Russia Analytical Report, July 5-11, 2022
This Week’s Highlights
- Author Stephen Kinzer argues that “many in Washington dream of destroying Russia.” “American strategic planners … see it [the war] as a battering ram against Russia” and “view diplomacy as an enemy” if only because “negotiation would inevitably give Russia at least some of what it wants,” Kinzer claims in The Boston Globe.
- MIT’s Barry Posen predicts a stalemate in Ukraine, urging the warring sides to return to the negotiating table and noting that “U.S. leadership would be essential to a diplomatic solution.” Such a solution would require Ukraine to relinquish some territory and Russia to relinquish some of its gains, renounce future territorial claims and acknowledge the legitimacy of “strong assurances of U.S. and European military support” for Ukraine, Posen writes in Foreign Affairs.
- New York University’s James Traub looks at the war in Ukraine and sees “coalescence of the West and the fragmentation of the rest.” “If the West is not going to gain the loyalty of the global south through appeals to democratic solidarity, it will have to do so by delivering the goods,” he writes in Foreign Policy. “But the democratic appeal is so much cheaper,” Traub adds. RIAC’s Andrei Kortunov also sees a fragmentation of the rest over the war in Ukraine.
- Nikolai Petrov of the Royal Institute of International Affairs argues that anyone betting that Russian security forces would join forces to oppose Putin would lose. “The consolidation of the elites around Putin, both the oligarchs and the security forces, is now firmer than ever, having [been] strengthened—not weakened—with the start of the war in Ukraine and Western sanctions,” Petrov writes for Russia Post.
- In the wake of Russia’s invasion, it is easy to see other countries’ increases in defense spending as necessary, according to Stockholm International Peace Research Institute’s Nan Tian, Diego Lopes da Silva and Alexandra Marksteiner. “But the belief that expanding defense budgets will necessarily help safeguard the world is both flawed and dangerous. Rather than deterring violence, rising military spending can contribute to a more fraught and explosive international system,” the SIPRI trio argue in Foreign Affairs.
- I“nstead of challenging the Russian Black Sea Fleet with NATO combatants, the Biden administration should provide Ukraine with whatever military equipment it will take to protect its own shipping lanes, especially unmanned aerial vehicles,“ Hudson Institute’s Bryan Clark and Peter Rough write in Foreign Policy.
- S&P Global’s Daniel Yergin believes Putin is manipulating energy supplies to Europe in hopes that European voters will eventually “say ‘I’m more concerned about energy prices than I am about Ukraine or Russia’ and governments will change.”
I. U.S. and Russian priorities for the bilateral agenda
Nuclear security and safety:
- No significant developments.
North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs:
- No significant developments.
Iran and its nuclear program:
- “Despite this show of [Russian-Iranian] solidarity at the highest leadership level, however, the war in Ukraine has had several negative consequences for Iran. Like other Middle Eastern countries, Iran had been importing wheat from Ukraine and Russia. The Russian blockade of Ukrainian wheat exports, as well as Russia’s unwillingness to sell as much of its own wheat, has served to both raise wheat prices as well as limit supplies of wheat for all wheat-importing countries, including Iran.”
- “There were some who initially thought that the Western embargo on Russian oil exports would help Iran by bolstering demand for its oil. Instead, however, Iranian oil exports have shrunk since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This is because Russia managed to increase its oil exports to China and India by offering them discounts from the world market price of oil that far exceeded what Iran had been offering. ... Russia has similarly undercut Iranian steel exports through aggressively discounting the price of its steel to Iran’s Asian customers, including Afghanistan, China, South Korea and Thailand.”
- “There have also been conflicting reports about whether or to what extent Russia has withdrawn some of its forces from Syria for redeployment in Ukraine. If so, it theoretically would provide Iran with an opportunity to increase its influence in Syria relative to Russia’s. ... Still, this does not mean that Iran is likely to break with or turn against Russia. So long as both Russia and Iran are at odds with the United States and the West more broadly, Tehran is likely to cling to its relationship with Moscow despite the current downsides. And Moscow knows it.”
