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Canada's long-standing, stalwart support of Ukraine will be under new and intense pressure early in the new year, say experts and a former top military commander, as the West braces for possible military action by Russia, perhaps as soon as late January.

There could be as many asfive possible scenarios on how the current crisis in Eastern Europe might play out,and they're almost all bad.

The assembly of over 100,000 Russian troops on Ukraine's eastern border and the possibility of a full-blown invasion has riveted the attention of western leaders and policy-makers.

It is just one of the potential scenarios, although U.S.intelligence officials say Russian President Vladimir Putin has not made up his mind to use overwhelming military force and the Kremlin denies it is planning an invasion.

Canada, which originally sponsored Ukraine's bid to join NATO, and is among the country's biggest cheerleaders and defenders, will find it faces uncomfortable choices in the new year,both internationally and domestically.

The U.S. and NATO have already said that they will not send troops to defend the country in the event of an invasion. That is cause for anxiety in the politically-active, occasionally strident, Canadian-Ukrainian diaspora population in this country.

The Liberal government will have to fall in line with other NATO allies, no matter how painful it becomes domestically.

Stefanie von Hlatky, associate professor of political studies at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont., said the challenge for the government will be to "play up what it is already doing in Ukraine."

One of the things Canadais doing is helping to improve the combat skills of Ukrainian soldiers through an international training mission. It isan endeavour the Trudeau government has already signalled its willingness to renew, when the mandate expires in March of the coming year.

Defence Minister Anita Anand's mandate letter contained a reference to "extending" both Operation Unifier in Ukraine and Operation Reassurance, the overall Canadian military contribution to NATO's campaign of deterrence against Russia.

The Canadian military trainers in Ukraine, roughly 200 in all,would "quite possibly" have to be withdrawn in the event of major hostilities, said the country's top military commander.

"It is a capacity-building mission that we have there, it is not a combat mission," said Gen. Wayne Eyre, Canada's chief of the defence staff, in a recent interview with CBC News.

"We have trainers who are focused on training, not fighting and so,as with any deteriorating situation,we would have to take a look at that situation and what we do with that force on the ground."

The possibility of having to make thatdecision underlines the delicate balancing act facing not only Canada, but NATO as a whole. In the face of a military crisis, there will be the need to show resolution without antagonizing Russia,or getting drawn into one of Moscow's disinformation campaigns.

"No one has a crystal ball," said Dominique Arel, a University of Ottawa professor and the school's chair of Ukrainian Studies, who added that he found the notion of full-blown invasion to be "wildly unlikely" because of the enormous cost Russia would pay in terms of blood and treasure.

An invasion, he said, would be a complete change in policy for Moscow and the Ukrainian Army is better trained, more experienced and more effectively armed than the last time Russian forces fought them for control of Crimea and the eastern Donbass region in 2014.

"There's an actual army there and they're gonna fight," said Arel, referring to Ukrainian forces, which are now equipped with U.S.-made Javelin anti-tank rockets and Turkish missile-carrying drones. "Even if they are initially defeated, that's going to be at a serious cost to the Russian Army. Why would the Russian government do that?"

Similarly, Matthew Schmidt, an associate professor and national security expert at the University of New Haven, Connecticut, said he's doubtful we'll see the absolute worst case scenario.

"I think the scenario of a massive invasion of Ukraine is unlikely," he said. "If Putin has to take Kyiv, he's lost the war because the international response will be so devastating that he doesn't gain much benefit."

The U.S has threatened devastating economic sanctions, including the possibility of cutting Russia off from SWIFT, the messaging network used by 11,000 banks in hundreds of countries around the globe to make cross-border payments. That has been referred to as "the nuclear option," a crippling economic blow that would deliver major financial pain.

Western and Ukrainian intelligence officials have suggested, that if there is going to be conflict, expect to see it in the window from mid-January to early February when the ground is frozen and solid enough to take the weight of tanks.

There are two other scenarios that involve a limited invasion:one that sees Russia establish a land bridge to Crimea by taking the Ukrainian city of Mariupol and possibly driving further west as far as the port city of Odessa; the other notion would see some form of overt reinforcement of Russian-backed proxy forces in the breakaway oblasts of Donetsk and Luhansk,known collectively as the Donbass region.

