Multi-dimensional war of 21st-century Europe

Commentator and Author

The Russia-Ukraine conflict now appears to be a full-fledged conventional war of attrition as uncertainty continues regarding how long it will last. It’s also multi-dimensional as the West shows little keenness to end it. Instead, the ceaseless flow of high-tech weapons reveals the high-stakes game it is up to. Evidently, the West has its traditional economic dominance and geopolitical pre-eminence in mind.

Combat casualties aside, what is more difficult for the West is that Russia’s production and possession of inexhaustible commodity and critical resources are impossible to be contained or curbed (overnight) to the West’s desired level. Moscow continues as a leading player in food and fuel production, factory output and lethal fire power, though its traditional vulnerability to macrofinance still exists. Like it or not, the West’s strength lies in economics and currency acceptability which far outweighs that of Moscow.

Though none can visualise the ultimate fallout, the features of the ongoing conflict have inflicted multi-dimensional collateral, long-term damage, if not a permanent unbridgeable hiatus between yesterday’s blood brothers and today’s fratricidal delinquent belligerents. It will be long before Moscow and Kyiv can even think ever again to be on the same page. Strangely, however, this European conflict has started resembling the chronic India-Pakistan bickering, hostility and ceaseless proxy-cum-shadow war of Pakistani origin. Can the conflict model of South Asia be replicated in the developed heartland of Europe?

Nevertheless, unlike South Asia, the European conflict has created a tad more virulent animosity between Moscow and Kyiv, thereby taking the shape and colour of virtual racial hatred which threatens to turn it into a despicable “race war” of the Middle Ages. The implacable hatred between the White Christian West of the Seine, Rhine and Danube-origin Europe heartland and the comparatively poor, backward and underdeveloped but resource-rich Euro-Asian confluence zone inhabited by the Slav, a “race” considered “inferior” to the West, has already created an unprecedented, unique animosity.

And, as the conflict turns more fierce, fratricidal and fractious, it could be likened to a tussle between the “original”, ethnic and demographic torch-bearers of western Europe, constituting the Vandals (Scandinavians), Goths (predecessors of Germans) and Gaul (wherefrom originated the French Carolingian dynasty of Charlemagne 768-814 AD), and the 20th-century Bolsheviks and their 21st-century leftover associates.

Unsurprisingly, thus, this multi-dimensional conflict is affecting all-round food, factory, finance and firepower and also creating a fuel crisis situation. The adverse effects are spreading thick and fast for all: frontline fighters to friends and foes alike. In a flash, the “global village” of connectivity, cooperation, convention and conference has turned into combat, confrontation, casualty and catastrophe. The much-touted global philosophy too is giving way to an atomised unit, thereby arraigning the West with the “we”-or-”they” syndrome. Thanks also to the “sanctions”. A word which carved the way for Moscow’s route to “Ekla cholo re” (traverse alone, whatever it takes to hit or reach the target). Today’s West psyche indicates that the sole (successor) soul of the former Soviet Union of the Volga, Dnieper, Dniester and Don-basin is turning into a foul “spirit” for which the West’s war cry of the 2nd century BCE — “Carthage must be destroyed” — is seeing fresh invocation.

The West’s strategy is understandable, though not necessarily honourable, as its distinctly unethical touch of racial hatred steadily crystallises into a “total war”, as is being complained in some quarters. Additionally, the “sanctions” have been in selective-use mode for a while, for the perceived errand boys, as an effective means of economic punishment. The result? Forty-plus Western nations would throttle the one errant “invader” Russia, notwithstanding the pre-existence of the causation (relation between cause and effect) factor.

Being a new means to an end, to bring around inexperienced babies and seasoned belligerents to the table; it’s not to be applied against the poor and hungry, starving and emaciated even if they show resilience to the strong and wealthy, the prosperous and mighty. So, sanctions just couldn’t have had any meaning on the poorest of poor Afghanistan for 20 years (2001-2021) or the wretched and devastated Libya of the Maghreb and its West-created devilish dictator Col Gaddafi. All those had to be physically (not financially) dealt with, inflicting body blows, not the primitive blow pipes of economics.

Nevertheless, taking Russia head on is a different ball game. Russia is no Iran or a Third World nation to be bullied. It has got a formidable unknown armoury which is sophisticated and lethal. Hence, the West’s desperation to neutralise the Moscow war machine through choking and throttling finance, bank, commerce, economics. Russia ought to be insulated and isolated from globalisation. Port to global financial portfolio, commodity supply chain of grain, oil and gas mart of the West to asphyxiating the bank transfer. Today’s war is a war of existential threat. Say both. Nevertheless, the sanction’s success depends on the foolproof plugging of loopholes. So, is it effective? Certainly not. Because Europe itself is a divided house. Whereas the wealthy western Europe leads the pack for total sanctions, the landlocked central and eastern Europe are in a hopeless geography to economically sustain their restive and restless demography. Sandwiched between the pincer ops of the Moscow Slavs and the Anglo-Saxon NATO-EU-backed Ukraine.

Combat casualties aside, what’s more difficult for the West is that Russia’s production and possession of inexhaustible commodity and critical resources are well nigh impossible to be contained or curbed (overnight) to the West’s expected and desired level. Moscow continues as one of the leading players in food and fuel production, factory output, lethal fire power, though its traditional vulnerability to macrofinance still exists. Like it or not, the West’s strength lies in economics and currency acceptability which far outweighs that of Moscow.

Moscow’s formidable sectoral strength too can’t be wished away. In 2019, it stood sixth among the “biggest economies by purchasing power” (after China, the USA, India, Japan, Germany); sixth in official gold reserves (after Eurozone, the USA, Germany, Italy, France); sixth among nations with the largest industrial output; ninth in agricultural output; sixth in fisheries and aquaculture production. As a major key raw material supplier too, it had an impressive global export share (2020): palladium 45.6%; platinum 15.1%; gold 9.2%; oil 8.4%; gas 6.2%; nickel 5.3%; wheat 5%; aluminium 4.2%; coal 3.5%; copper 3.3%; silver 2.6%. Aside, Russian defence exports too have been in the top bracket.

Understandably, the matter is complex. The West saw an opportunity to spread its geopolitical tentacles post-Soviet Union 1991. Rightly or wrongly, they chose the eastern Balkan where great powers seldom desisted from wrangling and wrestling. Historically, therefore, it has never ever been stable and steady owing to too much and too many interests clogging one spot. Actors and factors from the east, west, north, south got into the eastern Balkan and Ukraine magnet zone. Consequently, it’s always been a scene of military action which seldom enjoyed a demilitarised zone’s peace, progress and prosperity.

Hence, the ongoing multi-dimensional Balkan-Crimea war zone is (again) pregnant with a prolonged dispute. Recurrent conflict is inevitable. If the 1919-1920 Paris Peace Conference couldn’t bring the desired result following the 1914-1918 war, there’s no reason to believe that the Russia-Ukraine conflict won’t go same way. Face the grim future realistically. It’s because the West has, wittingly or unwittingly, given a touch of a “race war” to the present conflict, Moscow’s avoidable gunboat policy resulting in a monumental blunder notwithstanding.