This morning, I woke up to the expected news that the Russian megalomaniac, Vladimir Putin, has started the invasion of neighboring Ukraine. As a historian, this occurrence has brough ominous echoes of past events that shattered the world. It’s time for a little history lesson and a brief explanation of how this military action in Europe might affect us.
In 1935, Benito Mussolini, the Fascist dictator of Italy ordered the invasion of the African nation of Ethiopia without a declaration of war. As reasons for the invasion, his propaganda argued that Italy had a right to colonize Abyssinia, as Ethiopia was once known, because of their ancient cultural ties. By that, he meant that Abyssinia was once part of the Roman Empire, many hundreds of years earlier. The real reason was that Italy was struggling with economic problems and unemployment during the Great Depression, and Ethiopia had defeated Italy in an 1896 attempt to take over the African nation. Mussolini figured that a military invasion would provide jobs to Italians in the military and raw materials for his factories, and an easy victory would increase Italy’s military prestige and national pride. It was indeed an easy victory, as Italy used modern weapons, tanks, and airplanes against a country using spears, bows, and obsolete weapons left over from the 1896 conflict. Ethiopian emperor, Haile Selassie, appeared before the League of Nations (the forerunner to the United Nations) begging for assistance. In an impassioned speech, he said, “It is us today. It will be you tomorrow.” Preoccupied with the Depression and wishing to avoid war at all costs, the U.S. and the other European powers did nothing. Italy, Japan, and Germany were emboldened by the lack of a response, and World War II drew inexorably closer.
Three years later, in 1938, Adolf Hitler, the Fascist dictator of Germany, invaded Austria, arguing that he was helping the Austrian people, who needed protection from rioters and wanted to become a part of the German Empire. This event became known as the Anschluss, or annexation. His propaganda cited the decades-earlier 1871 unification of German in which Chancellor Otto Von Bismarck had excluded Austria from the new nation of Germany. The real reason for the invasion was to provide jobs for the unemployed, raw materials for his factories, and to increase national pride and the prestige of the German military. He presented the annexation as Austria having “invited” him to take over, but, in fact, he had issued an ultimatum: allow Germany to take over or face a military attack. Once he had control, Hitler immediately rounded up all dissenters, Gypsies, and Jews, sending them to concentration camps. Eventually, the Holocaust was extended to Austria. The League of Nations, the U.S., and the European powers did nothing, thus encouraging Hitler and Japan to become more aggressive. Later that year, Hitler used the same arguments to annex a part of Czechoslovakia called the Sudetenland. World War II drew inexorably closer.
In 2014, Russian dictator Vladimir Putin invaded and annexed a part of Ukraine called the Crimea. He argued that he was protecting those people and that the Crimean peninsula had belonged to the Russian Empire since the 1700s. Ukraine had been a part of the USSR, as Communist Russia was known from 1917 until 1991. It has been an separate nation since it broke away from the USSR in 1991. Putin has wanted it back since he first became president, and he has repeatedly said that he believes it is a part of Russia, not an independent nation. For the past few years, he prepared to invade the rest of the Ukraine, citing cultural ties dating back centuries. The reality is that Russia is struggling economically and a war would provide jobs for the unemployed, raw materials for his factories, and would increase national pride and help people forget their economic problems. This morning, he attacked more than a dozen places at once, including the capital city of Kyiv. Unlike the appeasement of the 1930s, the U.S. and President Biden have led efforts to unify opposition to Russia among European and NATO allies. Thus far, those efforts have been primarily in the form of economic and diplomatic sanctions, but that situation could change now that Russia has actually invaded.
