7 Ideas to Explore

1. Despite the “immense costs” Russia has incurred since its full-fledged invasion of Ukraine in 2022, “the war remains sustainable for the Kremlin in the foreseeable future” and Russia’s goals in Ukraine have not changed, according to Max Bergmann and Maria Snegovaya of CSIS. With these realities in mind, the co-authors assess four plausible scenarios for the war’s future: “(1) a Russian breakthrough and the collapse of Ukraine’s military; (2) prolonged low-intensity conflict; (3) a ceasefire; and (4) a peace agreement.” This last scenario is the least likely, while the second scenario is “particularly plausible,” according to the authors.
2. Ukrainian officers said that 100,000 people—“more than Britain’s full-time army”—are now part of the country’s air defenses, “spanning radar stations, aircrews, anti-missile batteries, electronic warfare and drone operators,” according to John Thornhill of Financial Times. “Even so, the Russians continue to overwhelm them,” Thornhill observes. “Ukraine would ‘in the near future’ be able to deploy 1,000 drone interceptors a day,” according to Ukraine’s Defense Minister Denys Shmyhal. But that may not suffice, according to reporting by Ben Hall, Charles Clover and Laura Pitel of Financial Times. Ukraine’s air defense forces need to deploy three interceptors for every one Russian/Iranian Shahed drone, which at current rates means 2,500 a day, according to Max Enders of Munich-based Tytan Technologies, whose interceptor drones are being tested with the Ukrainian military. “The scale is mind-boggling,” he told FT. Meanwhile, Russia continues to ramp up production, flying “34,000 drones into Ukraine this year, almost nine times as many as a year ago,” according to Philip Pan of The New York Times.
3. A framework agreement on resolving the Russian-Ukrainian conflict should include security guarantees for Ukraine based on the "armed neutrality" model for Ukraine and non-expansion of NATO further into the former Soviet space, Thomas Graham, former Special Assistant to the U.S. President and a distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, told Russia’s RBC news agency. Graham’s vision of this framework also includes recognition that “each side controls territories that the other considers its own,” according to Graham, as reported by RBC. Two other key features of the proposed framework envision unfreezing Russian assets and rebuilding Ukraine, as well as respect for the rights of Russian-speaking citizens of Ukraine, according to Graham’s vision, as reported by RBC.  
4. Any Western optimism about Ukraine’s prospects should be tempered in spite of Donald Trump’s apparent about-face at the U.N., during which he predicted that Ukraine could win its war against Russia, according to Lawrence J. Korb and Stephen Cimbala. For one, Trump’s sudden support may be insincere and prompted by political optics or advice rather than genuine belief, the authors write in The National Interest. In addition, persistent obstacles remain: Ukraine’s military faces manpower shortages; political corruption and growing public fatigue could drive Ukrainians toward negotiating peace; and Russia continues to advance in eastern Ukraine. Furthermore, doubts linger that Trump’s true goal is to shift responsibility for Ukraine’s defense onto European allies, rather than ensuring robust U.S. support, according to Korb and Cimbala.
5. In his annual address to the Valdai Discussion Club on Oct. 2, Vladimir Putin dismissed Western warnings of a Russian attack on NATO as either incompetence or dishonesty, urging European leaders to "calm down.” He claimed the Russian armed forces are confidently advancing along multiple axes in Ukraine and dismissed Trump’s descriptions of Russia as a "paper tiger," asserting that Moscow is managing to fight not just Kyiv in Ukraine, but the whole NATO bloc. In his remarks, Putin also warned that deliveries of U.S. Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine would mark a “qualitatively new stage of escalation,” triggering a fresh crisis in the U.S.-Russian relations.¹ Putin also asserted that Russia remains confident in its nuclear deterrent, but has again reiterated Moscow’s recent proposal for Russia and the U.S. to jointly extend the central limits of the New START treaty before it expires in February 2026. He also warned Russia would resume nuclear tests if another nuclear power does so and repeated Russia’s long-standing position that U.S. calls for trilateral U.S.-Russia-China nuclear arms control negotiations will fall flat unless, among other things, the arsenals of Britain and France are factored in.²
6. In his Wall Street Journal article “Putin Warns West as Drones Appear in European Skies,” Thomas Grove reports that unidentified drones have appeared over European cities, disrupting airports and raising fears of Russian hybrid warfare aimed at exposing NATO vulnerabilities and deterring Western support for Ukraine. Vladimir Putin warned the West that Russia’s response to NATO’s increased aid to Ukraine would be "very convincing," especially if advanced weapons like Tomahawk missiles are supplied, implying that such moves would significantly escalate U.S.–Russia tensions.  “If we are fighting with the entire NATO bloc and we are moving, moving forward, and we feel confident, and we’re a paper tiger? What does NATO think it is?” Putin said, according to Grove.³ So far, the appearance of drones and other hybrid measures used by Moscow has only steeled resolve on the continent to counter Russian aggression, according to Grove. “Deterring Russia should not be beyond our capacity,” said Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski, speaking at the recent Warsaw Security Forum. “It is a question of how we organize ourselves for that task.”
7. When assessing the claim that Ukrainian drones have knocked out 38% of Russia’s oil refining capacity, it is important to keep in mind that “Russia’s refining capacity is not equal to output,” according to Sergey Vakulenko. “Every year, Russia refines up to 270 million tons—so at least 22% of the country’s total capacity is always idle,” this Russian energy expert explains. “For the moment, it’s unclear who will come out on top in the battle over Russia’s oil refineries—only time will tell. While the 38% figure may be based on real data, it’s a long way from accurately reflecting the nuance of the present situation,” Vakulenko writes for Carnegie Politika.

NB: Next week’s Russia Analytical Report will appear on Tuesday, Oct. 14, instead of Monday, Oct. 13, because of a U.S. federal holiday.

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:

• No significant developments.

Humanitarian impact of the Ukraine conflict:

• No significant developments.
• For military strikes on civilian targets see the next section.

Military and security aspects of the Ukraine conflict and their impacts:

“Russia’s War in Ukraine: The Next Chapter,” Max Bergmann and Maria Snegovaya, CSIS, 09.30.25.

• Bergmann and Snegovaya write: “[D]espite the immense costs Russia has borne since 2022, its goals in Ukraine remain largely unchanged.” The authors assess four plausible scenarios for the war’s future and emphasize that, “shifting the balance and ending the fighting will require sustaining significant investment in European and Ukrainian defense industries.”
• With these realities in mind, the co-authors assess four plausible scenarios for the war’s future: “(1) a Russian breakthrough and the collapse of Ukraine’s military; (2) prolonged low-intensity conflict; (3) a ceasefire; and (4) a peace agreement.” This last scenario is the least likely, while the second scenario is “particularly plausible,” according to the authors.
• Bergmann and Snegovaya conclude, “Achieving a stable outcome to this war, one that allows Ukraine to realize its European dream, would conversely amount to Putin’s nightmare. ... Russia will have to be pressured—militarily, economically, and diplomatically—to accept such an outcome. This will take time to achieve, especially since the Kremlin presently appears to believe it can still win the war. Unfortunately, at the moment, the fighting shows no end in sight.”

“Drone attacks threaten us all,” John Thornhill, Financial Times, 10.02.25.
 

• “Bombardments have become an ‘everyday reality’ in Ukraine,” Thornhill quotes Eveline Buchatskiy, who observed that Russia unleashed nearly 600 drones and dozens of missiles in a single weekend before she left Kyiv.
• Thornhill notes, “These terrors have been preying on the minds of NATO officials amid escalating tensions with Moscow and recent incursions into Polish and Danish airspace by drones, presumed to be Russian.”
• “Several NATO countries have been urgently redeploying air defense systems to central Europe,” Thornhill reports, but adds that “the Russians are becoming increasingly adept at evading even the best anti-missile systems.”
• As Denmark’s prime minister Mette Frederiksen told the FT, “‘The idea of a hybrid war is to threaten us, to divide us, to destabilize us. To use drones one day, cyber attacks the next day, sabotage on the third day.’”
• “Ukrainian officers said that 100,000 people—'more than Britain’s full-time army’—are now part of the country’s air defenses, spanning radar stations, aircrews, anti-missile batteries, electronic warfare, and drone operators. “Even so, the Russians continue to overwhelm them,” Thornhill observes.
• “Given how cheap, elusive and lethal they are, drones have rapidly become the weapon of choice for Russia and Ukraine,” Thornhill writes, recounting how both sides have used unconventional tactics, including Ukrainian drones launched from trucks near Russian airfields and suspicions that recent attacks in Denmark were launched from Russia’s ‘shadow fleet.’”
• Serhiy Skoryk of Kvertus predicts a demand for anti-drone technology will persist postwar, noting Russia’s 40,000 drone operators could become “the hired hands of criminals or terrorists.” Once restrictions are lifted, “Ukrainian companies could have a ‘huge impact’ in helping to counter such threats,” Skoryk says.
• “The lesson from Ukraine is that drone technology has already changed the rules of war, and peace, forever. The stark truth is that drone defenses will now require eternal vigilance, not just emergency investment,” Thornhill concludes.

“Military briefing: Ukraine races to intercept Russian drones,” Ben Hall, Charles Clover, and Laura Pitel, Financial Times, 09.30.25.

• “With a maximum speed in excess of 315km an hour, the Sting tears across Ukrainian skies with a shriek quite unlike the buzz or hum typical of other military drones. The bullet-shaped quadcopter is a drone killer, developed in a matter of months by Ukraine’s innovative defense technology sector,” Hall, Clover, and Pitel write.
• “Europe’s interest in the technology has surged since 21 Russian attack drones entered Poland’s air space earlier this month, exposing weaknesses in Nato’s air defenses. The alliance had to send F-35 fighters to shoot down four of the drones with expensive air-to-air missiles, and EU states are now eyeing Ukrainian drone interceptors as part of a proposed ‘drone wall’ along their eastern flank,” they note.
• “We are expanding production at a dramatic pace,” said Alex Roslin of Wild Hornets, makers of The Sting. “The company first successfully intercepted an attack drone less than five months ago and claims to have downed 600 drones since then.”
• “Kyiv has dwindling stocks of advanced short-to-medium range air defense missiles, which are vastly more expensive than Russian Shaheds, thought to cost $35,000 each, although estimates vary. The AIM-9X interceptor missile for the NASAMS air defense system, for example, costs more than $1mn. The one-way Sting interceptor drone — which explodes on contact — costs $2,100,” Roslin said.
• “‘It’s a very cost-effective solution. It is an example of Ukraine’s asymmetrical approach, fighting against the mass suicide approach that Russia has,’” Roslin added.
• “To ensure success, Ukraine’s air defense forces say they need to deploy three interceptors for every one Shahed, which at current rates means 2,500 a day, according to Enders. ‘The scale is mind-boggling.’ Ukraine’s defense minister Denys Shmyhal this month said Ukraine would ‘in the near future’ be able to deploy 1,000 drone interceptors a day,” Hall, Clover, and Pitel write.

“Ukraine at the Rubicon,” Jillian Kay Melchior, The Wall Street Journal, 10.03.25.

• “Sgt. Temnohorov and his special-forces brigade colleagues had been experimenting with a novel way to deliver blood by drone. … Fridge-to-front blood delivery by drone was ‘still faster than any evacuation measures.’ It saved the wounded soldier that day in March, and Ukraine's Azov Brigade now does it ‘at a systemic level,’ Sgt. Temnohorov says,” Melchior reports.
• “Similar innovations are sustaining Ukraine in the face of Russia’s onslaught. Vladimir Putin wants to devour all of Donetsk oblast, but Ukrainians still control about 25% of it. Ukraine has established a 31-mile defensive line here known as the fortress belt that has stymied Russian advances.”
• “The idea is simple: If the Ukrainians holding the line can't get supplies, reinforcements, medical evacuations and other necessities, they'll be weakened, perhaps critically so. To isolate them, the Russians are striking targets in the rear. To soldiers on the ground, this feels like ‘a Middle-Aged siege, a modern version of that, with drones attacking all roads,’ says Capt. Yevhen Alkhimov.”
• “Ukrainians' current nemesis in Donetsk is the Rubikon Center for Advanced Unmanned Technologies, an elite Russian unit at the center of this interdiction campaign. … Rubikon is ‘slotting in and deploying to front lines the Kremlin sees as important,’ says Kateryna Stepanenko of the Institute for the Study of War.”
• “If we had resources like Rubikon, we would knock them out,” says a deputy Ukrainian commander. Melchior concludes, “The West can help with an interdiction campaign of its own: Moscow has about $300 billion in reserves in the West ripe for confiscation, if only the U.S. and Europe could muster the will to do it. Hand those assets over to Ukraine to fund weapons production.”

 "Ukraine's drone lessons for NATO," Anna Husarska, The Washington Post, 10.03.25.

• "On Sept. 9, 19 unarmed drones reached Polish territory. That same night, Russia launched more than 400 drones into Ukraine. While NATO fighter jets destroyed as many as four of the 19 drones over Poland, Ukraine's Air Force reported it took down 93 percent of Russia's drone salvo. In the field of anti-drone combat, NATO has a lot to learn — and Ukraine has a lot to teach," Husarska observes.
• Reflecting on her own experience bringing aid to Ukraine, Husarska writes, "At the start of the war, I was a neophyte. Now I can tell the difference between 'Mavic 3' and 'Mavic 3 Classic' drones (the former is easier to evade). I can also easily recognize the sound of an Iranian-designed Shahed drone."
• Husarska recounts learning new wartime skills and notes, "During a course in Odesa, I was taught how to apply a tourniquet, and I now know how to put together a basic first-aid kit. . .  I understand that plastic from recycled bottles can feed a 3D printer for making drone parts."
• She highlights the civilian role in drone defense: "Ukrainian officers said that 100,000 people (more than Britain’s full-time army) now contributed to the country’s air defenses, spanning radar stations, aircrews, anti-missile batteries, electronic warfare experts and drone operators. Even so, the Russians continue to overwhelm them."
• On the spread of war, Husarska warns, "Because there is no escaping the fact that the war is at NATO's doorstep. . . . Facts on the ground, or rather facts in the air, suggest that this is very much our war — all of ours. A war that Europe must confront, and a war that one day may come to the United States, if Putin's imperial appetite is not opposed."
• She concludes, "I fear my newfound expertise in drone-recognition and tourniquet-handling will become a globally useful skill."

“Tracking the Components of Missiles and UAVs Used by Russia in Ukraine: What Lessons for Control Regimes?” David Hayes, IISS, 09.25.25.

• “Analysis of battlefield debris from missiles and uninhabited aerial vehicles (UAVs) can reveal the origins of their components, providing insights into the strengths and weaknesses of international efforts to prevent unauthorized recipients from accessing lethal technologies,” Hayes writes.
• “Despite international sanctions on Russian, Iranian and North Korean missile and UAV programs, analysis of debris in Ukraine shows these weapons have relied heavily on foreign commercial components, including in the recent past,” Hayes observes.
• “Procurement networks exploited the complexity of global, distributor-centric supply chains and used intermediaries in countries with weak or absent enforcement,” he notes, explaining how even legitimate channels led to sanctioned users.
• “The Missile Technology Control Regime has, by its very design, a limited scope,” Hayes writes, adding that even new tools like the Common High Priority List “cannot meet all the challenges posed by globalized supply chains.” He argues, “Sanctions have disrupted some supply channels but also redirected procurement towards markets outside the Global Export Control Coalition. As a result, enforcement gaps remain.”
• “Geopolitical competition, the widespread use of dual-use and commercial/uncontrolled technologies, and the adaptability of procurement networks are all factors that undermine the effectiveness of traditional multilateral control regimes,” he states.
• Hayes stresses, “strengthening end-use controls, enhancing distributor accountability and improving industry due diligence could mitigate future technological diversion.” He concludes, “Only practical reform... can meaningfully reduce the leakage of lethal, sophisticated technologies to states under sanctions.”

“It’s not just about tanks and trenches anymore,” Philip P. Pan, The New York Times, 10.05.25.

• “Artillery, missiles, tanks and trench warfare dominated the first years of the war, but no longer… Drones do most of the killing now,” Pan notes, citing Marc Santora and colleagues. “Russia’s industrial might has lately given it an edge: It has flown more than 34,000 drones into Ukraine this year, almost nine times as many as a year ago.”
• Pan adds, “It’s not just aerial drones. … Ukrainian recruits learn to steer unmanned ground vehicles that deliver supplies and evacuate the wounded… In the Black Sea, drones resembling speedboats and torpedoes have kept Russia’s fleet at bay.”
• “These are the new economics of war: Drones worth hundreds or thousands of dollars must be shot down by missiles that cost millions to protect tanks and ships that cost even more. That changes the shape of conflict,” Pan observes.

“Military stalemate: Why Russia is not winning the war of attrition and what this means for all sides,” Kirill Rogov, Re: Russia, 09.30.25. Clues from Russian Views.

• “By calling Russia a ‘paper tiger,’ Donald Trump has drawn a line under the era dominated by the concept of a ‘war of attrition,’ which until now had remained the main framework for understanding the Russia–Ukraine conflict and its potential outcomes,” Rogov writes.
• “The failure of Russia’s current offensive will demonstrate that Vladimir Putin has been unable to build a military machine capable of delivering such an advantage. And, judging by the state of the Russian economy, it is unlikely that he will be able to do so in the near future,” Rogov asserts.
• “A military stalemate is the new framework that will shape how this stage of the conflict is understood, both within Russia and by the international community. It will deprive opponents of military aid to Ukraine of their arguments, strengthen discipline within the sanctions coalition, reshape the agenda for any potential ceasefire negotiations, and confront Putin with a stark choice: a deep crisis in public finances by the end of next year, or abandoning yet another attempt to seize northern Donbas.”
• “Since late 2023, Russia’s army has focused on capturing the remaining parts of Donbas. Yet, after nearly two years of fighting, it has seized a mere 6,500 square kilometers… The idea that such an offensive is more of a defeat than a victory has become increasingly popular among analysts in recent months.”
• “The assumption that Russia would inevitably win a ‘war of attrition’ rested on two premises: its advantage in manpower and in economic potential. Yet Putin’s reluctance to conduct large-scale forced mobilization, coupled with the rise of drone technology, has prevented Russia from fully exploiting either.”
• “From a purely military point of view, the inevitability of a stalemate was argued as early as November 2023 by the former Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, in an article written for The Economist. As in the First World War, Zaluzhnyi claimed, the technological capabilities of both sides had reached a point where a breakthrough offensive was impossible without a new technological leap in the means of warfare. Yet his words were not taken literally, and it took two years for this conclusion to become persuasive to politicians.”
• “Thus, a military stalemate is now the new overarching framework for understanding the current phase of the conflict. Russia is losing the war in the sense that it has failed to achieve its objectives, which is an undeniable defeat for a ‘great power.’” “The ‘war of attrition’ has turned out to be a double-edged sword — thanks to Ukraine’s courage, the resilience of the European coalition, and, of course, the drones,” Rogov concludes. Since Jan. 1, 2025, average Russian monthly gains have been 169 square miles. In the past four weeks (Sept. 2–30, 2025), Russian forces gained 146 square miles of Ukrainian territory, a 34% decrease from the 222 square miles these forces gained during the previous four-week period (Aug. 5–Sept. 2, 2025), according to the Oct. 1, 2025, issue of Russia Matters’ Russia-Ukraine War Report Card. Russia has occupied 27,421 square miles (71,019 square kilometers) since launching the full-scale invasion on Feb. 24, 2022, according to the Oct. 5, 2025 estimate of Ukraine’s DeepState OSINT group, which is associated with the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense. As of Oct. 5, 2025, Russia controlled a total of 44,397 square miles (114,988 square kilometers) of Ukrainian territory, including areas captured prior to Feb. 24, 2022, according to DeepState’s data. In comparison, Russia previously controlled 43,180 square miles (111,836 square kilometers). Thus, Russia gained 1,217 square miles (3,153 square kilometers)—a 2.8% increase—so far this year.

