Geopolitical Implications and Challenges of the Coronavirus Crisis for Ukraine

Abstract

Spanish

Chinese

Among various geopolitical repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic are redefinitions of the short-term priorities of many international organizations. Among others, the European Union (EU) and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) are becoming absorbed by new internal challenges, and are thus even less interested in further enlargement than before. Against this background, Kyiv, Tbilisi, and Chisinau, as well as their Western friends, need to seek new paths to increase the three countries’ security, resilience, and growth before their accession to the West’s major organizations. Above all, an alternative way to decrease Ukraine’s current institutional isolation is to develop more intense bilateral relations with friendly states across the globe, including Germany and the United States. In Eastern Europe, moreover, Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova should attempt to create new multilateral networks with post-communist member countries of NATO as well as the EU, and try to become part of such structures as the Three Seas Initiative or Bucharest Nine group.

Keywords

Pandemic Coronavirus COVID-19 Global Crisis Response Geopolitics Eastern Europe European Union EU NATO Ukraine Georgia Moldova Security Policy

In their seminal 2012 study Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity and Poverty, Daren Acemoglu and James A. Robinson identified the Bubonic Plague of 1346–1353 not only as one of the greatest calamities in human history. The Black Death—as the pandemic is also called—acted as a critical juncture in European political history. While the 14th-century pestilence encouraged the gradual abolition of feudalism in Western Europe, it led to the so-called Second Serfdom in most of Eastern Europe—not the least, in parts of today’s Ukraine. The Black Death thus fundamentally reset European affairs during the Middle Ages, resulting in consequences that reach as far as today. The COVID-19 pandemic will presumably result in far fewer victims than the Bubonic Plague, which claimed the lives of between 70 and 200 million people. Yet the coronavirus crisis could also become a critical juncture in human history, with far-reaching repercussions for both states’ domestic affairs and their international relations.

The ongoing pandemic’s various aftereffects on the contemporary world system will be especially far-reaching for weak states located in geopolitical gray zones between adversarial defense coalitions (Bond 2017; Hamilton and Meister 2016; Rotaru 2018; Tyshchenko 2018). Countries like Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova—that are neither military or economic great powers nor embedded in relevant security alliances or trading blocs—are at special risk (Balmaceda 2001; Härtel 2012). For Kyiv, Tbilisi, and Chisinau, the evolving world crisis will have, among others, the unpleasant consequence that their nations’ already stalling integration with the West may slow down further (Appel 2014; Getmanchuk 2019; Pifer 2017; Umland 2016c).

Some already existing special outreach programs in which Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova are included, such as the European Union’s (EU) Eastern Partnership initiative or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) Individual Partnership Action Plan scheme, will probably remain in place and may even be strengthened (Rinkēvičs et al. 2019). Moreover, in 2019, Ukraine put the aim of full membership in NATO and the EU demonstratively into its Constitution (Klimkin 2019). Yet these organizations will probably be turning ever more inward, as international and national instability may be growing in 2020 and, perhaps, beyond. At least, it seems unlikely that the ongoing crisis will decrease skepticism toward further EU and NATO enlargement, especially in Western Europe.

Kyiv’s Ambivalent Relationship with Western Europe

Already in 2019, Ukrainian politicians and experts were dismayed by a number of, in Kyiv’s view, scandalous West European decisions and signals. This included the unfounded readmission of the Russian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, from which it had been excluded in view of Moscow’s attack on Ukraine in 2014 (Gigitashvili 2019), and a strangely conciliatory turn in French President Emmanuel Macron’s rhetoric vis-à-vis Moscow (Leonard 2019). Moreover, as became clear after Macron’s unexpected advance, the French president has numerous supporters in Western Europe in his stated intention to change the current character of EU–Russia relations and begin a new security partnership with Moscow.

