ukraine to deter Russian military intervention with diplomatic reassurance to Putin that neither NATO nor Western policy offers a strategic threat to Russia.

 

Oddly, there is one unusual center of opposition to this approach in the United States. Some realist conservatives argue that the U.S. has no strategic interest in Ukraine and that there is no reason we should fight to protect Ukrainian independence. Both assertions are true, but neither is a criticism of American policy. Washington has made it clear that neither the U.S. nor NATO will go to war to protect Ukraine, which is not a NATO member. So has almost everyone else. There may be a Russo–Ukrainian war — indeed, there has been one going on for some time, as the Ukrainian government keeps pointing out — but it’s unlikely to spread beyond those two countries, because that is in no country’s interest and is every country’s anxiety.

 

What the U.S. has an interest in defending, and doing so strongly, is the post–Cold War settlement that established a stable group of independent states that are also American allies in a crucially important part of the world, standing against the revanchism of a revisionist Russia. A friendly and peaceful Europe under the NATO umbrella is a vital American interest, and we should defend it against attack and subversion. America is fundamentally a status quo power in the modern world — most talk of its being a revolutionary one is dangerous hot air — and it is at the apex of several international security organizations. In addition to defending our interests in Europe, Washington also needs to show that it’s a reliable ally in other contexts, too — especially after America’s scuttle from Afghanistan.

 

These considerations are all conservative by any standard. They do not require us to send troops to defend Ukraine against a Russian attack, but they should persuade us to adopt the following policies: Deter such an attack through diplomacy and by offering military, technical, and diplomatic aid to Kyiv; make such an attack, if it happens, as painful and costly as possible for the invader; and ensure that our allies in the region are protected against the waves of instability and disorder growing out of a Russo–Ukrainian war.

 

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Will Putin order such a war? No one knows for certain; all is speculation. Although it may seem that Moscow is mobilizing for an invasion of Ukraine — an idea reinforced by the hyperactive media coverage — we need to be aware of a reality obscured by the massive military buildup on the border. Russia is not what the USSR was in terms of economic might and global power projection, and while it continues to remain a great power mostly because of its formidable military capabilities and sizeable nuclear arsenal, it cannot sustain — or even risk — a prolonged war in Europe. The Russian GDP is comparable to that of Spain’s or Italy’s and approximately 14 times smaller than the United States’. The economic sanctions im­posed by Western countries on Russia since the annexation of Crimea have been slowly draining it over the years. And Russia has lost its economic dominance of post-Soviet Central Asia to China, as measured by investment, although Moscow’s intervention in Kazakhstan shows that its political weight remains more than significant.

 

Indeed, as recent years have shown, Russia’s primary instruments for political leverage are its military power and its role as an energy provider. Russia is the greatest natural-gas exporter to the European Union, which depends on it for more than a third of its total gas supply. This certainly gives Moscow an advantage when negotiating with the West, but Putin is also aware that, as a weapon, energy is a double-edged sword. Threatening Europe’s energy supplies may work in the short term, but actually cutting them off or even seriously limiting them would undermine the energy weapon’s long-term effectiveness, because European nations would naturally look for ways to reduce their dependence on Russia by diversifying their energy supplies. It’s not a weapon you can use twice. In fact, we already see Europe reducing its dependence on Russian energy, as the Biden administration enters into talks with international energy companies on behalf of the EU in case the Russian threats become a reality.

 

What then of Russia’s other advantage: its military power? While Russia would win any war with Ukraine, possibly quickly but also possibly with serious casualties, all the scenarios of Russian invasions predict essentially Pyrrhic victories. In the gloomiest scenario, Russia would end up fighting an endless guerrilla war with Ukrainians assisted and funded from outside. Our view is that almost all discussions today under­estimate the impact of even a short or limited war — with its casualties, inevitable atrocities, and massive destruction of modern cities — on popular, political, and business opinion in the West and the wider world. Russia’s Western friends would not be able to prevent the imposition of still more punitive economic sanctions.

 

In its cold alliance with China, Russia would be forced into an even more subservient position. It would be a diplomatic pariah for quite a long period in all the institutions of globalism. And the important gains it hopes to win from its forward policy — dividing the United States from Europe, building a new Euro­pean security structure, reversing the post–Cold War settlement — would be postponed for a considerable time. In such circumstances, Putin’s only sensible strategy has to be to turn up the military heat until Ukraine and NATO, either singly or in diplomatic cooperation, offer him a compromise that allows him to claim a victory. If that doesn’t happen, however, there’s a risk that, to avoid humiliation, he will decide on a limited invasion as the least bad risk.