See this link for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “Russian missile upgrade outpaces Ukraine’s Patriot defenses,” Christopher Miller, Financial Times, 10.02.25.
• “Ukraine’s hellfire is intensifying the Kremlin’s fuel crisis,” The Economist, 10.05.25.

Military aid to Ukraine: 

“U.S. to Provide Ukraine With Intelligence for Missile Strikes Deep Inside Russia,” Bojan Pancevski, Alexander Ward and Lara Seligman, The Wall Street Journal, 10.01.25. In his reaction to these developments, Harvard University Professor Graham Allison warned that the “dangers [may] move up the escalation ladder.” “Now we will see whether the U.S. actually does it. And if so, how Russia responds,” he wrote in a short commentary for RM.

• “The U.S. will provide Ukraine with intelligence for long-range missile strikes on Russia’s energy infrastructure, American officials said, as the Trump administration weighs sending Kyiv powerful weapons that could put in range more targets within Russia,” Pancevski, Ward, and Seligman report.
• “President Trump recently signed off on allowing intelligence agencies and the Pentagon to aid Kyiv with the strikes. U.S. officials are asking North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies to provide similar support, these people said,” Pancevski, Ward, and Seligman write.
• “It is the first time, officials say, that the Trump administration will aid Ukrainian strikes with long-range missiles against energy targets deep inside Russian territory,” they note.
• “The intelligence, combined with more-powerful weapons, could have a far more potent effect than Ukraine’s previous strikes in Russia, causing greater damage to its energy infrastructure and tying up Russian air defenses,” Pancevski, Ward, and Seligman explain.
• “The administration recently approved the sale to Ukraine of Extended Range Attack Munitions, an air-launched missile that can travel between 150 and 280 miles. Tomahawk cruise missiles, one of the most precise U.S. weapons, have a range of around 1,500 miles,” the authors note.
• “Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky revealed last week that he asked Trump for Tomahawks. Vice President JD Vance said Sunday on Fox News that the U.S. was considering Ukraine’s request,” Pancevski, Ward, and Seligman report.
• “The Pentagon imposed a review process for each time Ukrainians want to use them. That veto has prevented Kyiv from launching U.S.-supplied Atacms, which have a range of about 190 miles, into Russia since late spring,” the article adds.
• “Moscow is carefully analyzing U.S. statements about delivering Tomahawks to Ukraine, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday. ‘The question remains: Who can launch these missiles, even if they end up on Kyiv regime territory? Can only Ukrainians launch them, or will the American military do so? Who is assigning the targeting to these missiles? This requires a very thorough analysis,’” Pancevski, Ward, and Seligman quote.
• “European officials welcomed the move. Germany has invested around $350 million into developing Ukraine’s industrial capacity to manufacture deep-strike capabilities,” Pancevski, Ward, and Seligman note.
• “‘You have to cut off the supply lines to hold the front line—that is the military logic behind it,’ Kaschke said,” they quote Brig. Gen. Joachim Kaschke of Germany.

 “Why Not Let Ukraine Hit Moscow? Trump offers intelligence support for long-range strikes inside Russia,” Editorial Board, The Wall Street Journal, 10.02.25.

• “The news this week that the U.S. will lend intelligence support for Ukraine's long-range missile strikes on Russian targets is welcome—and testifies to the live debate inside the Trump Administration on how to deal with Vladimir Putin's refusal to negotiate an end to his assault on Ukraine,” the WSJ editors write.
• “All who follow the war understand that Ukraine won't gain the upper hand in the fight if the Russian homeland is a sanctuary. Mr. Trump himself said on social media this year that President Biden's big mistake was refusing to let Ukraine ‘fight back’ instead of merely defending its own territory. He was right then, not that his policy has changed much since,” the board argues.
• “Ukraine's attacks on Russian energy infrastructure are doing real damage. The Hudson Institute...noted that ‘Russia has been placing protective metal structures over its energy facilities to protect them from long-range Ukrainian drone strikes. The Kremlin also recently banned the export of gasoline until the end of 2025 in an effort to conserve its resources for domestic use.’”
• “U.S. intel will make these attacks pack a more powerful and precise punch. The intelligence support is at least a tacit overruling of those in the Administration, especially in the Pentagon's strategy shop, who fret that any such help amounts to dangerous escalation that might rile Mr. Putin,” the editors explain.
• “A crucial question is whether Mr. Trump will put targeting restrictions on the new Extended Range Attack Munition soon to arrive in Ukraine. These cheaper munitions will give Ukraine better ability to strike at longer ranges. Their U.S. development for Ukraine is a success story amid so much defeatism about insufficient and too-expensive U.S. weapons inventories,” they add.
• “Even on the good days, Mr. Trump's Ukraine policy is a muddle. But we'll still applaud an incremental improvement like more U.S. intelligence support for Ukraine to help pressure Mr. Putin to the negotiating table,” the editorial board concludes.

See these links for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “Why the White House Is Considering Tomahawks for Ukraine,” Sam Skove, Foreign Policy, 10.03.25.
• "Why Is Denmark Leading the Pack on Ukraine?" Marc Champion, Bloomberg, 10.02.25.
• "Will Trump Send Tomahawk Missiles to Ukraine?" William Lawson, The National Interest, 10.03.25.

Punitive measures related to Russia’s war against Ukraine and their impact globally:

"'Decision day' is coming on Russia's frozen assets. It's about time." Editorial Board, The Washington Post, 10.03.25.

• “Since last year, Ukraine has been making ends meet with the help of interest earned from frozen Russian sovereign assets held at Euroclear, a Brussels-based securities settlement house. But that's not going to be enough if Russia's war drags on. To stay afloat, the International Monetary Fund forecasts that Ukraine will need an estimated $65 billion through 2027. The only realistic way to get that kind of money, especially as the United States steps back, is for Europeans to go after the Kremlin's underlying assets that remain in their banks,” the Washington Post editorial board writes.
• “For good reasons, this has been a nonstarter since Russia's full-scale invasion more than three years ago. Leaders in Europe and the United States have been reluctant to confiscate Russian funds for fear of setting a dangerous precedent that could be wielded against Western governments in the future and spook foreign investors. They've also worried that Russia could eventually win back its money in court, leaving the countries on the hook for huge sums,” the editors explain.
• “In recent weeks, however, the debate shifted dramatically on account of Russia's military provocations against NATO members, combined with Russian President Vladimir Putin's rejection of President Donald Trump's entreaties to stop the fighting in Ukraine.”
• German Chancellor Friedrich Merz proposed that the EU “borrow” the Russian money at Euroclear — $164 billion — and loan it to Ukraine interest-free, to be paid back only if Russia pays war reparations after the conflict ends. “If Russia refuses to agree to pay reparations, which seems almost certain, then the Kremlin would theoretically be the party left holding the bag,” the editorial notes.
• “Alas, last week's positive momentum appears to have stalled. … After a day of wrangling behind closed doors, the E.U. leaders agreed they need to show Russia that they have the ‘means’ and ‘will’ to support Ukraine — but not much else. ‘Now it's the European Union's turn to deliver,’ said European Council President António Costa. ‘Decision day’… would come the next time the Council officially meets — on Oct. 23-24.”
• The Washington Post concludes: “If it's going to be taken seriously, the E.U. will need to figure out how to break bureaucratic logjams.”

“The creative ‘reparations’ loan plan for Ukraine,” Editorial Board, Financial Times, 09.29.25.

• “With characteristic bravado last week, Donald Trump appeared once again to pivot on Ukraine. The US president insisted Kyiv could win back all of its territory — but, he added as an all-important rider, ‘with the support of the European Union’,” the FT editorial board notes.
• “Germany’s chancellor Friedrich Merz has backed a ‘reparations’ loan plan that could mobilize €140bn to support Ukraine, linked indirectly to frozen Russian central bank assets.”
• “Bonds that Russia’s central bank held with Euroclear…have been turned into about €176bn cash as they matured. The plan now taking shape would enable the EU to use these cash balances for a zero-interest loan to Kyiv…Ukraine would only repay the loan later if it could do so using Russian reparations.”
• “The loan idea is a further sign of European capitals stepping up to fill the gaps created by Trump’s withdrawal,” the FT board argues, praising recent moves for a “drone wall” of interlinked defenses.
• “The wheels of European policymaking can move with exasperating slowness. But when it comes to stepping up Ukraine’s and the continent’s defenses, they are moving in the right direction.”

“$300 billion for Ukraine outweighs Putin’s threats,” Stephen Rademaker, The Washington Post, 09.30.25.

• “Momentum is building on both sides of the Atlantic to give Ukraine the approximately $300 billion in Russian state assets frozen by Western countries after Moscow launched its full-scale invasion in 2022,” Rademaker writes.
• “European leaders are coalescing around the idea of converting the Russian money into a ‘loan’ to Ukraine— which Ukraine would not have to repay unless Russia makes reparations for damages inflicted in the war.”
• “Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has responded by warning that such action ‘will not go unanswered.’ For years, Peskov has threatened that Moscow would retaliate against confiscation of its assets by seizing Western investment in Russia.”
• “But hostage-taking is a long-established Russian tactic. In fact, Russia is estimated to have already confiscated about $50 billion in investment over the past three years.”
• “Governments…should aggressively deploy their own version of Helms-Burton against Russia to counter the threat to the property of their investors,” Rademaker concludes.

“Moscow Indicates Retaliation if Europe Uses Russian Assets for Ukraine,” Paul Sonne, The New York Times, 10.01.25.

• “The Kremlin warned it would seek prosecution of individuals and countries involved in the ‘theft’ of frozen Russian sovereign assets in Europe, as EU leaders discussed a $165 billion loan to Ukraine based on these assets,” Sonne reports.
• “Kremlin spokesman Dmitri S. Peskov stated: ‘We are talking about theft,’ refusing to distinguish between outright seizure and using the assets to back loans to Ukraine.”
• “Analysts suggest Moscow could retaliate by seizing or selling assets, property, or shares of foreign companies and individuals from countries backing the loan to Ukraine; Russia has already taken over multiple Western company operations”
• “President Vladimir Putin warned in September that European seizure of Russian sovereign assets ‘would completely destroy all principles of international economic and financial activity, and would undoubtedly cause enormous harm to the entire global economy.’”
• “In June, appearing in Minsk, Putin said Western ‘theft’ of Russian reserves would ‘accelerate a splintering of global financial systems,’ and Russia has promoted moving trade out of dollars and euros and creating payment systems immune to Western interference.”
• “‘There’s constant talk about how they’re planning to steal our money,’ Putin added. ‘But once that happens, the movement toward regionalization of payment systems will accelerate and become, without a doubt, irreversible. Perhaps it’s worth paying for.’”
• “Dmitri A. Medvedev, deputy chairman of Russia’s national security council, pledged Russia would pursue EU states and officials ‘by every means possible [… and] even out of court,’ should Russian property be confiscated.”

“Russia’s Shadow Fleet Is Doing More Than Sanctions-Busting,” Elisabeth Braw, Foreign Policy, 10.02.25.

• “The infamous Pushpa, a unflagged tanker believed to be run by Russia, has been making trouble in the Baltic again,” Braw reports. French authorities detained the ship on suspicion it helped launch drones that disrupted Copenhagen airport.
• “Russia’s shadow fleet, operating under Moscow’s orders but nominally registered in other countries, has become even more aggressive in Baltic waters than before,” Braw observes. Maritime pilots report these ships increasingly refuse pilotage, carry “surprise passengers” in Russian navy uniforms not listed on crew rosters, and operate without paperwork.
• “We’re seeing uniformed personnel carrying the camouflage uniform of the Russian Navy,” Danish pilot Bjarne Skinnerup tells Braw, adding “the unofficial passengers are mapping Danish infrastructure.”
• Braw quotes Rear Adm. Nils Wang: “Russian shadow vessels may be using the Baltic approach to attack, harass, and map maritime and land-based infrastructure because they can do it unnoticed by using freedom of navigation.”
• Braw concludes, “Trying to track Russia’s shadow fleet is a frustrating task… The Danish pilots are perhaps the only group to have seen their activities up close. We should listen to them.”

For sanctions on the energy sector, please see section “Energy exports from CIS” below.

Ukraine-related negotiations: 

“Former Special Assistant to the U.S. President Outlines a Possible Settlement Model for Ukraine,” RBC, 10.04.25 Machine-translated.

• “Security guarantees like an adapted CFE (Conventional Forces in Europe) treaty, unfreezing Russian assets and creating a Ukraine reconstruction committee, a halt to NATO expansion without consensus, and protections for Russian speakers—this is how Thomas Graham, distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and former Special Assistant to the U.S. President, described a potential model for Ukraine settlement in an interview with RBC.”
• “He said that solving the conflict in Ukraine isn’t about signing one document, but is part of the broader European security question. Graham believes that Russia and Ukraine could agree on basic principles for a final settlement, after which talks on all aspects of ‘ending the Ukrainian crisis and stabilizing relations between Russia and the West in Europe’ would begin.”
• “Graham proposes several negotiating tracks, some of which, in his opinion, require the participation of more than just Russia and Ukraine:”
  1. “Security guarantees based on the "armed neutrality" model: Graham cites Ukraine's own army with defensive capabilities as an alternative to the deployment of Western peacekeeping forces and NATO guarantees similar to Article 5 of the alliance's charter, which, in his opinion, its member states are reluctant to provide. According to Graham, Kyiv will insist that even with neutral status, Ukraine cannot be completely demilitarized "to be able to defend itself in the event of an attack." "The Ukrainians are referring to aggression from Russia. But Ukraine could theoretically face threats from other directions in the future, be it in the Black Sea region or, for example, in the Balkans," he concluded. It all comes down to the question of what size army Ukraine needs so that Moscow doesn't perceive it as a threat, Graham says, noting that a possible solution is unlikely to be agreed upon through dialogue between Kyiv and Moscow alone.’”
  2. “NATO's role in Europe, which does not necessarily require agreement with all alliance members De facto, further NATO expansion eastward, closer to Russia's borders, will not occur, Thomas Graham is confident. "I find it difficult to imagine a scenario in which Belarus would become a candidate for membership, and frankly, the three Transcaucasian states as well. This fact requires formal recognition, which would go a long way toward allaying Moscow's concerns," he noted. [Negotiations are also needed on how to stabilize the line between Russia and NATO and create mechanisms similar to those discussed at the end of the Cold War: increased transparency and restrictions on the types of military contingents and heavy weapons that can be deployed within a certain distance from the border, the expert believes.”
  3. “The territorial issue: The initial settlement, according to Thomas Graham, could be based on a de facto line of contact and the recognition that "each side controls territories that the other considers its own." Thus, we may be talking about de facto recognition of the current state of affairs, but not de jure recognition, provided that the final resolution of the territorial dispute will be the subject of future negotiations, he noted.”
  4. “Unfreezing Russian assets and restoring Ukraine: In the issue of Russia's frozen assets, Thomas Graham identifies "two interrelated problems that may suggest a solution." The first is the future of the frozen assets. The second is the issue of restoring Ukraine. Moreover, restoration is necessary not only in the territories controlled by Kyiv. A significant part of Donbas, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson oblasts were also affected by the conflict, and they too will need to be rebuilt.”
  5. “Respect for the rights of Russian-speaking citizens of Ukraine: The resolution of the issue of discrimination against ethnic Russians and Russian-speakers is already being seen in the context of Ukraine's plans for European integration and compliance with relevant European human rights charters, Thomas Graham notes. "The rights of Russian-speaking residents in Ukraine will be protected in one way or another, especially as Ukraine addresses issues related to its accession to the European Union. And, in fact, many Russian-speaking and ethnic Russians now live in territories controlled by Moscow," he concluded.”

“Is Donald Trump’s Ukraine Conversion Sincere?” Lawrence J. Korb and Stephen Cimbala, The National Interest, 10.01.25.

• “Many observers and commentators were surprised when US president Donald Trump, in the same week as he addressed the United Nations, did an apparent about-face and predicted that Ukraine could win its war against Russia… Why the sudden shift in rhetoric…?” Korb and Cimbala write.
• “Before breaking out the champagne, we should consider possible sources of President Trump’s sudden démarche in favor of Ukraine and hold our breath with respect to its durability,” the authors caution.
• “First, Trump’s summit with Russian president Vladimir Putin was, from the standpoint of foreign policy optics and possible movement toward a peaceful settlement of the war between Russia and Ukraine, a flop,” Korb and Cimbala assert.
• “A second source of discouragement for the United States came in the form of repeated probes near or into NATO airspace by Russian drones and combat aircraft,” the authors report.
• “A third possible source for Trump’s apparent reversal on Ukraine is the advice he is receiving from some of his own military experts. They and others have expressed optimism that, if additional weapons of the proper type could be fast-tracked to Ukraine in good time, it might turn the tide of battle in Ukraine’s favor,” Korb and Cimbala suggest.
• “Arrayed against this recent optimism are at least three major contrarian indications and concerns,” the authors note.
• “First, Ukraine is already under considerable pressure to provide for the manpower needed to support its existing deployments. Second, the government of Ukraine must get a better grip on its own political corruption and anticipate that the longer the suffering of its civilian population continues, the more willing citizens will be to favor negotiated peace over continued fighting. Third, the Russian position on the ground in eastern Ukraine… is still inching forward,” Korb and Cimbala explain.
• “Finally, there remains a suspicion that Trump’s… real intent is to pass most of the responsibility for the continued defense of Ukraine to the US’ European allies,” the authors conclude.

