You could be excused if you believed you had fallen asleep and awoke to find yourself in Europe in the 1930’s. Armies massing? Bogus staged provocations? Claims of the illegitimacy of neighboring states or governments? Interstate war? Same as it ever was.
There is little surprising in Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Even recently, the Biden administration released unprecedented amounts of US intelligence clearly indicating Russia was preparing to do so, and US government officials made one dire prediction after another. These may have become background noise to some, but if so, those ignoring the warnings missed the true significance. Government officials rarely predict something as serious as war: they almost always emphasize first the ongoing negotiations and offer a tepid “war remains possible” walk off statement. In the past two weeks, US officials flipped the script: talking about how Russia was preparing, warning war was imminent, then giving a feeble “we still hope for negotiations.” It was a tell that an invasion was inevitable.
For some of us, this has been obvious for much longer. Long-time Russia hands remember seventeen years ago when Putin described the collapse of the Soviet Union as the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the Twentieth Century. Neither the holocaust nor Nazism. Neither the holodomor nor the Khmer Rouge killing fields. Not Mao’s Cultural Revolution. The end of the largest authoritarian menace in history was what bothered Putin. Putin publicly dedicated himself then to re-establishing Russia as a great power, feared and respected by the world. Everything he did subsequently was toward that end.
Putin’s Russia will never be a world power, and he knows that. His economy is a mix of what we used to call Third World extraction (oil and minerals) and oligarchic capitalism, benefiting a few corrupt officials. Russian demography remains a disaster: rampant alcoholism and early male death, misogyny and violence leading to few marriages and even fewer births, a shrinking population unparalleled in peacetime. The average Russian is little better off than he was under Communism: and that is totally irrelevant. Putin has a iron grip on Russia itself: he openly jails political foes and kills dissidents with impunity. Russians either admire his strength or fear his vengeance. Remember, this is a country where you can stop in Red Square and take a tourist photo with a Stalin look-alike!
Long term, Russia remains in mortal danger, but Putin has played a mid-term game. Russia was initially too weak to do much but posture. He stabilized the Russian economy during oil price spikes and drops and solidified his position with the oligarchs: they know he will turn on them on a dime if they conspire against him, but they are free to make money if they don’t. He fundamentally remade the Russian military from a massive conscript force to a much smaller, more modern, volunteer force capable of threatening any neighbor, if not NATO writ large. He weathered the so-called color revolutions, losing a client state in Ukraine but holding on to Belarus. He threatened and invaded Georgia, putting its move toward NATO on ice. He has been welcomed into Kazakhstan, and has a “bond without limits” with China (no, I don’t believe this means much either, but it doesn’t hurt).
After President Obama failed to enforce his own red line in Syria (Assad’s chemical weapon attack), Putin moved quickly to ensure his Syrian ally’s security. Then he turned to Ukraine and unleashed his “little green men,” Russian Spetsnaz (special forces) which occupied ethnically Russian potions of the Donbas river basin and all of Crimea.
Russia never accepted the Maidan revolution which had chased off a Russian-friendly government in Kyiv. The Crimea occupation was part practice and part toe-in-the-water experiment. Would the West respond forcefully to naked aggression covered with the only the most transparent fig-leaf? Sanctions indicated the answer was no, and the subsequent Minsk accords gave Russia some cover for its defacto seizures.
Meanwhile, Putin began preparing to finish the job. Russia amassed over $630 billion in hard currency (mostly non-US dollar) reserves in case of future sanctions. His oligarch friends probably did the same with their personal fortunes. The EU estimates current sanctions (pre-invasion) cost the Russian economy $50 billion annually. Assuming the new sanctions are twice as bad, Russia will run out of reserves in . . . only six and a half years! Putin negotiated agreements with friendly states, especially China, to continue trade without using dollars in the event of tightened US sanctions. He began a drumbeat in state-controlled Russian media to show Ukraine was a base of “NATO aggression” or “fascist forces” threatening ethnic Russians in Ukraine.
What happens now? Putin may stop at the Dnieper river to assess the situation. He may not try to take Kyiv in order to avoid the urban destruction and outrage that would entail. He may be willing to occupy ethnic Russian majority areas, establish a land bridge to Crimea and Moldova, and eliminate Ukraine’s access to the Black Sea. From these positions, Putin could pause to negotiate a cease fire and the establishment of a rump Ukrainian state with a government more amenable to Russia. He does not need to, nor does he probably want to, engage in a long-term occupation, which might become the focus of an insurgency.
The Biden administration was dealt a bad hand here: given Putin’s obvious intentions, the West needed to start to act long ago to deter him. However, every administration inherits bad situations, and they are responsible for resolving them. George W. Bush wanted to be “the education President,” focusing on America’s relations with Mexico and embracing “compassionate conservatism”: he got 9/11 instead. President Biden said he knew the world’s leaders on a first name basis; now has come his moment. The President has rightly rallied NATO, even encouraging Finland and Sweden to join in. But this won’t be over soon.
