HISTORICAL-INFORMATION COMPONENT OF THE RUSSIAN HYBRID AGGRESSION AGAINST THE UKRAINIAN STATE

Abstract

Unprovoked armed aggression of Russia against Ukraine after victory of the Dignity Revolution in it, annexation of Crimea, kindling and financial and material support of separatist rebellions in the eastern regions of our country actualized analysis of international-historical reasons of aggressive behavior of Russia, primarily regarding the former Soviet republics, and of historical-information component of the Russian hybrid war. Therefore, an attempt to look back this problem in the context of the medieval international relations in Central and Eastern Europe and the formation of autocratic ideology of the Grand Duchy of Moscow, the Moscow kingdom and the Russian Empire was made in article. In view of that the Rurik and Romanov dynasties are oficially descended from the rulers of Kyiv Rus,  Moscow grand dukes, kings as well as Petersburg emperors considered all the lands (in parrticular, Ukrainian ones), that once belonged to Rus, as part of their historical heritage. Joining and later incorporation of Ukraine into the Russian Empire, from their point of view, was like returning of lost once patrimony. And the fact that the Ukrainian and Belorussian lands formerly were part of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Rus and Rzeczpospolita, or had their own political autonomy and time to develop a separate cultural, religious and public-political tradition, was seen as distortions caused by ostensibly forced distancing of these countries. Leading Moscow and St. Petersburg intellectuals both conservative and liberal-democratic were able to argue about the nature of Russian nationality, but they never had the slightest doubt as to “Russianness” of the Ukrainian, Belarusian and Baltic lands. This view completely coincides with the official position of the Russian autocracy and is now the basis for the foreign policy strategy of Vladimir Putin. The aggressive and defiant Russian behavior in the international arena has violated the sovereignty of Ukraine and destroyed its territorial integrity, ignored the basic rules and principles of the international law and set architecture of European security and post-bipolar world order before serious challenges, not seen since the Cold War. Thus, the problem of Ukraine’s national security went beyond its national borders and has become a regional and global dimension. Therefore, only receiving full membership in NATO and the European Union (and exclusively in this order as experience shows of all EU members except Austria, Finland and Sweden) is the most effective way to strengthen national security of Ukraine. In this context the strategic partnership between Ukraine and the United States acquires the critical importance for security and success of political and economic reform in Ukraine, it is undoubtedly useful also for the whole region of Central and Eastern Europe. Successful and attractive Ukraine, in the opinion of Putin, left a serious challenge to his autocratic regime would put into question not only Kremlin regional but also global projects. Therefore, to internal and financialeconomic destabilization of Ukraine, its international political discrediting for Putin all means were and are acceptable: information and propagandist, “gas” and “hybrid war”; falsification of national and world history and trampling of current international, primarily bilateral, agreements, power pressure, organization  and supply of separatist insurgencies.