“Trump’s Ukraine Gamble,” George Beebe, Compact, 09.26.25.

• “Did months of boastful promises to end the war in Ukraine really produce little more than an Oval Office tongue-lashing of Volodymyr Zelensky, a day of ceremonious summitry with Vladimir Putin in Alaska, and a several hours of cringe-inducing European obsequiousness toward President Trump in the White House?” Beebe asks.
• “Upon further consideration, he [Trump] now believes that with continued support from NATO and tough economic pressure on Moscow, Ukraine can in fact defeat Russia and reclaim its lost lands. His closing, ‘Good Luck to all!,’ appeared to signal that the United States will step back, allowing Ukraine and Russia to settle their differences on the battlefield, while providing Europeans long opposed to a compromise peace with the arms needed to pursue their preferred course of proxy warfare with Russia,” Beebe writes.
• “For Europe, Trump’s message was in essence a poison pill,” Beebe argues, suggesting that “such wording spoke volumes, dangling the prospect of a US retreat not just from peacemaking in Ukraine, but from European alliance commitments more broadly. That prospect, much more than continued war in Ukraine, is Europe’s biggest security concern.”
• “The unstated implication behind Trump’s post—that Ukrainians should expect many more months if not years of continued attritional warfare with a much larger and better supplied Russian army, even as the United States winds down its involvement in the conflict—cannot be altogether encouraging to an increasingly exhausted Ukrainian population,” Beebe observes.
• “For Russia, Trump’s post elicits concerns of a different type. Putin has little fear that Ukraine can drive Russian forces out of Crimea or the Donbass, nor are the strains on its economy anywhere near sufficient to force him to quit the war. Rather, Russia worries that the window of opportunity for restoring some kind of normalcy to its relations with the United States may close,” he notes.
• “Relying on nuclear weapons to deter NATO would place Russian security once again on the hair-trigger that Soviet leaders found so discomfiting in the 1980s,” Beebe warns.
• “If Russia is to be the great power Putin and other Russian elites envision, it must have normal relations with the United States and use negotiations to mitigate the threats it faces in Europe. Trump’s post has almost certainly forced Russia to contemplate the implications of failed rapprochement with Washington,” Beebe writes.
• “No doubt, Trump’s post is a gamble. If it does not pay off in more flexible negotiating positions from Russia, Europe, and Ukraine, he will have little choice but to pull back from his peacemaking agenda in Ukraine… The prospects of great power conflict would grow, and Trump’s hope that a more peaceful international order will allow him to focus on America’s acute domestic problems would be dashed,” Beebe concludes.

“What Kissinger would do about Putin and Ukraine,” Robert Hormats, Atlantic Council/New Atlanticist, 10.03.25.

• “The lack of progress is due largely to the Russian side: Moscow has made wildly unreasonable demands. Russian President Vladimir Putin has hypocritically talked about a desire for peace and then escalated attacks on Ukraine. And the Kremlin continues to deny the legitimacy of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the Ukrainian government. But the lack of real progress is also due in part to an often tepid and unclear US response regarding new sanctions against Russia and new sales of advanced arms to Ukraine,” Hormats writes.
• “From his actions and the tenor of his rhetoric, one can surmise that Putin has no intention to negotiate a constructive outcome at this time. He is using these talks as an excuse for delay, while he attempts to seize more Ukrainian territory, discredit the Ukrainian government, divide the West, and weaken NATO, hoping that the United States will lose interest and resolve in supporting Kyiv. Since his talks with US President Donald Trump in Alaska in June, Putin has only stepped up his attacks against Ukraine,” Hormats argues.
• “Many of the above-mentioned actions by Putin and Russia would have come as no surprise to Kissinger, who was a realist... Putin increasingly came to see Russian greatness as inseparable from his own,” Hormats observes, describing how Kissinger’s personal attitudes toward Moscow evolved from “cooperative” to recognizing Putin’s belligerence and irrationality.
• On negotiations, Hormats notes, “Kissinger believed that discussions between US and Chinese officials should be aimed at building trust as a common objective—rather than engaging in hollow, theatrical meetings. … In recent negotiations with Russia, the United States has made several concessions—often at the expense of Ukraine. But there has been no reciprocity from the Kremlin.… Russia is unwilling to give back any part of Ukrainian territory that it invaded and now occupies. It is unwilling to accept the West’s insistence on credible security assurances for Ukraine and the broader region.”
  • “Putin is smart and experienced; no one should underestimate him or his foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, who has lived in the United States and understands that Americans often get tired of long, indecisive, and expensive wars. Both men clearly are hoping for that once again,” Hormats observes.
• “Can negotiations in these circumstances ever produce trust between the parties and lead to constructive and credible Russian actions? If the answer is no, as it appears to be, there are few options other than the application of significantly greater Western pressure, especially in the form of much tougher sanctions, further and enhanced military support for Ukraine, and tangible evidence of prolonged American and Western resolve,” Hormats writes.
• As Kissinger’s economic adviser, Hormats recalls, “the United States has overestimated the strength of Russia’s economy, while Moscow has cleverly disguised its considerable economic weaknesses.” He asserts, “Russian inflation is already about five times higher than inflation in the United States or most other countries in the West, and its budget deficit is higher this year than any since the full-scale invasion began.”
• “As Kissinger, drawing on his experience in international power politics, would likely have pointed out, the decisive point here is not what a few other countries do or don’t do; it is what is in US interests. Supporting a free and democratic Ukraine and ending the war there decidedly fall into that category,” Hormats argues.
• Hormats recommends that U.S. support for Ukraine’s strikes on Russian energy infrastructure and much tougher sanctions could “accelerate” Moscow’s willingness to negotiate “a just peace.” He urges, “Western leaders should expect much more of this and more serious provocations if the United States or its allies appear irresolute.”
• “By acting boldly—right now—to impose greatly intensified sanctions, provide more and higher-capacity weapons to Ukraine, increase intelligence sharing with Kyiv, and diplomatically support this country defending itself against Russian aggression, Trump will put himself and the United States on the right side of history. And all Americans should rally behind the president if he does so,” Hormats concludes.

“5 Takeaways From Trump’s Address to Generals and Admirals” Minho Kim, The New York Times, 09.30.25.

• “Mr. Trump expressed deep frustration over the continued war in Ukraine, despite his efforts to broker a peace agreement, including with a one-on-one meeting in Alaska where the president rolled out the red carpet for Mr. Putin,” according to NYT.
• “Mr. Trump said that he had thought the war in Ukraine would be the “easiest” one to end, but it “turned out to be the hardest” of all conflicts to solve. Mr. Trump also called Mr. Putin “a paper tiger” for failing to win the war, which began with a full-scale invasion more than three years ago,” according to NYT.
• “I’m so disappointed in President Putin,” Mr. Trump said. “We met in Alaska and had a good meeting. Then he went back and started sending drones into Kyiv.”

See this link for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• "Risks or Money: Does the West know how to end the war in Ukraine?" Re: Russia 09.26.25.
• “Chat with David Ignatius about the war in Ukraine and foreign affairs," The Washington Post, 10.06.25. To be available at a later time.

Great Power rivalry/new Cold War/NATO-Russia relations:

“The paradox of Russian escalation and NATO’s response,” Charlie Edwards, IISS, 09.26.25.

• “The recent drone incursion into Poland represented a significant escalation in Russia’s unconventional war on Europe,” Edwards writes.
  • “The incursions into NATO’s airspace starkly illustrate a dynamic of Russia’s unconventional war on Europe: the paradox of escalation. While the Kremlin keeps testing the Alliance’s resolve with drones, sabotage and disinformation, to make gains, it must keep pushing. In doing so, each probe increases the risk of a miscalculation, narrowing the room for crisis management that could turn a limited incident into a conventional war that the Kremlin wants to avoid,” he notes.
  • “The Kremlin’s playbook includes targeting critical national infrastructure both physically and through cyber attacks, recruiting proxies to limit its exposure and employing influence operations to undermine European security and manipulate public opinion,” Edwards writes.
  • “The recent incursions into NATO’s airspace suggest a calculated escalation. Firstly, to identify potential vulnerabilities in NATO’s air defenses…Secondly, to spread insecurity, sow disunity among allies and erode public confidence in NATO’s ability to protect its citizens. Thirdly, the drone incursions forced NATO to expend expensive missiles against low-cost drones…”
  • “It is likely that the Kremlin was emboldened by perceptions of waning American interest in Europe, leading to more assertive foreign-policy actions, but the shift in rhetoric from United States’ President Donald Trump will force the Kremlin to recalibrate its approach,” Edwards argues.
  • “NATO’s challenge is now to develop a sustainable response. Using fighters, AWACS and tanker aircraft as well as air-to-air missiles…to counter cheap €10,000 drones highlights a critical vulnerability. At scale, launching hundreds of inexpensive drones can quickly exhaust the Alliance’s finite and costly supply of interceptors, potentially leaving some sectors exposed while reloading.”
  • “Beyond the military challenge, the recent slew of incidents has changed the political picture. Six European countries have stated they will defend their airspace with force. Lithuania, for example, has authorized its forces to shoot down unlawful drones in peacetime,” Edwards writes.
  • “Following numerous incursions, NATO member states have replaced ambiguity with clarity. Following Trump’s intervention, that clarity now has political top-cover even if it doesn’t come with an explicit US backstop,” he writes.
  • “The episode [Turkey shooting down a Russian Su-24 in 2015] illustrates how quickly cross-border probes and split-second rules of engagement decisions can trigger a crisis,” Edwards concludes.

• “For weeks, drones have been mysteriously appearing in European skies, closing airports from Warsaw to Munich. Western officials suspect that Russia is behind the campaign, seeking to sow fear in European capitals, probe NATO weaknesses and raise the stakes over the continent’s support for Ukraine,” Grove writes.
• “On Thursday, shortly before the drones were spotted, Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered a warning: Moscow was ready to respond to efforts by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to boost support for Ukraine in the war. 'You won’t have to wait long for Russia’s response,' Putin said at a foreign-policy think tank discussion. 'A response to threats, to put it mildly, will be very convincing.'”
• “Drones have been appearing over Europe as Western allies consider ways to strengthen Ukraine’s hand in the war. President Trump recently gave his approval to U.S. intelligence agencies and the Pentagon to aid Kyiv with missile strikes deep inside Russia,” the Wall Street Journal has reported. The U.S. is also weighing providing powerful new weapons, including Tomahawk missiles.
  • “It’s impossible to use Tomahawks without the direct participation of American troops,” Putin said on Thursday. “It would mean an absolutely new, qualitatively new phase of escalation, including between Russia and the United States.”
• “Trump has recently signaled growing impatience with Moscow, after a series of meetings between U.S. and Russian leaders failed to yield substantial progress on peace negotiations. His public comments have appeared aimed at raising pressure on Russia. 'Everyone thought Russia would win this war in three days, but it didn’t work out that way. It was supposed to be just a quick little skirmish. It’s not making Russia look good,' Trump said last week.”
  • “Putin responded to Trump’s comments Thursday. 'If we are fighting with the entire NATO bloc and we are moving, moving forward, and we feel confident, and we’re a paper tiger? What does NATO think it is?'”
• “So far, the appearance of drones and other hybrid measures used by Moscow has only steeled resolve on the continent to counter Russian aggression,” Grove reports. “Deterring Russia should not be beyond our capacity,” said Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski, speaking at the Warsaw Security Forum last week. “It is a question of how we organize ourselves for that task.””

“The Russian Air Incursions Are a Warning to Europe,” Anatol Lieven, The American Conservative, 09.26.25.

• “The Russian fighters that briefly entered Estonian airspace last Friday and the drones that flew into Polish and Romanian airspace earlier are very unlikely to have been an accident, but they were not an ‘attack,’” Lieven writes, noting “they were almost certainly intended as a warning—a warning above all against British and European plans to deploy a ‘reassurance force’ to Ukraine after a peace settlement. This has been repeatedly and categorically rejected by the Russian government.”

• Regarding European security arrangements, Lieven argues, “Instead of trying to trap the U.S. into a commitment to Ukraine involving the permanent risk of war with Russia… European governments should be steadily and sensibly building up the defenses of NATO within its existing borders while at the same time developing a viable peace settlement by which Russia would abandon its impossible demands to Ukraine in return for a new European security architecture guaranteeing Russia’s own legitimate security interests.”

  “EU must be defense power, not just a trade bloc, Finnish PM says,” Gabriel Gavin, Politico, 10.01.25.

• “The EU should take on unprecedented powers to defend itself against increasing threats from Russia, Finland's prime minister said,” Gavin reports.
• “In an interview with POLITICO ahead of a summit of the bloc's leaders in Copenhagen on Wednesday, Petteri Orpo said the EU must act as a 'real union' when it comes to facing down hostile states,” Gavin notes.
• “‘We need common EU capabilities—so we need EU funding and EU cooperation,’ Orpo said. ‘We have shown solidarity for the last two decades, for example, in Covid, in economy, in migration. Now is the time to show solidarity in security.'”
• “Frontline states like Finland have long called for other member countries to step up on defense spending. But Orpo said all leaders now need to realize the eastern flank 'is our common border' and that nobody is safe from Moscow's tactics. A string of drone sightings grounded planes at Copenhagen's airport just days before presidents and prime ministers flew in,” Gavin recounts.
• “‘These incidents, these attacks, are against the whole of Europe,’ he said. ‘Who is next? Denmark is not a border country, so we can see that it's possible all over Europe.'”
• “However, Orpo said, that doesn't mean Brussels displacing the NATO alliance,” Gavin writes.
• “‘We trust NATO, that is clear,’ he added. ‘The European Union can do more to help countries and support NATO, for example, to ramp up military industry, which is needed. Without stronger military industry, industrial capacity, in Europe, our defense cannot be stronger.'”
• “‘There are no signs Putin will have peace,’ he said. ‘Because of all this, we are worried — I am very worried—and now is the time here to take action.'”

“‘So what?’ Orbán says spy drone incursion into Ukraine was no big deal,” Elena Giordano and Csongor Körömi, Politico, 09.29.25.

• “Prime Minister Viktor Orbán on Monday questioned Ukraine’s sovereignty and shrugged off accusations from Kyiv that Hungarian reconnaissance drones had violated the country’s airspace,” Giordano and Körömi report.
• “‘Let’s suppose they flew a few meters in there [Ukraine], and so what?’ Orbán said on the Fighter’s Hour podcast produced by his Fidesz party,” Giordano and Körömi quote.
• “‘Ukraine is not an independent country. Ukraine is not a sovereign country… If we, that is the West, decide not to give it a single forint [Hungarian currency], tomorrow Ukraine could shut down,’ he added,” Giordano and Körömi recount.
• “Relations between Budapest and Kyiv have deteriorated in recent months as Hungary persists in blocking Ukraine’s EU accession while preserving energy ties with Moscow despite the Kremlin’s ongoing full-scale invasion,” Giordano and Körömi observe.
• “Orbán argued that Kyiv has already ‘lost one-fifth of its territory’ to Russia and that its survival depends entirely on Western aid. ‘That is where sovereignty ended, and we support the remaining territory,’ he said, adding that Hungary and Ukraine ‘may disagree, but we are not enemies,’” Giordano and Körömi report.
• “Ordering an investigation into the incident, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Friday claimed ‘likely Hungarian’ drones had crossed the border to conduct reconnaissance of industrial sites,” Giordano and Körömi note.
• “Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó swiftly rejected the allegations, accusing Zelenskyy of ‘losing his mind to his anti-Hungarian obsession,’” Giordano and Körömi write.
• “Orbán on Monday further downplayed the security concerns, insisting Ukraine should ‘be dealing with the drones on its eastern border’ where the ground war with Russia is being fought,” Giordano and Körömi add.
• “‘No one is going to attack it from here,’ he said. ‘Two, three, or four Hungarian drones, whether they crossed the border or not, is not the issue the Ukrainians should be concerned with,’” Giordano and Körömi quote.

“Why Russia’s micro-aggressions against Europe are proliferating,” The Economist, 10.02.25.

• “Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, its intelligence services have led a campaign of sabotage and subversion across Europe. Described…as ‘hybrid warfare’ or ‘grey zone’ tactics, these hostile acts occupy a hazy space between untroubled peace and open war.”
• “Recent research by the International Institute for Strategic Studies…found that incidents of confirmed Russian sabotage against European infrastructure more than tripled between 2023 and 2024.”
• “A defender’s dilemma”, says Elisabeth Braw of the Atlantic Council, “is: respond harshly and you appear to overreact; let it pass and you lose credibility; retaliate in the grey zone and you instigate ‘a race to the bottom.’”
• “Western countries cannot be certain why Russia has ramped up its poking and prodding. Some believe…incidents were accidental…Others…insist the incursions were intentional.”
• The Economist concludes, “Russia may be resorting to more grey-zone intimidation precisely because repeated offensives in Ukraine have made little headway.… Mr. Putin does not need to frighten politicians or generals…He can advance his aims simply by alarming the public…and so undermining confidence in their governments.”

“The dangers of war in the grey zone,” Gideon Rachman, Financial Times, 10.06.25.

• “Over the past week, Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, has said that, when it comes to Russia, ‘we are not at war, but we are no longer at peace either.’ Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen told the FT: ‘We are now in the most difficult situation in Europe since the end of the second world war.’ She warned ‘we are running out of time.’ And Eliza Manningham-Buller, a former British intelligence head, mused that it ‘may be right [in saying] we’re already at war with Russia,’” Rachman writes.
  • Rachman notes, “All three were responding to a wave of Russian ‘hybrid warfare’—aggressive acts that stop short of actually killing people. As Frederiksen explained, it is ‘drones one day, cyber attacks the next day, sabotage on the third day.’”
• Rachman suggests, “Russia’s current actions do require a response that both makes it clear that there is a price to be paid for hybrid warfare — and avoids crossing the threshold into direct combat.” The best option may be “a western version of grey zone tactics,” using “offensive cyber capabilities” to impose costs for hybrid attacks, while carefully avoiding escalation into kinetic conflict.

