The Current Ukraine Situation and IR - Essay Example

The Current Ukraine Situation and IR By Ukraine has existed for many thousands of years. However, this country is known for being subjugated by foreigners, even as depicted by its name, “Ukraine,” which is believed by some scholars to mean “borderline.” The country existed as an independent state starting 1991, when the Soviet Union declined. On the other hand, Crimea, a peninsula that is believed to have belonged to Ukraine even before 1954 when the then Soviet leader, Nikita bestowed it to Ukraine, remains a point of controversy, affecting Ukraine’s international relations (Plokhy 2008). Since the Soviet Union declined, there remain struggles between Moscow and Kiev over the ownership of Crimea. This paper bases on the current situation in Ukraine to show that power and self-interest are characteristic of International Relations today. The current situation in Ukraine shows the pursuit of Russia of its unification with Crimea. The Russian troops are seizing control of Crimea, whose majority population is ethnic Russians. Nonetheless, the root of this situation is the passing of the Crimea Referendum by majority of Crimeans, who are Russians (Curran 2014). From around December 2013 to present, there have been protests by the pro-Russian and opposition activists in Crimea, and this has also been accompanied by violence and killings. Today, the Ukrainian-Russian relationship remains unstable. According to Flis (2008), the differences between Russia and Ukraine emanate from their interdependence, including their dealings involving energy and the Black Sea. This kind of relationship is political in nature and a reflection of power and self-interest being characteristic of international relations. With regard to power, Ukraine and Russia exhibit different levels of power, with Russia being the most powerful in terms of its size and military capabilities, thus basing on its power to manoeuvre in the conflict. On the other hand, self-interest is manifested by Russia and Ukraine, as well as other international players affiliated to the situation in Ukraine. Ukraine manifest self-interest in the way the country was undecided in taking sides with either EU or Russia. The EU offered Ukraine a trade proposal, which the Ukrainian president turned down, despite a larger part of the Ukrainian population being in support of dealings with the EU (Curran 2014). If the Ukrainian president were to accept the economic deal with the EU, Russia had threatened that Ukraine would face harsh economic consequences from Russia, which is a major supplier of natural gas to Ukraine. Therefore, after weighing the consequences of each decision, self-interest led the then president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych to turn down the proposal by EU, and accepted a deal from Russia, including aid amounting to $ 15 million, among other economic benefits (Curran 2014). Similarly, Russia’s self-interest is displayed in the country’s commitment to achieving its unification with Crimea, which is of great importance to it. According to The Independent (2014), the strategic location of Crimea is an important navy base for Russia. Additionally, Ukraine is a big consumer of Russia’s natural gas (DAnieri 1999). Furthermore, Russia desires to protect the interests of the Crimean Russians (Plokhy 2008). All these reasons explain why Russia persists in owning Crimea, and having influence over Ukraine. Although the conflict has resulted in great loss of lives, Russia emphasizes that the reason it has its troops in Ukraine is to promote law and order. Russia also maintains that it has no interest in having influence over Ukraine. Nonetheless, one might question why Russia did not seek to solve the problems facing Ukraine in the previous years. This therefore, is a proof of Russia’s self-interest with regard to Ukraine. Self-interest is also depicted by the European Union. There have been debates in the EU in the past to have Ukraine as one of its members. Ukraine is strategically placed, in relation to European countries. Additionally, 80% of natural gas from Russia reaches the European countries through Ukraine. Therefore, having Ukraine to join EU as a member would have contributed to multiple benefits for the European countries (Rudarakanchana 2013). On the other hand, different international and regional organizations have showed interest in the Ukrainian conflict, while others have not showed any interest. The intervention of different organizations in the Ukrainian conflict represents self-interest on the part of those organizations. Similarly, those organizations that have remained mum over the Ukrainian issue can be considered to have no self-interest in Ukraine, since the country might be of no value to the organization. For instance, NATO has shown least interest in the Ukraine issue probably because Ukraine is a non-member. The economic instability and poor military technology in Ukraine lowers the value of Ukraine with regard to NATO. Therefore, if Ukraine would have been a member of NATO with economic and military prowess, NATO would have intervened in the conflict. Similarly, Russia can be considered to have self-interest when it warned NATO of expanding into its former Soviet Union neighbours (Baker 2014). The United Nations (UN) can also be considered to have self-interest, as it has not taken any serious action in the Ukrainian conflict. The two major moves of the UN include voting in the UN Security Council condemning he referendum regarding the unification of Russia with Crimea. Second, the UN General Assembly resolved on March 27 to call on all world nations to oppose