He once described that as “the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th Century.” He is deeply resentful that the Cold War ended with Moscow losing territory, influence, and an empire.īut Adekoya says the issues are more nuanced. Prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the Union stretched from the Baltic and Black seas to the Pacific Ocean and, in its final years, consisted of 15 Soviet Socialist Republics.ĭecember 2021 makes it 30 years since the Soviet Union was dissolved and President Putin still bears a grudge. He studied the behaviour of Western leaders very well and waited for until the only person that could stand up to him – Angela Markel – left the scene before he moved on to Ukraine.

Kurt Volker, former US representative for Ukraine negotiations, notes in an article for the Centre for European Policy Analysis (CEPA) that within 21 years in office, Putin has rebuilt the Russian military, modernised and expanded Russia’s nuclear arsenal, revived and expanded Russian intelligence services and activities, took control of Russian media outlets, consolidated state industries, and crippled political opposition to his United Russia party and made elections easily rigged.Įkpo says Russia has been preparing for this for the past 20 years.

Some say Putin’s nostalgia for a new Soviet Empire is driving this incursion into Ukraine. Russia may yet be inured to the effect of sanctions.īesides, “Putin is banking on sanctions equally affecting Western countries even more than it affects Russia,” says Eyo Ekpo, a former commissioner for NERC and global affairs commentator. However, Russia has a buffer of $630 billion in foreign reserves, huge reserves of oil and gas, access to the Chinese market, the world’s second-largest economy, and is still selling weapons to India. These include travel restrictions, asset freezes, constraining ability to access financial markets in the West and trade restrictions. It is targeting financial institutions, members of Russia’s governments and political class, assets and even the Nord Stream II gas pipeline. The economic sanctions are designed to hurt. In this case, the United States, France, Germany, and Britain have not risen to defend Ukraine, they are offering cash and weapons while running out of ideas on new sanctions for Russia. Even then, before Hitler could invade Poland, it had to make sure Russia would stay out of the fray, offering Russia a piece of Poland. Both countries have earlier signed a pact guaranteeing military support to Poland. Unlike the last world war, the major powers are not rousing their parliaments to declare war on the aggressor.įollowing Hitler’s invasion of Poland in September 1939, Great Britain and France declared war on Germany.

You may not have a world war, but it could lead to Europe and interested parties engaged in prolonged skirmish,” notes Onyekachi Adekoya, a fellow of Nigeria Institute of Industrial Security. “In the realm of possibility, there could be a miscalculation on the part of the actors that could lead to a broader war. Shortly afterwards, explosions were reported across the country but this is unlikely to devolve into World War lll as some have feared.Īn analysis of the previous World Wars indicates that some of the precipitators of a global conflict are missing in this instance, even if the mad impulses that drove the world into a global warfare are still animating the hearts of men decades later.Īnalysts cite the restraint of global powers employing sanctions rather than retaliatory action, the influence of NATO, the major powers’ capacity to cause nuclear destruction and the economic consequence of a global war as possible restraints. During the early hours of Thursday, Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, announced on television that he had decided “to carry out a special military operation” in Ukraine.

World war 3 2021