The Infinite Subconscious

The Russian Defense Ministry in Moscow this week.   Credit...Sergey Ponomarev for The New York Times

"[It is certain that Vladimir Putin intends to return Ukraine to Russia as a major part of the former Soviet Union.] But he also doesn't want to by accident inherit another Afghan war."

"He needs social calm at  home, so in a way it's quite possible this is a diversion. [Putin learned in 2008 a] nice little war [works wonderfully well for public opinion, shading corruption and inflation'. The problem with Ukraine is that Ukraine is not little."

"His [Putin's] problem at the moment, I think, is he effectively manufactured this crisis. Nothing has changed on the NATO side."

"One thing we don't know enough about is what makes him tick. What's the investment for? It's for mobile combined operations, therefore it is to control Russia's periphery. This is an agenda that goes well beyond Putin."

"[Staging troops on the Ukraine border was a big bet], and now he realizes that there's no jackpot. So what do you do? Do you just walk away? Or do you invade because the clock is ticking, and if you invade, what next?"

"Putin doesn't like to get humbled, and Kyiv is a recipe for that."

Neil MacFarlane, Canadian expert on Russian security and foreign policy -- Lester B.Pearson Professor of International Relations, Oxford University

 

"[What is happening in Ukraine today, is a] forced change of identity."

"And the most despicable thing is that the Russians in Ukraine are being forced not only to deny their roots, generations of their ancestors but also to believe that Russia is their enemy."

Russian President Vladimir Putin 

Celebrating the independence of Ukraine in Kyiv in 1991.   Credit...Anatoly Sapronenkov/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

First came Moscow claiming that it was pulling some troops from the border after the completion of war exercises. Vladimir Putin had met in Moscow with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, informing him he has no wish to go to war, he was willing to continue negotiations. A statement that British Prime Minister Boris Johnson questioned given the "mixed signals" of the appearance of field hospitals that "can be construed as a preparation for an invasion". 

Vladimir Putin is incensed with bristling rage over the ever-closer-creeping presence of the North Atlantic Treaty Alliance in Russia's near-abroad, the zeal with which former satellites of the Soviet Union have joined NATO, making him feel security-vulnerable, a feeling he detests, believing the solution is to arm-wrestle NATO into an agreement to cease and desist, reverse and retreat. The passion of his loathing for the West's incursion, and his determination to restore a semblance of the USSR motivates and drives his decisions.

Despite that Ukraine was not yet close to being accepted into NATO the promise that Putin tried to extract will never see the light of day; no outsider threatening world stability could ever convince the Alliance to withdraw its presence when its very mission is to address itself to forestalling the kind of chaos and disruption the West foresees in an expansion of the Russian Federation, all the more so its forceful and violent bullying of neighbours who shudder at the memory of the USSR that trapped them.

When the USSR collapsed it was penurious and militarily feeble. Vladimir Putin visualizes its restoration and sees himself as the vehicle to drive it back on track to its former glory and status as a world power. Much has changed in a generation, the once penniless state Russia found itself in has been transformed into an energy giant with enough disposable income to modernize its military on a scale to challenge the most modern army in the world; the U.S., with China bringing up the rear.

Putin's mind is fixated on pride and identity, history and even a special kind of spirituality. His essay On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians, claiming Russia and Ukraine to be "parts of what is essentially the same historical and spiritual space", with their "spiritual unity" under attack reflected his mystical views of history. According to Mr. Putin, Belarusians, Ukrainians and Russians are one people, descendants of Kyivan Rus, a 10th century Slavic federation.

An Orthodox church service in 2018 in Chernytsia, Ukraine.  Credit...Brendan Hoffman for The New York Times