Recently, The situation in eastern Ukraine has undergone some changes. The Western Ukrainian government forces have assembled 7 brigades and deployed in the direction of eastern Ukraine. The entry of US paratroopers into Ukraine for exercises has made the situation in eastern Ukraine even more tense. The war seems to be about to break out. The Ukrainian government and Donetsk armed forces accuse each other of deliberately exacerbating tensions. Why is there such a stalemate between East and West Ukraine? So much so that a turmoil broke out that has not subsided for 8 years?
1. The grudges between Ukraine and Russia
As we all know, Russia has always been involved in the Ukrainian civil war. It can be said that the direct contradiction in the Ukrainian civil war is the contradiction between the Ukrainian nation and the Slavic nation. This contradiction can even be traced back to ancient times. Kievan Rus dynasty period. Kievan Rus was a dynasty established by Viking colonists. Later, as East Slavs (later Russians) entered Ukraine, the locals mixed with East Slavs and formed the Rus tribe. Later The Slavic Kievan Rus dynasty was established, and ethnic disputes in Ukraine were not yet evident at this time. Later, in the 14th century, the tribes who settled in western Ukraine began to form their own unique culture and language, and there were obvious cultural differences with the East Slavs who settled in eastern Ukraine, and the gap between the two sides began to become increasingly big.
After the establishment of the Polish and Lithuanian Federation, they controlled most of Ukraine and spread Polish cultural values to Ukraine. However, the Polish rulers imposed extortionate taxes on Ukraine, so the resistance of the local people has always been relatively tenacious. Until the 17th century, the Cossack leader who settled in Ukraine Khmelnytsky In order to fight against the powerful Poland, he signed the "Pereyaslav Agreement" with the Tsar, which aligned Ukraine with Russia, but also gave the Russian Empire control of Ukraine. excuse, This made Ukraine completely become a part of Russia in the 18th century. A large number of East Slavs poured into Ukraine, forming an eastern Ukrainian settlement circle with East Slavs and German immigrants as the core and Poles and Ukrainians Mainly the settlement circle of Western Ukraine.
Since the western region of Ukraine has been under Polish rule all year round, the western region of Ukraine mainly believes in Catholicism, while the eastern region of Ukraine mainly believes in Orthodox Christianity because it is dominated by East Slavs. This not only makes the mutual identity between western and eastern Ukraine weak, but also As a result, the conflicts between religions and ethnic groups continued to deepen. Even at the end of the 18th century, many conflicts between religions and ethnic groups broke out on both sides. After the First World War, Ukraine broke away from the rule of Czarist Russia. At this time, the situation in Ukraine was very chaotic. Several forces appeared in the territory. They were Galicia, ruled by the old aristocracy of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Republic, the Western Ukrainian People's Republic established by the Western Ukrainian nationalists Bandera , the Ukrainian Soviet Republic established by the socialists Emmanuel and Serafima, and the anarchic freedom of Eastern Ukraine established by the liberal Makhno District, Crimea ruled by the White Army warlord Wrangel (Crimea was not part of Ukraine at the time) and the Don River area of the rebels of another White Army warlord Denikin.
These people attacked each other, and their grievances and conflicts continued to deepen. However, after the victory of the Soviet Red Army, the main remaining conflict in Ukraine was the ethnic conflict between the East and the West. The Western Ukrainians, mainly Poles and Ukrainians, and the Eastern Slavs There continues to be intrigue and deception between the people and the Eastern Ukrainians, who are mainly German immigrants. Fortunately, under the rule of the Soviet Union, where each had a fifty-fifty rule, no too fierce conflicts broke out. It was not until the Germans occupied the Ukrainian region during World War II that they instigated ethnic conflicts to maintain their rule in the occupied areas. The contradiction between East and West Ukrainians has once again surfaced.After the end of World War II, it took the Soviet Union nearly two decades to suppress the extreme democrats in Western Ukraine. However, these people did not disappear. Instead, they moved underground and reappeared after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
During the reign of Khrushchev, the Ukrainian assigned Crimea to Ukraine. This was no problem in the 1950s. After all, no one expected that the Soviet Union would disintegrate in the future. Among the people living in Crimea, there are a large number of old Soviet soldiers who participated in World War II and their descendants. This makes Crimea, a region in southern Ukraine, have an obvious pro-Russian mentality and appear to be different from Ukraine. Nationalists are out of place. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, nationalists became popular and oppressed these veterans and their descendants. Since Ukraine pursued deindustrialization, while eastern Ukraine was dominated by heavy industry, and western Ukraine was dominated by finance and service industries, this made the two sides look at each other. dislike; despise. Now that they are all dissatisfied, it is only a matter of time before the full martial arts show takes place.
