Russo-Ukrainian Crisis

[Szdfan]

This thread is also a place to discuss how various professing Christians (both individuals and churches) respond to a situation like this.

From what I've heard, the relationship between Russian and Ukrainian Christians, which has been in bad shape for years since the annexation of the Crimea is really, really bad now.

Are you referring to Orthodox Christians only, or others as well?

Others as well. There are two different Ukrainian Orthodox Churches -- There is the Orthodox Church of the Ukraine (whose metropolitan is in Kyiv) and Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate) that have been at bitter odds for decades. What I've heard is that relationships between non-orthodox Russian and Ukrainian Christians have tanked and are getting worse due to the political issues between the two countries.

[Josh]

Others as well. There are two different Ukrainian Orthodox Churches -- There is the Orthodox Church of the Ukraine (whose metropolitan is in Kyiv) and Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate) that have been at bitter odds for decades. What I've heard is that relationships between non-orthodox Russian and Ukrainian Christians have tanked and are getting worse due to the political issues between the two countries.

Is this somehow new? Internecine conflicts in Eastern Orthodoxy aligning with political boundaries are as old as Eastern Orthodoxy itself (and, indeed, are the reason Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism parted ways in 1054). An obvious example is the Eritrean - Ethiopian conflict, which has nothing at all do with Russians or Ukrainians (other than the Soviet Union funding any civil war they could get their hands on back in the 1980s).

[Ken]

It would be more accurate to say that NATO is amassing troops and weapons at the border with Russia, which is a very belligerent act. NATO promised a long time ago they wouldn't expand into Ukraine.

I read the other day that Russia is telling its people that NATO is preparing for an invasion of Russia with the goal of deposing Putin.

All I've heard from the U.S. press for the last 6 years is that Putin is an evil mastermind who stole an American election by electing Trump.

What exactly is NATO preparing for? Do they want to get into a hot war with Russia? Expanding NATO into Ukraine is an act of aggression. Russia, China, and their many other allies remain quite united that they don't want this.

NATO is not expanding into Ukraine. The only NATO states on Russia's border are the Baltic states of Lithuania, Estonia, and Latvia who requested membership in NATO of their own free will after decades of Soviet occupation. There are no other NATO states that border Russia.

Threatening to invade Ukraine is a funny way for Russia to show the world that NATO membership is unnecessary. If anything it demonstrates the exact opposite. And for that matter, Russia is also showing the world that it's word is not worth the paper it is printed on. In 1994 Russia signed the Budapest Memorandum which guaranteed Ukraine's territorial integrity in exchange for nuclear disarmament. At that time Ukraine had the world's third largest nuclear stockpile. Since then Russia has violated that agreement twice, first in Donbas and later in Crimea. And is now threatening to do it a third time.

What really threatens Putin is not NATO but the prospect of a successful independent democratic nation on its border. Putin would much rather be surrounded by autocratic undemocratic regimes like Lukashenko's Belarus lest the Russian people start getting their own ideas. In Ukraine he is basically trying to roll back the 2004 popular "Orange Revolution" that ejected the Russian-backed dictator Yanukovych from power. But I'm not sure that threatening a 1968-style invasion of Czechoslovakia in Ukraine to restore a Russian puppet government is going to win him the support of the Ukrainian people.

[Szdfan]

From what I've heard, the relationship between Russian and Ukrainian Christians, which has been in bad shape for years since the annexation of the Crimea is really, really bad now.

This sounds like state-sponsored propaganda. Is the relationship somehow worse than it used to be?

So...I heard it from my Dad who might be many things but isn't state-sponsored propaganda. Prior to retirement, he worked for the Russian Evangelical Alliance (which is Baptist) and has frequently reported as a journalist on churches in Central and Eastern Europe. He currently lives in Kaliningrad and is still active in Baptist issues. He recently became a dual US-Russian citizen and I received an email this morning that he's in Minsk right now.

Here's a blog post he wrote about the current crisis:
https://www.wyoder.de/2022/01/18/regard ... n-ukraine/

My Dad is pro-Russia. If he was state-sponsored propaganda, he'd be Russian state-sponsored propaganda. I don't agree with him about everything.

After the annexation of the Crimea by Russia and the beginning of the Donbas War, my Dad expressed shock at the anger and enmity that Ukrainian Protestants and evangelicals felt towards Russia.

I mean, are you telling me that it's in worse shape than, say, the situation with Christianity in the U.S.S.R. was in the 1980s?

