This Week’s Highlights

• U.S. President Joe Biden can set clear priorities early by scrapping the last administration’s self-fulfilling construct of “great-power competition,” writes Stephen Wertheim, deputy director of research and policy at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. In Europe, Biden should call a halt to NATO enlargement, Wertheim suggests. Through prudent retrenchment, the United States can coexist with China and Russia and find the right mix of competition and cooperation as U.S. interests dictate. The alternative, he writes, is to spend the rest of the twenty-first century guaranteeing conflictual relations, risking great-power war and crowding out domestic investments. Stephen Kinzer of the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs writes that in past eras, countries could fight their way to security. In today's America, shaped by a health crisis, deep social injustice and intense political anger, that is not possible. The most radical epiphany President Biden could have, according to Kinzer, is that national security starts at home.
• U.S.-Russian bilateral nuclear risk reduction efforts have produced successes in the past, but those efforts are now fading and failing, writes Alexandra Bell, senior director at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation and Council, appointed Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in the Bureau of Arms Control, Verification and Compliance. Should the United States want to continue to reduce nuclear threats in the 21st century, Bell writes, it has no choice but to engage in a reinvigoration of nuclear policy dialogue and cooperative activities with Russia. Former California Gov. Jerry Brown, former U.S. Secretary of Defense William J. Perry and Prof. David Holloway write that Russia today is an essential partner in managing the global nuclear order—in spite of the hostile relations between our two countries. The United States must deal with Russia as it is, not as we wish it to be. This means engagement and diplomacy on the issue that threatens all of humanity, they write.  
• Though Moscow’s stance on Iran’s regional activities might be ambivalent, Russian competition with Iran in Syria, as well as their military-defense cooperation, will afford Washington limited opportunities to rely on Russian leverage-plays with Tehran, particularly if other dimensions of the U.S.-Russia relationship will become less hostile, write Hanna Notte and Hamidreza Azizi, a senior non-resident scholar with the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies and an Alexander von Humboldt fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs.
• Instead of maintaining the current U.S. strategy in Syria, the Biden team, with its newfound emphasis on diplomacy, should rely more heavily on Russia and Turkey, argues Robert S. Ford, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute. Better to let Russia and Turkey secure their national interests by taking on the anti-ISIS burden. Ultimately, Ford writes, such bargains are the essence of diplomacy—working on specific problems, even with unsavory partners, to achieve limited but mutual goals. 
• Analysts say a Kremlin crackdown on protests across Russia risks following Belarus’ Lukashenko in stoking popular discontent, the Financial Times reports. According to Alexei Zakharov, who led volunteers from a monitoring group in conducting 359 interviews in Moscow, 42 percent of those who attended the weekend protests had never attended a protest before, while nearly half of them were women. Carnegie Moscow Center’s Alexander Baunov writes that Saturday’s protests were undeniably anti-regime, anti-elite and anti-corruption, but not necessarily liberal, pro-Western, and pro-democracy. A combined imperative of freedom, order and justice is at least as evident as classical liberal and democratic values. It’s not surprising that such protests frighten not only the regime, Baunov writes, but also successful members of society: even those who do not consider themselves supporters of the Kremlin. Prof. Michael Kimmage, meanwhile, advises the Biden administration to acknowledge that the fate of Russia’s domestic politics lies in Russians’ hands. Biden administration policy should be focused on the foreign-policy fallout from the Navalny-Putin duel, among which the likely consequence is a deteriorating U.S.-Russian relationship, Kimmage warns.
• Germany’s energy sovereignty is undermined by U.S. sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, writes Kirsten Westphal of SWP. The newly emerged reality of U.S. energy self-sufficiency and abundance has deprived the U.S.-EU energy alliance of its essential foundations, according to Westphal.   

 

I. U.S. and Russian priorities for the bilateral agenda

Nuclear security:

• No significant developments.

North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs:

• No significant developments.

Iran and its nuclear program:

“Can Russia Help Biden Get a Comprehensive Agreement with Iran?” Hanna Notte and Hamidreza Azizi, The National Interest, 01.19.21. The authors, a senior non-resident scholar with the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies and an Alexander von Humboldt fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, write:

• “Assuming that the Iran file could be a ‘low-hanging fruit’ for cooperation in an otherwise strained U.S.-Russian relationship ignores Moscow’s ambivalent attitude toward Iran’s proxy activities and missile program.”
• “For the most part, Russia does not view Iran’s cultivation of proxy actors in Arab societies … as a threat to its own interests. And where its views are more nuanced, as in Syria, Russia’s record of being able to rein in the Iranians is mixed at best.”
• “The only exception to Russia’s reluctance in reining in Iran’s influence might be Syria, where Tehran’s attempts to establish a network of allied local militias and import foreign proxies have been at odds with Moscow’s desire to form unified, Russia-oriented military and security structures.”
• “As for the Iranian missile program, Moscow has consistently defended Tehran’s right to develop and test missiles, emphasizing that such activities do not violate international regulations and are intended to mitigate Iran’s sense of insecurity. … A broader reason for Russia’s ambivalent stance on Iran’s missiles and proxy activities is that the conflict potential they generate can play into Russia’s hands—as long as it does not precipitate full-blown war.”
• “Though Moscow’s stance on Iran’s regional activities might be ambivalent, Russian competition with Iran in Syria, as well as their military-defense cooperation, will afford Washington limited opportunities to rely on Russian leverage-plays with Tehran—particularly if other dimensions of the U.S.-Russia relationship will become less hostile. Still, Biden’s diplomats should go to Moscow with their eyes wide open to the constraints in getting it to act against Tehran.”

