Ukraine and Russia are two countries that border each other in Eastern Europe. On Feb. 24, 2022, Russia sent its army into Ukraine and began trying to take over the country by force.
This invasion surprised many people, as it was the first major war in Europe for decades. But Russia and Ukraine have had a difficult relationship for centuries. To understand what’s happening now, you have to dig into 1,300 years of history.
Both countries trace their beginnings to the same medieval kingdom, called Kyivan Rus.
It was founded in the 800s by a group of Vikings, the Varangians, who came from Northern Europe to rule over the local people. Kyivan Rus spanned what is now Russia and Ukraine, and its people, the Slavs, are the ancestors of today’s Russians and Ukrainians.
Its capital was the city of Kyiv – the same Kyiv that is now the capital of Ukraine. Moscow, capital of today’s Russia, was also part of Kyivan Rus.
Kyivan Rus was conquered by Mongol armies from Asia in 1240 and split up. Kyiv became part of a new commonwealth that spanned today’s Poland and Ukraine. Moscow became a local capital of the Mongol Empire. Both Moscow and Kyiv were at the crossroads between Europe and Asia, but with different cultures based on their geography.
Imperial Russia and the Soviet Union
In the 1500s, descendants of the Kyivan Rus’ princes in Moscow formed an empire of their own, imperial Russia. By 1654, it included Kyiv and its Ukrainian peoples, along with other lands and people from Europe and Asia.
In imperial Russia, some saw Ukrainians as brothers to the Russians because they shared a culture dating back to medieval times.
But Ukrainians said that while both groups practiced the same religion and shared some history, Ukrainian culture – such as its food, language, art and music – was different. It was shaped by contact with different peoples and a history different from Russia’s.
A revolution in February 1917 forced Russia’s leader, Czar Nicholas II, from the throne. Another revolution that same year created a new empire called the Soviet Union.
Some Ukrainians didn’t want to join the new Soviet empire. They tried to form their own country. But the Soviets defeated their movement and created the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic instead – one of a number of republics that made up the union.
At first, it allowed Ukrainians to keep their culture and run their local government. But when the Soviets began to fear that Ukrainians wanted independence, they took their power away.
A free Ukraine
In 1991, the Soviet Union collapsed. Ukraine and Russia, which both had been part of the Soviet Union, became independent countries.
Fast-forward to 2013. Ukraine’s president, Viktor Yanukovych, wanted Ukraine to be loyal to Russia. So he decided not to sign a trade agreement to bring Ukraine closer to Europe. Ukrainians protested, kicked Yanukovych out of office, and elected a government that favored Europe rather than Russia.
Perhaps the biggest question behind the current crisis in Ukraine is this: What is Vladimir Putin thinking?
The Russian president’s decision to deploy large numbers of troops to eastern Ukraine has already triggered new Western sanctions on Russia. A full invasion could lead to land warfare on a scale Europe hasn’t seen since World War II, a bloody and devastating conflict for Russians and Ukrainians alike. What could justify even threatening that?
Putin’s clearest answer yet came in a speech delivered on Monday. He believes that Ukraine is an illegitimate country that exists on land that’s historically and rightfully Russian: “Ukraine actually never had stable traditions of real statehood,” as he puts it.
The overtures to the West from the current government of Ukraine are an attempt to stand up to this false regime, as is its antagonistic stance toward Moscow. This combination — an anti-Russian regime in what Putin views as rightfully Russian territory populated by rightfully Russian people — is unacceptable to him.
“Ukraine might have remained a sovereign state so long as it had a pro-Putin government,” says Seva Gunitsky, a political scientist at the University of Toronto who studies Russia. “Reuniting the lands formally would probably not have been at the forefront of the agenda if Putin felt he had enough political support from the Ukrainian regime.”
Putin’s basic claim — that there is no historical Ukrainian nation worthy of present-day sovereignty — is demonstrably false. However, this does not mean Putin is lying: In fact, Russia experts generally saw his speech as an expression of his real beliefs.