The eastern part of Ukraine is inherently close to Russia due to demographic problems, and the western region is also inherently close to Poland and Turkey due to demographic problems. This has resulted in ethnic conflicts that have not been resolved for a long time. The Ukrainian government failed to play a good role in smoothing out a series of ethnic conflicts between the East and the West. On the contrary, the bureaucrats favored the Western Ukrainian nationalists, which made this group of nationalists even more rampant and even threatened to kill them all under Nazi banners. Eastern Ukrainians and pro-Russian elements. Faced with this threat, the people of Eastern Ukraine naturally could not sit still and wait for death, so they began to organize resistance.
2. The grievances and resentments of Crimea
Crimea was one of the colonies of the ancient Greeks in ancient times, and later became a colony of the Roman Empire . Later, the Crimean Peninsula changed several times. Among them, the Byzantine Empire and the Republic of Genoa ruled Crimea for two hundred years, and then it was occupied by the Mongols. After the Golden Horde split, the Crimean Khanate became a vassal of the Ottoman Empire, which also made Crimea A wide range of Islamic culture was born on the Miya Peninsula. At this time, the Grand Duchy of Moscow, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and the Ottomans launched a century-long battle over Crimea. The Poles once captured Crimea, and the Ottomans once captured Crimea with the help of the United Kingdom. Asia, but the ultimate victor was Tsarist Russia. Russia regards Crimea as an important Black Sea outlet, and has painstakingly operated a naval base in Sevastopol .
When Tsarist Russia collapsed under the stimulation of World War I, Crimea was occupied by the warlord Wrangel and the British and French intervention forces. Later, the Soviet Red Army drove away the warlords and foreign intervention forces, and conquered Crimea. Asia was included in the territory of the Soviet Union. During the Soviet period, it was still a naval base and the home port of the Soviet Red Flag Black Sea Fleet, which had important strategic significance. When World War II broke out, the Soviet authorities decided to implement population relocation. Unfortunately, the Soviet army collapsed too quickly. The German army invaded Crimea in September 1941 and did not have time to relocate. The Tatars and Ukrainians, the Slavs were almost exterminated by Nazi Germany. When the Soviet Union defeated Nazi Germany and regained Crimea, it was rebuilt here. It is still an important naval base of the Soviet Union and a famous health resort. Many officers and soldiers injured in the war were arranged to settle here to heal them. The physical and mental trauma suffered during the war.
In 2013, Ukraine decided to join the European Union and leased Sevastopol in Crimea to the United States as a naval base. Western Ukrainians who are close to Western Europe and eastern Ukrainians who are close to Russia took to the streets to express their political demands. , and a conflict broke out, resulting in about 1,200 casualties. In 2014, Ukraine issued a warning to Crimea, which has a relatively high resistance, hoping to make the Crimean people more honest and stop fantasizing about fighting against the Ukrainian government. Soon a new round of demonstrations broke out, and nationalists in Western Ukraine also began to suppress the pro-Russian faction in Crimea. The results were unexpected. Russian President Putin approved the use of force against Ukraine on March 1 of that year. The Russian military Special forces and marines quickly entered Crimea and took over various local military bases. Almost most of the Ukrainian troops stationed in Crimea surrendered to the Russian army. Crimea officially voted to join the Russian Federation in a referendum.
While the confrontation and referendum was going on in Crimea, demonstrations and referendums broke out in Odessa, Kharkiv, Kursk, Donetsk and other places in Ukraine. The Ukrainian government forces immediately intervened to maintain the referendum. order, but conflicts still occurred. Later, the Russian media claimed that as many as 5,000 Ukrainians were killed by Ukrainian government forces. Later, pro-Russian militia forces in East Ukraine established the "Donetsk Republic" and the "Luhansk Republic" with the support of Russia. These militiamen did not Most of them are veterans of the Soviet era or former Ukrainian government troops. They believe that the Kiev government's endless oppression of eastern Ukraine and connivance of Nazi attacks on eastern Ukrainians have seriously threatened the survival of the people of eastern Ukraine. If they want to make a living, It can only be solved by force, either by seizing the entire Ukraine or joining Russia. The Ukrainian government also declared the eastern Ukrainian militia to be a terrorist armed force, and then launched the army to carry out a crusade, and the Ukrainian civil war officially broke out.
3. Comparison of the strengths of the warring parties
Most of the weapons in the hands of the East Ukrainian militias are light weapons and individual anti- tank weapons. The heavy weapons they can rely on are either old equipment from the Soviet era in stock, or guns fired from museums and monuments. The old tanks that came out, , these tanks have lagged behind for many years and cannot compete with the tanks of the Ukrainian government forces on the battlefield. Therefore, the Eastern Ukrainian armed forces use the old tanks as mobile turrets to support infantry operations and eliminate the firepower points of the government forces.
