Ukraine as a buffer

Tension between US President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin has reached worrying levels because of the consequences of an indirect military confrontation with Ukraine as a potential theatre of suffering. Biden's threats have been blunt, warning Putin of severe economic sanctions if Russian troops cross the Ukrainian border where the Kremlin has deployed some 170,000 troops. Although Biden wanted from the outset to limit the scope of the confrontation to economic and diplomatic sanctions, he has had no choice but to announce the deployment of US troops to help defend Ukraine's border with Russia. 

Washington is using all the elements of deterrence to make Putin comply with what it is saying about not having offensive intentions against Ukraine, but it is making it very clear that Ukraine's NATO membership is unacceptable to Moscow because it would mean the installation of military bases and weapons systems that would threaten the security of the Russian Federation. Some experts are divided on this issue, with some calling on Putin to end the deployment of Russian troops on the Ukrainian border in order to reduce tensions. 

Others also see Putin's aggressive attitude as unacceptable, but also recall that Ukraine, after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Soviet Union, was considered by all to be the essential buffer to guarantee Russia's security against a NATO that had recruited all the Warsaw Pact countries. However, in 2014, the revolt known as Maidan Square in Kiev upset the balance when President Viktor Yanukovych rejected an association agreement between Ukraine and the EU and, after bloody violence, a solution was negotiated between the government and the opposition with the presence and signature of the foreign ministers of France, Germany and the UK, but Maidan rejected it and the president was ousted from power and took refuge in Russia. Putin's response was to annex the Crimean peninsula and foment the Dombash war in Ukrainian regions considered pro-Russian.  Since then peace agreements such as the Minsk agreement have been reached, but the low-profile conflict has continued. 

Ukraine is the justification for a confrontation that is driven by Putin's determination to regain his role as the world's superpower. Syria and the Middle East, Libya and North Africa are some of the scenarios where Putin has occupied positions, but his domestic position is weak due to mismanagement against COVID, the economic crisis, the repression of opponents such as Navalny, and because internal contestation is growing in several Russian power structures.