Analysis

This listing contains all the analytical materials posted on the Russia Matters website. These include: RM Exclusives, commissioned by Russia Matters exclusively for this website; Recommended Reads, deemed particularly noteworthy by our editorial team; Partner Posts, originally published by our partners elsewhere; and Future Policy Leaders, pieces by promising young scholars and policy thinkers. Content can be filtered by genre and subject-specific criteria and is updated often. Gradually we will be adding older Recommended Reads and Partner Posts dating back as far as 2011.
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Biden-Putin Call Solves Nothing, US Signals ‘Deterrence by Punishment’

Nikolas K. Gvosdev December 09, 2021 RM Exclusives
The call guarantees that the Biden administration is going to have to devote more attention and time to Moscow in 2022.
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Russia, the United States and the Counterrevolutionaries: A Trilateral Chess Match in the Middle East

Jon Hoffman July 21, 2021 RM Exclusives
Russia's return to the Middle East must be assessed from the perspective of regional actors, namely how they seek to use competition between Moscow and Washington for their own strategic benefit, our latest exclusive argues.
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Macron’s Dialogue With Russia: A French Attempt to Fix the European Security Architecture

Juliette Faure May 12, 2021 RM Exclusives
While Macron has attempted to shape Europe’s strategic autonomy in the management of its eastern neighborhood, lack of support from the EU has impeded the success of this policy, as has Russian behavior throughout 2020.
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Russia and Collective Security: Why CSTO Is No Match for Warsaw Pact

Dmitry Gorenburg May 27, 2020 RM Exclusives
The CSTO is too organizationally weak and insufficiently integrated to serve as a capability multiplier for its members, and the weakness of other member states' military forces make them of limited value to Russia as military allies.
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Acknowledging Policy Shortcomings Is First Step to Solving America’s Russia Problem

Paul Saunders March 12, 2020 RM Exclusives
America’s government and its foreign policy elites need to make a greater effort to develop effective policies toward countries in regions where rival great powers—China and Russia—have greater capabilities and/or resolve to advance their goals.
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Military Assets in the Arctic: A Russia-West Correlation of Forces

Mathieu Boulegue January 22, 2020 RM Exclusives
Should military tension in the region grow, overall military deployments would largely play in Moscow’s favor in the European Arctic and in Washington’s in the Pacific Arctic.
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Alternative History: Would Russia in NATO and EU Be Game Changer in West’s Rivalry With China?

Simon Saradzhyan November 20, 2019 RM Exclusives
Quantitative measurements show that while Russia’s decision to align with the West rather than with China might not have been a game changer, it would have diminished the latter’s might vis-à-vis the West.
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Ukraine and NATO: Disconnect Between State Policy and Public Opinion Is Less Dangerous Than Russia

Daniel Shapiro May 09, 2019 RM Exclusives
Governments in plenty of countries have pushed through major foreign policy initiatives such as NATO entry despite formidable opposition among their citizens. This doesn’t necessarily mean Ukraine should do the same.
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5 Years Since Russia’s Intervention in Ukraine: Has Putin’s Gamble Paid Off?

Simon Saradzhyan March 14, 2019 RM Exclusives
The author analyzes the costs and benefits for Russia, finding that the intervention advanced one vital national interest and damaged several others. The costs have been manageable so far, but may eventually become prohibitive.
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Trump-Putin G20 Summit: High Stakes and Strained Dialogue

Matthew Rojansky November 28, 2018 RM Exclusives
As high-level U.S.-Russian contacts are again plagued by deep disagreement, both sides face a list of urgent global security challenges that can be managed only through dialogue.
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With Russia and the US, Nuclear Risks Never Go Out of Vogue

Jon B. Wolfsthal November 08, 2018 RM Exclusives
Thirty-five years after Able Archer, the lack of sustained, high-level engagement with Russia risks once again putting America and its allies at unnecessary risk of a nuclear conflict no one wants or even expects.
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NATO’s Trident Juncture Exercise as a Deterrence Signal to Russia

Dmitry Gorenburg November 01, 2018 RM Exclusives
The military lessons for the exercise’s participants promise to be significant, while the immediate political impact will be minor. Russia’s main worry? A permanent U.S. troop deployment in eastern Europe.
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