Original to:
https://www.dhakatribune.com/op-ed/2022/03/18/ukraine-and-the-new-world-order
Ukraine and the New World Order
By Vivek Menezes, St Patrick's Day, 2022 ;-)
We have seen precisely this before, and Europe is doing it all over again
It may be a universal sentiment -- some scholars credit it as “unattributable”
-- with reverberations of its wisdom in everything from Plato to the oeuvre of
“Piano Man” Billy Joel.
In our contemporary reading, however, the phrase mostly refers to the two World
Wars instigated in Europe in the first half of the 20th century, that wrought
unimaginable destruction across the planet. Everyone was affected, and even
here in the subcontinent -- which was mercifully spared the brunt -- there are
locations like Kohima (*) which witnessed epic carnage of the kind no one in
their right mind might want to revisit.
So difficult then, for any student of history, to watch the West tie itself in
knots while hand-wringing impotently over what exactly to do after Vladimir
Putin’s Russia has invaded Ukraine. We have seen precisely this before, and
Europe is doing it all over again nonetheless.
In his daily video address on March 16, Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy
called Putin “a war criminal” while directly addressing the Russian people with
the pointed question, “how does your blockade of Mariupol differ from the
blockade of Leningrad during WWII?”
Zelenskiy’s thrust is clear -- there is no difference.
He is implying that Russia will eventually break itself apart in the face of
heroic resistance, just as the Wehrmacht foundered, weakened, and retreated
from Leningrad despite its all-out siege that famously extended for “two years,
four months, two weeks, and five days.”
In fact, that kind of result is highly unlikely.
Either the Russians will methodically grind through Ukrainian defenses, to an
inevitable military victory (which cannot possibly be delayed longer than the
extent of the coming summer months). Or, it’s possible there will be a cease
fire, which may be close after both sides say they have already agreed on the
main elements to compel truce.
That happenstance -- which we must pray will occur as soon as possible -- will
still leave major questions, each one loaded with ingredients for resumed
conflict.
Paramount amongst these is the problem of Putin himself -- can he be restored
to the kind of status quo that existed just a few weeks ago, as just another
“normal” world leader? Can the likes of Biden -- who just recently called his
counterpart “war criminal” -- afford comity after this supposed point of no
return?
Even more important, but perhaps less immediate, is the nature of settlement
imposed on the region. Will Russia be forced to retreat to pre-war positions,
and will future generations of Ukrainians be allowed substantial freedoms to
pursue their own destiny?
There are fiendishly difficult conundrums, with endlessly thorny implications.
Thus, for just one example, it should not be lost on anyone that the costly
settlement forced upon Germany at Versailles in 1919 directly laid the ground
for the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party.
Whatever happens next, it’s already clear that the old world order --
inequitable, exploitative, flawed, and bloody as it was -- has been effectively
demolished. We already live in another paradigm altogether.
As the highly perceptive geopolitical analyst Bruno Maçães wrote in The New
Statesman earlier this week: “We now live in the middle of a great recession”
where “American power is everywhere retreating, leaving behind vacuums that
others strive to fill.” (**)
In Ukraine, that decline “is magnified by the incipience of European power,
creating a combustible mixture, a propitious landscape for a war of worlds.
[Here] the end of the American empire is taking an even grimmer form than in
Afghanistan: A war of genocide whose declared goal is the extermination of
Ukrainian nationhood.”
What’s next?
Martin Wolf laid out one set of scenarios in the Financial Times, starting with
this summation: “A new world is being born. The hope for peaceful relations is
fading. Instead, we have Russia’s war on Ukraine, threats of nuclear
Armageddon, a mobilized West, an alliance of autocracies, unprecedented
economic sanctions, and a huge energy and food shock. No one knows what will
happen. But we do know this looks to be a disaster.”
Wolf says that after the battle Austerlitz in 1805, William Pitt the Younger
said, presciently: “Roll up the map [of Europe]; it will not be needed these 10
years.”
He concludes: “Russia’s war on Ukraine has similarly transformed the map of our
world. A prolonged bout of stagflation seems certain, with large potential
effects on financial markets. In the long term, the emergence of two blocs with
deep splits between them is likely, as is an accelerating reversal of
globalization and sacrifice of business interests to geopolitics. Even nuclear
war is, alas, conceivable. Pray for a miracle in Moscow. Without it, the road
ahead will be long and hard.” (***)
Vivek Menezes is a writer and photographer based in Goa, India.
(*) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Kohima
(**)
https://www.newstatesman.com/podcasts/world-review-podcast/2022/03/why-russia-gambled-on-ukraine-with-bruno-mac%CC%A7a%CC%83es
(Free limited registration needed/ paywall)
(***) Martin Wolf in FT: paywalled
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