Germany has, in many ways, been supportive of Ukraine since 2014 (Härtel 2019). The Federal Republic will probably continue or may even strengthen its support for Ukraine in the future (Umland 2020). Yet Berlin continues to irritate Kyiv with its myopic insistence on the completion of Gazprom’s Nord Stream 2 pipeline through the Baltic Sea (Fischer 2016; Goldthau 2016; Lang and Westphal 2017). The German and Austrian governments have not changed their strong support for the controversial underwater conduit even in view of growing resistance against the dubious project in Eastern Europe and the United States throughout 2019 (Assenova 2018; Gawlikowska-Fyk et al. 2018; Heinrich and Pleines 2019; Przybyło 2019).

The geopolitical surroundings of Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova will seemingly worsen further during 2020. Since the outbreak of the coronavirus epidemic, world politics has become more complicated with every passing week. The EU and its member states are today confronted not only with the pandemic and its uncertain economic repercussions (Schwarzer and Vallée 2020). They simultaneously face a new refugee crisis in the South, complicated situations in the Middle East and Africa, increasingly difficult relations with Turkey, and an awkward U.S. president with a different understanding of transatlantic solidarity than previous inhabitants of the White House.

Russia’s Weakening as a Result of the Corona Crisis

To be sure, not all recent foreign trends may be disadvantageous for Ukraine. The currently multiplying economic and social repercussions of the pandemic for Russia could, so hopes not only Kyiv, dampen the Kremlin’s traditional foreign adventurism (Kushnir 2018; Plokhy 2018; Torbakov 2018). Moscow made an ill-conceived attempt to push back against producers of shale oil and gas in the world’s energy markets—especially American ones (Gould-Davies 2020). Russia’s nonagreement to an Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries’ (OPEC) proposal to cut the extraction of oil so as to hold up prices may have also been meant to be the Kremlin’s rebuttal to the United States’ sanctioning of Gazprom’s controversial Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project via the Baltic Sea in December 2019 (Łoskot-Strachota 2020).

As of late April 2020, however, it looks as if this attempted Russian manipulation is backfiring. The recent decline of world market price for crude oil seems to have been much deeper and may turn out to last much longer than the Kremlin probably intended to. If one believes recent research on a causal link between economic well-being—largely determined, in Russia, by world energy prices—and a Russian inclination toward foreign adventurism, this should be good news for countries like Ukraine (Snegovaya 2020a, 2020b). Also, as a result of the deep impact of the drop in energy prices and pandemic on Russia’s economic and social life, there is now an increasing likelihood that a disruption of Putin’s regime may, at some point in the future, happen (Kragh 2020; Shagina 2020). Arguably, that scenario will have positive rather than negative repercussions for countries like Ukraine (Umland 2017a).

Moreover, some domestic political developments in the West may also be—at least, indirectly—to the advantage of Ukraine. Both Russia and Ukraine will apparently be topics in the U.S. electoral campaign throughout summer and autumn 2020. Kyiv may well benefit from further discussion of Moscow’s continuing malevolent actions against the United States and its allies, as in the case of Congress’ December 2019 decision to sanction Nord Stream 2 (Polyakova and Boyer 2018). As time goes by, various details and a better comprehension of Russia’s past, current, and possible future covert intrusion into American and European electoral and other political affairs are accumulating in Western societies (Kragh and Åsberg 2017; Polyakova 2018; Shekhovtsov 2017, 2020; Vilmer 2019; Weiss 2020).

Certain purely domestic current and future developments in a number of EU and NATO member countries can be to the advantage of Ukraine. In October 2021, for instance, the German parliamentary elections may be resulting in an entry of the relatively pro-Ukrainian Green party into the Federal Republic’s new government (Kefferpütz 2019; Rohac 2017; Umland 2020). Yet these possible and other positive developments abroad and their presumably benevolent effects for Ukraine remain uncertain as of spring 2020.

