At an international forum in Novgorod, Professor Fen Yu Shun of Shanghai's Fudan University openly stated that, in his opinion, the invasion of Ukraine is destined to end in a fiasco for Russia. “Moscow wants to destabilize the world order through forceful actions, Beijing wants to put it back together.”
Moscow () – At the meeting in Russia of the Valdaj International Debating Club of Novgorod, a speech by Fen Yu Shun, professor at Peking University and director of the research center on Russia and Central Asia at Fudan University in Moscow, caused a stir. Shanghai. According to him, Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine is destined to end in fiasco for several reasons.
Firstly, he highlighted the high level of opposition and national unity shown by Ukrainians, and how this has translated into great international support, which despite the weakening of recent months remains a substantial factor. The third factor highlighted by the expert is the particular character of contemporary war, which depends on the conjunction of industrial power and the system of military command, control, communications and intelligence.
According to Yu Shun, Russia faces many difficulties in controlling Ukraine's response actions, mainly due to the deficiency of industrial and technological production, which was not adequately restored after the end of the Soviet Union and was too dependent on imports of West.
Another factor of special importance refers to information: Putin has found himself in a dead end in this sense, due to his excessive repression and the crystallization of the dictatorial system. The Kremlin lacks reliable sources of information collection and relies on ineffective error correction mechanisms.
For these reasons, according to the Chinese professor, Russia inevitably faces defeat, and sooner or later will be forced to withdraw its troops from all occupied territories in Ukraine, including Crimea. Victory is also not guaranteed by atomic potential, and as an example he cited the withdrawal of US troops, equally well-equipped with nuclear weapons, from Korea, Vietnam and Afghanistan.
The war in Ukraine was a defining moment in Russia's recent history, as Yu Shun also writes in an article in The Economist, which forced Putin's regime into international isolation and created fertile ground for “every possible black swan.” that is, for all types of unpredictable catastrophes. The Moscow regime has already had to start counting with several of them, as it did with the Wagner company uprising, the numerous interethnic tensions and the recent Isis-K attack against the Krokus City Hall.
Furthermore, the Ukrainian conflict is convincing almost all former USSR republics in Europe and Asia, with the sole exception of Belarus, that Russia's imperial ambitions threaten their independence and territorial integrity. They, too, are convinced of the impossibility of Russian victory and try by all means to distance themselves from Moscow's influence, although they maintain a formal snobbery towards it. In this way, “the prospect of Eurasian integration also fades,” concludes Yu Shun.
On the other hand, the war has also forced Europe to realize the enormous threat that Russia poses to the security of the entire continent, abandoning the friendly relations of many countries and forcing NATO to increase its military spending, concentrating on the northeastern sector and adding Sweden and Finland. In this sense, if Putin's war was against NATO enlargement, he has already achieved a resounding defeat.
The Chinese expert also points out that China “has already organized two rounds of diplomatic mediation,” and no one should doubt that China's intention is to end the conflict through negotiations. This shows that “China and Russia are two very different countries, Russia wants to destabilize the world order with forceful actions, China wants to rebuild it with peace initiatives.” And if a peaceful settlement of the conflict in Ukraine is not achieved, “we can only wait for Russia's next war.”
