Russia Analytical Report, June 15–22, 2026

3 Ideas to Explore

  1. Former SACEUR Christopher Cavoli calls Ukraine’s creation of a domestic drone and cruise missile industry “one of the most remarkable military feats of the century,” but cautions that “we’re not going to see a World War II‑type of ending to this war.” In an interview with Independence Avenue Media, the U.S. general expects “a little bit more war before the sides are ready to sit down.” Looking beyond a ceasefire, Cavoli warns that “we can expect Russia to rebuild as quickly as possible, to reposition on NATO’s borders, and they will do so in a frame of mind in which they are very much persuaded that we are their enemy.”
  2. Despite Ukraine’s increasingly spectacular long‑range drone attacks against Russia, Kyiv still lacks what military experts say is decisive: a home‑grown ballistic‑missile capability, according to an article by Constant Méheut for NYT entitled “A Missing Ingredient in Ukraine’s Barrages on Russia: Ballistic Missiles.” Ballistic missiles carry far larger payloads than drones and travel so fast that “roughly two‑thirds” of the 74 Russian ballistic missiles launched on average each month in 2026 have pierced Ukraine’s defenses, up from six per month in 2023 and 49 in 2025, according to Méheut.  According to recent CSIS data analyzed by RM, Russia launched 1,001 ballistic missiles since September 2022, and of these, only 196 were intercepted by Ukraine.*
  3. Russia’s territorial gains in Ukraine in February–May are significantly smaller than during the same period last year, according to an FT article entitled “Vladimir Putin’s war machine sputters in drone age.” Russian troops captured just 164 square kilometers (63 square miles) of territory between February and May, versus 1,151 square kilometers (444 square miles) in the same period last year, according to Black Bird Group, a Finnish war monitoring group, cited by FT’s Fabrice Deprez and Max Seddon. “Russia’s offensive usually experiences a lull in the late winter and early spring before picking up in May. But its advances have shown no sign of resuming across the frontline in June,” the two FT journalists write. “But Russia still retains the capacity to inflict significant damage on Ukraine,” the duo warns, noting that Russia is projected to launch more than 75,000 guided bombs in 2026, up from approximately 60,000 in 2025. According to DeepState’s data, Russia gained 432 square kilometers (167 square miles) in the period of Feb. 1–May 31, 2026.1 In contrast, in the period of Feb. 1–May 31, 2025, the total area of Ukraine occupied by Russia rose from 112,157 square kilometers to 113,106 square kilometers, increasing by 949 square kilometers (366 square miles), according to DeepState. Additionally, in the period from June 1 to June 22, 2026, the total area of Ukraine occupied by Russia increased by 55 square kilometers (21 square miles) from 116,854 square kilometers to 116,909 square kilometers, according to DeepState data analyzed by RM.

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

Nuclear security and safety:

North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs:

  • No significant developments.

Iran and its nuclear program:

“At The Upturned Table: How the fragile Iran-US agreement turned out to be bad news for Putin,” Re:Russia, 06.19.26.

  • The US-Iran reflects “a partial defeat for Donald Trump,” the authors argue: reopening Hormuz for 60 days is “his principal objective,” while nuclear, missile and proxy issues are “set out only in highly vague terms” or “not mentioned at all.” The final text, they note, turned an Iranian draft that “looked almost like a US capitulation” into a time‑sequenced, conditional framework in which “the agreement could be abandoned by either side at almost any stage,” functioning as “an open‑ended framework that can be closed at any moment” and a “meaningful pause” both sides need.
  • Economically, during talks “prices fell below $100 per barrel and, following its signature, dropped below $80,” they write, so “revenues from Russian crude… will be considerably lower than Moscow would prefer” just as the Kremlin “managed to increase spending further, effectively consuming much of the windfall.” Politically, “relations between Putin and Trump appear to have cooled noticeably,” with Moscow still signaling it “would like to return to the trajectory of 2025,” but that “no longer appears popular in Washington.”
    • The G7 communiqué on Ukraine is “a major blow to Moscow,” the piece contends: for the first time since Trump’s return it articulates a “common position grounded largely in the European approach,” including unity on “strengthening economic pressure on Russia” and support for “air defense systems, long‑range weapons and licenses for their production.” Even under Biden, “no explicit political decision” on long‑range strikes was publicly declared; the statement now “removes an important political barrier” to Ukraine’s evolution into “a more capable military power,” and makes any Kremlin hope of reviving the 2025 Trump‑Putin track “highly improbable.”

“Trump and Iran: How to Pass Off a Draw as a Victory,” Oleg Barabanov, Valdai Club, 06.19.26. Clues from Russian Views. Machine-translated. (This organization is affiliated with the Russian authorities.)

  • Barabanov argues that Trump’s Iran war ended not in victory or defeat but in a “draw” — and that recognizing this, and choosing a draw over endless war, is unusual in world politics. The U.S.–Iran memorandum was signed remotely, without a high‑profile in‑person ceremony, and each side immediately proclaimed itself the winner. In reality, he writes, the central issue Trump claimed to be fighting over — Iran’s nuclear weapons — remains formally unchanged: Tehran again pledges not to build a bomb, but it was already bound more strongly by Ayatollah Khamenei’s fatwa declaring nuclear weapons un‑Islamic. By contrast, the fate of roughly 440 kg of 60‑percent‑enriched uranium, enough for several bombs if further refined, is left for future negotiations, whose outcome will depend on how fast Washington actually lifts sanctions, unfreezes assets, and funds reconstruction.
  • Barabanov notes that Israel’s interests are barely reflected in the memorandum, breaking the informal rule of “nothing about Iran without Israel,” and predicts that clashes around Hezbollah and Lebanon may simply revert to the pre‑war pattern, with Trump unlikely to re‑enter that fight. On balance, he concludes, “Trump certainly did not win, but it cannot really be said that he lost either; Iran held out, but no more than that.” In sports terms, this is a draw—unlike the eight‑year Iran‑Iraq war, which also ended roughly where it began. The striking thing, he suggests, is that Trump quickly realized outright victory was impossible and accepted a tie far faster than most leaders do. Medially he must sell it as a “great victory,” but substantively it is “a victory over himself,” and, paradoxically, one that lets him revive his image as a peacemaker who not only stopped others’ wars but “stopped his own war”—something very few leaders ever manage.

“Discrediting the U.S. Alliance System as the Key Preliminary Outcome of the Middle East War,” Dmitri Trenin, Russian International Affairs Council, 06.22.26. Clues from Russian Views. (This is a Russian-government funded organization.)

  • Trenin says calling the conflict a “Persian Gulf War,” even a “Third Gulf War,” is “valid only when viewed from a U.S. perspective.” From Moscow, Tehran and Tel Aviv, “the conflict is something much larger,” having “spread far beyond the two shores of the Gulf” from “Israel and Lebanon to Iraq and Yemen, and from Gaza to Jordan.” With Israel “fighting on seven fronts” and Iran coordinating an “Axis of Resistance,” “at stake in this armed confrontation is the future regional order in the Middle East,” so “it is more accurate to describe the conflict as a Middle Eastern war,” he writes.
  • “From Moscow’s perspective—and, objectively, from Beijing’s as well,” the war appears as “part of a broader struggle over the future world order: a functional equivalent of a world war,” Trenin argues. The focal point is “the Eurasian landmass as a whole,” with Eastern Europe, the Middle East and a likely East Asian front as “three closely interconnected and mutually dependent theaters,” all revolving around “the determination of the United States and its allies to preserve … their global predominance” and “suppress (or at least contain)” rising powers.
  • While it is “too early to draw definitive conclusions,” Trenin contends that “Iran succeeded in stopping the United States and Israel,” and that the war exposed “the Achilles’ heel of America’s global strategic position: its unwillingness to make sacrifices and suffer losses for the sake of its allies.” As a result, “the alliance system that has underpinned Washington’s global predominance … has been called into question,” not only in the Gulf and Israel but also “in relation to NATO Europe” and potentially Asian allies. This is “not simply another ‘Trump zigzag,’” he insists, but part of a “gradual unraveling” of what was once “a blood-sealed, almost sacred compact,” a vulnerability that those shaping a new world order “should seek to make use of.”

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

Humanitarian impact of the Ukraine conflict:

“Thousands Are Fleeing Ukraine’s Donbas Strongholds as Russia Pushes Closer,” Cassandra Vinograd and Oleksandr Chubko, New York Times, 06.22.26.

