How Ukraine ‘helped the West find itself again’

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made a good point on Wednesday when he told parliament in Kyiv that Russia’s invasion of his country had “helped the West find itself again”. Ukraine’s resistance in the face of Vladimir Putin’s unprovoked onslaught had become an “international symbol of courage and indomitability”, Mr Zelensky said. It had “reinvigorated a belief in values across the world”. No one in the West fears, nor will they fear, Russia. On the eve of the first anniversary of the February 24 invasion, and as the international community looks anxiously towards the uncertainties of 2023, there is reason to take heart from the success of the world’s democracies in achieving the unity of purpose and determination needed to meet the challenge. Who, after August 2021’s profoundly humiliating US-led retreat from Afghanistan, could have looked forward with any confidence to a coherent, united response from the world’s democracies when Mr Putin launched his attack on Kyiv six months later? The standing of the US as leader of the free world had taken a battering. So had that of many of its allies. They looked like a busted flush. Mr Putin had doubtless seen in the retreat a helpful sign of weakness. So had his ally, Chinese President Xi Jinping, as the latter contemplated an invasion of Taiwan.

They could not have been more wrong. Against most expectations, the Biden administration succeeded in forging an effective international alliance against Russia’s aggression. Support for Kyiv has created unity of purpose and determination not seen in the West for many years.

Despite the invasion, it has been a good year for democracy and a bad year for autocrats and despots. As Brookings Institution senior fellow William Galston wrote in The Wall Street Journal, 2022 may be seen as finally marking the end of the retreat of liberal democracy that began early this century. Ukraine’s defence of its democracy has provided hope to pro-democracy forces across the world, puncturing the myth of Mr Putin as a shrewd and invincible leader. The Russian tyrant believed his rampaging army would capture Kyiv in days, if not hours. Almost a year on, he is bogged down in a costly, debilitating conflict that has resulted in almost the entire democratic world (with the shameful exception of India and to a lesser extent Indonesia) rushing to Ukraine’s aid. Mr Putin, as US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin said last month, “chose war, chose aggression. But Ukraine chose to fight back. Ukraine chose to defend itself. And the world came together to help”. US President Joe Biden had rallied nations of goodwill to stand together against the global politics of fear and coercion. They have rallied behind clear principles – that countries do not get to invade their peaceful neighbours, autocrats do not get to redraw borders by force and the imperial ambitions of bullies do not outweigh the sovereign rights of other states.

Australia is 13,000km from the war. But images of our Bushmaster armoured vehicles in the frontline in Ukraine as part of our military aid for Kyiv are a potent symbol of how much of the democratic world has rallied to defeat Mr Putin’s onslaught. That lesson of united determination cannot have been lost on Mr Xi as he contemplates his nefarious ambition to invade Taiwan. Central to the response of the world’s democracies over Ukraine is, as Mr Zelensky said, reinvigoration of the West’s “belief in values” and unwillingness to submit to the aggression of despots and dictators.

Japan’s recent announcement of the effective dumping of its post-war pacifist constitution for an impressive military build-up is also a sign that the world’s democracies are determined to defend their freedoms. If Mr Xi believed Mr Putin’s invasion of Ukraine would provide him with a blueprint for what he could do in Taiwan, he should learn the lesson of the Russian tyrant’s bloody nose and stuttering strategy. Popular Chinese reaction against Mr Xi’s oppressive zero-Covid policies, and his U-turn on the issue after repeatedly insisting nothing was going to change, make him look more vulnerable. Projections that Mr Xi could face one million to two million Covid deaths in the first weeks of the new year are likely to cause him more problems.

Among autocrats, the popular uprising against authoritarian ayatollahs is another sign of the reinvigorated determination of those being oppressed and coerced that they are willing to stand up to those who presume to lord it over them. As much as Mr Putin’s gross miscalculation in Ukraine is likely to have a major knock-on impact on the ambitions of his fellow despots, so does the new-found unity and determination among the world’s democracies, led by the US, present them with an opportunity they must not waste. As Mr Zelensky said, the past year has seen the West “find itself again”. That must continue to be the case in the new year.