On the other hand, Western Ukraine has excellent armored brigades and mechanized brigades. They also have the support of fighter planes and armed helicopters. These Ukrainian government troops armed to the teeth are staunch supporters of the Kiev government and loyal hawks. They are It has previously acted efficiently and ruthlessly in blocking traffic arteries in areas bordering Ukraine and Russia, and in clearing out protesters in Kharkov and Kursk. If these armies launch a full-scale attack on Donetsk and Luhansk, the consequences will be disastrous.
The tactics of the Western Ukrainian government forces are basically to rely on heavy weapons to carry out saturation bombings and then use mechanized troops to launch assaults. They also bring a large number of ultra-nationalist militias to clear out Eastern Ukraine. As long as the battlefield opens, it will be a one-sided massacre. The early fighting of the armed forces in Eastern Ukraine did not go smoothly, and they were even compressed by the government forces to the core areas of Donetsk and Luhansk. There are still some strongholds in these areas that are occupied by Ukrainian government troops and mercenaries. For the Eastern Ukrainian militias, they are simply surrounded by enemies from both sides. If these entrenched government military strongholds cannot be eliminated first, fighting may really break out in major cities. It was a unilateral massacre, so the most famous and most brutal battle for the airport broke out. The observation team of international human rights organizations also discovered that the Ukrainian government forces used cluster bombs extensively, and they could not escape the disaster even against the militias in East Ukraine and even residential areas.
Soon the battlefield in Eastern Ukraine turned into a proxy war between the United States and Russia. Both sides continued to send military advisers to guide the battle and help the forces they supported to train their troops. Originally, Western Ukraine had a complete victory in sight, but when the Ukrainian government forces routinely checked the safety of the bridge during the attack, an accident occurred when a large number of convoys blocked the bridge. The Eastern Ukrainian armed forces took the opportunity to use the only heavy artillery on hand to launch a bombardment of the Ukrainian government forces at the bridge. , directly defeated the erring government troops, and the war situation once again reached a draw. Until 2015, when the United Nations came forward to coordinate a ceasefire, a rough calculation of the casualties caused by the Ukrainian civil war was initially estimated to be more than 5,300 people. The real death toll may actually be more than 50,000, and more than 800,000 people have left their homes. Go and run for your life.
However, the ceasefire agreement was basically just empty talk. The two sides had numerous sporadic fighting intermittently during the period when the ceasefire agreement was in effect. The situation in Ukraine was often pulled into a tense state where war could break out again because of these sporadic fire conflicts. For Western Ukraine, Eastern Ukraine is a sacred and inviolable territory. It is absolutely impossible for the Kiev government to sit back and watch Russia encroach on its sovereign territory. For Russia, Ukraine is an indispensable part of the Tsarist Russia and the Soviet era. It is the land bridge connecting Western Europe, Southern Europe and Eastern Europe. As long as it controls Ukraine, it will gain the European breadbasket and also enable Russia to stabilize its Black Sea exports. Haikou, coupled with the fact that countless Russians shed blood and sacrificed their lives to encircle Crimea and Ukraine during the Soviet era, Ukraine is a target that cannot be easily given up.
Conclusion
Although the Ukrainian civil war temporarily belongs to Schrödinger's ceasefire, the actual situation can be said to be very pessimistic. Under the intensification of religious, regional and ethnic conflicts, it is difficult for both sides to reach a settlement through negotiations, and the United States and Russia are also trying to Respective interests will not easily allow their agents to negotiate for peace. For the Ukrainian government, maintaining the integrity and sanctity of national sovereignty is understandable.
For Russia, Ukraine is a burden from a certain perspective. Many industrial facilities in Eastern Ukraine were destroyed during the war and can only rely on Russian assistance to maintain them. However, Russia has also suffered international economic sanctions for its direct intervention in the Ukrainian civil war, which has led to the continued decline of the Russian economy. Eastern Ukraine is gradually losing value. If the desire for territory and considerations of national security are put aside, Russia may actually give up at any time. Eastern Ukraine, but considering that Russia’s defense strategy is to strictly prevent NATO troops from reaching its doorstep, it cannot completely abandon Ukraine. Therefore, the situation in Ukraine is not very clear, and the conflict may intensify at any time or even evolve into a war between Ukraine and Russia.
But then again, for Europe and the United States, instead of fighting Russia in Ukraine, it is more practical to increase military power in Syria, drive Russia out of Syria, and then divide the interests of Syria.
References:
"War in Donbass"
"Crimea Crisis"
"History of Ukraine"
