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Strife Feature – Elites and activists in Donetsk before the armed conflict

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By Daria Platonova

Pro-Russian militia at a rally in Donbass, in May 2014 (Credit Image: Evgeniy Maloletka/ AP)

 

The causes of war in eastern Ukraine (or between the Ukrainian government and Donetsk People’s Republic and Luhansk People’s Republic) have been interpreted in a wide variety of ways. Two main interpretations emerge: endogenous, that is an interpretation seeking indigenous roots of the conflict, and exogenous, that is looking at the role of Russia. In her recent book, Anna Matveeva, argues that one of the causes of the war was the peculiar behaviour of the local elites in Donetsk and Luhansk region. This article seeks to give some empirical grounding to this idea in a theoretically-attuned way by looking at some statements and actions of the local elites in Donetsk preceding the violent events of April 2014. I also look at how these actions and statements were interpreted by one of the key pro-Russian activists, Pavel Gubarev, who headed the pro-Russian protest for a short period of time.

Theories of conflict[1] predict that the local elites are key to mobilisation and act as catalysts in the protest evolving into a civil war. They do so by engaging in manipulating arising emotions and channelling to protect their hold on power. The research, particularly on ethnic conflicts, demonstrates that elites construct ethnic appeals and manipulate ancient hatreds in order to mobilise people along ethnic lines.[2] Kalyvas argues that, in a situation resembling security dilemma, elites will use popular emotions of fear to their own ends.[3]

What we witnessed in the Donbas however was a rather confusing and erratic behaviour of the elites at best, sending mixed signals to the population. On the 22nd of February 2014 immediately after Yanukovych left Kyiv and even before Turchynov was elected the speaker, the deputies of all levels from south-eastern Ukrainian regions, Crimea, and Simferopol, organised an urgent congress in Kharkiv. Andriy Shishatsky, the governor of Donetsk oblast, governors of four Russian regions,[4] and some Russian representatives, such as Aleksey Pushkov, were present. During the congress, they voiced their opposition to “fascism”, called for unity of Ukraine, refused to comply with the orders coming from Kyiv, and announced the creation of the alternative power base, passing all the reins of power to the local councils and administrations.[5] The participants at the congress were immediately labelled as separatists by the Ukrainian press.[6]

After this “brave” congress however, the vast majority of the local elites moved to recognise the new government. On the 23rd of February 2014, Shishatsky issued a statement in which he described his meeting with Rinat Akhmetov (the richest oligarch in Ukraine and the owner of the major industrial enterprises in the Donbas) and “other respected people” of Donetsk. The governor posted a message on the website of the regional administration stating that “all of them see the future, our common future in indivisible, integral, and independent Ukraine.”[7] On the following day, Shishatsky stated that he recognised the Rada as the only legitimate power body in the country.[8] On the 25th of February 2014, Donetsk mayor Oleksandr Luk’yanchenko stated at a press conference that he recognised the Verkhovna Rada as the only legitimate government body in the country, effectively swearing allegiance to the new government, as did Shishatsky.[9]

What explains this kind of behaviour? It is quite probable that, due to the change of government, at first, the elites were gripped by fear, both for their lives and for their status. Barbalet writes on the elite fear: “elites may fear that their privileged position is threatened when the system they dominate undergoes a relative shift in power relations 149”. Party of Regions, the dominant party in south-eastern Ukraine, in particular, had grounds for fear, both due to the major exodus of their colleagues – by the 23rd of February 2014 more than 76 MPs were lost by the party[10] – and direct threats to their livelihoods and security emanating from the radical groups in Kyiv. Kharkiv mayor Hennadyi Kernes, for example, claimed to have been threatened with violence personally.[11] Oleg Tsarev described at length the extreme pressure the deputies were put under during the Verkhovna Rada voting: “I called my friend Vitaly Grushevski. He did not respond. Then I called his aide, who told me that Grushevski has been beaten up next to the Parliament. They have taken voting cards from some deputies and started voting on their behalf. It is possible that some deputies from whom the cards have been taken are locked up somewhere in the Rada. There is no Symonenko (Communist Party of Ukraine –DP), nor many other deputies, who were beaten up earlier, in the Rada. But now somebody is calling me and pretending to be Mikhail Chechetov, with a voice which does not sound like his at all, telling me that I should leave Ukraine urgently. Otherwise, I will be arrested. I told him… that I am not going to leave Ukraine.”[12]

 

The Party of Regions’ logo

 

After this initial spell of helplessness, the local elites seem to have engaged in bargaining with the central government in order to protect their hold on power. Throughout the pre-war period, they would engage in federalisation referendum talks with the government and appeasement of the radical groups, which to many experts and journalists, was an indication of their desire to protect their power.

