Unfortunately EAs rarely think about helping during war, because it’s difficult to find cost-effective interventions in a war zone (I think the best time to help was before the invasion started.) The Ukraine situation is especially sad to me, because European countries (or the US) did not offer to directly defend Ukraine before (or after) Putin made his veiled nuclear threat. But I encourage EAs to think about this today, offer ideas, and share relevant news stories and names of trustworthy blog posts and analysis (with summaries).
Aide to Polish PM: “Everyone seeking help in Poland will be able to receive it.”
February 2022 Survey: “49% of all adult Ukrainians...say they will volunteer to fight or serve in Ukraine’s armed forces if a new Russian offensive happens. 10% are undecided, only 35% said they would not themselves volunteer”
Analysis from a military historian (who doesn’t believe the conflict was avoidable). Update: a month ago, Binkov’s Battlegrounds predicted what would happen if Russia invades fairly accurately so far, and it offers other informative military videos. And Scott Alexander points to Clay Graubard as the one who made the best prediction of invasion, while Clay and friends offer further depressing predictions along with a summary of Metaculus (etc.) predictions: Zelensky will be ousted/killed/captured, Putin probably won’t, (very roughly) 50,000 people will be killed, and Kyiv is more likely than not to fall this month likely to fall within a few months.… I’m finding it informative to follow @WarSignals, superforecasters, and people they follow, on Twitter.
Organizations are manpower-limited so I’m not sure how useful it is to send money to the same orgs to which everyone else is sending money, considering that Ukraine needs help right nowtoday. That said, the war could be very long and it’s worth considering how to provide long-term help. Here are some orgs found by quick Googling:
“Vostok SOS, based in Ukraine, partners with German-Swiss NGO Liberico to provide immediate evacuation support to Ukrainians attempting to flee their homes.”
“Save the Children: an international NGO delivering emergency aid to Ukrainian families”
“Phoenix Wings: a charitable foundation that supplies the Ukrainian army with medical treatment and defensive equipment such as vests and helmets”
“Kyiv Independent: a Ukraine-based, English-language independent news media outlet”
I wonder about the issue of how cost-(in)effective current interventions really are—it’s true, that current interventions in the war zone can seem cost-ineffective in terms of immediate help to affected populations, however there is one larger game at play—Russian Federation’s (and Belarussian) aggression against Ukraine effectively demolished the current peacekeeping balance in Europe and across the world, and it seems that responding to worldwide defence challenges in case of Russian victory can be much more costly and time/attention consuming, than in case of Ukrainian victory, see a possible analysis here:
Therefore, it seems to me (curious to hear your thoughts), that supporting Ukraine’s defence/humanitarian response, even if seems less cost effective at the face value than other possible EA actions, can actually save a lot of money/time/attention in the long-term perspective (not sure how to quantify how it exactly measures up to other existential risks etc., but my first reaction is that with new Cold War going on in case of Russian victory, responding globally to any other existential risks will be much more complex and difficult—however, how one’s indivitual contribution/donation plays into all of this is one tricky question).
I do worry about the Free World’s response not being strong enough, and I’ll be donating to some kind of Ukraine cause regardless of effectiveness. Still, I’m frustrated about not seeing an effective intervention. I’m in Canada btw, and the government is matching all donations to the Canadian Red Cross specifically, but the Red Cross has a “low impact” rating from Charity Intelligence. Hmm. Plus, Canada has generous tax deductions for donations to Canadian charities, so I’ll probably dump some money in the CRC even as I doubt its effectiveness.
I worry about follow-on effects. The more easily Putin succeeds in Ukraine, the more Xi Jinping might think he can succeed in Taiwan. The West may have enough resolve to sanction Russia, but sanctioning China would be much harder and many/most countries will be very tempted to defect. If Taiwan is invaded, the free world may weaken and the chance of World War 3 will increase. This historian analysis that I linked above encourages people to demand strong sanctions (I’m glad to see the SWIFT banhammer brought out btw):
[...] That does not mean Ukrainian resistance is pointless here. Instead, both the initial, conventional stage of resistance and the likely secondary insurgency phase push towards the same objectives: making Russian occupation so costly in blood and treasure that it cannot be maintained. Here the Ukrainians have a real chance of eventual success if they remain committed to the effort, while the challenges for Russia are immense.