  • The article describes how Russia’s intensified air and ground campaign is turning the remaining Ukrainian‑held “fortress belt” cities in Donetsk—Sloviansk, Kramatorsk, Druzhkivka, and Kostiantynivka—into depopulated targets. A 3,000‑pound bomb that obliterated a city block in Sloviansk in April signaled a shift toward the same scorched‑earth tactics that destroyed Bakhmut, Avdiivka, Chasiv Yar, and Toretsk. Russian forces have fought into Kostiantynivka and reduced Druzhkivka to a wasteland, leaving Sloviansk and Kramatorsk as the last major strongholds in the region.
  • Although neither city is on the verge of falling, they are now within range of sustained glide‑bomb and FPV‑drone attacks. Local officials say roughly 1,000 people a week have been leaving Sloviansk; its population has dropped from about 50,000 in March to under 44,000. Hospitals report 10–15 drone‑related civilian injuries weekly, maternity services have shut after strikes, and anti‑drone netting now covers key roads and streets. Evacuation volunteers describe rising requests and areas already too dangerous to enter, as netted roads, burned‑out vehicles, and constant sirens become daily reality.

“The Kremlin Strikes a Sacred Site in Kyiv,” Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal, 06.16.26.

  • The editorial board writes that Putin “poses to America’s more credulous conservatives as a defender of Christianity,” but Russia’s June 15 attack on the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra exposes that claim. The 11th‑century monastery, “Kyiv’s equivalent of St. Patrick’s in New York City or Notre Dame in Paris,” suffered a direct hit on the sanctuary of the Assumption Cathedral during a missile‑and‑drone barrage that killed at least five and injured 29 in Kyiv.
  • Russia’s Foreign Ministry tried to blame a misfired U.S. Patriot, but Ukraine’s first deputy culture minister Ivan Verbytskyi told the board that “all evidence points to ‘a direct hit by a drone on the cathedral’” and that the strike “was ‘not collateral damage.’” The editorial notes that Moscow had already accused Kyiv of “religious persecution” over the Lavra’s lease, yet “note which party is bombing churches and targeting Christians.”
  • Citing Mission Eurasia, the board says Russia has damaged or destroyed “more than 730 religious buildings in Ukraine” since 2022, and has confiscated church property and tortured clergy in occupied areas—evidence, it argues, that the Kremlin is waging both a military and spiritual war against Ukraine.

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

“A Missing Ingredient in Ukraine’s Barrages on Russia: Ballistic Missiles,” Constant Méheut, New York Times, 06.19.26.

  • Méheut reports that despite Ukraine’s increasingly spectacular long‑range drone attacks—including the June 18 strike that sent black smoke over Moscow—Kyiv still lacks what military experts say is decisive: a home‑grown ballistic‑missile capability. Ballistic missiles carry far larger payloads than drones and travel so fast that “roughly two‑thirds” of the 74 Russian ballistic missiles launched on average each month in 2026 have pierced Ukraine’s defenses, up from 6 per month in 2023 and 49 in 2025. Those barrages have repeatedly overwhelmed air defenses and devastated Ukraine’s power grid.
  • Ukraine exhausted its Soviet‑era Tochka stocks early in the war and has received only limited U.S. ATACMS, often under employment restrictions driven by escalation fears. That, combined with Russia’s growing missile production, has pushed Kyiv to pursue domestic options. Fire Point Rocket Technology is developing short‑range FP‑7 and longer‑range FP‑9 ballistic missiles; FP‑7 is said to be “completely ready” and FP‑9 could flight‑test this summer. Yet experts caution that Fire Point’s earlier Flamingo cruise missile has shown “low effectiveness,” likely accuracy problems, underscoring how much harder missiles are than drones to get right.
  • Ukrainian officials hope even “good‑enough” ballistic missiles able to threaten Moscow and major cities could change Putin’s calculus and force negotiations. 
  • But Dmytro Kuleba, a former foreign affairs minister in Ukraine, told New Voice Ukraine, a news outlet, that if Ukraine were to develop a ballistic missile program that would “truly pose a threat to Moscow and major Russian cities,” Mr. Putin would be forced “to make the next step.” “The only unresolved question of our war is whether Fire Point’s ballistic missiles will reach Moscow, and then whether Putin will dare to use nuclear weapons,” Mr. Kuleba said.2

“Infrastructure Rather Than Territory: Russia’s Next Winter Campaign Against Ukraine’s Energy Sector Appears to Pose a Greater Threat Than Russia’s Summer Offensive,” Re:Russia, 06.18.26.

  • The article argues the war has become a multi‑front war of attrition in which Russia’s most dangerous advantage is not on the front line but in the air against Ukraine’s power system. Since February 2022 Russia has gained only “just over 1.5%” of Ukrainian territory, at the cost of “more than a thousand men a day” and roughly “200 men per square kilometer” of land captured. By contrast, in 2025 alone Russia carried out 1,225 strikes on Ukrainian energy infrastructure—more than in the first three years of the war combined—cutting national generating capacity from 38 GW pre‑war to about 9 GW by March 2026, while winter demand has exceeded 18 GW.
  • Last winter’s campaign, combining Shahed‑type drones with large salvos of ballistic and cruise missiles, produced rolling blackouts and, for the first time, major heating failures in cities like Odesa, Kharkiv and Kyiv; in the capital, after the destruction of key CHP plants, some 6,000 apartment blocks—around two million people—saw indoor temperatures fall to 12°C during cold snaps. Russia has adopted a “scorched earth” tactic of repeatedly hitting substations as soon as repairs begin, forcing Ukraine’s grid operator to rely on near‑constant load shedding. Imports from the EU (peaking at 1.3 million MWh in February, about 20% of winter consumption) help but are limited by interconnector capacity.
  • Ukraine is trying to respond by decentralizing generation (“energy honeycomb”), expanding storage (from 500 MW toward 1.5 GW), hardening substations with reinforced concrete shelters, and building 1.4 GW of new capacity on the left bank of the Dnipro to reduce dependence on vulnerable cross‑river lines from its western nuclear plants. But the article notes a large funding and air‑defense gap: Kyiv estimates it needs €5.4 billion for winter energy preparations and has only ~€1.9 billion pledged; Patriot shortages, worsened by the Iran war, remain acute, and Ukraine’s own FP‑7 missile is only in testing. He concludes that the coming winter “energy battle” may be as decisive as holding the land front, echoing U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s warning that while Russia cannot win militarily, Ukraine’s energy vulnerability is now one of Washington’s chief concerns.

“Cavoli: Ukraine Is ‘Gaining Advantage’ Over Russia, but No Knockout End to War,” Ia Meurmishvili interviewing Gen. Christopher Cavoli, Independence Avenue Media, 06.17.26.

  • Cavoli calls Ukraine’s creation of a domestic drone and cruise‑missile industry “one of the most remarkable military feats of the century,” arguing it has allowed Kyiv “against the odds to fight Russia to a standstill” and start “regaining moderate amounts of territory.” He says Russia is now losing “30,000 to 35,000 casualties a month,” meaning “for the first time since the beginning of the war, Russia has begun losing more soldiers in a month than they are able to field back onto the battlefield,” and notes that deep Ukrainian strikes have “really started to take a toll on the energy industry inside Russia” and “brought the war home.”
  • Yet Cavoli cautions that “we’re not going to see a World War II‑type of ending to this war,” stressing that “almost all wars end with some sort of agreement.” Ukraine has shown it will not surrender and Russia “is incapable militarily of pushing Ukraine so far that Ukraine has to surrender,” so he expects “a little bit more war before the sides are ready to sit down” and predicts the conflict will end through “some sort of a brokered decision.”
  • Looking beyond a ceasefire, Cavoli warns that “we can expect Russia to rebuild as quickly as possible, to reposition on NATO’s borders,” reminding that its navy (outside the Black Sea), air force and nuclear forces have “suffered minimally.” He calls the war “a wake‑up call to build larger forces with greater stockpiles of munitions,” and says NATO’s task now is to “very responsibly and very quickly rearm itself and prepare to deter a significant threat from Russia after the Ukraine war.”

“Are Ukraine drones really exposing gaps in Russia's defense?,” Alena Zhabina, Deutsche Welle, 06.20.26.

  • After the June 18 strikes on Moscow — “the largest attack since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine” — Zhabina reports that a refinery supplying “40% of the region's fuel” was set alight, with apparent production halts and evacuations at Russia’s largest airport. Eyewitness videos of failed interceptions fueled the impression of a “gap” in defenses. But Ruslan Leviev told DW that this is an illusion “among non-specialists, who see a missile fly past a drone without hitting it,” arguing that more than 90 percent of UAVs were downed and that the real problem is scale: “Mass drone attacks demand more hardware than any industry can supply.”
  • Ukrainian expert Anatoliy Khrapchynskyi countered that breaches reflect both “systemic degradation of Russia's defense architecture and the technological evolution of Ukraine's strike capabilities.” He said systems such as Pantsir-S1 were “calibrated against highly radar-reflective targets” but are “basically ‘blind’ to small drones” made of composites, while Russia’s huge territory makes a single “dome” impossible. Moscow itself is “an even easier target” because high-rises let drones “hide from radars behind buildings,” he argued.