The Distant Prospect of EU and NATO Accession

Concerning Ukraine’s two major foreign political targets, accession to NATO and the EU, the prospects today look gloomier than before the start of the ongoing worldwide crisis. Already after the victories of the 2004 Orange Revolution and 2014 Revolution of Dignity, Ukraine’s political and intellectual elite was repeatedly disappointed by Brussels. For instance, during the April 2008 NATO summit in Bucharest, Kyiv’s and Tbilisi’s official applications for membership in the Alliance were not rejected. The summit’s final declaration even stated that Ukraine and Georgia will become NATO members. Yet the two countries’ actual admissions to the Alliance were curiously postponed to an uncertain later period (Hagedorn 2008). Neither Membership Action Plans nor any other road maps for accession were adopted, in response to Ukraine’s and Georgia’s formal requests for entry into NATO.

In 2014, after the Revolution of Dignity’s victory, Kyiv’s and the EU’s conclusion of a far-reaching Association Agreement did not lead to a formal change in Brussels’ traditionally uncommitted position on the possibility of Ukraine’s future Union membership. An accession has also never been excluded by Brussels. Yet the texts of Ukraine’s as well as Georgia’s and Moldova’s especially large Association Agreements do not include any reference to the option of a future membership in the EU (Umland 2013).

It is true that Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova are far from the standards required for EU accession today. However, those Western Balkan countries, which have not yet joined the Union but have an official membership perspective or are even already negotiating their accession, are not more (or not significantly more) advanced than Ukraine or Georgia. The latter continue to be hampered by an inability to move beyond their post-Soviet oligarchic form of governance to a more modern model. However, Brussels’ lack of long-term strategy, absence of political will, and excessive fear of Russia are the main reasons for the dearth of clear language in the decisions of the EU Council or Commission concerning the possibility of future accession of Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova (Klimkin 2017).

Currently accumulating domestic issues in the member states of NATO and the EU, as well as mounting tensions within these international organizations, are bad news for such aspiring applicants as Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova. NATO’s and the EU’s ongoing enlargement in the Western Balkans may still continue more or less unhampered, as North Macedonia’s recent accession to the Alliance illustrated. Yet that is because the former Yugoslav republics and Albania are already partly members of, and surrounded by, NATO and the EU. With the partial exception of Serbia, they have thus more or less clear membership prospects (Dabrowski and Myachenkova 2018). Current and future Western integration successes of the Balkan nations may thus imply only little for Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova. In contrast, possible future setbacks in the former Yugoslavia may have also negative repercussions for the chances of other formerly communist countries to ever enter NATO and the EU.

A Reboot of U.S.–Ukraine Relations

All this means that Kyiv, Tbilisi, and Chisinau need to rethink their tactical short- and medium-term foreign policy priorities and the means of their implementation. Achieving EU and/or NATO membership will certainly remain their top aim. But these targets should, in view of growing geopolitical instability, be acknowledged to be achievable only in the long term. Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova may instead have to make plans of what to do within a more or less prolonged interregnum during which their current lack of international embeddedness and gray zone status will continue for a number of years (Umland 2017b).

The most obvious interim solution for Kyiv will be to deepen as quickly and as much as possible bilateral ties with those countries that already have or may soon have more or less pro-Ukrainian leaderships. Thus, Kyiv could seek an upgrade of the little-known 2008 Charter on Strategic Partnership between Ukraine and the United States. Kyiv could refer vis-à-vis Washington to the American respect for Ukrainian borders, sovereignty, and integrity expressed in the famous 1994 Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances in connection with Ukraine’s accession to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (Budjeryn 2014; Budjeryn and Umland 2017; Umland 2016b). The content of an update of the 2008 bilateral Charter could be (1) a clearer formulation than was the case in the Budapest Memorandum of the United States’ security guarantees for Ukraine until it accedes to NATO, and (2) a new package of security cooperation between Washington and Kyiv.

An upgrade of the existing U.S.–Ukraine Charter could even lead to a qualitatively new agreement between the two countries. (It could also include Great Britain as another signatory of the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, or Canada and other especially pro-Ukrainian Western countries.) Ideally, a newly defined pact between Kyiv and Washington would contain provisions approaching those of the 1953 Mutual Defense Treaty between the United States and Republic of Korea, or similar security guarantees that the United States has given to its closest non-NATO allies around the world.

