Ukraine's Foreign and Security Policy 1991-2000

Roman Wolczuk

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2002
• eBook ISBN: 9781135786397
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: 20th Century History
• Index: History

This book analyses Ukraine's relations with each of its neighbours in its first decade of independence. It examines the degree to which these relations fitted into Ukraine's broad objective of reorienting its key political ties from East to West, and assesses the extent to which Ukraine succeeded in achieving this reorientation. It shows how in the early days of independence Ukraine fought off threats from Russia and Romania to its territorial integrity, and how it made progress in establishing good relations with its western neighbours as a means of moving closer toward Central European sub-regional and European regional organisations. It also shows how the sheer breadth and depth of its economic and military ties to Russia dwarfed Ukraine's relations with all other neighbours, resulting in a foreign and security policy which attempted to counterbalance the competing forces of East and West.

Part I
Regionalism and Ukraine’s foreign and security policy

1 A theoretical context

Independent Ukraine has variously been referred to as a pivot or keystone.¹ A pivot refers to a bearing on which something oscillates or turns. A keystone is the central, stress-bearing stone or crown at the very peak of an arch that locks the remaining parts of the arch into place. The common theme therefore is that of load- bearing centrality: the importance of the pivot lies in the central location of the support it provides to the whole and on which the balance of the whole depends; the centrality of the keystone is critical to the very existence of the structure of which it is an integral part. Without a pivot, no oscillation takes place, turning becomes impossible; with the removal of the keystone, the arch collapses. To refer to Ukraine, then, as a pivot or a keystone is to confer a rare honour: Ukraine is seemingly the pivot on which the European continent ‘revolves’; it is the keystone that locks the remaining members of the European geographical arch into place. Ukraine is thus seen as a central and even critical feature in the European security structure: if at the end of the twentieth century ‘geography and geopolitics still matter’, Ukraine’s geography and geopolitics seem to matter more than most, at least on the European continent.²

Up to a point, it is self-evident that the emergence of any new nation-state in Europe was going to be an event of no small significance. However, Ukraine was not just ‘any’ nation-state. First, Ukraine is one of the largest states in Europe at 603,700 square kilometres. Second, it is one of Europe’s most populous states with over 50 million citizens. Third, on independence, Ukraine was, after Russia, Europe’s most powerful state, in the sense that it possessed (if not actually controlled) the third largest nuclear arsenal in the world; even after denuclearisation, its military might remains formidable. Finally, it is probably Europe’s most well-endowed state in terms of resources, possessing an estimated 5 per cent of total world mineral resources.³ To paraphrase the second president of Ukraine, Leonid Kuchma, Ukraine is no Switzerland. These four features, in conjunction with the fact that Ukraine is located in what is historically a volatile part of a geopolitically critical region, between ‘East and West’, or between Europe and Eurasia, or even between Germany and Russia, help contextualise the importance of Ukraine’s independence in 1991.⁴ This is because geography remains important as ‘geography defines the players (which are territorially organised states or would like to be), frequently defines the stakes for which players contend and always defines the terms in which they measure security relative to others’.⁵ If so, the emergence of an independent Ukraine not only redefined the geography of the region it also introduced new stakes into the reckoning and fundamentally challenged the hitherto long-established regional security norms.⁶ The upset of such norms is problematic at the best of times; it is especially problematic ‘when states are surrounded, or are bordered by states with historical grudges or by states that have previously used their power against weaker states’.⁷ Independent Ukraine was such a bordered state.

However, beyond mere geography, the measures adopted by Kyiv to integrate with Western institutions following independence in 1991 reflected the continuation of an evolving phenomenon, namely the emerging salience of regions in general and the Central and East European states in particular in international politics.⁸ If it is true to suggest that the end of the Cold War contributed to the newfound prominence of Central and Eastern Europe, the diminished stature of Russia and the reduced inclination of the US to intervene in regional conflicts suggest that the end of Cold War hostilities opened up hitherto unexpected possibilities for regional co-operation. With the irrevocable breakdown of bipolarity, it has been suggested by Richard Rosecrance that ‘autonomy has been restored to the separate regions of the world’.⁹

This book will argue that because of the restoration of this autonomy, Ukraine consistently pursued a policy of responding to the security threats that emanated from this context by attempting to integrate with or avoid integrating with regional security complexes (RSC). In particular, the book argues that Ukraine sought to integrate with RSCs along the Western azimuth and avoided integrating with RSCs along the North-eastern azimuth. Furthermore, Ukraine’s objective of integration along the Western azimuth was pursued in conjunction with the pursuit of a special relationship with Russia and highly circumscribed relations with the CIS along the North-eastern azimuth. The book will further argue that participation in RSCs along the Southern azimuth was pursued insofar as they facilitated the achievement of the previous two objectives.¹⁰ It is further hypothesised that Ukraine achieved a degree of success in preserving its security and enlarging its freedom of manoeuvre by integrating or avoiding integration with RSCs, bearing in mind the numerous internal and external obstacles it faced.