“The terrifying new air war in Ukraine,” The Economist, 06.15.26.

  • The Economist says Russia’s June 15 barrage of “611 drones and 70 missiles” on Ukraine, including a direct hit on Kyiv’s Pechersk Lavra and a “double‑tap” strike killing rescuers in Kharkiv, reflects “Russia’s increasing difficulties on the ground” and a shift of the war’s “center of gravity…towards the factories and supply lines.” Unable to regain momentum in the trenches, Moscow is “simply bomb[ing] Ukrainian cities harder and more ruthlessly,” aiming to break Ukrainian morale and “foreign allies’ confidence.”
  • Russia is “dominating the missile war by default” because Ukraine lacks enough anti‑ballistic interceptors. Ukrainian air defenses down “more than 90%” of drones and cruise missiles on an average night, but “roughly two‑thirds” of ballistic missiles—Iskander‑M, S‑400 and now Zircon—get through. Ukrainian intelligence estimates Russia will produce “roughly 700 Iskander” ballistic missiles plus 60 Kinzhal and 30 Zircon this year, and combined attacks on Kyiv are running at about one a week with an increasing ballistic share.
  • The article warns that in the near term “Russia will escalate,” possibly using “even more destructive weapons” and targeting government and civilians “with no pretense of restraint,” while Ukraine scrambles to field its own ballistic missiles and braces for faster, jet‑powered Shaheds with Chinese engines.

"Vladimir Putin’s war machine sputters in drone age,” Fabrice Deprez and Max Seddon, Financial Times, 06.19.26.

  • Between February and May 2026, Russian forces captured only 164 sq km of Ukrainian territory, versus 1,151 sq km in the same period of 2025, according to Finnish monitor Black Bird Group—a decline of more than 85 percent. Analysts note that Russia’s offensive usually accelerates in May, but this year “advances have shown no sign of resuming” into June.
  • Ukrainian officials say Russia has for “nearly half a year” been losing more men at the front than it can recruit. Budget data show that new military contracts fell from 89,601 in the first quarter of 2025 to 71,216 in the first quarter of 2026, a drop of roughly 21 percent. 
  • “Ukrainian innovations in mid- and long-range drones have destroyed air bases, army convoys and oil refineries hundreds of kilometers into Russian territory. Meanwhile, Moscow’s troops captured just 164 sq km of territory between February and May, against 1,151 sq km in the same period last year, according to Black Bird Group, a Finnish war monitoring group,” according to the FT journalists. 
  • Russia still inflicts heavy damage. A Ukrainian institute projects that Russian forces will launch more than 75,000 guided glide bombs (KABs) in 2026, up from about 60,000 in 2025—around a 25 percent increase.
  • Yet outside Donbas, Russian advances are “nearly absent,” and analysts such as Konrad Muzyka argue that, short of another large mobilization—or nuclear escalation—Moscow has limited tools left to change the war’s trajectory, even as domestic pressure to “raise the level of mobilizing human, industrial and economic resources” grows.

“‘Game Changer’? Too Soon to Tell. But Ukraine Flexed in Striking Moscow,” Siobhán O’Grady, New York Times, 06.19.26.

  • O’Grady reports that a Ukrainian drone barrage on June 18 set part of Moscow’s largest oil refinery ablaze, sending a “towering dome of black smoke” over the capital and “blew the roof off the idea that Russia could continue to shield Muscovites from the war.” The strike came as Zelensky secured a G7 statement of “unwavering support” in Évian and as the EU began disbursing a €90 billion loan package and confirmed $4 billion in fresh Western military pledges.
  • European leaders framed the attack as a psychological and strategic inflection point: 
  • The article notes Kyiv’s growing confidence and long‑range strike campaign, including continued drone attacks on Moscow the following day, even as Russia keeps “pounding the Ukrainian capital” amid Patriot shortages. Zelensky used his meeting with Trump to request Patriot blueprints so Ukraine can produce the systems itself, undercutting Russia’s ballistic advantage.

“The Unspoken Ban on Decapitation Strikes Has Been Lifted,” Dmitry Trenin, Russian International Affairs Council, 06.19.26. Clues from Russian Views. Machine-translated. (This organization is affiliated with the Russian authorities.)

  • Trenin argues that the Middle East war has normalized decapitation strikes against top state leaders. He notes that in the opening hours of the Iran war, Ali Khamenei, “many members of his family,” senior commanders and diplomats were killed, and that Hezbollah’s Hassan Nasrallah and numerous Hamas leaders met a similar fate. While targeted killings of “radicals and extremists” were common in the U.S. “war on terror,” Russian operations in the North Caucasus, and Israel’s campaign against Iranian nuclear scientists, Trenin says today’s strikes are qualitatively different because they target “the highest leaders of a UN member state.”
  • He also cites the U.S. commando abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and a pre‑New Year raid by “almost a hundred Ukrainian, but U.S.-directed, drones” on Putin’s Valdai residence as evidence that the informal prohibition on killing sitting heads of state “has de facto been lifted.” From this he draws three conclusions: Russia must (1) enhance protection for its top leadership; (2) ensure the resilience and succession of its “power vertical” in case of such an attack, as Iran did; and (3) be prepared to consider using similar forceful measures against states or entities in conflict with Russia—reminding readers that at the start of the “special military operation” Putin had personally guaranteed Zelensky’s safety.

“Russia’s Longer Inter-State Wars Have More Often Ended in Victory,” Simon Saradzhyan, Ivan Kurilla, Angelina Flood and Ivan Arreguín-Toft, Russia Matters, 06.18.26.

  • “About a year ago, Vladimir Medinsky, Vladimir Putin’s assistant and Russia’s then chief negotiator with Ukraine … cited Russia’s participation in a 21-year war against Sweden in the beginning of the 18th century as evidence of Russians’ ability to endure historically longer hostilities than Russia’s full-fledged invasion of Ukraine,” the authors write.
  • “Russia fought 49 inter-state wars since Ivan IV was crowned as the first tsar of Russia in 1547, including its current full-fledged invasion of Ukraine. Of these, Russia won 28, lost 11 and eight ended in a draw, with one outcome difficult to categorize and the conflict in Ukraine ongoing. Seventeen conflicts lasted longer than the ongoing Russian invasion as of June 2026. Of these 17, 11 ended in Russian victories, one ended in a draw and five ended in losses,” according to the authors. 
  • “Given that we are looking at just one country, which has changed drastically multiple times since the establishment of the Tsardom of Russia in 1547, these results cannot have external validity. Nevertheless, they could perhaps be useful for those wondering if the characteristics of Russia’s past wars might impact Vladimir Putin’s thinking—who is fond of reading Russian history—on how long to continue fighting in Ukraine and what kind of outcome he might accept in this conflict,” the authors write. 

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

Military aid to Ukraine:

  • No significant developments.

“Moving Towards a ‘Bright Future’: The European Coalition and Russia Reach a Dangerous Threshold in the Shadow Fleet Confrontation,” Re:Russia, 06.18.26.

  • Re:Russia charts a rapid escalation between Moscow and a 14‑state Baltic–North Sea coalition over Russia’s “shadow fleet” of sanctions‑evading oil tankers. After years of Western tolerance, pressure ramped up when evidence emerged that tankers were used for sabotage and intelligence, including the Eagle S cutting cables between Finland and Estonia and other ships carrying Wagner/GRU‑linked “security” personnel. EU states have since relied on UNCLOS Article 110 to detain vessels with false flags or no genuine registration; by mid‑2025 more than 550 tankers were on EU lists, and 22 shadow‑fleet ships have been detained since December 2024 (nine by Europeans in 2026).
  • Under EU pressure, many flag‑of‑convenience states have struck Russian‑linked tankers from their registries, forcing Moscow to re‑flag ships to Russia: the number of Russian‑flagged tankers rose from 48 in late 2024 to 82 by early 2026, and their share of Russian oil exports and the shadow fleet has roughly tripled. Russia has responded legally and militarily: a new law on “extraterritorial protection” authorizes using its armed forces to shield Russian citizens abroad, including crews on foreign‑flag tankers, and the frigate Admiral Grigorovich has begun escorting sanctioned ships through the English Channel, recently firing warning shots near the British yacht Bright Future.
  • The analysis concludes that Europe and Russia are at a “critical juncture.” European states argue unregistered or fraudulently flagged vessels have no right of innocent passage and can be detained; Russia rejects European court decisions and signals readiness to contest seizures by force. A repeat of April’s scenario—sanctioned, non‑Russian‑flag tankers transiting under Russian naval escort—could bring the two sides to a direct naval clash over the shadow fleet.

