There is a high alert as NATO sends reinforcements and U.S. puts troops on alert as Ukraine tensions escalate, India in a delicate position.
NATO is sending ships, fighter jets to Eastern Europe and the USA has put around 8,500 troops on alert while Kremlin says West and not Russia is heightening tensions and Russia denounced their moves as Western “hysteria” in response to its build-up of troops on the Ukraine border in their fear that Russia might invade Ukraine.
Earlier, Russia brought in an estimated 100,000 troops in reach of its neighbor’s border, surrounding Ukraine with forces from the north, east, and south but Russia denies planning an invasion and Moscow is citing the Western response as evidence that Russia is the target, not the instigator, of aggression.
President Joe Biden, pushing for transatlantic unity, held an 80-minute secure video call with a number of European leaders on Monday from the White House Situation Room to discuss the Ukraine crisis.
Biden told reporters “I had a very, very, very good meeting” with the Europeans, which included the leaders of Germany, France, Italy, Britain, and Poland. He said there was “total unanimity.”
A White House statement said the leaders “discussed their joint efforts to deter further Russian aggression against Ukraine, including preparations to impose massive consequences and severe economic costs on Russia for such actions as well as to reinforce security on NATO’s eastern flank.”
Welcoming a series of deployments announced by alliance members in recent days, Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg earlier said NATO would take “all necessary measures.”
“We will always respond to any deterioration of our security environment, including through strengthening our collective defense,” Stoltenberg said in a statement.
He told a news conference that the enhanced presence on NATO’s eastern flank could also include the deployment of battlegroups in the southeast of the alliance.
Thus far, NATO has about 4,000 troops in multinational battalions in Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia and Poland, backed by tanks, air defenses, and intelligence and surveillance units.
U.S. officials said the Pentagon was finalizing efforts to identify specific units that it could deploy to NATO’s eastern flank.
One of the officials said up to 5,000 could be deployed, while a NATO diplomat said Washington was considering gradually transferring some troops stationed in western Europe to eastern Europe in the coming weeks. read more
Denmark, Spain, France, and the Netherlands were all planning or considering sending troops, planes, or ships to eastern Europe, NATO said. Ukraine shares borders with four NATO countries: Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania.
Would India Stand with Russia?
From the point of view of not just India, but of the entire world, it is wise not to weaken Russia and maintain it as a center of global power, balancing not just the US, but also, increasingly, China. A weakened Russia would be forced, given its posture of rivalry with the West, to play second fiddle to the West’s principal rival, China who is already advancing its borders and aimed to attack Taiwan. For the sake of global multipolarity, it is better for Russia to remain a strong base of global power, minus a NATO deployment across its border.
In 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea, to energetic and unanimous condemnation by the West, India recognized the annexed Crimean Peninsula as a part of Russia and refrained on a UN resolution upholding Ukrainian territorial integrity. The same reasons that influenced India to overlook Ukrainian sovereignty and support the annexation of Crimea remain equally valid now.
At the same time, India is a traditional defender of national sovereignty, even against doctrines such as the global community’s ‘Responsibility to Protect’ persecuted minorities within national borders. That would mean that India should oppose Russia and endorse American and European demands for Russia to back off from whatever it means to do with its massive troop deployments along Ukraine’s border, in both Belarus and Russia. But that would be a mistake.
In both these situations, India is in a delicate position, what will India do?