"Will Europe Admit It's at War?" Bernard-Henri Lévy, The Wall Street Journal, 10.02.25

• Citing a long chronology of Russian provocations through 2025, Lévy writes, “This year things are speeding up. Intimidations, provocations and aggressions are multiplying: ... Sept. 25: overflight of Denmark's Skrydstrup military base, and closure of Aalborg and Billund airports because of drones. ... Sept. 26: drones over Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, over the naval base at Karlskrona, Sweden, and over Lithuania's Vilnius. ... Sept. 30: unidentified drones around Norway's Bronnoysund Airport.”
• “How do these countries and their allies respond? The bravest announce the opening of military hospitals to handle large numbers of wounded or the creation, next year, of an antidrone wall with hazy contours. Article 4 of the North Atlantic Treaty is invoked. Article 5 is debated. Air patrols are sent,” Lévy observes.
• According to Lévy, “Our irenic democracies struggle to accept the truth that when war is declared there is no choice but to face it -- with restraint, respecting the rules of proportionality, but with enough firmness to deter the enemy from pushing its escalation further.”
• On European hesitation, Lévy challenges, “Drones are banned in Europe over sensitive zones, strategic sites, most airports and certain urban areas. So what stops Europe from shooting them down?”
• Referring to a past precedent, Lévy writes, “In November 2015, Turkey saw its air border crossed by a Russian Su-24. When its warnings went unheeded, Turkey invoked self-defense and shot the aircraft down. ... No—never again did a Russian aircraft risk repeating the act.”
• “That is where we are today. Either we play or we say stop, increase our aid to Ukraine, and actually deter Mr. Putin from going further in this venture,” Lévy concludes.

"Valdai Discussion Club meeting. Vladimir Putin took part in the plenary session of the 22nd annual meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club,” Kremlin.ru, 10.02.25. Clues from Russian Views. Partially translated.

• “I think they [European elites] cannot possibly believe this. They cannot believe when they are saying that Russia is about to attack NATO. It is simply impossible to believe that. And yet they are making their own people believe it. So, what kind of people are they? They are either entirely incompetent, if they genuinely believe it, because believing such nonsense is just inconceivable, or simply dishonest, because they do not believe it themselves but are trying to convince their citizens that this is true. What other options are there? Frankly, I am tempted to say: calm down, sleep peacefully, and deal with your own problems.”
• “We are closely monitoring the growing militarization of Europe. Is it just rhetoric, or is it time for us to respond? We hear, and you are aware of this as well, that the Federal Republic of Germany is saying its army must once again become the strongest in Europe. Well, alright, we are listening carefully and following everything to see what exactly is meant by that.... However, if anyone still feels tempted to challenge us militarily – as we say in Russia, freedom is for the free – let them try. Russia has proven time and again: when threats arise to our security, to the peace and tranquility of our citizens, to our sovereignty and the very foundations of our statehood, we respond swiftly.”
• “You see, Russia’s very existence displeases many, and all wish to partake in this historic endeavor – inflicting a “strategic defeat” upon us and profiting thereby: taking a bite here, a bite there… I am tempted to make an expressive gesture, but there are many ladies present [in the hall]… That will not happen.”
• “As for the Tomahawks, they're a powerful weapon. ... Of course, this won't change the balance of power on the battlefield, it won't change the balance at all. I've already said: the fundamental problems of the Ukrainian armed forces—no matter how many drones you saturate them with, no matter how many seemingly impenetrable defenses you create with drones—still, if there are no personnel, there's no one to fight. ...There were ATACMS, so what? Well, yes, they caused some damage. Eventually, Russia's air defense systems adapted, despite being hypersonic, and began to shoot them down. Can Tomahawks harm us? They can. We will shoot them down and improve our air defense systems. Will this damage our relations, which have seen some light at the end of the tunnel? Of course it will. But how could it? Using Tomahawks without the direct participation of American military personnel is impossible. This would mark a completely new, qualitatively new stage of escalation, including in relations between Russia and the United States.”⁴
• “A paper tiger... I already said that all these years Russia hasn't been fighting the Ukrainian Armed Forces, or Ukraine, but practically all NATO countries. Speaking of... Yes, you asked what's happening along our line of contact. Well, I'll get back to the "tigers" now. ... if we're fighting the entire NATO bloc, and we're moving forward, advancing, feeling confident, and it's a paper tiger—what is NATO itself then? What does it even represent? ”
• “You started with a visit to the United States, to Alaska. President Trump and I discussed practically nothing there, not even the bilateral agenda; we only discussed possibilities and ways to resolve the Ukrainian crisis. Overall, that's already a good thing. In my opinion, President Trump—we've known him for a long time—is a bit of a shocker, we all see it, everyone around the world sees it, but he's basically the kind of person who knows how to listen, oddly enough. He listens, hears, and responds. So, he's basically a comfortable conversationalist, I'd say. And the fact that we made an attempt to find, explore, and ultimately find possible solutions to the Ukrainian crisis—in my opinion, that's a good thing. That's the first thing. Second. Still, one way or another, the discussion in this case, albeit superficially, was about restoring Russian-American relations, which are not just at an impasse, but at their lowest point in memory. And it seems to me that the very fact of our meeting, the very fact of the visit—and I am grateful to the President for the way he organized it—all of these are signs aimed at thinking about restoring bilateral relations. And in my view, this is good for everyone: for us bilaterally and for the entire international community.”
• “Our country, striving to eliminate the grounds for bloc confrontation and to create a common space of security, twice declared even its readiness to join NATO. Initially this was done in 1954, during the Soviet era. The second time was during the visit of US President Bill Clinton to Moscow in 2000 – I have already spoken about this – when we also discussed this topic with him. On both occasions, we were essentially refused outright. I reiterate: we were ready for joint work, for non-linear steps in the sphere of security and global stability. But our Western colleagues were not prepared to free themselves from the shackles of geopolitical and historical stereotypes, from a simplified, schematic view of the world. I also spoke publicly about this when I discussed it with Mr. Clinton, with President Clinton. He said, “You know, it’s interesting. I think it’s possible.” And then in the evening he said, “I consulted with my people – it’s not feasible, not feasible now.” “When will it be feasible?” And that was it, it all slipped away.”  The early 2000s saw Putin ask not only Bill Clinton, but also then the alliance’s SG Lord Robertson when NATO would invite Moscow into the alliance.”
• [With regard to extending central limitations of New START] “If the US Administration agrees to our proposal, then I know what will happen next within a year, but what will happen beyond that is hard to say. The dialogue is not easy; we know the pitfalls of this dialogue. First, we have acquired many modern, high-tech weapons systems. Take the Oreshnik missile system, for example. ...We recently demonstrated that such weapons are not strategic. Now we hear some experts in the US saying: no, these are still strategic weapons. ...We may acquire other systems as well. We haven't forgotten anything we planned; the work is ongoing, and there will be results. That's the first part. The second is tactical nuclear weapons... They talk about strategic weapons, but tactical ones...we have more of them, that's true. This needs to be sorted out. ...Overall, we are doing well; we are confident in our nuclear shield; we know what to do tomorrow and the day after tomorrow. ...There is a third aspect – international. We are constantly being told: you will persuade China, so that China will also..." "We've joined this system of strategic offensive arms limitation. Why us? Anyone who wants to involve China, go ahead and negotiate with China. What about us? But we have a question: if China needs to be involved, why then leave out the nuclear potential of Great Britain and France? ...If they want to lock in the status quo for a year, we're ready, we want to... But we're ready to take a break and, in this case, I'm not afraid to say it, work with our American colleagues if they deem it appropriate."
• “Some are preparing these [nuclear weapons] tests, we see it, we know it, and if they happen, we will do the same. You know, I can only tell my Chinese brothers and sisters that we are on the right path. We must maintain this, we must cherish the relationship that has developed between us and do everything in our power, wherever we may be—at the pinnacle of power, at the machine shop, in the theater, in film, or in higher or secondary education—to strengthen this interaction. It is of the utmost importance for both the Chinese and Russian people.”
• “As for, let us say, uranium – what is it, really? In this case, uranium is a fuel, an energy resource for nuclear power plants. In that sense, it is no different from oil, gas, fuel oil, or coal, because it too is an energy source that generates electricity. What is the difference? None at all. The United States does, in fact, buy uranium from us.”
• “You asked: why does the United States buy it, while, at the same time, trying to prevent others from purchasing our energy resources? The answer is simple, and it was given to us long ago in Latin. We all know the saying: Quod licet Iovi, non licet bovi – what is permitted to Jupiter is not permitted to an ox. That is the essence of it.”

“Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s remarks and answers to media questions at a news conference following the High-Level Week of the 80th session of the UN General Assembly,” Russian Foreign Ministry, 09.27.25. Clues from Russian Views.

• “We appreciate that from the very beginning, the administration of President Donald Trump proposed to resume our dialogue. We have resumed it. We immediately affirmed in February 2025, during a meeting with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and in a telephone conversation between President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump, that we recognize that Russia, the United States and all other countries have national interests,” Lavrov said.
• “In cases (which prevail) where the interests of Russia and the United States do not align, the main objective is to prevent them escalating into a clash, a confrontation, let alone a ‘hot’ conflict. Here, we fully agree,” he emphasized.
• “As for the 2022 borders, no one seriously expects a return to them anymore. To insist on this would be a sign of ‘political blindness’ and a complete failure to understand the realities on the ground.... What we are now discussing are the borders as enshrined in the Constitution of the Russian Federation,” according to Lavrov.
• “President Putin conveyed that Russia would continue to abide by the provisions of the START Treaty next year. ...The official White House representative, Karoline Leavitt, said it was an engaging statement and that President Trump would certainly provide a comment. We operate on this premise,” Lavrov noted.
• “Any attempt to shoot down or target an object over our territory, within our sovereign airspace, will have the gravest of consequences. Those who commit such a gross violation of territorial integrity and sovereignty will come to seriously regret it,” Lavrov warned.
• “Truth be told, even in those serious capitals the elites are committed to the goal of suppressing Russia. They are no longer talking about inflicting a strategic defeat, but are phrasing their goals somewhat differently. Yet, the idea of inflicting a strategic defeat never leaves their minds. They will continue to provide modified versions of what a defeat may look like, but this is exactly what they are focused on,” Lavrov asserted.
• Russia and the People’s Republic of China have done everything possible to give diplomacy a chance. Even after the resolution to restore the sanctions regime was adopted, there was still a chance to agree on extending the full implementation of the Iranian nuclear deal for a certain period (we proposed three months) without adding or removing any conditions so that it would remain in effect with all its aspects during a period when, as we hoped, talks would proceed,” Lavrov said.

"Remarks by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov at the General Debate of the 80th Session of the United Nations General Assembly," Russian Foreign Ministry, 09.27.25. Clues from Russian Views.

• “Systemic and callous violations of the principle of the sovereign equality of states undermine the very faith in justice and lead to crises and conflicts. The root cause of these problems lies in the incessant attempts to divide the world into 'friends' and 'foes',” Lavrov warned.
• Speaking on the Middle East, Lavrov said, “There is no justification for the collective punishment of Palestinians in Gaza, where Palestinian children are dying from bombings and starvation... There is no justification for the plans to annex the West Bank.”
• Turning to Iran, Lavrov declared, “Yesterday in the Security Council, the West rejected a rational proposal by China and Russia to extend the 2015 arrangement on Iran’s nuclear program to allow time for diplomacy. This move has fully exposed the Western course for sabotaging the search for constructive solutions in the UN Security Council.”
• On Ukraine and Russian language rights, Lavrov asserted, “The Kyiv regime, which seized power as a result of an anti-constitutional coup orchestrated by the West in 2014, is pursuing the dismantling of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church and eradicating the Russian language by law from all areas of life, including education, culture and media... Ukraine is the only country in the world that has a law suppressing the native language of nearly half of its population.”
• “Europe remains silent, obsessed with its utopian goal of delivering a ‘strategic defeat’ on Russia. Therefore, the Kyiv regime can do anything it wishes to do, including terrorist attacks against politicians and journalists, torture and extrajudicial killings, indiscriminate bombing of civilian facilities, and reckless sabotage targeting nuclear power plants,” Lavrov alleged.
• According to Lavrov, “As President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly stressed, since the very beginning, Russia has been and remains open to negotiations aimed at eliminating the root causes of the conflict. Russia’s security and vital interests must be reliably guaranteed. The rights of Russian and Russian-speaking people on territories remaining under the control of the Kyiv regime must be restored in full. This is the basis on which we are willing to discuss Ukraine’s security guarantees.”
• “At the moment, neither Kyiv nor its European sponsors show any sign of realizing the gravity of the moment — or readiness to negotiate in good faith. The North Atlantic Alliance continues its expansion up to Russian borders, despite assuring Soviet leaders not to advance one inch eastward and despite the obligations assumed by NATO members within the OSCE... to refrain from strengthening their own security at the expense of others... Our proposals in 2008 and later in December 2021 were ignored and continue to be ignored to this day,” Lavrov said.
• Commenting on nuclear arms, Lavrov maintained, "As a contribution to maintaining strategic stability, on Sept. 22, President Putin put forward a new initiative, declaring Russia’s readiness to adhere to the central quantitative limits under the New START Treaty for one year after it expires on February 5, 2026, provided that the United States reciprocates and refrains from steps that disrupt the current balance of deterrent potentials.”
• “We believe that the implementation of our proposal will create conditions for avoiding a strategic arms race, maintaining an acceptable level of predictability in the sphere of nuclear missiles, and improving Russia-US relations in general,” Lavrov affirmed.
• Lavrov concluded, “Russia, together with like-minded states, offers a constructive alternative to this dangerous course: the establishment of a new architecture of equal and indivisible security in Eurasia... This framework would be inclusive, designed not for a single bloc like NATO and its allies but for all countries and regional associations across the continent without exception.”

“The Trump casus: A half-baked revolution” in “Dr. Chaos or: How to Stop Worrying and Love the Disorder,” Oleg Barabanov, Anton Bespalov, Timofei Bordachev, Fyodor Lukyanov, Andrey Sushentsov and Ivan Timofeev, Valdai Club, October 2025. Clues from Russian Views. (This organization is affiliated with the Russian authorities.)

• “Donald Trump offers a case in point when it comes to discussing the potential for radical change around the world. The notion of the so-called second American revolution has been gaining traction among his supporters in the United States,” Barabanov and colleagues write.
• The authors argue, “The 47th President does have a lot of influence on international relations, and the whole situation may appear to be quite prone to a revolution considering the abrupt steps he has made – and especially in view of his declared intentions.”
• “But what kind of a revolution could this be if the impulse comes from a person who already de facto rules the world? After all, the United States remains the world’s biggest power, even if it may have lost some of its might,” they ask.
• “Taken in its classical form, the revolutionary theory as defined by Marxism-Leninism makes it abundantly clear that only the exploited groups, those suffering from oppression, have the right to be revolutionary. Under this logic, a hegemon’s revolt against international rules it had shaped cannot be designated as a revolution,” they write.
• “Marxists use a different language for describing these aspirations by calling it an effort to divide the world against the backdrop of mounting differences between imperialist powers. Nothing new on this front, either,” Barabanov et al. note.
• The authors observe, “Even if we view Trump as a revolutionary determined to break the global order apart, replacing it with an order offering greater justice and better representation is not on his agenda. Trump’s foreign policy is designed to do everything to enable the United States to further increase its economic might and use all the available resources around the world for domestic development.”
• “As for other countries, they seek to have a wider range of tools for countering US pressure, including by selectively supporting some of the elements of the old order while also building up their own potential. … What the United States and most of its partners and opponents share in common is their focus on momentary considerations. This has become a new normal,” Barabanov and colleagues conclude.

[In his book] “Former secretary general Jens Stoltenberg recalls the rollercoaster ride of dealing with Donald Trump – and how close the US president brought the alliance to the point of collapse,” The Guardian, 10.04.25.

• [In mid-April 2017 ] “When the conversation [with Trump in WH] began, however, it quickly became apparent this was going to be extremely loose. We jumped from one topic to the next. Talking about Russia, Trump suddenly exclaimed, “But why can’t you guys in Nato join us in Korea? They’re developing nuclear weapons, and that’s something we can’t accept.””
• “Soon our conversation [with Trump] returned to Russia, and I repeated the points I had been keen to make since taking office in Nato . “We must be strong and predictable, but be open to maintaining a dialogue with Russia. Russia is here to stay. It’s a neighboring country, not a terrorist organization that needs to be eradicated, like IS,” I said.”
• ““Then what do we want with Iceland?” Trump asked. Before I could say anything further, Jim Mattis came to my aid, explaining how important Nato’s bases there were for the alliance’s submarines, ships and planes: “Mr. President, they’re good to have if you want to track down Russian subs.” Trump thought for a moment. “Well, then we’ll let Iceland stay a member,” he said.”
• “To this day, I remain surprised at how Trump accepted the [2017 NATO] summit’s conclusion. Had he made good on his threat to leave in protest, we would have been left to pick up the pieces of a shattered Nato. I think he realized he was banging his head against a wall with his demands of immediate budget increases, but at the same time, he departed Brussels convinced he would have more money by the new year.”

“How foreign powers are gaslighting Americans: Russia, China and Iran pay no price for spreading false claims about the U.S.,” L. Gordon Crovitz, The Washington Post, 10.06.25.

• “The United States has unilaterally disarmed in the information wars. The Trump administration has ended key efforts to defend against Russian, Chinese and Iranian targeting of Americans with false claims,” Crovitz writes.
• “Adversaries take advantage of U.S. unilateral disarmament on foreign propaganda by gaslighting Americans. Several Chinese state-controlled propaganda outlets...tried to drive a wedge between the U.S. and Israel by posting a video claiming two U.S. military pilots had been arrested at the Pentagon... This was false,” he observes.
• “After Charlie Kirk’s assassination, state-backed media in Russia and Iran along with China’s online proxies flooded the internet with falsehoods. Analysts at NewsGuard...discovered 6,200 mentions of Kirk the week following his killing across the official outlets and social media accounts of the three nations,” Crovitz notes.
• “Russian state outlets were the most aggressive, pushing the baseless claim that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was responsible for Kirk’s murder. Russian tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda ran the headline, ‘Ukraine has found the culprit in Kirk’s death: it turned out to be Zelensky,’” he writes. “An article in Russia’s Tass declared, ‘Zelensky’s hand is both ideological and practical in the assassination attempt on Donald Trump and the murder of Charlie Kirk.’”
• Crovitz concludes, “The U.S. government should restore efforts by its intelligence agencies to discover and alert Americans and our allies to false claims spread by enemies of the West... AI models should disinfect themselves by relying on quality journalism, not foreign propaganda, and by refusing to spread false claims when people ask about topics in the news.”