“Adversaries Weaken Power of Sanctions,” Rory Jones, Patricia Kowsmann and Thomas Grove, Wall Street Journal, 06.22.26.

  • The authors write that despite “more than 1,000 sanctions on Iran during the past 18 months,” Tehran “has found ways to keep generating billions of dollars in revenue, mainly by selling oil to China,” earning an estimated “$43 billion in 2024” from crude exports. They note that global sanctions listings jumped “to over 3,000 in 2024 from 880 in 2017,” yet “North Korea continues to develop its nuclear program,” Russia’s Putin “still pursues the conflict” in Ukraine, and Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro “survived sanctions for a decade and was only removed when U.S. forces physically dragged him from power.”
  • Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent argued in May that “the most effective actions are aggressive and targeted, with defined timelines,” saying “sanctions should not linger so long that their intended effects create unintended consequences.” But critics quoted in the piece, such as Avi Vishnevitz, insist that “the sanctions themselves were not soft… What proved too soft was their implementation and their enforcement,” as Iran, Russia and North Korea built “elaborate apparatuses” of shell companies and middlemen in China, the UAE and Turkey to keep trading.
  • The article stresses that ordinary citizens “have borne most of the brunt,” while oil waivers for Russia during the Iran war handed Moscow an extra “$2.4 billion” in May alone. Former enforcement officer Max Meizlish warns that seeing regimes evade penalties may convince people “that sanctions are impotent,” but, he argues, “the tool itself is just a tool… you would ask about how you’re actually using it.”

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

“The window for peace in Ukraine won’t be open forever,” Ivan Krastev, Financial Times, 06.18.26.

  • Krastev argues that in today’s “age of asymmetry,” a clean, long‑term peace in Ukraine is unlikely; what is realistically on offer is a fragile, frozen truce—and that window is open now. Russia “is not winning”: its summer offensive has been stopped by Ukraine’s technological edge, losses exceed mobilization capacity, the economy is “hemorrhaging,” and to seize all of Donbas in the next year or two Putin would need either mass mobilization or nuclear escalation, both “catastrophic” options. Yet he could still “fake success”—no NATO membership for Ukraine in the short term, no European peacekeepers that Kyiv actually wants—while using any ceasefire to destabilize Ukraine from within.
  • For Kyiv, Krastev writes, the core question is no longer whether it can withstand Russia but “how many more people Ukraine can lose before it loses its future.” After four years of war, Ukraine has proved it is not “bewitched Russia,” has one of Europe’s strongest armies and a world‑class defense industry, but faces demographic collapse and another brutal winter. Prolonging the war to retake some additional territory may not be the optimal long‑term strategy. Krastev contends that Zelenskyy’s June 4 open letter proposing direct talks reflects this shift, and warns that Putin’s fantasy of total victory—and European illusions about a “diplomatically negotiated long‑lasting peace”—could squander a rare chance to freeze the conflict through direct Russia‑Ukraine negotiations, which may be “the most realistic way to achieve what passes today for peace.

“The G7 has nudged open a window for diplomacy in Ukraine,” The Economist, 06.18.26.

  • The Economist reports that the Évian G7 summit ended in “cautious optimism” that the United States might re‑engage on Ukraine after Trump stayed for the full three days and signed his Iran deal at a Versailles dinner. The communiqué pledged “unwavering support” for Kyiv, vowed to “strengthen sanctions” on Russian oil and gas, and promised more air‑defense and long‑range strike systems, plus consideration of licensed production in Ukraine—a package Macron dubbed an “Evian moment” and Germany’s Friedrich Merz called a “new tone” in transatlantic ties.
  • European diplomats see the Iran deal as potentially freeing U.S. bandwidth, easing the energy crunch, and cutting Russia’s $5–6 billion‑a‑month windfall from high oil prices, making tougher Russia sanctions more feasible. A mood shift in Washington is also noted: senior U.S. officials now praise Ukraine’s battlefield integration and drone warfare, and sources close to the White House say the conflict has been “humanized” for Trump, who has “learned” that without pressuring Putin he “will not get what he wants.”
  • Informal talks with Russia have quietly resumed, and there are “daily contacts” between Kyiv and Trump’s team; one idea is a two‑phase ceasefire that first limits fighting to a 50–70km belt along the front, then broadens. But obstacles are “formidable”: Moscow still clings to its secret “Anchorage formula” (legal recognition of its hold on all of Donbas and Crimea), and is likely to delay serious moves until after another winter of missile and drone attacks on Ukraine’s energy grid. Any window for diplomacy, The Economist concludes, could close quickly—and both Putin’s maximalism and Trump’s record of flip‑flops make it fragile.

“How to Ensure That Europe-Russia Talks Do Not Fail,” Arkady Moshes, Carnegie Politika, 06.18.26.

  • Moshes argues that emerging European ideas to open direct talks with Russia on Ukraine will only work if Europe abandons illusions and learns from 2014–2022. He warns against assuming Russia is near military or economic collapse, noting Moscow has repeatedly adapted to Western weapons and still has resources and support from the “Global South,” especially China. Europe must not pose as a neutral mediator but as Ukraine’s partner, and should explicitly acknowledge that past leniency—treating Russia as a mediator, downplaying Crimea, continuing Nord Stream 2—encouraged the full‑scale invasion. Any new dialogue, he says, requires EU unity (on sanctions, visas, the shadow fleet), continued defense buildup, and assertive negotiating tactics that avoid appearing as supplicants. Reopening channels is not an end in itself; the only acceptable outcome is a settlement that guarantees Ukraine’s independence and Europe’s security—“anything less…is hardly worth the effort.”

“Trump Puts Russia-Ukraine War on the Back Burner,” Alexandra Sharp, Foreign Policy, 06.16.26.

  • Sharp writes that at the Évian G‑7 summit Trump is visibly prioritizing the Iran war over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, “putting the Russia-Ukraine war on the back burner” even as European leaders seek to make it the central security topic. While allies arrive ready to discuss more air defenses, sanctions, and long‑range strike support for Kyiv, Trump’s focus is on selling his fragile Iran cease-fire and avoiding new commitments.
  • The article notes that this imbalance is sharpening transatlantic divisions: Europe is now “carrying almost all of the military and financial burden for Ukraine,” yet still depends on U.S. Patriots, intelligence, and political cover. Trump’s reluctance to push additional Ukraine aid or tougher Russia sanctions, Sharp argues, undermines Western leverage over Moscow just as Ukrainian drones and mid‑range strikes are beginning to squeeze Russian logistics and energy exports.
  • Trump’s stance also complicates Zelensky’s diplomacy: the Ukrainian president will get only a group working session rather than a clearly defined bilateral, signaling that, for Washington, Ukraine is no longer the top war to manage—leaving Europe to close the gap.

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

Great Power Rivalry/New Cold War/NATO-Russia relations:

“NATO’s Permanent Crisis: The Alliance Has Survived 80 Years of Disagreement—and It Will Survive Again,” Florence Gaub and Jonathan Heist, Foreign Affairs, 06.15.26.

  • Gaub and Heist argue that today’s tensions over Ukraine and Iran are not unprecedented, stressing that NATO has weathered repeated Russia‑related shocks, from Suez and de Gaulle’s withdrawal from the command structure to the 1970s oil embargo and the Iraq war. They note that despite flare‑ups over U.S. force cuts and Article 5, “the alliance is not held together by sentiment,” but by a hard calculation that “the security costs of abandoning it exceed the political costs of sustaining it,” especially in the face of Russian power.
  • On Russia, they stress that the full‑scale invasion of Ukraine has been the “most significant out‑of‑area challenge in NATO’s history,” with allies supplying arms, intelligence and money to a non‑member “fighting a nuclear‑armed adversary.” Disagreements over escalation and end‑states are “real,” but, they argue, “not categorically different from the disagreements over Suez, Vietnam, or Iraq,” and have not altered the basic consensus that NATO’s core goal is “preventing further Russian aggression.”
  • The authors interpret recent U.S. reductions in deep‑strike assets in Europe as part of a long‑signaled global rebalance rather than a break with NATO, and point out that Russia’s war has actually driven Europeans to raise defense spending toward or above 2% of GDP. NATO’s “maddening vagueness” on automatic military commitments, they conclude, has helped it adapt to internal quarrels while still deterring Moscow.

"Our Allies Are Wondering Whether Supporting the American War Machine Is Worth It,” Linda Kinstler, New York Times Magazine, 06.19.26.