Not only gripped by fear and the desire to stay in power, after the flight of Yanukovych, many party members engaged in soul-searching, which continued throughout the pre-war period and precluded them from becoming good intermediaries between the region and the central government. During the Donetsk city council meeting on the 28th of February 2014, Nikolai Levchenko,[13] who later became the head of Party of Regions in Donetsk and a very important influence on the situation in Donetsk, was also sending extremely confusing signals to activists and the rest of the audience. He claimed that “today the leaders of the opposition parties find themselves in government as a result of pressure from the street (“stikhiino”)”. He was expecting armed units to come from the Maidan to the regions to attack and burglar homes. “It is true that the government is now in the hands of nationalist radicals”, he stated, “we have no rights”. At the same time, Levchenko revealed that he voted for Yatseniuk for the purpose of safety, due to the power vacuum in the country. Party of Regions, he said, as an opposition party, had the right to protection, according to the European Convention on Human Rights. Significantly, Levchenko endorsed Pavel Gubarev by saying that “he is 90% right”.[14] For the bulk of his speech, Levchenko blamed the fugitive government for what had happened in the country. He also said the party was misled and betrayed by Yanukovych, and that he felt guilty for having supported the president, whom no one could control any more after he assumed power in 2010.

This erratic behaviour of the elites, with their endorsement of both the new government and pro-Russian activists, seems to have been increasingly irrelevant to the pro-Russian movements. These pro-Russian movements, particularly Pavel Gubarev, seem to have decided to take matters into their own hands which contributed to the final outcome, that is the violent confrontation. Gubarev, for example, later claimed to have provided key intelligence and resources to Igor Strelkov, who started the insurgency in Slavyansk. Below I illustrate how Gubarev came to the realisation that he could not rely on the local elites.

Many people felt they were left to fend for themselves[15] and the word “people” (“narod”) increasingly gained currency on social media. There were many comments on the Kharkiv mayor Kernes and governor Dobkin, who were extremely quick to find a compromise with the new elites in Kyiv, with the words, such as abandoned (“kinuli”) or rat out (“slili”) in describing their attitude towards the people. An extremely popular pro-Russian blogger Boris Rozhin commented on the congress of the 22nd of February 2014 as a “total abandonment (“sliv”) of the people by the elites”. Reflecting back on the events of 2014, Mustafa Nayyem, a prominent Ukrainian journalist, said he believed neither Kernes nor Levchenko cared much for the people, with Kernes being able to “survive under any regime”.[16]

 

The Donbass People’s Militia, formed by Pavel Gubarev

 

Significantly, despite Levchenko’s endorsement of Gubarev, the latter was adamant that he would not negotiate with the elites and local oligarchs. It must be said that Gubarev had already held strong anti-elite sentiments prior to the emergence of his Narodnoe Opolchenie. In fact he reveals that the reason why he called his movement “people’s” was “because we came out of people, and not at the whim of some oligarch”.[17] He further states that “… we were dreaming of creating a new Russian state, free from oligarchs and corruption”.[18] As a result of his brief stint as a local official, he emerged bitter and enraged at the powerlessness of the local councils and pervasive corruption. On a number of occasions in his book he called Party of Regions a “pseudo-elite”.[19] During the Donetsk city council meeting on the 28th of February, Gubarev complained that the Party of Regions “suffocated and swallowed constructive opposition in the south-east, ratted out all competing political groups. Now the people of Donetsk come to the meetings not to support you but against the banderites/ banderovtsy. You have nobody to support you. And, if someone from the Maidan comes with lustration, there will be no one to defend you.”[20] Gubarev described the congress of the 22nd of February as “toothless and meaningless; it became certain that the “elite” (inverted commas in the original) decided not to confront [the winners of the Maidan].”[21] He regretted that “in Kharkiv, the pro-Russian activists cooperated with Kernes. Our colleagues in other regions made a big mistake by cooperating with the local elites which betrayed them immediately”.[22] His very first post on the Narodnoe Opolchenie on the 24th of February brimmed with vitriolic language directed at the Party of Regions. He described Shishatsky’s behaviour by using a slang word “slilsya” which means approximately “to get cold feet”. He also called the local elite “rygi”, which denotes someone cynical and without any values. To Gubarev, both Shishatsky and the local elites deserved such names as they willingly submitted to the new authorities.[23]

