Is Russia really about to invade Ukraine?

Jordan If geopolitics was a car, then Russian aggression towards Ukraine would be the dashboard light that has been blinking for so long. You don’t even notice it anymore.

News Clip 1 It is the right time to remind the whole world that Ukraine has been living under the threat of invasion and for some parts for Ukraine real invasion and occupation for the past eight years. But this time, it really feels different.

News Clip 2 Russia tonight has 112 to 120,000 troops on Ukraine’s borders in 60 battalion tactical groups,

News Clip 3 there have been weeks of diplomatic talks, and so far, they’ve been unsuccessful.

News Clip 4 US officials wouldn’t get into specifics, but they along with their European allies have more and more economic sanctions.

News Clip 5 Global Affairs today announced it is temporarily withdrawing families of diplomatic staff, Canadian citizens are also being advised not to travel there. And if they are already there to leave.

Jordan A lot of us in Canada have been lucky enough to be able to tune out the years of Russia Ukraine conflicts, but the same can’t be said, for the more than 1 million Ukrainian Canadians who must fear for the safety of family and friends back home. Every time Russia pulls something like this. And since Russia’s current troop deployment is massive enough to make a full-scale invasion, a real possibility. The stakes now are higher than they’ve been in decades. So where do things stand on the ground? What does Putin really want? What are other countries prepared to do to stop him from getting it? And how likely is it really, that the world returns to something resembling full-scale war in Eastern Europe, it’s time to pay attention to that blinking light and figure out exactly what it means rather than keep driving and hoping for the best.

I’m Jordan Heath Rawlings. This is the big story. Seva Gunitsky is an associate professor of political science at the University of Toronto. He has also written about the Russia-Ukraine conflict and foreign policy. Hello, Seva.

Seva Gunitsky Hi Jordan. Thanks for having me.

Jordan You’re very welcome. This has been a situation we’ve kind of been keeping our eye on for, I guess, more than a month now and that probably many Canadians, including myself don’t fully understand. So I’m really glad you could help us out. The first thing I would love you to do is just as we speak on Tuesday morning, can you lay out the situation on the ground? Like where are Russian forces? And what are they doing right now?

Seva Gunitsky Sure. Right now, there are about 130,000 Russian forces that are positioned all around the Ukrainian border essentially, and circling it basically from the east and the north and continues troop movements can still be seen fanning out around the borders. There are also about 30,000 Russian troops in Belarus for what’s supposed to be a military exercise. So this is really the largest movement of Russian forces to date since the Soviet period. This is not typical Wargaming. And that’s why it has everybody sitting up and paying attention. And Ukraine has been doing what it has been doing since 2014, which is continuing to fight the ongoing conflict in the regions of Lugansk and Donetsk. So for them, this has been less of a crisis and really more of a continuation more of the same, which is partly why you see the Ukrainian president saying things like the US is hyping up the threat. And partly he says that because he doesn’t want the economy to fall apart from the panic. But partly it’s because I think there’s a sense in Ukraine, at least among some people, that Putin is bluffing or trying to extract concessions from the west.

Jordan Does Ukraine have help committed to it right now, if Russia does decide to invade if this isn’t a bluff, like it happens, let’s say later today, what happens next in terms of allies?

Seva Gunitsky Well, right now a number of states have said that they’ll provide lethal aid or nonlethal aid, lethal aid being essentially a euphemism for guns and ammo, and non-lethal aid being things like recon vehicles and defensive weapons, etc. So countries like Poland and the Baltic states in the Czech Republic have provided those. And then you see other countries like Holland and Denmark in the US moving troops to the region, but not to Ukraine, but to the border, which is essentially a deterrent to say, don’t get too out of hand, Russia because we’re right here and we’re watching and more generally, the US has provided two and a half billions in military aid since 2014, when the Maidan revolution happened, and that includes military aid as well and NATO has sent military instructors to train troops, etc. But the idea at least the way it’s presented, is this supposed to be a deterrent. So Ukraine gets Javelin missiles from the US which are anti-tank missiles, but The supply contract that they have prohibits the use of these rocket launchers in combat. So they have to use them as a as a deterrent against Russian aggression. So Ukraine does have some options available to it.

Jordan What about Canada? Specifically, what have we said, we will or won’t do to help?

