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In the first week of Russia’s aggression on Ukraine, the scariest
moments were two of Putin’s speeches: one on Monday, February 21 and
the other, as he was beginning the war, on February 24. There was
the usual discourse that goes with wars of aggression, where
attacking is defending, invasion is prevention and aggressors are
the victims. But there was also something that made the speeches
much more menacing and showed the meaning better than the words
themselves. It was the genuine, passionate hatred and contempt that
Putin showed for Ukraine and its people. There was nothing
artificial or fake there. He was dehumanizing Ukrainians, denying
the right of Ukraine to exist, and more or less openly threatening
nuclear attack on anybody who might consider coming to their aid. In
the meantime, this “more or less” has disappeared, and Russia’s
nuclear deterrence forces have officially been put on full alert.
The dehumanization of the other side, the enemy, is a textbook tool
in trying to justify and make it easier for soldiers to
indiscriminately kill the people they are invading. This, more than
anything else, showed the true meaning of the three objectives set
forward by Putin: demilitarization, de-Nazification and
stabilization. In this context, demilitarization means stripping
Ukraine of all means to defend itself, its independence and
territorial integrity; de-Nazification means killing Ukraine’s
democratically elected president and government; and stabilization
means installing a puppet regime under Russia’s control.
It should come as no surprise that it was an African leader, Kenya’s
Permanent Representative to the UN Martin Kimani, that best
recognized Putin’s war for what it was. Instead of approaching it as
a security, nationalism, energy, economic or rivalry with the West
issue, Kimani explained it in terms of neo-colonialism. It is an
attempt to “stoke the embers of a dead empire” and to re-colonize a
former dependent. In the disdain and hatred Putin showed in his
speech, African and African-American leaders and analysts recognized
the emotions of racism, further proving that racism is caused by
delusions of supremacy rather than race differences. It doesn’t say
that all the other things like security, economy etc., are also not
relevant. But the essence of the aggression is an attempt to
re-colonize Ukraine.
In the hours, days and nights after Putin brought his war to
Ukraine, Ukrainians have taught the world many things. They have
demonstrated once again how essential true leadership is always, but
especially in times of crisis. Steady, confident, involved, hands-on
leadership by Ukrainian president Zelensky has not only mobilized
and inspired his own people. In less than a week it has unified the
EU, changed Germany’s decades-long defense policy and raised its
defense spending to above 2% of its GDP, an issue on which for years
they would not budge despite all threats and insults by Donald
Trump. It has played a major role in introducing sanctions that will
hurt the West but have isolated Russia and could easily bankrupt the
Russian economy. It has made non-NATO Sweden and Finland send
military equipment to Ukraine. It has persuaded fanatically neutral
Switzerland to freeze Russian assets. And it has given the 21st
century its first hero. Personal integrity in the most trying of
times by one of Europe’s most unlikely of leaders, has changed
politics in Europe. This war has also shown again how important it
is to know and face reality. There is no hope for authoritarian
regimes – in the end they cannot avoid the psychosis known as “the
personality cult”, that destroys their own state institutions and
damages society. It removes the leader from understanding and
relating to reality. It is quite obvious that what Putin expected in
Ukraine was a combination of welcome and surrender, and therefore a
quick and successful operation. This shows that he didn’t understand
Ukraine of 2022, but also that he didn’t know much about his own
army, its readiness and motivation for a war without an enemy.
Despite all the assurances of his cronies, the Russians do not see
Ukrainians as the enemy. All this in the first four days of the war!
Now, the war is far from over and many tragic things might and will
still happen. We all hope it will end soon, with a negotiated peace,
with an independent and democratic Ukraine standing and with the
Russian people able to rejoin the world. But regardless of what
happens, none of these lessons and effects will go away. They are
here to stay.
This war has and will have long term consequences for the whole
world. But it is already having particularly tangible and
potentially dangerous consequences for the Western Balkans. In this
small area of Southeastern Europe Putin has some of his staunchest
supporters. The Serb leader in Bosnia Herzegovina Milorad Dodik, the
political leadership in Serbia and the Democratic Front Party of
Montenegro have turned from Putin’s sidekicks, used to threaten
Europe with instability on its borders, into the few remaining
allies supporting his aggression on Ukraine. The Serbian leadership
likes to equate the Russian bombing of Ukraine with NATO’s bombing
of Serbia in 1999. This would be sad if it wasn’t so offensive both
to Ukraine and to common sense. NATO bombing came after Milošević’s
regime had already started a short war in Slovenia, a long and
devastating war in Croatia and an even longer and genocidal war in
Bosnia Herzegovina. It was its fourth war in ten years, after years
of apartheid against Albanian population in Kosovo and after about
50% of Kosovo’s population was on the run trying to escape brutality
and ethnic cleansing by Milošević forces. So Milošević’s regime in
the 1990s cannot be compared to democratic Ukraine today.
But we in the Balkans have something else to learn from Ukraine, as
does the entire world. In their hour of deadly danger Ukrainians did
not summon hate to mobilize their people and give them courage. They
made a point of not fighting the Russian people but fighting Putin’s
policies and aggression. They have established a hot line for
parents of Russian soldiers who didn’t even know where they were
going. They publicized the capture of a 19-year-old Russian soldier
who is being given a phone by his Ukrainian captors to call his mom.
They are sending the message that they also do not see the Russian
people as the enemy. Even in the midst of war the Ukrainian
leadership seem to be mindful of their society in the future. They
don’t use hate as a weapon because they obviously understand that it
is in the end most damaging for their own society. Societies recover
much faster from war than from hate.
Experience teaches us that compassion, especially in times of war
and great disasters, has, unfortunately, a short shelf-life. As the
war is getting more brutal and Russian forces attack with their full
might, the distinction between the Russian people and boy-soldiers
and Putin’s regime will get blurred in the eyes of the Ukrainians.
But neither they nor we should ever forget this lesson of the first
days of Ukrainian resistance. Because whatever happens, in the end
Ukrainians will have to rebuild their state, and this should be
cherished as an important legacy. |