Humanitarian impact of the Ukraine conflict:
- No significant developments.
Military aspects of the Ukraine conflict and their impacts:
- “Russia's offensive in eastern Ukraine is intensifying in Donetsk Province, with a string of towns and villages coming under bombardment in the last week as Russian troops turn their firepower farther west after seizing control of the last city under Ukrainian control in Luhansk Province.”
- “For days now, the attacks have mostly seemed random and without purpose, but taken as a whole they make clear that Russia is preparing to capture another slice of Donetsk, the other province in the Donbas region. ... [Russian] forces have increased bombardment of the five main towns and cities in the area—Bakhmut, Kramatorsk, Sloviansk, Druzhkivka and Kostiantynivka—as well as surrounding villages. … The deadliest attack came late Saturday [July 9], when rockets struck an apartment complex in the village of Chasiv Yar, a dozen miles from the front. At least 15 people were reported dead.”
- “The fighting in Ukraine was picking up intensity on other fronts as well. In the south, it was Ukrainian forces using artillery to hit Russian troops in the area around the city of Kherson, in what officials suggested would become an effort to retake territory that has been held by Russia since nearly the beginning of the war.”
- “And in northeastern Ukraine on Saturday [July 9], Russia sent both military and political signals that its forces might make a new push near Kharkiv, a crucial city that has been bitterly fought over and is still held by Ukraine.”
- “Russia has announced an operational pause as its troops regroup … But Ukrainian officials and civilians said heavy fighting was continuing in the frontline villages as Russian forces pursued their push westward, and Ukrainian troops remained determined to make them fight for every inch of land.”
- “[When it comes to aiding Ukraine] The U.S. is drawing from a sparse stockpile of weapons, however. Over the last decade, its priority has been to produce the low-yield precision bombs and missiles favored in counterterrorism campaigns … The U.S. has therefore cut back on producing legacy munitions, including versions of the antitank Javelin and antiaircraft Stinger missiles, and on purchasing more expensive, high-yield smart missiles.”
- “Four months of support to Ukraine has already depleted much of the stockpile of such weapons, including a third of the U.S. Javelin arsenal and a quarter of U.S. Stingers.”
- “U.S. stockpiles of artillery ammunition are similarly dwindling. The last three budget cycles have seen cuts in this area … RUSI estimates that Russia is firing more than 7,000 artillery rounds a day. RUSI concludes that the artillery ammunition that the U.S. currently produces in a year would last for only 10 days to two weeks of combat in Ukraine.”
- “The natural answer to stockpile shortages is to increase production. But here, too, the U.S. has reduced capacity. After the Cold War, the U.S. consolidated its defense industry, leading many small-arms production plants to shut down completely.”
- “Investing in defense production capacity and weapons stockpiles can help shore up U.S. deterrence in Taiwan and elsewhere—convincing states looking for a quick win that the U.S. is willing and prepared to sustain support for the long-term. That message will be especially important as the U.S. balances both a rising China and a revisionist Russia.”
- “The U.S. can support Ukraine through its war of attrition with Russia. But to do so, it will need to make significant reforms to its defense acquisition and production policies. Those changes will have to happen fast, because Ukraine might not have ‘as long as it takes’ to survive.”
- “Instead of challenging the Russian Black Sea Fleet with NATO combatants, the Biden administration should provide Ukraine with whatever military equipment it will take to protect its own shipping lanes, especially unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). After supplying Kyiv with HIMARS and MLRS, the transfer of UAVs would not dramatically alter the U.S. approach of providing security assistance.”
- “On the front in eastern and southern Ukraine, Gray Eagles [UAVs] —along with the recently announced transfers of medium-range air defenses and longer-range missiles—could finally allow Ukraine to fight Russia as NATO would.”
- “It is important to note that the recent transfer of more potent weapons to Ukraine by the United States, France and other Western countries has not prompted Russia to escalate the conflict to NATO.”