See these links for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “The West Is Lost,” Andreas Reckwitz, The New York Times, 10.05.25.
• “Trump Told the U.N. the Hard Truth: It Failed,” Matthew Kroenig, Foreign Policy, 09.25.25.
• “The Price of Unpredictability: How Trump’s Foreign Policy Is Ruining American Credibility,” Keren Yarhi-Milo, Foreign Affairs, 10.02.25.
• “‘Good luck to all!’ What are U.S. allies supposed to do with that?” Max Boot, The Washington Post, 09.30.25.
• "For Arctic Soldiers, Colder Is Better," Sune Engel Rasmussen, The Wall Street Journal, 10.03.25.
• “We need Ukraine as much as it needs us,” Chrystia Freeland, Financial Times, 10.01.25.
• “Enemy number one: What Putin’s foreign policy speech says about Europe,” Anton Barbashin, ECFR, 10.03.25.
• "NATO’s Article 4 Alert: The Path to Disentanglement," Diana Nasreddine, The National Interest, 10.01.25.
• “Vladimir Putin is testing the West—and its unity,” The Economist, 10.02.25.
• “As Russia menaces NATO skies, E.U. plans to build a shield against drones,” Ellen Francis, The Washington Post, 10.01.25.

China-Russia: Allied or aligned?

“The China-Russia Axis Is Getting Firmer, and It’s Built on Gas,” Keith Johnson, Foreign Policy, 10.03.25.

• “Russia and China dramatically deepened their energy relationship, less for economic reasons than for geopolitical ones,” Johnson reports, highlighting LNG deliveries from Russia’s Arctic LNG 2 project to China despite U.S. sanctions.
• Johnson writes, “The Russia-China axis is on a stronger footing than ever before and will be around for a while,” as Beijing defies U.S. threats of secondary sanctions by importing Russian gas and advancing pipeline plans like Power of Siberia 2.
• “China seems to have a get-out-of-jail-free card regarding U.S. Russia-related energy sanctions,” said Jack Herndon of the Center for European Policy Analysis.
• “Russia has finally found a buyer for some of its stranded LNG,” Johnson observes, even as China drives a hard bargain; by 2035, China could source up to “40 percent of its gas from a single source: Russia,” a development that both links and potentially limits Beijing and Moscow.
• Johnson concludes, “The energy deals, the September summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping, the greater cooperation on display… all point to a greater, if still unequal, alliance between China and Russia.”

"How Russia is Helping China Prepare to Seize Taiwan," Oleksandr V. Danylyuk and Jack Watling, RUSI, 09.26.25.

• “Russia has agreed to equip and train the PLA to air-drop armored vehicles and special reconnaissance capabilities,” Danylyuk and Watling report.
• According to contracts and correspondence obtained by the Black Moon hacktivist group, “Russia agreed in 2023 to supply the PLA with a complete set of weapons and equipment to equip an airborne battalion, as well as other special equipment necessary for airborne infiltration of special forces, along with a full cycle of training for operators and technical personnel to use this equipment.” The transfer includes technology “to allow China to scale-up the production of similar weapons and military equipment through localization and modernization.”
• “The agreements provide for the sale by Russia to China of: 37 BMD-4M light amphibious assault vehicles; 11 Sprut-SDM1 light amphibious anti-tank self-propelled guns; 11 BTR-MDM ‘Rakushka’ airborne armored personnel carriers; and several Rubin command and observation vehicles and KSHM-E command vehicles,” the authors specify.
• The deals also require “Russia to train a battalion of Chinese paratroopers in employing the equipment,” including driver training in Russia and collective airborne unit training in China, as well as “the transfer of Rheostat airborne artillery command and observation vehicle and Orlan-10 multi-purpose unmanned aerial vehicles.”
• “In addition, the agreements provide for the transfer of special-purpose parachute systems ‘Dalnolyot’, which are designed for inserting loads of up to 190 kg from an altitude of up to 32,000 feet, achieving a range of between 30–80 km depending on load,” Danylyuk and Watling write.
• "Russia is equipping and training Chinese special forces groups to penetrate the territory of other countries without being noticed, offering offensive options against Taiwan, the Philippines and other island states in the region,” the authors state.
• These capabilities would allow China “to air drop armored vehicles on golf courses, or other areas of open and firm ground near Taiwan’s ports and airfields… [enabling] air assault troops to significantly increase their combat power and threaten seizure of these facilities to clear a path for the landing of follow-on forces.”
• The program reflects “the growing military-industrial co-operation between Russia and the PRC over the course of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine,” Danylyuk and Watling observe, with Russian and Chinese defense firms and ministries both heavily involved.
• “Historically, Russia has been wary of exporting its areas of military-technical advantage to China out of fears of intellectual property theft. However, Moscow increasingly sees the invasion of Taiwan… as a means of building leverage over Beijing by making Russia a supplier of critical raw materials and military industrial capacity,” the authors conclude.

“The U.S.-China Crisis Waiting to Happen: Beijing’s Reluctance to Engage With the U.S. Military Has Never Been More Dangerous,” Kurt M. Campbell, Foreign Affairs, 10.06.25.

• “U.S.-Soviet military diplomacy during the Cold War has long served as a model for successful relations between competing armed forces. Despite being existential nuclear adversaries, the two states developed significant military-to-military contacts during the later part of the Cold War,” Campbell notes.
• “Historically, China has also been reluctant to participate in confidence-building exercises precisely because they were modeled after the U.S.-Soviet experience. … The CCP-dominated military structure jealously guards decision-making authority in a crisis and views confidence-building schemes as a potential threat to party control and authority,” he writes.
• Campbell concludes, “The two great powers of the twenty-first century must have the foresight to create such channels without first subjecting the world to a Cuban missile–type crisis in the Indo-Pacific.”

See this link for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• "CRINK Security Ties: Growing Cooperation, Anchored by China and Russia," Bonny Lin, Brian Hart, Leon Li, Hugh Grant-Chapman, Truly Tinsley and Feifei Hung, CSIS, 09.30.25.

Missile defense:

“Russian missile upgrade outpaces Ukraine’s Patriot defenses,” Christopher Miller, Financial Times, 10.02.25.

• “Months of devastating Russian air attacks suggest Moscow has succeeded in altering its missiles to evade Ukraine’s air defenses, according to Ukrainian and western officials,” Miller reports.
• “Russia was likely to have modified its Iskander-M mobile system, which launches missiles with an estimated range of up to 500km, as well as Kinzhal air-launched ballistic missiles, which can fly up to 480km,” he writes, citing officials who say the missiles now follow a typical trajectory before “diverting and plunging into a steep terminal dive or executing maneuvers that ‘confuse and avoid’ Patriot interceptors.”
• “It is a ‘game-changer for Russia,’ said one former Ukrainian official,” with evidence cited that Ukraine’s interception rate of Russian ballistic missiles plunged from 37 percent in August to 6 percent in September.
• “Ukraine’s air force on Wednesday reported all four Iskander-M missiles fired overnight had eluded the country’s defenses and hit their targets,” Miller notes, adding significant damage was inflicted on drone-making facilities near Kyiv this summer.
• “The Patriot interceptors are the only ones in Kyiv’s arsenal capable of shooting down Russian ballistic missiles,” Miller explains, but new Russian tactics and upgrades have led to a “marked drop in interception rates,” according to a western official briefed on Patriot performance data.
• Miller quotes a US Defense Intelligence Agency report: “Ukraine’s armed forces had ‘struggled to consistently use Patriot air defense systems to protect against Moscow’s ballistic missiles because of recent Russian tactical improvements, including enhancements that enable their missiles to change trajectory and perform maneuvers rather than flying in a traditional ballistic trajectory.’”
• Fabian Hoffmann, a missile researcher at the University of Oslo, told the FT: “A steeper terminal trajectory, that’s something you can program in the missile,” and “the Iskander-M ‘can maneuver quite aggressively in the terminal stage.’”
• “Ukraine and Russia were ‘playing an adaptability game’ when it came to their weapons technology,” Miller quotes Hoffmann, adding both sides are “trying to destroy each other’s weapons systems.”
• President Zelenskyy warned, “Russia is once again trying to hit Ukraine with a blackout this year,” underscoring that “Russia’s evolving missile technology makes this year’s threat more acute.”

See this link for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “Can a European Drone Wall Stop Russia?” Alexandra Sharp, Foreign Policy, 10.01.26.

Nuclear arms:

“Responding to Putin’s Proposal to Extend New START,” Steven Pifer, FSI Stanford, 10.02.25.

• “The 2010 New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) reduced U.S. and Russian strategic offensive nuclear arms numbers to levels not seen since the 1960s,” Pifer writes.
• “With the treaty due to expire in February 2026, the Trump administration must decide how to respond to a Russian proposal to extend the treaty’s quantitative limits for one year. Such an extension could well be in the U.S. interest, but President Trump needs to consider the question with open eyes.”
• The core of New START, Pifer explains, is numerical limits: “no more than 700 deployed intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs), and nuclear-capable bombers; no more than 800 deployed and non-deployed ICBM and SLBM launchers and nuclear-capable bombers; and no more than 1,550 deployed strategic warheads.”
• Verification is also key, but “implementation of those provisions has been in dispute in recent years…Russian President Putin said Russia would suspend its observance of the treaty” in 2023. Still, “Officials in Moscow clarified that Russia would continue to observe New START’s three numerical limits until the treaty’s expiration in 2026.”
• Absent verification measures, “the United States and Russia likely can monitor the other’s compliance with the 700 and 800 limits using national technical means of verification, such as imagery satellites, with fairly high confidence,” but for warheads, “monitoring the 1550 limit without notifications and on-site inspections poses a more difficult challenge.”
• “Agreeing to Putin’s offer would maintain a useful measure of predictability in the tense U.S.-Russia relationship and could slow, if only for one year, a three-way nuclear arms race with Russia and China that has begun gathering steam,” Pifer argues.
• “On balance, a one-year treaty extension seems worth a try…the expiration of New START would mean the end of the only remaining constraint on U.S. and Russian nuclear force levels.”
• “Absent an extension, the United States and Russia will find themselves along with China in an unconstrained arms race,” Pifer concludes, warning that “one year of restraint would not risk much against a possible pay-off that could mean greater security for the United States and the world.”

“Interview with Task Force on Nuclear Proliferation and U.S. National Security Co-Chairs Meghan O'Sullivan and Ernest Moniz,” CNN, 10.02.25.

• Ernest Moniz: “[T]his task force today came to the same high-level conclusion of the Gilpatrick Commission, namely that nuclear non-proliferation is indeed central to our security and should remain a priority.”
• O’Sullivan: “I think that was one of the reasons why we created the task force is to say, it's a changed geopolitical environment. You have China becoming, you know, a country that has a very large nuclear arsenal. You have Russia now threatening the use of nuclear weapons. You have Iran, a proliferation threat like we haven't seen from Iran before, the current military force notwithstanding, and the questions over extended deterrence.”
• Moniz: “I would also say that, with regard to Russia specifically, but also, I would say, China, clearly, a lot of the success has been advocating … a lot of the success in nonproliferation during the Cold War and beyond the Cold War came from great power relationships, the U.S. and the USSR and then Russia working together, despite disagreements, on a shared interest in nonproliferation. That continues today.”
• O’Sullivan: “[I]t would make to me a lot of sense to take Vladimir Putin up on that [offer to extent New START]. I think there might be other motivations that Vladimir Putin has in extending that offer. Perhaps he's looking, you know, to try to muddy the water between be tough on Ukraine and nice on nuclear matters, or perhaps he's looking for limitations on the Golden Dome project that the Trump administration is committed to … I would imagine the Trump administration would find it very much in its interest to have more time to be able to develop a follow-on to the New START.”
• Moniz: “It's easy to, you know, be somewhat cynical about the offer. … Nevertheless, completely agree with Meghan that having those guardrails at least extended is a very, very good signal and one that has to be capitalized on by having other discussions start. Despite the Ukraine situation, we can have other discussions. And by the way, New START, of course it puts these quantitative limits on, which is what Putin offered to extend. But there are other elements as well in terms of inspections, very, very tricky in this current environment, in terms of data exchange, which could be still possible, certainly alerts in terms of missile tests. So, I think the issue is, I very much hope the president will accept the offer, but accept it with the statement, and let's keep talking and get some other things in place.”

"Director Kathryn Bigelow is sounding the nuclear alarm," Max Boot, The Washington Post, 10.02.25.

• "Would Vladimir Putin have invaded Ukraine if that country hadn’t given up its nuclear arsenal in 1994? Doubtful. Why isn’t he attacking the Baltic republics? At least in part because they’re still under the U.S. nuclear umbrella," Boot observes.
• Boot remarks that "most of the deployed [nuclear] warheads are American or Russian, but China is building up its own force," and notes the grim reality that "nearly all of the nine nuclear-armed states — the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel — continued intensive nuclear modernization programs in 2024."
• He warns, “The need for nuclear arms control is urgent — but not realistic right now,” emphasizing the lack of progress on renewing treaties with Russia and the continued expansion of Russian nuclear capabilities.
• Boot notes that "the New START Treaty limiting U.S. and Russian nuclear arsenals is due to expire next year, and there has been little progress in negotiating a successor accord."
• "Because nuclear weapons are here to stay, they need to be managed as responsibly as possible," Boot argues, with a clear reference to U.S.-Russian nuclear parity as the cornerstone of stability—and a warning that the “pitiless logic of mutual assured destruction” is still very much with us.

“Can More British and French Nuclear Cooperation Help Deter Russia?,” Zsofia Wolford, James Black, and Paul Van Hooft, War on the Rocks, 09.30.25.

• “As Europe continues to come to terms with both the Russian threat amid the war in Ukraine as well as the uncertainty surrounding the U.S. commitment to Europe, policymakers across the continent are urgently considering alternative deterrence arrangements,” Wolford, Black, and Van Hooft write.
• “French President Emmanuel Macron has repeatedly spoken of the ‘European dimension’ to the French nuclear deterrent and his country’s willingness to open a conversation about extending a French nuclear umbrella to Europe’s non-nuclear states,” the authors note.
• “Yet, assessments of European nuclear deterrence are often inward-looking, focusing on French and British arsenal sizes and escalation options, and on reassuring European allies of French and British credibility. What adversaries think about European deterrence efforts is, however, underappreciated,” Wolford, Black, and Van Hooft argue.
• “The key takeaway of our study is that Russia did not take European nuclear deterrents as seriously as the U.S. nuclear deterrent, nor did Russia include the United Kingdom and France in its nuclear planning to a significant degree. First, the research shows that Russian military thinkers have mostly focused on America’s nuclear deterrent when considering NATO’s deterrence posture in the past,” the authors find.
• “Second, Russian military publications highlight that the British deterrent ‘guarantees unacceptable damage to any aggressor and there is no doubt that the UK has the requisite capabilities,’ despite its low warhead stockpile and limited ability for managed escalation. This suggests that Russia likely considers the British deterrent credible,” Wolford, Black, and Van Hooft report.
• “Third, the French strategic deterrent hardly played a role in Russian thinking before Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine… It is therefore particularly important to assert France’s role in NATO’s deterrence, considering the historic ambiguity France has had regarding nuclear use,” the authors explain.
• “Europeans are beginning to adapt to the new geopolitical reality shaped by Russia’s aggression and uncertainty over Washington’s long-term commitment… What is clear is that enhanced Franco-British nuclear cooperation, coupled with the gradual development of long-range precision strike capabilities, will be central to both reinforcing Europe’s deterrent against Moscow and reassuring European allies,” Wolford, Black, and Van Hooft conclude.

"Beware Russia Bearing Arms Control Gifts," Pranay Vaddi, RUSI, 10.03.25.

• “President Vladimir Putin’s offer to maintain New START limits on US and Russian strategic nuclear forces for one more year deserves serious consideration by the Trump administration. However, rather than reflexively accepting what looks like an oasis in the arms-control desert of the new-nuclear era, US officials must consider why Putin is making this offer now,” Vaddi warns.
• Detailing the Russian proposal, Vaddi notes: “On 22 September, President Putin announced that ‘Russia is prepared to continue observing the treaty’s central quantitative restrictions for one year after 5 February, 2026.’ He described New START as having ‘played a constructive role in maintaining balance and predictability in the sphere of strategic offensive weapons’ and warned that a ‘complete renunciation of this treaty’s legacy would, from many points, be a grave and short-sighted mistake.’”
• “Amid the higher nuclear temperature after invading Ukraine, Russia suspended implementation of New START in 2023, but made a political commitment to adhere to the New START central limits..." Vaddi explains. “Putin is now proposing to retain these limits that Russia is abiding by, along with the US.”
• Vaddi details, “Despite Putin’s suspension of the agreement in 2023, it is notable that he consistently praises the agreement ... However, the landscape shifted dramatically after February 2022.”
• “The [New START] agreement contains other extremely important provisions, such as requirements for eighteen on-site inspections per year, daily information on the status and location of treaty accountable nuclear forces, and biannual data exchanges... These are all provisions with which Russia no longer complies.”
• According to Vaddi, “The fact that Russia is facing challenges in modernizing its nuclear forces should be no surprise. The coalition of Ukraine-supporters placing export control restrictions and sanctions on Russia intend to starve the military industry of technology and components.”
• “Russia faces extreme shortages in technologies necessary for modern nuclear weapons delivery systems, such as microelectronics, space-grade components and propulsion systems for advanced aircraft,” Vaddi asserts.
• “US officials should consider whether another year of New START limits, without verification of Russian strategic forces, is satisfactory.”
• “Putin’s willingness to limit Russian forces, if the US reciprocates, should be considered in the context of his last arms control offer: a moratorium on intermediate-range missiles offered after Russia produced and deployed those same capabilities in violation of the INF Treaty,” Vaddi cautions, urging a “skeptical review.”
• “The US can benefit from a new nuclear weapons deal with Russia. Engaging in open competition with both Russia and China in the decades to come will drain limited US defense resources, exacerbate tensions and lead many countries to wonder whether the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty ... has any merit. However, it would be malpractice for President Trump to accept this deal on its face,” he concludes.

"Russia's Nuclear Deterrence Put to the Test by the War in Ukraine," Dimitri Minic, IFRI, 10.06.25.

