The Abandonment of Ukraine by Western Nations

The decimation wrought by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on 2022 Feb 24 has been immense. Ukraine has crumbled, its economy severely damaged and its people scattered across the EU and the Western world. On one hand Ukraine has a bully neighbour intent on destroying it, while on the other Western countries have continued to provide Ukraine with enough weapons to continue its fight, the result being even more destruction of Ukraine. Ukraine’s predicament has had many other global implications, almost all bad.

Russia’s invasion and destruction of Ukraine has shown the world that the West will not stand up to a rogue nation such as Russia, if it decides to invade other countries. Instead of a unified charge against Russia, the West has said that only Ukraine will defend its own sovereignty. Only Ukrainians will die in the Russia-Ukraine war. The West has provided sufficient weapons to Ukrainians to defend themselves, which in turn has added to the destruction of Ukraine’s infrastructure. Sanctions on Russia have been largely symbolic and ineffective. Both China and India are supporting Russia.

The result is that Ukraine‘s culture and heritage sites, old towns and museums are in ruins, and face a possibility of being wiped off the face of the earth. Ukrainians have been split, women and children evacuated to the EU and other Western nations, their men staying to fight or die trying. The Ukrainian people will need multiple generations to recover from this traumatic war. The damage to Ukraine, their people and their society is beyond belief, their people scattered, their cities bombed to rubble.

While the West will not send their troops to fight in Russia or Ukraine, there are serious world-wide implications to their lack of direct involvement. Russia sells the world oil, and has also destroyed Ukraine’s ability to export oil, wheat and many other products. Because of the West’s inaction they will suffer a global recession, which hurts all people who live in the West. On the positive side Western nations have been able to clear out their old stocks of arms and make more money producing new arms. This profiteering is, sadly, at the expense of the Ukrainian people.

The Middle East, which depends on Ukrainian wheat will suffer food shortages and food insecurity. These losses are minor compared to the total destruction of Ukraine, but still not trivial.

China has supported Russia, and has benefited from cheap Russian oil. This is very good for their economy, but not good for the environment and any sort of “climate change” initiative that the EU and Western nations had hoped to do. it is clear that China is in it for themselves, and that there is no unified worldwide climate change initiative. War has made this clear to all.

India has also not come to Ukraine’s aid, has not strongly condemned Russia’s invasion. India relies on Russian arms and oil. Like China, India has benefited from cheap Russian oil, to the detriment of any global climate change initiative. it is clear that India is pushing its own agenda above a global need to reduce the earth’s temperature.

At least there is a direct correlation between China and India burning cheap Russian oil, and the rising global temperatures, which directly damage both countries with increasingly high temperatures, drought and floods. There is some retribution there.

It seems like Africa has not taken any side to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Small countries such as Taiwan are watching as the West abandons Ukraine. Though it is not only Taiwan that lives very near a neighbouring bully country, there is no doubt that Taiwan cannot depend on the West to help them out. There is no unity among nations. Small countries such as Taiwan and Ukraine must arm themselves with as much firepower as possible in order to defend themselves. Without a global agreement to protect smaller nations, nuclear arms will proliferate. Maybe North Korea’s independent thinking is way ahead of its time? Ukraine’s president Zelensky has often lamented that previous generations of his government had abandoned nuclear arms, and now they cannot defend themselves. Russia has many more smaller countries on its border to conquer, and then there is the EU.

Globalization has been very good for humans overall, but our innate animal instincts show that relying on other nations, some wanting to hurt us, is not beneficial for our long-term benefit. It will be more expensive but more localization is necessary. World peace has also been overall beneficial for people, as funding and resources for arms can be put into healthcare and education. This time has passed.

Truth, no matter how much it stings, is better than a lie to yourself. The Russian invasion of Ukraine is terrible, but the abandonment of Ukraine by the West is even more troubling and sets a bad precedent: All countries need to defend themselves. We should not have allowed a united world to crumble like this, but it has happened. it is clear that the United Nations is a farce and should be dismantled and abandoned. So now we know.

2022 Oct 12 How Europe’s dithering leaves Ukraine fighting Russia and high inflation: As the EU dithers, Ukraine is being eaten by runaway inflation, further damaging the country.