Seva Gunitsky Well, Canada has gone out of its way to say that they support Ukraine. And since my done in 2014, Canada has also given Ukraine a lot of money, almost a billion dollars in aid. Canada also deploys about 200 Armed Forces personnel. And just a few days ago, Canada sent a package of non-lethal aid. Again, things like protective equipment and cage equipment, surveillance, things like that.

Jordan Why aren’t we providing military aid? Specifically? Have we talked about that?

Seva Gunitsky Well, in the sense, Canada is providing aid. It’s, I think it’s a big debate of how much can be provided and how much is actually useful. You know, Canada knows that it’s not going to turn the tables strategically. So I think it’s focusing on providing support in other ways. And that might change you know, that Canada might provide additional aid in the future.

Jordan How tense is the situation? As it stands right now? Because, you know, you mentioned that to Ukraine, this is nothing new really accepted, I guess, number and threat, but it feels, I think, to casual observers, or people who only hear about it when things ratchet up that Putin is always threatening to invade something somewhere.

Seva Gunitsky That’s right. So what’s new here? Yeah, in a way, you know, that’s right. He has been aggressive in his foreign policy continuously over the past couple of years. I think what’s unprecedented here is simply the scale of the troop movements, and aggressive rhetoric that has accompanied those movements. And there are military analysts in DC. In fact, a significant number of them who believe you don’t do that just for show you don’t do that just for a bluff. And you know, it’s interesting, there are always debates on social media about this or that world event. But the Ukraine thing for me has really brought out a range of perspectives from really well-informed people, not just pundits or you know, insane people on Twitter, but individuals who really study the region have a range of opinions and something Putin is bluffing, trying to gain diplomatic influence. I think there’s something to that something he might try a short offensive to force Ukraine’s hand and then withdraw could be something to that, and something. There’s a full-scale occupation coming, which I’m still skeptical about, but it’s a legitimate argument that people are having.

Jordan Well, let’s talk about the diplomacy first, then I think we’ve been talking for a while that Russia is poised to invade and diplomacy is stalled. But there are talks right now. Right with the the French president in Moscow, the German chancellor has met with Joe Biden on this issue. Is there actually a legitimate prospect for a diplomatic breakthrough? Here? Are these talks building to anything? Do we have any indication?

Seva Gunitsky Well, it’s very hard to say, because for now, it seems to be more of the same. Judging from the conversations with Macron, there have been no major breakthroughs. Because Putin has essentially said, You have not dealt with any of our concerns. And by the way, Putin might prefer this state of strategic ambiguity where he has everybody guessing, because he has everybody sitting up and paying attention to him. You know, some people seem very resigned to imminent war or even a conquest. And so I think it’s worth re-emphasizing just how much Putin still has to lose here if he invades not just isolation or dependence on China or more sanctions. But if he actually decides to occupy Ukraine that would make for an insurgency that will be extremely difficult to control and will grow very unpopular at home. If you didn’t grow up in the Soviet Union, it’s easy to forget that Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and 1980s very much undermine public trust in the regime even more than it was at the time. And I think the memory of that blunder is still on the minds of the leaders of the country, on that dimension on the on the minds of the older generation, on whose support Putin relies. So I’m hoping that President will keep away the prospect of a full-scale occupation. I can’t pretend to know what will happen and leaders do stupid things all the time, right. But a full-scale occupation, at least right now, doesn’t seem likely Putin has used force in the post-Soviet space multiple times. But he has never tried to do something like a full-scale occupation.

Jordan So this isn’t the first time that we’ve talked about Russia and Ukraine. I think there’s been a whole bunch of smaller conflicts, and I think most of our listeners would remember Crimea. So what is it about this nation in particular, to Vladimir Putin? Why is Ukraine so important to him?

