What did Putin want by invading Ukraine?

 

For three years, analysts, specialists in the ex-Soviet space, military experts, political scientists, psychologists, journalists and chibits keep trying to guess why Putin invaded Ukraine. Difficulty is given by the apparent lack of any political and economic logic behind such a gesture.

Ukraine has no use value for Russia. The northern neighbor of Romania has a wide range of natural resources and an important agricultural capacity. But Russia already has all of that. A hypothetical total occupation of Ukraine would not economically bring anything more to the Russian Federation. Moscow already holds a huge hinterland, whose management is already creating big demographic and economic problems. Expanding the territory would only create new problems for it. Ukraine's resources would bring it nothing new, and the military occupation of Ukraine or part of it would increase the risks related to riots and terrorism.

In addition, Ukraine is not and has not been among the rich states of Europe. Even before the war, the standard of living in this state was one of the lowest in Europe, far below that of Russia, which itself is far behind the European Union. From this point of view, in the last decade, Russia has been surpassed on the main economic and social indicators including by the former satellites of the USSR – Romania, Poland, Bulgaria – which it clearly dominated during the cold war.

In these circumstances and in the situation where Ukraine needs a massive reconstruction as a result of the devastating war, a hypothetical integration of Ukraine or part of it into Russia would bring huge costs to Moscow, almost at the level of the costs of war. In the same chapter – hypothetical – the full occupation of Ukraine, which Russia tried in February 2022, would have led to population growth of more than 20%: an even poorer population than in Russia, with a logical and obvious hostility, in an economically destroyed region.

What does Russia have to gain in Ukraine? The comprehensive answer is: absolutely nothing.

Beyond all Putin's demagogue and Russian diplomacy, an eventual victory in Ukraine would only bring him problems. Any analysis of this conflict gets stuck at this point. So: if victory is not the goal of war, what else can it be?

Smoke curtains

Like in Orwell, war is not war, it's special operation. Invasion is pacification. Ethnic purification is denazification. Russia's most fascist actions are justified by Moscow as actions against Ukrainian fascism. Predictably, the breaking of pieces of Ukrainian territory is presented as their release.

Hijacking the semantics to beyond all meaning and promoting rhetoric that mixes threats and pseudo-truths, Moscow has so far successfully created smoke curtains in the face of its actions. No one can say with certainty what Putin wants and how far he would be willing to go.

All sorts of other themes have invaded the public space. Constant threats to the atomic bomb and the deregulation of the use of nuclear weapons create an area of insecurity where half-truths and sets of pseudo-solutions increase confusion and uncertainty. Historical, tactical, strategic, ethnic, linguistic, military, geopolitical, religious, mystical, axiological arguments are cast clay over the scrum under discussion, without the minimum concern for them to make sense of each other, to flow from each other or to be able to somehow order in a vision.

Conflict is the purpose of conflict

If victory is not the goal, the only explanation that remains is that war is the goal of this war.

The possible arguments lie in Russia's special situation in recent decades. At the fall of communism there was an enthusiasm that seemed to lead the new Russian Federation to cordial relations with former opponents in the Cold War, with the US and Germany in the first place. After the economic and social collapse of the USSR, a foreign investment package, on the one hand, and the commercial opening of the Western markets, on the other, created prerequisites for a gradual integration of Russia into the post-communist global system.

But things didn't evolve in the predictable paradigm in the 1990s. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, first of all, have taken Russia unprepared. Russia's fresh president, in the first term, Putin had no say, and Russia was not even considered. Overall, the price increase for hydrocarbons, spurred by the two wars, led to the doubling or even tripling of Russian exports, and Moscow benefited, not to lose. However, it was a first sign that Russia had lost its relevance in global politics.

Subsequently, the crisis of 2009 led to the massive withdrawal of foreign investment from Russia, making the crisis for this state to have an even greater impact. Equally, the Covid crisis has found Russia isolated and without room for manoeuvre. In addition, Russian oligarchs, supporters of Putin's willing and need, have begun to have problems globally because of the corruption associated with their activity. On the other hand, the population of Russia and the satellite states – Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, etc. – has triggered ample protest movements, some of them soldier, as in Ukraine, with the removal of pro-Russian leaders.

The Russian Federation has become irrelevant in a global context. Its role has been reduced to exporting raw materials. In all relevant industries it has been overcome without prospects to recover, and digitalization and robotics will create new and new problems for it. The prospects are even more worrying in Moscow if we consider the new climate agreements. The EU's decision to reduce pollution and replace energy sources with clean ones hits Russia's main capacity, which is to provide polluting energy. In the 2030 horizon, its main export, hydrocarbons, would be deprived of any interest in the Western world, where capital is.

It is right, Russia has a diversified economy, which allows it relative autonomy. In addition, for the moment, its foreign trade is net positive. But globally its industry is uncompetitive. It exports almost exclusively raw materials and imports everything that means advanced technology. It is not a successful scheme that preserves it as a global actor and that can generate social development. And if its main exports were to be banned, the prospect of entering the deficit is a very concrete one. FULL ARTICLE IN CULTURA