Schmidt said both of those scenarios would likely provoke western allies.

"He may well engage in some kind of limited invasion in the east, but even there it's risky for him because of the kind of sanctions the West would bring down, particularly the risk of cutting them out of the SWIFT banking network, which woulddevastate the Russian economy," Schmidt said.

A fourth option;to use special forces and subversion to wear down Ukraine and its allies,is something that is more Moscow's speed, said Arel.

"Will Russia find other ways of ratcheting up the military pressure, while pretending it's not doing it? Possibly. Because that's been the playbook," said Arel, referring to the campaign of disinformation and confusion the Kremlin used following the annexation of Crimea.

The fifth option would be to do nothing and allow the giant military force to sit on Ukraine's border and wear down the government in Kyiv, as well as NATO, with a perpetual state of crisis.

Canada's former military representative at NATO, retired vice-admiral Bob Davidson, said he believes Putin senses weakness among the allies following the disastrous, chaotic end to the two-decade western alliance mission in Afghanistan.

For authoritarian leaders, there was an unmistakable message.

"We didn't lose the war because the Taliban won. We lost because we basically gave up on it," said Davidson. "So, that's what I think Putin and some of the others in the world are looking at: What is the real staying power of NATO when it comes to some of these issues that may turn out to be generational?"

Schmidt agreed with the assessment, saying Putin is an astute opportunist.

"Putin is often seen as some kind of grand strategist, my view is he isn't," Schmidt said. "What he is, is that he's a good reader of current events and he takes advantage of targets of opportunity."

The loss of Afghanistan and the way it has reflected on NATO and the United States"has given him an opportunity to push and do two things he's wanted to do:things that have been part of his foreign policy for a long time,which is to weaken and break apart NATO, and secondly, to weaken and break apart the European Union."

On Dec. 17, Russia published draft security demands that included: NATO denying membership to Ukraine and other former Soviet countries; a roll back of the alliance's military deployments in Central and Eastern Europe anda halt to western military drills near Russia, among other things.

The demand for a written guarantee that Ukraine won't be offered membership has already been rejected by the West and the other ultimatums are almost certainly headed in the same direction.

The attempt to link the ending of the Ukraine crisis with the wider Russian policy of stopping NATO's eastward expansion is illuminating, Davidson said.

The reality, he said, is that Ukraine is at least fifteen years away from the kind of institutional reform that would allow it to be a full-fledged NATO member and Russia knows that.

So, why now?

Putin is struggling with "a weakening economy" and the drive towards clean energy, which will have a furtherenormous impact on the Russian economy, because of its reliance on fossil fuels, limiting its ability to wage war, said Davidson.

The U.S. has said it is seeking a diplomatic solution to the crisis, but achieving one will be difficult without the willingsupport of President Volodymyr Zelensky's government.

There have been two peace accords, brokered with the help of the U.S., France and Germany, known as the Minsk agreements. The deals have been a recipe for political stalemate.

Arel said it's clear Russia is tired of the situation.

"Russia is seeking ways to ratchet up the pressure so this political impasse will crack," Arel said. "It's hard to see how it will work."

The accords propose giving the two breakaway regions so-called special status within Ukraine;something the government in Kyiv appears loath to grant.

"The word autonomy is not used in the accord, but that's what it amounts to, but that's not happening," said Arel. "Ukraine is unable, unwilling to move forward because it's seen as total capitulation."

There is good reason for the Ukrainians to be suspicious. Crimea, which was annexed by Russia, had an autonomous status before 2014.

Ironically, Arel said, France, Germany and the United States are all onboard with the notion of giving special status to the Donbass.

But with Russia's recent military buildup neither the allies, nor Canada, can openly pressure the government in Kyiv to be flexible because it would be seen as caving in to Moscow.

It would put Canada in an uncomfortable position if the U.S. pressed Ukraine to make concessions; or if NATO showed signs of walking back its commitment to eventually allow Ukraine to join.

"Were NATO to do that, that would be the end of NATO," Arel said.

