A choice of evils
There’s no “winning” strategy for dealing with Russia’s unrelenting incursions into Ukraine — just a choice between greater and lesser evils.
Armed escalation, with Western powers providing modern weapons to Ukraine, seems particularly fraught with peril. Yet the status quo won’t do. At least a million Ukrainians have been driven from their homes in this conflict and new estimates from German intelligence sources indicate that as many has 50,000 soldiers and civilians have been killed. A negotiated peace deal might seem welcome, but any terms dictated by Russian President Vladimir Putin are unlikely to be kind.
None of these options present an easy choice. But given the Ukrainian government’s weakness and the limited alternatives available to the West, an agreed upon end to the fighting — even with disappointing conditions — remains the best way forward.
That’s what’s on the table in widely anticipated peace talks planned for Wednesday. Negotiations are reportedly to centre on the proposed creation of a broad demilitarized zone separating eastern parts of Ukraine, held by Russian-backed rebels, from the rest of the country. It’s hoped that such a buffer zone would keep warring sides apart and help defuse escalating violence.
It might well do so. But there’s a danger this would reward Moscow’s aggression by locking in gains made by pro-Russia separatists, depriving the Ukrainian state of long-term control over a wide swath of its territory. There is even a risk Russia would install “peacekeeping” troops and turn the demilitarized zone into a de facto border. Still, creation of a neutral buffer zone is the best that can be hoped for when leaders of Germany, France, Russia and Ukraine sit down at their summit in Minsk, the capital of Belarus.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President François Hollande simply don’t have many cards to play. Their most valuable opportunity appears to rest with U.S. President Barack Obama’s warning that the U.S. may opt to send high-tech defensive weapons to Ukraine. Pressure is certainly building from the Republican-dominated Congress to take just such a step.
Merkel has forcefully spoken out against an armed escalation. But warding off such a development, and a commensurate increase in Russian casualties, might just be enough to push Putin into signing a peace agreement and sticking to its terms.
Nothing else has worked so far. Economic sanctions imposed almost a year ago, as Putin seized the Crimea, have sapped Russia’s economic growth, set the ruble on a downward slide and slammed its entrepreneurial class. An unexpected plunge in oil prices escalated this damage, and Russia has been repeatedly snubbed on the global diplomatic stage. But none of that has changed Putin’s behaviour or halted Russian-back attacks in Ukraine. And there’s no indication of when it might.
The threat of facing Ukrainian forces carrying sophisticated weapons supplied by the U.S. opens another channel for applying pressure on Putin. Whether such an escalation should be more than a threat — and actually carried out — requires further evaluation, especially in light of opposition from Merkel and other Western powers. For now, it’s at least a useful bargaining chip toward obtaining a less-miserable outcome for Ukraine.