The more I hear about the Ukraine war, the more obvious it seems that Vladimir Putin is after one thing: Ukraine's natural resources, especially those "rare earths". This would explain, for one thing, why the war has had so many casualties and so much infrastructure destruction. A conqueror in the mold of Cyrus the Great of Persia (or, even more so, in that of the modern Chinese) would have minimized the damage necessary in order to derive the benefit of cooperative human labor and existing capital. Putin would apparently like to be seen as an idealist, albeit perhaps misguided, trying to make political unity match cultural unity in eastern Europe. Or is he simply taking the low road in response to substantial pressure from the Russian people to end Russia's serious iodine deficiency problem?

About iodine and iodine deficiency

Iodine is an essential nutrient which the thyroid gland needs to produce enough hormones, which in turn regulate the body's metabolism rate: the higher the hormone level, the faster the metabolism. According to Johnson et al. (2003), in agreement with the World Health Organization, an optimum urine iodine level, in mcg/L, is 100-199; mild deficiency is 50-99, moderate deficiency is 20-49, and severe deficiency is <20. The main social concern with iodine deficiency is that it has been linked to lower intelligence as measured by IQ. Most countries take measures in the form of monitoring and supplementation of iodine levels. The Iodine Global Network (IGN) has pushed for table salt iodization for decades, devoting its attention to the countries with the greatest difficulty in this regard.

Russia's special iodine deficiency problem

Russia had always struggled with mostly "mild" iodine deficiency because of its geography; although the country has northern and eastern ocean coasts, most Russians live in its huge iodine-poor interior. In addition, Russia's cold climate increases the need for thyroid hormone production. While the USSR existed, the Eastern European SSRs probably furnished most of the country's supply of iodine, perhaps one of their key reasons for wanting independence! Today, the Russian Federation experiences increased hardship.

According to Russian researchers Alferova et al. (2019), "iodine deficiency of mild severity was noted" in the Russian Federation; median urine iodine concentrations (UIC) ranged from 65.8 mcg/L in the Republic of Dagestan to 100.0 mcg/L in the Perm Region. These numbers clustered near the lower number; Moscow's median was 67.0 mcg/L, and St. Petersburg's levels range from 66.0 to 86.0 mcg/L, for instance. On the other hand, Ukraine's median UIC was 169 mcg/L, and Belarus' was 191 mcg/L. These numbers contrast with the WHO UIC measurements, which were 50 mcg/L for Ukraine and 54 mcg/L for Belarus (de Benoist et al., 2004), however.

What Russia's citizens have done to cope with this problem, scientifically, politically, and legally

In the 1950s, what was then the USSR set up a Ministry of Health Ordinance “On Improvement of Measures to Fight Endemic Goiter”, which regulated the mining and distribution of iodine as well as monitoring of goiter on a regional basis, reducing goiter to 5% of the population by 1970. Ukraine, with its rich iodine source in the Sea of Azov, was part of the USSR then, which might have contributed to this success. However, after this milestone was reached, enforcement became lax and iodine deficiency increased. As more sophisticated measures of iodine deficiency prevailed, the condition was observed to be very widespread, especially in the rural interior; even the big cities were affected. This became a much bigger problem after the USSR was broken up, dismantling its bureaucracy, some of which dealt with the iodine deficiency problem, according to International Council for the Control of Iodine Deficiency Disorders (ICCIDD) Regional Coordinator for Eastern Europe and Central Asia Gregory Gerasimov (2008).

After persistent lobbying, Gerasimov (2019) and the IGN were able to persuade lawmakers to propose a new bill that would require table salt "to be fortified with iodine, and milk would be required to be fortified with vitamins A and D." Gerasimov notes that iodine deficiency is a special problem for mothers and newborns, and that efforts to push salt iodization were met with resistance from pharmaceutical companies selling iodine tablets. He argues in favor a Universal Salt Iodization (USI) program, which has been legally required in some countries for at least several years. Dold et al. (2018) performed a USI clinical trial with sites in China, the Philippines, and Croatia and concluded that the program was a success in bringing population iodine to healthy levels. However, it appears that the law was never enacted in the Russian Federation.

