IF I CANNOT HAVE HER: The Pathology of Putin's Obsession with Ukraine
Lost Kingdom the Quest for Empire and the Making of the Russian Nation,
How useful are national stereotypes? I leave the question
hanging in the air, for regardless of their utility we seem stuck with them for
the time being. With respect to Russia the stereotypes can be harsh and
unforgiving. Though given the history of the 20th Century and the
opening decades of the twenty first many would argue justly so. One of the side
effects of such stereotypes is the tendency toward anthropomorphising nation states.
Putin’s Russia, like all autocratic despotic regimes makes this exceptionally
easy. Never more so than in the case of Ukraine.
As Serhii Plokhy makes clear in Lost Kingdom the
Quest for Empire and the Making of the Russian Nation, Ukraine, and Ukrainian
identity, or indeed the supposed lack thereof, looms large in both Russian
history and, following my earlier thread, the Russian psyche. For Russia
Ukraine represents both father, son, and is rapidly becoming holy ghost to the
Russian state.
From a Russian perspective the history of Russia begins with
ninth century Kievan Rus, with the centre of gravity moving to Muscovy in the later
Middle Ages. Kyiv gave birth to Russia which moved spiritually to Moscow,
becoming father, turning Ukraine in the process into Little Rus. The levels of ambiguity
generated by this process grew as Russian power grew, power and prosperity
powered to a great extent by the fertility and abundance provided Ukrainian
agriculture. Russian attitudes toward Ukraine in the 19th century
age of nationalism became an increasingly complex cocktail, patronising, fearful,
both demonstratively affectionate and hostile, overbearing and controlling,
with a consistent thread of denial, a denial of Ukrainian nationality.
Communism complicated these attitudes further. If Tsarist
Russia denied Ukrainian culture and nascent statehood Lenin was not prepared to
make the same mistake. He understood Ukrainian aspirations and sought to
harness them within the framework of the early USSR. Ukrainian nationality was recognised,
as it became the second largest Soviet Republic after Russia. Ukrainian culture
and language briefly flourished, encouraged by Lenin and even Stalin during the
mid-1920s. However, as the threat of nationalism to the soviet project was
perceived this initial nurturing turned into persecution and repression.
No other constituent Republic suffered more than Ukraine in
the great Soviet experiment, with millions dying because of collectivisation
and the deliberately created famine of the early 1930s More horrors followed
during the period of purges and the battle for Ukraine between the Nazi
barbarians and Stalin’s totalitarian state, turning Ukraine into the blood
lands of the Second World War.
That many Ukrainians initially greeted the Germans as
liberators is a matter of historical record. Given their experience under Stalin
this is hardly surprising but has been misused ever since by historians of both
the far right and far left. Of course, the German occupiers had even less use for
‘subhuman’ Ukrainians than did Stalin. Ukraine was to be colonised by Germans;
other than as necessary slaves they were to be eliminated.
The one great narrative that bolstered Brezhnev’s Soviet
Union, and that survived the breakup, at least in Russia, was the highly
polished tale of The Great Patriotic War. ‘Russia’s’ existential
fight with Nazi Germany, which culminated in the occupation of Berlin.
This, alongside the triumphs of imperial Russia, dictates Putin’s
image of Russia and Russian exceptionalism. It is a worldview without room for
an independent Ukraine.
Putin’s pathological hatred for Ukrainian independence began
to be clear to anyone paying attention in 2013, ignited by the orange
revolution, which he believed was instigated by Hilary Clinton and the US. And as
soon as the Sochi Olympic games were over, he acted with his takeover of
Crimea.
Putin’s inability to accept a free and independent Ukraine
is now all our problem, for make no mistake he has already shackled Belarus and
he will soon seek to swallow Moldova. But Ukraine is the real goal. However, as
the conflict has revealed, Putin, like psychopathic spurned lover, may have concluded
that if he cannot have her then nobody else will, and we are now witnessing
genocide, a term incidentally coined by a Ukrainian. He is clearly willing to
create a wasteland. He must be stopped.
The failure of Russian society to develop a strong civic
culture means we are left with Putin and whatever kleptocrat might succeed him.
It must be made clear to the Russian ruling elite that sticking with Putin will
mean ruination for Russia, that the West is not going to back down.
Plokhy’s book is an expert outline of the roots of this
conflict, a timely read for those wanting to understand.