Buzan defines a security complex as a ‘group of states whose primary security concerns link together sufficiently closely that their national securities cannot realistically be considered apart from one another’.¹¹ In addition to the security interdependence between member states that the conception of RSCs implies, geographical propinquity and an autonomous existence apart from the global system are also deemed characteristics of RSCs. In a considerable refinement of the conception of RSCs, Lake introduces the notion of externalities to address what are seen as flaws in the conception of RSCs, namely their inability to sufficiently distinguish between regional- and global-level interaction.¹² Externalities are benefits (positive externalities) and costs (negative externalities) that are conferred on actors other than those that are the sources of such externalities and thus help delineate more precisely the parameters of that which may be defined as an RSC.

This book identifies three geographically based RSCs in which Ukraine participates, although other conceptualisations exist.¹³ These three azimuthial RSCs are the North-eastern, Western and Southern.

The role of Ukraine along each azimuth will be analysed on two levels. First, it will be examined in terms of Ukraine’s regional bilateral relations with a particular neighbour along a given azimuth, or within a given RSC. Second, it will be assessed in terms of Ukraine’s relations with subregional and regional institutions along a given azimuth, or within a given RSC. In pursuit of analytic clarity and academic utility an institutional definition of the terms ‘regional’ and ‘subregional’ will be utilised.¹⁴

As far as the term ‘regional’ is concerned, it has been pointed out that ‘Europe is now defined by the membership of different clubs. Today you are what you belong to. We are no longer governed by history or geography, but by institutions’.¹⁵ These different ‘clubs’ or institutions have different objectives and geographical scope. For example, the EU and NATO are clearly within the European/transatlantic geographical area, something that the CIS, in the widest geographical sense, is not. Yet clearly, in terms of geographical scope, they are all regional institutions, adequately satisfying the criteria of’regionship’ referred to above. Furthermore, their functions and objectives affect or impact upon the fundamentals of individual states - security, defence and sovereignty. Integration with institutions such as the EU, NATO and the CIS profoundly affects the most fundamental aspects of the character of the member states. This distinguishes these regional institutions from other ostensibly regional institutions such as the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the Council of Europe. The functional scope of the latter two is notably less intrusive (statehood is not encroached upon to anything like the same extent as occurs in the case of membership of the EU or CIS) and the criteria for membership are notably less stringent and hence less discriminating.¹⁶

Subregional institutions, in the area covered by this book, turn out to be institutions whose members have either the explicit or implicit goal of membership or avoidance of membership of the regional institution of the geographical area within which the subregional institution finds itself. Thus, CEFTA and the Visegrad group (originally made up of Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic) were patently subsets of the NATO/EU region, drawn as they were to the West from the earliest days of the collapse of the Soviet Union. In addition, CEFTA and Visegrad had as a functional goal membership of the EU for its member states. Similarly, the BSEC and the informal GUUAM are subregional formations in that they function in the shadow of the regional institutions (i.e. the CIS), and have as a functional objective the intention to impact either positively or negatively on the regional institution. Thus the BSEC, formed under the leadership of Ankara, was designed to facilitate Turkey’s chances of integrating with the EU. It is for this same reason that Ukraine is an enthusiastic supporter and participant in the institution. GUUAM, on the other hand, has had as one of its explicit goals the transportation of Caspian oil by its member states beyond Russian control. Kyiv hoped to facilitate its chances of membership of the European Union by becoming part of the energy transportation system taking Caspian oil westward. It was also hoped that the emergence of GUUAM would inhibit Kyiv’s further integration into the CIS to the extent that GUUAM actively contributed to the unravelling of certain aspects of the CIS.

Defining the proposed Slavic Union as subregional is somewhat more problematic in light of the sheer size and importance of Russia, one of its constituent states. However, if it were ever to emerge, a Slavic Union would be distinctly subregional in the sense that its main proponents see it very much as forming a core within the CIS. As such, the Slavic Union has always been envisaged as an albeit important subset of the CIS.

In sum, three azimuths will be examined, along which are found three RSCs, each of which will be analysed on two levels:

The North-eastern azimuth/RSC:

• bilateral relations with Russia and Belarus
• subregional level – Slavic Union regional level – relations/membership of the CIS

The Western azimuth/RSC:

• bilateral relations with Poland, Hungary, Slovakia (and formerly Czechoslovakia), Romania and Moldova
• subregional level - relations with CEFTA, the Visegrad group regional level - relations with the EU, NATO

The Southern azimuth/RSC:

• bilateral relations with the Black Sea littoral states: Russia, Georgia, Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania
• subregional level - relations with the BSEC, GUUAM regional level - relations with the EU, NATO, CIS

Ukraine was motivated by externalities on the bilateral and regional levels. On the bilateral level, Ukraine was reluctant to renew Soviet-era military, political and economic ties with Russia. Thus Kyiv sought a special, but circumscribed relationship with Moscow. Above all, however, Kyiv was focused on avoiding deep integration with the CIS, a negative non-security externality to the extent that it was seen in Kyiv as synonymous with continued industrial ossification. Such integration was likely to be accompanied by risks to Ukraine’s independence and sovereignty, a clear negative security externality.

