Great Power Politics and the Ukrainian Crisis NATO, EU AND RUSSIA AFTER 2014 1 DIIS REPORT 2014:18 NATO, EU AND RUSSIA AFTER 2014 This report is written by Henrik Boesen Lindbo Larsen and published by DIIS as part of the Defence and Security Studies for the Danish Ministry of Defence. Henrik Boesen Lindbo Larsen, PhD Consultant on Defence and Security Studies at DIIS . Danish Institute for International Studies Postdoctoral Research Fellow, International Security Program, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School of Government [email protected] DIIS . Danish Institute for International Studies Østbanegade 117, DK 2100 Copenhagen Tel: +45 32 69 87 87 E-mail: [email protected] Web: www.diis.dk Layout: Lone Ravnkilde og Viki Rachlitz Printed in Denmark by: Bording A/S ISBN 978-87-7605-696-4 (print) ISBN 978-87-7605-695-7 (pdf) DIIS publications can be downloaded free of charge or ordered as hardcopies from www.diis.dk For academic citation: Larsen, H.B.L., 2014. ‘Great Power Politics and the Ukrainian Crisis: NATO, EU and Russia after 2014’, Report 2014:18, Copenhagen: DIIS, Danish Institute for International Studies. © Copenhagen 2014, the author and DIIS Contents 4 Summary 4 Introduction 6 Ukraine between Russia and the EU 8 Reactions to Russia’s Crimean Annexation 12 6 8 Germany 14 Poland 18 United States 22 France 26 United Kingdom 28 Recalibrating Euro-Russian Relations 30 Countering Russia 32 Assisting Ukraine 34 Reinforcing NATO 38 12 30 Bibliography 40 NATO, EU AND RUSSIA AFTER 2014 3 4 MANAGING EURO-RUSSIAN RELATIONS BEYOND 2014 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY This report assesses the relationship between Europe and Russia as the sum of great power reactions to the Ukrainian crisis and Russia’s annexation of Crimea. Despite agreement on a no business-as-usual principle, important national nuances have arisen stemming from different historical bonds to eastern Europe and Russia (Germany, Poland, United States) or different interests in the region (France, United Kingdom). The report calls for a recalibration of the Europe-Russia relations along three dimensions based on the great power pattern: imposing moderate sanctions and thus letting markets punish Russia, given its vulnerability to international investors; placing the EU at the forefront of implementing the Association Agreement already in place to assist Ukraine in painful but needed reforms; and getting NATO to reinforce its eastern posture to incentivize de-escalation. The Ukrainian crisis must be recognized and managed as a predominantly political- economic rivalry involving relatively strong Russian interests in this common neighborhood with the EU. MANAGING EURO-RUSSIAN RELATIONS BEYOND 2014 5 IntroDUCTION 6 NATO, EU AND RUSSIA AFTER 2014 The Ukrainian crisis that started with the Euromaidan The report represents an independent contribution to protests in November 2013 and have culminated thus the vast body of policy and academic commentaries far in Russia’s annexation of Crimea represents the already published on the implications of Russia biggest geopolitical shock to the European security reasserting itself. It focuses specifically on great- system since the end of the Cold War. On this occa- power reactions as a basis for a more realistic sion Russia was prepared not only to use military assessment of how policymakers can and should force but also to pursue a forward policy by annexing navigate the new perils of European security. The territory. If the Russo-Georgian war of 2008 had put an report is structured in the following way: effective halt to further NATO enlargements, the Crimean crisis of 2014 was about preventing the EU ■ A brief overview of the increased competition from extending its eastern neighborhood closer between Russia and the EU that has caused through forms of association. Ukrainian politics to spiral into an international crisis and the geopolitical dilemmas that Russia’s land grab in Crimea pose in terms of policy This report focuses on great-power response. reactions as a basis for a realistic assessment of how policymakers can ■ An analysis of the foreign-policy reactions of the and should navigate the new perils of Western great powers, namely Germany, Poland, European security the United States, France, and the United Kingdom, with particular attention to sectional interests or the revival of historical sensitivities that account For the first time since the end of the Cold War, the for predictability in action over time. Crimean crisis has forced Western powers to seek a new equilibrium between balancing Russia through ■ The pattern of reaction and its impact on Russia, forceful countermeasures or accommodating mutual which provide an assessment of viable Europe security interests in an East-West dialogue. Basically Russia readjustments and institutional responses incompatible ways of thinking about security are to the changed eastern neighborhood (EU, NATO), complicating the management of state relations in the given the conflict’s protracted economic