[...] As I write this, it is not yet entirely clear what the scale of Western sanctions on Russia will be or how effective they will be; harsh sanctions have been promised and are being implemented, but I lack the expertise to really assess just how effective those sanctions will be. The major variable here is political will; consequently if you are a citizen of one of those Western countries, one thing you can do here is signal to your representatives that you, in fact, are willing to accept a degree of economic pain in order to send the message to Russia that wars of conquest will not be tolerated.
Sanctions work much better when everyone acts in unity (though we can assume China will not participate). It concerns me the most that India abstained from supporting the UN resolution against Russian aggression, and has not announced sanctions, and isn’t acting even mildly bothered about the invasion AFAICT. But again, I’m not sure EAs have any leverage here beyond the standard “call your representative”.
(Best case scenario: sanctions and Ukrainian resistance are severe while Russian military morale is low; Putin reconsiders, and to save face moves all forces to Donbas, claiming that the invasion was a cover and that Donbas was the real target all along. An unlikely outcome, but if anyone can pull that off that pivot, Putin can.)
Here’s a recent announcement from MSF concerning their operations in Ukraine:
The drastic escalation of conflict in Ukraine has led Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) to make the painful decision to halt our normal medical activities in the country.
Immediately before the escalation, we were in contact with several hospitals in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions to provide training in emergency medicine and surgical preparedness, and yesterday our team provided one mass casualty kit, with supplies for treating traumatic injuries, to a hospital in Mariupol. As hostilities continue, assuring people’s access to health care and medicines will be critical.
MSF teams in Belarus and Russia stand ready to provide humanitarian assistance where needed. We are looking to send teams to neighboring countries to be ready on stand-by, either for response in Ukraine or to provide humanitarian medical assistance to refugees seeking asyl um abroad. Our supply centers are currently working on preparing medical kits for rapid dispatch.
Thank you, as always, for supporting us as we rush to respond. We’ll continue to update as our response changes.
thank you @dpiepgrass! the point about spreading out instead of focusing money on the same orgs makes a lot of sense, I’ve made my company do just that and I’m spreading out my money as well.
another thing I hope I can help my people with is spreading information and generating as much support from other countries as possible
Unfortunately EAs rarely think about helping during war, because it’s difficult to find cost-effective interventions in a war zone (I think the best time to help was before the invasion started.) The Ukraine situation is especially sad to me, because European countries (or the US) did not offer to directly defend Ukraine before (or after) Putin made his veiled nuclear threat. But I encourage EAs to think about this today, offer ideas, and share relevant news stories and names of trustworthy blog posts and analysis (with summaries).
Related EA forum question (Update: also here; large donors see here)
Update: Bellingcat (on Twitter) analyzes footage in Ukraine (and elsewhere) to debunk, verify, and geolocate (donations accepted)
Tips for helping Ukraine from Ukraine Crisis Media Center.
Expect Russia to cut off internet access. Officials are asking for Starlink. (Update: first shipment of terminals delivered Feb. 28. Words of warning—even Musk says using Starlink is dangerous.)
Aide to Polish PM: “Everyone seeking help in Poland will be able to receive it.”
February 2022 Survey: “49% of all adult Ukrainians...say they will volunteer to fight or serve in Ukraine’s armed forces if a new Russian offensive happens. 10% are undecided, only 35% said they would not themselves volunteer”
Analysis from a military historian (who doesn’t believe the conflict was avoidable). Update: a month ago, Binkov’s Battlegrounds predicted what would happen if Russia invades fairly accurately so far, and it offers other informative military videos. And Scott Alexander points to Clay Graubard as the one who made the best prediction of invasion, while Clay and friends offer further depressing predictions along with a summary of Metaculus (etc.) predictions: Zelensky will be ousted/killed/captured, Putin probably won’t, (very roughly) 50,000 people will be killed, and Kyiv is
more likely than not to fall this monthlikely to fall within a few months.… I’m finding it informative to follow @WarSignals, superforecasters, and people they follow, on Twitter.Thread about how non-soldiers can help defend their city.
