Andrew Goodman
Abstract: A number of prominent scholars, journalists, and politicians have advanced the thesis that the West provoked Putin into attacking Ukraine by enlarging NATO into Central and Eastern Europe and by declaring in 2008 that Ukraine would become a member as well. The dubious assumptions on which this thesis is based are contradicted by my personal experiences at NATO and with Vladimir Putin, which show, first, that the Russian Government has always known that NATO’s 2008 declaration was essentially hollow; and second, that well before he became Russian President, Putin saw the West as an adversary and believed Ukraine naturally belonged to Russia’s sphere of influence.
Putin’s war against Ukraine is best seen, therefore, as Putin’s last-ditch effort to stifle Ukrainian efforts to escape from Russia’s orbit rather than the result of Great Power competition.I would argue that attributing responsibility to the West for provoking Putin ignores that he has long been on a quest to return Russia to a position of dominance over Ukraine and other countries in Eastern Europe. During his politically formative years in the 1980s and 90s, Putin served as a KGB operative in the German Democratic Republic (GDR), and then as a city official in St. Petersburg.
His words and deeds over these years demonstrate that his original and enduring goal has been to return Russia to great power status with all the trappings that accompany such a position, including the domination of neighbouring states. From this perspective, the war in Ukraine would primarily be the result of Putin’s desire to end Ukraine’s persistent efforts to escape the Russian orbit. Rather than try to explain the war in Ukraine as a consequence of great power competition, it seems to me more likely that the war is the outcome of great power/lesser power dynamics.
The current debate over responsibility for the war in Ukraine effectively began with an article written by John Mearsheimer in 2014, which argued that the West was at fault for the events leading up to Russia’s annexation of Crimea. Mearsheimer sees the ongoing conflict in Ukraine as a consequence of NATO’s 2008 declaration that Ukraine would (someday) become a member of the Alliance. On several occasions since the war began in February 2022, Mearsheimer has reiterated his view that NATO’s engagement with Ukraine sparked Putin’s decision to take military action.
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