West must respond to Putin’s aggression By: Editorial Posted: 7:00 PM CST Tuesday, Feb. 22, 2022 Last Modified: 9:26 AM CST Wednesday, Feb. 23, 2022 Updates

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 21/02/2022 (1037 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday declared he recognizes two regions of eastern Ukraine as independent states — Luhansk and Donetsk — and ordered his army to enter those territories. The U.S. government and the authorities of the North Atlantic alliance have been warning he would do something like this, and now he is proving them right.

Canada cannot tolerate a world order in which great powers are free to invade neighbour countries and seize their territory. This country, with its allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, must insist upon peaceful relations among nations, negotiation to resolve conflicts and respect for the popular will when borders are being adjusted.

Canada cannot prosper in an economic order in which trade is routinely cut off when countries disapprove of each other’s conduct. But Russia’s president told the world on Sunday that he is free to intervene in Ukraine because it is an entity created by Russia, and therefore not a real country.

Russia’s president told the world on Sunday that he is free to intervene in Ukraine because it is an entity created by Russia, and therefore not a real country.

For want of any other way to change his mind on that point, Canada and other industrial nations may have to cut Russia out of the trading world and accept the resulting damage to international markets. Economic damage will be unwelcome, but it’s better than submitting to military coercion.

Mr. Putin already dominates Crimea, Luhansk and Donetsk. His troops occupied Crimea unopposed in February and March 2014. From 2014 on he has been supporting insurgent forces trying to separate Luhansk and Donetsk from Ukraine.

The Russian president demands a promise from NATO that Ukraine will never be allowed to join the western alliance. Even though there is no plan for Ukraine to join NATO, that demand is totally unrealistic. The NATO countries cannot allow Russia to choose its members.

NATO added Montenegro to its ranks in 2017, North Macedonia in 2020. Last year NATO officially recognized Bosnia-Herzegovina, Georgia and Ukraine as aspiring members, whereupon Mr. Putin hit the roof. Even though it is purely a defensive alliance, NATO’s eastward expansion may turn out to be a miscalculation — one that has been seized upon by Mr. Putin as a threat to Russian that justifies his military incursion into Ukraine.

NATO expanded because peoples who lived for years under Russian domination sought to take shelter under the alliance’s security guarantee. They longed for that guarantee because of military threats of the type Mr. Putin is now brandishing against Ukraine.

In that light, Mr. Putin’s best way to prevent further NATO expansion is to stop bullying his neighbours, stop massing troops and equipment for an invasion, stop trying to force his will on countries that want nothing to do with him.

Canada and its allies will not go to war to defend Ukraine, which is not a member of the alliance. Ukraine should be supplied, supported and assisted in defending itself.

Canada and its allies will not go to war to defend Ukraine, which is not a member of the alliance. Ukraine should be supplied, supported and assisted in defending itself. Partition of Ukraine into a Russian-facing eastern part and a Europe-facing western part may ultimately be a solution worth considering, as long as the people involved have a genuine opportunity to choose between one side and the other.

Canada should assure Russia’s people and its government that we have neither the means nor the wish to attack Russia or seize territory from it. We should keep our small force in Latvia to show the NATO security guarantee will be honoured in case Russia makes a move against a NATO member country.

We should impose whatever economic penalties are deemed necessary against Russian aggression, and lift those penalties when Mr. Putin accepts peaceful means of settling international disputes.