Seva Gunitsky Well, how far back do you want to go? If you ask a pundit, they’ll probably say We have to go back to 2004, which is the Orange Revolution in Ukraine. And that’s when there were mass protests that overturned a rigged election for candidate that Putin supported and brought in a candidate that was more pro-West that put in the net support, and put in. So this is a direct challenge to Russian primacy in its sphere and to his own regime, because he saw the Orange Revolution as a Western provocation. And the idea for him was, well, if they can do this in Ukraine, they can do this to me. He’s very much convinced that behind every color revolution is a CIA agent. So that’s one answer. But if you ask a political scientist, they’ll say, Well, no, you have to go back to 1991 when the USSR collapsed, and Ukraine became its own country, it had been a Tonka country briefly during World War One when the tsarist empire collapsed, but then it was reoccupied by force by the Red Army. So what we’re seeing now is a return to those imperial ambitions that Russia has always had control over its neighborhood, which had lost in 1991. And finally, the third answer, if you ask a historian, they’ll go back to the ninth century, probably to the founding of Kievan Rus, which isn’t today’s Ukraine, the roots of the Russian state go back to Ukraine. And I think that’s why for putting these reasons are inseparable for emotional reasons, for historical reasons. And for strategic reasons as well.

Jordan I’m going to ask probably a dumb and definitely a selfish question right now. But for those of us in Canada, or even, you know, in the United States, half a world away, this conflict can seem very remote. Why should the West care what Putin does in Ukraine?

Seva Gunitsky Well, the West is a difficult concept, the West has different reasons to care. Germany cares about getting Russian gas. And the US cares about a strategic competition with Russia. So they all care, so to speak already for their own self-interested reasons. If the question is why people in the West should care for the well-being of Ukrainian people, and they would say they should care or not care based on how they generally feel about this sort of thing happening around the world, not just in Ukraine. invasion would mean casualties and a humanitarian crisis, period. And I guess, I guess one general reasons people should care is that, you know, territorial conquest has pretty much disappeared from global politics since 1945. And I think that’s a good thing. It’s an it’s nice to not have that. Now, of course, sovereignty gets violated all the time. But in general, it’s a good thing that states have agreed to Nazis, each other’s territory, which was, you know, keep in mind for centuries, a legitimate tool of statecraft. And that just legitimate but expected, so I kind of don’t want to go back to that world. And if it happens in Ukraine, it sets a precedent for it in Taiwan or somewhere else that we may not even be thinking about yet. So this is not just about Ukraine, I think the repercussions go Well, beyond it.

Jordan Even a little closer to home, I want to ask you about the 1.4 million Ukrainian Canadians, and what that means for them. If this thing goes off, and an invasion or an occupation happens, what will Canada have to do for them? Well, we have to create an immigration response. You know, that’s a sizable chunk of Canada’s population.

Seva Gunitsky It is. And I think that’s a question that, you know, you would really want to ask a member of the Ukrainian diaspora, because there are all sorts of ways that they now connect to their relatives back home. But needless to say, if there’s an actual conflict or an occupation, that will make things incredibly difficult. And of course, the Ukrainian population here has been very vocal about Canada providing more support in terms of what Canada can actually do. It’s really hard to say because it will depend on the situation on the ground. And at this point, it’s in pretty much impossible to predict.

Jordan As we’re speaking, it’s not so long since we’ve seen reports that Canada is telling Canadians in the country to evacuate. Does that mean they know something does that mean? We’re close to an end to this impasse either way.

Seva Gunitsky So Canada said this, and Biden said the same thing, encouraging Americans to leave and I think some people saw this as almost a gaffe, sort of, you know, why are you telling people to leave? To Do you have some Do you know, something we don’t know. But in general, it seems like a good idea that if a giant army is messing on the borders and being hostile as a precautionary principle, I don’t think it’s particularly controversial, right for either the Canadian or the American government to tell its people to to leave the country if they can, I think in general, that’s, that doesn’t seem incredibly strange that they would say something like that.

Jordan I know you can’t see into his mind, obviously, but just based on, on what your experience tells you about Putin does He really want to invade, or? Or is it more valuable to him to have the eyes of the whole world on his troops at the border and talking and thinking about what Putin wants or what Putin might do?

Seva Gunitsky I don’t think he has war in mind as the ultimate goal. If he has to escalate the conflict, he will. But I don’t think anything is predetermined at this point. I think there are many scenarios in which Putin benefits from brinksmanship much more than war. I’ve already mentioned all the negative consequences that Putin would suffer if there is a there is a war. And he has achieved a major goal which is being taken seriously by the West and dominating the discussion. And for a leader who really cares about great power status. That’s not a small thing. You know, for the first time in a long time, the US is sitting down at the table with Russia, to discuss the problems of European security, broadly. So in that sense, Russia can claim a sort of victory. And so therefore, I would say, Nothing is inevitable here at this point.

