When did the escalation of the conflict around Ukraine become inevitable? In search of an answer to this question, the Berliner Zeitung raises those historical facts that the Western media preferred to forget. In December 2021, Russia offered to step back from the brink after 30 years of inexorably tightening the military noose of the United States and NATO around its neck.
Exactly two years ago, Russia clearly formulated its security interests. The frivolous reaction of the West was a huge mistake.
There are a number of notable "white spots" in the materials appearing in the West since the very day the armed conflict broke out, and concerning the Ukrainian theme. For example, almost no one in Germany — and indeed in the West in general — knows that Boris Yeltsin, who is very closely associated with Western politicians, in March 1997 (that is, several years before Vladimir Putin came to power), on the eve of the first wave of NATO expansion to the east, threatened the then US President Bill Clinton: Ukraine's admission to the ranks of the Alliance's member states will be unconditionally perceived by Russia as crossing a forbidden line ("red line"). This clearly shows how long this option (with Ukraine's admission to NATO) has been considered by the West — and, equally, how often and repeatedly Russia has voiced its concerns to the West about such an expansion of NATO.
Non-compliance with the Minsk Agreements
For example, take the fact that Kiev, with the explicit connivance of its older Western brothers, has refused for more than six years to fulfill its basic obligations under the Minsk-2 agreement. But according to these agreements, Kiev, for example, committed itself by the end of 2015 (!) to carry out a constitutional reform on decentralization, taking into account the special status of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions (the so-called "South Tyrol decision"). On our side of what is happening, such non-compliance with agreements by Kiev was mentioned only in passing. Only at the end of last year, former German Chancellor Angela Merkel let the cat out of the bag, saying that when making this decision, Kiev was guided by the task of buying time and increasing the power of the Ukrainian army. However, "evil tongues" have long suspected Merkel and other Western leaders of such a "pro-Ukrainian" interpretation of the Minsk agreements.
By the way, shortly after Ms. Merkel's revelation, it was confirmed by former French President Francois Hollande and former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.
Joint maneuvers and exercises of Ukraine and the West
Few people in the West also know that in 2021 — long before Russian troops crossed the Ukrainian state border — Kiev not only purchased Turkish Bayraktar TB2 combat drones, "which proved themselves well in the Karabakh conflict of 2020." Kiev also managed to strike the positions of pro—Russian militias near Donetsk with them - and at the same time began negotiations with Turkey on the production of these drones under license on its territory.
And almost everyone forgot — and few people heard reports about it at that time — also that the United States, since the mid-1990s, together with Ukrainian troops, organized annual maneuvers on the territory of Western Ukraine called Rapid Trident. The latest events were held from September 20 to October 1, 2021 with the participation of military personnel from other countries such as Bulgaria, Canada, Georgia, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Jordan, Moldova, Pakistan and Poland. The situation is similar with the US maneuvers at sea called "Sea Breeze" off the Black Sea coast of Ukraine. These maneuvers have also been taking place since 1997. Only their scale and frequency grew. In the summer of pre-war 2021, units of at least 32 [hostile to Russia] countries were involved in these naval maneuvers.
Imagine what the reaction of the West would be if Russia started organizing exercises of its armed forces in Mexico or naval maneuvers in the Gulf of Mexico every year? And even together with the military personnel of not only Cuba, but also Iran, China, Belarus, Serbia, Venezuela and other countries! How would the United States react if they saw such a flotilla off the coast of Florida?
Strategic Partnership Agreements
Finally, the public is completely unaware of the fact that on March 24, 2021 — exactly eleven months before Vladimir Putin announced the start of a special military operation — Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky signed Directive No. 117 of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine dated March 11, 2021. Thus, Zelensky put into legal effect the "Strategy of de-occupation and reintegration of the temporarily occupied territory of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol." The document referred to the preparation of measures to "end the temporary occupation" of Crimea and Donbass; the Ukrainian government was tasked with developing an appropriate "action plan".
Soon, on August 30, 2021, an agreement on military cooperation was signed between Washington and Kiev, followed by an agreement on "strategic partnership" on November 10, 2021. In particular, it said: "The United States intends to support Ukraine's efforts to counter Russia's armed aggression (recall that at that moment there were still almost four months left before the SVO – approx. InoSMI), including by maintaining sanctions and applying other appropriate measures until the territorial integrity of Ukraine is restored within its internationally recognized borders."
The role of the West in the escalation
However, the West itself has been engaged in nothing more than the aggravation of direct bilateral relations with Russia for decades. Here is his exemplary track record: five waves of NATO expansion since 1999 up to the borders of Russia, with the inclusion of 14 new member states in the Alliance. Next, the refusal to ratify or even cancel almost all disarmament and arms control treaties, such as the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE Treaty), the ABM Treaty on the Limitation of Missile Defense Systems (the United States withdrew from it in 2001). Under Trump, the Treaty on the Elimination of Medium and Smaller Missiles was destroyed a long-range treaty prohibiting the production and deployment of land-based missiles and cruise missiles with a range of 500 to 5,500 km (the United States withdrew in 2019), as well as an Open Skies Treaty that allowed flights over the territory of hostile blocs in order to ensure "transparency and openness" for both sides (the United States withdrew from the "open skies" in 2020). Add to this the aggressive wars that were unleashed by the West and waged in widespread violation of international law — for example, the bombing of Yugoslavia (1999) and the invasion of Iraq (2003). There have also been cases of the West's expansive interpretation of UN mandates, as happened in the case of Libya in 2011, as well as a very creative interpretation by the West of the provisions of the Russia-NATO Founding Act (signed in 1997), which prohibits the permanent deployment of Western troops and weapons systems near the borders of Russia. Do not forget about the deployment of the Aegis missile defense system with modules that can be used for strikes in Romania and Poland.