I'm talking about the relationships between Christians, not between Christians and the state. The situation for non-Orthodox Christians is not as bad as it was in the USSR in the 1980's, but they are still the subject of low-grade persecution through anti-evangelism laws and legal restrictions. It's the kind of stuff that you'd be calling out as persecution if it was happening in the US.

[Neto]

Ukraine is a sovereign nation, and should have the choice to affiliate with what ever international organization they want. A hundred years is a long time, but memories of the Soviet-induced famine (the holodomor, under Stalin) in what is now Ukraine will not go away easily, especially with the recent and current Russian military aggression. Some years ago (perhaps around 15 - 17 years back) I met a Ukrainian businessman, and I told him that we (my people) had received an invitation to come back there, as refugees who had fled. He said (incredulously) "Why would anyone want to go back there?!", then preceded to tell me that no (ethnic) Ukrainians will ever trust Russia. The odd part about all of this is that in some ways, Russia is the only non-Muslim country that appears to be attempting to maintain any sort of moral society.

[barnhart]

This is a thread to discuss the situation of Russian troops amassing at the border with Ukraine, as well as the response of Ukraine and NATO.
...
This thread is also a place to discuss how various professing Christians (both individuals and churches) respond to a situation like this.

It might be helpful to think of this conflict in terms of the collapse of the Soviet Union. At that time there were promises about the West (NATO) not expanding into the Soviet Bloc nations, this has been widely ignored and so Russia feels they have been wronged. The strategy they are persuing is in some ways similar to the response of the US to the formation of Soviet friendly states in the Americas, sort of a "not in my back yard" policy.

Responses:
1. This likely a good time to judge your feelings towards someone else's nationalism. What would you wish the response of the Russian church to be? How does that compare to the response of the American church in the 70's, 80's, 90's 2000's? We don't often get a chance to be on the other side of nationalist aggression, don't waste the opportunity to learn.
2. Start praying, dreaming and planning how to support the inevitable victims on both sides.

[Ken]

It might be helpful to think of this conflict in terms of the collapse of the Soviet Union. At that time there were promises about the West (NATO) not expanding into the Soviet Bloc nations, this has been widely ignored and so Russia feels they have been wronged.

This is certainly the current revisionist Russian propaganda but that doesn't make it true.

There have never been any written agreements of any kind in which the west promised not to expand NATO eastward. None at all. And Soviet leaders at the time also admit that there were never any informal agreements either: https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front ... v-says-no/

Whether it was geopolitically prudent to expand NATO eastward is a different topic. But there was no promise from the west not to do so.

[Karstan78]

Male members in our churches are preparing to be conscripted. A bit back they started and things cooled down, now tensions are peaking and the members are worried about the hardships coming for those believing non-resistance and if they even offer those positions.
I don’t know much else, just the European churches are trying to help where we can.

[Szdfan]

It might be helpful to think of this conflict in terms of the collapse of the Soviet Union. At that time there were promises about the West (NATO) not expanding into the Soviet Bloc nations, this has been widely ignored and so Russia feels they have been wronged.

This is certainly the current revisionist Russian propaganda but that doesn't make it true.

There have never been any written agreements of any kind in which the west promised not to expand NATO eastward. None at all. And Soviet leaders at the time also admit that there were never any informal agreements either: https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front ... v-says-no/

Whether it was geopolitically prudent to expand NATO eastward is a different topic. But there was no promise from the west not to do so.

There do appear to have been verbal assurances.

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/l ... story.html

Leaders in Moscow, however, tell a different story. For them, Russia is the aggrieved party. They claim the United States has failed to uphold a promise that NATO would not expand into Eastern Europe, a deal made during the 1990 negotiations between the West and the Soviet Union over German unification. In this view, Russia is being forced to forestall NATO’s eastward march as a matter of self-defense.

The West has vigorously protested that no such deal was ever struck. However, hundreds of memos, meeting minutes and transcripts from U.S. archives indicate otherwise. Although what the documents reveal isn’t enough to make Putin a saint, it suggests that the diagnosis of Russian predation isn’t entirely fair. Europe’s stability may depend just as much on the West’s willingness to reassure Russia about NATO’s limits as on deterring Moscow’s adventurism.

After the Berlin Wall fell, Europe’s regional order hinged on the question of whether a reunified Germany would be aligned with the United States (and NATO), the Soviet Union (and the Warsaw Pact) or neither. Policymakers in the George H.W. Bush administration decided in early 1990 that NATO should include the reconstituted German republic.

