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.

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