The Russia–Ukraine War: A Regional Disaster Threatens a Wider Catastrophe

The Sierra Leone-flagged cargo ship Razoni, carrying Ukrainian grain, in the Black Sea off Kilyos, near Istanbul, Turkey, on Aug. 2, 2022. (Yoruk Isik/Reuters)

Commentary

Russia miscalculated in expanding its war on Ukraine beyond the Russophile Eastern Ukraine and Crimea. The attack on Kyiv and western Ukraine unified NATO and impelled the United States to engage in a proxy war with Russia in Ukraine. In the months since, Ukraine—with American and allies’ arms and aid—has proven far more resilient than Russian President Vladimir Putin, or President Joe Biden, expected. But as that war drags on—though an argument could be made that it began in 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea—it now has the potential to go from a regional disaster to a global catastrophe of famine.

On Saturday, a Ukrainian drone vessel, called a USV (un-crewed surface vessel), reportedly, successfully, attacked a Russian frigate and minesweeper at Sevastopol, the homeport of the Russian fleet. This tweet, which The Epoch Times cannot verify,  purports to show the attacks:

By Saturday morning, Russia had abandoned a deal that permitted safe passage of Ukrainian grain and sunflower oil. The agreement, called the Black Sea Grain Initiative, had been brokered by Turkey, a NATO country with long-standing ties to Ukraine, under the auspices of the United Nations. The initiative was intended to allow safe transit through the Black Sea of foodstuffs.

Notwithstanding Russia’s withdrawal from the agreement, though, there were reports that ships were sailing with foodstuffs from Ukrainian ports. As of early Wednesday morning, Russia now says it is back in the initiative, but Putin is mercurial and mendacious, so wholly unpredictable. It’s what makes dealings with him so dangerous. A Ukrainian attack on Russian naval assets will almost assuredly cause Russia to back away from the deal again.

The Risk of Escalation

But even if Russia were to again renege on the deal or, worse, to effect a blockade of the Ukrainian grain ports, it would not trigger a food crisis, according to Dr. Nancy Qian, an economist at Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management. She estimates that other producers could cover the Ukraine shortfall.

But the real risk would occur, Dr. Qian says, if Russia were to cut its grain production or exports. She estimates Russia provides 19 percent of the world’s wheat exports as well as 15 percent of fertilizer exports. That risk is real, given this statement from the Russian embassy on its Facebook page:

“In addition, [there is] the background of unilateral Western sanctions, despite all the declarations by Washington and Brussels about the alleged absence of any restrictions. Russia, as one of the world’s leading agro producers, remains a reliable and responsible supplier to global markets. We have proved this by our concrete actions. It is obvious to reasonable politicians, as well as to ordinary people, that those who hinder our supplies are the ones exacerbating hunger.”

On the Russian news agency Interfax, Putin warned:

“The supply of our grain and fertilizers abroad is, unfortunately, not even for us, but for the global food market, difficult. The sanctions against Russia threaten to further exacerbate the situation, the global food crisis that the world has been heading toward for several years.”

The danger here is that additional escalation of the war, particularly if it goes worse for Russia, will cause Putin to create a “self-fulfilling prophecy” of his statement, whereby Putin stores Russian grain exports instead of shipping them.

While the world’s leaders focus on the risk Putin might use tactical nuclear ordnance to reverse his army’s losses—and that would clearly be a defining moment of escalation in the conflict—a less provocative strategy by Putin could bring his enemies to heel with less drama and with far less risk of retaliation. Moreover, Putin could blame the West by laying out a false claim that the West’s economic sanctions were “reducing Russia’s crop yield.”

The concocted “shortage” could destabilize political regimes in regions that are important to the United States, NATO, and other non-NATO U.S. allies, like Israel. The biggest markets for Russian wheat are Egypt, Turkey, and Pakistan. Food inflation, hunger, and even famine—historically triggers to political insurrection—could inflict enormous geopolitical damage to vital U.S. interests overseas; indeed, interests that are far more important to the United States than whether Russia controls eastern Ukraine or Crimea. Imagine radical Islamist states taking hold in NATO member Turkey or in Pakistan. Or a regime hostile to Israel again taking control of Egypt for the first time since the Camp David Accords. Imagine popular uprisings in Germany, France, or Holland over food inflation.

Time to Settle

I have been flummoxed by the Biden administration’s failure to coax the government of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy toward settlement. The White House seems set only on escalation. While stated policy is “to defend Ukraine,” at seemingly any cost, there is little debate or even discussion of whether that policy is working or to what end it is directed.

The president has not gone before Congress to define U.S. objectives or how peace will be achieved. Even his communications team has not done so. The public is basically left to fund the war (some $57 billion, so far, that we can identify; perhaps more) and gird for more, but we’re seemingly not to know the endgame. Meanwhile, U.S. ordnance stockpiles are drained to dangerously low levels. And New Yorkers are told to prepare for a potential nuclear first strike on their city for the first time since the Cold War.

Leaders have shared little else supporting U.S. involvement beyond the assertion by Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) that, “The United States aids Ukraine and her people so that they can fight Russia over there, and we don’t have to fight Russia here.” Daring to challenge the blank check the United States has written to Ukraine to fund the war gets one labeled a “traitor” on social media.

There are, however, various means to settle the war.

A military victory that prevents continued Russian aggression might be achieved, but seems unlikely without tremendous cost and downside risks. Other possibilities to end the war are various measures of appeasement, such as Ukraine forswearing neutrality so that it refuses alignment with either Russia or NATO for 50 years; agreeing to independently monitored elections (which, if the 2010 elections are indicative, would support a separation of eastern Ukraine into Russia or an independent nation); or Ukraine offering a 100-year lease of the mission-critical Russian naval base at Sevastopol (like the U.S. Marine base at Guantanamo), with accompanying easements allowing safe passage to and from the base from Russia.

Appeasement, of any type,  is anathema to the post–World War II generation of American policymakers, who seem to know it only in the context of Neville Chamberlain’s “peace in our time” guarantees after his negotiations with Hitler at Munich in 1938.   We were all reared with the notion that it is always a mistake and that the aggressor we appease will always come back for more.

But neither lesson is true.

In fact, appeasement is just a tool of foreign policy. Chamberlain is thought by some to have appeased Hitler only to ramp up Britain’s defense posture in preparation for war with the Nazis. Klemens von Metternich, the foreign minister of the Austrian Empire, appeased Napoleon circa 1810–13, to the point of even allying with him for some time and encouraging Napoleon’s marriage to the daughter of Austria’s emperor.

Similar to what is thought of Chamberlain in 1938, Metternich’s strategy was to appease Napoleon until such time as Metternich’s skilled diplomacy among Russia, Prussia, the German States, and Austria gave the Corsican “enough rope to hang himself.” Unlike Zelenskyy, instead of going to war against a more powerful enemy, Metternich chose to save Austria from its tenuous position until his consummate statecraft could turn the tables on the French leader and allow Austria to become arguably the most influential nation of continental Europe in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars.

A drawn-out, unresolved, but escalating conflict between Ukraine/NATO and Russia risks spinning out into a full-fledged kinetic war, a nuclear conflict, or famine. The priority for the United States and NATO should be to achieve settlement of the war, however achieved.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.