The key dynamics of the magnetotail have been
researched for decades and have been associated with either
three-dimensional (3-D) plasma instabilities and/or magnetic
reconnection. We apply a global hybrid-Vlasov code, Vlasiator, to simulate reconnection self-consistently in the ion kinetic scales in the noon–midnight meridional plane, including both dayside and nightside reconnection regions within
the same simulation box. Our simulation represents a numerical experiment, which turns off the 3-D instabilities but
models ion-scale reconnection physically accurately in 2-D.
We demonstrate that many known tail dynamics are present
in the simulation without a full description of 3-D instabilities or without the detailed description of the electrons. While
multiple reconnection sites can coexist in the plasma sheet,
one reconnection point can start a global reconfiguration process, in which magnetic field lines become detached and a
plasmoid is released. As the simulation run features temporally steady solar wind input, this global reconfiguration is
not associated with sudden changes in the solar wind. Further, we show that lobe density variations originating from
dayside reconnection may play an important role in stabilising tail reconnection.