In a further ironic twist, he noted how in 2008, when Ukraine was first proposed by Canada for NATO membership, the resolution was deliberately vague on the timetable and meant as a concession to ease Russian fears.

"It means Ukraine could join in 50 years, not five," Arel said.

Excerpt from:
Tough choices ahead for Canada as Ukraine and Russia teeter on brink of war - CBC News

HRANITNE, Ukraine Artillery shells fired by Russian-backed separatists shrieked into this small town deep in the flatlands of eastern Ukraine, shearing branches from trees, scooping out craters, blowing up six houses and killing one Ukrainian soldier.

It was an all-too-common response to the smallest of provocations a dispute over grocery shopping for a hundred or so people living in the buffer zone between the separatists and Ukrainian government forces. But in the hair-trigger state of the Ukraine war, minor episodes can grow into full-fledged battles.

Hunkered down in a bunker, the Ukrainian commander, Major Oleksandr Sak, requested a counterstrike from a sophisticated new weapon in Ukraines arsenal, a Turkish-made Bayraktar TB2 armed drone.

Deployed for the first time in combat by Ukraine and provided by a country that is a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the drone hit a howitzer operated by the separatists. Things quickly escalated.

Across the border, Russia scrambled jets. The next day, Russian tanks mounted on rail cars rumbled toward the Ukrainian border. Diplomacy in Berlin, Moscow and Washington went into high gear.

The sudden spike in hostilities last month underscored the tenuous nature of the cease-fire that exists along the 279-mile front in the Ukraine war. It set off a new round of ominous warnings from Moscow, and highlighted President Vladimir V. Putins willingness to escalate what is known as hybrid conflict, a blend of military and other means for creating disruption including exploiting humanitarian crises like the current one on the Polish-Belarusian border.

The drone strike in Hranitne also raised fears in Western capitals that Russia would use the fighting as a pretext for a new intervention in Ukraine, potentially drawing the United States and Europe into a new phase of the conflict.

Our concern is that Russia may make the serious mistake of attempting to rehash what it undertook back in 2014 when it amassed forces along the border, crossed into sovereign Ukrainian territory, and did so claiming falsely that it was provoked, Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken told journalists in Washington last week.

The battle came at an increasingly volatile moment in the conflict. This fall, commercial satellite photos and videos posted on social media have shown that Russian armored vehicles had massed near the Ukrainian border; Ukraines president, Volodymyr Zelensky, has estimated the buildup at 100,000 troops. And Russian rhetoric toward Ukraine has hardened.

Amid this heightened tension, the drone strike in particular became a flash point for the Kremlin. Alarmed that Ukraine possessed this highly effective new military capability, Russia called the strike a destabilizing act that violated the cease-fire agreement reached in 2015.

Mr. Putin has twice in the past week pointed to the drone attack as a Ukrainian escalation, justifying a potential Russian response. He raised the issue in a phone call with Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany.

Asked on Saturday about accusations from Washington that Russia was massing troops on the Ukraine border, Mr. Putin responded by criticizing the United States for supporting the drone strike, as well as for conducting a naval drill in the Black Sea, which he called a serious challenge for Russia.

A sense is created that they just arent letting us relax, he said. Well, let them know we are not relaxing.

Mr. Putin has long made clear that he views Ukraine as inseparable from Russia. In July he published an article outlining that doctrine, describing Russia and Ukraine as essentially one country divided by Western interference in the post-Soviet period, an apparent justification for Russian-Ukrainian unification. Russia has already annexed Ukraines Crimean Peninsula.

We will never allow our historical territories and people close to us living there to be used against Russia, he wrote.

Hacking, electoral meddling, energy politics and a recent migrant crisis on the border of Belarus and Poland have all strained ties between the West and Russia. But nowhere are the tensions more overt than in this conflict zone that cuts through villages and farmland, where opposing soldiers one side backed by the United States, the other by Russia face off.

Russia intervened militarily in Ukraine after street protesters deposed a pro-Russian Ukrainian president in 2014. Moscow sent soldiers wearing ski masks and unmarked uniforms to the Crimean Peninsula, whipping up the rebellion in the east in two separatist enclaves, the Donetsk and Luhansk peoples republics.

