Strategy&Future

Jacek Bartosiak and Nicholas Myers discuss the recent events in war in Ukraine, as of late evening of 1 March 2022.

On Sunday 27th February (the day before the meeting of the Russian and Ukrainian negotiating teams), President Vladimir Putin announced that the nuclear forces of the Russian Federation would be under increased readiness. Let’s add that Putin did not specify whether it is a strategic or a non-strategic force.

Jacek Bartosiak and Nicholas Myers discuss the war in Ukraine, situation as of morning 27 Feb 2022.

Jacek Bartosiak and Nicholas Myers discuss the operational and tactical details of the war in Ukraine, as of afternoon 25 Feb 2022.

The main take-away points from the events in Belarus from the summer of 2020 (the unrest of the pro-Western factions of Belarusian civil society) until the current refugee crisis on the Belarusian border with the EU are the following:

In the 1990s, when Ukraine was forced to give up the nuclear weapons it had inherited from the Soviet Union, John Mearsheimer published a text that is forgotten today, arguing that Ukraine should remain a nuclear state against the will of the United States. This would, according to Mearsheimer, ensure a lasting peace in Europe, depriving Russia of a chance to rebuild its empire and, subsequently, break the European order and peace.

On 5th December 1994, the three depository states of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) that entered into force on 5th March 1970 – Russia, UK, and the US – pledged to provide security assurances to Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine for their accession to the NPT and to respect their independence and sovereignty within their existing borders. Already from the very document, it is possible to draw three main components.

“I asked my opponents the question, ‘Who are our weapons aimed at?’ If we are to retarget our missiles, we must choose a target to aim the missiles at. Let’s suppose that we choose a target. What will the reaction be in a situation where no one aims their missiles at us while we choose an ‘enemy’ to target our missiles? What will be the international reaction and attitude toward Ukraine?” Leonid Kravchuk, 1993 TV-statement

It seems that 2022 may not be easy, bringing many challenges to the world and Poland. We at S&F will list a few of them, focusing on the absolute most important issues.

The current crisis related to Russian political and military maneuvering, and the West’s reaction to it, forces us to reflect on several issues concerning Poland’s vital interests.

Jacek Bartosiak, Nicholas Myers and Hilib Parfonov talk about the Zapad exercises 2021 with respect to Ukrainian military preparations.

(Fot. Wikimedia Commons)