When Putin decided to create the current crisis, it was probably beyond his wildest dreams that the reaction by Western allies would be so divided.
The artificial Ukrainian crisis generated by the Kremlin has exposed deep divisions among NATO nations, currently scrambling to identify a unified response. President Biden recognised this when last week he suggested that any response to Russian aggression could be “complicated by differences” within the NATO alliance. Earlier this month, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters on a visit to the Ukrainian capital, Kiev, “I think one of Moscow’s long-standing goals has been to sow divisions between and within our countries”.
As if to prove his point, Germany refused to allow British military planes, transporting antitank weapons to Ukraine, a flight-path over their country, forcing them to fly over the North Sea and Denmark, a route which added several hours to the journey. “It’s symbolic of the absence of any coordinated NATO effort to help a NATO ally and to help a European ally”, said the head of the defence committee in Britain’s Parliament. Shortly after, Germany refused to grant re-export licences to Estonia, which wanted to send German-origin howitzers to assist Ukraine’s forces, citing their country’s post-World War 2 policy of refusing to arm parties in conflict.
When Vladimir Putin decided to create the current crisis, it was probably beyond his wildest dreams that the reaction by Western allies would be so divided. Gathering such a large contingent of troops on the Ukrainian border in January was obviously good timing for an invasion, but his action has also exposed Western weakness and divisions, both within NATO and in terms of Europe’s relations with the US. High oil and gas prices, largely triggered by the crisis, have resulted in Russia being flush with cash and Putin sees a weak American president in the White House who has continually talked tough, but constantly signalled that he wants a quiet reset of policy. As soon as Biden took office, the Kremlin started testing him with the initial build-up last year, and everything since then has confirmed their belief. Putin is clearly convinced that he will never have a better opportunity to reorder the European security structure in his favour.
The Kremlin has become emboldened by events over recent years. Why did Putin just walk into Crimea in 2014 and take it? Because he knew the West would talk but not act. Why did Belarusian President Lukashenko feel able to order a Ryanair plane down and take a dissident off it last year? Because he knew the West would talk but not act. Why did Moscow, via Minsk, continue to weaponise migrants against the EU? Because it knew the West would talk but not act. In all these, Moscow suffered no real consequences for its behaviour, so why stop now? Fiona Hill, White House Russia strategist during the Obama years, says President Putin’s real objective in this conflict is to force the Americans out of Europe once and for all, inflicting the same humiliation on them that his country suffered with the collapse of the Soviet Union. The Brussels-Paris-Berlin triangle is helping the process along, playing with fire.
Moscow is also helped by a hopelessly split NATO. Germany, the powerhouse of Europe, has a new coalition which is divided on Russia. Signals from Berlin indicate that there will be no serious consequences whatever Putin does with his blitzkrieg forces and armoured divisions on Ukraine’s borders. Like his predecessor, Angela Merkel, the new German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is trying to remain vague and ambiguous to avoid conflict with both Russia and the West. Foreign Minister Annelina Baerbock and Economic Affairs Minister Robert Habeck have both been critical of Berlin’s Russia policy in the past, but have recently toned down their potentially more hawkish instincts on Russia in the light of political pressures they find themselves under. Berlin, with its national faith in Ostpolitik, is sustained by its undying belief that it has a unique understanding and appreciation of Russia. As its companies have continued to invest in the Russian economy on a huge scale, even after the illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014, Germany has become a hostage to Russia, more so as it currently relies on Moscow for more than 40% of its gas supplies.
French President Emmanuel Macron, facing a crucial presidential election in April, is hesitant to engage in the debate, other than to call for a new strategic partnership between the EU and Russia, separate from the Americans, to the consternation of those EU states on the front line that depend on America for their survival. In the UK, Prime Minister Johnson, while calling for Europe to act with the US over the crisis, is embroiled in scandals over the alleged breaking of his own Covid rules at the height of the pandemic, which are now being investigated by the Metropolitan Police. In Italy, currently undergoing presidential elections, the lucrative commercial ties it had with Russia were the decisive factor in the Ukraine crisis of 2014, when Rome was at the forefront of diplomatic efforts to prevent tough EU sanctions on Russia. Given Italy’s history of opposition to sanctions, it’s not surprising that President Putin saw advantage in holding video calls with the big beasts of Italian business last Wednesday. Diplomats from Poland, Britain, Sweden and the Baltic nations fulminated against a “Club-Med” of Italian-led southern European countries that opposed a hard line on Putin last time, and it remains to be seen if there will be a redux this time.
By contrast, Putin has already secured a number of wins from the crisis. He has acquired the attention of the Biden administration and the West in general. President Biden rewarded him with a summit call late last month, and there have been subsequent high-level meetings between Blinken and Lavrov. He has forced NATO to focus on security challenges in Europe, and by setting outrageous red lines in terms of no NATO deployments to members that joined after 1997, which the US rejected last week, Putin has enhanced his image as a strong man who calls the shots and the geopolitical poker player with all the cards. More than ever, he is seen as a leader with whom everyone has to contend if they want solutions to the geopolitical problems that he typically creates himself.
The crisis has also allowed Putin to highlight Russia’s significant military capability to the world and demonstrate its use in support of coercive diplomacy. The build-up along the border with Ukraine has served as a showcase for the huge upgrade achieved, thanks to investments made in the Russian military over the past decade. But will he actually use it this time?
Reading Vladimir Putin’s mind has never been easy—and that’s how he likes it. In his current stand-off with the West, Putin has taken the guessing game to a new level. Is he about to plunge Europe into its most serious military conflict since World War 2, or is he staging a bluff to show the West he is as dangerous as ever? The state-controlled media in Russia is full of stories about the wicked West sending huge amounts of lethal weapons into Ukraine in order to attack besieged fellow Russians in the Donbas region, so public opinion has been carefully prepared. All Putin has to do now is create a “false-flag” incident (which steeped in the black arts of the KGB he is an expert in doing) and war begins. It’s worth remembering that Putin hasn’t exactly shied away from using force in the recent past, catching the West off guard. And think what he would look like if he backed down now without firing a shot, having at massive expense deployed thousands of troops around the borders of Ukraine. He would look like a leader whose bark is worse than his bite—not a good image for an authoritarian!
On the other hand, if Putin orders an attack on Ukraine, an invasion would almost certainly bring NATO together like never before. German resistance to spending more on defence would evaporate and Sweden and Finland would be urgently knocking on NATO’s door, increasing the Organisation’s presence on Russia’s borders. The White House would pressurise a divided EU to carry out the threat of imposing much tougher sanctions than anything currently in place, and the Nord Stream gas project will likely be cancelled, reducing the Kremlin’s revenue and Putin’s bank balance. Russia could be suspended from the financial payment system known as SWIFT, and crippling sanctions would immediately be placed on Russian banks, making it almost impossible for them to operate internationally. Beijing, on which Putin would become increasingly dependent, will use a Russian invasion of Ukraine to carry out a cost/benefit analysis for a potential invasion of Taiwan, destabilising the whole Indo-Pacific region.
So, while countries in a divided NATO wait with tense foreboding as the ground remains hard enough for an invasion by Russian tanks and artillery—the next step is yours, Vlad.
John Dobson is a former British diplomat, who also worked in UK Prime Minister John Major’s office between 1995 and 1998. He is currently Visiting Fellow at the University of Plymouth.