Russia has sophisticated iodine-mining capabilities, but has had to go to the northern ocean coast, in Arkhangelsk, to mine iodine; the country is just winding up a 20-year project there which will start recover iodine soon (Investment Portal of the Arctic, 2024). However, it would be a much easier process to harvest iodine-rich laminaria, a type of seaweed, from the Sea of Azov, situated between Ukraine and Russia. Ukraine apparently has much less capability in that respect and has not been able to mine laminaria to meet its iodine needs (Leskiv, 2020), although it has clearly been doing better than Russia has (at least according to Russian sources). There, on the northern shores of this sea, was a great deal of Ukraine-Russian fighting. Of course, Russia's seizing the Crimean Peninsula would also have been advantageous, claiming a small part of that shore.

Putin's choice: a military one

On October 1, 2022, according to aljazeera.com, Putin announced that referendums would be held in the partially militarily controlled Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Lukansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhia, leading to confirmation of these regions being incorporated in Russia. Crimea is already part of Russia; these regions cover all of the Ukrainian lands on the northern shore of the Sea of Azov. This would seal Russia's control of this body of water, and therefore access to its laminaria. However, fighting continued in this area.

U.S. President Donald Trump eventually persuaded Putin to meet for negotiations in person. As of August 9, 2025, Putin proposed a compromise deal of taking control of Donetsk and Luhansk, the two disputed territories closest to Russia, in return for two Russian territories, i.e., Kharkiv and Sumy oblasts (Sorokin, 2025), in the northeastern part of Ukraine. Because of the loss of Sea of Azov territory, Ukraine's rejection of the plan would be understandable, while the U.S., apparently unaware of the iodine issue, would be likely to regard it as an even trade. The meeting in Alaska on August 15 did not yield any results. Bombing of Ukraine stepped up afterwards, and Russia holds most of the Sea of Azov border lands anyway.

One sobering thought: maybe Putin just wants this little piece of Ukraine. Or, on the other hand, after strengthening Russia with laminaria-furnished iodine, he might be emboldened to advance westward. After all, Russian drones have recently dropped bombs on Poland, as of Sept. 9, 2025. In late September, Russian planes were seen in Estonian air space. It doesn't look good right now.

It is still a great evil, and a bigger challenge to the U.S. than we had anticipated

This issue has two basic aspects: 1) Russia has a real problem that we can understand, and 2) Putin has chosen to commit a great evil to resolve this problem. After waging a destructive, ruthless, war, Putin has sought to injure Ukraine further by annexing the Sea of Azov's north shore, thereby laying claim to the entire sea, and therefore all of Ukraine's precious laminaria. This, and previous claims to the Crimean Peninsula, are certain to worsen Ukraine's iodine nutrition situation significantly. If Putin breaks his promise and invades the rest of the Sea of Azov coast remaining to Ukraine, Ukraine will suffer a devastating iodine deficiency problem. This is quite likely why Zelenskyy is putting up persistent resistance.

Alas, because the rest of the world seems oblivious to the iodine issue specific to this war, it will almost certainly agree to Ukraine being sacrificed. Worse yet, this is unlikely to produce enough iodine to meet Russia's needs. What will happen then?

Lessons to learn from Ukraine's experience

History has shown that young democratic republics face special challenges and often do not survive. Crime and corruption arise as their governments struggle to form, especially if they fail to write effective constitutions; all too often, citizens turn to autocratic rulers to control internal rebellions. Invasions and infiltrations, such as coups d'etat, by neighboring countries, not necessarily with autocratic rule, are also frequent threats. These new republics need the support of older, more stable republics, such as that that the U.S. provided Germany after World War II (but not before). Ukraine has had an additional vulnerability, having been persuaded to give up its nuclear arsenal by idealistic allies who in exchange made promises that were unfair to their citizens and ineffective in the end.

On the other hand, we have seen the U.S. survive serious threats, just some of which appear to be the psy ops of hostile autocratic countries. What is special about our constitution is 1) the balance of powers, 2) presidential term limits, 3) the special character of presidential executive orders, i.e., subject to change by subsequent presidential administrations, and 4) the combination of presidential immunity to prosecution and the impeachment option, all of which go far to allow the President to carry out the duties of office, including solving major problems, without continual harassment by political opponents and yet without dictatorial power.