Organizations are manpower-limited so I’m not sure how useful it is to send money to the same orgs to which everyone else is sending money, considering that Ukraine needs help right now today. That said, the war could be very long and it’s worth considering how to provide long-term help. Here are some orgs found by quick Googling:
“Vostok SOS, based in Ukraine, partners with German-Swiss NGO Liberico to provide immediate evacuation support to Ukrainians attempting to flee their homes.”
“Save the Children: an international NGO delivering emergency aid to Ukrainian families”
“Phoenix Wings: a charitable foundation that supplies the Ukrainian army with medical treatment and defensive equipment such as vests and helmets”
“Kyiv Independent: a Ukraine-based, English-language independent news media outlet”
Norwegian Refugee Council plays some kind of role
Doctors Without Bordersoperates in Ukraine & Donbas(update)Razom is a Ukrainian-American human rights organization with its own list of recommendations, as well as accepting donations itself
I wonder about the issue of how cost-(in)effective current interventions really are—it’s true, that current interventions in the war zone can seem cost-ineffective in terms of immediate help to affected populations, however there is one larger game at play—Russian Federation’s (and Belarussian) aggression against Ukraine effectively demolished the current peacekeeping balance in Europe and across the world, and it seems that responding to worldwide defence challenges in case of Russian victory can be much more costly and time/attention consuming, than in case of Ukrainian victory, see a possible analysis here:
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/ukraine/2022-02-18/what-if-russia-wins
Therefore, it seems to me (curious to hear your thoughts), that supporting Ukraine’s defence/humanitarian response, even if seems less cost effective at the face value than other possible EA actions, can actually save a lot of money/time/attention in the long-term perspective (not sure how to quantify how it exactly measures up to other existential risks etc., but my first reaction is that with new Cold War going on in case of Russian victory, responding globally to any other existential risks will be much more complex and difficult—however, how one’s indivitual contribution/donation plays into all of this is one tricky question).
Michael, I’m very much biased but that’s a brilliant point: aggression can’t be tolerated and normalised
I do worry about the Free World’s response not being strong enough, and I’ll be donating to some kind of Ukraine cause regardless of effectiveness. Still, I’m frustrated about not seeing an effective intervention. I’m in Canada btw, and the government is matching all donations to the Canadian Red Cross specifically, but the Red Cross has a “low impact” rating from Charity Intelligence. Hmm. Plus, Canada has generous tax deductions for donations to Canadian charities, so I’ll probably dump some money in the CRC even as I doubt its effectiveness.
I worry about follow-on effects. The more easily Putin succeeds in Ukraine, the more Xi Jinping might think he can succeed in Taiwan. The West may have enough resolve to sanction Russia, but sanctioning China would be much harder and many/most countries will be very tempted to defect. If Taiwan is invaded, the free world may weaken and the chance of World War 3 will increase. This historian analysis that I linked above encourages people to demand strong sanctions (I’m glad to see the SWIFT banhammer brought out btw):
Sanctions work much better when everyone acts in unity (though we can assume China will not participate). It concerns me the most that India abstained from supporting the UN resolution against Russian aggression, and has not announced sanctions, and isn’t acting even mildly bothered about the invasion AFAICT. But again, I’m not sure EAs have any leverage here beyond the standard “call your representative”.
(Best case scenario: sanctions and Ukrainian resistance are severe while Russian military morale is low; Putin reconsiders, and to save face moves all forces to Donbas, claiming that the invasion was a cover and that Donbas was the real target all along. An unlikely outcome, but if anyone can pull that off that pivot, Putin can.)
Here’s a recent announcement from MSF concerning their operations in Ukraine:
I interpret that as “we are no longer operating in Ukraine”, so modified my post.
thank you @dpiepgrass! the point about spreading out instead of focusing money on the same orgs makes a lot of sense, I’ve made my company do just that and I’m spreading out my money as well.
another thing I hope I can help my people with is spreading information and generating as much support from other countries as possible