The tension has risen a notch this week between Russia and the United States on the question of Ukraine. Washington fears an invasion of this country of the former USSR by Russian soldiers. Should we be worried about the situation? France Bleu takes stock.
The context
Russia has deployed tens of thousands of Russian soldiers, along with tanks and artillery, have been near the Ukrainian border since late last year, raising fears of an invasion. Russia denies any bellicose intentions and assures that its thousands of soldiers on the Ukrainian border are not a threat, but says it is threatened by the strengthening of NATO in the region.
In response to a pro-Western revolution in Ukraine, Russia already annexed Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014 and is widely seen as military support for pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine’s Donbass. theater of war for nearly eight years.
If Russia denies any plan of attack, the Kremlin insists that a de-escalation requires written guarantees for its security. In addition to a treaty banning any enlargement of the Atlantic Alliance to Ukraine and Georgia, another former Soviet republic, Russia is demanding that the Americans and their allies renounce organizing military maneuvers and deployments in Europe from the east.
Moscow made it clear that its demands were non-negotiable, and the United States, for its part, deemed them essentially unacceptable. After a series of diplomatic talks in Europe last week, which only resulted in the gap between Moscow and the West, Russia and the United States must try again this Friday to defuse the threat of a new conflict in Ukraine, during a face-to-face meeting in Geneva between Antony Blinken, Secretary of State of the United States, and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov.
What happened this week?
Joe Biden talks about a probable Russian incursion into Ukraine
While, from Kiev in Ukraine, United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken tried to clear the ground by calling on Moscow to choose the “peaceful way”, two days before this new Russian-American diplomatic face-to-face, the President of the United States seemed on Wednesday to accredit the idea of a probable next “incursion” Russian in Ukraine.
“I think that [Vladimir Poutine] still don’t want a full-scale war”, he launched during a press conference at the White House. However, “he will test the West”. “I think he will come back” in Ukraine one way or another, “he’s going to have to do something”, he predicted, without further details.
Joe Biden then acknowledged that the reaction and unity of Westerners would depend on the extent of what Moscow does. “If it’s a minor incursion”, NATO members are likely to be divided on the extent of the response, but if the Russians “do what they can with the forces they have massed on the border, it will be a disaster for Russia”, he insisted. The situation could “get out of control”, he was alarmed. Words that did not fail to provoke the wrath of the Republican opposition in the United States. Republican tenors immediately accused the Democratic president of having resigned to such an incursion.
Faced with the emerging outcry, the White House tried to clarify the presidential statement on Thursday. Any entry of Russian troops into Ukraine would be a “invasion”, insisted Joe Biden.
Retaliation prepares in case of invasion
Joe Biden has in any case firmly detailed the consequences of a major invasion. “If they invade, they will pay for it, they will no longer be able to go through the banks, they will not be able to make transactions in dollars”, he warned, referring, in addition to these unprecedented sanctions against the Russian economy, to the risk of “lourdes” casualties on the battlefield.
“All” crossing of the Ukrainian border by Russia would cause a reaction “fast and severe” of the United States and “our allies”, assured this Thursday the American Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Berlin. From the city that was cut in half by a wall for almost 30 years, the US Secretary of State considered that any violation by Russia of the territorial sovereignty of Ukraine “would take us back to a far more dangerous and unstable time, when this continent was split in two, (…) with the threat of all-out war hanging over everyone’s head.”
The United States has also approved the Baltic countries’ requests forship weapons of American manufacture to Ukraine. Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania, in Russia’s immediate neighborhood, are particularly worried about the situation. “We have decided to send weapons and other aid (to Ukraine)”, Lithuanian Defense Minister Arvydas Anusauskas confirmed to AFP that the move aims to “deter” Russia from any attack. Since last year, President Joe Biden’s administration has approved the shipment of $650 million worth of weapons to Ukraine, including $200 million last month.
Russia responds to US threats
The Kremlin on Thursday denounced the remarks “destabilizers” by Joe Biden. Moscow responded by announcing the launch of all-out naval operations. More 140 warships and about 10,000 soldiers will take part in January and February in these exercises carried out in the Atlantic, the Arctic, the Pacific or the Mediterranean.
