By Ashley Scott

For the past few weeks, the news has been drowning with panic over the Ukraine crisis in Europe. Unfortunately, panic over Ukraine is nothing new. We have seen it before in 2014 with Russia annexing Crimea. However, this time leadership from both the U.S. as well as in Europe adds another layer to the conflict. Within the U.S. government, opinions over the conflict vary. U.S. General Mark Milley has said that an invasion by Russia would be “horrific,” quoted from an article by the BBC written by Lyse Doucet. U.S. Defense Secretary, Lloyd Austin believes conflict can be avoided through diplomacy. Frankly, this belief is not convincing in the slightest. 

You may be asking yourself, why is this conflict happening? What is the cause for a Ukraine-Russia conflict that keeps arising every few years? The answer lies in NATO, or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. NATO is a Cold War era organization that was used as a coalition of countries to counteract the former Soviet Union. Russian president Vladimir Putin does not want Ukraine to be a part of the organization and the U.S. rejected Putin’s demand that NATO rules out the addition of Ukraine. 

As Lyse Doucet points out, leadership from both the U.S. and Europe has interest over this conflict. U.S. President Joe Biden needs a win internationally after the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, Germany has new leadership after Angela Merkel, Britain is post-Brexit, and France has elections in the spring. Each leader has an interest in a “win,” so to speak. And of course, Biden is loving this attention. “President Biden is where he wants to be – at the center of world attention,” Doucet said. 

There is yet again another layer of this conflict which is the gas pipeline, Nord Stream 2. This pipeline is “designed to double the gas flowing directly from Russia to Germany, bypassing the typical transit route through Ukraine,” according to Alia Shoaib in an article for the Business Insider. This pipeline only adds to the fears because Russia has direct access to the heart of Europe with this pipeline. 

The whole crisis is a mess. There will not be a full-scale war as some people are predicting. Putin is doing exactly what he loves doing which is putting himself in the center of international news and toying with the U.S. government. Putin has even said himself that he will “study the U.S. response before deciding what to do,” Doucet said. NATO is an easy excuse to ruffle feathers on the international stage. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said to not create panic over the stationing of Russian troops at the border of Russia and Ukraine. Although, if we are being honest here Ukraine’s opinions are not the concern of the international community. The country is simply a proxy for the interest of Russia and the United States exactly like the events during the Cold War. And like the Cold War, I do not believe this crisis will turn “hot” and lead to a full-scale war. 

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