Conclusion

In conclusion, gripped by fear, soul-searching, and the desire to remain in power, the elites displayed a highly erratic behaviour first engaging in the “separatist” congress on the 22nd February 2014 and then swearing the allegiance to the new government. They retained this kind of behaviour into March and early April, with some of them intermittently pressing for federalisation and others being highly reticent on the issue. This behaviour had two effects: firstly, it demoralised the elites themselves, and, secondly, it disillusioned the people, which increasingly felt they were left to fend for themselves. Gubarev and others discovered that they could not rely on the local elites and had to take initiative into their own hands.

Daria is a PhD student at King’s College London and a Senior Editor at Strife. Her research focuses on violence and the unfolding of conflict across several regions in eastern Ukraine, 2013 – 2014. She also leads one of the Causes of War seminars at the War Studies Department. Prior to joining King’s, she worked as a teacher. She graduated with a degree in History from the University of Cambridge in 2011. Her broader interests include European history, war studies, and interdisciplinary methods.

Notes: 

[1] Stuart Kaufman, Modern Hatreds: the Symbolic Politics of Ethnic War (Cornell University Press: London, 2001); Emil Souleimanov, Understanding Ethnopolitical Conflict: Karabakh, South Ossetia and Abkhazia Wars Reconsidered (Palgrave Macmillan: Basingstoke, 2013); V. Gagnon, The Myth of Ethnic War: Serbia and Croatia in the 1990s (Cornell University Press: London, 2004).

[2] Souleimanov, Understanding Ethnopolitical Conflict.

[3] Stathis Kalyvas, The Logic of Violence in Civil War (Cambridge University Press: New York, 2006).

[4] Southeast congress delegates urge peace, unity in Ukraine, oppose “fascism”, 22 February 2014, BBC Monitoring Newsfile.

[5] https://www.rt.com/news/thousands-gather-eastern-ukraine-252/ ; http://www.rbc.ru/rbcfreenews/20140222160422.shtml

[6] http://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2014/02/22/7015646/ ; http://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2014/02/22/7015652/; http://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2014/02/22/7015713/

[7] http://novosti.dn.ua/news/201855-akhmetov-potreboval-prekratyt-razgovory-o-separatyzme-gubernator; Akhmetov sees future of Ukraine in unity and integrity – Donetsk governor 23 February 2014 Interfax: Russia & CIS General Newswire

[8] Ukraine’s Donetsk governor says parliament only legitimate power body, 24 February 2014, BBC Monitoring Ukraine & Baltics.

[9] “Donetsk Mayor Recognises Verkhovna Rada’s Legitimacy”, Interfax: Russian & CIS General Newswire, 25 February 2014.

[10] Ukrainian former ruling party loses 76 MPs since November, 23 February 2014, 12:49 BBC Monitoring Ukraine & Baltics

[11] https://www.rt.com/news/thousands-gather-eastern-ukraine-252/

[12] http://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/2014/02/22/

[13] http://novosti.dn.ua/news/202213-regyonaly-golosovaly-za-yacenyuka-chtoby-on-ykh-zashhytyl-rasskazal-levchenko ; Full video here http://novosti.dn.ua/news/202169-sessyya-doneckogo-gorsoveta-v-pryamom-ehfyre-vydeo

[14] http://novosti.dn.ua/news/203827-nykolay-levchenko-ne-odobryaet-deystvyya-gubareva

[15] Anna Matveeva, “No Moscow stooges: identity polarisation and guerrilla movements in Donbass” in Southeast European and Black Sea Studies, 24 February 2016, p.1 – 26.

[16] Interview with Mustafa Nayyom, Ukrainian House, London, 15th of October 2016.

[17] Pavel Gubarev, Fakel Novorossii (Moscow 2016), p. 87.

[18] Ibid., p. 31

[19] Ibid., p. 79.

[20] Ibid., p. 93.

[21] Ibid., p. 81.

[22] Ibid., p. 31.

[23] https://vk.com/polkdonbassa

 

Image Source: https://medium.com/@Hromadske/donbass-europes-latest-frozen-conflict-38e91aedb4a9

Donbas Reintegration Law: What Impact on the Minsk Agreements?