“The Lessons of the Past Point to Rejoining the Iran Deal,” Nicholas L. Miller, War on the Rocks, 01.21.21. The author, an assistant professor in the Department of Government at Dartmouth College, writes:

• “All of the main objections to rejoining the deal echo the logics that led to failures in the past. … [C]ritics of the Iran deal charge that it is too weak—because of its sunset provisions and because it doesn’t address Iranian missiles or regional behavior. … But much like the Agreed Framework, the Iran deal was quite effective at achieving its purpose: verifiably rolling back Iran’s nuclear program such that the United States could be confident it would detect and have time to respond to any Iranian cheating before it could cross the nuclear threshold.”
• “A second objection to rejoining the Iran deal relates to the revelations that have emerged from the ‘nuclear archive’ … The International Atomic Energy Agency has been investigating sites revealed by the archive but so far no evidence of an active nuclear weapons program has emerged. … The Biden administration should encourage Iran to cooperate with International Atomic Energy Agency investigations but should not hold all diplomacy hostage to a full accounting of Iran’s past.”
• “A final objection to rejoining the Iran deal is that it relieves the economic pressure that might otherwise lead to rebellion and regime change in Iran. But it is reckless to assume this would serve U.S. interests. … [A] new Iranian regime would not guarantee a pro-Western government or a new nuclear policy. It is often forgotten that Iran’s nuclear weapons ambitions began under the Shah, a staunch ally of the United States.”
• “The Biden administration’s efforts to resuscitate the Iran deal are sure to arouse controversy both at home and abroad. But it is a prudent strategy informed by history and the limits of U.S. power. Continuing on the current course risks repeating the costly failures of the past.”

“Iran Wants the Nuclear Deal It Made. Don’t Ask Tehran to Meet New Demands,” Mohammad Javad Zarif, Foreign Affairs, 01.22.21. The author, Iran’s foreign minister, writes:

• “U.S. President Joe Biden can choose a better path by ending Trump’s failed policy of ‘maximum pressure’ and returning to the deal his predecessor abandoned. If he does, Iran will likewise return to full implementation of our commitments under the nuclear deal. But if Washington instead insists on extracting concessions, then this opportunity will be lost.”
• “The administration should begin by unconditionally removing, with full effect, all sanctions imposed, reimposed or relabeled since Trump took office. In turn, Iran would reverse all the remedial measures it has taken in the wake of Trump’s withdrawal from the nuclear deal. The remaining signatories to the deal would then decide whether the United States should be allowed to reclaim the seat at the table that it abandoned in 2018. … That return to the table will be jeopardized if Washington or its EU allies demand new terms for a deal that was already carefully constructed through years of negotiations.”
• “Separate from the nuclear issue, Iran has always been willing to discuss the problems plaguing our region. But the peoples of the region, not outsiders, must resolve these issues. Neither the United States nor its European allies have the prerogative to lead or sponsor future talks.”
• “We in the region are capable of addressing our own problems, provided that outsiders do not act as spoilers for short-term dividends or to abet the agendas of unscrupulous clients.”
• “The window of opportunity for the new U.S. administration will not be open forever. The initiative squarely rests with Washington. The Biden administration’s first step ought to be to seek to redress—rather than attempt to exploit—Trump’s dangerous legacy of maximum failure. … Doing so will open new possibilities for peace and stability in our region.”

Great Power rivalry/New Cold War/saber rattling:

“Biden's Same Old Foreign Policy,” Stephen Kinzer, The Boston Globe, 01.21.21. The author, a senior fellow at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University, writes:

• “During his [Biden’s] administration, from all appearances, the United States will continue trying to run the world. Hegemony is a powerfully addictive drug. … The new president, and most of the men and women he has chosen to direct American diplomacy over the next four years, are Obama-era retreads, bred in the tradition of limitless American ambition and power. The world has changed dramatically since they were ousted four years ago, but few of them seem to have changed their view of it.”
• “In order to pay for our urgent domestic needs, and to stop creating more enemies abroad, the Biden administration should rethink American foreign policy as thoroughly as it rethinks domestic policy. … We should stop taking sides in foreign conflicts. The most obvious place to start would be the Middle East. … We could do the same in Europe. …Instead of resisting the idea of ‘strategic autonomy’ for Europe—meaning that Europe would make its own security choices rather than following American guidance—we should embrace it. … If that means closer relations between Europe and Russia, fine—we needn't see everything that's good for others as bad for us.”
• “In these regions, as well as in Africa and Latin America, the United States should stop trying to impose our America-centric vision. That leaves just one glaring challenge: China.”
• “America can keep pace with a rapidly rising China only by creating a society that is as healthy, well-educated and prosperous as China's. Submarines and aircraft carriers won't suffice. … In past eras, countries could fight their way to security. In today's America, shaped by a health crisis, deep social injustice and intense political anger, that is not possible. The most radical epiphany President Biden could have is that national security starts at home.”

