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Journalism has been called \u201cthe first draft of history\u201d. As the emerging story of Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine unfolds, I\u2019ve been thinking of this page of the \u201cfirst draft\u201d.<\/p>\n
The 2008 financial crash began with problems in the sub-prime mortgage market in the US. One reading of this is that 9\/11 shook the US to the core. Had it been in a stronger place, it might have been possible to seek a peaceful solution \u2014 borrowing language from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa to ask about grievances in the Middle East against the US. IF that had been possible, it might also have unlocked the possibility of an enduring peace in Israel \/ Palestine.<\/p>\n
Instead, it found in the US, a global superpower struggling to accept its decline, that needed a show of power in the \u201cwar on terror\u201d. An assumption that the peoples of Iraq and Afghanistan would happily accept US-style democracy lead to an underestimating of the cost of this military intervention.
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For such a big misunderstanding to happen points to the US being unable to let itself see what was going on under its nose \u2013- which points to unconscious content. Many in the US recognised that gerrymandering, the distorting effects of the electoral college and the outcome of the 2001 US Presidential election having been effectively decided by the US Supreme Court were signs of a deeply dysfunctional democracy, yet there seem to have been few qualms about bringing that understanding of democracy to Iraq and Afghanistan, and seem a genuine surprise when neither this nor \u201cregime change\u201d were received with the anticipated easy and joy. It\u2019s almost inevitable that such a gap between conscious and unconscious process would land most heavily on the a segment of American society that is highly marginalised \u2014 in this case those at the bottom of the economic pile, with sub-prime mortgages. But, although marginalised, those people are still part of the collective process \u2014 and their suffering was enough to damage an economic system that wasn\u2019t as robust as it might have been.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s a very quick summary, but suggests that US hubris-driven over-reach in the Middle East lay behind the 2008 economic crash. Once begun, global interconnectedness meant that the echoes would go in all directions.<\/p>\n
There is a parallel with Putin\u2019s invasion of Ukraine. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s been widely reported that, having grown up in the USSR and begin his career as an officer in the KGB, Putin experienced the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe and the end of the USSR as a moment of national shame. Countries from the former Warsaw Pact joining, or seeking to join, the EU and NATO added to the sense of the diminishment of Russia. But time has passed. Russia is now more economically stable than in the aftermath of the USSR. There are many suggestions that it has been accreting influence by \u201csoft\u201d means \u2014 influencing politics in general, and elections (and the Brexit referendum) in particular, through social media \u2014 with widespread stories about donations to extreme right-wing groups across Europe and stories of Russian influence on Trump and the his election. On that trajectory, invading Ukraine is a credible next step, now a larger military adventure seems affordable. It\u2019s put Putin on the map as a figure of power, and demonstrated Russian military might.<\/p>\n
Where the parallel with the US in Iraq and Afghanistan starts to shout is that Ukraine hasn\u2019t keeled over and welcomed the Russians. Despite Putin\u2019s claim to be \u201cde-nazifing\u201d the country, early evidence is that Ukrainians are not seeing their government as \u201cNazi\u201d and the Russians as \u201cliberators\u201d. <\/p>\n
Writing this a few days after the invasion began, how it will work out is far from clear. But there are two very big questions. One is what resources Russia will have to put in to taking over Ukraine and controlling Ukraine. At what point does a country of 145 million people discover it can\u2019t subdue a neighbouring country of 44 million? The other is how much the Russian people will accept. Putin may well be able to stir up patriotic pride, but does that speak to Russians with painful memories of financial hardship after the fall of the USSR, for whom things are still fragile? Will this eventually force him from power, or cause him to hang with with greater repression? (bearing in mind that keeping a population under control is expensive).<\/p>\n
Russia probably has a narrow window in which to re-assert its power. As China and India take up their places as the world\u2019s most powerful nations as well as their most populous, Russia faces being overshadowed by its Southern neighbour. It can grab for influence now, while there is still influence to grab and while the US is becoming more engaged with China, but needs to do that soon, before it becomes the \u201clightly-populated nation north of China\u201d.<\/p>\n
2008 showed how quickly an American financial problem could became global. It\u2019s not yet clear where the fault lines will go if Russia discovers that it too is over-reaching. My guess is that we will see economic hardship in Europe if Russia uses its leverage over gas supply and increased attempts to influence politics in Europe and North America \u2014 undermining Western society by undermining our politics \u2014 which in turn undermines the economy by creating conditions bad for business and for social cohesion.<\/p>\n