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By Daria Platonova

The contemporary definition of Donbas refers to the Donetsk and Luhansk regions of Ukraine (Credit Image: Al Jazeera)

 

The low-scale conflict in Ukraine, now in its fourth year, threatens to become a hot war as Ukraine passes a new law titled “Donbas reintegration law”. The law vests the President with new unprecedented rights, widens the prerogatives of the army in the non-government controlled areas of Ukraine and, crucially, calls Russia the aggressor country entirely responsible for the conflict. The law naturally provoked the ire of the Russian government while for Ukrainian opposition politicians as well as Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR or DNR) and Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR or LNR) authorities, the law “spells death” to a peaceful resolution of the conflict. The article aims to provide an analysis of the law by looking at different perspectives on it.[1]

Main propositions

On 18th January 2018, the Ukrainian Rada (Parliament) adopted the Donbas reintegration law or the law “On the special aspects of the state policy on securing the state sovereignty of Ukraine in the temporarily occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk regions” (No. 7163).[2] 280 MPs voted in support of the legislation. The Opposition Bloc members and some independent MPs voted against it.[3]

The law is meant to change the modality of the conduct of military operations in the non-government controlled areas of Ukraine.[4] Russia is now called “an occupying state” or an “aggressor country” (the Preamble; Article 7), which is the main leitmotif of the law. Constant references are made to “measures to ensure national security and defence, and repulse and deter the armed aggression of the Russian Federation in Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts” (Article 5.3; Article 10).[5] In the preamble to the October bill, Russia is said to have “initiated, organised and supported terrorist activities in Ukraine; it continues an armed aggression against Ukraine and temporarily occupies parts of its territory”. Similarly, in the preamble to the December bill, it says “the armed aggression of the Russian Federation began with unannounced and covert invasions (or operations) on the territory of Ukraine … as well as through organisation and support of terrorist activities”. According to the law, the Russian Federation carries responsibility for moral and physical damage inflicted on the citizens of the “occupied” territories (Article 2).  Those who take part in the Russian aggression, or are involved in cooperation with the occupation administrations, are criminally liable for acts that violate the laws of Ukraine and the norms of the international humanitarian law (Article 2).

The President is now vested with rights to set the borders of (Article 1), and to determine the nature of military operations in these territories (Article 7) on the proposal of the Ministry of Defence and on the basis of the proposals of the General Staff of the Supreme Armed Forces. Articles 8, 9 and 10 confer unprecedented levels of responsibility on the Ukrainian army, and Article 11 officially ends the Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO). The army now has the right to use civilian transport, enter civilian apartments and other premises, search and detain civilians and their belongings for the purposes of “deterring the armed aggression of the Russian Federation” (Article 10). The army is said to be given oversight on the kinds of goods that are allowed to be transferred between the “occupied” and government-controlled areas. Strategic command over all combat units and other formations is assigned to Ukraine’s Armed Forces Joint Operative Headquarters, the head of which is to be nominated by the army’s Chief of General Staff and approved by the President. The law further disassociates Ukraine from the “occupied territories”, by limiting the officially recognised documents issued in the occupied territories to birth and death certificates (Article 2).

Reactions, analysis and implications

The passage of the law provoked some of the most dramatic debates in the Rada for the past years. The law was registered as urgent in October 2017. The total of 675 amendments then took several months to process, amid fierce debates,[6] and even bombing, and the final vote was scheduled for January 16th 2018.  The key debates were around the inclusion of the Minsk Agreements, the exact name and nature of the Russian occupation, and the precise date when the occupation of the Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk had begun. Ukrainian MPs who proposed most amendments, especially Samopomich and People’s Front parties, reason that such precision is needed in the event of law suits against Russia, which bears sole responsibility for the conflict, according to this law.

The text of the law initiated a tense debate in the Rada (Credit Image: Vestnik Kavkaza)

There are radical divisions within the Ukrainian government as to how this law can come to force and whether it should have been allowed to pass at all. The opposition is fiercely against the law. The Opposition Block[7] politicians Yury Boiko, Oleksandr Vilkul and Mikhailo Papiev proposed to cancel the voting in support of the law due to the omission of the Minsk Agreements. The leader of the social movement “Ukrainian Choice” pro-Russian Viktor Medvedchuk thinks that the law “spells death” to a peaceful resolution of the conflict in the east.

