Carnegie Center Sees Weak Incentives for Ukraine-Russia Military Conflict

Russia & Ukraine Tensions: Interesting analysis from Carnegie Moscow Center

• With Moscow massing its troops on Ukraine's eastern border and in Crimea, Kyiv has little chance of standing its ground if the standoff deteriorates into a military confrontation. Yet there are reasons to believe that neither side intends to unleash a war. From Ukraine's standpoint, an offensive in Donbas would likely give Russia a pretext to intervene in the region: Russian officials have repeatedly stated the country's readiness to protect the self-proclaimed republics. The ensuing losses would ruin Zelensky's already limited public support, while prompt assistance for Ukraine from the West is by no means guaranteed.
• For Russia, the benefits of going to war with Ukraine are also dubious. Defying the Kremlin's expectations, the Ukrainian state did not collapse when faced with a far more dire situation in 2014. It is even less likely to do so now. In addition, public opinion polls show clearly that Russian society has grown tired of foreign policy adventurism and will not welcome a new military foray into Ukraine on the eve of the parliamentary elections scheduled for September.
• Furthermore, the idea of capturing a land bridge to connect Crimea with mainland Russia is outdated. Since 2014, Moscow has invested billions of dollars in various infrastructure projects ranging from railways to electricity grids to meet the peninsula's needs without a land connection. Crimea still suffers from water shortages, but that has been a problem for years, and hardly warrants a war to solve it.
• It's also highly implausible that the Russian leadership would risk the completion of its grand project, the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, for the sake of a questionable popularity boost at home, let alone in the Donbas republics.
• The purpose of the current military buildup, therefore, is limited to demonstrating to Kyiv and Washington that Russia is prepared to respond with force to any military attempts to change the status quo in Donbas. The ostentation with which the troops are being moved confirms that Russia is saber-rattling rather than contemplating a blitzkrieg.