Invasion of Ukraine triggers global realignment

BANGKOK (AP) — On the eve of the first anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the battlefield has shrunk and fierce resistance has forced Moscow to reduce its military targets, but the diplomatic fallout from the war still reverberate around the world. .

The war reshaped global alliances, stoked old fears and breathed new life into NATO and US-European relations.

The invasion sparked a rapprochement between Moscow and Beijing, as well as the rogue states of Iran and North Korea. It also raised questions about sovereignty, security and the use of military power, and heightened fears about China’s plans for Taiwan.

“War highlights the interrelationship between diplomacy and the use of force in a way that no one has thought about for many, many years,” said Ian Lesser, vice president of the institute of German Research Marshall Fund.

The invasion by Russian forces on Feb. 24, 2022 “signalled the total end of the post-Cold War world,” Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said last month during a speech at Johns Hopkins University. “It became apparent that globalization and interdependence alone do not guarantee peace and development in the world.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Ukraine was an “integral part” of Russian history and had never achieved a “true state”, the same position Chinese President Xi Jinping holds in Taiwan, a claimed self-governing island by Beijing.

Six months after invading Ukraine, China released a white paper on Taiwan claiming that the island “has been an integral part of Chinese territory since ancient times”. The document says that Beijing aspires to “peaceful reunification” but that it “will not renounce the use of force”.

China’s intentions towards Taiwan date back to long before the war in Ukraine, but Beijing has stepped up pressure over the past year, including launching ballistic missiles at the island and into Japanese waters in August following a visit from the then President. United States House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi in Taipei.

If the West allows Russia to succeed in Ukraine, China may be emboldened by its vision of an international order “divergent from ours and which we can never accept”, Kishida warned.

Japan’s prime minister vowed to use Japan’s G7 presidency this year to strengthen “unity among like-minded countries” against Russian aggression. “If we allow this forced change in the ‘status quo’ to go unpunished, it will happen in other parts of the world, including Asia,” he warned.

A Chinese invasion of Taiwan would be far more complicated than the Russian attack on Ukraine, says Euan Graham, a Singapore-based expert at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS).

“Russia’s incompetent performance on the battlefield in Ukraine gives any high-ranking military or politician in China pause for thought on an adventure on a much grander scale in Taiwan,” Graham adds.

But the fear is real. Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen referenced the war in Ukraine when she announced the extension of military service in December.

“They learned from Ukraine the lesson of having a larger military reserve in the event of a conflict,” Graham said.

North Korea, which has threatened to use its nuclear weapons preemptively in a wide range of scenarios, was already a source of concern in the region, but Russia’s hint that it might use its nuclear weapons in Ukraine has sparked new fears.

South Korea, protected by the US “nuclear umbrella”, last year expanded its military operations with US forces that had been reduced under the Trump administration. Seoul is asking for new assurances that Washington will quickly deploy its atomic weapons in the event of a North Korean nuclear attack.

North Korea has provided strong military support to its neighbor Russia. Last year, the United States accused Pyongyang of supplying Russia with artillery shells.

Iran is also providing military aid to Russia, supplying it with the bomb-carrying drones used to attack power plants and civilian sites across Ukraine.

The Western allies collaborated closely in their responses to the war, but took on the diplomatic challenge of convincing the rest of the world of the importance of the invasion.

Only a handful of Asian countries have cracked down on Moscow, and many abstained on a United Nations resolution condemning the attack.

A few weeks before the invasion, China proclaimed its “unlimited” friendship with Russia. Beijing has refused to criticize the war and has increased its purchases of oil and gas, helping Moscow counter Western sanctions.

However, there are signs of “complex fault lines” in Sino-Russian relations, Jude Blanchette, an analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), warned in a telephone press conference.

During talks in September in Uzbekistan, the Chinese president expressed unspecified “concerns” to Putin over the invasion, while promising to give “strong support” to Russia’s “core interests”.

“I think if Xi Jinping could snap his fingers, he would like to see an end to the war, but in such a way that Putin remains in power and Russia remains a strong strategic partner,” Blanchette added.

India, heavily dependent on Russia for its military equipment, also abstained from the UN resolution and continues to buy Russian oil.

However, as regional rival China draws closer to Russia, India has quietly turned to the United States, especially within the Quad partnership, which includes Japan and Australia, says Viraj Solanki , expert at the IISS center.

In Europe, the invasion reinvigorated NATO after a barrage of criticism from then-President Trump led French President Emmanuel Macron to declare the alliance “brain dead”.

NATO member countries and allies have come together to help Ukraine, changing rules that banned the export of arms to countries in conflict. Most remarkable, perhaps, is that Germany overcame its taboos after World War II to send Leopard tanks.

The war has prompted Finland and Sweden to apply for NATO membership, which most experts believe will happen in the coming months.

Last year, NATO first named China a strategic challenge, but not a direct adversary. The alliance warned of Beijing’s growing military ambitions, aggressive rhetoric and closer ties with Russia.

Beyond NATO, the war has underscored the importance of the relationship between the United States and the European Union, which Lesser says has been “absolutely crucial” to sanctions and export controls.

China argues that it was the United States that sparked the Ukraine crisis, in part thanks to NATO’s expansion into Eastern European countries. Beijing has criticized the alliance for suggesting the war could influence China’s actions in Asia.

“NATO pretends to be a regional organization, but it continues to open up territories and fields, stoking conflicts, creating tensions, exaggerating threats and encouraging confrontation,” a spokesman for China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Thursday. Foreign Affairs, Wang Wenbin.

The long-term consequences of the war are difficult to predict, but according to Lesser, one thing is indisputable: it will be “very difficult for Russia to recover from the damage caused to its reputation on many levels”.

A group of countries like Syria, North Korea, Iran and Venezuela “may feel inclined to continue supporting Russia”, he adds, but in terms of broader diplomacy, Russia’s reputation Russia “took a terrible blow”.

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Associated Press writers Lorne Cook in Brussels and Jon Gambrell in Dubai contributed to this report.