Franck PetitevilleProfessor of Political Science at Sciences Po Grenoble and at the Pacte laboratory

At the end of the the end of the Cold War, American that inter-state wars were doomed to "obsolescence" due to normative devaluation. condemned to "obsolescence" due to normative devaluation. The invasion of Ukraine, part of a geopolitical software package caught between the expansionist empires of the late ^19th century and the military tactics of the Second World War (tank columns, siege and bombardment of siege and bombardment of cities).

As in 1984, when Big Brother 's screens assert that "war is peace", Putin can still claim, on April 12, that his "special military operation" is proceeding "harmoniously" and for a "noble" purpose. But in our interconnected global world, images of massacres (Boutcha) and bombings of Ukrainian civilians (Marioupol, Kramatorsk, Donbass) belie the Kremlin's propaganda in real time. President Zelensky himself contributes to the worldwide mobilization of compassion in the face of his country's aggression, through a series of videoconferences with the US Congress, the European Parliament, the UN Security Council, Western heads of state, CNN, etc. 

If the military occupation of eastern Ukraine is confirmed in the coming weeks in the coming weeks, Putin will be able to claim that he has "liberated" the Donbass and beyond (while establishing territorial continuity with Crimea). He will then be able to annex the result of his scorched-earth policy: completely destroyed towns like Marioupol of Marioupol, emptied of a large part of their population, uninhabitable in the uninhabitable in the short term. No Western aid will be forthcoming to finance the reconstruction under Russian control. Putin's military "victory Putin's military "victory" will be measured in terms of the consequences of this war for his regime. regime. And they are numerous.

Diplomatic isolation

Since invading Ukraine, Russia has been excluded from the Council of Europe (March 15, 2022), the 47-state organization to which it had belonged for a quarter century. It was also condemned twice by a majority of almost ¾ of the 193 member states of the UN General Assembly [1]. A third Assembly resolution led to Russia's exclusion from the UN Human Rights Council [2] (a punitive measure adopted only once against Gaddafi's Libya in 2011).

The UN General Assembly thus demonstrated its ability to overcome the paralysis of the Security Council, blocked by the Russian veto the day after the invasion. Finally, the International Court of Justice, the UN's judicial body, which was seized by Ukraine at the start of the invasion, ordered Russia to "immediately suspend the military operations" launched in Ukraine (March 16, 2022).

Measures symbolic measures. But wars are also fought on the level of international international legitimization/deligitimization in terms of the "just war" doctrine. "just war". In this case, Russia is accumulating violations norms of jus ad bellum (as a war of aggression ) as a war of aggression) as well as those of jus in bello (due to the scale of the war crimes committed). International organizations are therefore playing their rightful part in this normative normative register.

Finally, Russia 's isolation Russia's isolation is also measured by the annihilation of what may have been "Russian " soft power Putin's dictatorship. There have been countless cooperation initiatives (cultural, scientific, sporting) with Russia have been suspended or cancelled. The time seems long gone when could still organize the Winter Olympics (in February 2014 in Sochi, just before Sochi, just before invading Crimea). 

Sanctions

International sanctions (economic, financial financial, and targeted at Putin's politico-military entourage and Putin's political and military entourage and oligarchs) are further isolating Russia. Add to this the hundreds of Russian diplomats expelled by Western capitals since the start of the conflict (260 in Europe alone as of April 5). April).

The debate on the ability of sanctions to Putin's policy in Ukraine remains rather speculative for the time being. speculative: international sanctions have a medium- to long-term effect. medium and long term. Nonetheless, their escalation since the start of the war is striking. war is striking. On April 8, the European Union adopted its fifth sanctions package, including an embargo on Russian coal imports. The European is preparing a proposal to extend this embargo to oil. Of course, Russian gas imports are not included for the time being, but the but the "energy taboo" on European sanctions against Russia has begun to be lifted.

The revelation of Europe's energy vulnerability to Russia acts as the equivalent of the 1973 oil shock. The Euro-Russian energy deal will never be the same again. Future cooperation projects have been frozen (Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline), and Europe's urgent need is to diversify its energy supplies by all possible means.

Whether these sanctions have an effect on Putin's policy in Ukraine will depend very much on their their scope and duration. The idea that sanctions are not effective in general be debated: the Iranian regime, for example, has suffered enough for example, has been sufficiently affected by Western sanctions (oil embargo, financial financial sanctions) to induce it to come to Vienna to negotiate (2015) to renounce all military nuclear ambitions in exchange for the lifting the lifting of these sanctions. Sanctions also serve to express a simple diplomatic simple diplomatic message: democracies don't do business as usual with business as usual with criminal regimes.

Remobilization of NATO and the European Union

Just a few years ago, NATO, which had been involved in commanding the international coalition deployed in Afghanistan since 2003, no longer considered Russia a strategic priority. The Russian-Georgian war in the summer of 2008, and above all the annexation of Crimea and the destabilization of the Donbass region in 2014, were the first warnings. But Western responses at the time (sanctions, Russia's exclusion from the G8, the Minsk agreements on resolving the conflict in the Donbass, the deployment of OSCE observers, the reinforcement of NATO's presence in the East from 2016) seemed sufficient. Obama's "Asian pivot" and the priority given to China containment by Trump and then Biden seemed to herald less US investment in NATO's European vocation.

The invasion of Ukraine brought the Alliance back to basics and put it on unprecedented alert. fundamentals and placed the Alliance in an unprecedented state of alert. mobilization of 140,000 soldiers, relocation of 40,000 of them to eastern member states (as well as naval and air assets), troop reinforcements from the USA from the USA, and preparations for the possible use of unconventional weapons. Finally, the political debate is intense in two historically neutral states, Sweden and Finland, to apply for rapid for rapid NATO membership. Putin wanted "less NATO": he will now have a remobilized, consolidated military alliance and potentially extended to its borders.

For its part, the European Union, which Putin has always regarded as a negligible geopolitical entity, has put up a front since the start of the war. war: sanctions, humanitarian aid, massive reception of Ukrainian Ukrainian refugees. The April 8 visit to Kiev by European Commission President Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and the European Union's Foreign Affairs for Foreign Affairs, Josep Borrell, was a major gesture of European diplomacy. meeting with President Zelensly, symbolic handover of a document symbolic handover of a document formalizing Ukraine's application to join the and the two representatives paid their respects at a mass grave in Boutcha, where Ursula von Boutcha, where Ursula von der Leyen evoked "the cruel face of Putin's army" and Putin's army" and Josep Borrell "war crimes".

Criminal prosecution of war crimes war crimes

"Ukraine is a crime scene", said the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Karim Khan, also visiting Boutcha on April 13, 2022. He opened an investigation on behalf of the Court on March 2, 2022, with the declared support of more than a third of the 123 states parties to the Court. Ukraine is not one of them, but Kiev has accepted the Court's jurisdiction over allegations of crimes committed on its territory, making prosecution possible. Putin will be unapproachable, but if Russian soldiers and officers are captured in Ukraine and transferred to The Hague, they could face charges of crimes falling within the Court's jurisdiction (war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide).

Since 1945, many states have pursued the mirage of military victory in asymmetric conflicts: France in Indochina and Algeria, the USA in Vietnam, the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, the USA in Iraq and, most recently, the US-led international coalition in Afghanistan. Putin's Russia may well be the next state to face up to the aporias of what it means to "win a war". 

[1] Resolutions adopted by 141 votes on March 2 and by 140 votes on March 24. China, India and a large number of African African states abstained.

[2] Resolution adopted on April 7, 2022 by 93 votes. China voted against.