Crimean referendum (Nekrassov 2014). Russia declared to the UN that it did not want to wage a war with Ukraine (BBC 2014). Therefore, Russia also utilizes its power to influence the UN not to take a major action in the conflict. “Leniency” when powerful states break the law manifests itself in the Ukrainian issue. The fact that Russia is among the five permanent members of the UN Security Council guarantees it the capability of blocking any UN intervention in the conflict, as the five permanent members of the UN Security Council have more powers (Bosco 2009). This is why the UN, through its secretary general, Ban Ki-moon has only warned Russia verbally of acting in a manner that will escalate the situation. Additionally, the UN has not acted because of Russia’s veto (Nekrassov 2014; Sengupta 2014). This has therefore, led to Russia going scot-free, despite breaking set rules. Therefore, the aspect of power manifests through Russia. Russia takes advantage of its powerful nature to continue breaching set laws and treaties and further the Ukrainian conflict. In the Budapest Memorandum, Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons in part, as it was assured of the five permanent member states of the UN Security Council, including Russia, through diplomatic notes and memorandum (Pifer 2014; Solchanyk 2001). The ongoing Ukrainian conflict therefore, displays cynicism on the side of Russia and other permanent members of the UN Security Council. Russia and other four permanent members of the UN Security Council, being powerful, continue to witness breaching of the Budapest Memorandum, and this is unfair to the currently less powerful Ukraine (Brown 1996). This portrays an elastic approach to treaties, thus jeopardizing chances that countries will take treaties seriously in future. The aspect of power also manifests itself in the military technology of a country. In this case, Russia has powerful military as compared to Ukraine. Therefore, Russia uses its military capability to attack or threaten the weaker Ukraine. On the other hand, other international countries, including the United States, hesitate in taking action against Russia, since Russia has a strong military base. This is in fear that Russia might attack them with its nuclear weapons. Therefore, the breaches by Russia do not receive the punishment they deserve, due to the power Russia possesses. The theories of offensive and defensive realism are relevant in understanding the Ukrainian conflict; hence basing on this situation, this makes the realists to be right. Offensive realism claims that international system allows for offensive strategy as the best way of ensuring security, thus a state can be secure if it ensures that it is strong (Kydd 2005; Tang 2010). In this case, Russia continues to use an offensive strategy as well as its power to attain its objective of owning Crimea. On the other hand, defensive realists note that security dilemmas will persist without necessarily resulting in war, mainly because of intervening variables such as natural resources, military technology, and geography, which influence the decisions of political leaders (Donnelly 2000). The Ukrainian conflict is yet to escalate into a major war, as the Russian advanced military technology acts as an intervening variable, which scares most international countries from active intervention in the conflict. A popular quote by Thucydides, “"the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must,” applies in this case, as Russia, the strong one, continues to do all it can in its power to achieve its objective of unification with Crimea. On the other hand, the weaker Ukraine continues to suffer violence resulting from confrontations between the pro-Russian and anti-government supporters in Ukraine. There are different similar situations in the past, where powerful countries have received leniency in various situations. For instance, in a past League of Nations the criticism of Japan and Italy led to their withdrawal from the league, which later collapsed. The UN might therefore, not act against Russia for fear of Russia’s withdrawal and eventual collapse of the UN Security Council. Additionally, in 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait, but the UN took an action against Iraq, since it was not a permanent member that could veto (Charron 2011). Furthermore, in 2003, Bush took an action against Saddam, and stated that they did not need an approval from the UN (Greenstein 2004). However, today, the US has not taken an action against Russia, probably because of fear of Russia’s nuclear weapons, and owing to the lack of self-interest in Russia. This therefore, portrays cynicism on the side of the UN and the US. In conclusion, the Ukrainian-Russian conflict represents an important international relations problem. It is possible to understand from this conflict how and why nations act the way they do in the contemporary international relations. This paper has analysed how the aspects of power and self-interest manifest in current international relations, basing on the Ukrainian conflict. Russia has been seen to capitalize on its higher power status to control the less powerful Ukraine. On the other hand, both Russia and Ukraine exhibit self-interest in the different ways they have acted in this conflict. Similarly, the UN and the US are considered to have greater authority to resolve various problems in international relations. However, the lack of a major move by the US and the UN in the Ukrainian conflict, as opposed to other similar past situations in different countries, depicts cynicism on their side. 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