In early February 1990, U.S. leaders made the Soviets an offer. According to transcripts of meetings in Moscow on Feb. 9, then-Secretary of State James Baker suggested that in exchange for cooperation on Germany, U.S. could make “iron-clad guarantees” that NATO would not expand “one inch eastward.” Less than a week later, Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev agreed to begin reunification talks. No formal deal was struck, but from all the evidence, the quid pro quo was clear: Gorbachev acceded to Germany’s western alignment and the U.S. would limit NATO’s expansion.

Nevertheless, great powers rarely tie their own hands. In internal memorandums and notes, U.S. policymakers soon realized that ruling out NATO’s expansion might not be in the best interests of the United States. By late February, Bush and his advisers had decided to leave the door open.

Regardless of whether it's true or not, it's a huge part of the Russian motivation.

[Ken]

It might be helpful to think of this conflict in terms of the collapse of the Soviet Union. At that time there were promises about the West (NATO) not expanding into the Soviet Bloc nations, this has been widely ignored and so Russia feels they have been wronged.

This is certainly the current revisionist Russian propaganda but that doesn't make it true.

There have never been any written agreements of any kind in which the west promised not to expand NATO eastward. None at all. And Soviet leaders at the time also admit that there were never any informal agreements either: https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front ... v-says-no/

Whether it was geopolitically prudent to expand NATO eastward is a different topic. But there was no promise from the west not to do so.

There do appear to have been verbal assurances.

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/l ... story.html

Leaders in Moscow, however, tell a different story. For them, Russia is the aggrieved party. They claim the United States has failed to uphold a promise that NATO would not expand into Eastern Europe, a deal made during the 1990 negotiations between the West and the Soviet Union over German unification. In this view, Russia is being forced to forestall NATO’s eastward march as a matter of self-defense.

The West has vigorously protested that no such deal was ever struck. However, hundreds of memos, meeting minutes and transcripts from U.S. archives indicate otherwise. Although what the documents reveal isn’t enough to make Putin a saint, it suggests that the diagnosis of Russian predation isn’t entirely fair. Europe’s stability may depend just as much on the West’s willingness to reassure Russia about NATO’s limits as on deterring Moscow’s adventurism.

After the Berlin Wall fell, Europe’s regional order hinged on the question of whether a reunified Germany would be aligned with the United States (and NATO), the Soviet Union (and the Warsaw Pact) or neither. Policymakers in the George H.W. Bush administration decided in early 1990 that NATO should include the reconstituted German republic.

In early February 1990, U.S. leaders made the Soviets an offer. According to transcripts of meetings in Moscow on Feb. 9, then-Secretary of State James Baker suggested that in exchange for cooperation on Germany, U.S. could make “iron-clad guarantees” that NATO would not expand “one inch eastward.” Less than a week later, Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev agreed to begin reunification talks. No formal deal was struck, but from all the evidence, the quid pro quo was clear: Gorbachev acceded to Germany’s western alignment and the U.S. would limit NATO’s expansion.

Nevertheless, great powers rarely tie their own hands. In internal memorandums and notes, U.S. policymakers soon realized that ruling out NATO’s expansion might not be in the best interests of the United States. By late February, Bush and his advisers had decided to leave the door open.

Regardless of whether it's true or not, it's a huge part of the Russian motivation.

The Brookings article I cited upstream quotes Gorbachev directly stating that this is not true and that there was no promise from James Baker or anyone else not to expand NATO generally. He notes that the discussion was about the resolution of Germany and that the discussion and promise was about expanding NATO installations into the former East Germany and that is an agreement that NATO has upheld. There were no new NATO bases built in the former East Germany.

Clearly Putin is trying to roll back the clock. That is what this is all about. Perhaps it was imprudent and provocative for NATO to expand eastward. I don't really know and those are all independent countries that are free to enter into their own alliances as they see fit. But there was never any formal agreement not to do so. And I don't think anyone can make a serious argument that Russia would have been less expansionist over the past few decades if NATO hadn't expanded. They might well have been more expansionist and aggressive toward former Warsaw Pact countries had NATO not expanded.

By contrast, there was indeed a formal agreement entered into by Russia in 1994 that promised to uphold Ukrainian independence and territorial integrity in exchange for nuclear disarmament. An agreement it has violated twice since 1994 and is threating to do so a third time today.