A Drive Through History into a Foggy Future: The Russian-Ukrainian War
The Russian-Ukrainian war shook the world with its dire consequences, and it might have shocked many. Still, this bloody turmoil’s genesis didn’t occur overnight; rather, an accumulation of past events gave birth to this war. So, what are these events, and how has the war impacted the world? Additionally, what can we do to prevent such a tragic event from taking place again?
The Beginning: The Transfer of Crimea in 1954:
Crimea was a part of Russia from 1783 until it was transferred from the Russian Soviet Federation of Socialist Republics (RSFSR) to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic (UkrSSR). Its population is 75% Russian and 25% Ukrainian, and it is geographically near Ukraine, which will explain the reasons for the transfer.
The Russians claim that the transfer was a commemoration of the 300th anniversary of the “reunification of Ukraine with Russia” (a reference to the Treaty of Pereyaslav signed in 1654 by representatives of the Ukrainian Cossack Hetmanate and Tsar Aleksei I of Muscovy). It was messaged as a gesture done out of trust and love for the Ukrainians, with the commonalities of their economies, and the close agricultural and cultural ties between the Crimean Oblast and the UkrSSR. But actually, it was an indirect way for Russia to assert its dominance over Ukraine, and this transfer will prove to be drastic for Ukraine later on (Why Did Russia Give Away Crimea Sixty Years Ago?, n.d.).
Ukraine’s Declaration of Independence in 1991:
After some hard-line communists arranged for the August 1991 coup that led to the weakening and eventual fall of the Soviet Union, Ukraine declared its independence from Moscow on August 24th, 1991, after 92% of the Ukrainians supported independence, and elected Leonid Kravchuk as president (CFR.org Editors, 2019). Immediate reprisal from the USSR may have been feared but was not to be due to the fall of the Soviet Union later that month
Later, Ukraine became a highly developed industrial base with rich agricultural capabilities and nuclear weapons on its territory. It tried to maintain relations with Russia while also signing agreements with its other neighbours. This did not sit well with Russia, as its goal was to keep the upper hand on ongoing situations taking place in its sphere of influence.
The Orange Revolution in 2004:
This revolution took place to prevent Viktor Yanukovych, a candidate backed by the Russians, from stealing the Ukrainian presidency, which was made possible thanks to the Orange Revolution. Viktor Yushchenko was elected president, leading to the rise of Democracy in Ukraine. At this point, Ukraine had formed closer ties with the European Union and NATO (Nouthemes, 2024). This angered Russia, who perceived it as a hostile attempt by Europe and North America to interfere with Russia’s internal affairs and viewed it as a threat to its regional influence.
The Annexation of Crimea in 2014:
Russia initiated the annexation process under the claim that it was protecting the rights of ethnic Russians in Crimea, where a wave of pro-Russian rallies broke out, organised by Russian proxies to violate Ukraine’s territorial integrity. These took place in cities in the east and south of Ukraine – Luhansk, Donetsk, Mariupol, Kharkiv, Kherson, and Odesa. They were Protests that called for the formation of separate republics, and protesters carried Russian flags (The History of Russia’s Aggression in Ukraine, 2024).
As annexation commenced, the Russian military seized the premises of the parliament and the councils of ministers in Crimea, in addition to blocking airports and land entrances to the peninsula. Russia denied military involvement, but both Ukraine and NATO reported the build-up of Russian troops and military equipment near Donetsk and Russian cross-border shelling immediately following Crimea’s annexation. The net result was 4,886 tragic deaths (World Bank Open Data, n.d.).
Pre-2022 War:
In March 2018, the U.S. Department of State approved the sale of anti-tank weapons to Ukraine, the first sale of lethal weaponry since the conflict began. In October 2018, Ukraine joined the United States and seven other NATO countries in a series of large-scale air exercises in western Ukraine. The exercises came after Russia held its own annual military exercises in September 2018, the largest since the fall of the Soviet Union (War in Ukraine | Global Conflict Tracker, n.d.).
In October 2021, after months of intelligence gathering and observations of Russian troop movements, it was concluded that there would be a near-certain mass-scale Russian attack on Ukraine. In mid-December 2021, Russia’s foreign ministry called on the United States and NATO to cease military activity in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, and prevent Ukraine from joining NATO in the future; otherwise, a war would break out. The United States and other NATO allies rejected these demands and threatened to impose severe economic sanctions if Russia took aggressive action against Ukraine.
The Russian-Ukrainian War in 2022:
On February 24, 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin authorised a “special military operation” against the country. In his statement, Putin claimed that the goal of the operation was to “demilitarize and denazify Ukraine” and end the alleged genocide of Russians in Ukrainian territory (Walker, N. 2023). The “special military operation” consisted of a full-scale land, sea, and air invasion of Ukraine, with forces crossing into the country from Belarus in the north, Russia in the east, and Crimea in the south, targeting Ukrainian military assets and cities across the country.
The 2022 Russian-Ukrainian War’s Major Events:
Putin’s main goal was to seize Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital. Despite Russia’s plans to take over the capital in only three days, Ukrainian defenders succeeded in resisting and repealing the Russian forces’ attacks, saving Kyiv from Russia’s ruthless grip.
In March 2022, Russia launched a massive missile attack on Kharkiv, and Russian forces entered Kherson. Kherson became the only Ukrainian regional centre that was temporarily captured during the full-scale invasion. Russia carried out an armed seizure of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, where they have put the power plant in constant danger with the shelling of the infrastructure, mining of the site, and the unsafe storage of military equipment and ammunition near nuclear reactors.