- “The need to prevent a global humanitarian catastrophe by maintaining freedom of navigation in the Black Sea far outweighs any risk of Russia getting its hands on these U.S. technologies.”
- “The only war a modern, prosperous, open society is willing to fight is a comfortable one. This has been noticed by the world's rogue dictators. Vladimir Putin's war in Ukraine is a challenge to the prevailing international order, presided over by a sedentary, prosperous U.S. hegemon. Unless this challenge is met by superior technology, it will likely succeed.”
- “A new arms race is the only option for the West. The Russian offensive flounders in the face of superior firepower. On battlefields where there are no modern weapons, the barbarian Russian army, with its tactics of cannon fodder and indiscriminate shelling, slowly prevails. Where the Ukrainian defenders have been equipped with Western artillery, Russia's stockpiles explode into fireworks and its fodder troops are burnt like chaff.”
- “A world without a war is only a dream. When the strong and just refuse to fight with the weapons they have, thugs and bullies can do what they want. The West must build precision weapons that can take out Russia's nuclear silos—and let Mr. Putin know that they aren't afraid to use them. Develop drones that can hunt and kill terrorists. An open society can't dictate to rogue states how to live. But it should be able to prevent aggression like the invasion of Ukraine.”
- “Four months after Russia invaded Ukraine, foreign combat veterans who answered the Ukrainian president’s call to fight are grappling with the grueling reality of a war unlike any they have seen ... Many are American and British veterans of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, where they could count on calling in airstrikes for protection and other critical support. In Ukraine, the military effort is essentially bare-bones, leaving Ukrainian forces … to face a larger and better armed Russian invasion force without basics, like steady meals, and even some tools of modern warfare that would help them level the field.”
- “Four months into the war, much about the foreign forces remains opaque. Mr. Arestovych estimates that 1,000 have participated in battles. But with no central clearinghouse for volunteers, no one knows for sure. Hundreds or thousands more have come to help with noncombat duties.”
- “Weeding out extremists from the many fighters who want to help Ukraine has proved tricky. Two frontline recruits, who did not want to give their names for security reasons, described meeting in safe houses with American and Scandinavian members of the white supremacist Aryan Brotherhood, including some with prison tattoos, who were trying to make their way on their own to the battle.”
- “The reasons fighters choose to risk their lives for a country that is not their own vary widely. … Brian, the American veteran who fought in Afghanistan, said he came because he had trained Ukrainians years ago to try to hold off Russia-backed separatist forces, and many of the Ukrainian friends he made died in those battles. … For some other Americans and Britons carrying the baggage of unpopular wars in Iraq and Afghanistan … the call to arms for what they see as a clear-cut cause proved irresistible. Matthew Robinson, a Briton who is a former U.S. military contractor in Iraq, said he saw his service in Ukraine as a form of ‘redemption’ for having profited from a war he now believes was unjust.”
Punitive measures related to Ukraine and their impact globally:
- No significant developments.
Ukraine-related negotiations:
- “Putin’s dictated conditions that allowed him to leverage and continue his 2014 aggression should never have been accepted by the West. As we now know, the Minsk agreements did not de-escalate the Russian-Ukrainian conflict but fanned it and could not prevent an even bigger war.”
- “Insisting on respect for deeply flawed deals such as the Minsk agreements is not just normatively and morally questionable but also strategically unwise, as the catastrophic fallout of the agreements has demonstrated. Even if Western leaders and negotiators believed their own lofty phrases, such as ‘peaceful settlement,’ ‘confidence-building’ and ‘promoting dialogue,’ they objectively enabled the construction of a smokescreen, behind which the victim of aggression was largely left alone vis-à-vis an aggressor. Moscow only felt encouraged in its assertiveness and saw Western attempts at rapprochement as signs of weakness.”