• “The initial failure of the SVO, the prolonged and unexpected high-intensity war that has ensued, and Russia’s military setbacks have all fueled fears that the Kremlin might resort to the use of nuclear weapons,” Minic writes. He explains that since 1993, Russia’s strategy has allowed for “the possibility of first use of nuclear weapons in order to prevent such a war from breaking out or to deter the adversary from pursuing it … including from the very outset of the conflict.”
• According to Minic, “military thought progressively evolved, shifting from the centrality of nuclear deterrence in 1993-2003, marked by a lowering of the threshold for use, to a broader conception of so-called ‘strategic’ deterrence (strategičeskoe sderživanie) from the mid-2000s onward.” He observes that “the nuclear component was progressively supplemented by conventional and nonmilitary/subversive forces, methods, and means,” reflecting both modernization of Russian forces and “a threat perception more focused on hybrid conflicts and local wars than on a conventional war with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.”
• “This evolution led Russia, in 2010, to raise the threshold for nuclear use.” Still, Minic warns, the war in Ukraine and Russia’s setbacks have “called into question the entire Russian strategic deterrence system,” and “Russia could ultimately lower its threshold for use in a new doctrine … to restore the credibility of its nuclear deterrence,” but more fundamentally to “compensate for the weakening of its conventional forces and its economic and technological potential, as well as to guard against any conventional confrontation with NATO, which the Kremlin sees as increasingly plausible.”
• “Some experts have tended to downplay its significance, while others have interpreted it as the expression of a supposed ‘Karaganov doctrine’—thereby reproducing analytical shortcuts that impede a clear understanding of Russian strategy,” Minic writes.
• Minic calls for relying on Russian primary sources and warns that the new nuclear doctrine and Trump’s election may further alter “Russian calculations regarding nuclear deterrence.” He concludes: “This new study...provides a comprehensive and original analysis of the evolution of Russian nuclear deterrence under the test of the war in Ukraine.”

"Wartime Zapad 2025 Exercise: Russia's Strategic Adaptation and NATO," Fabrizio Minniti and Dr Giangiuseppe Pili, RUSI, 09.22.25.

• Zapad 2025, the major Russia-Belarus joint exercise, marks what Minniti and Pili describe as “a critical inflection point in the evolution of Russian military strategy and force development.” Unlike earlier years’ massed drills, they argue, “Zapad 2025 appears as a meticulously calibrated, scaled-down, and geographically-constrained exercise. This is a deliberate and rational adaptation to the immense human and material costs of the ongoing large-scale war in Ukraine and the persistent strain of international sanctions.”
• The authors stress that Zapad 2025 “worked as a multi-layered instrument of a state in war time, even though not fully mobilized.” Politically, it reinforced the image of Russian–Belarusian unity and “deployed calibrated, low-resource deterrent messaging.” Militarily, it allowed Russia to “stress-test and refine its ‘Initial Period of War’ (IPW) playbook, incorporating direct lessons from the Ukrainian battlefield.” The focus, Minniti and Pili write, was on “high-leverage capabilities, such as long-range precision fires, integrated air and missile defense (IAMD), and electronic warfare (EW), while conserving mass and materiel that are critically needed in Ukraine.”
• “The exercise’s low-visibility, modular design allowed Russia to maximize its political and military utility while minimizing resource consumption,” the piece states. To avoid scrutiny, exercises remained deliberately below the OSCE Vienna Document thresholds, a pattern the authors say is “a long-standing practice that Russia has employed since at least Zapad 2013.”
• A notable element was the “distinct nuclear shadow” surrounding the drills. Minniti and Pili note that “Belarusian officials explicitly signaled that planning for the exercise would include scenarios for nuclear employment, with a specific focus on tactical options,” while Russia itself avoided full-scale nuclear rehearsals.
• On the economic underpinnings, Minniti and Pili assert, “the Russian economy's recent growth is almost entirely attributable to the surge in war production... This militarization of the economy, sustained by deficit spending and the depletion of the National Welfare Fund, is fiscally unsustainable in the long-term.”
• The authors ultimately warn, “the exercise’s focus on high-end capabilities represents a persistent, long-term threat.” For NATO, they argue, the lesson is to “target Russia’s demonstrated weaknesses, strengthen its own key vulnerabilities, and deny the Kremlin the political and strategic victories it seeks through coercive signaling.”

Key takeaways of “The U.S. Nuclear Arsenal of 2050: A Proposal for American Survival,” Robert Peters, Heritage Foundation, 10.03.25.

1. “The global security environment is deteriorating as America’s adversaries are modernizing and expanding their nuclear arsenals at a breathtaking rate.
2. The current U.S. arsenal is insufficient to address the new arms build-ups underway in China, Russia, and North Korea.
3. As such, the United States should expand its nuclear force to a total of about 4,625 operationally deployed nuclear weapons by 2050.”

“Verification Without a Treaty,” Tamara Patton & Pavel Podvig, UNIDIR, 09.24.25.

• “This report introduces the concept of demonstrative verification—a unilateral, transparent approach by which States can actively prove compliance with disarmament or arms control commitments in the absence of formal treaties.”
• “Demonstrative verification provides a structured alternative by centering on unilateral commitments, public protocols, and the use of commercially or publicly available monitoring methods, such as Earth observation satellites.”
• “A State could commit to a limit on the number of deployed intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and periodically demonstrate empty silos using a cryptographically protected declaration system and satellite monitoring.”
• “States can place physical barriers outside storage facilities, using satellite imagery and persistent scatterers... to verify that weapons have not been removed.”
• “States could declare their intent and share tracking data [on satellites]... Even without full disclosure, such transparency builds confidence in the non-threatening nature of space activities.”

“Nuclear Boomerang,” Aleksey Arbatov, RIAC, 10.01.25. Clues from Russian Views. (This organization is affiliated with the Russian authorities.)

• “The world is going through the deepest crisis of the nuclear arms control and disarmament system built over the last 65 years,” Arbatov writes, arguing the system “significantly reduced the likelihood of nuclear use” and fostered stability and predictability—but now faces reversal.
• Arbatov observes, “The three main pillars of the nuclear arms control system are under threat,” with the impending expiration of New START, growing domestic pressure in Russia and the U.S. to abandon the CTBT, and a risk to the NPT if these pillars collapse. “The collapse of these two central pillars...will bring down the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.”
• On U.S. policy, Arbatov adds, “No president in American history has done as much damage to arms control as Trump.”
• Meanwhile, in Russia “part of the political science community has outpaced their overseas counterparts and has been advancing unconventional ideas for several years now—for example, that a polycentric and stable future world order cannot emerge without nuclear multilateralism.”
• “Without succumbing to the groundless optimism that initially gripped some Russian politicians, it would be reasonable to reintroduce this topic to the Russian–U.S. dialogue when the time is right in order to gauge the seriousness of the Republican administration’s new sentiment. After all, in this sphere Russia is the only country in the world capable of engaging the U.S. as peers, at least for the next several years (until China completes its strategic programs). Moreover, in interactions between the two superpowers, this represents a unique area in which Moscow can deal with Washington on an equal footing and link this engagement to other issues on the bilateral agenda to its own advantage,” according to Arbatov.
• “As recent years have shown, without this “supporting pillar,” other tracks of superpower relations lose momentum and orientation, undermining the stability of the entire international system. This practice was formalized half a century ago by Henry Kissinger through his tactic of “linkage.” The need for such an approach today is driven by the harsh reality of our time—a fifteen-year pause in arms limitation negotiations, the disruptive efforts of opponents of this agenda in the U.S. and elsewhere, unprecedented growth of international tensions and objective military-technical development—all this has pushed the nuclear arms control system to the brink of collapse,” according to Arbatov.
• Arbatov concludes: “If today’s cumbersome treaty-based arms control structure...disintegrates, it will not be replaced by some elegant and bright edifice, but only by nuclear chaos and ultimately the inevitable demise of the world as we know it, with all its problems and misfortunes.”

“The Future of New START: Chances for Agreement and Challenges in the Negotiations Process,” Evgeny Buzhinsky, RIAC/PIR-Center, 10.03.25. Clues from Russian Views.

• “We are not negotiating with Europe on this issue, because for us it is not a key player in this context. It is exclusively a dialogue with the United States,” Buzhinsky states.
• “About three months ago, shortly after his inauguration, Donald Trump expressed a desire to preserve the existing treaty. In response, Vladimir Putin took a pause, because our position is that we are against so-called ‘compartmentalization,’ that is, dividing issues of strategic stability into separate parts and removing them from the overall context of bilateral relations,” Buzhinsky explains.
• “However, now, apparently, a decision has been made to show readiness to start negotiations on a new treaty,” Buzhinsky writes.
• “In order to conclude such a treaty, it will take at least a year—in my estimation, and even that time may not be enough to agree on all the American requirements concerning China, new arms, and non-strategic nuclear weapons,” he adds.
• “It is important to note that, before a new agreement is signed, the agreed levels must be observed. There was a precedent in the case of the SALT II treaty, when the Americans did not ratify the agreement, but for eight months, on our part, we continued to observe its terms, as agreed,” Buzhinsky said.

Sergei Karaganov’s remarks at the roundtable “Russia and the World Geopolitical Storm: Scenarios and Strategies,” Biznes Online/Globalaffairs.ru, 04.10.25. Part III.  Clues from Russian Views. Machine-translated. For Russian officials’ views on the New START extension, see Putin’s and Lavrov’s remarks in the “Great Power rivalry” section. (Globalaffirs.ru is affiliated with the Russian authorities.)

• “We have allowed the unthinkable—an atmosphere of impunity has come to prevail in the world, especially in the West. Therefore, we need to sharply increase our emphasis on nuclear deterrence, start to climb the escalation ladder, even delivering initial strikes with conventional weapons, and, if there is any response, even nuclear ones, against our adversaries in Europe,” Karaganov asserts.
• “Russia is gradually recovering from the disease of mercantilism. Now the process has begun of Russia’s return to normal values. … This is not to say it should be imposed harshly, but this is what war does. … This war confronts everyone with real values: family, homeland, even God,” Karaganov says.
• “I have long called for a sharpening of our relations with the West, necessary for geostrategic reasons… and also to restore some of Russia’s core traits: the drive for independence and sovereignty, a defensive consciousness, love of the Motherland,” Karaganov explains.
• Karaganov argues, “We need to consciously offer normal values to a significant part of society—not by force, but firmly and consistently. This should be done from school onwards.”
• “We together with colleagues have drawn up our own code of Russian values. But the main thing is that this code should be sworn to by all those ready to govern our country. … If you want to prosper in this society, to aspire to leadership positions, you must adhere to a certain code. Once people start supporting such a code—we will instill it—I assure you the situation will begin to change very quickly,” Karaganov maintains.
• “In my view, the optimal defensive strategy is to have effective general-purpose armed forces and the unequivocal readiness, when necessary and faced with massive aggression by an adversary superior in numbers and economy, to use nuclear weapons,” Karaganov states.
• “The fact that we still hesitate to actively use nuclear deterrence is a strategic mistake. I speak and write about this often. I believe it is, to a certain extent, a moral sin, because we paid for the nuclear shield with millions of lives. After all, huge numbers of people were malnourished in the 1940s and 1950s because we built the nuclear shield, and now we are senselessly failing to use it. It is even a sin against those very people who were malnourished, who died, who lived very meager lives. It is also a universal sin. By abandoning the active use of nuclear deterrence, we are removing the barrier to World War III, which will destroy modern human civilization. Some theologians believe this is as it should be. I do not yet share this view.”
• “During Soviet times, we engaged in a senseless arms race—both nuclear and conventional. Then we swung the other way… But we were not ready for the use of nuclear weapons nor their employment,” Karaganov recalls.
• "Good stock of Russians must be grown from school age, which we have not paid much attention to. This is the first guarantee of our victory," he argues.
• “I say it with regret, but it is absolutely necessary: in our state and military-political strategy, we must sharply increase the role of nuclear deterrence. We have relaxed, and so has the rest of the world—war is no longer feared,” Karaganov concludes.
• “We should set ourselves the goal of saving humanity from self-destruction, from a third world war. But the first goal is, of course, saving Russia—which means a relatively quick victory in this war and a high readiness to repel conflicts in the future. There will certainly be more of them,” he adds.
• “Russia is a nation of warriors, whose calling is to defend peace. … We are a liberator nation. This is our great achievement, our goal, our mission, which we must be proud of,” Karaganov declares.

See this link for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

•  “Guarding the unthinkable: Why regular fail-safe reviews are essential for responsible nuclear stewardship,” Julia Berghofer, European Leadership Network, 10.02.25.

Counterterrorism:

•  No significant developments.

Conflict in Syria:

“Russia Isn’t Done With Syria: How Moscow Has Retained Influence in the Post-Assad Era,” Hanna Notte, Foreign Affairs, 10.03.25.

• Notte explains that “after Bashar al-Assad was toppled last December by armed factions led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, many predicted Russia’s influence in Syria would soon collapse,” and points out that even within Russia, some observers “lamented losing such a key partner in the Middle East.” Yet, “against these predictions, Russia has managed to keep control of its important Mediterranean military sites—namely Tartus and Hmeimim—and has even strengthened its hold in northeastern Syria,” she points out.
• She notes that while many Syrians resent Russia for its intense airstrikes in support of Assad, the country has not been associated with sectarian motives like Iran, nor has it been perceived as attempting to fundamentally alter Syrian society. Instead, Russia is generally regarded as a pragmatic, ruthless great power with longstanding ties to the region, Notte explains.
• Notte also argues, “Syria is likely to remain divided and unstable, as outside countries continue to compete for influence in Damascus and various zones across Syria. In this dynamic environment, Russia will be just one actor among many, and not necessarily the preeminent one.”
• She cautions Western governments: “Instead of reacting with alarm to Russian activity or hinging Western aid on Syria cutting all ties with Moscow, U.S. and European leaders should prioritize supporting Syrians as they try to rebuild after years of war and dictatorship.”

“Russia struggling in the Mediterranean Sea,” Jack Detsch and Giselle Ruhiyyih Ewing, Politico, 10.01.25.

• “Russia is increasingly violating neighbors’ airspace and menacing NATO throughout Eastern Europe and along the Baltic, but there’s one area where its strength is waning: the waters of the Mediterranean,” Detsch and Ewing report.
• “That has some NATO officials expressing relief, but others warning it means Moscow is likely to change tactics in the region, and that NATO will have to adapt to new types of threats,” Detsch and Ewing explain.
• “Russia’s naval presence in the Mediterranean Sea has declined dramatically since the fall of Bashar Assad’s regime in Syria late last year, two alliance officials told NatSecDaily,” Detsch and Ewing note.
• “In January, the new government in Syria took back a Russian base in Tartus, which had been Moscow’s only permanent base along NATO’s southern flank. That has deprived Russia of key maintenance and resupply facilities, even forcing it to uncharacteristically keep its submarines above water more often,” Detsch and Ewing report.
• Jeffrey Edmonds, a former DOD adviser on Europe, argued that Russia’s inability to project power in the Mediterranean is a sign that it is losing power in the Middle East writ large: “Russia just simply did not have the wherewithal or the means to intervene, to protect Assad. Just couldn’t do it,” Edmonds said.
• “The first NATO official said there haven’t been incidents of malign damage between Russian vessels and the allies since January and Moscow still keeps ship-to-ship contact to avoid collisions. However, the person warned that the Kremlin is also moving toward asymmetric tactics on the waves in the Baltics,” Detsch and Ewing write.
• “‘They give us these dilemmas with drones,’ the official said. ‘When you can’t generate a lot of conventional forces, you have to resort to other measures.’”

Cyber security/AI: 

“Don't Sweat the AGI Race: Why Concerns About Catastrophic Instability Are Overblown,” Hal Brands, RAND, 09.30.25.

• “Claims that a race to artificial general intelligence (AGI) will prove deeply destabilizing are common among technologists and parts of the public policy community, even if it remains debatable whether such a race is truly underway,” Brands observes.
• In this paper, Brands “challenges the idea that racing for AGI will cause catastrophic instability, in part by critiquing the theoretical concepts and historical analysis that often underpin such arguments.”
• He argues that “many of those claims rest on questionable assumptions about the causes and costs of international instability or about the likely impact of AGI on great-power rivalry.”
• “More fundamentally, some of those arguments fail to account for the pervasive geopolitical damage that could result if the United States loses an AGI race to a revisionist foe,” Brands contends.
• “For better or worse, AGI will unfold in a world in which competitive dynamics still exist — where nations compete, often fiercely, for prosperity and advantage,” Brands explains.
• “If the United States becomes too consumed with mitigating the risks of instability, it could find itself at a disadvantage in molding the balance of ideas and the balance of power,” Brands concludes.

Energy exports from CIS:

“Have Ukrainian Drones Really Knocked Out 38% of Russia’s Oil Refining Capacity?” Sergey Vakulenko, Carnegie Politika, 10.03.25.

• “There has been a lot of speculation in recent days about how much damage Ukrainian drone attacks have done to Russia’s oil refineries, with some news outlets claiming Russia has lost 38 percent of its oil refining capacity,” Vakulenko writes. “While this figure might have some formal basis in fact, the real state of affairs is far more complex.”
• “Russia’s notional refining capacity is 327 million tons per year, and the 16 refineries attacked since August have a combined capacity of 123 million tons—a theoretical 38% share,” Vakulenko notes.
• “But most refineries kept operating—at least in part—after attacks, and had restored full output within weeks,” he stresses, giving the example that “The Volgograd refinery...was able to fully repair the damage from attacks by multiple drones on August 13 and August 14, and had restored full operations by August 25.”
• “Russia’s refining capacity is not equal to output. Every year, Russia refines up to 270 million tons—so at least 22% of the country’s total capacity is always idle,” Vakulenko points out.
• “A reduction in primary refining capacity...does not mean a proportional reduction of market-grade fuel output. The destruction of one of two identical atmospheric distillation columns...is more likely to lead to a 30 percent drop in gasoline production—not 50 percent as you might expect,” he writes.
• “Russia’s oil refineries are facing a lot of problems—but things are far from catastrophic,” Vakulenko concludes, comparing the situation to “a man who is being repeatedly punched. He will not die from one punch, or even half a dozen punches. But it becomes harder and harder for him to recover after each subsequent blow.”
• “For the moment, it’s unclear who will come out on top in the battle over Russia’s oil refineries—only time will tell. While the 38 percent figure may be based on real data, it’s a long way from accurately reflecting the nuance of the present situation,” he writes.

“Taiwan becomes largest importer of Russian naphtha,” Paddy Stephens, Financial Times, 10.01.25. 

• “Taiwan has been buying millions of tons of oil product naphtha from Russia since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, raising concerns that China could lean on Moscow to choke off supplies and threaten Taipei’s economic security,” Stephens reports.
• “Monthly imports of the hydrocarbon liquid, which is used to make chemicals for technology and semiconductor manufacturing, have surged over the first half of 2025 to an average of six times higher than 2022 levels, according to a report by the Helsinki-based Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (Crea),” Stephens notes.
• “In the first six months of 2025, Taiwan imported 1.9mn tons of naphtha, valued at $1.3bn, compared with 574,000 tons in the full year of 2022, making it the largest importer of Russian naphtha this year, according to Crea,” Stephens reports.
• “The country’s dependence on Russian naphtha has raised concerns about its economic security. China, which claims sovereignty over Taiwan, maintains close ties with Russia and has supported Moscow’s war machine,” Stephens explains.
• “‘We cannot rely on a single country or company, especially one that may not recognize Taiwan’s sovereignty or even be hostile to it,’ said Chen Kuan-ting, a lawmaker with Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive party,” Stephens quotes.
• “‘This isn’t just a resource issue; it’s a national security and geopolitical issue,’ he said,” Stephens adds.

