LEXINGTON, Ky. 9EX 18) — With the tension and invasion in Ukraine, there are reasons we should pay attention because of what it could mean in the United States.
Experts say we could start to feel impacts on Thursday, but there's the potential for more issues down the road.
"Russia had been preparing to launch these attacks for several months and had been building up forces in the region and threatening Ukraine," said Dr. Robert Farley, a senior lecturer at the Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce at the University of Kentucky.
While the invasion is a direct issue Russia has with Ukraine, other countries like the U.S. could feel some impact.
"There's going to be an economic impact," Farley said. "And that's true whether or not we put sanctions on Russia because this is just going to be disruptive to energy supplies. Every time energy supplies get disrupted, gas prices go up in the United States."
He says any time there is a form of international disruption, it sparks a panic. Once sparked, that's when we start to see prices increase.
"I think the longer-term effects may take several years to play out," he said. "We may see changes in how energy exploration is done and energy production is done in Eastern Kentucky."
There have been reports the U.S. is preparing for the possibility of a cyberattack, which would be a form of retaliation from Russia for the U.S. support of Ukraine.
"We could see an increase in things like cyber hostage-taking, where especially hospitals have been victimized by this," he said. "There have been ransomware and so forth."
Farley says there is more to that.
"How seriously we should take all that is a different question because the United States has some pretty formidable cyber capabilities and Russia may not want to really tease out what those capabilities could do in a crisis, he said.
