This article tries to lay some sort of reasonable foundation for why Russia is doing what it's doing. I'm not buying it. There is truth that "the West" probably cannot truly have an understanding of all the dynamics at play in that region. Conversely, it's pretty apparent -- on a surface level -- what is obviously occurring. In fact, so much of this lays bare the naivete that some of us had in the early-nineties, during the fall of the Soviet Union. There was, at least in the western world (and, it seemed, in much of eastern Europe) a sense of hope. Then again, that could be a misperception on my part, based on age.
You see, back then, there was still an East Germany. The country, divided since the Cold War, had two separate names. We were on the cusp of that becoming history when I started German class that year. Decades of oppression were seeing a major pushback and, on November 9, 1989, the Berlin Wall fell. It was the topic of much discussion in class, and it felt like an exciting time to be alive. Our parents and grandparents, who'd lived through the events of WWII and the Cold War, would give us history lessons of what all had transpired leading up to the monumental occasion. Those of us in Generation X -- many of us kids during the 1980s -- were around to witness Glasnost. The Soviet Union, our sworn enemy for so many years, officially dissolved on December 26, 1991. Things seemed to be moving in the right direction. There was hope. At least there seemed to be, through my teenaged eyes.
With hindsight, we should have seen what was coming in the years since. History often -- though not always -- has a tendency to either repeat itself, or, to use modern movie parlance, give itself a reboot. Just as Germany had been defeated, wounded and humbled after WWI, only to come roaring back in the 1930s, so too has the former Soviet Union in 2022. In both scenarios, the aggressive nations had scores to settle, and muscles to flex. In the article I linked to above, it talks about how many in Russia have always considered Ukraine to be theirs. To them, the freedom and closer ties with the West they've enjoyed in recent years has been an aberration. It's time now to rejoin the flock. By force, apparently.
Ukraine's western allies have responded to Russia's moves with what would you expect: a lot of stern words and sanctions against the invading nation. We'll see how effective those will be. Indeed, it's difficult to know how this will all play out, both in the short and long-term. There are some who are calling this the beginning of WWIII. I tend to think that is -- at the moment -- hyperbolic, though WWI was sparked by an assassination, and WWII by one country invading another, so who knows? I tend to think that sanctions will have little impact on Putin's aggressive tendencies, though it becomes dicey to consider what an allied escalation into military action could bring about.
Of course, if Ukraine permanently falls back into the Russian column, it would seem bad both for the country and, quite possibly, the world. What would it mean going forward? Would it embolden the Russian president to do worse things? What would that look like? That's the thing -- you give a bully an inch, and they often want a mile.
Much of the world of global politics, particularly at this level, is beyond me. It's beyond most of us. We're out of our depths. And it doesn't help that we're so fractured here at home. Who knows -- perhaps that what's Putin is counting on? We're in such a mess with our own affairs, that we won't be able to offer a strong and coherent rebuttal to whatever he decides to do?
All I know is that I'm old enough to remember those days in the late-eighties/early nineties, when the world wasn't like this, when things seemed like they were getting better, and there was hope. I'm reminded of a line spoken by Gabriel Dauntsey, a character in P.D. James's Original Sin:
"The young... so much hope, so rarely justified."
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