So do the people of the Donetsk People’s Republic and Lugansk People’s Republic. For them and politicians such as Denis Pushlin, the new law means war,[8] which, strangely, concurs with some opinions expressed in the staunchly pro-Ukrainian Ukrainskaia Pravda newspaper.  The separatists read Ukrainian armed aggression into this law, and that it stops short of declaring war on the occupied territories. Some go as far as to claim that it is a “step to[wards] a military dictatorship” to help the ongoing Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko win the next elections. In retaliation, the head of the Donetsk People’s Republic Aleksandr Zakharchenko responded by proposing early elections in the republic  and establishing “people’s tribunals” to sue Ukrainian combatants for “their crimes”. The former DNR Minister of Defense Igor Strelkov is now writing on the possible resumption of the Novorssiya project and the possible unification of the republics after simplification of customs procedures. Strelkov proposes to fight alone, without the help of Russia, as it is “too slow” to react, and there is a general anti-Russian feeling across a representative sample of separatist press.

In Russia, the response has been somewhat predictable, as noted by a famous pro-Russian blogger Colonel Cassad (Boris Rozhin). On the 19th of January, President of Russia Vladimir Putin met with the permanent members of the Security Council to discuss the law, and it was noted that the law will have a negative influence on the regulation of the Ukrainian conflict. Press-Secretary of the Russian President Dmitrii Peskov said that the Kremlin disagreed with the fact that Russia is called “the aggressor country” and that the law does not help regulate the conflict by omitting references to the Minsk Agreements. The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement in which it declared that Poroshenko “untied the hands of the war party”.

Ukrainian opposition politicians, the Russian government and the representatives of the DNR and LNR latch onto the fact that the references to the Minsk Agreements have been removed from the latest version of the law. Their removal was the main proposition of Samopomich and People’s Front parties, with ensuing fistfights in the Rada. The law is particularly damaging to the Minsk Agreements as it omits references to Article 5 on the amnesty of the participants in the armed conflict. In fact it states that all people participating in the “occupation” of the east are criminally liable. Additionally, the Minsk Agreements do not put sole responsibility on any of the parties in the conflict, let alone one particular state, in this case Russia. The new law does. The Minsk Agreements call the DNR and LNR “certain areas of Donetsk and Lugansk oblast”, whereas the new law calls them “occupied” areas.

Human rights activists as well as DNR and LNR politicians also lament  the expansion of the Presidents’ and the army’s prerogatives as to these territories. Firstly, the law confers unprecedented level of responsibility on the President. A lawyer and the coordinator of the Vostok SOS (East SOS) NGO Oleksandra Dvoretska says that the powers conferred on the President go beyond those allowed by the Constitution. The President can issue orders to the army without requiring confirmation from the Parliament. “This sets a bad precedent – it means that it is possible to overwrite powers specified by the constitution with a regular law, with just 226 votes,” Dvoretska said. Normally, to change the Constitution at least 300 lawmakers have to vote in favour. In fact, this means that the bill empowers Ukraine’s President alone (without subsequent parliamentary oversight) to decide on the use of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and other military formations, which directly contradicts Section 33, Art. 85 of the Constitution of Ukraine.

Human rights activists note that identifying Russia as liable for moral and physical damage is not going to help afflicted civilians. There are no details on the procedure of claiming compensation for such damage. Moreover, the wide range of powers given to military personnel, law enforcement officers raise human rights issues because there are no mechanisms of control. This can potentially affect the people living in the “grey areas” (that is areas not controlled by either the Ukrainian or separatist government) negatively. In general, the law is rather vague on the use of the military. The Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union [UHHRU] maintains that the responsibilities and commitments of Ukraine are not specific enough. In particular, it is not clear which government is going to protect civilians: on one hand, the law vests Russia with this responsibility as the “occupying country”, on the other, it gives wide-ranging responsibilities in relation to civilians to Ukraine. With regard to the exact nature of the conflict, UHHRU proposes considering the conflict as both a non-international and an international armed conflict at the same time.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the new law is not going to help settle the conflict. From a purely legalistic point of view, the law needs many further provisions and clarifications. For example, the law is unclear as to the “special status” of the occupied regions, and a special Parliamentary procedure is required to establish a martial law in such areas, if this was deemed necessary by the Ukrainian President. Overall, it is unclear what status these territories have and how any kind of status can be conferred on them. Most importantly, the law has done further significant damage to the relations between Ukraine and Russia and the relations between Ukraine and its breakaway territories. By calling Russia the “aggressor country” and placing sole responsibility on Russia for conflict, Ukrainian politicians are sure to provoke the Russian government into retaliatory measures, although, to DNR and LNR politicians, such measures are too mild. By disassociating Ukraine further from the breakaway territories, Ukrainian Rada leaves ordinary citizens particularly in the “gray areas” caught between a rock and a hard place.