Jordan If Russia does decide to invade, does Ukraine have any chance with the forces that it has? What is the fight look like? And what is the geopolitical fallout from that look like?

Seva Gunitsky While the geopolitical fallout for Russia would be extreme? If Putin invades that means more sanctions, it means the end of the Nord Stream pipeline, which is something that Biden explicitly said yesterday, which is Putin’s way of selling more gas to Germany, and it’s very important to him, it would basically mean fortress Russia, growing isolation, the more belligerent foreign policy, which has been the case already over the past couple of years. And we’ve seen that this aggressive foreign policy has yielded some results. Crimea in 2014, most famously, but in general, it’s left Putin more isolated. cooperation with the US is, of course, stalled. But so as a cooperation with Europe, and India and Japan, Moscow is getting closer with China. But that’s not going to make Putin feel comfortable, because Russia will always be the junior partner in that relationship. So if his goal was to transform the global order, you know, he has the world’s attention, but he hasn’t reached this goal. Now, what chance does Ukraine have probably little chance against a major Russian strike. Russia has the military capacity to overwhelm Ukrainian defenses. But Ukraine does have some air defenses, it does have weapons, and it certainly has the willingness to fight, both initial invasion and certainly any occupation. You know, after 1945, again, we think the world war two ended and Russia one but after 1945, Stalin had to fight an insurgency for decades in Ukraine after World War Two against Ukrainian partisans who wanted independence. And you can be sure that those NKVD agents were not bound by any international laws, and it still took them a decade. So this is by no means a cakewalk.

Jordan When might we know what the eventual outcome will be? Like? Is there any sort of hard or soft timeline here? Or can Russia just kind of keep their troops there indefinitely and threaten? like?

Seva Gunitsky Well, there’s a bit of a timeline and that troops can deploy of that size indefinitely. They are in field tents, that are not really suited for the freezing weather. And there have been some reports that are not confirmed of COVID outbreaks. So put in can’t keep them forever and keep morale high. But the situation might drag on for a while for for weeks, maybe even months, and I hope it doesn’t come to an invasion, you know, because if he does invade it, it’d be just sad, sad for Ukraine, set for Russia, my former country that you know, somebody were, who was born and grew up there and speaks the language, I feel it would be a tragedy, you know, the Russia could have been the normal regional power, established cultural influence, establish economic ties, without having to go on 19th century on its neighbors, but it seems like after 20 years of food, and there’s just not enough state capacity, or cultural appeal or economic heft for Russia, to really do anything, but you know, fiddle with gas switches and put armies on borders. And that’s what we see. So my sincere hope is that this does drag on until absolutely everybody loses interest. And Putin will say, see, they take us seriously now, and see how the West lied and said we were going to fight and we didn’t. And the West will say, see, we did a great job keeping plot in check. We deterred him successfully. And then everybody can go on living in their fantasy worlds and until the next crisis, and that’s unfortunately my optimistic scenario in this case.

Jordan One more question. What will you be watching for in the coming days aside from you know, actual troop movements indicating an invasion? What signs will you be looking for that that might give you clues one way or another where this is headed?

Seva Gunitsky That’s a great question. I think beyond the obvious things. One thing to watch is the level of propaganda on Russian media on state-owned Russian media because in the past, we’ve seen massive PR drives propaganda drives, before any sort of conflict or attack, and so far, the Russian media has obviously been discussing Ukraine, but it has not been sort of at the front burner. So I think if we see a massive increase in Russian media attention being paid to Ukraine, that might be one indicator that an invasion is imminent, but again, put in his game is to sort of dangle the threats and he will dangle that threat in a number of ways. So there are no reliable science until it actually happens, unfortunately.

Jordan Well, here’s hoping that it doesn’t and that the sense peacefully seven thank you for this. I feel like I understand what’s happening. There’s so much better now.

Seva Gunitsky Well, I’m so glad Jordan, thanks for having me on. And let me talk about it.

Jordan Seva Gunitsky, Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Toronto. That was the big story. For more from us, a href=”http://thebigstorypodcast.ca/”>thebigstorypodcast.ca.Find us on Twitter @TheBigStoryFPN or write to us click here!You can find us on all your favorite podcast players. We’d appreciate it if you subscribe to us in more than one. Thanks for listening. I’m Jordan Heath Rawlings. We’ll talk tomorrow