“Beijing Fills the Mideast Vacuum,” Robert D. Kaplan, Wall Street Journal, 01.21.21. The author, the Robert Strausz-Hupé chair in geopolitics at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, writes:

• “The Biden administration's Middle East policy will reportedly focus on rejoining the Iran nuclear deal and renewing Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. This could undermine key allies in Israel and Saudi Arabia while ignoring a core geopolitical challenge that few in Washington are addressing: growing Chinese influence in the Middle East.”
• “While there are plenty of tragedies in what has transpired in Iraq and Afghanistan, using them as an excuse to turn away from the Middle East altogether would invite yet another tragedy: a great-power imbalance of such magnitude that it could fatally weaken America's position vis-a-vis Russia as well as China. Russia is upgrading its military bases in Syria and establishing a naval logistics center in Sudan on the Red Sea, the vital link between the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean.”
• “The U.S. has many clear interests in the Middle East. Among these are ensuring the security of Israel and other regional allies, thwarting Iran or any other Islamic autocracy from developing nuclear weapons, and protecting the maritime choke points for the sake of world trade and access to hydrocarbons. Pursuing and defending these interests will prevent China from dominating the Afro-Eurasian World-Island.”
• “The Biden team doesn't seem to realize that the Indo-Pacific encompasses the maritime Middle East, and containing China requires a sturdy presence in the region. Presidents from Franklin D. Roosevelt through George H.W. Bush managed a deep and abiding commitment to the Middle East without embarking on endless wars. The U.S. can do so again.”

“Delusions of Dominance. Biden Can’t Restore American Primacy—and Shouldn’t Try,” Stephen Wertheim, Foreign Affairs, 01.21.21. The author, deputy director of research and policy at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, writes:

• “It will be more difficult for the Biden administration to exhibit restraint in relations with Russia and especially China. It will also be more important, lest the failures of U.S. policy that have afflicted the Middle East over the past two decades expand to Europe and East Asia in the next two decades. Biden has already signaled a desire to work with Beijing on public health and the environment and with Moscow on arms control. But these laudatory aims will ultimately be overwhelmed by rigid adherence to grand-strategic primacy, by which the United States, seeking to dominate each region permanently, fuels intense security competition with rising or assertive powers.”
• “Biden can set clear priorities early by scrapping the last administration’s self-fulfilling construct of ‘great-power competition.’ His first National Security Strategy should recognize that pandemic disease and climate change constitute far more direct threats to the American public than does the specter of armed attack by rival states.”
• “In order to limit antagonisms counterproductive to U.S. interests, Biden should resist growing calls to commit explicitly to waging war with China to defend Taiwan. He should proceed to revamp U.S. military strategy in East Asia. Rather than exercise dominance, the United States should equip its allies and partners to deny dominance of waterways and airspace to China.”
• “In Europe, he should call a halt to NATO enlargement … Through prudent retrenchment, the United States can coexist with China and Russia and find the right mix of competition and cooperation as U.S. interests dictate. The alternative is to spend the rest of the twenty-first century guaranteeing conflictual relations, risking great-power war and crowding out domestic investments.”

“Joe Biden’s US Must Act Like a New Leader, Not a Returning One,” Anne-Marie Slaughter, Financial Times, 01.22.21. The author, president of New America, writes:

• “Step one, as Mr. Biden acknowledged, is ‘to repair our alliances and engage with the world once again.’ He began making good on this promise with a flurry of executive orders: rejoining the Paris climate agreement and the World Health Organization, and seeking a five-year extension of an important U.S.-Russian arms control treaty.”
• “Mr. Biden should thus move quickly to accept European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen’s proposal for ‘a new transatlantic agenda.’
• “Mr. Biden should fast-track negotiations for a U.S.-EU agreement that should cover not only trade and investment issues, but also deep cooperation on going green, a shared commitment to racial and gender justice and a framework for governing the digital world. Many countries, led by China and Russia, are proclaiming their digital sovereignty, creating a splinternet. If the U.S. and the EU could agree on common rules and norms for an open and secure internet that safeguards digital rights, they would lay the foundation for a new 21st-century order.”
• “Finally, Mr. Biden should prioritize global issues over great power competition.”
• “If history is any guide, no matter what priorities Mr. Biden sets, the world will get in the way. North Korea could launch a missile; Vladimir Putin could create a crisis to distract Russians from Alexei Navalny’s anti-corruption drive; China can and will tighten the vice on Hong Kong. The Middle East is still full of surprises, and Venezuela is becoming a failed state. When the crisis comes, Mr. Biden will respond with strength and competence. In setting his own course, however, he must pick his shots.”

“Outside Powers Are Making the Conflict in the Central African Republic Worse,” John A. Lechner and Alexandra Lamarche, Foreign Policy, 01.22.21. The authors, a graduate student at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and Refugees International’s senior advocate for West and Central Africa, write:

• “Just days before the elections, CAR[Central African Republic]’s constitutional court invalidated former President François Bozizé’s candidacy, leading to the sudden emergence of a rebel alliance that quickly captured towns near Bangui. The military response from Russia and Rwanda on behalf of the Central African government rapidly internationalized the conflict, while the G5—composed of the African Union, United Nations, European Union, United States and France—finds itself in an awkward position, championing elections that many believe were neither safe nor fair. Touadéra has declared war on the rebel alliance, but many question whether his government represents all Central Africans, and if it has the ability or willingness to take on armed groups.”
• “As a result, the conflict in CAR has become increasingly geopolitical—with France and Chad on one side, and Russia and Rwanda on the other. These actors will only intensify a crisis of overmilitarization in a region suffering from the effects of climate change, instability, lack of good governance and displacement.”
• “An international response … should prioritize Central African civilians first. … First, concerned governments and donors must address the country’s humanitarian needs; CAR received only 65 percent of its funding needs in 2020, and 51 percent of its COVID-19 related funding needs. … The second priority must be reform. After so many failed attempts at peace, the reality remains that territorial integrity is crucial for CAR’s stability.”

