By Maj Gen Ashok Kumar, VSM (Retd)
Despite all efforts made by various stakeholders to ensure that Russian troops don’t invade Ukraine, initial hopes were shattered. The proposed meeting between Presidents of USA and Russia also did not take place while France and Germany made Substantial effort towards resolution of the conflict diplomatically; it still fell short of Russian expectations. A clear lack of understanding of Russian legitimate concerns was probably one of the main reasons.
Then came the declaration of recognition of the Donetsk People’s Republic and the Luhansk People’s Republic in the Donbas region of Ukraine by Russia. Since this region was already under control of pro Russian forces and now having got recognition from Russia, a member of UN Security Council with veto Power, some analysts felt that Russia has achieved its aim and will probably not undertake offensive actions against Ukraine and the clouds of war will diminish but it was not to happen as main seeds of the conflict lied somewhere else.
It is therefore important to understand the real cause and for this, the clock has to be taken back by more than 30 years. Social media narrative has drowned the real cause and NATO along with USA has forced Ukraine to fight an uneven battle and a battle not required by Ukrainians at all. The details covered subsequently will look at the root cause of the issue which will remain relevant even after the conflict is over between Russia and Ukraine.
While it may be appropriate to take the deliberations back to post World War II days which were followed by the Cold War era where the USA and then Soviet Union were opposing each other despite not being in direct conflict with each other. However, the events from 1988 onwards are more significant as it is this timeline when the possibility of the Soviet Union started weakening and the possibility of its disintegration started becoming real. While all this was happening, the issue of German unification came up in 1990 where West Germany and East Germany united, making the dividing Berlin wall irrelevant. The Soviet Union which was earlier in strong opposition of East Germany unifying with West Germany agreed to the proposal with assurance from NATO as well as all stakeholders that NATO will not expand Eastwards and therefore it was an agreed Redline except that there was no written agreement on the issue. This was based on verbal assurance and commitment of the countries which should have been honoured. Any change in this should have been done after incorporating views of Russia (biggest successor of Soviet Union).
However, as against honouring the commitment given to the Soviet Union, NATO which had reached to 15 member countries by 1991 having started with 12 member nations, not only expanded its No’s to 30 ( doubled the No’s from 1991 timeline) but expanded Eastwards in a big way. Due to the weakening of the Soviet Union, the Warsaw pact was annulled in 1990. This opportunity was also exploited by NATO. Not only this, once Soviet Union was disintegrated in 1991 which resulted in the formation of 15 Republics including Russia, this was further exploited by NATO wherein it has already included 12 countries as part of it which have either been part of Warsaw pact or Soviet Union at some point defying the commitment, exploitation of Russia’s adversarial conditions and negating her security concerns. Ukraine was only the large country acting as a buffer between NATO countries and Russia.
NATO did not understand the pain, security concerns and rise of Russia under Putin who has been in power since 2000. Due to this, it started favourably considering Ukraine as part of NATO as Ukraine started looking beyond Russia after threatening posture by Russia in 2014 wherein it integrated Crimea as its part besides supporting independence movement in Donetsk and Luhansk part of Donbas region. Once admission of Ukraine in NATO came quite close in Jun 21, it was natural for Russia to get alarmed which had not only strengthened its nuclear and conventional military power but strengthened its economy and was under major resurgence to claim itself as an unifier of erstwhile Soviet Union states.
Russia was extremely concerned with the effect from 2014 when the Ukrainian Government was overthrown due to the Orange Revolution. Even at that time, Russia had encircled Ukraine but limited its aim by integrating Crimeas into itself besides extended support to Donetsk and Luhansk regions which are part of Donbas where a Lire of contact (LOC) was agreed with Ukraine in 2015.
After 2014, Ukraine was also concerned about its own security and made overtures towards NATO to join them, a situation which was never acceptable to Russia. It touched the redlines of Russian security concerns. It is to be noted that NATO is a military alliance wherein all countries are duty bound to fight together assuming if they themselves have been attacked. Not only this, due to distances involved, USA prepositions its nuclear weapons in member countries of NATO besides physical positioning of troops. It is due to this that there are more than 100 nuclear weapons deployed by the USA in Europe in addition to the positioning of more than 90,000 troops. If Ukraine was given the membership of NATO, it would have opened a binding option for USA to locate it’s nuclear bombs and regular soldiers on the Ukrainian soil. While it would have become a dream come true for USA and NATO, it would have brought in the undesired destructive resources at the doorstep of Russia, a situation which had to be avoided.
The initial demand of Russia related to non-inclusion of Ukraine into NATO fold while the second was to reduce deployment of NATO resources in East European countries. Ukraine was nothing to loose from its current position had it formally declared its decision not to join NATO as then, the ball would have been in the court of NATO right from the beginning, Ukrainian president probably misjudged the situation and had hoped that NATO will come to his rescues despite the fact that secretary General of NATO having announced at early stages itself that NATO will not send troops to fight in Ukraine as Ukraine was not a member of NATO yet Ukraine believed that NATO will fight for him but the support has been limited to provision of arms, ammunition and logistics supplies in addition to financial aid. Of course, they have initiated multiple sanctions against Russia which will have adverse impact as the time passes.
Issue is as to what is the solution?
Some options emerge but adoption of these depend on the will of various nations having multiple stakes in the issue.
These options have been discussed in succeeding paragraphs.
Option 1
This relates to putting the clock back by 30 years and taking it to the timeline of 1990-91 wherein USA along with other members of NATO honours its commitments made to the erstwhile Soviet Union. In that case NATO membership has to shrink to 15 members as existed in 1991 whereas the rest are non NATO countries and they can have their independent mechanism of their legitimate security concerns. Though the ideal solution has no chances of its adoption as it will be also seen as surrender to Russian demand.
Option 2
This relates to the declaration by NATO and Ukraine that Ukraine will not be a member of NATO. In addition, USA and NATO members limit their deployment only to 15 member countries while the balance 15 NATO members can be under the security umbrella of NATO but without any physical deployment of conventional and nuclear resources. This is going to meet Russian concerns and NATO concerns as well but NATO is not likely to accept anything from its 30 members while it may agree to declare that Ukraine will not become a member of NATO.
Option 3
This relates to bifurcating Ukraine into two parts viz Western Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine along the Dnieper River. This will be on lines of West Germany and East Germany wherein West is aligned to NATO and East affiliates itself with Russia. It will have its implications as the era of cold war has been shifted to the era of hot war. No analysts are propagating this model but it is not recommended as Ukraine will be split into two nations.
Option 4
This relates to NATO and Ukraine declaring that Ukraine will not become a member of NATO and Russia providing security guarantees to Ukraine. Ground situation can be reverted to Oct 21 days when there was no physical aggression inside Ukraine. An active diplomatic effort can make it happen and it will give an honourable exit option for Russia, NATO and Ukraine. Ukraine can become a member of the EU as the EU is a political and economic grouping and not a military grouping like NATO.
Summary
Notwithstanding which side is right, war has devastating effects. It does not remain local and has international ramifications. The world is trying to come out of the Corona pandemic slowly and getting exposed to such conflicts will add to human misery of unprecedented level, solution is therefore the need of the hour.
(The author is a Kargil war veteran and defence analyst. He is a visiting fellow of CLAWS and specializes in neighbouring countries with special focus on China. He tweets @chanakyaoracle Email: trinetra.foundationonline@gmail.com Views expressed are personal and do not reflect the official position or policy of Financial Express Online. Reproducing this content without permission is prohibited).
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