 

Daria is a PhD student at King’s College London and a Senior Editor with Strife. Her research focuses on violence and the unfolding of conflict across several regions in eastern Ukraine, 2013 – 2014. Prior to joining King’s, she worked as a teacher. She graduated with a degree in History from the University of Cambridge in 2011. Her broader interests include European history, war studies, and interdisciplinary methods.

Notes: 

[1] For a succinct summary of the law in Russian, see “Osobyi Poryadok Mira: Zakon o Donbasse Vstupil v Silu”, Novosti Donbassa, 25th of February 2018, http://novosti.dn.ua/article/6978-osobyy-poryadok-myra-zakon-o-donbasse-vstupyl-v-sylu , Accessed 3rd of March 2018.

[2] Also called the law on “de-occupation” by the Speaker Parubii here: “Rassmotrenie Zakonoproekta o Deokupatsii Donbassa. Utrennee Zasedanie Verkhovnoi Rady”, 16th of January 2018, Accessed 24th of February 2018 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Av9Ei1tDvwk

[3] For the English language version of the key propositions see “Rada Adopts Controversial Donbas Reintegration Law”, Kyiv Post, 18 January 2018, Accessed 23rd of February 2018 https://www.kyivpost.com/ukraine-politics/rada-adopts-controversial-donbas-reintegration-law.html ; for Ukrainian, see “Rada ukhvalila zakon pro integratsiyu Donbasa”, Ukrainskaia Pravda, 18th of January 2018, Accessed 24th of February 2018   https://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2018/01/18/7168749/ ; for the law itself http://w1.c1.rada.gov.ua/pls/zweb2/webproc4_1?pf3511=62638. Two texts: one from October, the other from December 2017

[4] Or “against Donetsk People’s Republic and Lugansk People’s Republic”. This terminology is most likely to be used in these republics’ and Russian press while “Non-government controlled areas” is the terminology used in the Ukrainian press. See Novosti Donbassa site and Donetskaya Republika and Narodnoe Opolchenie Donbassa Vkontakte groups.

[5] For the two versions of the law, see http://w1.c1.rada.gov.ua/pls/zweb2/webproc4_1?pf3511=62638 .

[6] https://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2018/01/16/7168537/; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g04pIkTfWmA

[7] The Party was formed on the basis of the “pro-Russian” Party of Regions and receives consistent support among the Russophile regions of Ukraine, such as Mykolaiv, Kherson and the government controlled parts of Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

[8] https://news-front.info/2018/02/02/denis-pushilin-o-zakone-o-reintegratsii-donbassa/

 

Image Source:

Banner: https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/interactive/2017/02/ukraine-map-170205081953296.html

Image 1: http://vestnikkavkaza.net/news/Donbass-reintegration-law-confirms-Kiev%E2%80%99s-intention-to-solve-conflict-by-force.html 

Russia and the World following Ukraine: A Strife 4-part series

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By Sebastian Åsberg:

Ukrainean tanks taking up positions in the city of Slovyansk, Crimea, July 2008. Photo: Sasha Maksymenko (CC 2.0)
Ukrainean tanks taking up positions in the city of Slovyansk, eastern Ukraine, July 2014. Photo: Sasha Maksymenko (CC 2.0)

“At last, Russia has returned to the world arena as a strong state – a country that others heed and that can stand up for itself” – Russian President Vladimir Putin, 2008.

While the overall strength of the Russian state, especially in the long-term, is still a subject of debate, Russia has increasingly become a power the international community must take not of once again. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 following the end of the Cold War, Russia suffered significant economic and social hardship and a loss of power as a result. The president of Russia at the time, Boris Yeltsin, was more mocked than respected.

When Vladimir Putin took office in 1999, he resolved to improve Russia’s stature in the world. Helped by a commodity boom, the country’s economy and standard of living improved notably during his time in office.[i] With material conditions in the country improved, the Russian leadership grew increasingly assertive in its regional sphere of interest, abandoning the earlier path of accommodation with the West. Richard Sakwa, professor of Russian and European politics at the University of Kent, argues that this turn towards what he calls “neo-revisionism” came at around 2007. By this time Putin had become increasingly embolden by the country’s economic growth, while there was a heightened sense of rivalry with the EU and US over their growing influence in the states bordering Russia.[ii]

