Is the crisis in Ukraine avoidable?

How should International Relations student interpret the current crisis in Ukraine?

This post is by Dr Haro Karkour, Online Tutor for Queen Mary Online's MA in International Relations and MSc in International Public Policy. Haro's research focuses on International Relations (IR) Theory.

American and British intelligence chiefs have recently warned of a likely Russian invasion of the Ukraine. This warning has followed failed attempts at diplomatic engagement with Putin’s demands to prohibit Ukraine from joining NATO and Western military retreat from Eastern Europe. Is the present crisis in Ukraine avoidable? What can students of IR theory make of the present crisis?

The realist theory

According to realist theory war is always a possibility between states. The reason is simple: there is no government above governments to stop war. War is the result of governments either seeking power as a means for security or as an end in itself.

Consequently the international realm is a dangerous place, where the pursuit of security by one state leads to the insecurity of other states. This realist story of the international is different from the liberal story.

Unlike realism, which sees all states as equally security and power maximisers, liberalism distinguishes ‘good’ liberal states from ‘bad’ illiberal states. Illiberal states, ran by autocrats, are the cause of war according to liberals.

Expanding the liberal international order

Following the end of the Cold War, liberal theory trumped realism in the conduct of US foreign policy. US foreign policy sought to expand the liberal international order under US leadership. As part of this expansion, which had both a security and value-based logic, came the expansion of NATO in Europe. ‘Democratic enlargement’ came to replace NATO’s mission to contain the USSR.

As former US National Security Advisor Anthony Lake, put it in his remarks on 21 September 1993: ‘The successor to a doctrine of containment must be a strategy of enlargement – enlargement of the world’s free community of market democracies’. Such a strategy was at odds with the earlier 1990 promise, by US Secretary of State James Baker, that following the reunification of Germany eastward expansion was off the table.

Russia’s perspective

The situation in Ukraine today is part of this larger story of expansion in Russia’s backyard. Can this expansion go indefinitely without threatening Russia? Liberals may find notions such as the ‘balance of power’ and ‘spheres of influence’ irrelevant in the twenty-first century international security environment.

But, according to Russia, NATO’s expansion and support of protestors against former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych are precisely seen in national security terms. This explains Russia’s reaction in the seizure of Crimea and the backing of separatists in the East of Ukraine.

Is Ukraine a vital interest to the West?

It is easy today to blame the crisis on Putin. But while there is no question that the West should worry about an autocrat who is involved in aggressive policies towards Russia’s neighbours, whether the crisis is avoidable or not ultimately depends on the policymakers’ assessment of their national interests.

Ukraine is in Russia’s backyard and therefore is a vital interest for Russia, irrelevant to whether it is Putin or anyone else in charge. Given that neither the UK nor the US would put ground troops to fight Russia over the Ukraine, it is unclear whether the latter is a vital interest for the West.

Conclusion

The West thus needs to decide what it vital interests consist of — where the line is drawn, which, if crossed, would mean military confrontation. Policymakers, as Morgenthau wrote over 70 years ago, need to accept to compromise on all issues not vital to their nations’ interests.

This does not mean admitting defeat or selling off the Ukraine, but to accept the limitations of power while negotiating to preserve the security and liberty of the Ukraine and Europe from Russian aggression.

A good place to start is to accept that the Ukraine would operate as a neutral country that will not join NATO, meanwhile in presenting such an offer, gain a concession over the preservation of Ukraine’s freedom as a sovereign nation, that trades freely and chooses its own leaders without Russian interference.

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