The Delineation Between War and Peace is Rubbish: Understanding the crisis in Ukraine.

Russia has just declared Dontesk & Luhansk in the Donbas region of Ukraine to be sovereign states.  Peacekeepers are on the ground.  NATO nations are applying sanctions.  The government in Kyiv has said for months that Russia is attempting to usurp democracy in the country.  Yet Moscow says that it is merely peacekeeping.  Is it peacekeeping?  Is it warmongering?  Is it something else? As we see the beginnings of a hybrid war emerging in Ukraine, Thomas Hughes joins GDP to help explain some of the factors that have led up to this escalation.  Will there be a full scale invasion?  What will become of the Donbas region?  Are cyberattacks on their way?  What could and should NATO nations do at a time like this? Thomas Hughes is a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Centre for International and Defence Policy, Queen’s University. His primary areas of research are on confidence-building, arms control regimes, deterrence, and strategic culture. Thomas defended his dissertation, The Art of War Games: The Political Effects of Military Exercises in Europe, 1975-2018 in August 2021. He co-edited the 2018 volume North American Strategic Defense in the 21st Century, and has also published work on the use of Remotely Piloted Aircraft. Thomas gained his MA from the Josef Korbel School of International Studies, Denver, and has also worked for the UN Inter-regional Crime and Justice Research Institute. Follow Dr. Bob on Twitter:  @ProfessorHuish