Climate change:

• No significant developments.

U.S.-Russian economic ties:

• No significant developments.

U.S.-Russian relations in general:

“How bad is America’s icebreaker gap with Russia?” The Economist, 10.02.25.

• “Finland’s firms have designed four-fifths and built more than half of the world’s icebreakers. As competition over the Arctic grows, America’s president is taking notice. In June Donald Trump said he was negotiating with Finland to buy 15 of the vessels.”
• “The contrast with America is stark. Its coastguard…needs around ten polar icebreakers. It has three. The last…built for the coastguard, Healy, was finished in 1997. A plan to build new ones is delayed and its budget has ballooned.”
• The Economist notes, “Russia…has around 50 polar icebreakers, including nuclear-powered behemoths.” Yet, “the real worry is the gap between the capabilities of America’s coastguard and the role it must play in Arctic security. Russia and China are vying for the Arctic, and northern shipping routes are growing busier.”
• “To plug the gap, America is looking to Finland.… Finnish shipyards could deliver for America this decade. But obstacles loom. One is opposition from American shipyards, which look to the president as their defender. Procurement laws…can be waived for national-security reasons.”
• Deputy foreign minister Pasi Rajala says, “We have a lot of capacity to deliver these vessels.… It is in our interest that our allies have Arctic capabilities.”

“The Arctic as a MacGuffin in the US-Russia Relationship,” Anastasia Martynova and Nail Farkhatdinov, Russia.Post, 09.30.25.

• “Donald Trump’s return to the White House opened the way for negotiations with Russia. In previous years, such a possibility had been ruled out, with the Russian government calling for a ‘pragmatic’ approach and blaming their ‘Western partners’ for severing economic and other ties with Russia over the war in Ukraine,” Martynova and Farkhatdinov write.
• “It was assumed that negotiations with the US would focus less on political issues than on missed opportunities for economic partnership ... The future economic prosperity of both countries needed to be discussed and a deal reached quickly. Ending the war in Ukraine was supposed to be on the agenda, but that has not happened yet,” they note.
• “The talks have touched on the Arctic, which is becoming a sort of ‘MacGuffin’…something that sets the intrigue in motion, with the unfolding plot oftentimes more interesting than the object itself,” the authors explain.
• “The idea of a US-Russia Arctic deal fits neatly into what is now termed ‘infrastructure diplomacy.’ … Infrastructure diplomacy, pursued not only by the US but also by China and Russia, is asymmetrical: one side seeks money and resources, while the other wants recognition of dominance or security guarantees, resulting in economic and political dependency,” Martynova and Farkhatdinov argue.
• “A notable feature of the ‘infrastructure diplomacy’ in which the US and Russia are currently engaged is its complete exclusion of environmental and humanitarian aspects, including the rights of indigenous peoples,” they observe.
• “International sanctions are the biggest drag on the prospects for cooperation in resource extraction, and the space for infrastructure diplomacy has been severely limited,” the authors warn.
• “In the current outlook, an easing or lifting of sanctions by the US ... could signal new opportunities. Even then, it would require significant reciprocal concessions from the Russian side...given that the Arctic is today a far more securitized region than it was 15 years ago...these concessions may be seen as disproportionate,” Martynova and Farkhatdinov note.
• “The US may be interested in restoring cooperation beyond energy, as well. ... The development of rare earth metal deposits, including in the Russian Arctic, has been frequently mentioned publicly as a topic of US-Russia negotiations. This could potentially reduce US dependence on China and bring the US closer to Russia,” they add.
• “Climate change is something that potentially unites many Arctic stakeholders, as it affects everyone ... Perhaps the crisis is the missing MacGuffin that should reset the drama and narrative of cooperation instead of ‘infrastructure diplomacy.’ However, for this to happen, both Washington and Moscow must reconsider their climate priorities,” Martynova and Farkhatdinov conclude.

“What I Learned From My Days in Russia: Silicon Valley Needs to Start Speaking Out About Trump,” Kim Scott, The New York Times, 10.03.25.

• “The pain of watching Russia lose its briefly held freedoms has made me particularly attuned to what is happening at the intersection of tech and the Trump administration,” Scott writes, recalling her days working in Moscow in the 1990s. “That history is why I got a sick feeling…when I saw…tech chieftains…paying homage to Donald Trump at a White House dinner.”
• Scott points out that in Vladimir Putin’s Russia, “the chilling thing about a state-run newspaper called Truth was not so much that people believed its lies, but that telling the truth had been so dangerous, for so long, that it left the population traumatized.”
• She describes how “when Mr. Putin came to power…he immediately targeted Russia’s newly minted media moguls,” with media barons arrested or exiled and independent outlets crushed, until her Russian friends “began speaking more guardedly and would no longer write anything critical of the regime in email or any unencrypted system.”
• Turning to Silicon Valley, Scott remembers the culture of “speaking truth to power,” but laments that “what is so alarming now isn’t that an authoritarian president and a small cadre of right-wing tech executives want to take over. … What is truly surprising is that everyone else…is allowing them to get away with it.”
• “Today, when I mention to former colleagues that I am writing this essay, they tell me I am brave. And there lies the problem. We are not Russia yet, thankfully. It’s not actually courageous to write this. The risk is in not speaking out, because silence enables future cycles of censorship and fear,” Scott warns.
• She concludes, “Fear is a tyrant’s best weapon. The people in Silicon Valley who have made fortunes still have a platform and a voice. Now is the time to exercise them, and to stand together in solidarity. Our silence will not protect us.”

See this link for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• "How and why the window of opportunity in Trump-Putin relations closed," Vasily Zharkov, The Moscow Times, 10.02.25. (In Russian.)

   

II. Russia’s domestic policies 

Domestic politics, economy and energy:

Natalia Zubarevich on the Russian Economy, Interview with Marianna Minzker, RTVI’s Telegram channel, 10,05.25. Clues from Russian Views. Machine-translated.

• “The economy is in bad shape, no kidding. In the civilian sectors, it’s either flat or negative. Civilian machine building, building materials production, timber products—it’s all either negative or near zero. The word ‘suffocating’ doesn’t fit, since it describes a state when you can’t breathe at all. The economy breathes somewhat, it’s not developing, it’s getting worse, but I also can’t say it’s about to die,” Zubarevich says.
• On the hardest-hit industry: “The coal industry is facing real trouble. For three years in a row, coal production in Kemerovo Region has declined. Coal isn’t leaving, it’s hard to sell. The Trans-Siberian Railway is clogged. The Chinese introduced an export duty on Russian coal. Global prices have crashed. This product always lives in cycles—right now it’s at the bottom, as in 2013. Few know that our coal industry is more export-oriented than, for example, our gas industry,” Zubarevich emphasizes.
• On the budget deficit: “The federal budget isn’t my department; everyone knows the authorities are going to raise indirect taxes, but few know what’s happening with regional budgets. Already in the first half of 2025, 67 regions had budget deficits, although normally the deficit appears only in the last month or month and a half, when state contracts are paid. What will happen by year’s end is hard to imagine. Kemerovo Region’s budget deficit was 34%—expenses a third higher than revenues; Komi, Arkhangelsk have 30% deficits; Vologda 25%. Novosibirsk is close to these as well. The deficit scale is enormous, and I don’t fully understand what will happen next, but I do know that the volume of federal transfers, that is, free aid from the federal budget, has only shrunk in recent years,” Zubarevich writes.
• On the prosperity of food service: “Very few regions are seeing a decline in food service. In Moscow it’s +17%. Muscovites are eating and drinking with triple the energy. Our mighty small business will respond to new taxes in its tried-and-true way: ‘The cash register isn’t working, could you pay in cash?’ Going into the shadows is inevitable—the eternal struggle between state and business will intensify in 2025,” she argues.
• On the consequences of a VAT hike: “There was a dilemma—either raise taxes all at once, prices will jump, but then inflation growth will slow, or borrow again, inject money into the economy and drive inflation and go for another round. That is, again, to raise the key rate,” Zubarevich explains.

“Putin’s propaganda flips reality on flights over NATO nations, as Russian public tires of war,” Eva Hartog, Politico, 10.01.25.

• “Russian state media is using Western coverage of recent military aircraft incursions and drone incidents over NATO territory to reinforce the Kremlin’s narrative of victimhood and defensive vigilance,” Eva Hartog reports.
• Hartog notes, “As the war drags on, many Russians are showing signs of exhaustion with official messaging, making the propaganda effort less effective.”
• “With both the Russian public and NATO capitals eyeing the risks of broader confrontation, the state propaganda apparatus is left to downplay Moscow’s provocations while amplifying narratives that the West is threatening Russia’s borders,” the article concludes.

“‘A God-Bearing People’: Kremlin-Aligned Experts Formulate a Messianic Ideology for Russia,” Alexei Stepanov, Russia.Post, 10.06.25.

• “A group of Russian political scientists, led by influential Kremlin-linked expert Sergei Karaganov, published a report this summer (English version here) in which they sought to formulate a coherent ideology for Russia. The title of the report is ‘Russia’s Living Idea-Dream: The Code of the Russian Citizen in the 21st Century,’” Stepanov writes.
• “To this day, the ideology of the Putin regime remains unsystematized: pieces of it can be found in different speeches, political actions and statements by Russian government officials,” Stepanov observes. “Yet in recent years, the political regime has increasingly attempted to articulate a consistent ideological doctrine and instill it in Russians, particularly young people, who are considered the least loyal to the regime. Hence the appearance of ideological classes in schools and universities.”
• Stepanov notes that Kremlin officials have presented Russia as a “civilization,” with one official describing five pillars: “collectivism, a special path, spirituality (dukhovnost’), freedom and will, and pioneering (pervoprokhodchestvo),” and referencing “the essential presence of a super-goal, messianism.”
• The new report by Karaganov and colleagues, “Russia’s Living Idea-Dream,” describes Russians as “‘a God-bearing people’ (narod-bogonosets),” reviving concepts from Slavophile discourse. Karaganov writes the “highest goal” of Russians is “service,” and describes Russia as “a state-civilization, even a civilization of civilizations...open to the world yet preserving its cultural identity and political and spiritual sovereignty.”
• According to Stepanov, Karaganov “employs the now seemingly archaic language of the Slavophiles,” and in the report argues that “to the external world, we are all russkie, despite the diverse components of our common civilization,” even including Ukrainians, Tatars, and Chechens as russkie.
• Karaganov’s “code of the Russian” includes: “To love and protect one’s family, society and the Fatherland, and to serve the state and (for believers) God – these are said to be universal, ‘truly human’ values. ... Russians are a ‘God-bearing’ people who defend what is best in humanity, peace and the freedom of nations, while recognizing cultural diversity – a people that ‘has a mission, but is not messianic.’ ... Russia resists hegemony, with the highest duty being service to the Fatherland and state.”
• Karaganov writes: “Excessive, ostentatious consumption is said to be immoral and unpatriotic,” and argues that business is “a way to make life better and materially richer for all, not oneself alone.”
• Stepanov remarks, “Karaganov’s ideological project is rooted in the traditions of Russian philosophy of late Panslavism, Eurasianism and Russian messianism... messianism, as well as a more Slavophile, radically nationalistic orientation than is usually expressed in official discourse.”
• He concludes, “Karaganov’s project cannot be considered the official position of the Russian regime. Still, given his growing influence ... this document provides insight into the growing rigidification of ideological production.”

See these links for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• "Russia’s budget at risk of economic reality," Alexander Kolyandr and Alexandra Prokopenko, The Bell, 10.03.25.
• "Putin outlines the contours of post-war Russia," Sergey Shelin, The Moscow Times, 10.03.25. (In Russian)

Defense and aerospace:

“The Shooting Party: Russia's Evolving Threat Perceptions Since 2022,” Gabriela Iveliz Rosa-Hernandez, CNA, September 2025.

• “Russian operations in Ukraine reveal a degree of adaptability, [but] the war has not reshaped Russia’s broader framework of threat perceptions. Rather than introducing fundamentally new assessments, current military discourse tends to reinterpret established concerns through the lens of ongoing conflict. In effect, Russia’s experience in Ukraine has not altered Russia’s security anxieties but has instead amplified and reinforced them,” Rosa-Hernandez writes.
• “The war on Ukraine has not led to new perspectives among Russian military thinkers on threat perceptions for multiple reasons. First, Russia’s understanding of internal and external threats and dangers to its security has not changed. Second, given the attrition of its military in Ukraine, Russian theorists perceive Russia to be even more disadvantaged than before in terms of the conventional military balance vis-à-vis the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Third, Russian military thinkers do not appear to have changed their assumptions about what a NATO-Russia conflict would look like,” Rosa-Hernandez writes.
• “Discussions among Russian military thinkers about significant threats from the US and NATO are still linked primarily to the scenario of a massive aerospace attack during the initial period of war. According to them, the main mitigation proposed to counter these capabilities is that Russia should continue to invest in asymmetric capabilities,” she writes.
• Rosa-Hernandez finds, “Russian military leaders remain chiefly preoccupied with two long-standing US programs that have shaped their strategic planning for years. The first is the development of Prompt Global Strike (PGS)... [for which] the proposed Russian response remains focused on escalation control and decisive action to inflict ‘unacceptable damage’ on an adversary.”
• “The second focus of concern is the development of US ballistic missile defense (BMD) capability, particularly the Golden Dome project,” she writes. “In response, many argue for sustained investment in offensive strategic systems capable of overcoming or saturating US missile defenses.”
• “Space threats are also significant for Russian military thinkers, who emphasize the importance of maintaining access to space-based military information while denying it to adversaries. The participation of Western commercial space firms in supporting Ukraine has reinforced Russian fears about the role of space in modern warfare,” according to Rosa-Hernandez.
• “Although Russia’s security concerns about US military capabilities remain consistent, it now extends these anxieties to the prospect of US deployments in Finland and Sweden, which has further intensified and magnified their earlier apprehensions,” Rosa-Hernandez observes.
• “Russian military thinkers interpret the substantial military assistance provided to Ukraine by the US and its allies as a broader Western strategy aimed at weakening Russia. They view the supply of long-range strike weapons as a signal that the West is increasingly willing to risk direct confrontation with Russia,” she reports.
• “Despite its own nuclear rhetoric and violations of arms control agreements, Moscow remains deeply concerned about the weakening of the nuclear taboo and the possible deployment of intermediate-range nuclear forces in Europe.”

“Russia’s Military Budget Shrinks as War Costs Hit Kremlin’s Economic Limits,” Ivan Nechepurenko, The New York Times, 09.30.25. It is important to keep in mind that the decrease from $163 billion to $156 billion constitutes less than 5%. Such a minor decline is “essentially noise” and unlikely to result in a significant decline of Russia’s position among the world’s top defense spenders, according to Harvard University Professor Graham Allison. Moreover, even if a decline does occur, the $163 billion sum still signals Russia's budgetary commitment to another year of war, Allison notes with regard to this NYT article.

• “Russia’s military budget is set to fall for the first time since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine more than three years ago. The slight reduction reflects the country’s growing economic strains but does not significantly alter its course in prosecuting its war of attrition against Ukraine,” Nechepurenko reports.
• “State spending on national defense is projected to go down next year to around $156 billion from more than $163 billion, under the current exchange rates, according to a draft budget submitted to Parliament on Monday. The decrease is larger when projected inflation of up to 7% is factored in,” Nechepurenko notes.
• “Russia is locked in a grinding war in which its army has advanced slowly on the battlefield. President Vladimir V. Putin is trying to demonstrate that Russia can outlast Ukraine despite Kyiv’s fierce resistance and eventually achieve its goal of fully occupying all the Ukrainian regions he declared annexed in 2022,” Nechepurenko writes.
• “Ukraine is hoping that Russia’s limited battlefield gains and mounting economic pressures will eventually convince Mr. Putin that further fighting is futile. But in recent months, he has signaled his determination to continue the war until his expansive conditions for peace are met, even if that determination is increasingly at odds with Russia’s economic reality,” Nechepurenko observes.
• “Russia’s budgetary figures show that it intends to continue conducting the war largely with soldiers who are effectively mercenaries, fighting only for the relatively high pay. This approach has helped widen a budget gap, and the government is responding by increasing taxes on Russians, with the rate of the value-added tax going up to 22% next year from 20%,” Nechepurenko explains.
• Sergei Suverov, an analyst at a Moscow investment consultancy, said the tax increases “may improve the budget revenue situation.” But, he added, “it will hit consumer demand and consequently slow down economic growth.”

“New Budget Confirms the Russian Public Is Paying for the War,” Alexandra Prokopenko, Carnegie Politika, 10.01.25.

• “There were no major surprises in the draft three-year budget submitted by the Russian government to the State Duma this week. The largest budget expense—defense spending—has been slightly reduced for the first time since the start of the full-scale war against Ukraine, but that is sadly not a sign of imminent peace,” Prokopenko writes.
• “As the war approaches the four-year mark, it is becoming increasingly difficult for Russia to make ends meet, and the budget looks more and more like a compromise between the war camp and economists. The former got their 8 percent of GDP for defense and security, while the latter got the least inflationary way to pay for it. Footing the bill will be the Russian people, who face further tax hikes,” she writes.
• “Based on the baseline scenario for the socioeconomic development forecast... Russia is entering a period of low growth. Economic growth will cool to 1 percent in 2025... with inflation slowing to around 4 percent,” Prokopenko notes.
• “Formally, this is a soft landing, but the price is a contraction in demand. After three years of increased spending—about 10 percent of GDP in 2022–2024—the Finance Ministry is reducing the fiscal stimulus. ... Under this plan, there will be a 0.5 percent decline in investment in 2026, compared with 3 percent growth the previous year. This indicates that interest rates will remain high, and private demand will effectively be displaced by the state,” she observes.
• “The government plans to keep the budget deficit about 1.6 percent of GDP in 2026 before lowering it to 1.2 percent of GDP—not through growth, but through tax raises and increased borrowing,” Prokopenko writes.
• “The military-industrial complex’s slice of the economy continues to grow, and is becoming a structural factor. ... By 2028, the industry is expected to have grown by 10 percent compared with 2024,” she writes.
• “The economy’s production profile remains militarized... industrial growth in 2026–2028 will be provided primarily by sectors in which state orders and import substitution priorities are linked to military needs,” Prokopenko notes.
• “The government is effectively saying openly that it’s more convenient for it to pay military expenses out of the pockets of the general public and businesses: after all, the entire economy pays VAT. ... If previously, the Russian economy resembled a marathon runner on budget steroids, now it is transforming into a country with a low growth trajectory, moderately high inflation, persistently high interest rates, and fiscal consolidation achieved through tax increases and maintaining core spending—all against the backdrop of a gradual decline in living standards and stagnation in the private sector,” Prokopenko concludes.
• See section Military aspects of the Ukraine conflict and their impacts above.