What sort of a man is Putin? He was acting President of Russia from 1999-2000, then he served two terms as the democratically elected President from 2000-2008. The Russian constitution barred him from running for a third consecutive 4-year term, so he had himself appointed Prime Minister for 4 years in order to continue running the nation. Then came two more terms, now 6-years each, as President. In 2020, he changed the constitution so that he could succeed himself for two more 6-year terms, effectively making him President-for-Life. He has gradually removed all elements of the government that would qualify it as a democracy and established himself as a dictator in an increasingly authoritarian government. His lies and propaganda have returned Russia to a nation which cannot ever be believed. There have been many pro-democracy protests against him, but political opponents, protestors, journalists, and those calling for free elections have been jailed, intimidated and otherwise silenced. He has worked vigorously to repress LBGT groups and gays. Like Mussolini and Hitler, he has secretly organized well-trained paramilitary groups to quietly enforce his will.
Before the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, Putin was a long-time member of the KGB, the Soviet intelligence agency. As such, his entire objective was to undermine the United States and weaken the primary opponent of the USSR. He has continued to pursue that objective as President. He has used computer technology to hack into financial institutions in the US to disrupt our economy. The US intelligence community discovered the extent of this hacking, reporting that Putin interfered in various ways with the 2016 election to help his friend Donald Trump get elected. In a famous Trump press conference in which he was questioned about this, the American president stated that he accepted Putin’s denials of such activity over our own CIA and intelligence reports, saying “He said he didn’t do it, and I believe him.” Like the weak-kneed politicians of the 1930s whose inaction allowed Hitler, Mussolini, and Japan grow stronger and bolder, Trump fawned over Putin’s every move while President.
It is clear that Trump admired the dictator’s power and wished that he, too, could have shut down the media and arrested those who spoke out against him. Just yesterday, while the democracies of the world lined up against Russia and their impending invasion of Ukraine, Trump referred to Putin as a “genius,” and once again expressed admiration for his military power. His former secretary of state Mike Pompeo recently called Putin “Very shrewd, very capable” adding, “I have enormous respect for him.” And the Trump mouthpiece on Fox, Tucker Carlson, indicated that he was rooting for Putin and that there was more to fear from the Democrats than Russia. History will deal harshly with Trump, Pompeo, Carlson, and others who support the sort of naked aggression exhibited by Putin. In the 1930s, such prominent Americans as Charles Lindbergh and Henry Ford expressed admiration for Hitler and conducted rallies in support of the Nazis—right up to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Those men and others like them saw their reputations destroyed by that support. Those of you as old as I am will remember the furor that erupted when actress Jane Fonda was seen supporting the North Vietnamese people during the Vietnam War.
Why should we care about all of this? How will this war affect us? First of all, the entire world will feel the economic impact. An increase in inflation and gas prices is certain. These two things have been on the rise due to shortages and supply-line problems for some time now. Russia controls a significant share of the world’s oil. That supply line will stop flowing today, driving oil prices up considerably. The stock market, which always reacts badly to the uncertainty of a war, will take a huge hit and this downturn will not be a short-term thing. Putin has already begun using Russia’s hacking skills to disrupt Ukraine’s financial institutions. If, the US gets involved, Russia may turn those skills against our banks, the stock market, etc. This will cause more economic distress. Ukraine is not a member of NATO, our mutual-defense alliance, so the US will not be sending troops to fight there. Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania, however, are suddenly vulnerable and they are members of NATO. We will be sending military forces to beef up our defenses of them and other Eastern European allies. While we won’t be directly fighting in Ukraine, we will probably be aiding the people of that nation with supplies and weapons in a revival of the “surrogate wars” of the Cold War. Then there is the fear that China will take advantage of this war to invade Taiwan. Like Putin’s attitude toward Ukraine, China has always regarded the island nation as theirs, rather than the independent nation it has been since 1949. In short, this regional conflict could easily spread to military confrontations around the world. Of course, the concern for which no one dares speak is the fact that Russia is a major nuclear power. Should the war go badly for them, Putin is unstable enough to use them—and he won’t confine them to Ukraine.
When Joe Biden took office last January, he inherited the worst set of crises faced by any new President since FDR. Today, that situation grew worse by several magnitudes. Every other time in our history that the US was faced with a serious threat to our security, the American people have forgotten their differences and banded together. If that can happen once more, perhaps some good can come out of this dire situation.