(Volume 24-03)

By Chris Westdal

I write here first about the popular narrative of Russia as an aggressive marauder; second, about Ukraine on the brink; third, about the plans for détente of President Trump; and, along the way, about Canada’s roles in all this drama.

The Common Wisdom Isn’t Wise

I encourage readers to take a hard, sceptical look at the prevailing, ubiquitous Western narrative that Vladimir Putin is a demon, killer, thief, dictator, war criminal and fixer of U.S. elections and that the Russia he’s led for 17 years is a malignant, aggressive marauder bent on domination in eastern Europe and far beyond.

Vladimir Putin is no choirboy; no great power leader ever is. The president of Russia is many other things: a patriot, a patriarch — Tsar Lite, say — formidably intelligent, informed and articulate, pragmatic above all, a proven leader tough enough to run the vast Federation, ruthless if need be in serving its interests, and genuinely popular. Putin is also, proudly, a spy — and deception is an essential tool of espionage. So, of course, those “little green men” were Russian – but, of course, Moscow won’t say so. As Putin explained at a Munich Security Conference, “We’re all adults here.”

What’s more, beyond its leader, there is much we may not like in Russia’s domestic politics or in the unapologetically brutal, few-holds-barred way it wages war.

But still, I find the current narrative about Russia’s role in the world overblown, full of exaggeration about Russia’s record, motives and capabilities, while blind to its obvious economic, demographic and security vulnerabilities and its necessarily defensive strategic posture.

That narrative is also notably ahistorical, blithely ignoring the provocations which have led to what’s labelled Russian “aggression” — the vast expansion of NATO, a congenitally Russo-phobic nuclear military alliance; the unilateral abrogation of the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, messing with Moscow’s perception of its nuclear security, and the forward deployment of missile defence (in Romania and Poland, to counter a threat from Iran, we’d have Moscow believe); and the billions spent stoking anti-Russian sentiment and regime change in Russia’s neighbourhood.

There has been much blood shed since the Maidan picked a fight with Moscow three years ago — a fight it can’t win — but the facts remain that Kyiv can’t make the (increasingly distracted and exasperated) West care more — and can’t make the Kremlin care less. We are not going to fight World War III for the Donbas. And the Kremlin, under any sensate leader, is not going to stop defining the geostrategic orientation of Ukraine, all of Ukraine, as a matter of fundamental national security. Call Russia’s reaction “aggression” if you will, but as we grew NATO by leaps and bounds, what did we expect? That Russia would just roll over in the face of obvious strategic calamity and meekly agree to rent historic Sevastopol, the Crimean base of its Black Sea Fleet, from a member of NATO?

Like them or not, theory aside, major powers’ zones of influence are real. We Canadians know that; we live in one. In the real world, Kyiv has about as much freedom to undermine Moscow’s security as Ottawa has to undermine Washington’s.

Ukraine on the Brink

Take a hard look too at the catastrophic circumstances of Ukraine and at the record and results of a quarter century of massive, sustained Western intervention, including our own. They must surely lead you to humility about our comprehension of Ukraine and our ability to mind its business.

In brief, the U.S. colony in Kyiv, the multibillion-dollar Western project there, of which we’re a vocal part, is a heartbreak, a corrupt oligarchy, unreformed, highly centralized (without even elected regional governors), littered with arms, full of hard men without jobs, ready recruits for private militias, and dominated by ethnic nationalists bitterly opposed to vital national and regional reconciliation.

More of the same from us will make no sense. In a hole, stop digging. At the very least, do no more harm. Our record proves we don’t have a clue how to solve Ukraine’s problems. They’ll have to be solved — or not — by Ukrainians.