The conflict isn’t a Russian-Ukrainian one per se because it’s actually the Russian Armed Forces fighting against US-backed Ukrainian fascists who seized power following the spree of urban terrorism from 2013-2014 popularly described as “EuroMaidan” by the West. It also isn’t a territorial one like many wrongly believe but is really the result of the undeclared US-provoked missile crisis in Europe that Washington refused to resolve through diplomatic means following Moscow’s security guarantee requests from late December.
The eastward expansion of NATO, deployment of “anti-missile systems” and strike weapons near Russia’s border, and the US’ withdrawal from arms control pacts like the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, and Open Skies Treaty all served to erode Russia’s nuclear second-strike capabilities. The end goal is to place it in a perpetual position of nuclear blackmail. President Putin warned about this during his expanded meeting with the Defense Ministry Board on 21 December as well as his addresses to the Russian people on 21 February and 24 February.
He claimed that NATO was plotting to strike Russia from Ukraine in the coming future after hinting that it first sought to neutralize his country’s nuclear second-strike capabilities in order to ensure the success of this World War II-like surprise attack. In his own words from Thursday morning’s speech, “If we look at the sequence of events and the incoming reports, the showdown between Russia and these forces cannot be avoided. It is only a matter of time. They are getting ready and waiting for the right moment…We cannot stay idle and passively observe these developments.”
With this in mind, Russia’s aims are to essentially ensure the integrity of its national security red lines, which involves revising the European security architecture in such a way that its legitimate interests are finally respected. That grand strategic goal might not be attainable right away, but Russia already succeeded in destroying NATO’s secret military infrastructure in Ukraine from which it planned to attack the Eurasian Great Power following the neutralization of its nuclear second-strike capabilities. In other words, President Putin didn’t spark World War III, he literally just averted it.
Russia’s special operation in Ukraine can only be described as a “tragedy” insofar that it was avoidable had the US respected Russia’s security guarantee requests and encouraged Kiev to comply with the UNSC-backed Minsk Accords, but Moscow’s military moves are legitimate in the interests of self-defense and are aimed at averting NATO’s surprise attack that President Putin warned Thursday morning “cannot be avoided”. The US has no mutual security obligations to Ukraine, but that country still didn’t expect it and its Western allies to withdraw their military forces in the run-up to Russia’s campaign. That was the wisest decision though since they would have otherwise opened themselves up to a nuclear attack by Russia in self-defense exactly as President Putin warned when telling others on Thursday morning not to interfere with his country’s military operations in Ukraine.
NATO’s long-term plans were to use Ukraine as a launching pad from which to attack and possibly even invade Russia after first neutralizing its nuclear second-strike capabilities. Its short-term plans in response to Russia’s special operation there might be to have Ukrainian President Zelensky declare the independence of Western Ukraine in order for that territory to immediately enter into a military alliance with NATO or ask for incorporation into Poland like had previously happened in the past after World War I. That would result in the partition of Ukraine and place part of its territory under that anti-Russian military bloc’s nuclear umbrella.
President Putin already reassured his compatriots that the government has been preparing for more anti-Russian sanctions for years and therefore has a plan in place for responding to that scenario. The economy will be immediately impacted but the country is expected to manage the consequences over the medium and long terms. It has enormous reserves of foreign currency and gold, and the National Wealth Fund is pretty large as well. Russia is also expected to rely on China for financial support if need be, though it might not come to that.
There are some stories about China nowadays. The Communist Party of China (CPC), which is what the Chinese government calls the ruling party, has made it abundantly clear countless times in the past that Taiwan’s reunification with the mainland will come at a time of its choosing. There presently aren’t any credible indications that this will happen in the immediate future, though of course anything can always transpire. Other countries involved in territorial disputes like India and Pakistan also don’t seem ready to militarily resolve them at this point in time either.
The Multipolar World Order began to unfold around 2008 according to some estimates but the existing order can more accurately be described as “bi-multipolarity” according to influential Indian thinker Sanjaya Baru. He explained that the American and Chinese superpowers are the top actors in the current world system, below which are a group of Great Powers like Russia, India, Japan, and the EU, among others. Baru predicts that the Bi-Multipolar World Order will be characterized by the flexibly changing relationships between the superpowers and Great Powers as well as between those Great Powers themselves. The smaller- and medium-sized countries below them will basically become objects of the competition between those above them in the international bi-multipolar hierarchy.