(I apologize for the roughness of the writing. I figured that with the crisis in Ukraine being as urgent as it is, and with Biden’s meeting with Putin, if it happens, presumably not far into the future, SPEED was what was called for, not craftsmanship. And speed did possibly matter in that I have reason to believe that the ideas presented below are heading in the direction of the people in our government that would be in a position to use them, if they thought the proposed approach useful.
As for the roughness, I’ll see if I can polish a bit of that off.
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Obviously, Putin warrants being called “an evil man” if anyone does. He kills his opponents. He enriches himself and leaves his people in relative poverty. He bullies his neighbors. With his aspiration to restore the superpower status of the Soviet Union shows his fixation on power, who works strategically to take things in the opposite direction that — ideally -- things should go.
But, if we take Putin out of the picture, and ask, “Does Russia have any legitimate complaints about the present security order in Europe?” it seems that Russia as a nation could make a case that the arrangements in place today don’t give Russia’s concern adequate weight.
Would the United States feel OK about that if it were Russian power heading toward us in a threatening way? Back in 1962, it was Russians putting nuclear missiles into Cuba—“90 miles from Florida” – that led JFK to take us to the brink of all-out nuclear war by confronting the Russians over what they were doing in a sovereign nation who agreed to have the Soviets.
(Of course, looking at Eastern Europe today, it doesn’t help that Russian behavior makes its smaller neighbors eager to become part of a NATO that will protect them from Russian intimidation and domination.)
So anyway, it seems likely that the present arrangement in Europe is unfair to the Russians. Likely, because much of the present arrangement was made at a time of unusual weakness for Russia. The West seems to have taken advantage of that weakness.
Russia was weak-- after the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the emergence of a new democracy of sorts led by a man who drank too much. At that time of Russian weakness (1997), NATO absorbed new members that had been part of the Russian-dominated Warsaw Pact and even parts of the previous Soviet Union (the Baltic states, which only a few years before had been under the thumb of the Communist Regime in Moscow.
Putin has been complaining for years about all this, and he couches his desires now in terms of this treatment, which he wants to rectify. Russia is stronger now, and it wants more say than it had in 1997.
The world is still much like how Thucydides had his Athenians describe it. “Matters of “right” arise only between equals in power. Otherwise, the Athenians say, the way of the world is that “The strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must.”
Accordingly, it seems, perhaps NATO unfairly advanced its powers as the strong wanted, and Russia had to suffer what it must. Until it is strong enough to insist otherwise.
It seems plausible, therefore, that things could be fairer. So it seems likely the under certain circumstances, it would be appropriate to make certain changes that Russia wants.
So what would the fairest arrangement in Europe be?
I don’t know. But with a regime like Putin’s — who bit off some of Georgia in 2008 and then took Crimea by force from Ukraine in 2014 — a fair arrangement has to take his conduct into account. It would not be fair to Russia’s neighbors to hand them back to a wolf that’s going to eat them.
The linkage is that what Russia gets is meaningfully connected to what the world needs from Russia.
- Russia gets some meaningful acknowledgment of its legitimate security interests.
- But changes in the security arrangement must be accompanied by changes in how Russia conducts itself.
Even if Putin turns down the offer, at the very least the West gets powerful talking points that put it in an advantageous position.
- The West can declare its desire for Russian security needs to be given fair consideration. But at the same time
- The West can take the equally noble position that it will not make changes that put the people in Eastern Europe in danger of losing their sovereignty and their rights because of an aggressive and domineering neighbor.
The West is covered. And Russia stands exposed.
That sets the standard that establishes the linkage.
Some kind of metric of Russian improvement toward becoming a more acceptable participant in the global order: like to right its wrongs with Georgian sovereignty and with its taking Crimea away from Ukraine by force.
And on the other side, establishing some corresponding series of steps in which Russian improvement is accompanied by giving Russia more fair consideration of their legitimate security needs.
Anyway, some such agreement would doubly improve the international order -— making Russia a better behaved player on the world stage, which would never any more try to murder the regime’s opponents all the way over in the U.S.
And it would avoid the war that has been threatening, which would create a huge rift in the international order, perhaps taking us back to a Cold War situation, in which the self-destruction of our civilization is not out of the realm of possibility, given what nearly happened in the last Cold War in 1962, at the time of the Cuban-Missile Crisis.
Humankind absolutely needs to create a better international order, if the nuclear holocaust that might have happened in 1962 isn’t eventually to happen. And who knows how far ahead that worst-case scenario gets played out?
But over the long haul, what can happen, will happen.
So it’s a race against time to get the international order that would be compatible with the long-term survival of human civilization before our international disorder — that puts a monster like Putin in a position to tear up that order as much as he does, and threatens now to do even more so — eventually throws us Snake Eyes, and the Cuban Missile Crisis Gone Bad gets acted out.
So how much better it is, not only for this moment, but for the whole destiny of the creature who took the path of civilization on this planet, something that develops over millennia up to the point where that civilization wields powers with which it could destroy itself.
- More fairness strengthens the order.
- More respect for other, weaker sovereign nations also improves the international order.
Whereas a Russian invasion of Ukraine along with the consequences (like crushing sanctions) would provide a huge impetus of brokenness into the world system, and leave the international order in far worse condition than it was in the 1990s.
Which means that — in terms of the crucial dimension of “the international order” — humanity would have lost ground, over the past thirty years. Losing ground is hardly OK when it may be a matter of life and death whether we’re able to move forward enough, quickly enough, to make human civilization something that can survive — and thrive — over the long haul.