Foreign Policy publishes an excerpt from Carnegie Endowment Vice President Andrew S. Weissʼ graphic novel, Accidental Csar: The Life and Lies of Vladimir Putin. Weiss studied Russia for many years, in particular while working in the State Department (similar to the Foreign Ministry) and the US Department of Defense, his book explores the biography and worldview of the Russian dictator. The excerpt published by FP refers to Putinʼs fear of public protests and his view of the color revolutions of the 2000s. He believed that these protests and revolutions were provoked and sponsored by the West, whose main goal is to overthrow Putinʼs own regime in Russia. The first shock for the Kremlin was the overthrow of Slobodan Milosevicʼs regime in Serbia in 2000, followed by protests in Georgia in 2003, Ukraine in 2004, and Kyrgyzstan in 2005. The Orange Revolution in Ukraine was a particularly humiliating defeat for Putin ― although these protests were grassroots, he saw in them the traces of US intervention, in particular his sworn enemy George Soros. At the same time, he finally began to consider people, public organizations and street protests as a threat to the security of Russia. According to the Russian president, the will of the people cannot flow from the grassroots, it must be cultivated by American diplomats who manage it in order to get rid of inconvenient regimes. This concept is at the heart of Russiaʼs relations with China, which also seeks to limit the freedom of its citizens and strengthen control over the information available to them, the novel says.
Author and columnist Robin Wright writes in The New Yorker about the history of Russiaʼs relations with Iran and their deepening against the background of the war in Ukraine and protests in Tehran. In 2015, it was General Qassem Soleimani, who led Iranʼs foreign military strategy, who convinced Putin to increase the Russian presence in Syria and save the regime of Bashar al-Assad. Now, according to a senior official from the White House, Iran is "repaying the debt" to Russia, which lost a huge amount of resources in Ukraine. Tehran denies involvement in arms supplies to the Russian Federation, but an analysis by the Institute of Science and International Security indicates that Iran has already provided Russia with hundreds of drones and plans to provide more than a thousand more. To hide its role, Iran will supply drones in a disassembled state, and in Russia they will be "disguised" with national symbols. Also, Iran can provide the Russians with missiles of the "ground-to-ground" class, which will significantly replenish the arsenal of the Russian Federation. In return, Russia can provide Iran with aid and materials to support its nuclear program, writes Wright. Putinʼs government is also advising Tehran on "best practices" for suppressing protests — yes, up to 14,000 people have been arrested in Iran over the past seven weeks. At the same time, Russiaʼs support caused considerable criticism inside Iran, in particular, 35 former diplomats of the country called for declaring neutrality regarding the war in Ukraine in order to prevent a conflict with the UN or NATO. The rapprochement between Tehran and Moscow has already strengthened the US position on the Islamic republic, writes Wright, which is reflected in the statement of the G7 countries in support of the Iranian protesters.
The Washington Post published an interview with political scientist and author of the book Putinʼs Wars: From Chechnya to Ukraine Mark Galeotti. Here are the main points of the conversation:
- Putin is an "apparatchik" of the late Soviet era who does not know how to manage the country;
- Putin has no military experience or military mindset, he is guided by the belief that terror is an acceptable tactic of war;
- the new head of the Russian army in Ukraine, Serhiy Surovikin, nicknamed the "Syrian butcher" is cruel, but not necessarily incompetent; he uses brutality as part of military strategy;
- the weak link in this war is not the Ukrainians on the front line, but the will of the West to support them;
- Ukraine needs anti-aircraft systems and ammunition for them the most — they must be supplied constantly;
- the lack of agreement between Ukraine and the West about when the war should end is a problem. As long as there is no such understanding, there is a risk of problems in the future. Ukrainians do not tell allies about long-term goals;
- now the Ukrainian offensive is at its peak, the Ukrainian Armed Forces have suffered losses and must regroup ― but Ukraine is in a stronger position. Both sides are likely to plan a counteroffensive in the spring;
- it is unlikely that Putin will decide to use chemical or nuclear weapons, because this step will cause him more losses than gains.
Iranʼs supply of weapons to Moscow is finally pushing Israel to help Ukraine more actively, writes Bloomberg. And this happens not because of a great desire to support Kyiv, but because of the fear that due to participation in the war, Iran will become more dangerous for the Jewish state as well. Using the Shahed-136, other drones, and potentially missiles, turns Ukraine into a testing ground for Iran, allowing it to improve the performance of its weapons ― and ultimately make them more dangerous to Tel Aviv. In Israel, in turn, there are already voices that Ukraine can become a test site for Israeli anti-aircraft systems. After the meeting between the Ukrainian Minister of Defense and his Israeli counterpart (they had been waiting for this conversation in Kyiv for months), the parties agreed on providing Ukraine with an early warning system about the launch of drones. As for more complex systems, which would also include anti-aircraft missiles ― Russia threatens Israel with "retribution" for providing them to Ukraine, however, former Brigadier General of the Israeli Army Amir Avivi suggests, it is possible to act more cunningly. Tel Aviv can simply sell anti-missile systems to any country ― the USA or Germany ― without imposing a ban on reselling them to third countries. "And to whom they will pass the complexes on is no longer our business, we are not involved in this," he concludes.