EU responds to Russian invasion of Ukraine with critical

Circled around Timothy Hazen, assistant professor of political science, members of the Elmhurst University community asked questions about Ukraine and Russia in the Frick Center on March 2.

The gathering was an attempt by EU to provide understanding about the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which began in late February. 

“What is the next level of sanctions?” asked one spectator. 

“Can this war expand?” asked another. 

While Hazen did his best to lay out each detail of the crisis, the world has remained confused about what exactly is going on in Ukraine.

The crisis then escalated when, on Feb. 27, Russian President Vladimir Putin put his nuclear forces on high alert.

“There’s this hope of human behavior, of human psychology, and also of history that he [Vladimir Putin] would not go so far [as to use nuclear weapons] because that is what we feared for the last 70 plus years,” Hazen told The Leader. “However, many people didn’t think he would invade in the first place.” 

“And I think it’s very very very unlikely, if I had to bet,” said Hazen. “I’m still resting easily at night, I don’t think that this will take place. But, that has certainly been challenged like that has never been challenged in a very long time.”

The world has turned against Putin, however. Along with citizens of his own country who have illegally protested the invasion, numerous countries, including the U.K. and the U.S., have placed historic level sanctions against the country and Putin himself. 

There has also been a historic break of Switzerland’s 500 years of neutrality, siding against Russia.

Hazen, from his understanding, said (albeit with some uncertainty) that these sanctions are some of the hardest that have been delivered. 

According to the BBC, some of the sanctions being placed on Russia include freezing Russian assets in their central bank and banning individuals from doing deals with the Russian central bank. These sanctions are considered to be “economy crippling” by some standards. Yet, Putin has continued forward.

“The political science literature was rather mixed on whether sanctions work or not. There’s a camp that says ‘yes they do work,’ there’s a camp that says ‘no they do not work.’ So there’s no clear answer from the political science literature,” said Hazen. “However, something that is different about these sanctions is, a couple things, I would say the depth and the breadth of the sanctions.”

While time will tell the specific effects of the sanctions being enforced against Russia, it is clear that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is unpopular in many nations.

“My thoughts about Ukraine and Russia is [it’s] pretty bad. I don’t think there’s any reason to do it [invade Ukraine],” said EU student Brandon Cipolla. “I think Russia was just afraid of NATO being closer to them, but I think Russia could have done something more peacefully, like diplomatic relations type of thing, instead of doing airstrikes on innocent civilians.”

As many around the U.S. advocate for Ukraine during this invasion, EU Chaplain H. Scott Matheney told The Leader that anyone who wants to help Ukraine should email him.