NATO-Russia relations:

• No significant developments.

Missile defense:

• No significant developments.

Nuclear arms control:

“Russia’s Impact on US National Interests: Preventing Nuclear War and Proliferation,” Alexandra Bell, Russia Matters, 01.21.21. The author, incoming deputy assistant secretary of state for arms control in the Biden administration, writes:

• “Understanding the potentially apocalyptic consequences of nuclear war, it is clearly in the national security interest of the United States to reduce nuclear risks. This necessitates a multilayered effort to slow the spread of nuclear weapons and technologies, reduce nuclear stockpiles, secure nuclear materials and prevent the proliferation of delivery systems for nuclear weapons. None of these efforts can be truly successful without the help and cooperation of the Russian Federation.”
• “U.S.-Russian bilateral nuclear risk reduction efforts have produced successes in the past, but those efforts are now fading and failing. Should the United States want to continue to reduce nuclear threats in the 21st century, it has no choice but to engage in a reinvigoration of nuclear policy dialogue and cooperative activities with Russia.” 
• “Nuclear tensions between the United States and Russia, and around the world, are now at the highest levels seen since the end of the Cold War. These conditions mandate that the United States take a leadership role in stabilizing the situation. … Beyond nuclear arms control and nonproliferation discussions, the United States should press Russia to expand cooperation to contend with conventional arms control challenges like the very likely collapse of the Open Skies Treaty.”
• “Incoming U.S. President Joe Biden has long supported nuclear risk reduction measures and it is likely that his team has already considered the initial pressing challenges and how to confront them. All of the new U.S. administration’s policy goals in this space will unavoidably be impacted by Russia. … The same, of course, is true in the reverse.”
• “With a renewed acknowledgement of the stakes, a stabilization of remaining structures and a commitment to substantive dialogue and adequate resources, the United States, working with Russia, can achieve its goal of reducing nuclear risks for themselves and the world.”

“Our Advice to President-Elect Biden: Break the Dangerous Pattern of Nuclear Competition With Russia,” Jerry Brown, William J. Perry, and David Holloway, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. 01.18.21. The authors, a former governor of California, a former secretary of defense and a professor of international history at Stanford University, write:

• “As with the Soviet Union during the Cold War, Russia today is an essential partner in managing the global nuclear order—in spite of the hostile relations between our two countries.”
• “In light of this, your announced intention to extend New START, which will otherwise expire on Feb. 5, is absolutely the right step to take. It will enhance the predictability of our strategic relationship with Russia and provide time for negotiating new agreements or understandings with Russia—and ideally with China, too. Revival of the Iran nuclear deal is also a vitally important goal to pursue.”
• “It’s long past time that we honestly confront the addictive and self-reinforcing quality of our current tit-for-tat relationship with Russia—one that perpetuates ever-higher nuclear spending and ever-higher levels of danger. Each nuclear ratchet upward by one country provokes a reciprocal nuclear response.”
• “The United States must deal with Russia as it is, not as we wish it to be. This means engagement and diplomacy on the issue that threatens all of humanity. Article VI of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty requires Russia and the United States to ‘pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date.’ Too often, and especially in recent years, we have blatantly shunned this obligation—in part, because of actions Russia has taken that we Americans find unacceptable. But that is not what the treaty permits, and it is not what makes sense.”
• “In this current state of dismal relations, dialogue is not a reward or an exercise of naivete; it is an imperative for survival. When things are bad—as they are now—is precisely the time to talk.”

Counter-terrorism:

• No significant developments.

Conflict in Syria:

“US Strategy in Syria Has Failed. Washington Must Acknowledge That It Can’t Build a State,” Robert S. Ford, Foreign Affairs, 01.25.21. The author, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, writes:

• “The Trump administration departed from its no-nation-building policy to pursue one long-shot effort—in Syria. The United States tried to use military force and financial pressure to compel Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to accept major constitutional reforms and a Kurdish autonomous zone in the country’s northeast. … After six years and roughly $2.6 billion, this statelet is America’s baby, raised under U.S. military protection and shielded from hostile neighbors. Unable to support itself, the autonomous zone will remain dependent on U.S. resources for the foreseeable future.”
• “Ostensibly, U.S. strategy in northeastern Syria is designed to mop up the last vestiges of ISIS, denying the group a safe haven from which to launch attacks. … Although politically appealing, this strategy is deeply flawed. The United States’ Syrian Kurdish allies have exacerbated long-standing regional tensions between Arabs and Kurds. … U.S. strategy has another, more fundamental defect: ISIS is not contained to the areas under U.S. and SDF control. … The current U.S. approach also lacks an achievable endgame.”
• “Instead of maintaining the current U.S. strategy, the Biden team, with its newfound emphasis on diplomacy, should rely more heavily on Russia and Turkey. Unpleasant as it sounds, acknowledging these two countries’ interests in Syria might produce better results.”
• “Russia is a far from perfect partner, but its support for Assad makes it the right force to take over the counter-ISIS fight. Moscow is committed to ensuring the Syrian government’s survival, and a resurgent ISIS … would seriously threaten Assad. To capitalize on this narrow strip of common ground, the Biden administration should strike a deal that delegates to Moscow counter-ISIS missions on both sides of the Euphrates.”
• “Better to let Russia and Turkey secure their national interests by taking on the anti-ISIS burden. Ultimately, such bargains are the essence of diplomacy—working on specific problems, even with unsavory partners, to achieve limited but mutual goals.”