The current Ukraine crisis is the latest in a series of incidents that have led to deteriorating relations between Russia and the West. The Ukraine crisis was preceded by the wars in Chechnya in 1999-2000 and Georgia in August 2008. The Chechnya campaign was perceived as being heavy-handed, exemplified by the carpet bombing of Grozny[iii], and it has been argued that Russia deliberately provoked the Georgia conflict.[iv]

International dismay has also accompanied Russia’s backing of the Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad in the country’s ongoing civil war in order to protect Russian naval installations in the country.[v]

Finally, domestic policies pursued by the Kremlin, such as discriminatory laws against homosexuals and a perception that the Russian state is cracking down on dissent and opposition, has also contributed to worsening relations between Russia and significant parts of the international community.

However, the Ukraine crisis can still be been seen as a major turning point. Russia’s annexation of the Crimean peninsula in March 2014 and its subsequent support for the Russian separatists in the Donbass region shocked large parts of the international community.

The Russian takeover of Crimea was the first annexation of another European state’s territory since the Second World War. It was met with accusations that Russia was breaking one of the most basic principles of the post-war international order – the sanctity of borders – by trying to redraw the map through force. The subsequent war in eastern Ukraine, a conflict which has killed an estimated 6000 people,[vi] where pro-Russian separatists have been aided by Russia, has provoked even further indignation in capitals across the world. Russia is seen as conducting a war of aggression by proxy. The downing of flight MH17 by the separatists, killing 298 people, added to the outrage as the conflict began to directly affect Western citizens. Comprehensive sanctions were imposed against Russia, and the United States even contemplated supplying Ukraine with arms before the Minsk II ceasefire in February.

The Ukraine crisis can arguably be viewed as sounding the death knell for the belief that Russia could be harmoniously integrated into a Western system following the end of the Cold War, like other post-communist countries in Eastern Europe.

Much has been written about the situation in Crimea and about the battlefields of eastern Ukraine, but what will be the geopolitical and diplomatic consequences of the Ukraine crisis?

Despite having declined in importance since the days of the Soviet Union, Russia remains a power of significance on the world stage. It still has a substantial population (140 million) and economy (the ninth-largest in the world) and retains close trade and diplomatic relations with other major actors. For example, it is the EU’s third-largest trading partner and many European countries rely on Russia for their gas supplies. It retains a large degree of influence in several areas of the world, in particular what is referred to as Russia’s “near-abroad”, the former republics of the USSR.

Given this, how is Russia’s relations with other states being affected by its perceived aggression in its neighbourhood and increasing revanchism? How are neighbouring states reacting to Russia’s conduct?

Over the coming weeks, Strife will examine how relations between Russia and various countries and international organisation are being affected and how they are approaching the Ukraine crisis, as well as looking at the possible geopolitical fallout of Russia’s actions in Ukraine. Mike Jones will discuss Britain’s handling of the crisis and why the Ukraine crisis has not received more attention in the UK. Conradin Weindl will look into the relationship between the European Union and Russia in the wake of the war in Ukraine. Andrzej Kozłowski will analyse Poland’s approach to the crisis and the implications for Polish security. Finally, Sebastian Åsberg, will examine the debate regarding NATO membership in neutral Sweden and Finland, which has intensified significantly as a result of the war in Ukraine.

An increasingly assertive and antagonistic Russia, with its military of 800,000 personnel and vast nuclear weapons stockpile, has been described as one of the biggest challenges facing the world today.[vii] [viii] In this four-part series Strife hopes to provide a deeper understanding of how key countries and regions are reacting to this challenge.

Sebastian Åsberg holds a BA in International Relations from Malmö University, Sweden, and is currently reading for an MA in War Studies at King’s College London. His main interests include European security and defence policy, security cooperation within the EU and NATO, and the transatlantic partnership, as well as in Russia’s foreign policy in the region and beyond.

NATO

[i] Thornhill, John “Vladimir Putin and his tsar quality”, Financial Times, 6 February 2015

[ii] Sakwa, Richard, Frontline Ukraine – Crisis in the Borderlands, I.B. Tauris, 2015, p.30-32

[iii] Human Rights Watch, “War Crimes In Chechnya and the Response of the West”, http://www.hrw.org/news/2000/02/29/war-crimes-chechnya-and-response-west

[iv] Georgia began war with Russia, but it was provoked, inquiry finds, The Independent, 1 October 2009

[v] Fisher, Max “The four reasons Russia won’t give up Syria, no matter what Obama does”, Washington Post, 5 September 2013

[vi] United Nations, “Death toll in eastern Ukraine crosses 6,000, Zeid says, as UN releases new report”, 2 March 2015

[vii] Rachman, Gideon “Russia is a bigger problem than Isis for Obama” Financial Times, 10 November 2014

[viii] The Telegraph, “What is the biggest threat facing the world today?”, 17 April 2015

MH-17: Why truth and justice may not be easily achieved.

