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Tomas Hradil
Dec 10, 2023
Liberation of Crimea: An Unattainable Goal
Photo by Stringer/AFP via Getty Images
In 1918, Robert Lansing stated on the matter of self-determination: “It will, I fear, cost thousands of lives” (Pleshakov, 2017). The spirit of what the Entente codified at Versailles has brought both liberty and death. Perhaps the most particular case of this double-edged sword is Ukraine. And, perhaps the most particular territory is that of the Crimean Peninsula.
With the escalation of the conflict in February of 2022, the label of “pro-western” has been unanimously given to Kyiv by NATO member states. This label transformed the conflict into a proxy war of sorts. Ukraine has similarly transformed into a member state of the ill-defined “west”. Within this transformation came a key shift in U.S. foreign policy. From primarily financial support, given to Kyiv for the sustenance of the Ukrainian welfare state, foreign aid intensified into military aid after February of 2022. What is the goal of this aid? This has changed as well, from merely allowing the continued existence of a state of Ukraine, to now the liberation of occupied Ukrainian territory (Biden). Yet, because of the special attitude the Russian Federation holds towards Crimea, the potential re-unification of the peninsula with Ukraine is implausible. Stemming from its cultural, historical, and economic links, control over the peninsula is seen as a fundamental goal of Russian foreign policy, a goal that will be achieved at all costs. As long as the Russian state continues to see Crimea as one of the pillars of its statehood, a pillar now attacked by an American “proxy”, the re-unification is an unattainable goal (Al Jazeera, 2022).
Current Policy
The Biden administration has adopted a new strategy towards the Crimean Peninsula. Financial injections have increased massively: $250 million in direct military aid was sent to Kyiv in 2019, while from January 2022 to July 2023, aid amounted to nearly $80 billion dollars (DoD, 2023). Moreover, the concept of aid shifted from humanitarian to military, in a clear aim to provide Kyiv with means to defend itself against the Russian Spring Offensive of 2022. These included numerous western weapons systems, such as Javelin and AT-4 anti-armor systems (DoD, 2023). The key shift, however, came in how the White House vocally supported a potential Ukrainian counter-offensive. Due to a relatively high amount of strategically important military targets in Crimea, a counter-offensive would not only mean land combat in the east of the country but also rocket and drone bombardment of the peninsula (Ukrainska Pravda, 2023). This shift is perhaps best reflected in what items were given to Kyiv before and after 2022. Before 2022, small-arms and defensive armament systems dominate (Merrow, 2023). But after the escalation, NATO member states, led by the U.S., changed their listings of items given to Kyiv. German Leopards, British Challengers, and U.S. M1 Abram Main Battle tanks are the most notable on this list. There can be no doubt that this alteration in foreign aid means one thing: it is now in the interest of the “west” to ensure a Ukrainian victory. A victory that will only come when “Crimea is Ukraine”, a scenario seen as existentially threatening by Moscow (Biden, 2022).
What Crimea is to Russia
In the vastness of the Russian state, a peninsula as small as Crimea can seem prone to neglect. Yet, in political and social terms, this could not be further from reality. The peninsula was conquered by the Russian Empire in 1783 by Catherine the Great. As a part of her “Greek plan”, funding flowed into the peninsula, as numerous nearly abandoned cities rose once again to prominence, Simferopol (the peninsula’s capital) and Yalta, among them (Pleshakov, 2017). During the following centuries, Crimea became the summer leisure house of the Empire, “Not just the tsar but his brothers, uncles and cousins thought it patriotic to build estates on the Russian Riviera“ (Pleshakov 2017). For the Empire, the territory was of immense political importance, as it guaranteed access to a warm-sea port. As Pleshakov explains, this allowed the creation of a Russian Imperial Navy, one of the only symbols of European imperial hegemony that Moscow lacked up until that point.
Over the next several years, the socio-political ties between Crimea and the Russian elites intensified. Constantine Pleshakov calls it “A national fetish” (Pleshakov, 2017). For the Russian intelligence, the defense of Sevastopol during the Crimean War and the Great Patriotic War were patriotic acts of the highest ordeal. There is a reason why Joseph Stalin’s Order No. 20 commanded the salutes in the hero cities of Leningrad, Stalingrad, Odessa, and Sevastopol. Similarly, there is a reason why the relatively obscure Crimean city of Kerch was added to the list in 1973. In comparison to the magnificence of Petrograd, the maritime history of Odessa, and the sheer violence incurred in Stalingrad, an observer can conclude that Sevastopol and Kerch have no business being on a list. The defenders of Crimea were not only defending a piece of the Russian homeland, they were defending its imperial status. In many ways, it was a Russian version of Rorke's Drift.