Cyber security:

“Solar Winds Hack Reveals America’s Cyber Helplessness,” Claude Barfield, American Enterprise Institute/The National Interest, 01.25.21. The author, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, writes:

• “[W]hile the US has the most advanced and sophisticated intelligence and offensive cyber capabilities in the world, it is also the most vulnerable target given its extreme dependence on digital communications. Further, at this particular point in time, America is acutely defenseless against potential Russian retaliation in light of the great unknowns regarding the reach and depth of Russia’s cyber penetrations. We will not know for some time what back doors or malware may be lurking in our civilian and defense infrastructures.”
• “Second, offense in cyberspace still trumps defense—even after the expenditure of billions of dollars. The Donald Trump administration’s much-hyped ‘Defend Forward’ strategy clearly failed to detect and counter a Russian attack that went on for over a year. It was FireEye, a private security company, that uncovered the dastardly clever spy system.”
• “Third, shocked reactions and labeling the most recent Russian action an ‘act of war’ are inaccurate and hypocritical. Despite the failure of the ‘Defend Forward’ approach, we still expect U.S. intelligence agencies to penetrate and stay inside the networks of adversaries (and sometimes friends). We cannot expect Russia, China or Iran to desist when the U.S. spends huge resources to achieve the same result.”
• “Like Gulliver, the U.S. has the means to break out of its cyber binds, but we should weigh carefully the implacable trade-offs of future offensive actions.”

Elections interference:

• No significant developments.

Energy exports from CIS:

“Strategic Sovereignty in Energy Affairs. Reflections on Germany and the EU’s Ability to Act,” Kirsten Westphal, SWP, January 2021. The author, a senior associate in the Global Issues Research Division at SWP, writes:

• “Germany’s energy sovereignty is undermined by U.S. sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline. As a result, questions surrounding states’ strategic capability in energy affairs have recently become a matter of discussion, particularly in Germany … In view of today’s fundamental upheavals in international politics, especially with regard to the geostrategic U.S.-China rivalry, debates about a state’s ability to formulate its strategic interests, prioritize its actions and shape its options for energy policy are becoming increasingly important. … It is, therefore, necessary to integrate energy sovereignty into political debates on the future of sustainable and resilient energy supplies, particularly at the EU level.”
• “The developments surrounding Nord Stream 2 show how little Berlin has focused on its own interests in its external communications. The doubling of the capacity of pipelines from Russia directly to Germany to 110 billion cubic meters signifies a major strategic gain for Germany as it minimizes transit risks, strengthens the German gas market and bolsters Germany’s position as a regional gas hub and industrial nexus.”
• “Certainly, this strategic added value should have been weighed against political rifts within the EU and considered the impacts on Ukraine. Indeed, the European Commission and several Member States saw this development as undermining the goals of the EU Energy Union and inhibitive of in­dividual states’ efforts to achieve greater energy sovereignty. Germany has so far not openly addressed this conflict of interest given its strict focus on the market and legal principles.”
• “The newly emerged reality of U.S. energy self-sufficiency and abundance has deprived the [U.S.-EU energy] alliance of its essential foundations. While unlikely, if the Biden administration continues to exploit its foreign (economic) policy options, as under Trump, the divide between the EU and the U.S. will persist. Com­pared to the EU, the U.S. will remain self-sufficient and may further supplement its energy abundance by rapidly expanding renewables and by developing new tech­nol­ogies.”

U.S.-Russian economic ties:

• No significant developments.

U.S.-Russian relations in general:

“Russia’s Anti-Putin Protests Will Increase Tensions Between It and America,” Michael Kimmage, The National Interest, 01.23.21. The author, a professor and department chair of history at Catholic University of America, writes:

• “The revival of potent pro-democracy opposition to Putin after four years of Donald Trump proves an important point about U.S.-Russian relations. The United States is not the tail wagging the Russian dog. … The United States is not the key reference point for Russian politics. The democracy promoters of the Obama administration did not get Russian democracy. The autocracy promoters of the Trump administration did not get a smoothly functioning Russian autocracy.”
• “This reality should encourage a certain humility in the Biden administration or it should encourage the acknowledgement that the fate of Russia’s domestic politics lies in Russians’ hands. Biden administration policy should be focused on the foreign-policy fallout from the Navalny-Putin duel, among which the likely consequence is a deteriorating U.S.-Russian relationship.”
• “The Biden administration has every right to affirm democratic values internationally. It can state its preference for free elections in Russia, request that Navalny be given a fair trial and argue that Russians should be able to protest without police interference. It should watch its own rhetoric carefully, however, and not give the impression that the United States can guarantee Russians’ rights, which it obviously cannot. And it should not explicitly back Navalny because there is no meaningful way of doing so without adhering to the logic of regime change. Russia is no less a nuclear power in 2021 than it was on the eve of the Cuban Missile Crisis.”
• “Most importantly, the Biden administration should be strategic in relation to Ukraine and Belarus. … President Biden has already dismissed the idea of a reset with Russia: Russian and American diplomats will not make the peace if a crisis unfolds in Belarus, and neither side would want to go to war. The West can better its position in these unsteady times by depriving Putin of his one great advantage in Ukraine in 2014, which was not military but psychological. This was the element of surprise.”