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By Thomas Colley:

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In a recent edition of Strife journal, I wrote an article about the lost art of propaganda in the context of conflict in Yugoslavia and Ukraine. The essential argument was that propaganda methods seen by Western strategic communicators as archaic remain relevant and useful in the modern conflict environment. Western strategic communications doctrine has emphasised the need to be first with the truth in order to minimise damaging counter-claims. Yet the tragic downing of yet another Malaysian airlines plane, this time over Eastern Ukraine, demonstrates that lying and censorship are potentially invaluable and remain strategically useful in contemporary conflict.

Someone is lying about shooting down MH-17. Russia, the Ukrainian rebels and the Ukrainian government all deny it; but one of them did it. Writing this post only hours after the event was announced in Britain, it does not seem prudent to join the conspiracy theorists and armchair strategists in filling the void of what happened until the truth is out – if it ever will be. Early media coverage in the West seems to imply likely pro-Russian rebel responsibility; Russian media the opposite. In any case, most audiences will have probably made up their minds who did it from their own common sense, predictable interpretations of the conflict, regardless of the early evidence.

That lying is immoral is beyond question. This author neither advocates it, nor wishes to distract from the indescribable tragedy inflicted upon those on MH-17 and their families. The perpetrators should be brought to swift justice, though as is often the case in war, it is highly uncertain whether they will be.

From a moral point of view, lying is almost unequivocally wrong. From a strategic point of view though, there is much to gain from doing so. Strenuous denial and then accusation of the other side has been the immediate response from the protagonists, both those telling the truth and the liar(s) amongst them. This is not unexpected, since it seems reasonable to assume, or at least hope, that shooting down a civilian passenger plane was unintentional. Still, there are few benefits from admitting the truth, however hard it should be for the individual perpetrators to live with.

The result of the lying and mutual accusations is confusion, obfuscation and doubt. And for fairly obvious reasons, there are likely to be few or no eyewitnesses, and those that exist can easily be discredited by their opponents. Satellite imagery might shed light on what happened, but can easily be countered with claims of forgery, misinterpretation, or simply just censored. After all, how many members of the public can interpret such data, even if they had access to it? Furthermore, given the slew of data used to track MH-370 unsuccessfully earlier in the year, attempts to use such data to prove who was at fault and justify action against them may not be as persuasive as expected.

Then there is the question of who each side is trying to convince. If for example a Western power discovers cast iron proof that Ukrainian separatists were responsible, this would be denied by them and most likely by Russia. What is to stop Russia from presenting evidence to the contrary? Western publics will probably believe their governments over Russia, but Russians and Russian sympathisers in Ukraine will likely believe their governments. The strategic gains from not being held definitively responsible appear far greater than the risk of sanctions if found out. Even if those responsible are found out, they can still deny it and be believed by many.

There is also no guarantee that citizens will even believe their own governments. This was demonstrated by the chemical weapons attack in Syria in 2013. When the British government attempted to use the attacks to justify intervention against the Assad government forces, plenty of British citizens, wary of a repeat of the WMD deception of Iraq in 2003, were sceptical of their own government’s claims that Assad was responsible. There is no guarantee that they would be more trusting now were this tragedy used as justification for stronger action or military support – even though several Brits were among the casualties.

One can only hope that this horrific incident will have positive benefits in galvanising the international community to act to end the conflict, preventing further atrocities, deliberate or otherwise. A more idealistic hope is that this event could once again galvanise states and their publics into accepting a more active role in maintaining international peace and security, rather than shying away while so many places burn. Much will be revealed in the coming days. Pledges, threats, promises and tributes will be made. But within the rhetoric, do not expect an admission of guilt – the strategic benefits of hiding the truth are too great. As a consequence, these human lives, which by either negligence or ill-fortune were unfortunate enough to be crossing the wrong airspace at the wrong time, may not receive the justice they deserve.

 

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Thomas Colley is a PhD student in War Studies at King’s College London. His research interests include propaganda, strategic communication and public attitudes to the use of military force. You can follow Thomas on Twitter @ThomasColley.