While the prospects of such a fundamental change in Kyiv’s international embeddedness are not clear, other directions for the improvement of Ukrainian foreign affairs are less uncertain. Ukraine’s relations to several East European countries with pro-Ukrainian or/and Russia-skeptic governments can and should be improved already today. This concerns both smaller countries like Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Slovakia and larger states like Poland and Romania.

Toward an Intermarium Alliance

Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova should, with regard to these countries, not only seek closer bilateral ties. They should also try to build with them as well as other East European states multilateral networks that transcend the borders of NATO and the EU. In fact, this was already tried in December 2005 when Estonia, Georgia, Lithuania, Latvia, Moldova, North Macedonia, Romania, Slovenia, and Ukraine founded the so-called Community of Democratic Choice in Kyiv. Some of these nine countries were then members of the EU and/or NATO, others were and/or are neither. However, the Community never got off the ground and is today largely forgotten.

A different strategy for Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova would be to try to enter already existing multilateral regional projects. This includes, above all, the Three Seas Initiative of twelve Eastern EU members states (Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia) established in 2016 and the Bucharest Nine group of countries constituting NATO’s East European flank (Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Romania, and Bulgaria), formed in 2015 (Rotaru and Umland 2017). While the Three Seas Initiative focuses on infrastructure and transportation, the Bucharest Nine is about security and defense. Both networks thus touch upon issues that are central to the geopolitics and geoeconomics of Eastern Europe and that are of crucial relevance to the protection, resilience, and development of Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova. An Eastern enlargement of the Three Seas Initiative could happen with simultaneous support from Brussels and Washington, and an extension of the Bucharest Nine could be envisaged within NATO’s already existing special partnerships with Ukraine and Georgia (Fedorenko and Umland 2017; Umland 2016a).

Another strategy for Georgia and Ukraine as NATO applicants—as well as perhaps Azerbaijan and Moldova, with no such ambitions—would be to persuade the United States to support more intensely these four countries’ already existing Organization for Democracy and Economic Development (GUAM) founded in 1997. Washington might be even persuaded to create with these four countries an equivalent to the U.S. Baltic Charter founded in 1998 with Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania or the U.S. Adriatic Charter founded in 2003 with Albania, Croatia, and North Macedonia. A U.S.-GUAM Charter would upgrade Washington’s already existing bilateral Charters of Strategic Partnership with Kyiv and Tbilisi, and provide the four former Soviet republics with at least a modicum of international security (Vereshchuk and Umland 2019).

Conclusion

The above-mentioned possible scenarios do not exclude an emergence of absolutely new formats of interaction in East-Central Europe. They should all make better use of the region’s human and economic potential by way of relying on a common Central European identity as a specific subset of European civilization. Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova—as well as their international friends—could and should think about different schemes that would strengthen their international embeddedness. There are a number of alternative avenues for Kyiv to pursue its Western integration even without yet starting accession procedures with NATO and the EU.

In 2020, because of the effects of the coronavirus spread, geopolitical uncertainty is increasing by the month. Even before the pandemic, domestic developments in a number of countries (including Great Britain, the United States, Hungary, or France) created uncertainty about the identity and future of NATO and the EU. In such circumstances, the two major Western organizations have already and will continue to become less rather than more open for new applicants. For the years to come, increasing Ukraine’s international security and her integration with the world’s still existing liberal democracies is a moving target. Accordingly, Kyiv and its partners will need creativity, resolution, and flexibility in exploring new paths of international cooperation.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

Some ideas presented in this commentary have been jointly earlier outlined by the authors in policy briefs for the European Council on Foreign Relations at Berlin and Swedish Institute of International Affairs at Stockholm.

ORCID iD

Andreas Umland

About the Authors

Pavlo Klimkin was, among other things, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine in 2014–2019 and is director of the Program on European, Regional, and Russian Studies of the Ukrainian Institute for the Future in Kyiv.

Andreas Umland is editor of the book series Soviet and Post-Soviet Politics and Society published by ibidem Press in Stuttgart and senior expert at the Ukrainian Institute for the Future in Kyiv.