“President Biden Is Starting on the Right Foot With Russia,” Editorial Board, The Washington Post, 01.23.21. The news outlet’s editorial board writes:

• “Biden’s opening moves to deal with Russia incorporate valuable lessons from the Cold War: that it is possible to engage Moscow when it's in the interests of the United States while continuing to unreservedly question and confront behavior that is adversarial and harmful. These multiple tracks promise to bring common sense back into U.S. policy after four years of mystery and incoherence at the highest level.”
• “Mr. Biden announced that the United States will propose to Russia a five-year extension of the New START accord limiting strategic nuclear weapons, which expires Feb. 5 and has a provision for such an extension … Mr. Biden should not fail to take advantage of the five-year extension to take stock of future threats, both nuclear and conventional, from Russia, China and elsewhere. Where it is in the interests of the United States, he ought to look for new arms control opportunities.”
• “The president also ordered an intelligence assessment on four nettlesome aspects of Russian behavior: the recent SolarWinds cyber breach, interference in the 2020 election, the use of chemical weapons against opposition leader Alexei Navalny and reports that Russia placed bounties on U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan. The intelligence assessment will give Mr. Biden a chance to hold Mr. Putin and his government to account where necessary, and to protest in the strongest terms where appropriate. Each of these episodes demands a stronger U.S. response than Mr. Trump provided.”
• “Mr. Biden is starting on the right foot, announcing from the outset that he is prepared to engage on important business but also that he will not flinch at Mr. Putin's unpleasant and dark arts.”

 

II. Russia’s domestic policies

Domestic politics, economy and energy:

“The New Face of Russian Protest,” Alexander Baunov, Carnegie Moscow Center, 01.25.21. The author, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Moscow Center and editor in chief of Carnegie.ru, writes:

• “The protests that took place across Russia on Saturday [Jan. 23] were not like the local movements seen in recent times … Instead of several different causes, which make the opposition agenda appear incoherent, the latest protests were all united by the same cause: opposition to the ruling regime, and support for the jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny.”
• “Unlike the protests that followed the murder of the opposition politician Boris Nemtsov in 2015, Saturday’s Moscow rally was not dominated by representatives of the capital’s liberal intelligentsia. … There is no sociological data on Saturday’s protests yet, but predictions that they would be led largely by very young people appear to have been wrong. In addition, the most militant protesters didn’t look like the typical supporters of pro-democracy protests in Moscow. … Most likely they are people who work in the service sector or office jobs, and who are dissatisfied with their jobs, their salaries and their prospects.”
• “The West’s position on the latest protests is far more active than in previous years, which only adds to the public and private fears of the Russian regime and some ordinary Russians. … Navalny has become Russia’s second voice abroad after Putin’s—and a politician on a global scale—and Western statements correspond to this new reality.”
• “The Joe Biden administration in the United States, for example, has said that it will ‘stand shoulder to shoulder with our allies and partners in defense of human rights.’ It follows that Biden’s partner in Russia is not Putin but Navalny; that Navalny is an ally in the battle against Putin.”
• “Saturday’s protests were undeniably anti-regime, anti-elite, and anti-corruption, but not necessarily liberal, pro-Western and pro-democracy. … In response, the state will attempt to delegitimize the protesters by playing on the ideas that they are violent and that they have backing from sponsors abroad. … [P]rotests can go on like that for many long months, in the hope of events that will break the stalemate. For now, time is on the side of the regime—but not indefinitely.”

“Don’t Look for Political Logic in the Kremlin’s Treatment of Navalny,” Tatiana Stanovaya, Carnegie Moscow Center, 01.20.21. The author, a nonresident scholar at the Carnegie Moscow Center, writes:

• “There are three main schools of thought about Navalny within the Russian leadership. … The first (and by far the most powerful) is the simple, hardline approach of the siloviki, the people who run Russia’s sprawling security apparatus. For them, Navalny has for a long time been a threat to Putin’s regime. But now he has become also an enemy to be demonstratively destroyed, at least politically … [T]he only way to deal with these kinds of threats is with cold-blooded, military-style operations. Such activities, by necessity, sit outside the realm of domestic politics or even the polite niceties of international affairs.”
• “There is a second school of thought in the ranks of the presidential administration team that is responsible for the country’s domestic political situation. For them, the best outcome would have been for Navalny simply to remain in Germany.”
• “The third school of thought is perhaps the most interesting—yet least influential on day-to-day policymaking. For months, representatives of various business interests, state corporations, industrial giants and banks have held out hope that the worst-case scenarios for their parochial agendas could be avoided. Even though most of those organizations are managed by people close to Putin, they generally are eager to avoid a new wave of confrontation with the West. Unfortunately for them, the Kremlin’s brute-force handling of Navalny all but guarantees that the United States and its allies will pursue policies heavy on sanctions and other forms of pressure.”
• “In the absence of meaningful resistance from within elite circles or society at large, the siloviki will be inevitably tempted to press their luck and go even further than they have with Navalny. That means a no-holds-barred approach to Navalny’s team and a further crackdown on internal threats to the regime, real or imagined.”