 

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So what could that compromise be? Let’s sensibly set aside possible Western diplomatic concessions that don’t change the status of anything in Ukraine. What then are the principles and interests that the U.S. should consider in crafting a compromise that concerns Ukraine’s status? We suggest the following four: first, that the post-1991 Cold War settlement is a first-order U.S. interest to be defended firmly; second, that all nations, including Ukraine, have a right to choose their allies but without any certainty of admission to the alliance of their choice; third, that attempts to rectify borders, annex territory, or otherwise alter the status quo in the region other than by agreement of all concerned parties will be resisted by NATO and the U.S.; and, finally, that if Russia were to cast aside its neo-imperial nostalgia, the United States and NATO would respond by cooperating with Moscow in joint security, economic, and other arrangements that address Moscow’s (unreasonable and likely bad-faith) fears of an unprovoked NATO attack.

 

With whatever principles the West approaches Ukraine, however, we have created difficulties for ourselves and Ukraine by our diplomatic evasiveness. NATO and EU diplomats con­sistently tell Ukraine that it has a right to membership in the Western institutions if it meets the conditions for accession; they tell Russia that it can’t deny or obstruct this right; they tell Ukraine that it should come back in a year or two. Yet when­ever Ukraine resends its application, the time is never ripe. That evasiveness reflects disagreements among NATO members on Ukraine, and it may perhaps have been justifiable when Ukraine itself was ambivalent. Today the great majority of Ukrainians favor NATO membership because of Putin’s threats, NATO’s hesitations, and the insecurity that both foster. Putin may not mind this because he wants Ukraine as a failed state presenting no competition to his authoritarian stability. That can never be acceptable to the West.

 

A peaceful route to a sovereign, independent, and secure Ukraine is a real Rubik’s Cube of a problem, but it must be decided by the West and Ukraine if it’s not to be taken from their hands by Russian military action. On that understanding, NATO should take the bold step of offering Ukraine a firm date for its admission. That date should be after the next Ukrainian elections, and the offer should have the conditions attached that Ukraine would meanwhile establish diplomatic forums open to all interested parties to discuss (a) safeguards for Ukraine’s neighbors, i.e., Russia, and (b) alternatives to NATO membership. One such alternative could be a proposal for Ukrainian neutrality that would include the country’s access to structures of trade and cooperation with both the West and Russia. In the event that such a proposal went ahead, Ukraine’s status would be guaranteed by the respectable international bodies, NATO, the West, and Russia. But it would have to be Ukrainians who decided between NATO membership and a neutral status for their country in democratic elections or referenda.

 

A neutral Ukraine might have benefits for both sides of this dispute in future, but it would achieve an urgent goal right now: avoiding the outbreak of an all-out war between Russia and Ukraine. Moscow could present itself as victorious because Ukraine’s NATO membership would have been postponed for a few years — a success for the Russian policy of keeping the West from the territories of its “near abroad.” On the other hand, Russia would have to explicitly abandon its demand for disarming Central Europe in return. The West, if such an agreement were reached, would have averted the immediate threat of Ukraine’s invasion while gaining valuable time to reinvent its strategy. And the final decision — between NATO membership and neutrality — would be taken by the Ukrainians democratically.

 

Either solution would be preferable to war and annexation. NATO membership would be our preference — and it is probably the choice that Ukrainians would make, but neutrality has its attractions, too. It worked well in Austria after 1945: The Soviets withdrew, conceding independence to Austria, which, however, soon became a Western country in every respect except the military. Even the Soviets found a neutral Austria useful for diplomatic purposes. A neutral but democratic Ukraine would probably move in the same direction, maybe becoming the headquarters of the OSCE, and prospering as Finland did during the Cold War.  And there could be a real if modest benefit for the long haul in a relationship between the West and Russia that didn’t actually push Moscow into an alliance with China.

 

If such a country were to emerge from the free play of Ukrainian democratic politics, or from Ukraine’s own unconstrained diplomatic bargaining, the rest of us would doubt­less be very relieved. A Rubik’s bomb would have been dismantled.