As the 10th month of Russia’s genocidal invasion of Ukraine goes on, there is the ever present danger of apathy amongst the populations of Ukraine’s western allies threatening to weaken support of Ukraine’s war effort. I’m not (currently) worried about the leadership of specific countries abandoning Ukraine, but rather I’m worried about the general populace losing the plot with regards to both why this fight is so important and why Russia can not be negotiated with. It is critical for Ukraine to win because it is fighting against the genocide of it people versus an authoritarian regime that has a history of ignoring treaties.
Genocide
Russia is actively engaged in the genocide of the Ukrainian people and culture. Thousands of adults and children have been abducted from occupied areas and disappeared into the far reaches of Russia. Russia has brought in teachers to enforce pro-Russian propaganda in the schools of occupied towns. Russia has committed countless massacres and indiscriminate bombing of civilians. Their goal is not just to take over Ukraine, but to eliminate the Ukrainian culture.
This would not be the first attempt of Russian to commit genocide of Ukrainians. In 1932 and 1933 the Soviet Union suffered from a famine in general. But in Ukraine, the Soviet policies were designed to increase the impact of the famine on the Ukrainian people, not to alleviate it. This forced famine is called the Holodomor by Ukrainians.
The current forced relocation of populations, abduction of children, stamping out of cultural identities are all war crimes and all recognized as genocide. Ukraine can not surrender to Russia because the people and culture of Ukraine would cease to exist. Some have wondered why Ukraine has held so strongly to cities since April even when it was not militarily the best move. According to a recent study from RUSI (The Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies), Ukraine changed part of its military strategy after the events of the massacre in Bucha became known.
The atrocities committed there by the Russians meant that the Ukrainian government could not in good conscience let more cities fall into the hands of Russia. So instead of a more military prudent maneuver strategy, they shifted to holding cities as much as was feasible. Many more Ukrainian soldiers lost their lives in Severodonetsk because Ukraine had to do everything it could to prevent more Buchas. While they could not hold in the end, their commitment and sacrifice to hold on as long as they could stems from their understanding that Russia’s goal is the elimination of Ukraine as a people.
Ukraine can not surrender any part of Ukraine to Russia because to do so is to forfeit the lives of those Ukrainians still there.
Untrustworthy
Russia can not be trusted to abide by its international commitments unless there is sufficient force to compel its action. In 1994 Ukraine was part of the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances.
According to the three memoranda,[5] Russia, the US and the UK confirmed their recognition of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine becoming parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and effectively abandoning their nuclear arsenal to Russia and that they agreed to the following:
- Respect the signatory's independence and sovereignty in the existing borders.[6]
- Refrain from the threat or the use of force against the signatory.
- Refrain from economic coercion designed to subordinate to their own interest the exercise by the signatory of the rights inherent in its sovereignty and thus to secure advantages of any kind.
- Seek immediate Security Council action to provide assistance to the signatory if they "should become a victim of an act of aggression or an object of a threat of aggression in which nuclear weapons are used".
- Refrain from the use of nuclear arms against the signatory.
- Consult with one another if questions arise regarding those commitments.[7][8]
That is Russia agreeing in 1994 to not attack, threaten, or coerce Ukraine in exchange for Ukraine giving up their nuclear arsenal to Russia.
Then after Russia broke this treaty in 2014 to take Crimea and essentially parts of Donbas, Russia signed on to and subsequently broke the Minsk I and Minsk II agreements.
After Russia has made and broken all of these treaties, how can any sane person expect Ukraine to negotiate with Russia? In what world do Russia’s assurances mean anything at all? A negotiation now under terms at all favorable to Russia means that Russia wins and gets to repair its army before trying to take Ukraine again. You cannot negotiate with a nation that does not honor its treaties. The only thing Russia understands is force. That is not me disparaging Russia, that is me pointing out their recent history.
Authoritarianism
If for some reason preventing genocide and recognizing that Russia does not negotiate in good faith is not good enough to justify continued support of Ukraine, fighting against Authoritarianism better be. The free countries of the world are fighting against authoritarianism within our own borders. The Republican Party has abandoned freedom and democracy and actively support insurrection and election tampering. Their former president has even publicly stated that the Constitution should be thrown out and he should forcibly be returned to office.
While this is primarily homegrown, we cannot ignore the influence Russian money has been having on the corruption of the American right wing. Russia has been funding organizations such as the NRA, interfered in the 2016 election and attempted to again in 2020. Russia clearly continues to have influence over some Republican politicians. Russia also has the clear support of the FOX news corporation as well as other right wing US media companies.
The United States must see to it that Russia is stopped now. By supporting Ukraine we are assisting the Ukrainian destruction of almost the entire Russian army. The more support we give Ukraine in this endeavor allows Ukraine to inflict even greater destruction of the Russian army. With a decimated army and economy, Russia will be greatly weakened in its ability to influence other parts of the world. It will have less money and resources to engage in destabilization of Western democracies and hopefully will itself be destabilized to the point where we can hope for a pro-democracy movement to take hold. (This is only a hope, and not necessarily a strong likelihood)
Furthermore, Russia is not the only authoritarian state. China is watching the Western Democracies’ response to Russian aggression as a means to gauge how they might respond to an attempt by China to forcibly take Taiwan. I’ve seen speculation that the US was eager for the Ukrainians to use Harpoon missiles against Russian ships to demonstrate to China what Taiwanese Harpoons could do to Chinese naval vessels should they attempt to invade. The United States continued strong support of Ukraine is essential to providing credible assurance of Taiwanese independence and making it clear to China they should not try anything. And there are other bad actors in the world beyond Russia and China who will hopefully be deterred by our continued support of Ukraine.
We must continue to support Ukraine
I’ve been a pro-peace progressive my entire life. I protested against the first Gulf War and the second Gulf War. I am not a war hawk. But we must stand up in support of people fighting for freedom and democracy. We cannot stick our heads in the sand while authoritarians pick us apart at home and abroad. We cannot pretend to be Progressive if we will not protect people who are asserting their freedom. We don’t choose to fight because we love war, we must fight because there are people coming to kill or control us and our allies.
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