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Western narratives against Moscow obstruct pacification of the border region between Russia and Ukraine.
Written by Lucas Leiroz, researcher in Social Sciences at the Rural Federal University of Rio de Janeiro; geopolitical consultant.
The situation remains tense in Ukraine and relations between Moscow and Kiev badly deteriorated. The Western insistence on pointing out the existence of an alleged Russian invasion plan prevents any pacification process from taking place in the Eastern European region. As a result of political and security instability, local states tend to arm themselves more and more and prepare for a possible conflict in the future, perpetuating a crisis of international relations fostered exclusively to serve NATO’s interests.
In recent days, a hostile conduct towards Russia has spread in the entire western world. Western governments decided to bet on massive propaganda about the existence of a Russian plan to invade Ukraine, thus justifying the huge sending of money and weapons to the Ukrainian government, in an alleged attempt to arm the country for a defense situation against Moscow.
The western media has contributed enormously in this hostility process, spreading on a massive scale several unfounded rumors about such an “invasion plan”. Fear, terror and panic are widespread among Russia’s neighboring nations. Consequently, the biggest affected by this psychological operation are the governments and citizens of the Eastern European countries themselves, which, as a way of reacting to the non-existent danger of Russian invasion, end up being “forced” to support NATO plans in their territories.
Undoubtedly, the mass media has been the main ally of the pro-Western Ukrainian government against Russia. Every day, a lot of misinformation is released involving the details of the alleged Russian invasion that is “about to happen”. Internet sites, TV and radio channels continuously transmit news about the case, making it appear that Ukraine is facing an imminent war situation. With so many propaganda weapons in action, a state of collective paranoia is activated among Ukrainians: everyone comes to see any trivial Russian movement as a “signal” that Moscow is about to attack Ukraine.
Obviously, Russia has been agitating troops on the western border in recent months as a way of maintaining an alert status in the face of escalating NATO maneuvers, but this has been reason enough to point to “clear evidence” that the invasion plan is real, according to the Kiev media – ignoring the fact that Russia is moving troops into its own territory, which is absolutely normal for any national state.
The big problem with all this is that the Ukrainian government is being affected as much by the propaganda as the population itself. Contrary to what happens in Western countries, where the idea of Russian invasion makes politicians and strategists laugh while it convinces public opinion, in Ukraine, state officials themselves are affected by the anti-Russian paranoia spread by media agencies of their own country. As a result, the psychological effects of this situation are converted into anti-Russian public policies, mainly in Donbass, where the endless violence seems to be the only plausible possibility of a conflict between Moscow and Kiev to start.
Racist policies against the population of more than 600,000 Russian speakers on Ukraine’s western border concerns Moscow immensely. The Russian government has been striving since 2014 not to promote any kind of coercive action in the region, seeking means of peaceful resolution, which was partially achieved in the Minsk Accords, but the Ukrainian resistance to comply with international pacts and the resurgence of a policy of systematic extermination and ethnic persecution make the situation increasingly difficult to manage without more effective means.
Moscow insists on resolving diplomatically and legally, but the difficulties are clear. It is unlikely, for example, that the lawsuit filed at the European Court of Human Rights will have any practical effect as this Court is simply dominated by the Western thought about Ukraine. While international organizations remain silent, Russian speakers die in the Donbass but there will come a time when Russia will no longer tolerate this situation.
Obviously, there will be no war, but Moscow can start mechanisms to help the region’s armed militias more actively, whether through larger funding, sending modern weapons, military instructors, or private security companies. The fact is that Moscow has sufficient means to intervene in the Donbass indirectly and has not done this until today because the most strategic thing for the Russian government is that definitive peace be achieved in the region, with Kiev ending racist policies and Donetsk and Lugansk integrating again to the Ukrainian State.
As analyzed by several experts, the Russian interest is to keep Ukraine intact, not to fragment it, as it is expected that, with the coming governments, Kiev will return to adopting a more neutral and Russian-friendly foreign policy in the future. If the situation worsens in the Donbass, Moscow will sacrifice this interest for the benefit of its people in the region – the problem is that Kiev believes that US and NATO will intervene in such a situation.
For the US and NATO, Ukraine serves as a destabilizing agent in the Russian strategic environment, but helping the Ukrainian government would never be reason enough for the two biggest nuclear powers in the world to go to war. More and more, the US government has actively sought to negotiate with Russia, although negotiations continue to be accompanied by unnecessary NATO military maneuvers in Eastern Europe. The US and the great NATO powers see Russia as similar and simply ignore Kiev, which is not considered a relevant state. Ukraine is an instrument for NATO. It has a role in the alliance’s scheme, which is to harm Russia constantly, creating frictions and tensions, but not to the point of generating a war or direct armed conflict. If Ukraine fails to fulfill this role, it will not receive any help.
For Kiev’s officials, it is necessary to be attentive to the recent American example in Afghanistan in order to understand what will happen to Ukrainian forces if the situation gets worse in the Donbass. The US simply abandoned its biggest historic allies in Kabul as it no longer had an interest in fighting the Taliban. What to expect from Washington in relation to Ukraine, which is not even part of NATO?
