Ukraine- the litmus test, deal breaker

With Putin on his first lightning visit to India since 2018, where does that leave one of Moscow’s
oldest allies, which has grown increasingly close to Washington?

Anuj Raina

With Putin on his first lightning visit to India since 2018, where does that leave one of Moscow’s oldest allies, which has grown increasingly close to Washington? Will Ukraine be the litmus test?

Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived in India on Monday for a short but important trip, at a time when Indo- Russian relations seem to have areas of both alignment as well as divergence.

This “all-weather” partnership is one of the success stories of global diplomacy, and a high mark for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to live up to when they meet in Delhi on Monday.

But beyond the big-ticket defence deals, trade announcements, handshakes and Modi’s trademark hugs, the two countries will also have to overcome serious challenges. And that is largely down to the different geopolitical choices the two countries have made in recent months and years.

Growing India-US relations is one irritant that has loomed large over Delhi- Moscow ties, more so in the past decade. Moscow largely overlooked such irritants even though its own relations with Washington steadily deteriorated in recent years. Russia has been compelled to forge closer ties with China to secure its economic and geopolitical interests in Asia as the US-led West also seeks to dominate the region.

China’s deteriorating ties with the US also appear to have pushed Beijing and Moscow closer.

What complicates the matter further is that India-China relations have been recently tense - troops from the two countries fought a deadly clash in Ladakh’s Galwan Valley with clubs and stones which left 20 Indian soldiers dead. China later accepted that some of its soldiers also died in the clashes.

President Putin’s visit is taking place in the backdrop of a worsening COVID- 19 crisis in Russia which has mobilised its military along the border with Ukraine for a possible armed confrontation. India maintains both political and defence ties with Russia and Ukraine and Prime Minister Narendra Modi met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on the side-lines of the COP-26 summit in Glasgow.

On Sunday, it was announced that U.S. President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin will hold a video call on Tuesday, with the two leaders set to discuss the tense situation in Ukraine.

Roughly 175,000 Russian troops are believed to be massed near Ukraine’s borders. Ukraine Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov said on Friday that Moscow may be planning a large-scale military offensive at the end of January, citing intelligence reports. U.S. officials say they have reached similar conclusions.

Moscow accuses Kyiv of pursuing its own military build-up. It has dismissed as inflammatory suggestions that it is preparing for an attack on its southern neighbour and has defended its right to deploy troops on its own territory as it sees fit. U.S. officials say they do not know yet what Putin’s intentions are, including whether Putin has made a decision to invade Ukraine.

Russian President Vladimir Putin triggered a serious war scare in March and April of this year, but decided not to move ahead with re-invading his vulnerable, much smaller neighbour. Now, Putin is once again not only moving troops near the border with Ukraine, but has also stepped up his rhetoric about Ukraine in multiple public appearances. He has hinted broadly that his patience with Kyiv is running out. A careful review of the Russian leader’s record with respect to Ukraine suggests that almost all of the requisite components and justifications for military intervention are either in—or moving into—place. Both the near- and longterm indicators suggest that Kyiv and Washington have good reasons to worry.

Putin’s unfinished business

The Russian leader’s domestic political and foreign policy trajectory suggests that as he enters his third decade at the helm and approaches his seventieth birthday, he is thinking about his legacy. With the constitutional changes introduced in 2020, there are no formal constraints on his ability to rule Russia until 2036, if not even longer.

But there is one piece of unfinished business that is still missing from Putin’s list of accomplishments if he is to consolidate his reputation as the leader who returned Russia to its former greatness. That is the restoration of Russia’s dominion over key parts of its historic empire. No item on that agenda is more important than the return of Ukraine to Russia’s sphere of influence. For the Russian President, the restoration of Ukraine back