To my students: My thoughts on Ukraine
*** I am a psychologist, not a political scientist. My students know this. I am providing this note for context here: This letter to my students is my perspective as someone born in Kharkiv, raised in Moscow, and now living in the US.***
Hi everyone,
As you all know Russia launched a full-scale unprovoked attack on Ukraine in the early hours of February 24, 2022.
I mentioned in class that this has been on my mind and I decided to email you my thoughts.
The country where I grew up is bombing the country where I was born. Unfortunately, I have seen Kremlin talking points repeated by many of my smart and well-meaning American friends. I spent the past few days sharing my perspective and fact-based information on social media to help friends understand the situation. I’d like to offer my thoughts and some resources, and I hope my email is useful.
1. Disinformation is a part of Putin’s war. Look for reliable and fact-checked news. I have a longer list of resources to offer, but my top suggestion for real-time on-the ground reporting is The Kyiv Independent: https://kyivindependent.com/
https://twitter.com/kyivindependent
I follow several trusted sources on Twitter to help me make sense of the news, listing just a couple sources here so this is not overwhelming:
Kimberly St. Julian-Varnon, https://twitter.com/ksvarnon (US based Ukraine expert)
Heather Cox Richardson, https://twitter.com/HC_Richardson (historian, not Ukraine specific but very helpful for putting things in broader context)
For anyone who prefers summaries to minute-by-minute reporting, historian Heather Cox Richardson has been doing an amazing service putting out nearly daily summaries in the form Letters from an American, you can subscribe and receive them by email or read them online: https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/ These letters are NOT always Ukraine specific, but are very helpful for putting current events in broader context.
2. This is a good summary of the roots of the conflict: https://www.vox.com/22917719/russia-ukraine-invasion-border-crisis-nato-explained
3. The above article is long, so let me pick out a few key points:
— Putin’s attack on Ukraine was unprovoked. There was nothing Ukraine was doing to increase tensions. The was mention of Ukraine possibly one day becoming a member of NATO in 2008 by then President Bush. Since then, there has been no serious discussion about this. Ukraine could not have averted this crisis by “negotiating harder/smarter about NATO”.
— As a sovereign country, Ukraine is free to choose its security alliances. There is nothing inherently wrong with Ukraine aspiring to join NATO one day (though again, it was not a prospect in the near future). Finland and Sweden are not currently members of NATO, although support for joining this security alliance has grown dramatically at least in Finland. Yesterday, Putin threatened “serious military and political repercussions” for Finland and Sweden if they join NATO. I hope you can see how unacceptable this is for Putin to decide security alliances of other countries, so this is not only about Ukraine: https://metro.co.uk/2022/02/26/russia-warns-finland-and-sweden-of-consequences-if-they-join-nato-16178469/
— Ukraine overwhelmingly voted for independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. In 1994, Ukraine agreed to destroy its nuclear weapons in exchange for security guarantees from the US, UK, and Russia. Ukraine upheld this agreement and has no nuclear weapons now. Putin violated this agreement first in 2014 by the annexation of Crimea (Ukrainian territory) and a few days ago by launching a full-scale attack from land, air and sea on all of Ukraine.
4. I found this conversation between Preet Bharara and Prof. Kimberly Marten very helpful in understanding what Putin thinks he has to gain from this (senseless to the rest of us) war. This conversation is available both in audio and transcript form: https://cafe.com/stay-tuned/crisis-in-ukraine-with-kimberly-marten/?fbclid=IwAR3ERJJmpafdMLtGAgOAz6sjavBR5iZSA1W0bWWwuntxTv20Q8B4fh-pfQU
5. Many people in Russia do not want war. There have been protests all over the country and thousands people have been arrested. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/24/we-dont-want-this-russians-react-to-the-ukraine-invasion
6. Putin’s war against Ukraine is a humanitarian crisis for the people of Ukraine. Residential buildings and a kindergarten have been bombed. Thousands of people are fleeing and trying to cross border into Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Moldova. https://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/ukrainians-flee-war-seeking-safety-western-borders-83109913
7. The humanitarian crisis in Ukraine is racially tinged. There are over 16,000 students from Africa attending universities in Ukraine, training to become doctors, engineers, etc. There are confirmed reports that while White refugees from Ukraine are allowed to cross the border into Poland, Black students from Nigeria are being turned away. https://twitter.com/ReutersAfrica/status/1497526606394441734
8. Here is another racist dimension to the crisis: Russia claimed that it is invading Ukraine to “de-Nazify” it (not sure why not start fighting Nazis at home in Russia, or why stop at Ukraine — lots of Nazis all over the world; this was clearly a pretext). But the current president of Ukraine is Jewish, his family members fought Nazis during WWII and many perished in the Holocaust. Journalist Julia Ioffe described what Putin is doing as a “cross-border pogrom”: https://mobile.twitter.com/juliaioffe/status/1497223989919371267?fbclid=IwAR23aOydi-Jpgo8fs7sDIo-93fiAPCzw82kwu4HdrBy5LfM9mKFr3WlfAAg
Let me stop here, but I am available to answer any questions you may have about what is going on.
Thank you,
Anna
