The Ukraine war with Russia – or rather, Russia’s war with Ukraine – is beset with obstacles. There are a large number of sensitive issues at play. There are significant interests in the region that are tinder boxes for recriminations. There is a multiplicity of competing forces only held back by Ukrainian sovereignty and Russian dignity, or at least the struggle by both for either.
This makes it so volatile that any controversial thing spoken may be tantamount to an escalation of tensions. Therefore, the advice of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to the world to pile in to get involved is worrying. He calls on help from all four corners of the world to repel an invasion, but in doing so invokes the approach of the World Wars.
“That is why only pressure can stop this war. Pressure that is multidirectional. The pressure from Western countries today is not enough. Nor is there enough unity in applying that pressure. We need more pressure from the United States, more pressure from Europe. As for the Global South – we do not yet even feel their pressure on Russia to make it stop.”
It cannot become as worse for a much smaller prize. Putin may be a warmonger, and a tyrannical political leader, but he’s not a token of radicalism. He hasn’t got designs on much of the world and he cannot be credited with disturbing its order. Russia’s reach is not so vast. The answer is to deny them their advance so that nothing is open to win. Ukraine needs to hold its own.