  • Kinstler argues that the Iran war has exposed a profound erosion of U.S. credibility as a security guarantor and may mark the start of “superpower suicide.” Trump proclaims a “decisive military victory,” but Iran’s regime survives, its nuclear and proxy programs endure, and Washington is releasing frozen assets and pledging at least $300 billion for reconstruction after spending over $100 billion on the war itself. What has changed most, she writes, is how allies see the U.S. “protective umbrella.”
  • Iranian attacks damaged or shut U.S. bases once seen as untouchable—Bahrain’s naval base was evacuated; Al Udeid’s Combined Air Operations Center in Qatar is reportedly inoperable. Gulf publics and elites now openly question whether hosting U.S. bases is “worth it,” and European states such as Spain, France, Italy and Turkey have curtailed U.S. access, refusing to be drawn into the conflict. Even Britain, which allowed “defensive” missions from Cyprus and saw that base hit by an Iranian drone, faces local calls to close it.
  • Kinstler situates this in a longer history of imperial decline—from Suez to the Soviet collapse—and suggests the war has made visible what Washington won’t admit: the U.S. still has enormous military capacity but little will to bear costs for its stated aims. That mix, she writes, is driving allies to hedge, U.S. basing rights to fray, and a managed contraction of American power that may ultimately make ill‑advised wars harder to wage—but also leaves partners less sure that U.S. backing is worth the risks.

“We’re ready to fight Russia tonight, vows head of German air force,” James Rothwell, The Telegraph, 06.15.26. Via David Johnson’s list.

  • Lt Gen Holger Neumann tells The Telegraph Germany is ready to “fight tonight” and will “defend every inch of our territory,” stressing “there are no zones of different security, that NATO is NATO, down to the last inch.” If Russia attacked a NATO ally, “we will go in with everything we have in Germany, the air force, but also in NATO, to defend our country, our values, our population, and our alliance,” he says, warning that the Kola Peninsula, Kaliningrad and the Black Sea would “suffer the wrath of NATO” if Moscow struck.
  • Overseeing a major rearmament drive, Neumann credits Berlin’s multi‑billion‑euro package for plans to “massively” increase Patriot, Iris‑T and Arrow 3 stocks as part of Friedrich Merz’s goal of Europe’s “strongest conventional army.” He cautions against complacency about Russia’s air force: “Rule number one: never underestimate your opponent,” he insists, citing “very potent platforms” like the Su‑35, Su‑57 and MiG‑31 and a “high level of adaptability” after four years of war.
  • Neumann rejects talk of Europe going it alone: “I am a big, big fan of NATO and the transatlantic bond. I don’t like the idea of European autonomy,” he says, preferring to be a “very, very strong European wingman.” If needed, “NATO could deploy air‑defense assets to Great Britain,” and “of course we would be there,” he adds.

“Report to Congress on Russian Military Activities in Asia: Combined Military Exercises and Patrols,” Congressional Research Service, 06.09.26 (summarized by the U.S. Naval Institute, 06.17.26).

  • The report outlines Russia’s “multifaceted diplomatic, economic, and security interests in Asia,” with a particular emphasis on its deepening military relationship with the People’s Republic of China. It highlights U.S. officials’ growing concern over an uptick in joint Russia‑PRC activity, noting General Alexus Grynkewich’s assessment that recent years have seen “increased joint patrols” by Russian and Chinese forces “in the maritime domain” and “long range bomber patrols being conducted jointly” in the air. Admiral Samuel Paparo testifies that “Russia is expanding its Indo‑Pacific footprint even as the war in Ukraine continues to strain Russian capacity,” pointing to a sustained pace of air and naval modernization in Russia’s Eastern Military District. Lieutenant General James Adams adds that DIA’s 2026 threat assessment judges Moscow to “almost certainly” deepen ties with Beijing through continued military‑technical cooperation, combined patrols, and the sharing of lessons from the Ukraine war.
  • Members of Congress, the report notes, are increasingly focused on the implications of these activities for U.S. strategy and global commitments. House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mike Rogers underscores the seriousness of the trend, observing that in the past two years “Russian and Chinese bombers and warships” have operated jointly “near Alaska,” calling it a “significant demonstration of military cooperation between our two most capable adversaries right off our shores.” The report frames this pattern as a strategic challenge for the 119th Congress and lays out possible avenues for response: holding hearings and investigations on how growing Russian activity in the Asia‑Pacific affects U.S. defense strategy and alliances; evaluating whether to strengthen, modify, or relax sanctions in light of Russia‑PRC military exercises; mandating executive‑branch reporting on the implications of joint patrols for policy, budgets, and defense industrial planning; and working more closely with allied and partner governments to share assessments and coordinate responses to emerging Russia‑China military cooperation in the region.

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

China-Russia: Allied or aligned?

Missile defense:

  • No significant developments.

Nuclear arms:

"Ukraine, Europe and Global Security," Sergey Lavrov, Russian Foreign Ministry, 06.19.26. Clues from Russian Views.

  • “The purpose of any dialogue with Russia is to dictate Europe's terms.”
  • “The real objective of Europe's leaders, then, is not to negotiate with Russia. It is to shore up the Zelenskyy regime and preserve it as a launchpad for continued confrontation.”
  • “Europe now aims to achieve ‘defense readiness’ against Russia by 2030. Until then, they mean to buy time by whatever means available.”
  • “This state of affairs poses serious threats to global security. A direct confrontation between NATO and Russia could rapidly escalate into an exchange of nuclear strikes, with catastrophic consequences. Under the banner of "strategic autonomy," Europe is witnessing a significant build-up of its military capabilities, including in the nuclear sphere. Paris's intention to extend its "nuclear umbrella" to several EU and NATO member states is a source of deep concern. This will do nothing to strengthen the security of France itself or the recipients of its so-called protection.”

"In a Year, Russia Will Strike the EU—A Big Interview with Sergei Karaganov," conducted by Diana Panchenko, 06.22.26.

  • "It was precisely in order to restore fear of nuclear weapons that I raised the possibility of a nuclear strike, in order to end this war that the West is waging against us in Ukraine." 
  • "The Russian leadership should be ready for the limited use of nuclear weapons, naturally against targets in hostile European countries." 
  • "If Russia were to launch a series of nuclear strikes on Europe… a significant part of Europe would cease to exist." 
  • "President Putin does not want nuclear weapons to be used. But I demand of him and of our elite that they be ready to use nuclear weapons, prepare to use nuclear weapons, and, in an extreme case, use nuclear weapons." "If it is difficult for Mr. President to make this decision… he should appoint a hardline general as a commander in the European theatre of war, one who would use nuclear weapons." 
  • "The fear of nuclear escalation must be restored, otherwise humanity is doomed." 
  • "Using nuclear weapons is a colossal sin. But not using them and allowing our country to fall… that is a mortal sin altogether." 
  • "My advice would be to act more decisively, to move resolutely up the ladder of escalation… and to be ready to use nuclear weapons." 
  • [On striking Europe] "I think this will happen within a year... "Germany, Romania… and Poland as well, unfortunately. But Germany comes first." 
  • "If we now simply conclude a temporary peace, a truce, the provocations will continue, and we will still have to come crashing down again with even greater force on Ukraine, on its territory, and on Europe…" "If they are ready, then we must launch a pre-emptive strike." 
  • [On Russia's mistakes] "One of the biggest was that we did not use our nuclear potential, at least politically. From the very start, it should have been used politically." 
  • [On strikes against Ukrainian leadership] "We should have struck them." (referring to decision-making centers such as Bankova and the Verkhovna Rada) 
  • On ending the war "Russia can wear itself down. That is why, sooner or later, it must move toward far more decisive action. There is no point in letting this bloodshed continue." 

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

Counterterrorism:

  • No significant developments.

Conflict in Syria:

  • No significant developments.

Cyber security/AI:


“AI Warfare Is at the Point of No Return. What Now?” Daniel Michaels and Anastasiia Malenko, Wall Street Journal, 06.19.26.

  • The authors argue that AI has moved from support tool to “agent of death,” with Ukraine, Russia, Israel, the U.S., China and others racing to automate targeting, guidance, and command systems. In Ukraine, companies such as Vyriy and Skyfall and units like Lasar’s Group use AI to identify and track Russian vehicles and positions, while human operators still “press the button.” This human‑in‑/on‑the‑loop role is increasingly tenuous as larger, more autonomous swarms are developed and as automation accelerates targeting “more than 10‑fold” compared with past campaigns.
  • Washington is scrambling to catch up ethically and doctrinally. Trump’s new executive order urges “aggressive” AI use in national security but insists it operate “in accordance with applicable laws,” even as the Pentagon clashes with Anthropic over limits on autonomous weapons and surveillance. Officials such as DoD digital and AI chief Cameron Stanley warn that “the most dangerous course of action… is to stand still,” while Red Cross lawyers and experts highlight unresolved questions: Will an autonomous drone abort if a child appears? Who is responsible if AI‑assisted targeting commits a war crime? How do commanders guard against “automation bias,” the human tendency to over‑trust machine outputs?
  • The piece notes that only nuclear weapons present a comparable “civilizational dilemma.” From the Vatican’s encyclical urging that AI “must never be allowed to make life‑or‑death decisions” to NATO advisers pointing out that “no country can prosecute” a digital war crime under current law, the world is improvising norms after the fact. Ukrainian officials openly accept battlefield risks because “the ethical framework is just now being developed,” while AI and ethics experts fear that once fully autonomous systems are normalized in war, “they cannot be stopped.”

