The resumption of the Ukrainian conflict as a further factor of confrontation between Russia with the USA and the European Union

At a time when relations between the European Union and the United States with Russia are at a very low point, an old cause of friction is adding as a factor of aggravation of the crisis. Not that on the Ukrainian conflict there were particular illusions of a resolution convenient to all the parties involved, but the stalemate allowed us to believe that this conflict remained in a latent situation so as not to contribute to increasing the conflicts. On the contrary, the resumption of fighting over the last two weeks has seen an intensification such as to be defined as the worst in recent months. So after seven years of fighting and about 14.00 victims, according to the tragic statistics of the United Nations, the question is still far from a resolution and the movements of Russian troops near the border with Ukraine and the strengthening of the military presence of Kiev along the eastern frontier, indicate that a peaceful definition appears increasingly remote. Moscow, to justify its provocations, uses the usual predictable tactic, which consists in accusing the Ukrainian country of carrying out provocations along the border line to which it is necessary to respond with a military deployment to protect Russia; now it must be remembered that Moscow has always denied its participation in the conflict in the Donbass, where effective without uniforms, but attributable to the Russian army, acted ambiguously that well describes Putin’s operating methods and that is part of the disinformation system justify the behavior towards Ukraine. But if the most immediate recipient of the Kremlin’s threats is Kiev, the message is also addressed to Brussels and Washington, which, within the Atlantic Alliance, frame Ukraine as a geostrategic frontier for the containment of the former Soviet country. It must be considered that after the change in the White House, the American administration is more compact in considering Russia as an opponent and less well disposed than when Trump was president, Biden in fact immediately showed his adversity to Putin, bringing the level back up. of the verbal confrontation. It is no mystery that Moscow would have preferred Trump’s continuity over the current situation and a possible explanation of some analysts for Russian behavior in Ukraine is that Moscow has no real intention of forcing the situation, as much as that of carrying out a showdown. with the aim of verifying the American reaction. This interpretation does not seem risky because it responds to the logic of the provocation to which the Kremlin has accustomed several times, understood as an instrumental means to be exercised in foreign policy. A further reading of Moscow’s behavior is that of exerting, through threats against Ukraine, pressure on Kiev’s western allies to obtain political concessions that can ease the sanctions to which Russia is subjected for the annexation of Crimea. At present, both the US and the European Union have assured their support for Ukraine, but from a military point of view, without a concrete commitment, which must go beyond the political one, Kiev would be destined to succumb in the face of supremacy. Russian and it is difficult to hypothesize the presence of American and European forces alongside the Ukrainian soldiers; Moscow certainly knows that it would have an immediate result in the event of an attack against Ukraine, but in the medium and long term it would face international isolation and sanctions so harsh as to put the Russian country in great difficulty. An attitude that is always on the edge of provocation is more credible, but for this reason it is potentially very dangerous because it can degenerate even in the most trivial accident. It must also be analyzed that this Russian activism takes place at a time when the level of relations between Moscow and the West are particularly low and destined, at the moment, to be increasingly deteriorated, which may hide the Kremlin’s fear of ever-present involvement. greater than Ukraine in the western camp, which would have the main effect of having the troops of the Atlantic Alliance directly on the Russian border. This eventuality can be a solution to make the Russians retreat but also to exasperate them in a dangerous way: it must be remembered that the first objective of Moscow is to keep Ukraine within its area of ​​influence, but, if this were not possible , at least prevent it from joining the Atlantic Alliance. Diplomacy can support this Russian objective if Moscow withdraws its military, real or hidden, from areas under Ukrainian sovereignty and begins to respect international law: this will be the first starting point for the resumption of dialogue.