As Putin threatens his military might against Ukraine, many see him in total control of the narrative. Others caution that he may have underestimated the West’s response. With the exception of Germany, most of the NATO alliance is united, and the US presence in Eastern Europe has increased. Perhaps that was always part of his masterplan: to create a perceived “threat” to justify intervention.
But the risks of attacking Ukraine are great, not only to his vision of a restored “Greater Russia,” but to the leader himself. Could Putin go the way of Rasputin?
That mystical monk achieved a strange hold over the last tsarina, in fact exercising a sort of absolute control over an absolute monarchy. But in the end, some nobles decided enough was enough, and did him in.
Putin has secured his absolute control by cultivating and coopting a bunch of oligarchs and other flunkies, maintaining a grip on the military and security forces, and destroying civil society and any other form of opposition.
But such forms of control are a two-way street. When he stole the 2012 election and brutally crushed the popular response, he undermined any illusion of legitimacy, becoming more and more dependent on these elites. He is not their puppet. But if they turn on him, he has nowhere else to go.
Already, these groups see their leader’s Ukrainian posturing has not produced the expected result. If he does go through with a full-scale invasion, things will go from bad to worse fairly quickly.
Yes, Russia can overrun the Ukraine easily, and perhaps even install a “friendly” government. That’s the end of the good news. Western sanctions will hit the Russian economy hard, and will certainly target the oligarchs.
For the military, the invasion will be costly, and occupying Ukraine will turn into a version of Afghanistan. Sabotage and rear-guard actions will become the norm, prompting ever more severe responses. But the greatest threat will be the popular reaction—endless demonstrations against the invaders and their installed stodges.
How harshly can the Russian military and security forces react? This will only produce more popular opposition. And what will the impact be on the Russian troops themselves, to fire indiscriminately on their supposed Ukrainian compatriots? And how might these scenes energize the populations in Belarus, already dismayed by their own false government’s reliance on Russian support?
Ultimately, the impact on the home front may prove decisive. As the body bags come home, and the Russian public comes to recognize their noble warriors have not been welcomed as liberators but brutal invaders, the heroic myths will start to unravel. Combined with an unraveling economy and no ready end to the conflict, opposition may grow through a much broader segment of society. Protests in solidarity with the Ukrainians and Belarusians will spread.
Putin will, of course, unleash his “usual suspects” to deal with these popular uprisings. But how will they ultimately respond? The oligarchs can no longer prosper under Putin, the army faces another humiliating defeat, and the security forces will realize their power to suppress is waning (and may start to fear the fate of the Stasi).
Perhaps, they will think, it is time to depose our failing leader. And then? Who knows.
Dear Jon,
this time -I have to say- I completely disagree with you. Maybe it is due to the fact that I am European and German.
Russia’s reaction is not just Putin. Most of the people in Russia believe that they are continuously more and more encircled by the Nato. The US are the military leader of the Nato. The US has at least 761 military bases around the world. On all continents – even on Cuba (Guantanamo Bay !). The US does not leave Cuba though the Cuban government demands since decades the return.
The US is the country with the highest annual military expenditure (778 billions in 2020). Russia spends 10-times less (61,7 billions).
It does not makes sense for Russia to invade Ukrainie or the Baltic states. Why should they? They cannot win anything there.
As you remember there was a promise of the US and the NATO not to spread the NATO membership closer to the Russian borders after the German unification. This promise was never kept.
I guess it is more necessary to regard the geo-political interest of the US since the Monroe doctrin. But it is not only the Monroe doctrin it is Brzezinsky’s “Strategic Vision: America and the Crisis of Global power”
I would very much appreciate if the US would stop their worlwide interventions (think of Vietnam, Irak, Afghanistan) which always lead to a big mess in those countries.
Dieter, thank you for your forceful response. I tend to agree with you when it comes to certain US foreign policy misadventures, especially when it comes to VietNam and Iraq, and our centuries of intervention in the Caribbean, Central, and South America. On the other hand, I supported our intervention against the Serbian aggression (which Europe really shown have dealt with).
The thrust of my blog was to propose a potential risk for Putin from his own elites if he launched an attack on the Ukraine. You seem to agree that nothing would be gained by such a move; I’m not sure Putin appreciates this. But I do think that if he does, a unified Western posture is important. (It is also important in potentially dissuading him from an invasion.)
There is significant debate in the US whether allowing the foreign Soviet break-away states and satellites to join NATO was wise. But these countries wanted to join NATO for their own security. Given the Russian absorbtion of the Crimea, and continued involvement in the civil war in Eastern Ukraine, their desire to join NATO makes sense.
So I would make two points. The first is that Putin has mobilized over 100K troops surrounding Ukraine, even though there is no threat to Russia from Ukraine and it has not been invited to join NATO. So how can this be justified? Putin has created a crisis. If he primarily wanted a reduction in the US presence in Eastern Europe, there would have been far better diplomatic ways to achieve this.
Second, there seems to be a general assumption that great powers have a priviledged right to protect their security. The US originally declared the Monroe Doctrine to discourage European interference in the Americas, but it became the rationale to say we had certain rights within our “sphere of influence.” Ditto for the Russians in East-Central Europe.
But why do great powers have the right to declare a sphere of influence to protect their security, while those within those spheres have no right to protect theirs? Perhaps as George Orwell might have written, “All countries are created equal, but some are more equal than others.”