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

Energy exports from CIS:

“A Damper at the Crossroads: What a New Wave of Strikes on Refineries Means for Russia,” Sergei Vakulenko, Carnegie Politika, 06.18.26. Machine-translated.

  • Vakulenko writes that successful attacks on the Moscow refinery in Kapotnya have taken Ukraine’s campaign “to a new level — now even the dense air defense around the capital is unable to fully repel the increasingly frequent drone strikes.” On June 12 “one or two drones hit one of the two key units,” and on June 18 “five or more drones hit targets, including the second key unit and the tank farm.” Because a 2020 upgrade replaced many dispersed units with “two combined ones standing side by side,” a wartime hit can now cause far greater damage.
  • After a pause, “Ukraine has resumed strikes on Russia’s oil sector with new force,” shifting from export terminals to refineries: “in April–May there were 26 such attacks,” matching August–September 2025, when they caused a fuel shortage. Refining volumes have fallen “by 650,000–700,000 barrels per day… a drop of 12–13%,” he calculates, noting that maps of refinery fires show “more drones are reaching their targets” and damaging complex units like “isomerization, cracking and hydrotreating.” Around Moscow, the loss of capacity now threatens a region that holds “14% of all passenger cars,” 19% of road freight and 40% of air passengers.
  • “For the third year in a row,” Vakulenko argues, Russia’s refining capacity is the result of “a race between Ukrainian drones and Russian repair crews.” Stocks, seasonal demand and regulatory tricks (selling Euro‑3 as Euro‑5) have so far “avoided an immediate deficit,” but the system is “dangerously thinning.” If a shortfall cannot be overcome, Moscow must decide how to ration fuel: let prices rise, impose administrative controls and rationing, or accept queues and a black market. From a market view, “the government has every argument” to scrap the fuel‑price damper, he writes, but politically “there are no easy solutions left.”

Climate change:

  • No significant developments.

U.S.-Russian economic ties:

  • No significant developments.

U.S.-Russian relations in general:

  • No significant developments.

     

II. Russia’s domestic policies 

Domestic politics, economy and energy:

“Is Putin Finally Feeling Pressure?” Isaac Chotiner interviewing Tatyana Stanovaya, The New Yorker, 06.18.26.

  • Stanovaya says 2026 feels different inside Russia: four years of grudging adaptation have given way to a sense that people are “reaching the limits of their capacity to adapt.” Attempts to block or throttle Telegram, wider internet disruptions, and everyday digital dysfunction have pushed anxiety above calm and produced a “gradual decline” in approval ratings. War fatigue and a broad understanding that “the war must stop” are spreading, even if society is divided over how.
  • She stresses that Putin does not calibrate decisions to appease hawks or public opinion: in his worldview, society must support his “historical” course, and if it doesn’t, propaganda and repression must fix the problem. Domestically he could survive significant concessions—he has already weathered retreats from Kyiv, Chernihiv, and Kherson—so long as he avoids outright defeat. What he insists on is a “decent deal” that neutralizes Ukraine as an “anti‑Russia project:” no NATO presence, a reduced army, political space for pro‑Russian forces and the Moscow Patriarchate, and curbs on Ukrainian nationalism—demands she calls entirely unrealistic.
  • Ultra‑nationalist “ultra‑patriots” remain noisy but fragmented; the regime has “sufficient instruments and institutional capacity” to control or prosecute them if needed. The deeper problem, she argues, is systemic: Putin’s highly personalized regime depends on him but he is aging, more emotional, increasingly detached, and less able to coordinate competing institutions (FSB, domestic‑policy managers, military). The result is an “incoherent and unbalanced” system marked by clumsy moves like internet crackdowns. His “mystique” is fading, yet there are still no alternative power centers—only executors and yes‑men.
  • Strategically, she sees no clean “endgame” in Ukraine. The war is the violent expression of decades of accumulated antagonism between Russia and the West; a ceasefire or even a settlement won’t resolve that underlying conflict. With Russia still a major, nuclear‑armed power increasingly tied to China, and Ukraine deeply wounded but determined to seek redress, she foresees Europe drifting into an era of chronic, localized escalation zones and recurring flashpoints—until a larger tragedy or systemic shock forces a renegotiation of the continent’s security order.

“Winners and the Consoled: What the Conflict Over Internet Blockades in Russia Revealed,” Alexandra Prokopenko, Carnegie Politika, 06.03.26. Machine translated.

  • Prokopenko argues that Russia’s recent internet shutdowns in Moscow and St Petersburg were “not a confrontation between society and state censorship, nor resistance to intensifying repression,” but “a clash of two pyramids within one system.” She writes that the security bloc, having “monopolized the concept of ‘security’,” collided with the political bloc, which “provides electoral results.” Falling approval ratings were “one of the instruments in this conflict, citizens its fuel,” she notes, adding that “technically the siloviki won: blockades were normalized as practice.”
  • On polling, Prokopenko notes that Levada, FOM and VTsIOM all recorded drops in Putin’s approval—VTsIOM from “75% to 65–69%”—but insists that in an authoritarian context “the approval rating measures not so much support as the willingness to publicly declare it.” The spring wave of stories about falling ratings should be read “in an intra‑bureaucratic logic,” she writes, as a signal to Putin that “FSB policy in the internet sphere creates social tension and threatens electoral manageability,” not as evidence of imminent regime collapse.
  • According to Prokopenko, Putin’s response—ordering the government and FSB to ensure “uninterrupted operation of critical services… ‘during periods of restriction’ of the internet—did not resolve the conflict but “institutionalized it.” “The FSB retains the monopoly on decisions about shutdowns,” she writes, while the civilian bureaucracy and political bloc receive only “consolation prizes.” The whole episode shows, she concludes, that “the irritation of millions of people deprived of mobile internet for months became only fuel for bureaucratic pressure, not a subject of politics.”

“Loyal but Powerless: The Downgrading of Russia’s Elite,” Alexandra Prokopenko, Carnegie Politika, 06.17.26.

  • Prokopenko writes that “the contemporary ruling elite in Russia is not a political class, but a community of managers who are not subject to competition or public accountability.” In her view, “the state does not have its own will or strategy, but is becoming an operating apparatus without any internal autonomy, an empty shell capable of performing functions, but not of generating meaning.”
  • Once Putin exits, she warns, “the system will be faced with a critical deficit of agency,” because the nobiles who run it “have no experience of strategic thinking, public debate, or working with alternatives.” The resulting vacuum “will most likely be filled not by reformers, but by conflicts between elite groups and a protracted battle for control over the collapsing system,” meaning that “the prospects of democratization are minimal.”
  • For Western observers, Prokopenko argues, “there can be one conclusion: Post‑Putin Russia will not automatically become a different Russia.” The void left by a depoliticized elite “won’t necessarily be filled by democratic actors,” but rather by “whatever force proves to be best organized at the moment a political vacuum emerges”—an outcome that, she cautions, is “far from certain to be the one for which many people in both Russia and the West are hoping right now.”

“The Russian Economy Looks More Vulnerable Each Day,” Thomas J. Duesterberg and Peter Rough, Wall Street Journal, 06.16.26.

