Washington: When Russian President Vladimir Putin decided to invade Ukraine, he ruptured global stability. Less than two years after the world had been rocked by what became the most devastating pandemic in a century, the biggest land war in Europe since the Second World War had started.
Russian nationalism collided with Ukrainian nationalism, as a young state, born just three decades ago, challenged the designs of those who wanted to revert to a pre-1991 Soviet or even a pre-1917 Czarist era. There is little doubt that Ukraine’s leadership, civil society and citizens have offered a brave model of resistance. But the war in Ukraine was never just a local war on the eastern periphery of Europe.
Its roots were deeper and its consequences have been wider. As the year has progressed, the war has reshaped the wider international system as well as the positions of the United States of America, Russia, Europe, China, and the global south within this system. The story isn’t over yet, for how the battle evolves on the ground in Ukraine in the coming few months will determine what the future world order looks like. Any conclusion is, at best, tentative at the moment, but with that caveat, certain broad trends are discernible.
Take the international system first.
Even as the war has shown the extent of globalisation — a military battle in a small European pocket can cause the trifecta of food, fuel and fertiliser crisis in the farthest reaches of Latin America, Africa and Asia — and has revealed the hollowness of the global governance architecture — for instance the United Nations — in being able to address conflicts. It has marked, quite decisively, the end of the post-Cold War era and the return of great power competition. It has shown that hard military power remains the critical variable in a conflict, but cyber capabilities, intelligence and espionage, and control over information domains, new technologies and economic and financial instruments matter too. It has forced states to reset their security approaches to bolster defences and economic policies to reduce dependencies. And it has led to the European and Indo-Pacific theatres as being viewed as an integrated space, rather than two distinct categories.
All of this has got reflected in the policies of major powers, as they either participate in the war, directly or indirectly, or watch carefully to learn lessons.
To the US, the Russian invasion confirmed its worst suspicions that Moscow, under Putin, hadn’t made peace with the post-1991 order in Europe. President Joe Biden’s efforts to reset ties with Putin in Geneva in the middle of 2021 was an attempt to buy peace in Europe and reorient America towards the challenge of the future: China. But by the end of 2021, the US knew that Russia was preparing to mount an offensive in Ukraine.
Washington’s decision to declassify intelligence about Russia’s war preparations proved to be smart and accurate. It armed Ukraine to help mount a resistance. It forged together a strong transatlantic coalition and revived the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO). It unleashed the strongest ever sanctions regime against Russia. It ensured that while supporting Kyiv, the US did not directly get involved in the battleground and calibrated its weapons delivery in a manner that would prevent an escalation of the war into a direct Russia-NATO conflict. And through all of this, Washington showed that it remained a formidable power with the ability to influence and shape a conflict in a distant geography. The battle was with Russia but the message was as much to China.
Whether the US has done too much or too little; whether it has strengthened its global profile in the short term but weakened its power in the medium term as the global system fragments; whether it will be able to both retain the domestic appetite and international coalition to stay the course in supporting Ukraine; and whether its military-industrial complex has got a new lease of life or got drained at a time when the China challenge looms is to be seen. But the US has played its cards far more adroitly than it has done in other recent interventions.
For Russia, the year has been a setback. Putin had assumed that Kyiv would fall within weeks, Europe would be divided in its response, the US would not have the appetite to intervene on a sustained basis, and success in Ukraine would mark the revival of Russia’s sphere of influence across Eastern Europe. None of this happened. Russian intelligence has proven to be weak. Its military deficits have been clear. It was forced to retreat from key geographies in Ukraine, from Kharkiv to Kherson. It has witnessed the exodus of western companies and slow disentangling from the West-dominated economic architecture. And it has had to unleash repression at home and take draconian steps to mobilise soldiers.
But the year has also shown Russian resilience. Even as US officials predicted that the Russian economy would shrink by 15-20%, its GDP only shrank by 2.1% in 2022. It has carved out new trading partners and arrangements, with its energy sources proving to be a lifeline. Moscow’s diplomacy in the global South has proved to be far more effective than the West had anticipated. It retains control of both Crimea and large parts of Donbas. Shattering the dreams of those who had thought that the invasion would spur regime change, Putin remains completely in control of the political apparatus. And he continues to believe that time, and geography, remain on his side as Russia mounts a fresh offensive.
But beyond the primary players, the war has changed the geopolitical calculus of others. Europe has worked to reduce its economic and energy dependence on Russia and taken steps to embrace hard military responsibilities. China has sought to both maintain its “no-limits friendship” with Russia, but convey to the West and Ukraine that it is not supporting the war — all the while learning lesson from Russia’s mistakes for its possible Taiwan offensive. Japan has become a key member of the coalition against Russia, while also embarking on a dramatic defence modernisation initiative with an eye on China. The global South has been fatigued with what it sees as a distraction from real challenges, from the debt crises to climate crisis.
The future will now be determined by what happens on the ground. As Lawrence Freedman, among the world’s foremost thinkers on strategy put it, “Russia seeks to create circumstances in which the Ukrainian people have had enough. Ukraine seeks to make the position for the Russian military untenable.” Who prevails as Moscow’s “total war” strategy collides with Kyiv’s “classic war” strategy will determine not just the European security architecture but major power relationships for years to come.
