Ending the war no one’s winning or losing: 10 months of Russia-Ukraine conflict

Sandeep Dikshit

Now that Covid has come knocking again, the world would desperately want an end to the 10-month-old war in Ukraine where the rapid Russian military thrust, though not bogged down into a stalemate, is in a two-steps-forward-one-step-back kind of situation. The strength of the Russian war machine and the resistance of the Ukrainians have both been surprising.

It all began in Kyiv

About 2,000 years back, Kyiv was the heartland of the Rus, the forerunners of the Russians. In 988 AD, Rus ruler Vladimir chose the Greek Orthodox Church as the state religion and two Greek monks brought an alphabet to create a standardised written dialect. This later became the Russian script. The moment of the two monks with the tablet is commemorated by a monument in central Kyiv. The abode of Nestor, a contributor to Russia’s history compiled in “Primary Chronicle,” is not far away and, now, a Unesco heritage site.

From Russia, with love

Three of India’s cutting-edge acquisitions bear the Russian stamp. One is the missile defence system S-400 that even the Israelis are wary of. The second is its assistance for nuclear submarines that could become a game-changer against China. And the third are the 1,000 MW nuclear reactors in Tamil Nadu. While the West was giving the first with strings attached, the second was denied outright and the third ruinously expensive. Add to these, the open as well as quiet Russian assistance in international politics, the space sector and intelligence, and it becomes clear why India will not abandon Russia in its moment of crisis.

With China in the grip of Covid, global supply chains are already wobbling. But there are no signs that either of the protagonists in the Russia-Ukraine conflict can politically afford to back down to ease the pain of food and fuel being felt on nations overburdened by the debts incurred in previous Covid waves.

All wars are ultimately political acts. This one was in the making since the Soviet Union disintegrated. It may not have been a coincidence that the chiefs of both churches who headed the Ukrainian nationalist movement against Moscow had their bases in the US, and were parachuted to Kyiv immediately after Ukraine became independent.

The head of the Uniate church, Cardinal Mirolav Lubachivsky, returned from exile in Ohio in 1991 and Bishop of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Church, Mastislav, landed in Kyiv a few months later from his headquarters in New Jersey. Their camp followers compared the two to the “Founding Fathers of America”, writes Mark Juergensmeyer, an authority on comparative religions. Leaders of both the churches were forced out by Stalin, who was peeved over the half-hearted participation of some Ukrainians and even collaboration with the Germans during the Second World War.

The opinions that were then polarised bore fruit eight years back when a pro-Russian President was sent packing by a mob and the pro-western replacements did not seem inclined to honour the earlier agreements to allow Moscow to operate its naval bases, especially the biggest of them in Crimea. Russia read the writing on the wall and a few months later, it sent in “little green men” to annex Crimea. The story has been downhill ever since.

For eight years, Ukraine’s western military advisers had been expecting a Russian military action. The Kremlin fervently believed that it would invade and win quickly. But the preparatory bombardment was not full tilt, nowhere near the western carpet bombing of Iraq, Afghanistan or Libya. This left part of the Ukraine air defence system and air force functional. There was inadequate infantry, which led to unsupported tanks getting picked off by mobile groups of regulars. But for a tight political circle, the commanders learnt of the invasion at the last moment. In an intercepted conversation, Chechen commander Daniil Martynov told Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov that Russian commanders had ‘bulging eyes’ when they were told of the invasion.

Aided by some bizarre Russian strategy such as the 40-mile convoy to Kyiv which finally turned back without firing a shot at the objective, the two lakh Ukrainian soldiers, bolstered by thousands of western professional fighters and volunteers, have distinguished themselves. So has Volodymyr Zelenskyy, once dismissed as a lightweight and a comedian.

Vladimir Putin may not have won the war but his military has sunk the Ukrainian economy. And this without using sub-strategic nuclear weapons even after Russian forces had to abandon Kherson. The Russians have shown no signs of relenting and the entire industrialised part of Ukraine in the east has been flattened. On the other hand, Kyiv’s military does not have any more recruitment to fall back on and its civilians go without electricity and water in sub-zero temperatures.

The western narrative, dominant and overwhelming as it is, assumed greater ascendancy after banning Russian TV channels and other media outlets. Therefore, the world will not get to know what the Ukrainians really think of Zelenskyy having taken them down an alley where their per capita GDP now is just above that of India. But what the world knows is that thousands have been arrested in Russia for protesting against the war which was sold to them as a brief, policy-type special military operation. Putin, too, cannot afford an indefinite war.

Europe, badly maimed by America’s desire to convert the Ukraine conflict into an end game for Moscow, yearns for a cessation of hostilities. In the US, but for a discredited Donald Trump leading the Republican Party to a poor showing in the mid-term polls, resistance would have been greater to Biden’s funnelling of billions of dollars to Ukraine.

This week has been dramatic. Zelenskyy went to the US, Putin to Belarus and former President Dmitry Medvedev to Beijing — all for the first time. Do the visits portend an intensified battle or some sort of ceasefire?

India, as did the other major emerging countries such as Brazil and South Africa, have taken the middle path. But Foreign Minister S Jaishankar easily stole the limelight among all his counterparts from the major developing states. The pressure on India was also more severe because of its status as primus inter pares in the Global South and its intimate defence ties with Russia.

India, as also China, needs a muscular Moscow to act as a counter-balance and a bargaining chip with the West. So too other developing countries which have seen the West’s capriciousness once too often. At the UNSC, WTO and climate change talks, the collision of self-interests compels India and the West to take divergent paths. The ones which walk more often with India are the Global South, China and Russia. But none of the major emerging countries face a belligerent China. This is why India is playing a much-finer balancing act in this conflict than most. It has to be by Russia’s side but equally play along with the US. It has done a reasonable job so far. As Covid seems set to upset global equanimity again, New Delhi will want the Russia-Ukraine disorder to end. Because, if the conflict sharpens, India’s flawless balancing so far can become error-prone.