The frontline in the war is sometimes called a new Berlin Wall, a dividing line in todays geopolitics. It is an eerie realm of half-abandoned towns, fields and forests.

It is also a tinderbox that requires only a match to spark new hostilities. In late October, the buffer zone near Hranitne provided one.

In most places along the front, a scant few hundred yards separate two trench lines. But in some areas, including Hranitne, the gap widens to a few miles, and people live in between the two armies, in a no-mans-land known in Ukraine as the gray zone. Residents must cross the Ukrainian trench line to shop and send their children to school, protected by an uneasy truce. Residents are aware of the danger, but are too poor to move.

Its scary, said Oleksandr Petukhov, a retiree as he cleared the last checkpoint one recent day carrying a bag of cheese and eggs. This is a ridiculous situation.

In Hranitne, the access point for shopping on the Ukrainian side is a footbridge over the Kalmius River, a slow-moving flow of inky green water. Ukrainian soldiers peek out from above sandbag parapets as shoppers trickle across the bridge.

The troubles began about a month ago when separatists closed a checkpoint on their side where local residents also traveled for shopping for unclear reasons, possibly as a coronavirus precaution.

In response, on Oct. 25, Volodymyr Vesyolkin, the administrator of Hranitne, a position akin to mayor, led a contingent of about a dozen soldiers across the footbridge. The same day, the military laid concrete blocks for a new bridge about 700 yards away that would be accessible for vehicles.

His motive, Mr. Vesyolkin said, was humanitarian: to assure locals of access for shopping and deliveries of coal for winter heating.

How can it violate anything? Mr. Vesyolkin said in an interview. This is our village. These are our people. They walk several kilometers to buy groceries.

The separatists interpreted it otherwise as a land grab and soon their artillery shells filled the air.

Even Ukrainian military officers concede a misperception was possible. They maybe thought we would send heavy weapons across the new bridge, Major Sak said.

Through the night and into the next morning, a separatist unit with 122-millimeter artillery guns fired toward Ukrainian forces in what is known as a shoot-and-scoot maneuver intended to skirt counterattacks by the enemy.

In total, the separatists fired about 120 rounds at the unfinished new bridge, but every shot missed. They hit nearby houses instead, destroying one with such force that it appeared turned inside out, with a pile of cinder blocks covering the street.

Major Sak said he requested the drone strike because it was the only weapon that could hit the maneuvering enemy artillery and because civilians were in danger, though none were hit.

Only modern weapons allow us to halt Russias aggression, he said in an interview.

Most military analysts say flare-ups in Ukraine are more a pretext for strategic saber-rattling than a cause. But they are sparks in an already dangerous world, and the West remains on high alert this week as Russia takes an increasingly bellicose stance toward Ukraine.

When the fighting in Hranitne subsided, the villagers emerged with at least one small victory: they finally got their groceries.

Two days after the drone strike, separatists opened their checkpoint, allowing the Red Cross to deliver 50-pound boxes of food to each house. The boxes held rice, sugar, sunflower oil, macaroni, flour and cans of meat and fish.

Tatyana Yefesko, an elementary schoolteacher, said she appreciated the delivery. But it was hardly a long-term solution.

Any small flare-up could turn into a big war, she said. Everybody asks, Why did this happen? Who needs this? I dont know. But history shows us every big war started with something small.

Maria Varenikova contributed reporting from Hranitne, Ukraine.

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How a Dispute Over Groceries Led to Artillery Strikes in Ukraine - The New York Times

What about the corruption that has plagued this country and might daunt would-be migrs? Future administrations might not allow tech companies to flourish without raids and seizures. Russia threatens from the east. There are also revolutions to worry about. There have been two since 2004.

Even without another revolution, Steven Hanke, a professor of applied economics at Johns Hopkins University and a vocal Bitcoin skeptic, argues that the combination of Ukraine and crypto sounds like a fiasco in the making. Most studies hes seen have found that roughly half of all Bitcoin transactions are for some illegal purpose. To him, this is not an industry that Kyiv should target with enticements.