References

Acemoglu

Daren

Robinson

James A.

. 2012. Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity and Poverty. New York: Crown Publishing Group.

Appel

Hilary

. 2014. “The Long-Term Prospects for Ukraine’s Accession to the European Union: A Focus on EU-Level Constraints.” PONARS Eurasia Policy Memo 330. http://www.ponarseurasia.org/memo/201408_Appel.

Assenova

Margarita

. 2018. “Europe and Nord Stream 2: Myths, Reality, and the Way Forward.” Center for European Policy Analysis Report, June. https://www.cepa.org/europe-and-nord-stream-2 (accessed June 16, 2020).

Balmaceda

Margarita M.

, ed. 2001. On the Edge: Ukrainian-Central European-Russian Security Triangle. Budapest: CEU Press.

Bond

Ian

. 2017. Contested Space: Eastern Europe between Russia and the EU. London: Center for European Reform.

Budjeryn

Mariana

. 2014. “The Breach: Ukraine’s Territorial Integrity and the Budapest Memorandum.” NPIHP Issues Brief #3. https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/issue-brief-3-the-breach-ukraines-territorial-integrity-and-the-budapest-memorandum (accessed June 16, 2020).

Budjeryn

Mariana

Umland

Andreas

. 2017. “Amerikanische Russlandpolitik, die Souveränität der Ukraine und der Atomwaffensperrvertrag: Ein Dreiecksverhältnis mit weitreichenden Konsequenzen [American Policy toward Russia, the Sovereignty of Ukraine, and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty: A Triangular Relationship with Far-Reaching Consequences].” Sirius. Zeitschrift für Strategische Analysen 1 (2): 133–42.

Dabrowski

Marek

Myachenkova

Yana

. 2018. “The Western Balkans on the Road to the European Union.” Bruegel Policy Contribution, 22 February. https://www.bruegel.org/2018/02/the-western-balkans-on-the-road-to-the-european-union/.

Fedorenko

Kostiantyn

Umland

Andreas

. 2017. “How to Solve Ukraine’s Security Dilemma? The Idea of an Intermarium Coalition in East-Central Europe.” War on the Rocks, August 30. https://warontherocks.com/2017/08/how-to-solve-ukraines-security-dilemma-the-idea-of-an-intermarium-coalition-in-east-central-europe/ (accessed June 16, 2020).

10.

Fischer

Sabine

. 2016. “Nord Stream 2: Trust in Europe.” CSS Policy Perspectives 4 (4). https://css.ethz.ch/content/dam/ethz/special-interest/gess/cis/center-for-securities-studies/pdfs/PP4-4.pdf.

11.

Gawlikowska-Fyk

Aleksandra

Terlikowski

Marcin

Wiśniewski

Bartosz

Zaręba

Szymon

. 2018. “Nord Stream 2: Inconvenient Questions.” PISM Policy Paper No. 5 (165). https://www.pism.pl/file/2c4add64-b729-48d0-a7bc-03e1beb570cc.

12.

Getmanchuk

Alyona

. 2019. “European Integration Is Taking Root across Ukraine Despite Russia’s Best Efforts.” Atlantic Council: UkraineAlert, December 12. www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/european-integration-is-taking-root-across-ukraine-despite-russias-best-efforts/ (accessed June 16, 2020).

13.

Gigitashvili

Givi

. 2019. “Russia’s Return to PACE: Irrational Compromise or Defending Russian Citizens from Their Government?” New Eastern Europe, July 10. https://www.neweasterneurope.eu/2019/07/10/russias-return (accessed June 16, 2020).

14.

Goldthau

Andreas

. 2016. “Assessing Nord Stream 2: Regulation, Geopolitics & Energy Security in the EU, Central Eastern Europe & the UK.” European Center for Energy and Resource Security Strategy Paper 10. https://www.asktheeu.org/en/request/7115/response/23365/attach/2/Goldthau%20July%202016.pdf.

15.