“Alexei Navalny Is a Real Threat to Vladimir Putin,” Gideon Rachman, Financial Times, 01.25.21. The author, chief foreign affairs columnist for the news outlet, writes:

• “Through his bravery, determination and investigative flair, Mr. Navalny has galvanized the Russian opposition. … Whether Mr. Navalny ultimately succeeds or fails, he now represents the most dangerous threat that Mr. Putin has faced in the two decades since he took power.”
• “There have been big anti-Putin demonstrations before. … But this time feels different. The current protests have taken place in more than 100 cities across Russia … Experienced observers say that the level of violence used against protesters is increasing … In 2012, the opposition did not have a clear leader. Now it does.”
• “There seems little doubt that Mr. Navalny will be jailed for several years. He may die in prison. … The probability is that there will be further and bigger demonstrations to come. Mr. Putin and his support apparatus will hope that repeated arrests, sackings, beatings and killings will eventually wear down the opposition.”
• “Whether the Russian leader’s carefully burnished image as the champion of ordinary citizens can survive such a process of mass repression is another question. As a keen student of the country’s history, Mr. Putin will know that tsarist rule was shaken by repeated cycles of protest and repression before it was eventually toppled.”
• “What happens next in Russia will be watched all over the world … Together, Mr. Putin and President Xi Jinping have formed an axis of reaction—pushing back against pro-democracy movements around the world. … U.S. expressions of support for Mr. Navalny and the protests will anger Mr. Putin. One of the reasons that the Russian leader detested Hillary Clinton—and worked to defeat her—was the support that she expressed for anti-Putin demonstrators in 2012.”

“Echoes of Belarus in Russia’s Navalny Protests,” Max Seddon and Henry Foy, Financial Times, 01.25.21. The authors, Moscow correspondent and Moscow bureau chief for the news outlet, write:

• “A casual observer on Moscow’s Pushkin Square on Saturday [Jan. 23] could have been forgiven for mistaking the scene for events that have wracked neighboring Belarus for the past five months. … If the rally—which attracted an estimated 40,000 people in Moscow and thousands more in 110 other cities nationwide—had more than a whiff of Minsk to it, the sudden outburst of anti-government sentiment only a short walk from the Kremlin has put Russia in a similar bind to Mr. Lukashenko.”
• “‘Nobody thought this could happen before, just like in Belarus,’ said Andrei Kolesnikov, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Moscow Center. ‘But the rise in protest activity shows you that a huge number of people are unhappy with the government . . . People aren’t coming out for Navalny so much as they are because they’re tired of corruption and bad governance.’”
• “The day after his arrest, Mr. Navalny released a two-hour video investigation claiming oligarchs had spent billions on a lavish palace for Mr. Putin on the Black Sea coast. The video racked up 78 million views on YouTube by Sunday and clearly inspired some of the protesters.”
• “The Kremlin denies any involvement in Mr. Navalny’s poisoning and says Mr. Putin has no connection to the palace. It has also sought to play down the protests as the work of an aggrieved minority. … Anecdotal data from Saturday’s protests, however, suggests the dynamic may be changing. According to Alexei Zakharov, who led volunteers from a monitoring group in conducting 359 interviews in Moscow, 42 percent of those who attended had never attended a protest before, while nearly half of them were women.”
• “Mr. Kolesnikov, however, said the Kremlin’s mistake was to ‘underestimate Navalny’s level of support.’ ‘When people saw what was happening to Mr. Navalny live on TV, and then the film [about the palace], it provided a strong emotional impulse for them to take to the streets,’ he added.”

“Exceptional Courage of Aleksei Navalny,” Editorial Board, New York Times, 01.20.21. The news outlet’s editorial board writes:

• “If Mr. Putin decides to imprison Mr. Navalny, he will have a celebrated political prisoner on his hands. If he sets Mr. Navalny free, he will appear weak to his lieutenants and followers, and will be under constant assault from the Navalny-led opposition. The option Mr. Putin is least likely to consider is to confront Mr. Navalny openly and fairly at the ballot box, say, in the parliamentary elections looming in September.”

“Russia’s Artificial Intelligence Strategy: The Role of State-Owned Firms,” Stephanie Petrella, Chris Miller and Benjamin Cooper, ORBIS, Winter 2021. The authors of the article write:

• “In 2017, Russian President Vladimir Putin declared that whichever country becomes the leader in artificial intelligence (AI) ‘will become the ruler of the world.’  Yet Russia lags competitors like China and the United States substantially in AI capabilities.”
• “Russia’s AI development strategy is unique. It is led not by the government, nor by the private sector, but by state-owned firms. In the United States, the government plays a role in funding some research in AI and in purchasing AI-enabled technologies, notably in the defense sector, but most investment in applied AI is undertaken by private corporations. In China, too, though state-owned firms play a massive role in the economy, private firms have driven technological advancement, including in AI. Companies like Alibaba and Tencent have fostered an AI ecosystem that responds to government guidance, but remains in private sector hands. In Russia, state-owned firms are leading.”
• “While Rostec, Russia’s largest defense conglomerate, is investing in AI technology to optimize existing weapons systems, its primary focus has been on other advanced technologies, such as 5G, the Industrial Internet of Things, and blockchain. Russia’s largest private tech firm, Yandex, is only loosely involved in government efforts to develop AI. As a result, leadership of Russia’s AI strategy has fallen to Sberbank, a bank, not a tech giant.”
• “While Russia has substantial resources that it can invest in developing AI expertise, most metrics suggest that it will lag behind rivals. The COVID-19 pandemic has caused Putin to delay the implementation of the National Projects until 2030 and redirect funds away from the Digital Economy National Project. Sberbank’s own research and development efforts will ensure the company’s competitiveness, but it is less clear whether this will catalyze expertise elsewhere in Russia. The Kremlin’s suspicions of Yandex and other foreign-linked tech firms creates an additional hurdle for Russia’s government efforts to boost the dissemination of artificial intelligence technology.”

Defense and aerospace:

• No significant developments.

Security, law-enforcement and justice:

• No significant developments.