The peninsula is much more important to the Russian elite than Luhansk or Donetsk. Crimea is not expendable. As one journalist stated “Crimea is the keystone of Russian power throughout the Eurasian Maritime Nexus” (Cropsey, 2023). It gives Russia access to the entirety of the Black Sea, allowing it to dominate the republics in the Caucuses as well, while also giving Moscow the option of pursuing the construction of a new gas pipeline along the lines of the canceled South Stream pipeline. As a major portion of Russian gas is still exported through Ukraine, a possible re-routing of gas transport would see Russia cut Kyiv of any revenue stemming through this transport, as well as ensuring more control over the transport itself (Losz, 2023). The Russian need for control over Crimea and the geopolitical benefits this entails, has only grown with the continuance of the war. With its elites envisioning themselves in an ideological conflict with the west, it is the peninsula that provides a political basis for Russian imperial power, whilst simultaneously allowing Moscow to hold a grip over the smaller economies of the Black Sea region.
Solutions
For the defense of Crimea, the Russian regime will exhaust nearly all means necessary. If, for the defense of the newly acquired Luhansk and Donetsk Federative Republic, Vladimir Putin has sacrificed the lives of tens of thousands of Russians, one can only expect this number to grow substantially for the defense of Crimea. Yet, a historical parallel may provide us with a possible alternative solution to the conflict. During the Finnish Winter War of 1939-1940, the Soviet regime was determined to conquer the area north of Leningrad and in the process install a pro-Soviet Finnish government. After a grueling stalemate, the exhausted Finland opted for peace and was able to escape subjugation, losing much of its territory but preventing the annexation of Finland into the USSR. A similar policy should be pursued by the United States, to assure a slow conclusion to the war at hand. With the Ukrainian Spring Counter Offensive officially declared a “dead end”, the war has come to a trench-stalemate, where experts predict that the side with the larger manpower reserves, Russia, will likely prevail (Wilk, 2023).
Thus, the U.S. should reconsider the goals of its foreign policy in Ukraine. The moral side of an individual naturally resides on the side of Kyiv. Yet, the pragmatic side must realize the unattainable nature of re-conquering Crimea. With the White House supplying over $40 billion in military aid to Ukraine in the past year alone, it has a decisive say on how Kyiv conducts its operations. In order to achieve a realistic maximum from the war, the U.S. should consider pushing Ukraine towards the negotiation table with Moscow. The ends of these negotiations will be of a different question, one that will primarily lie between the two belligerents of the war. The United States should act with the understanding of the sheer difficulty of recovering the peninsula back into Ukrainian hands, arising from the relationship Moscow has with the peninsula: a relationship of existentialist need. With this understanding, American foreign policy would give the galvanized Ukrainian elites a way out of the conflict, potentially fulfilling both a moral obligation to Ukraine and the American foreign policy goal of containing Russian advances in the region.
The views expressed in this publication are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the position of The Rice Journal of Public Policy, its staff, or its Editorial Board.
References
Al Jazeera. (2022, December 22). Russia accuses us of fighting proxy war in Ukraine. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/12/22/russia-accuses-us-of-fighting-proxy-war-in-ukraine.
Biden, President. “Statement by President Biden on the Anniversary of Russia’s Illegal Invasion of Ukraine.” The White House, February 26, 2021. Accessed November 6, 2023 https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/02/26/statement-by-president-biden-on-the-anniversary-of-russias-illegal-invasion-of-ukraine/.
Department of Defense. “Biden Administration Announces New Security Assistance for Ukraine.” U.S. Department of Defense, 2023. Accessed November 6, 2023 https://www.defense.gov/News/Releases/Release/Article/3578754/biden-administration-announces-new-security-assistance-for-ukraine/.
Lillis, Katie Bo, and Natasha Bertrand. “Ukraine’s Recent Focus on Crimea Draws Skepticism from Corners of the Biden Administration | CNN Politics.” CNN, August 18, 2023. Accessed November 6, 2023 https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/18/politics/ukraine-crimea-focus-biden-administration/index.html.
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Martinez, Luiz, Connor Finnegan, and Elizabeth McLaughlin. “Trump admin approves new sale of anti-tank weapons to Ukraine”. ABC News, 2019. Accessed November 6, 2023https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-admin-approves-sale-anti-tank-weapons-ukraine/story?id=65989898.
Pleshakov, K. (2017). The Crimean Nexus: Putin’s war and The Clash of Civilizations. Yale University Press.
Smith, R. Jeffrey. “Timeline: How Trump Withheld Ukraine Aid.” Center for Public Integrity, January 28, 2022. Accessed November 6, 2023 https://publicintegrity.org/national-security/timeline-how-trump-withheld-ukraine-aid/.
Ukrainska Pravda. (2023, May 10). Journalists post map with military facilities in Crimea. https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/05/10/7401482/.
Wilk, A., & Zochowski, P. (2023, November 6). Ukraine confirms its counter-offensive has failed. day 617 of the war. OSW Centre for Eastern Studies. https://www.osw.waw.pl/en/publikacje/analyses/2023-11-03/ukraine-confirms-its-counter-offensive-has-failed-day-617-war.
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