Great Power rivalry/new Cold War/NATO-Russia relations:
- “The West's strategy is to give the Ukrainians enough military aid to defend against Russian advances, and to counter Vladimir Putin's belief that he can win on the ground or wait out the Alliance until it runs out of gas, wheat or patience—in other words, to wait Mr. Putin out. The likely result will be a prolonged and bloody stalemate reminiscent of the Western Front of 1915.”
- “Recent changes in Russian operations suggest that they are making a transition from a maneuver war to an artillery war ... The Ukrainians are using recently arrived NATO systems with far more range and precision to counter that Russian advantage by targeting Russian firing positions, ammunition sites and logistics centers.”
- “The NATO strategy to resupply the Ukrainians for ‘as long as it takes’ means that this phase could be longer and far bloodier than earlier phases. The rate of casualties among the military and civilians will likely increase. More infrastructure within range of artillery and missiles will come under attack.”
- “Perhaps the NATO countries will tire and ‘as long as it takes’ will becomes ‘in together, out together.’ But as long as Messrs. Putin and Zelensky both believe they are winning, or at least not losing, and as long as they are listening to their generals and not their diplomats, it is likely that this conflict will remain a slow, bloody and long war resembling the Western Front of 1915-18. ‘As long as it takes’ may make the Donbas into a 21st-century Flanders field.”
- “For complex reasons that are as much psychological as political, many Americans have come to regard Russia as a font of evil. Many in Washington dream of destroying Russia utterly and forever—stripping it of all power and then perhaps breaking it up into smaller states that would submit to American influence.”
- “For American strategic planners, this war has little to do with Ukraine. They see it as a battering ram against Russia. Since saving Ukrainian lives is not their priority, they view diplomacy as an enemy. Negotiation would inevitably give Russia at least some of what it wants.”
- “Outlines of what will probably be the peace settlement in Ukraine are already clear. Russia will withdraw its army, eastern regions of Ukraine will be guaranteed autonomy and Ukraine will agree to keep Western troops out of its territory. Such a peace, however, would end the dream of inflicting a ‘strategic defeat’ on Russia. That is why many in Washington consider it anathema—and why Secretary of State Antony Blinken refused to meet his Russian counterpart when both were at a summit in Bali last week.”
- “An obsession with crushing Russia lies behind Washington's passionate embrace of the Ukrainian cause. But there is another, more cosmic reason. We are seeing a textbook example of what geo-strategists call the classic security dilemma. One country takes steps to secure itself, but others see those steps as preparation for war. They respond with buildups of their own. Fears, accusations and demonizing propaganda intensify until fighting breaks out. This syndrome has led to countless wars.”
- “Like many Americans, Biden sees Russia through a lens at least as distorted as the one through which Russia views us. His latest step reflects his choice of war over peace—or as he might put it, his belief that peace can best be achieved through war. That will haunt the world long after the Ukraine conflict ends.”
- “There is just one problem with the assumption that Putin never backs down. It’s incorrect.”
- “Several direct clashes also took place between the U.S. military and Russia-backed Wagner forces that did not provoke a serious escalation from Putin.”
- “When realizing the catastrophic failure of the initial ambitious goal of regime change in Ukraine, the Kremlin revised its plans and adopted much less ambitious goals. Instead of escalating and doubling down, the Kremlin announced a much humbler objective of ‘concentrating’ its ‘main efforts’ on ‘liberating’ the Donbas.”
- “When faced with strong enough resistance, Putin has even backed down in Russian domestic politics, where his dominance is nearly absolute. The most famous example came in 2005 when Putin attempted to replace benefits like free public transportation and subsidies for housing and prescription drugs for senior citizens with monthly cash payments.”
- “There are some encouraging signs that Western leaders are beginning to understand that Putin’s threats of escalation are hollow and the myth that he never backs down is false. When Putin threatened to ‘strike at those targets that we have not yet been hitting’ in Ukraine if the West provides Kyiv with longer-range weapons on June 5, the United States and Great Britain went ahead and delivered the weapons anyway. This should be the norm, not the exception.”