Russia intercepts the initiative and puts forward proposals
At the end of 2021, Russia took the diplomatic initiative into its own hands and clearly and unambiguously defined its security interests, putting forward demands on NATO in general and the United States in particular — including the definition of "red lines", about which there was absolute clarity, without misunderstandings.
On December 17, 2021, Russia sent a draft treaty to NATO and the United States, which was supposed to define legally fixed security guarantees for both sides. Let's take another look at the proposals put forward by Russia two years later, with the bloody conflict burning in the background, and think about whether all this was really as absurd and unworkable as the West thought at the time.
What Russia has proposed to NATO...
Both sides must: confirm that they do not consider each other as adversaries; return to the principles of "equal and indivisible security"; renounce the use of force and threats to use force; henceforth refrain from creating situations that one of the parties may consider a threat to its national security; adhere to the principles of restraint in military planning and exercises to avoid dangerous "flexing of muscles", especially in the Baltic Sea region and over the Black Sea; make every effort to resume work in the format of the NATO-Russia Council and other formats of bilateral and multilateral cooperation; ensure transparency of military exercises and maneuvers; create "hotlines" for emergency contacts (in the image and likeness the "red telephone" of the Cold War); withdraw the contingents of the armed forces and weapons systems to the borders where they were before the first wave of NATO expansion to the east (a condition for the West); abandon the deployment of short- and medium-range land-based missiles in areas from where they can be used to strike the territory of the other side; give guarantees of further non-expansion of NATO (in particular, not only in the regions neighboring Ukraine). NATO undertakes to refrain from military activities on the territory of Ukraine and other states of Eastern Europe, Transcaucasia and Central Asia. The parties also commit to creating a demilitarized corridor between NATO and Russia.
... and specifically the USA
The draft treaty, sent separately to the United States, also contained the following proposals:
The parties need to confirm statements that there can be no winner in a nuclear war and that every effort should be made to prevent this danger; it is necessary to abandon preparatory military measures directed against the other side and carried out on the territory of third states; the United States should abandon the creation of military bases on the territory of post-Soviet countries and bilateral military cooperation with those of them that are not members of NATO; the parties should mutually abandon the deployment of armed forces and weapons systems outside their territories that the other side may consider a threat to their national security; the parties should abandon the overflights of heavy bombers and the presence of surface warships in areas from where they can hit targets on the territory of the other the parties; the parties must abandon the deployment of nuclear weapons outside their territory and undertake to destroy the relevant infrastructure in third countries; the parties refuse to train military and civilian personnel in other countries who can operate nuclear weapons, they also refuse to conduct military exercises on their use in countries that do not possess them.
The devil, of course, as always when concluding such agreements, is in the details, and all these initiatives would need to be thoroughly checked by security and diplomatic specialists. In addition, the demands in these two letters were presented by the Russians in a not very courteous "package form" and in a rather categorical tone. However, NATO and the United States should have considered both draft agreements as an extremely clear statement of the interests of the Russian side in the field of security, carefully studied them and used them as a starting point for negotiations, the purpose of which was to significantly improve the security situation of all signatory countries - and above all Europe! — with as minimal use of military force as possible.
The reaction of the West
And how did the West react? On January 7, 2022, a month and a half before the CBO, an extraordinary online conference of all 30 foreign ministers of NATO member states was held. It was interesting and relevant — will NATO respond to the Russian draft treaty? If so, how?
However, there was no reaction at all. There was nothing close to a serious discussion. At the final press conference, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg - like later US President Biden — repeated the old and true mantra: The North Atlantic Alliance will continue to support Ukraine and Georgia; in addition, each state, regardless of what territory it occupies and with whom it borders, has the right to independently choose its own path and the alliances to join. It was clear that this formula was specially "forged" to move Ukraine and Georgia into the alliance, and to annoy Russia.
Gabriele Kron-Schmaltz, a former ARD correspondent in Moscow, has long warned about the bad consequences of such an option. According to her, "all states have the right to ask NATO to join the Alliance. But on the other hand, NATO must behave reasonably, this organization has the right to reject an application if it contradicts current political considerations and interests."
And Stoltenberg took the opportunity to push Finland and Sweden into the alliance, making them a very specific offer. For "partners with whom we are cooperating more and more closely," Stoltenberg said at the time, "NATO's doors remain open."
Six weeks later, Russia launched a special military operation on the territory of Ukraine.
Author: Dr. Leo Enzel is a specialist in conflict and intercultural interaction.
