The Ukraine War at Six Months: Lessons Abound
Source: Wikimedia Commons
Today marks the 6 month anniversary of the start of Russia-Ukraine war. Half a year later there is little indication of any end to, exit from, or improvement to this tragic situation. Some hope that fatigue will set in, or that Russia’s more limited goals will soon be met so that talks can begin. Looming with greater certainty than these hopes is the destruction of Ukraine, increased global food and energy insecurity and their ominous socio-economic implications, and the risk of further military escalation in Europe and elsewhere.
Given this unfortunate circumstance, perhaps we can draw lessons—less about the causes of the war, and more about its unfolding and related reactions.
First and foremost, for the United States and Europe, the Western response has been highly emotional and wishful rather than strategic. It is not imbued with achievable and constructive goals. As with most issues today, dramatic images, sharp rhetoric, and sweeping ambitions have dominated over realistic policy; strategic defeat of Russia and Ukraine winning the war are sometimes bandied about.
Initial Western hopes were deflated over time and by unintended consequences, including high energy prices and food shortages. The West has again demonstrated it is much more interested in emotional spikes, which shift from one hot topic to another, than thinking through how to meet realistic objectives.
The Ukraine war risks becoming yet another file to be managed by the techno-bureaucratic machine of the West: throw money, high tech and high-minded goals at any problem—and hope for the best. The blood spilt is left for Ukrainians. Western political leadership is so disconnected and abstracted from real consequences that it can claim to manage potential nuclear wars, climate change, pandemics and all their socio-economic consequences at once, yet ironically, without any linkage of the effects of one upon the other.
Meanwhile Russia’s lessons are not insignificant. It failed militarily in the first stage, but in typical fashion, as exhibited previously in Chechnya and Afghanistan, descended from flights of quick glory to the grind of attrition reminiscent of the tactically autistic battles of World War One. Russia can and will likely hold on to its gains in Ukraine, but at what cost? Above all, what is the impact of all this on Russia and Russians flourishing in the future? A campaign to counter the West militarily could end up draining the country’s resources to zero.
Despite these rather obvious lessons, both the West and Russia seem to be never more righteous than when in the wrong. The real lessons may be for others. For Ukraine, as with Czechoslovakia, Poland, the Palestinians and others in the past, it is the sheer pain of being a victim of larger and more violent blind forces of history. China potentially also has much to gain. Beijing is now biding its time, mulling the conquest of Taiwan and waiting idly by, as the two other great powers, guilty of self-harm and a refusal to learn, regress.
Amidst this flotsam and jetsam of human error, there may be one large lesson for people everywhere. The fundamental issue that fuelled the war is of one of respect—or lack thereof. The striving for dominance, to be top dog, is a key hinge upon which our history turns—and mutual respect is its antidote.
Of course, the Russian leader has shown the greatest disrespect to Ukraine by invading it and making it submit to his will. However, he did so primarily due to a long and tragically infectious chain of acts of omission and commission by both Russia and the West. It was Putin’s sense of being disrespected by the West, going back to the 1990s, that has spurred his malign ways. Even if Russia’s current understanding of its deepest needs are too grandiose, there is no other possible road to a future where all sides flourish again without respect.
The West claims it has devised a world built on mutual respect: the renowned international system. But is so tied to Western values (some of which are now dangerously unhinged from reality) that it effectively is involved in disrespecting others, as we see not only in the case of Russia but also China. Mutual respect is attitudinal and it requires some understanding of the fundamental needs of the other side, but it is the precursor and the baseline for managing a myriad of complex interests.
It is likely impossible to deal with Vladimir Putin, and therefore Russia, with respect after the invasion and destruction of another country. But we can learn a lesson regarding respect for the future. Except for a rare real statesman, this approach of mutual respect is ignored, or more accurately, not dared. In an era where outrage is a tweet a minute, such daring may not withstand the corrosion of a million opinions—or would it?
As much as one may dislike the other side, and find it difficult to forgive their sins, there is no other starting point for redress of such a complex and violent problem as the Ukraine war than to meet the enemy at eye-level and crunch through to inevitably imperfect arrangements. Meeting Russia as civilizational equals was ever the only first step to move forward towards arrangements that all sides might abide by. It may still be the only way to save Ukraine.
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