- “What we have seen since the beginning of the Russian invasion is the coalescence of the West and the fragmentation of the rest. The West is quite right to view Russia’s brazen assault on its neighbor as an unprecedented challenge to the post-World War II order. But nations that see themselves as victims of that order as much as beneficiaries cannot be expected to share that view. Or perhaps they should, but it’s clear that they don’t. ‘[T]he existing order,’ as former Indian National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon recently wrote in Foreign Policy, ‘does not address their security needs, their existential concerns about food and finances, or transnational threats such as climate change.’ (India really does have a special vocation when it comes to nonalignment.)”
- “If the West is not going to gain the loyalty of the global south through appeals to democratic solidarity, it will have to do so by delivering the goods. But the democratic appeal is so much cheaper. The kind of spending that would demonstrate a real commitment to the well-being of poor and middle-tier states is almost certainly not forthcoming any time soon; nor is, say, a reform of the U.N. Security Council that would more fairly represent the distribution of global power. The rising states of Asia, Africa and Latin America will continue pursuing their economic self-interest even as they look for protection to the United States and the West. We’ll just have to get used to it.”
“Assymetric Bipolarity,” RIAC’s Andrei Kortunov, RIAC, 07.07.22.
- “Apparently, over the course of several years, Russia will have to build its foreign policy in an international environment that can be ... described as ‘asymmetric bipolarity.’ In this environment, the united West will be confronted in various forms and with varying degrees of consistency by only a part of the non-Western world, while the rest of the non-Western world will try to stay out of this brewing confrontation as much as possible.”
- “Given that, it is very important for Russia to avoid the temptation to build its policy on the basis of the principle "who is not with us is against us." Given the balance of power that is emerging in the world, attempts to form broad strategic anti-Western alliances and alliances may not be very effective and even counterproductive. More promising is putting theemphasis on the formation of ad hoc coalitions around specific tasks, the solution of which is of interest to the widest possible range of potential participants.”
China-Russia: Allied or aligned?
“China and the Crisis of the European Security System,” MGIMO’s Ivan Zuenko, Valdai Club, 07.11.22.
- “If there had not been an active rapprochement between Moscow and Beijing over the past decades, then no Asian alternative to the European markets for Russian oil and gas would have emerged, then no ‘Feb. 24’ would have happened.”
- “At the same time, if China had not taken a position of benevolent neutrality with respect to the Russian special military operation, had not continued to buy Russian goods and thus provided a reliable strategic rear, no continuation of ‘Feb. 24’ would objectively have happened.”
- “But is China the main beneficiary of the European crisis? Is the situation developing according to the Chinese plan? For me, the obvious answer is ‘no.’”
- “Consolidation of the ‘collective West’ on the basis of an imaginary dichotomous idea of ‘opposition between democracy and authoritarianism’ (read ‘battle of Good and Evil’) harms China’s interests, as it cuts off its path to normalization of relations with the United States, which is beneficial to Beijing for purely economic reasons. It also reduces China's room for maneuver in Europe, which is a key market for Chinese goods. And that's not counting the sharp rise in energy and food prices, which are necessary for the stable development of the Chinese economy.”
“NATO’s New Division of Labor on Russia and China Won’t Be Easy,” Jo Inge Bekkevold, FP, 07.11.22.
- “It is inevitable that the main challenge for the United States and European allies over the coming years will be to design a trans-Atlantic division of labor. The problem is that this division has to be crafted in a more sophisticated fashion than the simple logic of Europe deterring Russia while the United States balances China. Such a simplistic division of labor not only risks a trans-Atlantic drift, but it could also result in a gradual military transformation gap, leaving NATO and Europe behind as a second-rate defense force. Moreover, deterring Russia is no simple, one-dimensional task. In Eastern Europe, it is a land-based theater, whereas in Northern Europe, it is largely sea based. Each creates different requirements for trans-Atlantic collaboration.”
“Lake Baikal Region: Russian Weak Point and Menace to China,” translated by David Cowhig1 for his blog and posted on 07.10.22.
