Russia-Ukraine conflict has deep historical roots

By Lethbridge Herald on May 18, 2022.

The reasons behind Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have deep historical roots.

Through examination of historical context during a presentation to the Southern Alberta Council on Public Affairs on Thursday, Associate Professor of History at the University of Lethbridge Dr. Chris Burton covered Russian attitudes toward Ukraine and why the invasion took place when it did. 

The common origin story of both Ukraine and Russia is a part of the reasoning for the invasion, according to Burton. He explained that both Russia and Ukraine share an inheritance from the very first Slavic state called Kievan Rus. Kievan Rus was bigger than the Holy Roman Empire and had one of the largest cities in Europe at the time, Kiev.

“Kiev had a very vibrant and original culture and society and interestingly, in the 1980s under the Soviet Union, they reconstructed the Great Gates of Kiev,” said Burton.

This happened as the Soviet Union was experiencing a crisis of identity, added Burton. He said it was an attempt in the late Soviet period to reinforce national identity.

“As long as Kiev remained part of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union, it was easy for Russians to present Kievan Rus, the very first Slavic state, as their historical legacy,” said Burton.

He explained how when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991 this presented a direct threat to Russian historical mythology. 

“The ancient capital of the Russian state was now in a different country,” said Burton. “This posed a direct threat to Russian historical identity.” 

Russia tried to create a different historical legacy in the 1990s by intensifying archeological explorations in the Russian north around Novgorod, explained Burton. The Russians tried emphasizing their origins were actually in the Russian north.

“Back to medieval history very briefly, Kievan Rus was conquered by the Mongols and the Tatars in 1240, and this led to the separation of Ukrainians from Russians for several hundred years,” said Burton.

He said there was little contact and culturally they grew apart. They were brought back together again by the Pereiaslav Agreement in 1654, hundreds of years after the Mongol invasion.

“The Treaty of Pereiaslav was presented by Russian rulers and intellectuals as the restoration of ancient historical ties,” said Burton. “And very importantly, any later attempts by Ukrainians to breakaway was understood as an attack on Russian identity itself.”

It was referred to from 1764 onward as Little Russia, according to Burton. He said Russians themselves use the term ‘Little Russians’ to put down Ukrainians. Burton shared that this discrimination continued for many years, with Tsar Nicholas apparently having said, “There is no Ukrainian language, just illiterate peasants speaking Little Russian.” 

After the Russian Revolution in 1917, Burton said they decided to co-opt a nationalist party while continuing to promote internationalism. He said the Soviet Union in the 1920s was the very first country in the world to establish affirmative action for national minorities.

“Ukraine and Ukrainians in the 1920s were major beneficiaries of this. However, by 1932 Stalin happened and Stalin changed nationalist policy in a major way. Communists who were Ukrainian nationalists were now seen as a dangerous threat, and they were purged.”

Burton added that relations between Russians and Ukrainians after this period became framed as fraternal, with Russians as the elder brother to the Ukrainian younger brother.

“There was a special and unfortunate attitude towards Ukrainians. Russians looked at Ukraine as something artificial that would be reunited with Russia,” said Burton.

Burton also spoke briefly on the claims that Russia launched the war to fight fascism.

“Ultra-right-wing groups have had a presence in post-1991 Ukraine and Ukrainian politics. 

“There’s a very right-wing party Svoboda for example and in the current war the Azov Battalion gets a lot of press that 10 per cent or more of its soldiers are neo-Nazis,” said Burton.

He said the numbers are disproportionate of the greater Ukrainian population with support for the right-wing Svoboda party having slipped from about 10 per cent in 2012 to about two per cent in the 2019 elections. 

“Evidence from before the war at least was that few Ukrainians embraced such beliefs and were increasingly moving away from [those beliefs],” said Burton.

Burton also thinks that NATO’s withdrawal from Afghanistan last summer played a role in the timing of the Russian invasion. 

“I think that Putin and his confidants, his echo chamber, read too much into NATO’s withdrawal from Afghanistan… They thought they had caught the United States and its allies in a moment of particular weakness,” said Burton. “They did not think that NATO would do anything substantial to help Ukraine.”

Another reason for the Russians invading when they did is the failure to secure Crimea with regard to its water supply, explained Burton. 

“The interior of the Crimean Peninsula is semi-desert like Lethbridge,” said Burton. “To fix this, the Soviet Union built the North Crimean Canal starting in the late 1950s.”

After it was completed, the canal provided 85 per cent of the freshwater supply for Crimea, resulting in the population and agriculture of Crimea growing. In 2014, after the Russian invasion, the Ukrainians dammed the canal according to Burton.

“It was one of the few ways the Ukrainians could put pressure on the Russians, but it was very effective… one wonders why the Russians didn’t consider this before they invaded but apparently, they didn’t,” said Burton.

The lack of water made the interior of the Crimea much less habitable. People started to leave, the farming shriveled up, and the occupation of the Crimea became tremendously expensive, largely because of the water supply, Burton explained.

“The first five years of occupying Crimea cost Russia roughly 23 billion U.S. dollars, the equivalent of three years of the entire Russian state expenditure on health care,” said Burton.

The water supply became a huge challenge for the Russians, said Burton. 

“It’s no coincidence that almost the first thing they did in February 2022 was they blew up the Ukrainian dam and they took Kherson,” said Burton.

To watch the session, visit SACPA.ca.