Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has alleged mercenaries from Albania, Kosovo, and Bosnia and Herzegovina have been recruited and transferred to Donbas in Ukraine to fight against Moscow-backed rebels, something vehemently denied by local governments. The Russian embassy in Tirana however, did not respond to requests for clarification.
Moscow still has the initiative in a crisis it provoked but apparent Russian failure so far to engineer a phony “internal” Ukrainian opposition leaves the situation literally on a knife’s edge. Russian propaganda is attempting to claim victory already by portraying post-Afghanistan America as “exhausted” but Moscow has struggled to provoke Western diplomatic disarray. For its part, the United States has lurched from a chaotic Trump Administration to the chaos of Biden’s withdrawal from Afghanistan and finds itself having to react to Vladimir Putin’s moves all around the former Soviet periphery. Still, Washington’s stern public warnings about Russian preparations seem to have surprised Moscow and out Putin on the back foot.
With the Ukraine crisis increasingly acute, there is growing danger of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, involving a significant possibility of escalating into a full-scale war between Russian and the NATO. At the core of the crisis is how to strike an agreement on durable geopolitical order to which Ukraine is central as a crucial strategic buffer between Europe and the Eurasia, or between a peninsula and a landmass. Thus, prescribing a geopolitical settlement is more necessary than ever.
The Ukraine crisis, similar to Brexit, is a vivid demonstration of the shaky nature of unions and alliances in Europe. This is not good news for the United States as it is determined to concentrate domestically and curb the rise of China. Putin’s determination to attack Ukraine also lies in the fact that NATO has no real intention of letting Ukraine join the alliance or waging war with Russia. In fact, NATO cannot fight Russia even if it wants to. The forces of the United States in Europe are not enough at all for this purpose, the same is true of the forces of Britain and France. Despite all the warnings about the Russian threat, why have no serious efforts been made or are being made by European troops to deter Russia and most NATO countries have always refused to increase their military spending to 2% of GDP? In short, because NATO is not going to fight Russia over Ukraine.
While geopolitical commentators are fixated on Russia’s border with Ukraine, a more interesting development is slowly boiling underneath the surface of the Russo-Ukrainian conflict that could potentially reorder international relations—namely, the death of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
When the war first broke out eight years ago, Natalya, 28, just hid in the basement when the gunfire and artillery bombardments came too close.
“Now it’s different. Now I fear for the children,” she said, holding her 3 1/2-year-old son and 5 1/2-year-old daughter by the hand as she crossed from the city of Luhansk, held by Russia-backed separatists since 2014, into Ukrainian government-held territory. “We’re leaving for good.”
Officials of Albania, Kosovo and Bosnia and Herzegovina have rejected claims made by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov that these countries are sending “mercenaries” to fight in Ukraine, where there are fears of a Russian invasion.
The US, its European allies and Israel are playing up the idea that war in Ukraine is inevitable if Russia attacks its neighbour. They are clearly preparing the public for such a conflict. It all serves US interests in this phoney psychological war against Russia which may strengthen America’s presence in Europe, as well as European economic conditions.
Why Moscow Would Use Overwhelming Force Against Ukraine
Russia appears to be on the verge of launching a major military operation against Ukraine. It has amassed an unprecedented number of troops on the country’s border, and Russian-led forces in the Donbas region of Ukraine have sharply escalated their attacks along the line of contact. Leaders of the Luhansk People’s Republic and the Donetsk People’s Republic, the breakaway regions of Ukraine that Russia has propped up since 2014, have blamed Ukraine for a series of explosions and attempted acts of sabotage, such as a supposed attack on a water treatment facility, that seem to be staged provocations. It appears as if Russia is engineering a pretext to invade Ukraine by conducting a false flag attack—blaming Kyiv for actions Moscow in fact instigated—and alleging that the government of Ukraine poses a threat to Russian speakers in the country’s east. U.S. President Joe Biden is convinced that Russian President Vladimir Putin has directed the military to move in.
A sense of helplessness and dread hangs in the air over the Western leaders gathered here at the Munich Security Conference as the expectation grows that Russian President Vladimir Putin will unleash a military attack on Ukraine within days, if not hours.