Moldova Has Become a Part of a Big Geopolitical Game

Vladimir ROTARI

The shortfall policy of the elites turns Moldova into one of the potential conflict zones in the Black Sea region

Events around Eastern Europe in general and Ukraine in particular continue to develop dramatically. The story of the upcoming Russian attack on our neighbor doesn’t leave the front pages and acquires new meanings and plot twists. Moreover, recently it has been “stirred up” not only by the collective West, but also by Russia itself. We have been writing about the fact that the situation in the Black Sea region is gradually heating up for a long time, warning that sooner or later this escalation will peak – and it is possible that even a military one. All these years, the opposing sides have been accumulating forces, developing and implementing advanced technologies in an attempt to achieve at least a temporary military-technical advantage – both quantitative and qualitative. In the end, thanks to hypersonic weapons, Moscow seems to have succeeded. Now this local superiority is one of the factors that allow it to declare its own interests more confidently than ever. It has been a long time since the leadership of the Russian Federation has been so frank in its opinions about the “red lines” of the United States and NATO in Eastern Europe. No more footnotes on international law and other ritual things – just crude facts and pure pragmatism. After all, Vladimir Putin declared openly that “Moscow has nowhere else to retreat”, and further penetration of the North Atlantic Alliance to the very borders of Russia will not remain unanswered – including the military, which is clearly heard in the words of the Russian leader. Putin repeated similar points during a meeting of the Defense Ministry board, and at his traditional large press conference. He expressed concern about the deployment of US and NATO military groups near the borders of the Russian Federation, noting that when their missile systems appear in Ukraine, their approach time to Moscow will be reduced to 5-7 minutes.: “If the clearly aggressive line of our Western colleagues continues, we will take adequate military-technical measures and react harshly to unfriendly steps.” Putin considers “written security guarantees” to be the way out, although even in this case, according to him, the United States cannot be fully trusted: “We need long-term legally binding guarantees. But we all know very well – we cannot trust even that! Because the United States easily withdraws from all international treaties that become uninteresting to them. Just like that! Explaining by something or not explaining at all. As it was with the ABM treaty, with the Open Sky. But at least this, at least something, and not verbal assurances. We know what such words and promises are worth.” How exactly the Kremlin sees these guarantees is already clear: Last Friday, the Russian Foreign Ministry distributed two draft agreements – with the United States and NATO. “Both texts are not compiled according to the principle of a menu, where you can choose one or the other, they complement each other and should be considered as a complex,” Deputy Head of the department Sergey Ryabkov commented on the documents. What is the point? Russia proposed to the Alliance to abandon any military activity outside its borders, to not deploy additional weapons or troops outside the countries in which they were stationed as of May 1997, to not consider each other as adversaries, to consolidate intentions to peacefully resolve disputes. There are many more important points there, but the block on commitments to exclude further expansion of NATO to the east and Ukraine’s accession to it attracts special attention. It seems that the latter is the point of the documents. Today, Putin again talked about Ukraine in a rather harsh manner: he spoke about the nationalists’ influence on Zelensky, and about the refusal to fulfill the Minsk agreements, and about the preparation of a new military operation against the LDPR (Luhansk People's Republic (LPR) and Donetsk People's Republic(DPR)). Probably, the Kremlin has finally lost hope for normal interaction with the Ukrainian authorities in the foreseeable future. At least, the territories of the separatist republics of eastern Ukraine have already begun to be integrated into the Russian space. Here is the active passporting of their population, and the inclusion of Donbass enterprises in the Russian state order and other important measures that serve to further separate the LDPR from the rest of Ukraine. But is Moscow seriously thinking about alternative options to sever this Gordian knot – especially by military means? Experts are now puzzling over this issue, trying to understand the true meaning of the appearance of draft agreements, and, in fact, in an ultimatum form. It is impossible to imagine that the United States and NATO agrees to meet all the requirements of Moscow, and even as a complex. Therefore, the interpretations of the “catch” of Kremlin’s such a step are very different. One of the most popular is that it is such an aggressive invitation to negotiations, where you put forward excessive demands in order to gradually reach a compromise. Another no less widespread opinion is that the “request list” is initially designed to be impassable, and Russia thus blames its opponents for further escalation and possible conflict – showing that it made attempts to solve