Russian official says another conflict with Ukraine is inevitable

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev doesn't believe that lasting peace between Ukraine and Russia is possible and he recently laid out his reasoning to his followers on Telegram. Here’s what he said and why it matters. 

Medvedev isn’t just a former president. He also served as Russian Prime Minister and is the current Deputy Chairman of the Security Council of Russia. Medvedev is also one of Vladimir Putin’s closest political allies in Moscow. 

What Medvedev says matters not only because of who he is within the Russian elite but also because his views of the world can give outsiders some insight into the thoughts of someone within Putin’s circle of decision-makers.

Medvedev has earned a reputation for making inflammatory comments since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, and he’s made several concerning nuclear threats over the previous two years of war. 

Photo Credit: Wiki Commons By Duma.gov.ru, CC BY 4.0

For example, on January 11th, Medvedev warned that any Ukrainian attacks on missile launch sites in Russia with weapons that were supplied by the United States could risk a nuclear response according to a Reuters report. 

Photo Credit: Wiki Commons By Vitaly V. Kuzmin

"What does this mean?” Medvedev wrote on Telegram. “It means only one thing. They risk running into the action of paragraph 19 of the fundamentals of Russia's state policy in the field of nuclear deterrence…This should be remembered.”

However, Medvedev’s most recent nuclear threat was nothing compared to remarks he made on his Telegram channel on January 17th that explained why Ukraine should not exist and why a future conflict was always possible. 

Medvedev began by writing that the existence of Ukraine was dangerous to Ukrainians under any form of government because an independent state existing in historical lands belonging to Russia would always lead to hostilities. 

Photo Credit: Wiki Commons By President Of Ukraine from Україна

“The existence of an independent state on the historical Russian territories will now be a constant pretext for the resumption of combat actions," Medvedev wrote according to a translation of his Telegram comments from Newsweek

Photo Credit: Wiki Commons By blu-news.org,  CC BY-SA 2.0

"No matter who is at the helm of the cancerous growth under the name of Ukraine, this will not add legitimacy to his rule and the legal viability of the 'country' itself." Medvedev continued before adding that new conflicts would persist. 

Photo Credit: Wiki Commons By President.gov.ua, CC BY 4.0

Medvedev went on to claim there was a “100 percent chance of a new conflict” between Russia and Ukraine despite any future security agreements Kyiv may sign with the West or if Ukraine were to join the European Union or NATO. 

Medvedev predicted that a new conflict after the current war ends could happen in ten years or fifty years, but he also believed Ukrainians would ultimately choose to join with Russia because of their practicality and desire to live. 

“They’ll understand that life in one large common state, even one that they don’t much like at the moment, is better than death, their death, and the deaths of their loved ones,” Medvedev stated according to the independent Russian news website Meduza. 

Medvedev’s comments were an interesting look into the high-level thinking that may be happening within Putin’s inner circle of decision-makers. But it’s important to note these comments may have been geared toward a domestic audience. 

This wasn’t the first time Medvedev has taken to Telegram to question the existence of Ukraine. In April 2023, the Kremlin official published a post entitled: “Why Ukraine will cease to exist? Because nobody needs it,” The Russian News Agency (TASS) reported. 

Medvedev’s post was divided into six sections with each explaining why Ukraine wasn’t needed by the United States, Africa, Latin America, Asia, Russia, and even by those in Ukraine itself—which he concluded ultimately meant the country shouldn’t exist.