Whether one sees the war in Ukraine as a proxy war depends heavily on how one assesses issues that, at first glance, have nothing to do with it. The question of arms deliveries, for example. Or the question of who is to blame for this war.
The war in Ukraine is not only a defensive war against Russia, “but is of course also a proxy war between America and Russia,” said publicist Alice Schwarzer last week on the ARD program “Maischberger”. Is that so, is it even “natural” so? In order to clarify this, one first needs a generally accepted definition of the term. Unfortunately, there aren’t. “It’s more of a political term that arose during the Cold War and is therefore unclear,” says political scientist Nicole Deitelhoff, head of the Leibniz Institute Hessian Foundation for Peace and Conflict Research.
According to the current definition, a proxy war is an “armed conflict between smaller states, each of which belongs to the sphere of influence of different major powers and, as it were, conduct the conflict on their behalf”. That’s what it says in the dictionary. Deitelhoff agrees: “These are wars in which superpowers want to achieve their goals against each other without appearing as a war party themselves,” she says to ntv.de.
As an example, she refers to the Vietnam War, which is considered a classic example of a proxy war. However, this only applies to its early days, when the Soviet Union supported North Vietnam and the USA supported the South. By definition, the Vietnam War was no longer a proxy war from the point at which the US itself became a local war party.
For Nicole Deitelhoff, the war in Ukraine is not a proxy war either. “Russia did not enter a conflict – it started this war to achieve specific Russian goals. Russia is waging this war.”
The political scientist Johannes Varwick sees it completely differently. The term “proxy war” is “complex and must be used cautiously in the context of the Ukraine war,” he writes in a September assessment that he made available to ntv.de for this article, “especially since it is undoubtedly primarily an abominable one war of aggression by Russia against Ukraine”.
The bottom line for Varwick is that the war still bears “features of a proxy war”. This view is possible for him because he defines the term much more openly than Deitelhoff or the dictionary. Varwick defines it as a war “in which at least one of the parties is closely allied with an outside group in whose interests the war is ultimately being waged”. This group does not necessarily have to be a great power, nor do two superpowers have to be indirectly opposed to each other. By this definition, most wars would be proxy wars, since supporters outside of the actual warring factions are the rule rather than the exception.
Above all, Varwick, unlike Deitelhoff, assumes that the West is partly responsible for the war. “Without Western intervention, the war would already be over; in this respect, the duration, intensity, etc. on the Ukraine side is entirely determined by the West.” So, practically speaking, Ukraine is also fighting vicariously. What remains open in this line of argument, however, is why Ukraine has had to press the West for months to supply it with more and better weapons, let alone ammunition. In a proxy war, one would think the West would willingly provide Ukraine with everything it needs to repel and repel the invaders.
Varwick concedes that Ukraine has “a legitimate claim to self-determination and prosperity”. Ultimately, however, he sees the country as a victim of an “externally fueled” war. The Ukraine is “almost worn out or ‘burnt out’ between the hope of armed aid, its own overconfidence and the unscrupulous brutality of the Russian army”.
The Cologne political scientist Thomas Jäger vehemently contradicts such positions in an interview with ntv.de. He follows Nicole Deitelhoff’s definition: “A proxy war is a war that two large states do not want to fight directly with each other and therefore lead two small states to wage war against each other.” There have only rarely been real proxy wars, for example in the Angolan civil war, in which both major powers intervened without having troops on site.
“Above all, the term ‘proxy war’ was always a frame, a frame that made conflicts understandable for the public,” says Jäger. This simplification does not do justice to reality: “Every war has so many dimensions and is so complex that it cannot be broken down into one aspect.”
With regard to the war in Ukraine, Jäger says that Russia uses the term “proxy war” as a “frame” to explain why the Russian army in Ukraine has barely gained ground after more than nine months. Russia’s portrayal that Ukraine is fighting the “collective West” is just propaganda. “The Ukrainians are fighting for their country, for their freedom. That’s their main motivation,” emphasizes the political scientist. Russia, on the other hand, makes no secret of wanting to destroy Ukraine as a state and as a society. Deitelhoff put it this way: The war aims claimed by Russia, such as wanting to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO, are “total nonsense.”
For Varwick, the formulation used by Western politicians that Ukraine is also fighting “for us” or “for our freedom” is an indication that speaks for a proxy war. “On the one hand, they [the western states] do not want to become a war party themselves in the sense of international law and emphasize that they are only helping people to help themselves. In that case, a representative role would not be an issue. On the other hand, they emphasize Ukraine’s value-based frontline attitude. That would make Ukraine one deputy.”
Jäger considers such an argument to be misguided. “When politicians say they are fighting ‘for us’, what is meant is that Ukrainians are fighting for Western values, that a victory for Ukraine is in our interests and that we should maintain support. Inferring from this that Ukraine is fighting a proxy war leads, in my view, is a deliberate misunderstanding.”
This is also Deitelhoff’s position: “Many people who speak of a proxy war with regard to the war in Ukraine have an interest in the support being ended.” She considers this position to be dangerous, because the result is not a resilient ceasefire or even peace, but an encouragement for Russia to attack the next country, probably Moldova first. “The later we start putting a stop to Russia, the more armed conflicts we will see in the next few years.”
In “Maischberger” the journalist Vassili Golod contradicted Alice Schwarzer’s proxy thesis. After all, the US had nothing to do with Russia attacking Ukraine. The war started with “Russia not accepting that people in Ukraine want to live in freedom”. When Golod talks about women being raped by Russian soldiers in Cherson, Alice Schwarzer exclaims: “That’s just misery!” Golod continues: “If Ukraine gave up now, Russia would take more territory and terrorize more people.” Schwarzer doesn’t think so. She believes that a ceasefire will be more likely if Ukraine cannot defend itself. “With guns, misfortune is prolonged,” she says.
This is the core of the proxy thesis. It stands or falls on the assumption that the West is partly to blame for Russia’s war of annihilation and that it would be better if Ukraine did not get any weapons. Seen in this way, the debate as to whether the war in Ukraine is a proxy war is ultimately just a proxy debate.
(This article was first published on Sunday, December 04, 2022.)