all problems diplomatically, but did not receive understanding. The further development of events so far gives arguments to supporters of both one and the other theory. On the one hand, the United States and NATO preferred not to immediately abandon the negotiations, although they stressed the unacceptable nature of many of the demands put forward. For example, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken noted that “there are points on which it makes sense to have a dialogue,” and also that the US and Europe will also put all their claims and concerns on the negotiating table. Sergey Lavrov called such a reaction “businesslike” and announced that negotiations would begin in January and at several levels at once. At the same time, this did not reduce the intensity of tension in any way, rather the opposite. NATO continues to point to the alleged transfer of Russian forces to the border with Ukraine, including combat units, artillery and tanks. The organization has even increased the combat readiness of its rapid reaction forces totaling 40,000 troops, which should be ready to deploy to the crisis region within five days. At the same time, retaliatory measures are being worked out in the West, which include the “most severe” packages of sanctions against Putin’s “entourage”, the Russian energy and banking sectors, disconnection from SWIFT, etc. In turn, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu announced a possible provocation in the Donbass with the use of chemical weapons. According to him, American private military companies are preparing it. This information was quickly confirmed in the separatist republics themselves, whose representatives even name the type of toxic substances. Whether this is true or not is not clear (Kiev and Washington naturally deny everything), but it already looks like a real casus belli, which again returns to the topic of the upcoming escalation in eastern Ukraine – and, perhaps, not only there. It is not surprising that the Moldovan leadership has expressed concern about the events unfolding in the region in recent days. Maya Sandu hoped that peaceful solutions would still be found, but urged to be prepared for “quite dramatic things”. And Speaker Igor Grosu recalled that Moldova is a neutral state, noting “I am somewhat surprised that Moldova can pose some kind of threat on the external military circuit,” and therefore any insinuations around the republic’s military potential are inappropriate. It’s funny how our leaders reacted when it has gotten really tough. Their fears are easy to understand. After all, the republic suddenly found itself among the targets in a potential conflict. The same Shoigu said that NATO is moving troops to the “eastern flank” and is involving Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia in military activity. That is, thanks to the efforts of our politicians, the republic found itself on the same shelf with countries that are obviously hostile to Russia. Now the same Grosu can talk as much as he likes about the impropriety of “insinuations”, but the fact is that it is the authorities who contribute to the ephemerality of Moldova’s neutral status, which, of course, no one is going to respect in such conditions. Moreover, it is naive to think that Moscow does not notice the constant unfriendly statements against its military and peacekeepers on the left bank, participation in all sorts of anti-Russian forums like the Crimean Platform, regular accusations against Moscow, as well as the intensifying cooperation with NATO. You cannot arrange direct military supplies from the United States and organize exercises with the Alliance and its members, and then wonder why you are considered in the same package with other unfriendly regimes. It is very disturbing that all this goes hand in hand with the aggravation of our Transnistrian conflict, again thanks to the efforts of the ruling party, which generally “turned off” communication with Tiraspol. Now the two banks are only exchanging accusations and threats through the media, giving the full impression that the situation will continue to deteriorate. The emphatically anti-Russian foreign policy of the new government, the escalation with Transnistria, Shoigu’s statements raise the question: have Western players decided to throw the map of Moldova into the big geopolitical game? And if a provocation is really being prepared in Donbass, then isn’t such a scenario prepared for our territory as well? Moreover, the small and isolated contingent in the Transnistrian region is an even more convenient target than Donbass, which is more or less prepared for war. And if so, how independent is our leadership in general to prevent these plans from happening – and does she want to interfere with them in principle. I think it is not necessary to say how dangerous direct participation in any mess in the Black Sea region can be for us. If someone thinks that “foreign countries will help us”, that’s not the case. Even now, speaking about the inevitability of a “Russian invasion”, the United States, NATO and the EU claim that they will not send their soldiers to Ukraine. Neither to us, I think. Especially memorable is the reaction of Romania in 2014, which, in fear of Moscow, hastened to declare that it would not help Moldova if anything happened. A good reason to think for those of our politicians who are making any important decisions these days. If there are any left in Chisinau.