Putin and Putinism are not foreover
There are things that are difficult to write, even when obvious. People all too often mistake analytical statements for normative ones. They fail to recognize that I can think something is likely to happen without wanting it to happen. Let’s be clear: what I am about to write is not what I want but what I think likely if the Russian takeover of eastern Ukraine continues.
Russian speakers, in an effort coordinated by Moscow, are seizing key government and police sites. But most people in eastern and southern Ukraine before this crisis considered themselves Ukrainian, not Russian, even if they spoke Russian better than Ukrainian. Anyone even remotely attached to Ukrainian identity will take offense at what Moscow is up to. Maintaining that sense of Ukrainian identity has to be a primary objective for those who want the country to remain united. If ever Kiev gets the upper hand, those who are today supporting the Russian takeover will find themselves unwelcome.
We’ve seen this happen in the Balkans, where Milosevic sponsored supposedly local Serb takeovers in parts of Croatia and Bosnia. Both had ample backing from Belgrade, including from its army. Once the Croatians got the upper hand several years later, 180,000 or so Croatian Serbs ended up leaving and entering Serbia. In Bosnia, the 500-600,000 Serbs who lived during the war in Republika Srpska were saved from a similar fate only by the Dayton agreements. In Kosovo, many Serbs left Albanian-controlled areas south of the Ibar once Serbian troops withdrew.
Someone more erudite than I am could extend the analogy to the Sudetenland, where Hitler’s takeover ended not so many years later with expulsion of German speakers.
I am trying in what I say above to avoid the fraught question of whether people were expelled, left of their own volition, or were summoned out. More often than not, such mass movements of population have multiple origins. Having mistreated others during their time in control, some people expect, justifiably or not, similar mistreatment when power is given to their enemies. Others are expelled. Still others respond to calls from their “homeland.” The mix is different in different places, and exponents of opposing sides won’t readily agree on what happened.
But I can be pretty sure that if Kiev ever regains control of the sites Russia is now seizing that an outflux of Russian speakers will ensue. Some will justifiably fear arrest or mistreatment. Others will be expelled by hotheads on the Ukrainian side of the ethnic divide. Still others may respond to an invitation by Moscow, which no doubt will be passing out passports to those who want them, as it did in Crimea.
The only real doubt I have is whether Kiev will ever regain control. It seems unlikely. Russia will always be much stronger. Even with a well-equipped and well-trained army that would take decades to create, Ukraine is not going to be able to defeat Russia in a slugging match. So long as it is prepared to devote the resources required, Russia should be able to maintain control.
There’s the rub. Moscow has a lot of problems other than maintaining dominance in Russian-speaking Ukraine. Russia is not much different in this respect from the Soviet Union. Its internal difficulties, both economic and political, are challenging. While today Russians are enthusiastically backing the takeovers, they are likely to feel differently when the bills start coming in. Putin and Putinism are not forever.
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8 thoughts on “Putin and Putinism are not foreover”
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Kiev may not be able to regain control [short term, militarily?], but Russia cannot retain it [long term?]. So, you think armed intervention with seizure of Ukrainian territory is inevitable? I’ll take the bet – I don’t think Putin would risk his economy on a military attack. Releasing oil from the U.S. oil reserves to lower the price would not only cripple the Russian economy, but give our own a boost. On the other hand, Obama is not famous for swift, decisive action.
In any case, the best revenge, they tell us, is in living well. Assuming even Putin would not try for a military occupation of the entire country with a puppet ruler installed in Kiev, here’s where the West has a chance to show its strength. Ukraine is a potentially rich country that has seen its wealth drained by corruption. By following the example of its neighbor Poland and with the help of a newly focused EU and US, its people can see a substantial rise in their living standards. One of the pro-Russians’ arguments is that Russia is prepared to increase pensions and salaries of the police and military; with sanctions, it may have problems funding major investments, but they’re still talking about them. But Russia is facing increasing problems of its own, while the rest of the world is working its way out of recession. The desire to speak Russian and pay taxes to Moscow could begin to wane once Kiev gets its act together. In a bidding war, the rich man wins. Honest administration and a growing economy are arguments Putin will be hard pressed to counter. No wonder he seems so intent on destabilizing the country and preventing a new government from forming.
Elections are going to be more difficult for the pro-Russian party in the future – without the Russian vote of Crimea, Yanukovych would not have been elected in the last election. That’s one lever lost. (This was the only bright spot a Russian human-rights activist could find in Russia’s take-over of the peninsula. Basically, she was mortified by the action.)
In order to deal successfully with your opponent, you first need to understand their fears, motives and interests. For the West, Ukraine is just another potential EU or NATO member – and rather unlikely one; for Russia, it is a country of greatest importance to Russian national security. That’s why Putin is prepared to take very serious risks – which he is fully aware of – if necessary to prevent Ukraine from being integrated into a Western orbit. So, while I do not justify military action as a way in which he has been pursuing Russia’s interests in Ukraine, I can understand his position.
