KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Tensions between Russia and Ukraine escalated to a full-scale invasion early Thursday morning.
Russian leader Vladimir Putin claims the action is to assist Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine, but a foreign policy expert at the University of Tennessee said Putin’s aggression is simply a power grab.
“This is really about great power politics,” Dr. Krista Wiegand said, the director of the Global Security Center in the Baker Center for Foreign Policy at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. “This is about NATO… the U.S. … and about how Ukraine has been moving increasingly toward NATO and the pro-western side, anti-Russian side... it's already been starting to be another Cold War with Russia.”
The military tension between the two nations is having a ripple effect on the economy in the U.S. and East Tennessee.
The Director of Energy and Environment at the University of Tennessee said the rising gas prices are a direct result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“We in the United States don't get a lot of oil and natural gas from Russia, but Europe does,” Charles Sims explained. “And because Europe as a whole is a big consumer of oil and natural gas - when a shortage happens there - we feel it here in the United States.”
The average price for a gallon of gas in the U.S. is about $3.50, which is a 50 cent hike from the price just 2 weeks ago in mid-February
“Prices are going to go up because of what's happening in Europe, but they can also go up because of panic buying here in the United States,” Sims said. “If all of our neighbors go out and try to buy gasoline now, anticipating that gas is going to go up, it's not going to do much to shield you. It's going to be maybe get you through another week.”
Sims added on top of the panic buying and the military hostility in Ukraine, there is also the issue of domestic inflation.
“We've seen rising prices over the past couple of years because of supply shortages and issues that are kind of lingering effects of the pandemic,” Sims said. “(Gas prices) may turn back down in the latter half of the summer, but a lot of that depends on what happens with the situation in Europe.”
According to Sims, gas prices could go up to $4.00 a gallon in the next several weeks.