Gould-Davies

Nigel

. 2020. “Russia’s Failed OPEC Gamble.” The International Institute for Strategic Studies, April 15. https://www.iiss.org/blogs/analysis/2020/04/russia-opec-agreement (accessed June 16, 2020).

16.

Hagedorn

Anke

. 2008. “Streit über den NATO-Beitritt von Georgien und Ukraine [Quarrel about the NATO Accession of Georgia and Ukraine].” Deutsche Welle, March 6. www.dw.com/de/streit-über-den-nato-beitritt-von-georgien-und-ukraine/a-3170607 (accessed June 16, 2020).

17.

Hamilton

Daniel S.

Meister

Stefan

, eds. 2016. The Eastern Question: Russia, the West, and Europe’s Grey Zone. Washington, DC: Center for Transatlantic Relations.

18.

Härtel

André

. 2012. Westintegration oder Grauzonen-Szenario? Die EU- und WTO-Politik der Ukraine vor dem Hintergrund der inneren Transformation (1998-2009) [Western Integration or Grey-Zone Scenario? The EU and WTO Policies of Ukraine against the Background of Its Domestic Transformation (1998-2009)]. Münster: LIT Verlag.

19.

Härtel

André

. 2019. “The EU Member States and the Crisis in Ukraine: Towards an Eclectic Explanation.” Romanian Journal of European Affairs 19 (2): 87–106. https://www.ceeol.com/search/article-detail?id=849908 (accessed June 16, 2020).

20.

Heinrich

Andreas

Pleines

Heiko

. 2019. “Towards a Common European Energy Policy? Energy Security Debates in Poland and Germany, the Case of the Nord Stream Pipeline.” In Europeanisation and Renationalisation: Learning from Crises for Innovation and Development, edited by Jenichen

Anne

Liebert

Ulrike

, 169–82. Leverkusen: Barbara Budrich.

21.

Kefferpütz

Roderick

. 2019. “Green Is the New Normal in German Politics.” Green European Journal, October 25. www.greeneuropeanjournal.eu/green-is-the-new-normal-in-german/ (accessed June 16, 2020).

22.

Klimkin

Pavlo

. 2017. “Putin’s Desire for a New Russian Empire Won’t Stop with Ukraine.” The Guardian, March 25. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/mar/25/putin-new-russian-empire-ukraine (accessed June 16, 2020).

23.

Klimkin

Pavlo

. 2019. “Ukraine Will Continue to Move towards the EU and NATO with a New President.” Opinion: The Way Ukraine Thinks, April 2. https://opinionua.com/en/2019/04/02/klimkin-ukraine-will-continue-to-move-towards-the-eu-and-nato-with-a-new-president/ (accessed June 16, 2020).

24.

Kragh

Martin

. 2020. “Russia in 2045: A Scenario Analysis.” Swedish Institute of International Affairs UI Paper 2. https://www.ui.se/globalassets/ui.se-eng/publications/ui-publications/2020/ui-report-no.-2-2020.pdf.

25.

Kragh

Martin

Åsberg

Sebastian

. 2017. “Russia’s Strategy for Influence through Public Diplomacy and Active Measures: The Swedish Case.” Journal of Strategic Studies 40 (6): 773–816. doi:10.1080/01402390.2016.1273830.

26.

Kushnir

Ostap

. 2018. Ukraine and Russian Neo-Imperialism: The Divergent Break. Lanham: Lexington Books.

27.

Lang

Kai-Olaf

Westphal

Kirsten

. 2017. “Nord Stream 2: A Political and Economic Contextualisation.” SWP Research Paper No. 3. https://www.swp-berlin.org/fileadmin/contents/products/research_papers/2017RP03_lng_wep.pdf.

28.

Leonard

Mark

. 2019. “Macrons Russlandinitiative: Eine Innenansicht [Macron’s Russia Initiative: An Internal Look].” Project Syndicate, October 2. www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/macron-russia-diplomacy-eu-security-strategy-by-mark-leonard-2019-10/german (accessed June 16, 2020).

29.