 

III. Russia’s relations with other countries

Russia’s general foreign policy and relations with “far abroad” countries:

• No significant developments.

China-Russia: Allied or Aligned?

“How NATO Manages the ‘Bear’ and the ‘Dragon,’” Elbridge A. Colby and Ian Brzezinski in conversation with Nikolas Gvosdev, ORBIS, Winter 2021. The interviewees, co-founder of The Marathon Initiative and an American foreign policy and military affairs expert, said:

• Elbridge A. Colby: “China is by a very considerable margin the more significant challenge to U.S. interests [than Russia]. China is a far larger economy and thus can mount a much more plausible challenge to establish hegemony over its region than Russia can over Europe, and Asia is the world’s largest economy. So, the top priority must be to deny China hegemony over Asia. That said, Russia remains a challenge in Europe, and, in particular, is a concrete military threat in Eastern NATO; ensuring Russia does not see a plausible ‘theory of victory’ in this area needs to be the priority focus for the Atlantic Alliance.”
• Ian Brzezinski: “China, due to the magnitude and global reach of its economy—its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) roughly matches that of the United States and is some ten times larger than Russia’s GDP—and the increasing sophistication and size of its military, presents in the long run a potentially more significant and complex threat to U.S. values and interests around the world.”

Ukraine:

• No significant developments

Belarus:

“Can Belarus Survive Without a Multi-Vector Foreign Policy?” Yauheni Preiherman, Carnegie Moscow Center, 01.21.21. The author, founder and director of the Minsk Dialogue Council on International Relations, writes:

• “The August presidential election again divorced Lukashenko’s priorities from the national interest, and the two issues are unlikely to realign until the Belarusian leader feels he is no longer in danger of being ousted. The Western vector of Belarusian foreign policy is likely to remain in crisis until then, since Lukashenko currently associates the West with risks and threats rather than opportunities. The Russian vector, on the other hand, is seen in positive terms only, although that will change if Moscow stops backing Lukashenko or the West reengages with the regime and drops its demand for new elections.”
• “Belarus’s return to a multi-vector foreign policy is, however, inevitable, whether Lukashenko stays in power after the revision of Belarus’s constitution or his rule comes to an end. Any successor to Lukashenko will have even more reason to diversify the country’s foreign policy and economic ties: a task that will be easier to complete without the burden of an authoritarian past.”

Russia's other post-Soviet neighbors:

“Elections in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan: The Challenges of Retaining Power,” Bruce Pannier, Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI), 01.25.21. The author, a longtime journalist and correspondent covering Central Asia, writes:

• “On Jan. 10, Kazakhstan held elections for its lower house while Kyrgyzstan held presidential elections and a national referendum on constitutional amendments. While the elections in Kazakhstan were the usual stage-managed affair designed to maintain the decades-old political status quo, Kyrgyzstan’s aimed to create a new political order based on an old model: presidentialism.”
• “The worst aspect of Japarov’s rise to power [in Kyrgyzstan] is the feeling many have that if he cannot succeed in improving conditions in Kyrgyzstan, a fourth revolution could remove him. While this does to some extent make Japarov accountable to Kyrgyzstan’s citizens, such a solution would be as much an admission of democratic failure as the process that led to Japarov becoming president.”
• “Kazakhstan’s leadership may also be running out of time. The parliamentary elections preserved the regime, but also showed how resistant the regime is to changes, such as the changes a small but increasing number of people are demanding more say in how the country is governed and a greater share in the wealth that has concentrated into the hands of a relative few. Nazarbayev’s death will signal a new period in Kazakhstan and despite his efforts and those of others to preserve Elbasy’s system after he is gone, that system is brittle and unlikely to endure.”

“Exit From a Sparse Hegemony: Central Asia’s Place in a Transforming Liberal International Order,” Alexander Cooley and Daniel Nexon, Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI), 01.21.21. The authors, the director of Columbia University’s Harriman Institute and a professor in the department of Government and School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, write:

• “In our book ‘Exit from Hegemony’ we argue that the era of American global hegemony is over and that the international order built by Washington in the immediate post-Cold War era has eroded significantly … We identify three distinct pathways of hegemonic unraveling, all well underway, what we refer to as the rise of revisionist challengers (‘Exit from Above’), the role of weaker states in soliciting alternative patrons (‘Exit from Below’) and the increasing contestation in transnational networks between liberal and illiberal ideas and norms (‘Exit from Within’).”
• “The first pathway from hegemony—‘Exit from Above’—refers to the rise of new great powers that promote counter-ordering institutions … The main vehicle for these counter-ordering efforts have been new economic and security regional organizations established by Moscow and Beijing to project their agendas and check the influence of Western counterparts.”
• “Our second pathway is the increasing willingness of weaker states to openly pursue or leverage partnerships with alternative powers. In the 2000s the West’s patronage monopoly [in Central Asia] was dramatically broken by the rise of both Russia and China as goods providers.”
• “The third pathway on display in Central Asia was the rise of contested transnationalism … Not only did transnational actors promoting liberal ordering lose their influence, but the region has witnessed the rise of actors now promoting illiberal norms in a variety of settings.”
• “During the 1990s, the norms, institutions and actors associated with liberal ordering were pretty much the only source for integrating the new Central Asian states into global governance. However now, Central Asia is a far more dense and contested region, where different sources of order and norms openly co-exist, compete and interact with one another. This richer and more crowded external environment offers important opportunities for the Central Asian governments and social actors, making the region an important arena of multipolar politics and setting for new forms of international ordering for many years to come.”