On March 4, the Levitt Center hosted a panel discussion on the current crisis in Ukraine. The panel featured three professors: Sol M. Linowitz Visiting Professor of International Affairs Robin Quinville, Henry Platt Bristol Professor of International Relations Alan Cafruny and Professor of Government Sharon Rivera. The panelists discussed the weeks of escalating tension and military build-up around Ukraine, and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decision to invade. The discussion covered what led to this conflict, what Russia is hoping to accomplish, how the international community has responded and what might be the larger geopolitical consequences of the conflict.
Quinville, who was the former Charge d’Affaires (acting ambassador) at the U.S. Embassy in Berlin, spoke first. Quinville recapped the Munich Security Conferences of 2007, 2015 and 2022. At the Conference in 2007, Putin gave the keynote speech. He protested a unipolar world and NATO expansion. However, he claimed that Russia would always operate strictly within the international legal framework. In 2015, German Chancellor Angela Merkel stated that the new world order is based on the “peaceful coexistence of peoples and the inviolability of frontiers,” but Putin’s actions in Crimea challenged this.
Quinville then moved to the present day — the 2022 Conference at which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy spoke. Zelenskyy reminded the audience that Ukraine was at the time surrounded by 150,000 Russian troops. He accused the West of appeasing Putin since 2007 and warned that the issue was not about war in Ukraine, but war in Europe. The following week, Russia invaded Ukraine, which “violated Russia’s commitments to the transatlantic community, to the U.S., to our European allies and partners.”
Rivera began her presentation by declaring that the situation represents one of the most “serious crises since World War II… and it is a human tragedy, as all wars are.” Rivera focused on two main aspects of the crisis: the fundamental cause and the potential repercussions going forward.
Regarding the former aspect, Rivera discussed the main circulating theories as to why Putin amassed troops at the border and why he invaded. The first theory is that during the troop build-up, Putin was trying to shore up domestic political support. This idea is known as the “rally around the flag effect.” In Rivera’s opinion, this reasoning received too much emphasis in the run-up to the invasion. She believes that in the past couple of years, Putin has moved beyond caring about public approval. Thus, Rivera stated that any bump in popularity from action against Ukraine would have been welcomed by Putin, but it would not have been the primary reason for invasion.
The second circulating theory is the security question. Russia’s leadership has repeatedly stated that it felt threatened by NATO expansion, and thus reacted defensively. An example of this sentiment is evident in a pro-Kremlin newspaper,
Argumenti i Fakty
, that stated, “NATO Is a Cancer: Should We Cure It?” Putin stated that the Soviet Union received verbal assurances in the 1990s that NATO would not expand eastward. Although these assurances were walked back, Russia believed they were still promised this, and thus saw any eastward NATO expansion as betrayal. Rivera’s belief regarding the security issue is that the timing of Putin’s ire does not correlate with NATO expansion. If this was the case, Putin would have talked about it during the earlier years of his presidency, as he came to power in 2000 and there were major NATO expansions in 1999 and 2004.
While Russian resentment toward NATO’s expansion may be a piece of the puzzle, Rivera proposes that Putin’s reasoning has broader civilizational and imperial roots. Putin never came to terms with the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and he saw Ukraine as steadily choosing to move into the western realm. These fed into the “pattern of humiliation” perceived by Putin at the hands of the West.
Regarding the civilizational roots, Rivera argued that Putin has shown concern with the increase of liberalism in Europe. He saw Russia as the “last bastion and defender” of traditional values and religion in Europe. Additionally, he is deeply worried about having a functional democracy on Russia’s borders. What would happen if Russians saw this and wanted democracy for themselves? According to Rivera, Russia’s invasion is fundamentally about “rewriting the post-Soviet order, integrating Ukraine with Russia…keeping Ukraine from being a part of a democratic Europe…and keeping Putin’s dream of reintegrating the former Soviet lands alive.”
Professor Cafruny began by explaining that we are “entering a dangerous new era that is seemingly only just beginning that presents a dire situation for the European balance of powers and a catastrophic humanitarian situation.”
While Cafruny agrees with Rivera’s proposed civilizational dimension, he believes more emphasis should be put on the expansion of NATO, which he deems a “tragic mistake.” He contends the U.S. uses NATO to consolidate its power in Europe and bolster the military industrial complex in the U.S. He expressed that while we should condemn the violence, we should simultaneously not lose sight of mistakes made by the U.S. since 1991. Cafruny stated that “the behavior of the United States in the world over the last couple of decades has been far worse than anything that has been done so far in Ukraine,” noting U.S. actions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and more.
Cafruny believes the world needs to return to negotiations to stop arming Ukraine. The foundation of the negotiations should be that Ukraine is neutral, does not join NATO and returns to the Minsk Agreement.
Rivera explained that an important aspect to consider is how isolated Putin is. He makes decisions within a small group of advisors and receives only palatable information. COVID-19 only worsened this isolation. Putin’s isolation has led to miscalculations from misinformation, including Zelenskyy’s willingness to remain in Ukraine and the willingness of Ukrainians to fight back.
There is also the issue of Russia’s domestic situation. Rivera pointed out that in Russia so far, 8,000 people have been detained for protesting, and independent radio and news stations have been shuttered. Cafruny noted how his contacts at Russian news outlets have been banned from publishing non-Russian sources.
Rivera explained how dictators face the problem of authoritarian control relating to the public and elite. While mass protests are important, the real question going forward is whether these mass protests create cracks among the ruling elite and oligarchs and whether they will challenge Putin’s authority.
As Quinville stated, “we are in this for the long haul. Sanctions take time and defending our values take time…for our European allies, the idea that borders can be changed by force is really anathema… because where one more post-war border is questioned, others could also be.”
The conflict in Ukraine has created a humanitarian crisis with millions of refugees who have been displaced by the invasion.