Łoskot-Strachota

Agata

. 2020. “Sanctions against Nord Stream 2 in the U.S. Defence Budget.” Centre for Eastern Studies (OSW), December 18. www.osw.waw.pl/en/publikacje/analyses/2019-12-18/sanctions-against-nord-stream-2-us-defence-budget (accessed June 16, 2020).

30.

Pifer

Steven

. 2017. “Will Ukraine Join NATO? A Course for Disappointment.” Brookings. Order from Chaos, July 25. www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2017/07/25/will-ukraine-join-nato-a-course-for-disappointment/ (accessed June 16, 2020).

31.

Plokhy

Serhii

. 2018. Lost Kingdom: A History of Russian Nationalism from Ivan the Great to Vladimir Putin. London: Penguin Books.

32.

Polyakova

Alina

, ed. 2018. “The Kremlin’s Trojan Horses 3.0.” Atlantic Council Report, December 3. https://issuu.com/atlanticcouncil/docs/the_kremlin_s_trojan_horses_3.

33.

Polyakova

Alina

Boyer

Spencer Phipps

. 2018. “The Future of Political Warfare: Russia, the West, and the Coming Age of Global Digital Competition.” Brookings Report, March 7. https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-future-of-political-warfare-russia-the-west-and-the-coming-age-of-global-digital-competition/.

34.

Przybyło

Piotr

. 2019. “The Real Financial Cost of Nord Stream 2: Economic Sensitivity Analysis of the Alternatives to the Offshore Pipeline.” Casimir Pulaski Foundation Report, May 6. https://pulaski.pl/en/pulaski-report-the-real-financial-cost-of-nord-stream-2-economic-sensitivity-analysis-of-the-alternatives-to-the-offshore-pipeline-2/.

35.

Rinkēvičs

Edgars

Klimkin

Pavlo

Mikser

Sven

Linkevičius

Linas

Czaputowicz

Jacek

Wallström

Margot

Samuelsen

Anders

, et al. 2019. “The West Must not Abandon Crimea and Ukraine to Russian Aggression.” The Guardian, February 27. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/27/west-crimea-ukraine-russian-occupation (accessed June 16, 2020).

36.

Rohac

Dalibor

. 2017. “Should Vladimir Putin Be Afraid of German Greens?” American Enterprise Institute. AEIdeas, August 14. www.aei.org/foreign-and-defense-policy/europe-and-eurasia/should-vladimir-putin-be-afraid-of-german-greens/ (accessed June 16, 2020).

37.

Rotaru

Vasile

. 2018. Russia, the EU, and the Eastern Partnership: Building Bridges or Digging Trenches? Stuttgart: ibidem-Verlag.

38.

Rotaru

Vasile

Umland

Andreas

. 2017. “How Romania and Poland Can Strengthen NATO and the EU: Two New Cooperation Initiatives Could Improve Regional Security.” Foreign Affairs, November 10. https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/central-europe/2017-11-10/how-romania-and-poland-can-strengthen-nato-and-eu (accessed June 16, 2020).

39.

Schwarzer

Daniela

Vallée

Shahin

. 2020. “How Leaders Can Stop Corona from Undermining the EU: The Health and Economic Crises Require Coordinated Handling.” DGAP Policy Brief, 6. https://www.ssoar.info/ssoar/handle/document/66934.

40.

Shagina

Maria

. 2020. “Double Shock: The Impact of COVID-19 and the Oil Price Collapse on Russia’s Energy Sector.” Foreign Policy Research Institute, June 4. www.fpri.org/article/2020/06/double-shock-the-impact-of-covid-19-and-the-oil-price-collapse-on-russias-energy-sector/?fbclid=IwAR0A7IrZen1Cw7GuJwAikPJJifdAalv3S406ahZ9JAowAEXdatBwyfzKQzM (accessed June 16, 2020).

41.

Shekhovtsov

Anton

. 2017. Russia and the Western Far Right: Tango Noir. Abingdon: Routledge.

42.

