Ykpaiha 2022

• Autore: Julian Fernandez
• Carica: Professor in Public International Law - Paris-Panthéon-Assas University, France
• Pagine: 1-6

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hps://doi.org/10.6092/issn.2531‐6133/14696

Україна 2022

There are wars that have barely begun militarily when they already appear lost

politically. By deciding to viciously attack at the heart of Ukraine, Vladimir Putin has

conflated Russia’s historic geopolitical concerns with his grotesque hubris concerning

his place in Russian history. Nothing is definitively written, of course. Between black

swans, serendipity, tactical moves, and strategic redefinitions, the time of the final

judgment of “Operation Z” has not yet come. But winning “hearts and minds” in the

asymmetric and irregular phase that this conflict will inevitably experience will not be

easy. The United States of America [hereinafter U.S.A.] know this from their experience

in Afghanistan, the longest war in its history. And everyone remembers how it ended. In

the immediate future, the path of total warfare chosen by Russia in Ukraine weakens the

internal authority of the Russian President, compromises the country’s economy, wipes

out years of investment in soft power, brings friends such as Venezuela closer to

Washington, and may even unsettle the objective alliance with China. It also

rehabilitates the Ukrainian President’s reputation, whose virtue had been questioned

and restores the backbone of yesterday’s world security alliances - like the North

Atlantic Treaty Organization [N.A.T.O.], which no one can say is brain-dead anymore,and

the list goes on.

“Winter is coming!”. Indeed, Putin’s Russia has crystallized and mobilized the

just resolve of the West. A resolve that had been confused and confounded, especially in

the Trump years, but that has emerged invigorated and that contributes to the

formation, albeit imperfectly, of a “liberal minilateralism” in combat. Who a few weeks

ago still believed in a collective impetus likely to (re)launch the defence of Europe? Who

foresaw the European Union ever activating the temporary protectionmechanism that it

had refused to grant to Syrian refugees? Even multilateralism seems partly

reinvigorated. Who would have thought, for example, that the General Assembly would

once again play a leading role, as in the heyday of the Cold War, by reactivating the

“Acheson” resolution? Who would have imagined that so many international

organizations, in fields as varied as sports, human rights, communications, and

economic aid, would emerge from their lethargy to adopt disruptive measures against

Putin’s regime?

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