- “Although Russia has not seemed a threat to our country in the complex international situation following the collapse of the Soviet Union, we have to be on guard, be wary and be cautious in the face of such a huge power. Russia has in fact caused great disasters to our country throughout history.”
- “Russia’s Coat of Arms is a ‘two-headed eagle,’ with one head looking majestically at the European region in the West and the other head looking majestically at the Far East. This very graphically illustrates Russia’s national policy since the Tsarist period of a geopolitical parallelism.”
- “The links between the two ends are fragile and extremely vulnerable to severance. In particular, the Baikal region, which connects the two ends, is Russia’s ‘Achilles Heel.’ … The Baikal region is not only the hub of Moscow to the Far East, but also the gateway to the north of the country.”
- “Russia’s Siberian region is sparsely populated, and most of its population is located along the Trans-Siberian Railway. If a force cuts off the Trans-Siberian Railway in the Lake Baikal region, Russia will not be able to defend both east and west. Both Tsarist Russia, Soviet Russia, and the modern Russian Federation regard it as their choke point and station large numbers of troops there.”
- “The Baikal region … is also a sword of Damocles hanging over our heads. From the Baikal region, we can cross Mongolia to the south and reach Datong and Beijing; we can also go through the Hulunbeier Steppe and cross the Daxinganling Mountains to reach the heart of the three eastern provinces. … The Baikal region was the main base of the Soviet Union. During the last century, when China and the Soviet Union went to war, the Baikal Rim became the core of the Soviet threat to China … The Soviet Union stationed more than a million armored corps in Ulan-Ude and Chita, and had the potential to swoop southward along the China-Mongolia railway line. Then all of China was very tense for fear of what disaster might befall us.”
Missile defense:
- No significant developments.
Nuclear arms:
“Negative Security Assurances After Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine,” Belfer Center’s Francesca Giovannini, Arms Control Today, July/August 2022.
- “As the war in Ukraine rages on, experts are debating how it will affect the security calculations of non-nuclear-weapon states. Some experts have claimed that the Russian invasion, if successful in its scope, could set a dangerous precedent so as to embolden other nuclear-armed states to launch military campaigns to conquer neighboring countries.”
- “In a scenario where nuclear-armed states become increasingly predatory, non-nuclear- weapon states could seek protection by joining existing nuclear alliances. … Alternatively, the ruthless way in which Russia has chosen to disregard its commitments to Ukraine’s territorial sovereignty and the glibness with which its leaders threaten the use of nuclear weapons today may prompt countries with advanced nuclear know-how to pursue or fast-track the development of their individual nuclear capabilities.”
- “A more likely, less discussed, but equally consequential scenario is that the war in Ukraine will deepen alienation, grievances and mistrust among non-nuclear-weapon states. Such estrangement could lead to even more fierce political obstructionism against any new nuclear policy and a dangerous institutional paralysis across multiple institutions. This scenario is not one the international community can afford to face.”
- “In such a precarious moment, there needs to be an urgent rethinking of the relationship between the nuclear-armed states and the rest of the international community by launching and sustaining a global dialogue with the goal of developing a new regime of universal, unconditional negative security assurances as a first concrete step.”
- “Specifically, the new regime should start with a U.N. Security Council resolution declaring that honoring unilateral pledges of negative security assurances is a precondition to maintaining veto power in the council.”
- “The U.N. General Assembly should then agree to convene a special session every year in which all nuclear-armed states recommit to universal, unconditional negative security assurances.”
- “Finally, the U.N. Economic and Social Council should adopt a resolution stating that all regional trade agreements concluded in regions with nuclear-weapon-free zones should include a clause obliging all nuclear-armed states to honor the commitment to nonuse and nonthreat of nuclear weapons.”
Counterterrorism:
- No significant developments.
Conflict in Syria:
- No significant developments.
Cyber security:
- No significant developments.