Speaking realistically, the best solution to the ongoing crisis is for Ukraine to be a neutral buffer state that cooperates with both Russia and the West, but is not a member of any particular bloc. Such a solution should be acceptable to all the sides involved and therefore should serve as a key basis for any future negotiations.
Putin had every opportunity to use soft power in Ukraine to persuade its citizens to opt for his Euroasiatic Union. But he failed to provide an attractive alternative to the EU and then assumed that the methods Assad is employing would work in Europe, costing him a lot, maybe eventually everything. It would be a lot easier for Russia’s neighbors if Russia could feel safe behind some serious geophysical defenses, not just distance, but since they don’t exist in the region, Russia may have to learn that good relations with the neighbors are the best defense. The Rio Grande obviously provides no obstacle to invasion from our south, and the border with Canada is mostly an imaginary line, so such a solution is possible.
The point of what I meant to say is that we need to try to view things from Putin’s perspective, which is pretty much different from – if not completely opposite to – ours.
First, Russians have historical reason to fear an attack on their territory from the west (North European plain, that is), given their experiences with Napoleon and Nazi Germany, the latter of which had even breached the Molotov-Ribbentrop Treaty of non-aggression between the two countries. Today, Russia perceives NATO as the greatest security threat, because the Russians see NATO not just as a politico-military alliance but as a powerful instrument in the hands of the United States that Washington could use to subjugate Russia. While Russia probably does not fear Central and Eastern Europeans in and of themselves, it fears them indirectly as American allies in a potential aggression against Russia. It is the United States that Russia perceives as its main geopolitical rival, especially after the Russian defeat in the Cold war; most Russians believe that their nation was terribly humiliated by the West – and the U.S. in particular – in the (Yeltsin’s) 1990s, following the end of the Cold war, something they do not want to happen ever again (this largely explains Putin’s huge domestic popularity).
Moreover, from the Russian viewpoint, European dependence on Russia’s energy exports is both a blessing and a curse. It is a blessing since it brings Moscow significant revenues and facilitates the Kremlin’s efforts to manipulate decision making of other countries. And it is a curse because, in Moscow’s view, Russia’s abundance of strategic natural resources makes the country a perennial target of foreign invasion. And while we may consider such a way of thinking ridiculous, Russians take it very seriously. In any case, all these factors make for Russia’s overall aggressive posture.
Now, you mentioned the U.S. relationship with its neighbors Mexico and Canada. But bear in mind that neither of them is a member of a Russia-led military alliance, nor are otherwise allied with Russia or other American rivals. I am not sure Americans would feel comfortable if Mexico and/or Canada were members of CSTO.
There is also a cultural aspect. Unlike you and me, Russians are generally inclined to resist the so-called Western values, thinking of them as “decadent”. And just as most Americans would not like Russian “traditional values” to be imposed on them, so, too, most Russians don’t want liberal Western values to be imposed on them.
Viewing things from Putin’s perspective does not mean accepting them. Yes, the Russians have been invaded, from both directions, but they don’t worry much about another invasion from the east because of the immense distances. The border on the west is a lot closer to the center of gravity of their population, after the loss of the East European countries, and Putin does not want to lose any more of his buffer: understood. Does this give him any right to decide for Ukraine what its policies should be?
As for liberal values, well, Russia is a country for old men. As the title here says, Putin is not forever. Unfortunately for the young, there just aren’t that many of them, and there will be even fewer in the future, but still, at some point, change will come. Sooner than later, if Russia’s economy continues to deteriorate, and picking fights with the neighbors can only hasten that.
Yes, the US border with Canada is an example that might attract the Russians. See Vladimir, we can tell him, there’s a country that we once tried to grab and dismally failed, so we cultivated friendly relations with it instead while not trying to interfere with its relations with third parties, and because we’re nearby and far larger in wealth and population, we ended as its closest and senior partner anyway. But I wouldn’t mention the Mexico border. We’d have to tell him that there’s a country that was once far bigger and had a large population of our co-nationals inside it who declared a secessionist republic, so we backed them up and seized a large part of the country right up to a big river, and even so, today we’re that country’s closest and senior partner too. I don’t think we should let on about that. We don’t want Vladimir to get the idea that he can get away with moving his border to the Dnipro the way we got away with moving our border to the Rio Grande.
I wouldn’t worry too much about using the Mexican example – after all, Russia only took Crimea from the Turks within recent historical times. Maybe it should actually have gone back to the Greeks? The Crimean Tatars? Every country decides for itself which period of time is determinative for establishing its historical borders, but at least in Europe, it seems to be best as a general rule to accept whichever currently exist.
Putin is a big disappointment. He could have been a sort of George Washington and start a modern Russian statehood. Water under the bridge.