Ukrainian Journey

In the west of Kyiv there is a commemorative park which reaches back to horrors committed eighty years ago in an earlier war: Babi Yar, scene of the worst single atrocity in the Second World War. When invading German troops captured Kyiv in September 1941, they rounded up the local Jewish population, took them to the edge of a deep ravine, ordered them to undress and shot each one with pistols and machine guns. Some 33,000 were murdered in 24 hours, the bodies piled in layers until the ravine was almost full. In the following two years, until the Red Army liberated Kyiv in late 1943, a further 70,000 people were murdered and dumped in Babi Yar: more Jews, captured Soviet prisoners of war, Roma people, the mentally ill, local troublemakers. 

In 1961, the Russian poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko published his poem “Babi Yar” to protest against anti-Semitism and the Soviet Government’s failure to commemorate the massacre. Eventually, in 1976 a monument was erected on the site. But, consistent with Soviet reluctance to give any special emphasis or status to victims of the Jewish Holocaust, the inscription reads merely that “Here in 1941–43 over 100,000 residents of Kiev and prisoners of war were executed by German-fascist invaders.” 

Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, new monuments to the victims have been erected, but controversy continues over how to commemorate Babi Yar. Some of the memorials have been defaced and vandalised, motivated by either  anti-Semitism or anti-Soviet feeling. When I visit, I notice the plaque on the Soviet monument is stained by some liquid. It might be urine. 

A different kind of defacement occurred soon after the start of the Russian invasion a year ago. Three Russian missiles, aimed at the adjacent 385-metre telecommunications tower – the tallest structure in Kyiv – damaged the memorial park. The tower, however, although now leaning slightly, is still standing: a monument to the reckless brutality of these new invaders from the East and their trashing of the common history of their countries.

During our visit, many refer to the war as attempted genocide. Putin, they say, wants to eradicate the Ukrainian nation: its culture, language and identity. Russian missiles indiscriminately target residential areas, hospitals and schools. Their soldiers rape and murder, without mercy or remorse. “They want to destroy us all,” they say.  “How is this different from Nazi genocide?” My journalist friends, who on their way to Ukraine visited the Nazi concentration and death camps at Auschwitz-Birkenau, insist they have seen what real genocide looks like, and this war does not qualify. They agree, of course, this is a brutal, criminal war, but question whether the Russians plan to murder all Ukrainians. There is as yet no new Babi Yar. But this is a discussion that can have no conclusion. Our areas of agreement are far more important than this semantic disagreement.

Our final stop is Odesa, Ukraine’s principal Black Sea port. We travel through the night in a comfortable sleeper train and arrive refreshed at dawn. Apart from the absence of tourists, and the closure of the famous Potemkin Steps leading down to the harbour, it seems uncannily peaceful, a good place to bring a family on holiday.

It is here that we try to bring the experiences and insights we have gained to some kind of conclusion. This is not like other wars between deadly enemies, where it is possible to imagine clear victory or defeat. Through this reckless military adventure, Putin has inadvertently but irrevocably driven Ukraine into the European embrace. He has lost, probably forever, the chance to bring Ukraine back into the Russian fold. But, on its own and even with substantial Western assistance, Ukraine is unlikely to be able to achieve complete military victory. 

Russian military tactics in the eastern and northern areas have been brutally destructive, scarred by individual atrocities and systematic war crimes. Other parts of the country, however, have been relatively unaffected. This is far from total war; but it could still be the precursor to one. What Ukrainians are fighting for is obvious. What Russian soldiers are fighting for is not. Russia cannot possibly subjugate Ukraine, but nor is it likely to lose. Equally, while Ukraine will surely survive as a country it is unlikely to realise all its war aims: withdrawal of all Russian forces back to the 1991 borders (returning Crimea therefore to Ukraine), Russian reparations for war damage, punishment of those, including Putin, responsible for war crimes, and reliable guarantees of Ukraine’s future territorial integrity and security.   

A nuclear power cannot be completely defeated without risking recourse to nuclear weapons. That after all is the whole point of having them: Mutually Assured Destruction, the Mexican Standoff. At the same time, Putin cannot back down. Otherwise, he risks being ousted. Staying in power is the war aim he will abandon last. He is likely therefore to plough on, in the belief that the Russian people can bear prolonged pain, loss and international isolation, outlasting the Ukrainians; also, that Western support for Ukraine will weaken, perhaps accelerated by victory for Donald Trump in the presidential election next year. In such circumstances Putin might hope to force Ukraine to the negotiating table, enabling Russia to hang on to its territorial gains, including Crimea. He might secure an undertaking that Ukraine will never join NATO and its territory will be a demilitarised zone. Russia will refuse to pay war damages and cannot be compelled to do so; there will be no prosecutions by the International Criminal Court. Russia could probably live with international sanctions in some form. In other words, a result that could be represented as victory. 

Such an outcome is by no means certain or even likely. Most of the conceivable scenarios for the war are dangerous and potentially catastrophic for all parties: Ukraine, Russia, the West, the “international rules-based order,” the rest of the world. One could be a “forever war” between Russia and Ukraine, always teetering on the brink of dangerous escalation. Or Russia sinking deeper into pariah status, becoming in effect a rogue state, intent on destabilising the comfortable peace to which the West aspires; meanwhile acquiring by whatever means possible allies in the global south, where existing suspicions of US and Western hegemony offer a good environment for Russian influence to spread. Or worst of all, perhaps, a situation where the Russian Federation – the present rump of the former Tsarist and Soviet empires – begins to disintegrate. What would happen then to the six thousand or so nuclear weapons Russia now possesses? What temptations would there be for Russia’s neighbours, especially China, to capitalise on Moscow’s loss of control, especially in the resource-rich, sparsely populated Far East?