Energy exports from CIS:
- “The main natural gas pipeline between Russia and Germany shut down for scheduled maintenance on Monday [July 11], raising concerns that Moscow could use the repairs as a pretext for a longer shutdown as it uses energy supplies as leverage in the Ukraine war. European ministers warned that it was unclear whether Moscow would turn the taps on the Nord Stream 1 pipeline back on after the 10 days of scheduled work.”
- “Germany's economy minister, Robert Habeck, said Berlin was concerned about a ‘nightmare scenario’ this winter if Russia decides against doing so.”
- “French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire went further, saying that a total cutoff was ‘the most likely scenario.’ He said that ‘it would be totally irresponsible to ignore this scenario.’”
- “The Nord Stream 1 pipeline pumps about 55 billion cubic meters of natural gas under the Baltic Sea to Germany each year. From there, it is also distributed to other countries in Europe. Virtually the entire European Union has said that weaning itself off Russian gas should be a priority, but several member countries remain heavily reliant on Moscow. Despite scrambling to diversify its supply since Moscow's invasion of Ukraine, Germany is still reliant on Russia for about 35% of its supplies while France gets 17% of its gas from Russia.”
- “It seems to me that the situation's going to get worse over the next several months. That’s because it's not only the question of markets now and investment, but it's also this clash with Russia and Putin is doing what Russia hasn't and the Soviet Union did not do for half a century. He is manipulating energy supplies to make the situation in Europe, more difficult by cutting back on gas. And his strategy is pretty clear—which is to create shortages in Europe, which will cause fissures in the Western unity on Ukraine so that the kind of Alliance falls apart and to get into the politics, President Macron was reelected in France and the sort of, kind of pro-Putin populous party only got 41% of the vote, but that's 41%.”
- “Putin has made clear that he thinks that the Alliance is going to crack because of energy prices. And by cutting back on gas supplies, he's trying to prevent the Europeans from getting enough natural gas in storage for this winter. So that eventually you'll have a political reaction and people will say, ‘I'm more concerned about energy prices than I am about Ukraine or Russia’ and governments will change. And that's on top of the kind of shortages that we're seeing and everything is in short supply. Oil is in short supply. Natural gas is in short supply globally, and coal is in short supply, and you can't build enough wind turbines and solar quickly to accommodate for that.”
- “So far, Russia has refrained from announcing any gas sale embargoes. The mechanisms of gas supply curtailments used by Moscow include a combination of changing payment requirements, retaliatory sanctions against formerly Russian-controlled entities placed under administration by EU countries, references to technical problems caused by the nondelivery of equipment by Western companies, and a refusal to use the alternative supply routes offered by Ukraine to bypass the conflict zone. Russia’s goal in this PR campaign is to make any gas problems look like they are entirely self-inflicted by the Western coalition, while Russia is trying its best to keep to its side of the bargain.”
- “However, the trendline is clear. This is why Europe and Germany, in particular, have already started to brace themselves for severe energy shortages in the coming winter, drawing up rationing plans and industry closure schedules. Europe, and probably the global economy as a whole, is already headed for a recession. Economic slowdown usually leads to a reduction in energy demand, which should help, but this time the potential shortfall is too big, and energy shortage–induced stoppages will probably deepen the recession and accelerate inflation, similar to the 1970s.”
Climate change:
- No significant developments.
U.S.-Russian economic ties:
- No significant developments.
U.S.-Russian relations in general:
- No significant developments.
II. Russia’s domestic policies
Domestic politics, economy and energy:
- “The data on how many Russians approve of Putin’s activities looks almost like a straight line, steadily going up and hardly dropping below 60%. In fact, over the past few years, his approval rating has been constantly fluctuating up and down.”
- “Pollsters wanted to get the answers the Kremlin wanted from respondents and started asking citizens questions with a prompt … respondents were frequently asked so-called formative questions in which they were immediately pointed to the right answer. … [T]he drop in Putin’s approval rating has also affected the options for answers—the pollsters have now practically stopped asking people open-ended questions.”