The main objective of these maneuvers is to put into action “naval, air and space forces” and counter the “threat” since the “seas and oceans”, justified the Russian Minister of Defense. Russia also plans to conduct joint naval maneuvers with Iran and China, the date of which has not yet been set.
And Europe in all this?
The security of the European continent is “impossible” without restoring the territorial integrity of Ukraine, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Thursday.
The Britain had announced on Monday that it intended to send anti-tank weapons. L’Germany for his part rejected the idea of delivering arms to Ukraine, believing that this would only aggravate tensions. The head of German diplomacy Annalena Baerbock, however, was very firm, assuring that her country “would do everything to guarantee the security of Ukraine” against Russia. And Social Democratic Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Wednesday dispelled ambiguities over the future of the controversial Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline. Germany, the project’s main backer, has pledged to the Americans to block its commissioning if Russia attacks. Ukraine, he said.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs French, Jean-Yves Le Drian, also present in Berlin on Thursday, warned the Russians against any desire to forge a “Yalta 2”, a new sharing of spheres of influence between East and West, nearly 77 years later the conference that shaped post-World War II Europe.
L’European Union said to himself “ready” to respond to Russian intervention in Ukraine with economic and financial sanctions “massive”, assured the President of the European Commission on Thursday. “We hope that an attack will not take place. But if it does, we are ready”, said Ursula von der Leyen in a speech during the virtual world economic forum in Davos (Switzerland).
The European Commission has been instructed by the Member States to work on the various economic and financial sanctions against Russia and the options will be discussed at the meeting of EU foreign ministers chaired in Brussels on Monday by the head of European diplomacy Josep Borrell. Sanctions must be unanimously approved by member states. “We do not accept Russia’s attempts to divide Europe into spheres of influence”, Ursula von der Leyen insists. “We reaffirm our solidarity with Ukraine and our European partners who are threatened by Russia. And of course we continue to defend the fundamental principle that Ukraine is free to decide as a sovereign state”, she added.
“To be very clear, we want a dialogue (with Russia), an encore dit Ursula von der Leyen. But if the situation deteriorates, if there are new attacks on the territorial integrity of Ukraine, we will respond with massive economic and financial sanctions.”, she explained. “The European Union is by far Russia’s largest trading partner and by far its largest investor. This trade relationship is important for us. But it is much more important for Russia”, she pointed out.
A possible dialogue?
Despite this escalation, the 46th President of the United States reached out to Russia’s demands and even said he was ready for a new summit with Vladimir Putin. On the guarantee demanded by the Kremlin that Ukraine will never join NATO, he argued that in practice it was unlikely that Kiev would become a member of the Atlantic Alliance in the near future – even if by principle, it does not close its door. For Mr. Blinken, slamming NATO’s door is not a solution, because “one nation cannot simply dictate its choice to another”.
On the promise that the West will not deploy strategic weapons on Ukrainian territory, “we can find a solution”, on the basis of reciprocity, assured Joe Biden. President Joe Biden’s government has said it is ready to accept greater transparency on military exercises.
Moscow and Washington must try again on Friday to defuse tensions during a face-to-face meeting in Geneva between Antony Blinken and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov.
The head of American diplomacy has already warned that he will not satisfy, during this meeting in Switzerland, the Russian request for a written commitment on its requirements, hoping rather to explore areas of cooperation. “I strongly hope that we can stay on a diplomatic and peaceful path, but in the end, it will be President Putin’s decision”, a dit à Kiev Antony Blinken.
Are we really on the verge of a conflict?
“Non”, estimated this Thursday on franceinfo Jean de Gliniasty, director of research at IRIS and former French ambassador to Russia from January 2009 to November 2013. “We are rather in a phase of bidding up during a negotiation process which began last week”, he analyzed, conceding that the “military concentration” at the Ukrainian border, “longer term” indicates anyway “a heavier threat that hangs over and is at the mercy of incidents.”
According to him, thespark that starts a war “can happen because there are hotheads on both sides”. “There may be incidents that escalate, he continued. It shouldn’t be ruled out.”
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