The country has endemic corruption and criminal syndicates swarming all over it, he said. Ukraine will appeal to shady characters because shady characters like to penetrate countries like Ukraine.

Mr. Bornyakov disagrees, though he offers a peculiar form of reassurance. No matter who is in charge, he argues, foreigners will have a kind of built-in protection, simply because they are foreigners.

You can go to Egypt, which I know theres a lot of problems, too, he said. But if youre a tourist nobody is going to harm you, nobody is going to touch you because on some DNA level people there know that tourists bring them money. We want to kind of create a similar situation here.

As Mr. Chobanian proved after the police searched his home, the primary assets of a tech company cant be confiscated the same way that a malign player could take over, say, a power plant or a nickel mine. It would be a challenge to appropriate a knowledge company like Kyiv-based Hacken, for instance, a cybersecurity firm that specializes in blockchain work. Its value resides in a cadre of white-hat hackers who are spread around the world.

Its co-founder, Evgenia Broshevan, sat in a conference room in Creative States and mused about how she ended up a leader in such a male-dominated industry. All credit to her grandmother, she said, a mathematics teacher who also seems to have gifted her a knack for practical thinking that is clearly a requirement in Ukraine.

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Ukraine Wants to Be the Crypto Capital of the World - The New York Times

Cranes and ships are seen in the Azov Sea port of Berdyansk, Ukraine November 30, 2018. REUTERS/Gleb Garanich

KYIV, Nov 13 (Reuters) - Ukraine said on Saturday it would speed up the construction of a naval base at the port of Berdyansk to prevent what Kyiv calls a gradual attempt by Moscow to take control of the Sea of Azov that flows past Russian-annexed Crimea.

Ukraine's newly-appointed defence minister announced the plans after a trip to Berdyansk that followed Western warnings this week about Russian troop movements near Ukraine's borders and a possible attack. read more

Russia has dismissed as inflammatory suggestions Moscow might be weighing an attack and accused Washington of aggressive moves in the Black Sea where Ukraine and the United States held military drills on Saturday. read more

Defence Minister Oleksiy Reznikov said it was vital for Ukraine to strengthen its naval forces. "The corresponding instructions will be given to accelerate the construction of the naval base," Reznikov said in a statement.

Ukraine announced plans to build a base in Berdyansk in 2018 after losing its military bases on the Crimean peninsula, which Moscow annexed in 2014 before backing separatists fighting in eastern Ukraine.

Moscow has since taken de facto control of the Kerch Strait, which provides a passage from the Black Sea to the Sea of Azov, where two large Ukrainian ports are located - Berdyansk and Mariupol.

In his statement, Reznikov said Russia's actions in the Azov and Black Seas had sharpened security risks and created systemic threats to shipping.

"Following the occupation of Crimea and parts of (eastern Ukraine), Russia is trying to de facto occupy the Sea of Azov as well," Reznikov said.

Russia has in the past denied the allegation it wants to take control of the Sea of Azov. There was no immediate reaction from Russia to the Ukrainian defence minister's comments

Reporting by Natalia Zinets; editing by Tom Balmforth and Andrew Cawthorne

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Ukraine to speed up construction of naval base in Sea of Azov - defence minister - Reuters

The United States and its NATO allies are busily arming Ukraine and engaging in other actions that encourage the leaders in Kiev to believe that they have strong Western backing in their confrontation with Russia and Russian-backed separatists. The conflict between the Ukrainian government and separatist forces in the Donbass region, which has remained at a low simmer in recent years, thanks to the fragile Minsk agreements, shows unmistakable signs of heating up. That development is exacerbating already dangerous tensions between Kiev and Moscow. There is growing speculation that Russia might even launch an invasion of Ukraine.

Western leaders are pursuing a reckless strategy that is generating increasingly pointed warnings from Kremlin officials. On two occasions since early April, Russia also has made ominous military deployments near its border with Ukraine. Shortly before the earlier episode, the Biden administration had announced a new $125 million arms sale to Ukraine. Although the transaction was put on hold temporarily in June, $60 million of that package was delivered during U.S. secretary of defense Lloyd Austins visit to Kiev in late October.