- “The biased answer options are best seen in the FOM poll about the purpose of the ‘special operation’ in Ukraine … There is only one option for opponents of the war … Young respondents aged 18-30 chose it one and a half times more often than all the others—but it does not usually make it into press releases or news reports.”
- “Russians and residents of the captured regions of Ukraine have become afraid of pollsters and often give ‘correct’ answers out of fear … Independent sociologist Elena Koneva says that polls should not be conducted on occupied territories … but the Russian authorities are not interested in their reliability … Inside Russia, polls by VTsIOM and FOM show a high (65-76%) level of support for the invasion of Ukraine. But few admit it—most refuse to talk to pollsters.”
- “The Kremlin forbids sociologists to publish poll results that are bad for them, including those about Alexei Navalny. And the data from the disloyal Levada Center is simply forbidden from being cited in the controlled media … at least a third of the poll results are not published, says a former VTsIOM employee. A former FOM employee put the figure at 50-70%”
- “The answer to the question often asked by Western observers about whether the security forces can consolidate, or at least one or two corporations can consolidate, to oppose the Kremlin is definitely no. Such a ‘rebellion’ is extremely unlikely due to their disunity (the ‘siloviki’ don’t have links with one another, only with Putin), as well as the existence of multiple control mechanisms—both external (by the FSB and through interdepartmental competition) and internal (through quasi-checks and balances in the leadership of the security corporations themselves). In addition, the Kremlin makes sure that the security corporations aren’t headed by overly authoritative and independent figures.”
- “The consolidation of the elites around Putin, both the oligarchs and the security forces, is now firmer than ever, having strengthened—not weakened—with the start of the war in Ukraine and Western sanctions.”
Defense and aerospace:
- See section Military aspects of the Ukraine conflict and their impacts above.
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:
- “The truth is, Putin is overconfident. He has surrounded himself with yes men, and that’s one problem when it comes to convincing him the cost for Russia is too high. The other problem is that he views his soldiers as just another massive horde of serfs that can be sacrificed. Major losses don’t deter him, not yet, anyway. In order to be deterred, he needs to have some empathy for his own people. He has none.”
Ukraine:
“Donbas: What’s Ukraine Losing—Industrial Hub, Breadbasket or Both?,” RM Staff, RM, 07.07.22.
- “With Russian forces coming closer to establishing control over the entire Donbas, one can’t help but wonder what Kyiv might lose for good if Russia captures the remainder of this historical region, which consists of Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk provinces, and holds onto it, per Putin’s plan. Searches for ‘Donbas’ turn up descriptions of an ‘industrial heartland’ and a ‘breadbasket’ (though the latter term crops up far less often). Is the Donbas either? And what would Russia gain from controlling it?”
- “The short answer to the first question, based on data from the State Statistics Service of Ukraine, is that prior to the conflict there the Donbas could indeed have been described as an industrial heartland, but not exactly a breadbasket. In 2013—the last full year before Russia’s de-facto separation of parts of these two regions from Ukraine—Donetsk and Luhansk:”
- “Jointly accounted for a quarter of Ukraine’s industrial production;”
- “Had the 2nd- and 9th-highest gross regional product, respectively, among Ukraine’s 27 constituent territories.”
- “When it comes to agriculture, however, only the Donetsk region made it into the top 10 of Ukrainian regions with the greatest agricultural production.”
Russia's other post-Soviet neighbors:
- No significant developments.
Footnotes:
- David Cowhig writes in the preface to his translation: “Although Russia and China announced a friendship with ‘no limits’ some articles in the Chinese press point to China’s difficult history with Russia and urge caution. An earlier article translated here brought up Russian Empire territorial gains at Qing Dynasty China’s expense during the mid-19th century: ‘Weibo: We Got Hong Kong Back, Why Not Vladivostok?’. This article has appeared several times in various Chinese media, most recently in July 2022. How many times it is hard to say; censors often sweep troublesome articles off the Internet or at least that section behind the Bamboo Curtain.”
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