UKR-TAZ

Military historian Phillips Payson O’Brien provides a good summary here of where things are at, strategically, with the Russia-Ukraine war.

“So in a nutshell, Russian strategy is take whatever you can now, no matter how small an area and no matter how much it costs, on the assumption Trump wins, and you get to keep it. You then have four years to basically recover and come again when you are ready. The strategy is based around the longer term degradation of Ukraine as a power, the friendship of Trump, and the weakness of Europe.”

Meanwhile, “Ukrainian strategy at present has settled into a pattern of trying to maximize Russian losses, to lead to a steady degradation of Russian fighting capabilities for 2025.”

Longer term, so much depends on whether the Trump-Orban-Putin (and techbro?) axis wins the U.S. election. O’Brien’s quote of a long rambling passage from Trump’s acceptance speech provides the justification for how and why that intersection of interests (of at least the first three) can rightfully be called an axis – a case also made by Byline Supplement, co-authored by the team at the investigative media site Byline Times. Anne Applebaum correctly notes that “axis” is too strong a word; she prefers “network of convenience.” I agree with her caution and will share my own thoughts on her new book soon.

I would go further than O’Brien does in his piece, however, and would say that every significant national election today, especially in a country like the U.S., is an international election involving external players – in this case Russia, China, and other countries and transnational groups (corporate-industrial lobbies, among others) exercising influence via media and other channels (just as U.S. interests play a role in foreign elections when those interests are at stake). When Americans vote for authoritarians like Trump, they are also voting for authoritarians like Putin — and for a carve-up of international power among neo-empires still largely driven by old-energy plus new-tech interests. The opening up of the Arctic, for instance, is also opening up geopolitical competition over the Arctic and its resources, which are particularly attractive to old-energy (fossil fuel) interests, as they may keep them afloat for a significant time longer.

And voting is just the tip of the iceberg of political action – still an essential step, in countries like the U.S., but also just a cog in a much larger set of wheels. That said, the very likely emergence of Kamala Harris as the Democrats’ presidential nominee has certainly invigorated U.S. politics, with the differences between the two candidates — in style now (as she differs little from Biden in policy) — being exactly the kind of thing the Democrats needed to whip up some enthusiasm. We’ll soon see how ugly things get as the racism of Trump’s far-right supporters (and their international backers — tech, fossil fuel, and media moguls — and autocrat/info-war facilitators) goes into high gear.

Further reading:

Phillips Payson O’Brien, “Strategic Update for Ukraine and Russia,” Phillips’s Newsletter, July 21, 2024, https://phillipspobrien.substack.com/p/weekend-update-90-strategic-update  O’Brien’s Substack newsletter is worth subscribing to.

Byline Supplement, “Fascism Redux: A New Axis Takes Shape,” July 20, 2024, https://www.bylinesupplement.com/p/fascism-redux-a-new-axis-takes-shape

Tonya Mosley, “Expert on dictators warns — Don’t lose hope, that’s what they want” (interview with Anne Applebaum), Fresh Air, July 23, 2024. https://www.npr.org/2024/07/23/nx-s1-5049021/expert-on-dictators-warns-dont-lose-hope-thats-what-they-want I;’ll have more to say about Applebaum’s new book, Autocracy, Inc., soon.

by Kate Bossert (UKR-TAZ intern; see her UKR-TAZ piece on Russian cyber threats here)

In all armed conflicts, land and nature are among the most immediate casualties, yet these devastating effects on the environment never seem to be prioritized in mass media or in conversations about wars. The environment is often the silent victim of war. In the context of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the natural world has endured ongoing widespread and long-term environmental damage that could continue to negatively affect the country for centuries.

A recent article in the Journal of Occupational Medicine and Toxicology (Hryhorczuk et al) provides an in-depth analysis of the environmental health impacts of Russia’s war on Ukraine, including coverage of air and water pollution, chemical contamination, habitat destruction, and much more. And the excellent first issue of the London Ukrainian Review, published in March, focused on various dimensions of this topic. Other coverage of it can be found here, here, here, and here, and see the bibliography of sources below.

One of the most devastating events affecting Ukrainian territory was the well-known destruction of Ukraine’s largest dam, Kakhovka, on June 6th, 2023, by Russian forces. This tragedy qualified as ecocide and the worst environmental disaster in Europe since Chernobyl. Russian troops blew up the dam and the hydroelectric infrastructure, destroying it and releasing massive amounts of water. Impacts of the event included leaving 700,000 people without clean drinking water, demolishing wildlife and natural habitats, and unleashing more than a thousand potential sources of pollution from flooded sites. (For further reading on its impacts, see here, here, here, here, here and here.) 

The attack elicited great controversy over whether or not to rebuild the Kakhovka dam. In the month following the flood, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine passed a decree on the reconstruction of the reservoir and dam of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant (HPP). Ukrhydroenergo, the biggest hydro power generating company in Ukraine, is in strong support of this bill as the company wants to build a new HPP with an output of 550-600 megawatts. From an economic perspective, rebuilding the reservoir could entice residents back to abandoned homes, weekend dachas, and fishing boats along the former shoreline. And considering the inconceivable social and environmental costs this catastrophe has had on Ukraine, it can appear to be logical and necessary to rebuild the dam. 

But the solution to this disaster is not so black and white, and many environmentalists have argued against restoring the reservoir. Environmental activist Eugene Simonov stated that the previous reservoir already produced “very low-quality water with a lot of pollution“, and so the 2,000 square kilometers of land could be used in a much more environmentally and economically productive way. Additionally, if the Kakhovka reservoir restoration project goes ahead, it will be necessary to destroy all of these 1,800 square kilometers of natural ecosystems that have now begun to form. To learn more about the Kakhovka dam debate, see here, here and here. 

Despite all the chaos and environmental damage that has and continues to occur in this war-stricken country, plans are being formed and action has been taken to improve the current environmental crisis in Ukraine. The international Conflict and Environment Observatory (CEOBS) has been covering the climate crisis in Ukraine and discussing progress as well as necessary steps forward for Ukraine, including climate mainstreaming and building capacity for a green transition. 

But these eco-friendly transitions can only happen with extensive funding and support from other countries (especially the U.S.). As highlighted in the Ten-Step plan to address environmental impact of war in Ukraine, Ukrainian “organizations are calling on the international community to act now.” There are also conservation groups in Ukraine making headway, including the Ukrainian Nature Conservation Group and other supportive organizations (e.g. see here).