Security, law-enforcement, justice and emergencies:

• No significant developments.

   

III. Russia’s relations with other countries

Russia’s external policies, including relations with “far abroad” countries:

“From Moldova to Africa, Russia’s Power Is Waning,” Adrian Karatnycky and Alexander J. Motyl, Foreign Policy, 10.03.25.

• “On Sept. 28, Moldovan voters overwhelmingly rejected pro-Russian parties and gave President Maia Sandu’s pro-European party a decisive parliamentary majority. The victory, which came despite a massive Russia-financed influence operation to sway the election, was only the latest in a series of geopolitical setbacks for Moscow,” Karatnycky and Motyl report.
• “Contrary to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s chest-thumping bravado, he has done enormous damage to Russia’s regional and global interests since launching his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022,” the authors argue.
• “The most dramatic [setback], of course, has occurred in Ukraine, where Moscow could once count on a large Russia-friendly segment of the population. However, Putin’s invasion and annexation of Crimea in 2014, his instigation of violent separatist movements, and his brutal occupation policies ... turned public opinion in Ukraine’s Russian-speaking east and south against Russia. Today, the shift has become deeply rooted, especially given the war crimes and massive loss of life perpetrated by Russia in three and a half years of war.”
• “When the war ends, Russia will face a heavily armed Ukraine whose population will be welded together for generations by the wounds of Russia’s aggression,” Karatnycky and Motyl warn. “A powerful Ukrainian military made up of skilled and seasoned fighters and enhanced by innovative weapons and tactics will work in concert with Europe to deter the Russian threat,” they add.
• “The Commonwealth of Independent States—once Russia’s main instrument for the peaceful reintegration of the post-Soviet states—is in shambles. … The Eurasian Economic Union ... has been reduced to a minor trading bloc with a stable membership of only four states: Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan.”
• The authors observe, “Russia’s war has ... weakened its influence in Europe. Deep reductions in energy imports have diminished Russian economic influence, while British and EU sanctions have sapped trade and investment.”
• “Almost everywhere in Europe, anti-Russian sentiments predominate among voters on the left, right, and center. The war in Ukraine ... has significantly eroded if not eliminated Russian soft power on the continent.”
• They conclude: “Putin’s motivations for the war in Ukraine are tied to ideology, politics, and his own personality. The West should realize that Putin has no interest in—or comprehension of—peace. The only way to overcome ideology, politics, and personality is by force and deterrence. In other words, by supporting a Ukrainian victory, building European military capacity, and demonstrating to ordinary Russians and the ruling elite that Putin’s war has taken their country into a dead end.”

Ukraine:

“Costa seeks to bypass Orbán’s veto on Ukraine’s EU membership bid,” Nicholas Vinocur and Gabriel Gavin, Politico, 09.29.25.

• European Council President António Costa is leading a push to advance Ukraine’s application for EU membership despite Hungary’s opposition as leaders head for a pivotal summit in Copenhagen this week.
• Costa has been sounding out support from EU capitals to streamline the process for new members and break the stalemate over prospective membership for Ukraine and Moldova, according to five diplomats and officials who were granted anonymity to speak to POLITICO.
• The diplomatic offensive is an attempt to circumvent Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who has used his country’s veto to hold up Ukraine’s path to membership of the Union. Existing rules require all 27 EU member countries to green-light each stage of the accession process.
• Moldova, which is also an official candidate for EU membership, is paired with Kyiv in the accession process and cannot move ahead as long as the impasse persists.
• Under Costa’s proposal, so-called negotiating clusters — key legal steps on the path to membership — could be opened with the assent of a qualified majority of EU countries rather than unanimous agreement.
• “Enlargement is an important priority for the president of the European Council,” said one of the officials. “He sees it as the most important geopolitical investment the EU can make. That’s why he believes it is important to continue discussing avenues to ensure that Ukraine’s reform efforts can be translated into tangible steps.”
• Marta Kos, the EU’s enlargement commissioner, will head to Ukraine on Monday as the country completes the screening process of the legislation required to move ahead with its candidacy.
• “All clusters have been screened, in record time. Ukraine has delivered. Ukraine is ready for the next step. It’s now up to member states to give the green light,” Kos told POLITICO’s Brussels Playbook. “Both Ukraine and Europe cannot afford to see Ukraine’s momentum for reforms slow down. This is the moment to accelerate.”

See these links for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “Serhii Plokhy on History, Ukraine War, NATO and Nuclear Deterrence in 2025,” Mezha/YouTube, 09.25.25. Video.( In Ukrainian.)

Russia's other post-Soviet neighbors:

“Stray Russian Drones Test Minsk’s Attempts to Improve Relations With the West,” Artyom Shraibman, Carnegie Politika, 09.16.25.

• “Minsk’s relations with the West have never been so multidirectional—in the most literal sense. On September 10, Russian drones crossed Belarus’s western border in one direction, while a U.S. delegation crossed the border in the other direction, bearing news of the lifting of aviation sanctions against Minsk in exchange for the release of a new group of political prisoners,” Shraibman writes.
• “In return for the United States lifting sanctions against the Belarusian national airline Belavia and announcing plans to reopen an embassy in Minsk, Lukashenko released a group of thirty-eight Belarusian political prisoners and fourteen Western nationals, including journalists and politicians. Previously, Lukashenko had released political prisoners in exchange for the mere fact of visits to Minsk by senior U.S. officials. This was the first time he had secured the actual lifting of U.S. sanctions—albeit only from one Belarusian company so far,” he explains.
• “The breakthrough became possible after Lukashenko spoke to Trump by telephone in mid-August, taking the dialogue with the United States to a new level. After that phone call, Lukashenko effectively offered Trump a ‘big deal’ in front of the cameras: for the United States to take all the prisoners it needs, while in another interview he listed the sectors of the economy from which he would like to see sanctions lifted,” Shraibman writes. “The sale of political prisoners has not been discussed so openly and cynically in Europe since the ransoming of dissidents from East Germany.”
• Shraibman notes, “Despite these rapidly unfolding developments, the diplomatic process is still at an early stage. More than 1,100 political prisoners remain in Belarus, and new arrests continue to be made.”
• “Minsk’s relations with Europe, in the meantime, are going from bad to worse,” Shraibman writes. Relations have become especially tense with Poland since September 12, when the active phase of Zapad 2025 began on Belarusian training grounds.
• “With the ruling liberal coalition having recently lost the presidential election to the conservative nationalist Karol Nawrocki, the government is afraid of appearing lax in protecting the country’s security,” Shraibman observes, noting that Poland announced the closure of its border with Belarus for the active phase of the exercises.
• “These contradictory events have once again shown how many variables beyond Minsk’s control influence the decisions of Belarus’s neighbors and its room for maneuver. Windows of opportunity open spontaneously, as with Trump, who decided to call Lukashenko from on board Air Force One while flying to Alaska to meet with Putin,” he writes.
• Shraibman concludes, “Minsk’s modest progress in creating a more predictable and peaceful image could stall at any minute as a result of the overall tension in the region, poorly timed spy scandals, and stray Russian drones. And hanging overhead like the sword of Damocles is the risk that either Trump will be distracted by something new, or Putin, on the contrary, will take an interest in why Lukashenko stole a march from him in the dialogue with Washington.”

“China Is Using Vocational Training Centers to Rebuild Its Image in Central Asia,” Edward Lemon and Bradley Jardine, Carnegie Politika, 10.06.25.

• “In the wake of mounting public backlash against its growing influence in Central Asia, China is betting on vocational education to reshape perceptions and re anchor its presence in the region,” Lemon and Jardine write.
• “At a September 2025 meeting between Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, the pair announced the opening of two new Luban Workshops in the Central Asian country.”
• “Over the past two years, Beijing has launched a flurry of these technical training centers (named after a legendary Chinese craftsman) in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan,” the authors note, describing this as “a marked shift: an effort to win hearts and minds by equipping local youth with high demand skills in AI, logistics, electric vehicle maintenance, hydropower, and automation, which helps Central Asia move up the value chain.”
• “This push is as strategic as it is philanthropic. First launched in 2016, the Luban Workshop network is part of China’s global strategy to improve its image while serving its economic interests by promoting its technologies,” Lemon and Jardine write.
• The workshops, they note, “represent an attempt to recast China not as a threat, but as a pragmatic partner in human capital development: a partner offering in-demand skills, opportunity, and advancement.”
• “The scale and speed of the rollout is telling. In Kazakhstan alone, where anti China protests have become a near annual occurrence since 2016, Beijing has unveiled three Luban Workshops since 2023, with two more under construction. Each of these centers is tailored to the host country’s priorities, allowing China to demonstrate responsiveness to local needs in contrast to Western donors, which it frames as imposing their own interests and priorities.”
• Lemon and Jardine caution, “For all the goodwill they generate, the workshops also deepen dependency. Most are designed and operated by Chinese institutions, using Chinese equipment and software. In effect, they lay the groundwork for a China centric technical ecosystem in which Chinese companies, equipment, and standards become deeply embedded in national development strategies.”
• They conclude, “Whether this approach can reverse the tide of Sinophobia or insulate China from future protest movements remains to be seen. What is clear, however, is that Beijing is learning to adapt. The era of raw economic assertiveness is giving way to a more nuanced strategy that fuses investment with education, infrastructure with human capital, and ambition with a dose of humility. In the contested arena of Central Asia, such recalibrations may prove decisive.”

“Moldova’s Victory Over Russia,” Linda Robinson, Council on Foreign Relations, 10.03.25.

• “The victory of President Maia Sandu’s Party for Action and Solidarity in Moldova’s September 28 parliamentary elections is significant for three reasons,” Robinson writes.
• “First, tiny Moldova, on the western edge of Ukraine, won a decisive victory over an unrelenting hybrid warfare campaign by Russia...That such a small country could stand up to Russia gives heart to others in Moscow’s sights.”
• “Since Sandu first became president in 2021 at the head of a popular reform movement, she has sought to move the former Soviet republic out of Russia’s orbit by cleaning up corruption and joining the European Union,” Robinson notes, describing how she “narrowly won reelection...in the face of a sustained effort, financed and orchestrated from Moscow...to unseat her through disinformation, vote-buying, cyberattacks, and training armed agitators.”
• Robinson writes, “She won an outright majority over two rival blocs, the pro-Russian Patriotic Bloc and the Socialist-Communist bloc.”
• Her victory “clears the path for Moldova to join the European Union by 2030,” which would “greatly strengthen the country’s hand against further meddling by Russia.”
• Robinson also emphasizes Sandu’s significance as one of just twenty-nine current heads of government or state who are women, and the first to be elected president in Moldova. “Her successive electoral victories have had coattails for women, who now comprise 40 percent of the parliament and cabinet ministers,” Robinson notes.
• “Under her leadership, Moldova has written a playbook for defeating hybrid warfare, and it is one that others can learn from,” she concludes.

“Europe Should Support Moldova Against Russian Meddling,” Ivana Stradner and Mark Montgomery, Foreign Policy, 10.03.25.

• “Moldova’s pro-Western governing party gained a clear parliamentary majority in this weekend’s elections, choosing European alignment amid ‘unprecedented pressure, disinformation, and interference from the Kremlin,’” Stradner and Montgomery write.
• “European support was crucial in helping Moldova hold free and fair elections in the face of Russian interference. But it’s too soon to grow complacent. European leaders can do more to support Moldova’s European integration: support Moldovan investigations into Russian illicit financings, fund a more resilient Moldovan power grid, and ultimately offer Moldova a faster path to EU accession,” the authors argue.
• “As PAS party leader Igor Grosu put it, Russia ‘threw into battle everything it had that was most vile—mountains of money, mountains of lies, mountains of illegalities.’ He also accused Moscow of using ‘criminals to try to turn our entire country into a haven for crime.’”
• “Russia’s interference included reports of bomb scares, cyberattacks on electoral systems, and false claims by Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service that NATO plans to invade Moldova. … Russian influence operations took advantage of Moldova’s large Russian-speaking population, exploiting Gagauzia, a historically pro-Russian region in southern Moldova that is already at odds with Sandu’s administration.”
• “Pro-Kremlin Moldovan and Russian officials are accusing Moldovan authorities of election fraud. Sergei Shoigu … described the elections as a fight to prevent ‘the authorities’ efforts to effectively destroy Moldovan statehood,’” Stradner and Montgomery report.
• “Moscow also wants to prevent Moldova from joining the European Union. … Sandu told the European Parliament: ‘because we have advanced greatly on this path, Russia has unleashed its full arsenal of hybrid attacks against us.’”
• “This time Moscow’s election interference failed, largely because of Moldova’s model proactive defense strategy. The EU sent members of its Hybrid Rapid Response Team to help on the ground and authorized its Cybersecurity Reserve to assist in dealing with cybersecurity incidents. The resilience of the electoral system was also bolstered by years of U.S. and EU cyber and election security assistance,” the authors explain.
• “Brussels should give Moldovan voters what they were seeking in electing pro-democracy politicians—a fast track into the EU. This would be the ultimate rebuke to Putin’s meddling,” Stradner and Montgomery conclude.

“This Crazy Crypto Heist Is the Story of Our Time,” Philip Shishkin, The New York Times, 10.05.25.

• “It is no exaggeration to say that Mr. Ivanishvili rules Georgia. Reclusive, often ensconced in a hilltop mansion, he is something like Iran’s supreme leader, minus the religion and the formal title,” Shishkin writes.
• Shishkin reports: “Over time, as Mr. Ivanishvili secured almost total control over Georgia and Mr. Bachiashvili was drawn deeper into the world of cryptocurrency, things fell apart. Now they face each other as enemies, with one seemingly seeking the destruction of the other.”
• “Mr. Bachiashvili, who holds dual Georgian and Russian citizenship, soon joined Mr. Ivanishvili’s sprawling, multi-industry business empire. … He quickly rose through the ranks and helped his billionaire boss sell off his Russian assets before entering Georgian politics… He proved himself adept at that, leading a global legal campaign to hold Credit Suisse accountable for negligence after a wealth manager there stole hundreds of millions from Mr. Ivanishvili.”
• “By 2016, [Mr. Bachiashvili’s] remaining Bitcoin was already worth nearly $12 million. … He became a true believer in Bitcoin’s future. And he wanted to put his own skin in the game.”
• “After contested parliamentary elections … in which Georgian Dream’s widely attested electoral fraud and manipulation spurred enormous street protests — he [Bachiashvili] criticized the state’s crackdowns and defended the protesters’ pro-European aspirations.”
• “On May 24, Mr. Bachiashvili left his beachfront villa to meet a lawyer at a nearby hotel. After the meeting, … a group of six to eight plainclothes officers approached the car and asked Mr. Bachiashvili to step out. … He was escorted into the jet, and his blindfold and restraints were removed. He told his lawyer he saw about five or six people and immediately recognized the head of Georgia’s state security agency and a former bodyguard for Mr. Ivanishvili.”
• “Languishing in prison, Mr. Bachiashvili still hasn’t given up his Bitcoin,” Shishkin concludes.

See these links for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

• “Putin’s Moldova election failure highlights Russia’s declining influence,” Kateryna Odarchenko, Atlantic Council/UkraineAlert, 10.04.25.
• “Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova’s answer to a media question about parliamentary elections in Moldova,” Russian Foreign Ministry, 09.29.25. Clues from Official Russian Views.
• “How Uzbekistan Is Shaping Its Afghanistan Strategy,” Giorgio Cafiero, The National Interest, 09.25.25.

Footnotes

1. For Tomahawks to have a tangible impact on the course of the Russian-Ukrainian War, they’d have to number at least dozens per week (Condition 1) and possess longer/longest range to reach Schwerpunkte deep in Russia (Condition 2). Russia does have (or recently had) means to shoot down these cruise missiles, according to Western press. For instance, The U.K.'s Telegraph reported in April 2018: "While its [S-400]missile interceptor capability is shorter range - about 75 miles - its missiles travel at a thousand meters a second and can hit low-flying targets at just a few meters of altitude - perfect for killing sub-sonic Tomahawks,” according to The Telegraph. Russia likely had around 16 to 18 battalions, or 56 full S-400 systems, deployed by the early 2020s, according to Newsweek, though some were then destroyed by Ukraine after February 2022, the bulk must have survived (along with the sole S-500). Moreover, it is not clear if Trump would agree to supply any Tomahawks at all, as that could prompt Russia to escalate vis-à-vis not only Ukraine, but also its allies, per Putin's Oct. 2 warnings at Valdai Club. What form that escalation can take and what its intended and unintended impacts could be difficult to accurately forecast.
2. That Putin and his foreign minister Sergei Lavrov  both urged the U.S. to consider Russia’s recent proposal to extend New START limits thrice in the past week and a half indicates that the Kremlin is now keen to preserve some semblance of nuclear arms control with Washington. It was on Oct. 5 that Donald Trump finally responded to the proposal, saying it “sounds like a good idea.” “Agreeing to Putin’s offer would maintain a useful measure of predictability in the tense U.S.-Russia relationship and could slow, if only for one year, a three-way nuclear arms race with Russia and China that has begun gathering steam,” according to Steven Pifer. “If today’s cumbersome treaty-based arms control structure...disintegrates, it will not be replaced by some elegant and bright edifice, but only by nuclear chaos and ultimately the inevitable demise of the world as we know it, with all its problems and misfortunes,” according to Aleksey Arbatov.
3. See Highlight 5 for more of Putin’s recent remarks on these issues.
4. On Oct. 5, Putin warned that providing Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine “will lead to the destruction of our [Russia-U.S.] relations—at least the positive trends that have recently emerged.” Speaking to VGTRK journalist Pavel Zarubin, Putin added, “That’s what I think. How things turn out depends not only on us.” (Gazeta.ru, 10.05.25)

The cutoff for reports summarized in this product was 10:00 am Eastern time on the day this digest was distributed. Unless otherwise indicated, all summaries above are direct quotations. 

*Here and elsewhere, the italicized text indicates comments by RM staff and associates. These comments do not constitute a RM editorial policy.

Slider photo by AP Photo/Yevhen Titov.