The war in Ukraine is rethinking the modern world. It is not only an international political change, but also one that affects the foundations of our culture and self-perception.
First, the world has seen the light and suddenly grasped the truth about Russia. Until now, for years, it did not want to see it. Poland and the Poles, who have had tragic experiences of partition, enslavement, Siberia, Katyn, the Gulag and Russian domination of the People's Republic of Poland, have been called Russophobes. Although the Czech experience has been shorter, the Czech position in this respect is equally resolute. For several weeks now, under the pressure of events, the scales have been falling from the eyes of the world public - from some more quickly, from others somewhat hesitantly.
The world has finally woken up - at least for a while. But the world still does not understand the implications of this truth, does not understand that Russia will not stop until we stop it. It only understands arguments based on force. I remember Angela Merkel saying that we must talk to Russia. Yes, we must talk, but we must also be strong. And all of us in Europe today have a responsibility to build that strength. Unfortunately, a large part of the world does not quite want to come to terms with the consequences of Russian aggression, still hoping that maybe things will work out. Preferably on the cheap (i.e. at the expense of the Ukrainians, or the Poles and the Baltic states).
The second important new factor - the element that this war has revealed, and which, I dare say, is changing not only the current balance of power, but perhaps even the paradigm of the existence of our civilisation in general, is the obvious fact that the existence of nations is conditioned by the patriotism of their citizens, by the readiness of society to defend itself. I am not sure that every European society, community or state today is prepared to defend its community at the cost of its own life.
The Ukrainians have shown that in order to preserve society, one must be prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice. To lay down one's life for one's country. That is the main reason why they have managed to defeat Putin so far. Nowadays, this is a completely unfashionable thing. Yet it is cultural identity, cultural formation, that makes someone capable of sacrificing for the country and someone else incapable. Of course, behind this there is also the realisation that defending the homeland means defending one's own interests, one's own family, one's own children, everything that is dearest to us. But it is a firm conviction that the national community is a core value.
Some people try to call our Polish or Ukrainian patriotism nationalism or even chauvinism, but in Poland we simply call it love of country. Like the Ukrainians, we know that such an attitude is decisive for the fate of the community. We now see clearly that it gives Ukrainians the power to change the rules of the geopolitical game. Let us face it, it must be admitted that the whole world expected the Russians to enter Kiev in three days, set up a puppet government there - and the war would be over. It will be over, "peace will reign in Kiev" and the world will not even notice that anything has happened! It doesn't stand still because someone changed this fact. It turns out that this change of thinking about a fatalistic world can be based on a beautiful attitude of love for the homeland! You can bring hope to the world through national (not nationalistic! not chauvinistic!) patriotism! It is the willingness to shed blood for the motherland that has become the real game changer of the modern world.
Thirdly, the Ukrainian patriotism that has manifested itself so strongly during this war does not have a nationalistic, Bandera-like tinge at all. For us Poles, this is new and particularly important, and at the same time it is very painful for the Russians, who would like Ukrainian patriotism to be just such a Nazi-Banderite, nationalist one. No, it is a modern, civic and pro-European patriotism.
The fourth lesson, which is very important and is also changing the rules of the game at the moment, is the possibility of effective military defence based on the most modern warfare technologies. A pile of iron and a multitude of soldiers are not as threatening as they might seem - in the face of modern defence systems and the individual capabilities of professional, morally and patriotically motivated small mobile groups of defenders. It is possible to defend very effectively against such an onslaught of old armies.
Technological changes and training (we know that the Ukrainians were trained by experts from NATO countries) are therefore another factor in changing the current situation. Regardless of how this war continues, the Russian military is already discredited and "de-charmed", and this is a whole new variable in the geopolitical puzzle.
Finally, there is a fifth, very important element. After the Buche massacre, it is hard to be indifferent. Hence the hope that, in some paradoxical way, world public opinion will unite in protest against the evil that is the Russian Federation and force its governments to take real action. This is driven by both the Christian ideal of love of neighbour and its postmodern equivalent, the cult of 'sensitivity' as Olga Tokarczuk referred to it in her Nobel speech. I hope, therefore, that both believers who subscribe to the Christian tradition and non-believers who subscribe to the liberal-left tradition will not only approve of what is now happening in Ukraine by appealing to the basic human response to evil, but will draw general conclusions about the Evil Empire. We must act now, while the Ukrainians have given us time to react.
It would seem that all five of these factors that we have briefly outlined here are phenomena that are not only new, but also largely positive in terms of the desirability of changing the image of the world today and of international politics today. The fact that all five of these phenomena triggered by the Ukrainian drama are occurring simultaneously, and that they are extremely dynamic and powerful, creates a unique opportunity for positive global socio-political change.
Ukrainians are fighting for us today, they are a new asset, a nation that is changing the vectors of today's politics and the world, but we must seek new, bolder solutions or we will not stop the evil. It's a domino effect - if we don't stop it, it will hit us too. The world must look for non-standard, new and bolder solutions.
Prof. Piotr Gliński is Deputy Prime Minister of the Republic of Poland, Minister of Culture and National Heritage.
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