과목명 : 글로벌이슈와 국제협력

담당교수 : 문경희 교수님

전공 : 국제관계학과
학번 : 20220592
이름 : 김민호
Russia vs Ukraine. How it came to the big war
    
 Russian armored vehicles of Ukraine on exercises near the borders, December 2021

The prerequisites for tension in relations between Russia and Ukraine and the start of a big
war unleashed on the morning of February 24 have been developing for more than a dozen
years. Russian President Vladimir Putin's arguments go back even further, to the Middle
Ages, when parts of what is now Ukraine and Russia were part of Kievan Rus. From there,
the thesis of the head of the Kremlin about "one people", to which he ranks the Belarusians.

At the same time, the President of the Russian Federation rarely recalls that Russians and
Ukrainians did not always have the same path and that as a result two languages and two
cultures were formed - related, but different. When both republics became separate
countries after the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was another difference, a political
one. Kyiv followed the path of Western democracies, with the change of power. Moscow
turned away from him.

The current war is the result of the policy of the last 30 years. It can be conditionally divided
into three stages, each of about ten years.

1992-2003: Ukraine leaves, Russia does not mind

In December 1991, Ukraine, together with Russia and Belarus, was one of the three
republics that sealed the collapse of the USSR in Belovezhskaya Pushcha. Moscow
apparently hoped to maintain influence with the help of the Commonwealth of
Independent States (CIS) and cheap gas supplies. But it turned out differently. Russia and
Belarus created a union state, Ukraine increasingly looked to the West.
the Kremlin, but Ukraine then inherited from the USSR almost a million strong army and the
third largest nuclear arsenal in the world. Kyiv refused the missiles, handing them over to
Russia in exchange for security guarantees (the Budapest Memorandum) and economic
assistance. While the West did not reciprocate Ukraine and was not going to integrate it into
its structures, Moscow's reaction looked restrained. There were no shots, except for the
incident with shooting in the air in 1992, when the Black Sea Fleet patrol ship raised the
Ukrainian flag and left Sevastopol for Odessa. Russia in the first post-Soviet decade was
economically weak, and the Chechen wars took away resources. By dividing the Black Sea
Fleet and signing the "Big Treaty" in 1997, the Russian Federation recognized the borders of
Ukraine, including Crimea.

2003-2013: Cracks in post-Soviet friendship

The first major diplomatic crisis between Moscow and Kiev occurred under President Putin.
In the fall of 2003, Russia suddenly began building a dam in the Kerch Strait towards the
Ukrainian island of Tuzla. Kyiv took this as an attempt to redistribute the borders. The
conflict was resolved after a personal meeting of the presidents. Construction was stopped,
but the declared friendship between the two countries received the first cracks.

In the 2004 Ukrainian presidential election, Russia actively supported the pro-Russian
candidate Viktor Yanukovych, but the “Orange Revolution “ prevented him from winning
amid allegations of fraud. Pro-Western politician Viktor Yushchenko became president. His
victory became the starting point for
changes in the policy of the Russian
Federation. They are aimed at
preventing what Moscow calls "color
revolutions" and blames the West
During Yushchenko's rule, the Russian
Federation twice blocked the gas valve
to Ukraine - in 2006 and 2009, which led Supporters of Yushchenko in Kyiv, Octber 2004
to interruptions in transit supplies to
Europe.

The key event for understanding the

current situation occurred in 2008. At the NATO summit in Bucharest, US President George
W. Bush tried to get Ukraine and Georgia to receive a Membership Action Plan (MAP). Putin
sharply opposed, Moscow made it clear that it does not fully recognize the independence of
Ukraine. As a result, Germany and France blocked Bush's plan. Both post-Soviet countries,
Ukraine and Georgia, were promised NATO membership, but no date.

Since it was not possible to quickly move into a military alliance, Ukraine set a course for
economic integration through an association agreement with the European Union. In the
summer of 2013, a few months before a possible signing, Russia began to exert massive
economic pressure on Ukraine, almost cutting off Ukrainian exports at the border. In
autumn, the government of Yanukovych, who became president in 2010, announced the
suspension of preparations for signing an agreement with Brussels, citing pressure from the
Russian Federation. Yanukovych's decision provoked protests in Ukraine, against which he
fled to Russia in February 2014.
2014-2021: Annexation of Crimea and war in Donbass
A power vacuum arose in Kyiv, and
in March 2014 Russia annexed
Crimea. It was a turning point, the
beginning of an undeclared war. At
the same time, Russian and local
paramilitary structures gave
impetus to separatism in the
Donbass, "people's republics" were
proclaimed in Donetsk and Luhansk,
Russian military during the annexation of Crimea, March 2014 which were led by people who had
come from the Russian Federation
in unmarked uniforms. Kyiv reacted slowly, waited for the presidential elections at the end
of May, and only then decided on a large-scale use of force, which it called the "anti-
terrorist operation" (ATO).
In early June 2014, in France, at events marking the 70th anniversary of the Allied landings
in Normandy, newly elected President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko met for the first time
with his Russian counterpart Putin through the mediation of the leaders of Germany and
France. This is how the "Norman format" was born. In the summer, the Ukrainian army
began to push back the separatists, but at the end of August, Russia, according to Kyiv, used
its army on a large scale in the Donbass. Moscow denies this. Ukrainian forces were
defeated near Ilovaisk, which was the peak of the conflict. The war along the entire front
line ended with the signing of a ceasefire in Minsk in September, which was quickly broken.

Then the positional war began. In early 2015, the separatists went on a broad offensive.
Kyiv again accused Moscow of using an army without identification marks, the Russian
Federation again denied everything. Ukrainian forces were defeated near the hub city of
Debaltseve, which they had to leave in a hurry. Then, with the mediation of Germany and
France, "Minsk-2" was signed, an agreement that still remains the main document for
resolving the conflict. None of its points
has been fully implemented, for which
the parties accuse each other.

The last time a breakthrough seemed

possible was in the summer and
autumn of 2019, when the parties Pro-Russian separatist tank near Donetsk, 2015
agreed and implemented the
withdrawal of forces in several areas.
But after the Normandy format summit
in Paris, there were no more meetings.
Russia refuses to communicate directly
with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, accusing him of failing to implement Minsk-2.
In 2021, the Russian Federation twice pulled troops to the borders of Ukraine - in spring and
late autumn. In December, President Putin for the first time issued an ultimatum to the
United States and NATO not to accept Ukraine and other post-Soviet countries into the
alliance, and not to provide them with military assistance. The Alliance refused.

2022: The beginning of the war of Russia against Ukraine

On February 21, 2022, Russian President Vladmir Putin recognized the independence of the
separatist "Donetsk People's Republic" and "Luhansk People's Republic". The relevant
documents were ratified by the country's parliament. Putin also stated that these
formations include the territories of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions of Ukraine. This is
much more than the region controlled by the separatists.
Early on the morning of February 24, the head of the Russian state announced the start of a
"special military operation" against Ukraine. He called its goal the "demilitarization" of the
country. The armed forces of the Russian Federation began to strike at the cities of Ukraine
and its military infrastructure - not only in the Donbass.