The speech is consistent with a body of statements from the Russian president going back years, ranging from a 5,000-word essay on Ukrainian history published last year to a 2005 speech declaring that “the collapse of the Soviet Union was a major geopolitical disaster [in which] tens of millions of our co-citizens and compatriots found themselves outside Russian territory.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that despite these protests, most Ukrainians wanted ties with Russia. He also worried that Ukraine would join a military alliance with the U.S. and Europe that would be a threat to Russia.
In 2014, Russia took over an area in southern Ukraine called Crimea. It also sent soldiers and weapons to eastern Ukraine, claiming to be helping people who wanted to be part of Russia. In the eight years since then, about 14,000 people have died, and 1 million people have fled to escape the fighting.
The current war
In February 2022, Putin again claimed that Ukrainians and Russians are one people. He sees Ukrainians and Russians as brother nations and says that because Russia is the older brother, it should get to be in charge.
Most Ukrainians disagree. They have been inspired by the words of their president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. He told Putin that Ukrainians want peace, but that if they need to, they will defend their country’s independence.
Putin invaded, and this time his plan is to take over the entire country. Ukrainians are now fighting the Russian army, trying to defeat what they say is an occupation.
In Russia, the people had no say about whether to invade. Many are protesting against it. Many families have both Russian and Ukrainians members. Because of this, a lot of people on both sides of the border do not want to fight a war against each other.
The United States and much of Europe are on the side of Ukrainians. They believe Ukraine should be able to decide its own future.
Putin’s attempt to redraw the map of Europe risks becoming the most devastating conflict on the continent since World War II. Already, it is causing an astounding humanitarian crisis: Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of civilians have died, and more than 1.5 million people have fled the violence so far, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, making it the fastest-growing refugee crisis in Europe since World War II.
The battle for Ukraine began in the early morning hours, local time, on February 24, when Russian President Vladimir Putin launched what he called a “special military operation” into the country of about 40 million. He claimed the Russian military seeks “demilitarization and denazification” but not occupation; attacks shortly followed from multiple fronts and targeted toward multiple cities.
Ukraine’s resistance has complicated Russia’s efforts to seize the country. Russian forces have not made the progress they likely thought they would at the start of the campaign. The Russian military’s early strategy has perplexed some experts and observers. But the more protracted this war becomes, the more catastrophic it will be.
The United States and its allies in Europe and the United Kingdom imposed the toughest financial sanctions ever on Russia after the first incursion, and have only built on these penalties since.
On February 26, the United States and European countries agreed to block some Russian banks from SWIFT, a global messaging system, which will essentially prevent those institutions from doing any global transactions, a punishment that allies had previously hesitated to pursue. Already, Russia’s economy is reeling from the impact of these penalties.
This sustained international pressure, and Ukraine’s resistance, may still not be enough to force Russia to end its military campaign. That leaves Ukraine — and the world — in a perilous and unpredictable moment.
Ukraine is under siege
After months of Putin building up tens of thousands of troops near the Ukrainian border and a series of failed diplomatic talks, Russia is now waging a full-out war on Ukraine.
Tensions escalated quickly when, on February 21, Putin delivered an hour-long combative speech that essentially denied Ukrainian statehood.
He recognized the independence of two breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine where Moscow has backed a separatist rebellion since 2014 and sent so-called peacekeeping forces into the region.
As experts said, that was likely just the beginning, setting the stage for a much larger conflict.
Days later, that larger conflict materialized. On February 24, Putin announced he was launching an assault “to defend people who for eight years are suffering persecution and genocide by the Kyiv regime,” a reference to a false claim about the government in Ukraine. He demanded Ukraine lay down its weapons or be “responsible for bloodshed.”
Soon after Putin’s speech, reports emerged of explosions around cities, including Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine and the capital Kyiv. The Ukrainian foreign minister called it “a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.”
By the afternoon in Ukraine, Russian troops and tanks had entered the country on three fronts: from Belarus in the north, from the east of Ukraine, and from the south.
The Russian military has targeted critical infrastructure, like airports, with airstrikes and has launched more than 400 missiles, as of March 1.
As a senior US defense official said on February 26, “There’s no doubt in our mind that civilian infrastructure and civilian areas are being hit as a result of these barrages.”
The main battlefronts are in Kyiv’s outskirts; in southern Ukraine, including the major city of Mariupol; and in eastern Ukraine around Kharkiv, the country’s second-largest city.
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