The administration said the array of increasing sanctions were designed to deter a Russian invasion: they have failed to do so. The EU and nations across the globe are joining in sanctions. But will they last? The NordStream 2 pipeline is completed; all Germany did was stop certification. In effect, some bureaucrat in Berlin took the pile of papers off his desk and put them in a drawer. They could resume certification in a moment. Europe needs Russian natural gas (Russia provides over 40% of Europe’s needs), and they cannot fully replace it with exports from the US. Oil prices have spiked to around $100 a barrel, which will further fuel inflation. Putin is betting he, his oligarchs, and the long-suffering Russian people can hold out longer than the–in his view–corrupt and irresolute West. He has a point. Most people forget that the very strict sanctions regime the entire world placed on Saddam Hussein was crumbling just before the Bush administration decided to go to war. We couldn’t keep sanctions on an insignificant country with a certifiable murderer-in-charge; can we do better with Russia?
Was Russian occupation of Ukraine inevitable? Putin took the measure of current Western leaders, and decided he could act. President Biden’s gaffe about a “small invasion” probably didn’t help, but what he said was true (NATO and the US weren’t going to fight to defend Ukraine), even though saying the quiet part out loud was the final nail in Ukraine’s coffin. Putin cannot afford war with NATO. While he would have tactical advantages in location initially, he cannot forestall a NATO build up and eventual counterattack. Any hint of ambiguity about US forces in Ukraine might have given Putin pause. For example, if Biden had rushed the US airborne forces not to Poland, but to Lviv (in far western Ukraine near the Polish border), to set up a permanent defensive perimeter for US diplomats, refugees, and perhaps the Ukrainian government, Putin might have occupied only the eastern parts of the country and steered clear. Even more so if Biden had convinced NATO allies to loin in the action.
Some will counter that American public opinion does not support going to war over Ukraine, and that is true. Neither do I. Yet American public opinion rarely supports going to war. Prior to provocation, the American public wanted to stay out of both World Wars. One major challenge of the presidency is to make the case for why the United States should go to war, if the President sees the need. President Biden ruled out making that case early on, following public opinion rather than leading it. One forgotten lesson of the Cold War is you can only deter an opponent if you have the capability and will to go to war with him; if the opponent doubts either your capability or will, he will not be deterred. The West can’t start the deterrence process by saying “we won’t fight under any circumstances.”
President Biden has announced tougher sanctions. A telling sign was the reaction of the US stock markets: while other markets around the world cratered on news of war in Europe, the US indexes rose! Why? They were expecting much tougher sanctions than the President imposed. We should assume Russia was warned: it makes no sense to rely on some sanctions with a threat of greater ones, if you don’t make it pretty clear how much worse it can get. In the meantime, there is much more the West can do, if the United States leads. All western airlines should be forbidden to land in Russia, and Aeroflot should be denied landing rights anywhere in the West. A review of all Russians on visas in the West for immediate expulsion, and a halt to all Russian visas in process. Russian consulates closed, Russian embassies reduced to minimum personnel. Of course no Russian athlete or team should be allowed into international competitions.
The US military could commence immediate production of ground-launched cruise missiles (GLCMs), once banned under the INF treaty (from which President Trump withdrew the US), and a replacement system for the Pershing II Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile. These two nuclear capable systems were the bane of Soviet leaders due to their short timelines (six minutes) to hit Moscow from Germany. The US should make clear to the Russian government that these weapons will be forward deployed in NATO countries IF Putin does not withdraw from Ukraine and re-establish the legitimate government in Kyiv.
The sanctions will hurt eventually, but will not soon force Putin’s hand. Instead, the West is in for a short (losing) contest for the future of Ukraine, but more importantly, a long contest to re-establish the notion of deterrence which has been lost. That means more spending on defense, more troops and agreements and exercises, more time and attention to foreign policy, and less time, attention, and money for everything else. All that just to maintain the status quo ante invasion.
Or Europe decides warm houses are more important than Ukraine. We lose focus. Americans resent double-digit inflation or a recession brought on by a massive rate increase by the Fed. China runs a sanctions evasion operation. And yes, China is watching how this all plays out for clues about its future interests in Taiwan.
For all intents and purposes, Putin has accomplished his initial objectives. Ukraine is his, and even NATO members like Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia must be wondering about their security. Now the larger game is afoot. Does the US lead a reinvigorated NATO, and to what end? Do we find a way to pressure Putin and Russia to let go of Ukraine? Does China seize the moment, or simply lay low and provide Putin some cover? During the Cold War, every US presidential election had a subtext which went something like this: can this candidate stand up to the Soviet threat? Can they lead the free world, even if that means edging closer to war? That is a focus which was lost in the postwar period. Now it has returned with a vengeance.
Pat, Thanks for the perspective. I guess national security wonks never really retire. Like Michael Corleone’s Godfather character, they keep getting sucked back into it.