10 opinion
1/28/22
Mizuno: End Putin’s game of Russian roulette Dane Mizuno Staff Writer In recent weeks, tensions between Ukraine and Russia have never been this high since Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea. Ukraine is bracing itself for a full-scale conflict as thousands of civilians volunteer for the resistance in the event the 100,000 Russian troops stationed at the border of the two former Soviet republics invade. Given that the United States and United Kingdom’s governments have started to pull some of their personnel out of embassies, the expectations are that open hostilities are seemingly imminent. In such dire circumstances, Ukraine giving up its nuclear weapons back in 1994 is without a doubt a major blunder in international diplomacy. Its past liberalist foreign policy is the one to blame for such foolish behavior because it gave Ukraine a disillusion that Russia would uphold Ukraine’s territorial integrity as agreed in the Budapest Memorandum. Further, it created the impression that the lovey-dovey post-Cold War peace would prevail forever. This idealistic folly produced a status quo of Ukraine throwing away its greatest weapon of protection known as nuclear deterrence. This was evident when Russia forcefully annexed Crimea in 2014 and only faced minor repercussions even after violating every single international treaty. If Ukraine had its nuclear weapons, perhaps Crimea would still be under the sovereignty of Ukraine. However, with such a precedent set, Russian President Vladmir Putin has this misconception that he can do anything he wants, and no one can stop him. Considering that the circumstances are simi-
lar to those in 2014, it looks like an invasion of Ukraine is highly likely. Just as in 2014, Putin is playing to the nationalistic sentiments of Russians who yearn to go back to the glory days when the Soviet Union was at the peak of its powers. By forcefully obtaining diplomatic concessions or perhaps even invading Ukraine, he puts Russia in this position of power. With his popularity waning from his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, such a move would instantly turn the tables for him and bolster his ability to maintain his despotic control over Russia. Putin’s unreasonable demands—that in no way the West would ever succumb to—only further solidify this point that he will twist anything to become a pretext for invading Ukraine. Now, international diplomacy is a dangerous game of Russian roulette, where Putin is holding the trigger. One minor incident could create a major conflict, such as how the Balkan Peninsula—also previously known as the “powder keg of Europe”—was the catalyst of World War I. But history doesn’t need to repeat itself. There are ways for the trigger to be in the hands of the West. At this crossroads where the fate of Europe and global democracy is at stake, Europe and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) have to be united now more than ever for the West to prevail. To unite Europe, the difficult but necessary decision will be for the U.S. to pull out its military commitments in Europe. For far too long, the U.S. has coddled European states, leading to an overreliance of U.S. protection of Europe. American
protection has led to Europe living in a state of utopian delusion that the threat of Russia is not imminent. It is why much of Europe’s military, such as its European equipment—from submarines to fighter jets—are not in the condition needed to be mobilized. No, the status quo is that a resurgent Russia is seeking to undermine everything the West has built since the dissolution of the Soviet Union. By having the U.S. pull out, it would force Europe to form a balance of power in response to Russia’s growing threat and stop neglecting its Article 3 “to maintain and develop their individual and collective capacity to resist armed attack.” If both countries rely on the ideology that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend,” they could set aside their differences and allow for practical realpolitik action to occur against Russia. However, Putin has one trump card up his sleeve that can strike the Achilles heel of any multilateral European cooperation. That trump card is his ability to extort one of the linchpins of NATO and the European Union: Germany. The trade relationship between Germany and Russia is lopsided in Russian favor; Germany imports more than half of its natural gas from Russia. Especially, given that Germany has pledged to move away from coal by 2038 and shut down its last three nuclear power plants by the end of this year, its reliance on Russia to provide more natural gas for heating and energy production is only increasing. Once this Nord Stream 2 pipeline is approved, Russia will be able to export double its previous amount of
natural gas to Germany. Germany’s economy will be at the mercy of Russia if Russia decides to engage in coercive energy diplomacy to get its demands across. Historical evidence suggests that Russia will carry out such despicable behavior if it gets the chance. One of many examples is that Gazprom, one of Russia’s largest natural gas companies in the world, accepted massive debt from its clients in Ukraine. However, when geopolitical tensions between Russia and Ukraine go up, Gazprom has weaponized gas by jacking up its prices and enforcing strict payments. The threat of cutting off Germany’s supply line gives massive leverage to Russia, compromising NATO. Therefore, Germany ought to reopen its nuclear power plants since the dividends of nuclear energy far outweigh its costs. Major nuclear meltdowns have only occurred in two nuclear power plants out of hundreds across the world. Yes, the fact that one of the incidents happened in Japan, one of the most technologically advanced countries, can be unnerving. However, rationally speaking, nuclear meltdowns are rare, looking at statistical likelihood. On the other hand, climate change is an existential threat to humanity. Nuclear energy provides clean, reliable energy that operates close to full capacity without any breaks making it a valuable asset in the fight to preserve our climate. Thus, reopening these nuclear plants is something that warrants serious consideration as it kills two birds with one stone: combating Russia and combating climate change.
