Russian bet on Ukraine war and its consequences

The euphoria of the end of the Cold War with the victory for the west soon died out with the emergence of China as a major economic and military power. Nonetheless, China's dramatic turnaround of economic fortunes was well integrated into the international financial institutions dominated by the west. It was however Russia whose struggle to reassert itself as a European and global power that brought the conflicts back to Europe thereby precluding the possibilities of the emergence of a unipolar world. Ironically Russia's bid to reassert its lost status is more out of its concerns for its inherent geopolitical insecurities rather than out of a desire for power projection to wield global influence as in the days of the USSR. Russia encompasses a vast landmass but its frontiers have been open lacking natural geographical barriers and were subjected to hostile invasions many times in the past. This realisation of geographical weakness is deeply ingrained in the undercurrents of Russian mainstream thought. Therefore Russians have learnt to exist only by expanding. But in the post-Cold War era, its already low population is fast diminishing due to the low birth rates and immigration of its youth to the western countries which may make it further hard to maintain its vast Siberian lands in future. The fountainhead of its European Slavic population resources to populate these lands was lost especially to Ukraine and Belarus after the end of the USSR. Geographically Russia is now a Eurasian entity but it has evolved as a nation whose history and culture are firmly centred in Europe. The loss of Belarus and Ukraine following the breakup of the USSR has deprived it of its European link. The loss of ethnically the same Slavic population of Ukraine and Belarus has made it difficult for Russia to populate its Eurasian expanse in the east as was the case in the past during the Tsarist and communist eras.

Before the break out of the recent war, Ukraine was the main trade partner of Russia resulting in Ukrainian markets providing a major outlet for Russian industrial produce. It had kept the Russian industry going. But Russia was going to lose this market following Ukraine’s ambitions of joining the EU. This development would mean a decrease in production and a rise in unemployment contributing to political unrest. Moreover, it would also give access to NATO into the Black Sea where despite Russia's huge land mass are located its only all-weather ports. Russia desperately needed to prevent Ukraine from swinging away towards the EU in order to protect its European and Slavic historical orientation and simultaneously prevent Western powers' bid to stagnate its industry and encroach upon its traditionally protected zone in the Black Sea which Russians have always struggled to exist only as a Russian pond.

Faced with challenges of such magnitude, Russian leadership had to perforce embark upon a new phase of expansion in Russian history to protect itself.

But unlike in past, Russians don't possess any justification for the need for their expansion this time. There is no communism liberating the working class which Russians had once promised to all the conquered peoples. There is no imperialism as in the days of Tsars who sought justification in bringing civilisation to the "Eurasian savages" in the East similar to the "white man's burden" that the western nations justified for their conquests in Africa and Asia.

This time there are plane geopolitical compulsions without any ideological veil.

Russia has to simultaneously reestablish its European link and protect the black sea region not only for the maintenance of its historical continuity as a European power reigning over all Eurasian steppes. But it also needed to discover of alternative trade routes to compensate for any prospective disconnection of its traditional commercial links with Europe. The former objective brought Russia into a military conflict with Ukraine in a preemptive move to secure the Eastern and Southern black sea regions before Ukraine could join the EU and NATO in order to forestall the entry of Western powers into the Black Sea. Earlier, Russian active participation in the Syrian conflict was also part of the same strategy aimed at securing sea lanes for Russia to the Mediterranean which is in its turn a gateway to the Atlantic and to the Indian Ocean via Suez.

The later objective of exploring new trade routes linking up with ports on the Asian coasts triggered another kind of expansion towards the South via Central Asia. And this is in perfect harmony with Russia's continuous history of seeking protection through expansion.

Russia made considerable efforts to link the soviet era communication infrastructure of central Asia with Iran with the potential of further expanding it to India. And that is the North South trade corridor which Russia aspires to with the object of mitigating the effects of its isolation and harassment at the hands of western powers for the past many centuries. This proposed trade route can provide Russia with immense economic benefits and give it political clout by integrating the economies of the countries sprawled across Central Asia, West Asia to South Asia. But the only missing chip that can bring Russia's economic and political march towards the south to a halt before it begins is Pakistan. Strongly allied to the western powers, Arabs and China, Pakistan's geopolitical importance is enormous. Located at a crossroad of geography, it can either be a roundabout linking all these regions or block out and insulate them all from one another.

Russia's overtures with Pakistan to join the Russian North South trade route during Imran Khan's tenure were therefore bound to meet with stiff resistance. Imran Khan's fascination with favouring this new experiment shocked the traditional stakeholders of the state who were justifiably conservative and believed that foreign relations of a state cultivated over many decades could not be dispensed with for the sake of a new experiment whose consequences were unforeseen. It cost Imran Khan his government and this simple and small move blocked the Russian bid to expand its influence southwards.

In the north in case of Russian failure to secure a position of strength in Ukraine may exacerbate the process of exposing its weaknesses further. West in an encircling move can also capitalise on the huge potential of trouble in Central Asia thanks to the Soviet era carving out of soviet Republics deliberately overlapping across ethnic lines. China despite its political and economic strong ties with Russia is the only power that can lay claim to its territories in the east with readily available historical justifications and the requisite resources of course.

Therefore the whirlpool of events concerning Russia's fate will change a lot of what we are accustomed to taking for granted. For a country like Pakistan marred by an insecure economy and political instability, the saner advice is to join the rows of spectators and resist the temptations to act on the stage because that may require some "live performances" with fatal consequences.