Ukraine As Chess Board – Frank Ofili

Russia’s war on Ukraine is, actually, Putin’s war with NATO and the West. It is a chess game and Ukraine is just the board. Putin will dictate the terms of settlement. He has already won the first – Ukraine, and by implication, the West accepting to talk.

Western Powers know Putin is a dangerous bully with nuclear buttons at his fingertips. So, any direct confrontation is out of the question. The prospects portend mutually assured calamity, may be even a holocaust. It is why they are pussyfooting to get directly involved militarily, preferring instead to deploy economic sanctions on Russia.

Sanctions may yet be the key to victory, but it is slow in becoming effective, especially with China unwilling to condemn Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Whatever the West deny Russia, China may fill the void.

The logic of sanction, however, is that it will, in the long run, spark off internal resistance against Putin’s regime as Russians gradually lose access to their much beloved Western luxuries. The tragedy though is that by then Ukraine’s current cartography would have been, more or less, significantly redrawn with destruction and economic ruin as her lot. Unless, of course, peace talks succeed early enough.

This war is avoidable. Ukraine should have learnt from history. She should have borrowed herself sense by shelving her NATO membership aspiration. It is not cowardice; it is wisdom.