A Preliminary Assessment of Russian Barbarism in Ukraine

About

Speaker:  Ivan Arreguín-Toft, Associate, International Security Program

Russia's invasion of Ukraine is now over a year old, and every day Russian forces are either deliberately or systematically killing or torturing noncombatants. Is this a strategy? A plan to use Russia's available resources to achieve a specific military objective? Might it possibly be an artifact of a long history, since the Russian Civil War (1917–1923), of using armed force bluntly while ignoring the very possibility of "noncombatant" as a relevant category in warfare?

Ivan Arreguín-Toft offers a summary of findings from the draft epilogue chapter of his larger book project, The [F]utility of Barbarism, with review of the long history of barbarism in Russian military operations since the founding of the Soviet Union, and an initial assessment of its impact on Russia's military and political objectives in both its recent intervention in Syria, and in its ongoing war in Ukraine.

Everyone is welcome to join us online via Zoom! Please register in advance for this seminar: https://harvard.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJIuce6spjsrHNNSH7GixtXqAjUbWSLdqHBO

Contact

For more information, email the International Security Program Assistant at susan_lynch@harvard.edu.