What is Putin's justification for the invasion of the country Ukraine?
The Russian military invasion began Thursday morning. This large-scale, unjustified and unprovoked invasion has been feared for weeks, carrying out airstrikes and bombings.
From different fronts, the Russian army entered Ukraine, with troops directed to the country's capital, kyiv. Ukrainian authorities have confirmed that dozens of Ukrainian and Russian soldiers, as well as Ukrainian civilians, have been killed in the fighting.
US President Joe Biden and other Western leaders have rebuked the actions of Russian President Vladimir Putin, calling this a violation of international law.
Biden announced on Thursday that Russia will have new and tougher sanctions, which will increase the long-term impact on Russia and reduce the damage to the United States and its allies.
Possible reasons why Vladimir Putin invades Russia
1. NATO extension to the east
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is a military and political alliance since 1949. It is made up of: Canada, United States, France, United Kingdom, Turkey, Spain, Belgium, Italy, Portugal, Denmark, Norway, Iceland, France, Iceland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Greece, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Slovenia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Albania, Croatia, Montenegro and North Macedonia.
Any European country can join NATO, it is completely free, but it must meet a series of criteria. In the past, the organization claimed that Ukraine was one of the three candidates for membership of the alliance.
For this reason, Vladimir Putin has shown great concern regarding the expansion of NATO towards the east and the former Soviet republics, especially Ukraine, since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Therefore, it has insisted that, should they join it, they would be representing a provocation regardless of the fact that NATO is a defensive alliance and has never threatened Russia in any way.
In his speech, he describes the invasion of Ukraine as self-defense against NATO expansion.
2. Recovery of spaces
The strongest reason for this Russian invasion of Ukraine is that Vladimir Putin longs for the reconstruction of the empire and the restitution of Russian hegemony (which was also generated in Soviet times), which existed in Asia and Europe. time before the Cold War.
Joe Biden, President of the United States, after the statements made by Vladimir Putin, assured that with this invasion of Ukraine, he only seeks to reestablish the former Soviet Union.
The US ambassador to the United Nations (UN), Linda Thomas-Greenfield, also stated that Putin only hopes to return to the era of the Russian empire, the one that existed before the Soviet Union.
At the UN Security Council meeting, he detailed that, "That includes all of Ukraine. It includes Finland. It includes Belarus, Georgia, and Moldova. Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia. Parts of Poland and Turkey. Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan.", Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan".
He concluded by assuring that Putin only wants to travel to the past, to the time before the United Nations, where empires ruled the world, but the world has turned the page and we are in 2022, not 1919.
3. Putin insists that Ukraine commits genocide
Vladimir Putin has been accusing the Ukrainian government of being a Nazi regime, and of committing genocide. However, given this, he has not shown any type of evidence to confirm this incrimination.
Putin, at the beginning of February, declared that genocide was being carried out against some Russian ethnic groups in eastern Ukraine, in Donbas. In this region, the rebel forces that receive support from the Kremblin have been fighting since 2014.
Donetsk and Luhansk are recognized by Putin as two separate and independent Donbas regions. For this reason, he sent troops to enter a special operation to " keep the peace ", which is considered as a simple pretext to start the war.
In his speech on Thursday, Putin announced the invasion of a sovereign nation and insisted on genocide. In addition, he assured that he was going to "denazify" Ukraine, when really the democratically elected president, Volodimir Zelenski, is Jewish.
4. Nuclear weapons as a threat
Ukraine decided to give up the nuclear weapons that were on its territory, after the collapse of the Soviet Union. This decision was made in exchange for a security guarantee by the United Kingdom, Russia and the United States.
Vladimir Putin has been voicing his concern that Ukraine is planning to design nuclear weapons that could pose a major threat to Moscow. However, so far there is no reason to show that Ukraine is thinking of designing nuclear weapons.
Putin has been using this conspiracy theory to make himself a threat and use it as a justification for the military invasion.
In case Ukraine carries out weapons of mass destruction, Europe and the world situation will change drastically, especially in Russia, Putin assured in his remarks.
He added that they can only act in the face of such danger, specifically because "the Western godfathers" of the Ukrainian country could help them develop weapons, creating a threat against Russia.
In response, NATO and different US representatives have insisted on different occasions that there really is no plan to provide Ukraine with nuclear weapons.
5. Ukraine part of Russia
The President of Russia has indicated that Ukraine is not a real country and has not had a solid state either.
Although there is evidence that Ukraine's history and culture existed before the Soviet Union, he claims that this country was designed by the Soviet Union, when Vladimir Lenin was there, and that it is part of Russia.
He emphasized in his speech that for them Ukraine is not a neighboring country, it is part of their living space, history and culture.
According to the president, Russia was the one who granted freedom to Russia, when the majority of Ukrainian citizens voted for its independence in the 1991 referendum. In this vote, 85% of the population with the right to vote attended the polls and more than 90% supported such independence.