Conversely, along the Western azimuth, Ukraine was motivated by the positive security and non-security externalities that would accrue from harmonious bilateral ties with CEES and, eventually, from ties with Western subregional and regional institutional structures.

The Southern azimuth bridges the two above-mentioned azimuths. On the one hand, Ukraine was driven by the positive non-security externality that might accrue if Ukraine were to be involved in the transportation of Caspian energy, a prerequisite of which were strong ties with ‘key’ Black Sea states. The institutionalisation of these ties in Southern subregional institutional structures, such as the BSEC and GUUAM, was one of the means with which Ukraine hoped to attain goals along this azimuth. The Southern azimuth was important for two other reasons. First, these subregional goals might facilitate the attainment of regional goals along the Western azimuth, namely membership of the EU. Second, Kyiv hoped that membership of subregional institutions along the Southern azimuth might inhibit Ukraine’s deeper integration along the North-eastern azimuth.

In sum, each of the two levels of analysis identified above, namely Ukraine’s bilateral ties with neighbours, and relations with subregional and regional institutions, will be examined in order to assess the extent to which Ukraine achieved regional goals along the North-eastern, Western and Southern azimuths.

Regional orders

In order to measure ‘success’ or ‘failure’ within a given RSC, an assessment will be made of the extent to which Ukraine influenced the dominant pattern of security management, or regional orders, along each of the azimuths. There are five forms of regional orders which can be placed in a hierarchy of ideal types requiring increasing levels of co-operation with regional neighbours: power-restraining power, concert, collective security, pluralistic security community and, finally, integration.¹⁷

Power-restraining power refers to the classic pursuit of security through the achievement of balance of power. In an RSC where security is primarily pursued via balance of power, stability is sought in either a unipolar/hegemonic (hegemonic stability theory), bipolar or multipolar regional order. With the collapse ofbipolarity on the European continent, and the instability that has ensued, a new regional order has been sought by the CEES. CEES are unambiguous as to what sort of order they desire:

in Eastern Europe there is a strong reluctance to trust other forms of security management in view of Russia’s past behaviour and uncertainties about its political future. Poland, the Baltic states, and others have been eager to join NATO as an alliance against Russia, seeking security in a traditional power- balancing way [italics in original].¹⁸

All available evidence suggests that such an unambiguous choice was not available to Ukraine if Kyiv was to avoid the wrath of Russia: Moscow would never countenance Kyiv’s membership of an alliance against it.

Hegemonic stability theory predicts that a hegemon will establish order or pursue security in a given region by dominating or exploiting smaller states. However, Ukraine’s gravitation towards the Russian pole, as predicted by the hegemonic stability theory, was not an appealing option to Kyiv, as the benefits to Ukraine of order or security presented by hegemonic stability were outbalanced by the fact that domination or exploitation by the hegemon threatened its independence.

A concert refers to regional great powers adopting collective responsibility within a regional security complex. While concerts primarily benefit the most powerful states of the concert, the stability that ensues benefits the ‘lesser’ parties of the region. However, by virtue of the fact that great powers allow for each other’s ‘vital influence’ in a region, concerts are perceived by the ‘subjects’ of the concert to have negative ramifications. In the European theatre, for example, Ukraine reacted with abhorrence to the Russian offer for such a concert in its ‘near abroad’ when in February 1993 Yeltsin argued that ‘the moment has arrived for authoritative international organisations, including the United Nations, to grant Russia special powers as the guarantor of peace and stability in this [i.e. the former Soviet Union] region’.¹⁹ In technical terms, as will be argued, the negative externality of the risk posed to Ukraine’s sovereignty and independence by such an offer was too great for Kyiv to countenance.

The collective security approach is a more inclusive alternative to a great power concert. By reducing the prerogative of the great powers to manage regional security, regional powers seek to influence regional decisions. Such powers agree to abstain from the use of force in resolving differences, and instead revert to collective responses to rule out violations by an aggressor against a victim.²⁰ The common interests which motivate such co-operation inclu...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Tables
• Acronyms
• Introduction
• Part I: Regionalism and Ukraine’s foreign and security policy
• Part II: The North-eastern azimuth
• Part III: The Western azimuth
• Part IV: The Southern azimuth
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Specialised texts on Ukraine’s International Relations - non-English language sources