Experts are divided over what Russian President Vladimir Putin's end game in Ukraine is, but an international affairs expert at UNG doesn't think he'll try to invade any of the former Soviet bloc countries.
Craig Greathouse, the associate department head in political science and international affairs, believes Putin would like to reconstitute the old Soviet Union. But that might be out of his reach, Greathouse said.
Former Soviet bloc countries like Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania are now members of NATO, and the provisions of the NATO treaty's Article 5 might cause concern for Russia.
"If he moves to attack these countries, it activates Article 5 of the NATO Treaty," Greathouse said. "And Article 5 is very specific. It says, 'If any member of NATO is attacked, all the other members of NATO will come to their defense.' And that includes the United States."
Ukraine, on the other hand, is not a NATO member and has perhaps the closest historical ties to Russia.
"Before the Soviet Union broke apart, Ukraine was a significant element of the Soviet Union," Greathouse said. "In the past, it's been described as the Soviet Union's breadbasket. There was also a lot of industry, especially in the eastern part of the country. Also it holds close ties to the Crimea region, which holds one of the few ports that Russia can use to get into the Mediterranean."
Greathouse said it's too early to know what Putin's ultimate goal is. Putin, in fact, may only be trying to claim a portion of Ukraine.
"That's going to be an interesting question, because it's not quite clear how far he's going to go with Ukraine yet," he said. "Is he just going to take parts of it? Or is he going to try and take the whole country? If the reports are correct, with 190,000 Russian soldiers, I don't know if he can basically control the entire Ukraine."
Greathouse doesn't believe the conflict will spread beyond Ukraine in a physical war. But an increase in cyberattacks is likely.
"We've seen Russia being very active using cyber war to attack Ukraine continually since 2014, when they took the Crimea and the eastern part of Ukraine.," Greathouse said. "Reports out of the AP last night say they had attacked certain companies that are attached to Ukraine with a very aggressive malware. So the likelihood that we could see more cyberattacks, I think, is fairly high."
Oil and gas prices are another concern. Oil futures hit $100 a barrel already this week, and gasoline prices have jumped at many U.S. stations. But Greathouse thinks Europe is at greater risk of an energy crisis because of its dependence on Russia for fuel.
Oil is a top revenue producer for Russia, so Putin might be reluctant to cut the taps to Europe. But if does, Greathouse said Europe will be left fighting for new sources of fuel.
"[Europe is] still heavily dependent on Russian gas and oil sales," Greathouse said. "Now, are there other suppliers out there that can pick up the slack? The answer is yes. But it's going to take them a while to do it. And it's not going to be as cheap."