Shekhovtsov

Anton

. 2020. “Conceptualizing Malign Influence of Putin’s Russia in Europe.” Free Russia Foundation Report, April 15. https://www.4freerussia.org/event-conceptualizing-malign-influence-of-putin-s-russia-in-europe/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=event-conceptualizing-malign-influence-of-putin-s-russia-in-europe.

43.

Snegovaya

Maria

. 2020a. “Guns to Butter: Sociotropic Concerns and Foreign Policy Preferences in Russia.” Post-Soviet Affairs 36:268–79. doi:10.1080/1060586X.2020.1750912.

44.

Snegovaya

Maria

. 2020b. “What Factors Contribute to the Aggressive Foreign Policy of Russian Leaders?” Problems of Post-Communism 67 (1): 93–110. doi:10.1080/10758216.2018.1554408.

45.

Torbakov

Igor

. 2018. After Empire: Nationalist Imagination and Symbolic Politics in Russia and Eurasia in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Century. Stuttgart: ibidem-Verlag.

46.

Tyshchenko

Roman

. 2018. “‘Our Existence is Not the Subject of Compromises’: Pavlo Klimkin during UCU Visit.” Ukrainian Catholic University, November 5. www.ucu.edu.ua/en/news/existence-not (accessed June 16, 2020).

47.

Umland

Andreas

. 2013. “Tor zum Osten oder Krisenherd? Wie das EU-Ukraine-Abkommen den postsowjetischen Raum verändern würde [Gateway to the East or Hotspot? How the EU-Ukraine Agreement would Change the Post-Soviet Area].” Internationale Politik 68 (6): 108–12.

48.

Umland

Andreas

. 2016a. “Mehr Sicherheit in ‘Zwischeneuropa’: Die alte Idee eines Intermarium-Staatenblocks wird wieder aktuell [More Security in ‘Inter-Europe’: The Old Idea of an Intermarium Block of States is Becoming Topical Again].” Internationale Politik 17 (4): 88–94.

49.

Umland

Andreas

. 2016b. “The Ukraine Example: Nuclear Disarmament Doesn’t Pay.” World Affairs 178 (4): 45–49. https://www-jstor-org-443.web.bisu.edu.cn/stable/24888130 (accessed June 16, 2020).

50.

Umland

Andreas

. 2017a. “Preparing for and Working towards a Democratic Russia.” Open Democracy, December 28. www.opendemocracy.net/en/odr/preparing-for-a-democratic-russia/ (accessed June 16, 2020).

51.

Umland

Andreas

. 2017b. “The Six Futures of Ukraine: Competing Scenarios for a European Pivot State.” The Brown Journal of World Affairs 24 (1): 261–78. http://bjwa.brown.edu/24-1/the-six-futures-of-ukraine-competing-scenarios-for-a-european-pivot-state/ (accessed June 16, 2020).

52.

Umland

Andreas

. 2016c. “Ukraine’s Understandable but Senseless Hope for NATO Membership.” Atlantic Council: Ukraine Alert, April 5. www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/ukraine-s-understandable-but-senseless-hope-for-nato-membership/ (accessed June 16, 2020).

53.

Umland

Andreas

. 2020. “Can Germany Become a Major Ally of Ukraine? Counterintuitive Deliberations on a Coming Partnership between Kyiv and Berlin.” World Affairs 183 (1): 74–89. doi:10.1177/0043820020906371.

54.

Vereshchuk

Iryna

Umland

Andreas

. 2019. “How to Make Eastern Europe’s Gray Zone Less Gray.” Harvard International Review 40 (1): 38–41.

55.

Vilmer

Jean-Baptiste Jeangène

. 2019. “The ‘Macron Leaks’ Operation: A Post-Mortem.” Atlantic Council Report, June 20. https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/The_Macron_Leaks_Operation-A_Post-Mortem.pdf.

56.

Weiss

Andrew S.

2020. “With Friends Like These: The Kremlin’s Far-Right and Populist Connections in Italy and Austria.” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Report, February 27. https://carnegieendowment.org/2020/02/27/with-friends-like-these-kremlin-s-far-right-and-populist-connections-in-italy-and-austria-pub-81100.