On June 10, 2022, Vladimir Putin held a town hall meeting that coincided
with the 350th anniversary of Peter the Great’s birthday.
Peter the Great is best known for having made Russia a world power,
modernizing the country, and expanding its borders.
This included capturing a port on the Sea of Azov,
which feeds directly into the conflict with Ukraine today.
During the town hall, Putin went back into history to tell a story
with eerie parallels to the current situation.
“Peter the Great waged the Great Northern War for 21 years. On the face of it,
he was at war with Sweden taking something away from it...” but according to Putin
“he was not taking away anything, he was returning. This is how it is.”
Putin continued: “None of the European countries recognized this territory as part of Russia…
However, from time immemorial,
the Slavs lived there … and this territory was under Russia’s control.”
The connection, of course, is to Ukraine.
Russia had been there before, under the flag of the Soviet Union.
Now Russia’s invasion seems to have the same undertone,
taking back territory that Russia has seen as its own from the beginning.
Some Western commentators have framed this as admission that the invasion was never about NATO
but rather is straight-up Russian irredentism—
that Putin views himself as the successor to Peter the Great’s legacy
and must work to accomplish similar goals.
For one thing, this comment was a tiny excerpt from a discussion with young entrepreneurs—it
was not a serious policy pronouncement.
Regardless of that, this is a fundamental misreading of how
international conflict works. The correct answer
is “why not both”. And failing to appreciate the nuance will lead to bad policies elsewhere,
especially with the ongoing Iranian nuclear problem.
First, a recap. During the address that initiated the invasion,
Putin complained of growing NATO expansion in Europe.
Empirically, he is right. NATO has drifted quite a bit eastward since the end of the Cold War.
This is problematic from Russia’s point of view.
Further drift enhances western power, which necessarily lowers Russia’s coercive capacity.
The war has been expensive for Russia, but Putin might prefer that
to a future where he would have to deal with an empowered Ukraine.
Putin’s latest comments appear to move away from that, and instead focus on the substantive matter
of wanting to reclaim territory. However, there is nothing in contradiction with both of these
points as causing the war. In fact, you need pairs of problems like these for war to occur.
Imagine for a moment that Putin was interested maximizing territorial expansion.
This white line might represent the expected territorial division
between Ukraine and Russia following a war.
Everything to the West remains Ukraine; everything to the east becomes Russia.
War is costly in terms of lives and money, though,
and we can use this red line to measure Russia’s costs.
The space between the red and white lines
represents how Russia internalizes the costs of war relative to square kilometers of territory.
This yellow line represents the same for Ukraine.
Note that any territorial division between the yellow and red lines
leaves both parties better off than had they fought a war.
Anything within this bargaining range simulates what the war outcome would look like
but does not come at any costs for either party.
What this tells us is that pure territorial ambitions are not sufficient for a war to occur.
Indeed, the recipe for war is a two-step process.
For step one, you need a substantive issue, like territory, or oil, or something else.
For step two, a bargaining friction, like a shift in the balance of power.
That is, something that moves the expected distribution from war
in a way favorable to Ukraine and unfavorable to Russia.
That’s the type of thing that NATO brought to the table. But it is only half a causal story.
NATO as an explanation for war requires some underlying issue that Russia sees
as justifying the decision to forestall the power shift.
Peter the Great-esque territorial ambitions fit that exact role.
In this light, NATO is not something that Russia
directly cares about. But that does not make it irrelevant.
Rather, Russia has to be greatly concerned about the indirect consequences of NATO
and how it would enhance Ukrainian military strength,
which then translates into worse outcomes for Russia on the substantive issues.
That’s where this shifting line on the map comes into play.
The long-running nuclear saga with Iran presents a second place where this distinction matters.
Listening to the news, one might think that the west cares directly about Iran
having uranium centrifuges like these, which a country can used to construct nuclear weapons.
That also misses the point. Nuclear weapons are a means to an
end. It is not the nuclear weapons the United States cares about per se—it is
the additional coercive bargaining leverage that Iran will yield if it proliferates.
Likewise, Iran does not care directly about nuclear weapons either. It cares
about the additional respect and influence that nuclear weapons will bestow upon it,
which may be substantial.
This distinction matters because it changes how one might negotiate over the problem,
which is a topic I have spent a great deal of time researching.
If Iran just wanted nuclear weapons for the sake of having nuclear weapons,
attempting to broker an agreement would seem hopeless.
But if Iran wanted to use nuclear weapons to get a seat at the table in broader negotiations,
the United States could just do that from the start.
And that was precisely the intention behind the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action,
also known as the Iran Deal, from 2015.
The United States thawed diplomatic relations and promised Iran a position in what Obama called
the “community of nations” in exchange for a freeze in Iran’s nuclear program.
And that strategy worked until the Trump
administration pulled out of the agreement in 2018.
With the benefits withheld, Iran went back toward advancing its nuclear program,
which is where we find ourselves today.
This logic gives us insight into the war between Russia and Ukraine as well.
Although Putin’s comments about Peter the Great do not tell us anything new, there is a significant
gap in what we would expect to see if NATO were the chief bargaining friction that caused the war.
Again, remember that Russia does not care directly about Ukraine’s potential NATO membership,
just how that membership would alter the balance of power between the two countries.
As we discussed in a previous video, if the war were truly about NATO expansion
and that shift in the balance of power, the war would end once NATO expansion is off the table.
After all, that is exactly what happened in the 2008 Russo-Georgian War.
But that is not what is happening here. NATO is not eager to deal
with the mess that Ukrainian membership would bring for the foreseeable future.
As such, a preventive war interpretation of the conflict is plausible but not fully convincing.
Do you think a NATO power shift truly concerned Putin, or did some other
bargaining friction cause the war? Let me know in the comments. And if you enjoyed this video,
please like, share, and subscribe, and I will see you next time. Take care.