spirit of a cooperative and inclusive Euro-Atlantic implications. space. This calls for a qualitative assessment of the political purpose underlying the Western attempt to promote political-economic integration in Eastern Europe, concentrating on how this clashes with Russia’s determination to contain this aim. This report discusses the management of East-West relations going forward given a new geopolitical situation in which Russia controls territory in all three borderline republics that aspire to closer ties with the EU (Georgia, Ukraine, and Moldova). It provides a study in European great-power politics with the aim of exploring the possibilities for successfully managing East-West relations, defined as the restoration of stable security interactions through accommodation, balancing, or a mixture of both. NATO, EU AND RUSSIA AFTER 2014 7 UKRAINE BetWEEN RUSSIA AND THE EU While European policy makers were well aware of The relationship between the EU and Russia deterior- Russia’s objections to NATO enlargements, the ated significantly after 2009, when the EU launched its Ukrainian crisis came as a big surprise in terms Eastern Partnership to cover the eastern dimension of of the depth and severity of Russia’s objections the existing European Neighborhood Policy. Russia to a growing EU influence in the common quickly developed a hostile zero-sum attitude to the neighborhood. EU’s growing influence in the region, launching its own alternative Eurasian Customs Union in 2011 with Kazakhstan and Belarus, and leaving no doubt that it would like to see other post-Soviet states joining in too. Russia’s integration project suffered severe setbacks when Ukraine was scheduled to sign an Association Agreement (AA) with the EU during the Eastern Partnership summit in Vilnius in November 2013, an agreement that had been initialed in 2012. At the same 8 NATO, EU AND RUSSIA AFTER 2014 UKRAINE BetWEEN RUSSIA AND THE EU time, Moldova, Georgia, and Armenia were supposed to cut energy supplies. In the case of Armenia, it also to initial an AA after years of negotiation with the EU. threatened to withdraw its military presence from the The AA is a framework for closer political association country. As a result, only Moldova and Georgia and includes as its most substantial element the Deep remained on the DCFTA course, while Armenia opted and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement (DCFTA), in for the Eurasian Customs Union. Russia rewarded which candidate countries commit themselves to Ukrainian President Yanukovich’s decision not to sign implement EU laws and regulations in return for AA in November 2013 with a package of much-needed enhanced access to the EU market. To a large extent economic benefits, including $15 billion of credit, the the EU formulated association with itself or with elimination of trade sanctions, and lower gas prices Russia as an either/or question, which may have (Lehne, 2014: 7-8). Yanukovich’s decision not to sign increased Russia’s already hostile attitude to the AA was at first seen as a victory for Russia’s hard power and the DCFTA. game, but the Euromaidan protests in Kiev and other major cities in Ukraine that were provoked by this Russia exerted intense pressure on the neighborhood decision showed the persistence of the EU’s soft republics not to opt in to the EU initiative approaching power. the Vilnius Summit, using trade sanctions and threats NATO, EU AND RUSSIA AFTER 2014 9 As the situation threatened to spiral out of control, with framework of the AA, but not as yet the DCFTA, with casualties increasing in the Maidan, Poland, Germany, the EU on March 21. These events demonstrated that and France (acting on behalf of the EU) brokered a Russia and the EU were the main external actors deal between President Yanukovich and the opposi- affecting political developments in Ukraine. tion. The deal signed on February 21 restored Ukraine’s constitution of 2004 and scheduled elections Russia’s annexation of Crimea, despite her strong and for May 2014. The loss of life in the Maidan arguably well-established historical and ethnic ties to the made Yanukovich’s position untenable and contri- peninsula, is a far-reaching step that represents the buted to his rapid ouster. On February 27, the new greatest revision of Europe’s geopolitical landscape interim government in Kiev announced that it intended since German reunification. Territorial annexation to reverse Yanukovich’s decision and to sign up to the represents a major geopolitical rupture, one that DCFTA. Russian ‘green men’ gained military control shows that Russia is no longer playing by established over Crimea on March 2. The European Commission international rules. The West’s recognition of Kosovo soon thereafter pledged $15 billion in loans and grants and Russia’s recognition of Abkhazia and South to keep the new government in Kiev financially afloat Ossetia in 2008 nourished great mutual distrust, but in the face of looming bankruptcy – the same amount neither were cases of outright territorial expansion.