  • “In the first four months of 2026, the budget deficit reached 5.87 trillion rubles ($81 billion), exceeding the government’s full‑year target of 3.79 trillion rubles,” the authors note. “In the first four months of 2026, the budget deficit reached 5.87 trillion rubles ($81 billion), exceeding the government’s full-year target of 3.79 trillion rubles,” according to the authors. Russia’s budget deficit is far from being the largest in the world, however. Russia’s federal budget deficit was about 2.6% of GDP in 2025 and in ‌the first five months of 2026, Russia ran a budget deficit of 2.6% of GDP, according to Reuters. In comparison, America’s fiscal year 2025 deficit was roughly 6% of GDP. As for FY2025, the U.S. deficit is projected to be about 5.8% of GDP, according to CBO,while France’s general government deficit for 2025 stood at 5.1%.
  •  Several Russian bond auctions “in 2024 and one in 2026 failed due to weak demand,” they write. Since then, “the banking sector—responding to incentives from the Bank of Russia—has become the primary buyer of government debt,” creating what Iwona Wiśniewska calls “a self‑reinforcing finance cycle” as state deficits, bank exposure and central‑bank liquidity feed each other. “Cut off from international capital markets, Russia depends on domestic bonds to fund its shortfall, the two authors explained. It should be, perhaps, noted that Russia's state debt (general government gross debt) is approximately 19% of its GDP, which is significantly lower than that of some Western nations, according to IMF. For instance, the U.S. state debt sits at 126% and the overall average for advanced economies exceeds 107%, according to IMF.
  • The Bank of Russia’s benchmark rate stands at “14.5%,” Duesterberg and Rough emphasize, as the central bank tries to contain inflation and “support financial stability.” “Some Russian analysts warn that one‑quarter of the country’s corporate bond market is in an elevated‑risk category,” they write, at a time when “an economic contraction this year added to a wave of corporate defaults.” 
  • On the fiscal side, Putin is raising the value‑added tax and “confiscating the wealth of certain oligarchs,” but “has shielded wartime spending from broader budget cuts,” the authors argue, leaving “municipal infrastructure and social services” under strain. The war in Iran and higher oil prices have provided “a temporary respite,” they say, but they urge a “pressure campaign” using tougher sanctions enforcement and “secondary sanctions on banks in China, Hong Kong and the United Arab Emirates.” “If Washington can sustain and escalate coordinated economic pressure, it has the chance to weaken the Kremlin’s war machine and force Putin to choose between economic collapse and a negotiated peace in Europe,” they claim.  It should also be noted, perhaps, that the Russian ruble emerged as the world's best-performing major currency against the U.S. dollar in the second quarter of 2026, Bloomberg reported in May. A stronger national currency tends to make a country’s exports more expensive and less competitive abroad, while at the same time making imported goods cheaper for domestic consumers and firms. 

“Putin calls Zelenskyy illegitimate. He’s describing himself,” Vladimir Kara-Murza, Washington Post, 06.15.26.

  • Kara-Murza argues that Putin’s fixation on calling Volodymyr Zelenskyy “illegitimate” is a classic case of projection: “the thief’s hat is on fire.” Putin lectures that leaders must “go to elections” and that holding power outside the constitution is “usurpation,” but, Kara-Murza notes, “he was, in fact, describing himself.” The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and the European Parliament have both passed resolutions labeling Putin “illegitimate.”
  • For Russian democrats, Kara-Murza writes, Putin has been politically illegitimate since at least 2003, when he seized national TV and removed real opposition from parliament. International patience lasted longer, but the “mask came fully off in 2020,” when Putin rammed through constitutional changes under cover of Covid, granting himself a personal waiver from term limits in violation of Russian and international law, as the Venice Commission found.
  • Kara-Murza accepts that limited contacts with Putin are needed for “regional peace” and humanitarian issues (including his own 2024 release in a prisoner swap), but insists there must be “no moves toward reestablishing full-fledged relations” or normalizing “an illegitimate usurper and an indicted war criminal” until a genuinely elected government is in power in Moscow.

“Critics of Russia Say This Critic Isn’t Critical Enough,” Milana Mazaeva and Neil MacFarquhar, New York Times, 06.18.26.

  • The profile examines Russian filmmaker Alexander Sokurov, a globally acclaimed auteur who publicly challenges the Kremlin yet remains inside Russia’s system. His films are sometimes banned and he has been interrogated and surveilled, but he still serves on Putin’s Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Rights and has at times received direct support from Putin, including help funding his Venice‑winning film “Faust.” At a December council meeting Sokurov denounced today’s censorship as “worse” than in Soviet times, called the “foreign agent” label humiliating, and questioned privileges for Ukraine‑war veterans’ children.
  • Exiled artists attack him as “safe dissent” tolerated by the regime—pointing to his continued presence in official bodies and the fact that he has not been jailed or forced out. Their protests led the Venice Biennale to drop him from a panel on dissent. Inside Russia, though, he is both censored and marginalized: a lifetime achievement award from the Moscow Film Festival and a 75th‑birthday retrospective in St. Petersburg were abruptly canceled after his latest criticisms.
  • Sokurov portrays himself as a “working‑class filmmaker” with a duty to speak for ordinary Russians and ensure the country remains livable for the young. He scripts his interventions with Putin like film scenes, aware they are “very stressful” and risky but saying he “can’t hold back.” Unlike many cultural figures, he rejects exile: “I am sitting in this boat, and if it starts to sink, I will go down with it,” insisting that the Russian state must hear dissenting voices even if they come from a lone, ambivalent insider.

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

Defense and aerospace:

  • No significant developments.
  • 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:

“Peskov says Starmer  made no mark in Russia,” RBC, 06.22.26. Clues from Russian Views. Machine-translated.

  • U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer has "made no mark" regarding Russian-British relations, Russian Presidential Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov told RBC. "Keir Starmer has made no mark regarding Russian-British relations; he was a proponent of keeping them at zero level. He left no memorable impression on us," Peskov said. According to him, Moscow does not expect a noticeably different stance toward Russia to emerge in British politics anytime soon. “It is unlikely that anyone on the British political landscape right now would hold a position on relations with Russia that differs from Starmer's," the Kremlin representative added. 
  • Amid reports of Starmer's possible resignation, Russian Presidential Special Envoy Kirill Dmitriev called his departure an "important signal" to other "warmongers in Europe."

“Russia reacts to Starmer’s decision to resign,” Varvara Koshechkina, Lenta.ru, 06.22.26. Clues from Russian Views. Machine-translated.

  • Dmitry Novikov, first deputy chair of the Duma foreign affairs committee, said that after Keir Starmer’s resignation, relations between Russia and Britain are “unlikely to change.” Starmer’s departure, he argued, “reflects an internal political crisis in Britain, including contradictions within his own party,” and British “infighting over the domestic political situation, over solving economic problems is the priority.” “This does not mean,” he insisted, “that any influential groups in Britain are ready to reconsider policy toward Russia.”
  • In Novikov’s view, “the leading politicians of NATO member states are not ready today for dialogue with Russia.” “Moreover,” he added, during the period when U.S. President Donald Trump, “striving to be a peacemaker in the Ukrainian conflict, actively spoke out for an end to hostilities and sought solutions, his NATO partners were more aggressive and less inclined to resolve the Ukrainian conflict.”
    “Another Russian Dissident Murder,” Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal, 06.18.26.
  • The editorial notes that Russian critics “have a habit of being shot, this time in Poland,” after the killing of dissident artist Semyon Skrepetsky, who was gunned down while walking his dog in Biała Podlaska. Skrepetsky, known for anti‑Kremlin caricatures, had fled Russia in 2021; Polish authorities say they had warned him of threats and offered protection, which he declined.
  • Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced the detention of a suspect with a Georgian passport and said investigators are “working to establish the mastermind,” while the Interior Ministry says intelligence services are involved because the killing may be “a political assassination commissioned by a foreign power.” The piece places this in a pattern: since August 2022 Russia has been linked to 10 other assassinations, attempts or plots in Europe, including the 2019 Berlin park murder and the Novichok poisoning that killed Dawn Sturgess.
  • Quoting another Russian dissident that “Kremlin agents do whatever they want on the territory of NATO countries. With complete impunity,” the board argues this latest killing is yet another reason the U.S. should not renew sanctions relief on Russian energy granted during the Iran war, and should instead increase pressure on Putin’s regime.

Vladimir Putin’s remarks at “Russia–ASEAN Summit,” Kremlin.ru, 06.18.26.

  • The summit in Kazan marked the 35th anniversary of Russia’s relations with ASEAN. Vladimir Putin told ASEAN leaders that the association “has withstood the test of time,” praised its reliance on “generally recognized norms of international law and mutual consideration of interests,” and said these same principles underlie a “strategic partnership” with Russia that acts as “an important stabilizing factor in the Asia‑Pacific region.” He framed Russia–ASEAN ties as contributing to “a balanced security architecture and equal, mutually beneficial co‑operation.”
  • Putin highlighted a “solid legal and contractual base” and “an extensive network of joint mechanisms,” citing deeper cooperation on “new security threats and challenges, trade and investment, energy, agriculture, digitalization, science and technology, tourism, [and] humanitarian contacts.” The summit adopted the Kazan Declaration, a new Comprehensive Plan of Action, and joint statements on cultural and energy cooperation.
  • Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., co‑chairing as ASEAN’s 2026 chair, said the partnership rests on “mutual respect” and the belief that “co‑operation, not confrontation, is the best way to build peace.” He outlined three priorities for future Russia–ASEAN work: “peace, security, and stability” (including cross‑border responses to terrorism, trafficking, and cybercrime); “more dynamic economic partnership” (trade, food security, and support for businesses of all sizes); and people‑to‑people ties such as scholarships, academic exchanges, and tourism. Youth, he argued, should be “at the center of our co‑operation,” because they will decide “what relations between Russia and ASEAN will look like.”
  • See this link for more commentary/analysis on this subject:

Ukraine:

“Zelensky leads tributes to Starmer as world reacts to PM’s resignation,” George Lithgow, The Independent, 06.22.26.