In April 2022, the Kyiv, Chernihiv, and Sumy regions were entirely liberated from Russian troops. Then, in September 2022, almost all of the Kharkiv region was liberated from Russian occupation in a rapid counter-offensive by Ukrainian forces. More than 8,500 square kilometres returned to Ukrainian control, and in November 2022, the city of Kherson was liberated after eight months of Russian occupation.
In June 2023, in just a week, Ukrainian defenders liberated 7 settlements – Lobkove, Levadne, Novodarivka, Neskuchne, Storozheve, Makarivka, and Blahodatne – during the counteroffensive operations in the Donetsk and Tavriia axis in addition to the village of Rivnopil in the Donetsk region later on that month.
In July 2023, Russia terminated the Black Sea Grain Initiative. The deal was created in July 2022 to unblock some of the Ukrainian seaports and allow the export of Ukrainian crops to Asia, Africa, and Europe. Later on in August, Ukraine announced a temporary corridor in the Black Sea for merchant ships sailing to and from Ukrainian ports. By the end of 2023, this corridor allowed the export of more than 15 million tons of cargo, including 10 million tons of agricultural products (War in Ukraine | Global Conflict Tracker, n.d.). However, Russia’s attacks are still ongoing to this day, and Ukrainians are still fighting for their lives and country.
The Aftermath:
The war has stifled the global economy. Costs have climbed even further, and inflation rates are far outpacing wage growth, due in large part to the economic sanctions imposed on Russia and its destructive attacks on Ukraine. The aftermath of the war was the diminished health and well-being of people worldwide, especially the poorest.
Combined, Ukraine and Russia were the world’s largest exporters of wheat – responsible for over a third (36%) of wheat exports. They also exported more than half of the world’s sunflower oil, and Russia was a reputable source of oil and gas. However, after the war, U.S. President Joe Biden and European allies issued severe sanctions against top Kremlin officials, including Putin and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov; four of Russia’s largest banks; and the Russian oil and gas industry, which, in turn, has resulted in:
Global Food Insecurity:
The conflict has exacerbated global food insecurity and increased the risk of famine, especially in developing and emerging economies, as wheat exports from Russia and Ukraine have been dramatically impeded. Nearly 258 million people in 58 countries/territories were in a food crisis or moderate-to-severe acute food insecurity in 2022 – up from 193 million in 53 countries/territories in 2021. This is the highest figure on record since the organisation began reporting these data in 2017 (Economics Observatory, 2024).
Soaring Energy Prices:
The severe economic sanctions on Russia have triggered further increases in energy prices in the international market. The end result is further inflation, as energy adds costs to each stage – production, storage, and transport – in the supply chains of goods and services. During the first two weeks of the war, Brent prices – the European oil benchmark – increased by more than 25%. By the end of March, European gas prices were around 580% higher than a year earlier, although they have fallen back since then.
Some viewed the sanctioning as a positive step as it would push countries to use cleaner energy sources and be more eco-friendly. Still, sadly, that proved to be challenging as the alternatives, such as liquefied natural gas (LNG), proved to be more expensive than conventional oil and gas. The EU was the largest collective buyer of Russian oil – buying 42% of Russia’s oil output in 2021 (Economics Observatory, 2024).
Impacts on Global Financial Markets:
The war has evidently affected global businesses and consumers. Evidence from the global stock market reveals that firms with strong ties to Russia, through trade or ownership, experienced a substantial fall in share prices following the invasion. On average, trade links with Russia caused a 1.53% drop in the value of each country’s aggregate stock market index (Economics Observatory, 2024). Still, some countries are far more dependent on Russia than others. European countries are the most affected, where East European countries are most affected through trade links, whereas West European countries are the most affected through ownership linkages. In contrast, countries that are less closely linked to Russia, such as the United States and China, have suffered less.
Conclusion:
No one is a fan of war. The world should wake up and stop being selfish and passive. Instead of focusing on the mass destruction taking place and wallowing in it, one should realize that we all have the same goal, which is to have a healthy, prosperous world. To achieve that, we have to focus on how to blow the dust off of the destruction and start constructing sustainable ways to better our world and, hopefully, avoid such tragedies in the future.
Works Cited
World Bank Open Data. (n.d.). World Bank Open Data. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/VC.BTL.DETH?end=2022&locations=UA&start=2014&view=chart
Why did Russia give away Crimea sixty years ago? (n.d.). Wilson Center. https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/why-did-russia-give-away-crimea-sixty-years-ago
War in Ukraine | Global Conflict Tracker. (n.d.). Global Conflict Tracker. https://www.cfr.org/global-conflict-tracker/conflict/conflict-ukraine
Nouthemes. (2024, March 3). Understanding the historical context of the Russia-Ukra. . . Invastor. https://www.invastor.com/blog/12131-Understanding-the-Historical-Context-of-the-RussiaUkraine-Conflict-A-Comprehensive-Overview/?gad_source=1&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI7pmS3va6hAMVaVJBAh1BIAiWEAMYASAAEgI9JvD_BwE
Economics Observatory. (2024, February 20). Ukraine: what’s the global economic impact of Russia’s invasion? - Economics Observatory. https://www.economicsobservatory.com/ukraine-whats-the-global-economic-impact-of-russias-invasion
CFR.org Editors. (2019, November 8). Ukraine’s struggle for independence in Russia’s shadow. Council on Foreign Relations. https://www.cfr.org/timeline/ukraines-struggle-independence-russias-shadow
The history of Russia’s aggression in Ukraine. HOW LONG DOES RUSSIA’S AGGRESSION AGAINST UKRAINE REALLY LAST? (2024). https://war.ukraine.ua/the-histrory-of-russian-aggression-in-ukraine
Walker, N. (2023, October 18). Conflict in Ukraine: A timeline (current conflict, 2022 - present). Conflict in Ukraine: A timeline (current conflict, 2022 – present). https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-9847