Nanda: CampusGroups is in need of a refresh Shivangi Nanda Copy Editor By now, most Case Western Reserve University students are used to the familiar CampusGroups icon on their lock screen, notifying them of an ID card gone astray, an upcoming movie showing in Strosacker auditorium or a biology textbook in need of a new home. If it wasn’t for Discover Week mayhem, I’m sure most of us wouldn’t have downloaded the app and considered its potential to help us connect with organizations, events and students on campus. However, following our initial excitement over the application’s ability to propel our college lives, we began to uncover imperfections in the system that led us to sideline its use. For those requiring a refresh, CampusGroups— launched in 2005 and used by 70% of the world’s top colleges—is a mobile platform that allows students to engage with their campus community through access to clubs, alumni and events. Created to encourage student engagement, this app offers various features, including a live feed, forums and group pages, tailored to making a space for students to network and seek out opportunities. However, despite developer Yorick Ser’s noble intentions, this app currently has certain, difficult to overlook, technological and design flaws that impede its ability to be a resource, rather than a
burden, for students. Among these issues are the poorly located features within the mobile app and an inscrutable user interface. For instance, with the QR code scanner being used as the primary method to sign into in-person events, it is inexplicably hidden within the “More” subsection. Navigating to this feature can be especially confusing for new users, and even once found the scanner does not load reliably. This frustrates both students and event coordinators in everyday use as it slows the registration process. Another major hindrance is the layout of the “Events” section. Organized in a way that requires students to scroll through events listed in order of date, it is not uncommon for the page to get glitchy or crash. Especially during busy weeks, such as orientation or Greek Life rush, it can become tedious to find and register for activities on campus, causing some students to bypass the online registration process altogether. This leads to even more chaos on the event day. Additionally, the overly simple formatting can make it difficult to determine the intended audiences for events. Club and Greek Life meetings are often blended with campus-wide events, so separating them based on type would help students better iden-
tify and register for events suited for them. A majority of the Greek Llife events posted on CampusGroups are open events, meaning anyone can attend, however this is not evident anywhere on the app. A final design issue is in the details provided within the “Groups” section of the app. Used to find clubs on campus, this subsection lacks adequate information for each club. While there are options to access the club’s website and view the member roster, there is no direct access to an email or number to contact every club’s executive board directly. Only some clubs provide personal CWRU emails for their executive officers—it is not a requirement for all officers. Even the linked websites are often poorly edited templates with little content. For these reasons, when exploring clubs, we are left to rely on short descriptions in the details section of the group page, which often vary in length and quality. While such shortcomings are vast, the app does succeed in offering a space for students to ask questions, sell items, find roommates and foster connections with other students. Furthermore, the CampusGroups feed is more reliable than online marketplaces such as Craigslist, giving students a sense of reassurance and comfort
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when reaching out. This, in turn, has created a small digital community, where students may shamelessly troll for used textbooks or iClickers. On a more serious note, this feed has offered students an affordable and safe way to access class resources and has even helped reunite some with lost IDs. Evidently, for CampusGroups to continue to live up to its mission statement, it needs to make specific design changes to make features more accessible. Among these changes is a better club interface to provide descriptions and contact information. Also, the app should make regular updates to ensure that all new clubs are immediately added to the CampusGroups system. Lastly, finding a way to rework the method of searching and registering for events will encourage students to use this platform more often as a way to explore the campus and find things they are interested in. Overall, I think we can all agree that CampusGroups and platforms like it are a vital part of the community-building mission of college campuses around the world— especially CWRU. However, developers need to make it a more efficient platform that reflects the ideals of modern-day students and technology standards. Only then can it bolster its relevance and user base.