  • Volodymyr Zelensky “extended his gratitude to the outgoing Prime Minister for his steadfast support,” writing on X: “Keir, thank you for all our cooperation, your support, and the joint decisions that have helped make our Europe and our protection of life stronger.” He praised Starmer for “always striving to do what is needed and what will truly help,” and added: “The United Kingdom has been, is, and will remain among the world’s leaders… Keir, you are always a welcome guest in Ukraine,” Lithgow reports.
  • Lithgow notes that Starmer had recently hosted Zelensky, Emmanuel Macron and Friedrich Merz at No 10, and, “following a dispute between Kyiv and Washington,” “took steps to unite predominantly European leaders” behind a “Coalition of the Willing” peacekeeping force to deter Russia, “signaling a move away from over-reliance on the US” and now “being considered for replication in the Middle East.”
  • Ursula von der Leyen wrote that “European and Ukrainian security is stronger because of you,” telling Starmer: “It can take many leaders years to grow into the statesman you became in just two years.” European Council president António Costa said, “Under your premiership we turned a new page in EU-UK relations,” while Irish Taoiseach Micheál Martin hailed Starmer’s “significant role” in “resetting the Irish-British relationship,” calling him “a person of great ability, decency and honor.”

“Bitter Historical Feud Threatens Ukraine-Poland Alliance,” Maria Varenikova, New York Times, 06.22.26. 

  • “Tensions between Poland and Ukraine escalated sharply on Saturday,” Varenikova reports, after Karol Nawrocki said he would revoke Poland’s highest state award from Volodymyr Zelenskyy and “Mr. Zelenskyy said he would return it first.” The trigger was Zelenskyy’s May 26 decree honoring UPA fighters whom Poles hold responsible for the “Volhynia Genocide.” “Russia is opening the champagne now,” Oleksandra Iwaniuk warned, saying “both sides are strategically shooting themselves in the foot while the one who is winning is Moscow.”
  • To Poles, Varenikova writes, the UPA is “synonymous with the massacres of Polish civilians,” while to Ukrainians it symbolizes an “armed struggle against the Soviet Union” and the war today “is seen as a continuation of this struggle.” Honoring the UPA is “outrageous and damaging to trust between our nations,” Nawrocki said, calling it “a blow not only to historical memory but also to the trust we have built over the years.” Zelenskyy shot back that Poland had not withdrawn honors from “Benito Mussolini or Gerhard Schröder,” but added that “Ukraine will remain open to all meaningful formats of engagement with Poland.”
  • Donald Tusk warned that “the conflict between Poland and Ukraine pleases Putin and shocks our allies,” saying “the task of Presidents Zelenskyy and Nawrocki is to calm emotions, not to fuel tensions. The front line is elsewhere.” Far‑right leader Slawomir Mentzen wrote that it was “a pity that we handed [awards] out like candy,” adding that once Ukrainians return them “they can also return the money, weapons, ammunition and everything else we previously gave them.” Anna Colin Lebedev argued that UPA commemorations are “not intended to be anti-Polish, but anti-Russian”: “Every time Ukrainians celebrate the fighters for their nation’s sovereignty, they trigger the Poles,” she said.

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

Russia's other post-Soviet neighbors:

“Test of Strength: Why Kyiv Has Hardened Its Policy Toward Minsk,” Balazs Jarabik, Carnegie Endowment, 06.22.26. Machine-translated.

  • Jarabik writes that on June 19 Volodymyr Zelensky issued Alexander Lukashenko an “ultimatum”: Belarusian authorities must, within a week, dismantle relay stations that “correct attacks by Russian drones on Ukrainian territory,” and “if not, the Ukrainian Armed Forces will do it for them.” This, he argues, is “further proof of how sharply Kyiv’s policy toward Belarus has changed,” following Zelensky’s meeting with Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, where he said Belarus must “free itself from Russian interference.” Kyiv still views Belarus as “an important part of Russia’s military infrastructure,” a concern sharpened by the deployment of Russian tactical nuclear weapons and “large‑scale nuclear exercises” on Belarusian soil.
  • The tougher stance, Jarabik contends, is driven less by immediate threat than by “Kyiv’s fears about nascent U.S.–Belarus interaction,” continued Russia–Belarus military integration, and Kyiv’s “increasingly assertive regional strategy.” Under Andriy Yermak, Ukraine “tried to avoid steps that could tie Belarus more closely to Russia” and even “secretly cooperated” with Minsk on security. After Zelensky’s first meeting with Tsikhanouskaya, however, Kyiv adopted two sanctions packages and “raised the issue” of possible prosecution of Lukashenko, amid U.S. efforts to “reset” relations and even talk of a future Trump–Lukashenko meeting.
  • Jarabik says Ukraine’s self‑image is shifting from seeking Western protection to becoming “a subject of regional security.” Citing polls, he notes that 40 percent of Ukrainians now see their country as a European leader (8 percent before the war), and “almost three‑quarters” believe the armed forces defend “all of Europe.” Kyiv wants to shape the EU’s future relationship with Moscow and Minsk so that any order “by default excludes” Russia’s return as a dominant power; Belarus, he concludes, is becoming the “first testing ground” for whether Europe chooses long‑term containment of Russia or “managed co‑existence” with it.

“Is Zelenskyy about to attack Belarus?,” Mark Galeotti, The Spectator, 06.22.26.

  • “There has long been a worry that Russian escalation or miscalculation might see the Ukraine war widen into a broader European one,” Galeotti writes. “But what if it’s Kyiv, not Moscow, that starts this process?” He notes that Lukashenko, “beholden to Vladimir Putin, but not a helpless vassal,” refuses to let Belarusians become “mincemeat” yet lets Russia use his territory. Zelenskyy, “flush with recent success after striking deep into Russia,” has “begun escalating his rhetoric,” warning of “consequences if there is aggression against Ukraine,” while a Ukrainian drone commander boasts of “a list of 500 Belarusian targets.”
  • Lukashenko has been “conciliatory,” offering to meet Zelenskyy “anywhere” and saying Belarus poses “no military threat.” Yet after a likely Ukrainian drone hit a bus with a Belarusian youth team, Zelenskyy “escalated,” threatening to strike communications relays in Belarus unless they are disabled within a week: “If they don’t do it, we’ll do it,” Galeotti recounts. Former diplomat Balazs Jarabik warns “the risk of Ukrainian strikes against targets in Belarus is now the highest since 2022.”
  • Galeotti says many allies fear Zelenskyy, already in a “bitter and unnecessary feud with Poland” and denouncing Europe as a “fragmented kaleidoscope of small and middle powers,” may “overreach.” While Belarus lies “like an open palm before the Ukrainian military,” he warns that attacking a third party for indirect support “is a precedent which goes both ways,” and that Putin, frustrated that key Ukrainian war industries are in Europe, may respond by stepping up “covert operations against railroads, factories and other facilities.”

“Multiple Wars Are Ruining Central Asia’s Efforts to Diversify Its Trade Routes,” Galiya Ibragimova, Carnegie Politika, 06.19.26.

  • Ibragimova argues that Russia’s full‑scale invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent Iran war have undermined Central Asian states’ strategy of reducing dependence on Russian transit by opening alternative corridors. Routes via the South Caucasus and Black Sea have been disrupted by fighting around Ukraine and Russian naval threats, while southern options through Iran and the Persian Gulf have been rendered risky and expensive by the Hormuz crisis and U.S.–Iran confrontation.
  • As a result, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and their neighbors remain heavily reliant on Russian railways, pipelines, and ports despite sanctions and political unease, and are paying higher insurance and transport costs on “alternatives” that no longer look safer. Moscow, for its part, uses this continued dependency to preserve economic leverage over the region even as it is weakened elsewhere. The upshot, Ibragimova concludes, is that the wars meant to isolate Russia have, paradoxically, delayed Central Asia’s escape from its Russian‑centric transit geography, leaving the region more exposed to great‑power shocks than before.

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

 

Endnotes

  1. Russia’s territorial control increased in the period from Feb. 1, 2026 (116,419 square kilometers occupied on that date) through May 31, 2026 (116,851 square kilometers occupied on that date) by 432 square kilometers (167 square miles), according to DeepState
  2. For a more detailed summary of NV’s interview with Kuleba, see RM’s June 15 analytical digest. 

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. 

AI was used in production of this digest.

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

Slider photo: A Ukrainian serviceman of the Cerberus Ground Unmanned Systems Company of the 60th Separate Mechanized Brigade, Third Army Corps, prepares for a drill with a combat ground drone during a training at the polygon in Kharkiv region, Ukraine, Sunday, May 24, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrii Marienko)

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