The United States is not the only NATO member that has made destabilizing arms sales to Ukraine. Turkey is equipping the Ukrainian military with drones, and in late October, Kievs forces launched a drone attack that destroyed rebel artillery batteries in the Donbas. Moscow issued strong protests about the escalation to both Ukraine and Turkey. A new deployment of Russian forces near the Ukrainian border also followed, and U.S. secretary of state Antony Blinken expressed concern that Russia might execute a rehash of its 2014 military offensive when Vladimir Putins government seized Crimea and then provided military support for secessionists in eastern Ukraine.

Arms sales are only one component of the growing support for Kiev on the part of the United States and some of its NATO allies. President Joe Biden has repeatedly expressed Washingtons commitment to Ukraines sovereignty and territorial integrity against Russian aggression. U.S. and Ukrainian troops have conducted joint military exercises (war games) on several occasions, and Ukraines forces have been included in NATOs military exercises. Indeed, Ukraine hosted the latest version of those maneuvers in September 2021. In response to Washingtons pressure, Ukraine is being treated as a NATO member in all but name.

Such actions are needlessly destabilizing. Ukraines leaders, including President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, already are making jingoistic statements about regaining Crimea and crushing the separatists in Donbass. The countrysofficial defense strategy documentadopted in March 2021 explicitly includes those goals.

Logically, such boasts are without substance; Ukraines military forces are no match for Russias in terms of either quantity or quality. However, a belief in U.S. or NATO military support may cause Ukrainian leaders to abandon prudence and mount an ill-starred confrontation. Once before, the United States led an overly eager client to assume that it had Washingtons backing, and the result was a needless war in which the client emerged bruised and humiliated.

George W. Bushs administration foolishly encouraged Georgias President Mikheil Saakashvili to believe that his country was an important U.S. ally, and that the United States and NATO would come to Georgias rescue if it became embroiled in a conflict with Russia. Washington provided millions of dollars in weaponry to Tbilisi and even trained Georgian troops. Bush also had pushed U.S. NATO allies to give Georgia (and Ukraine) membership in the alliance, albeit unsuccessfully.

In August 2008, Saakashvili launched a military offensive to regain control of South Ossetia (one of two secessionist regions). The Georgian offensive inflicted casualties on Russian peacekeeping troops that were deployed there since the early 1990s, and Moscow responded with a full-scale counteroffensive that soon led to the occupation of several Georgian cities and brought Russian troops to the outskirts of the capital. Despite Washingtons previous supportive rhetoric, Saakashvili discovered that the United States was not willing to fight a war on Georgias behalf, and he had to sign a peace accord on Russias terms.

The parallels between that fiasco and current Western, especially U.S., policy regarding Ukraine are alarming. Washingtons arms sales especially are helping to create a dangerous situation involving Ukraine. President Barack Obama apparently understood the potential for such sales to provoke Russia and trigger an armed conflict. He declined to implement the transfer of arms to Kiev, despite congressional legislation authorizing that step.

Unfortunately, Obamas successors were not as wise or as cautious. Despite the pervasive canard that Donald Trump was soft on Russia, his administration executed multiple arms sales to Ukraine. In both 2017 and 2019, those packages even included sophisticated Javelin anti-tank missiles, over Moscows vehement protests. Similar generous arms sales have continued under Biden.

Washington and its NATO partners need to back away from their increasingly dangerous policies. The Kremlin has made it clear multiple times that it regards Ukraine as a core Russian security concern, and that efforts to make that country a Western military ally risk crossing a bright red line. Adopting measures that encourage a volatile client to engage in provocations that it cant sustain if its stronger adversary responds by escalating the confrontation is egregious foreign policy malpractice. Arming Ukraine with sophisticated weaponry is a textbook example of such folly. The United States, Turkey, and Kievs other enablers need to change course before they turn the simmering Ukraine conflict into a conflagration.

Ted Galen Carpenter, a senior fellow in defense and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute and a contributing editor at the National Interest, is the author of twelve books and more than 950 articles on international affairs.

Image: Reuters.

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NATO Arms Sales to Ukraine: The Spark That Starts a War with Russia? - The National Interest