SOUTH BERWICK, Maine — For many people, we see the photos and videos coming out of Ukraine. But it can be difficult to really understand what is going on, and what implications the war has in the region and around the world.
Mariana Budjeryn has her Ph.D. in political science and is currently a senior research associate at the Harvard Kennedy School Belfer Center.
Although she lives in South Berwick now, Budjeryn is originally from Ukraine.
We sat down with her to try and get a better understanding of the reasoning behind the war. Budjeryn said there are a lot of reasons Russia could justify its invasion.
"Of course, Putin seems to harbor this resentment towards the strategic retreat still of the Soviet Union from eastern Europe, and then the disintegration of the Soviet Union," she said. "He feels maybe that it is his historical role to reassemble these lands. He feels like the west has taken advantage of Russia's weakness back in the early 90s."
She said the most significant impacts are being seen inside the country.
"You can't un-traumatize a whole generation of kids who are now sitting in bomb shelters," Budjeryn said.
But what about the United States, and western countries that have invested billions of dollars in aid to Ukraine? Why do they care so much? Budjeryn said it has a lot to do with the fall of the Soviet Union.
"When it collapsed, the nuclear arsenal of the Soviet Union was left on the territory of not one, but four newly independent states, and Ukraine was one of them," Budjeryn said. "And it has been a matter of U.S. policy, but also a matter of international non-proliferation regime, that this sort of understanding and set institutions that were built up over decades and were aimed at curbing the spread of nuclear weapons around the world."
Budjeryn tried to put it in perspective for those watching from the United States.
"Would this country want somebody to come in and tell you not to speak English, to forget about the Constitution and the founding fathers?" she said. "You basically obliterate who you are as a people. And this is the aim of Russia."
So, where do we go from here? Is the war nearing its end? Budjeryn doesn’t think so.
"For Ukrainians, it's going to be a long haul," Budjeryn said. "This war is not going to be over this year. One thing to keep in mind is that for the Ukrainians, this is an existential fight. It's basically choose your way to die. Either you die fighting, or you die then under the Russians, or you then are forced to forget who you are."
Budjeryn recently visited her mother, who still lives in Ukraine. You can read more about her trip here.