Putin’s rationality, war causes, and Xi’s inaction

Five initial thoughts on the war

1)      Vladimir Putin is rational and highly unlikely to attack NATO

I see no evidence that Putin seeks a confrontation with NATO. While Putin unmistakably warned NATO not to interfere in the invasion, Putin’s threat may reflect an admission of Russian forces’ conventional weaknesses: early reports suggest that Russian forces are taking significant casualties despite air supremacy and other advantages. There are also unconfirmed rumors that Russian authorities, facing manpower constraints, are conscripting Central Asian migrant laborers for military logistics. Putin likely lacks the military resources to occupy vast swathes of Ukrainian territory AND confront NATO using conventional means. Putin’s implicit nuclear threat to NATO, while alarming, may reflect his rational assessment of Russia’s conventional challenges, particularly if the war moves to urban areas.

2)      The invasion has domestic political motivations

It is hard to find any expert who believes the war will bring geopolitical benefits to Russia or the Russian people. It is, from a purely military perspective, an entirely unnecessary preventative war: Ukraine poses little military threat to Russia, any accession to NATO was (and probably is) at least 15 years away, and Russia possesses a nuclear deterrent. Putin’s claim that Ukraine could ever covertly develop nuclear weapons is pure effluvia: Russian security services have thoroughly penetrated all aspects of the Ukrainian state, and advances in satellite imagery and cyber espionage would make concealment nearly impossible. For that matter, where would Ukraine find the budget for such an expensive program? If Putin was genuinely concerned about a Ukrainian nuclear program he would have had ample evidence to show the world. Geopolitics seems to have played little, if any, role in Putin’s decision making.

The consequences of an invasion will prove almost uniformly negative for Russian national interests. The Russian economy will likely face a severe recession, NATO will almost surely strengthen its eastern posture, European countries will very likely bolster defense budgets and reduce economic reliance on Russia, and Ukraine will become permanently hostile to its neighbor, despite the profound linguistic, cultural, and historical ties connecting the two countries. It is hard to see how the war will be anything but a disaster for Russian foreign policy objectives.

Putin does not care. He is not a patriot, and an invasion may strengthen his domestic political position. Russian elite politics is a black box, but we do know that Putin is an extremely adroit Sistema operator. He may have concluded that an escalation would enable him to consolidate political power among the Russian elite.

For most Western geopolitical observers Syria, Venezuela, and Belarus are warnings. For Putin, they may be a model. In each case, dictators sacrificed the domestic and geopolitical interests of their countries in exchange for regime survival. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is already sparking a backlash at the popular level: over 100 Russian journalists have launched an anti-war petition, including reporters from TASS and RT – yes, TASS and RT; incredibly brave protesters have been arrested; and Yelena Kovalskaya, director of the Meyerhold Theater Center, resigned from the state theater, saying: "It is impossible to work for a murderer and receive salary from him. I will finish the work I’ve started, but without pay." The war will likely prove immensely unpopular among ordinary Russians, but I fear that Putin – learning from Syria, Venezuela, and Belarus – has concluded that he can stay in power indefinitely so long as he is able to maintain elite unity and the force structures’ loyalty.

Putin has been carefully managing Russian elite politics in the lead-up to the conflict, suggesting 1) that he remains highly attentive to costs and benefits; 2) is a rational actor - from his personal perspective; and 3) he remains fixated on his position in Russian domestic politics. A very important reminder:

Mark MacKinnon @markmackinnon

Putin making sure every senior Kremlin official is on the record publicly supporting this. No one can say later that they argued against it.

And today:

max seddon @maxseddon

Behold Russia's business elite, in the Kremlin's Hall of the Order of St Catherine, where the astonishing security council session with Putin was on Monday. Alexander Shokhin, who heads the oligarch lobby group, is talking about cryptocurrency regulation as Ukraine burns.

The war will also assist Putin’s domestic political standing indirectly, as the economic fallout from the conflict will undermine the performance legitimacy of his constitutional democracy rivals. The war will almost surely trigger inflation and lower economic growth, assisting pro-Putin factions in France and other prominent Western democracies in 2022, and possibly beyond.

3)      Will the invasion stop at Kherson? Probably not

Putin may care little about Russian nationalist objectives, but he understands that many siloviki actors do – and he cannot appear weak or lose Crimea. As The Report noted earlier, Putin’s escalation may have been motivated largely by his desire to secure Crimea, which is crucial to his domestic political legitimacy. Ukraine has, interestingly, offered next to no opposition along the Kherson canal. This could have represented something of an olive branch: Kyiv may have hoped that Putin, having resolved his Crimean water supply problem and secured the peninsula, would choose to deescalate.

Julian Röpcke🇺🇦 @JulianRoepcke

#Breaking #NewsMap The Ukrainian front in Kherson totally collapsed. Russian troops reached the Dnepr and do not face any resistance. I geolocated them 130 km inside Ukraine. The Ukrainian army says the situation is "difficult". Understatement of the year. This is unbelievable.

There are indications, however, that Putin will not be satisfied with “only” securing Crimea. U.S. Defense officials reportedly said he will not stop until he has essentially decapitated the Ukrainian state. This is a highly plausible claim. Putin may believe that he cannot sell a costly and deadly war to domestic audiences without presenting some “achievements.” Indeed, Putin’s claim that he seeks “denazification” across Ukraine may have boxed him into seeking maximalist outcomes. Putin’s “denazification” comment about a country led by a Jewish president is more than outrageous: it will also constrain his ability to end the conflict. Putin’s “denazification” comment could prove to be an extraordinarily costly mistake.

4)      Is Khan in Moscow at Beijing’s request?

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan’s visit to Moscow appears incredibly poorly timed, bizarre, and hard to explain. I initially thought that Beijing might have dispatched its “all-weather” strategic cooperative partner to quietly and deniably talk Putin down, but, upon reflection, the opposite may be true. There is some circumstantial evidence that China is expressing support for Putin through its Pakistani proxy.

China did not stop the Khan-Putin meeting and may have organized it. Khan finalized his plans to visit Moscow from February 23rd to the 26th only around February 7th - presumably after coordinating logistics with Russian officials also attending the Winter Olympics in Beijing. Chinese security services were surely aware of the discussions, particularly as meetings were likely held in Beijing. Moreover, barring an extraordinary analytical failure, Xi understood that Putin was likely to escalate soon after the Olympics concluded. If Beijing sought to talk Putin out of invasion indirectly, via a proxy, then it would have sent Khan well before February 23rd. Alternatively, if Beijing sought to express its disapproval of an invasion, or merely express neutrality, it would likely have (quietly but successfully) urged Khan to delay the meeting. Khan is certainly capable of making bizarre decisions on his own, but at the end of the day he is utterly dependent on the Pakistani force structures and Beijing. The CCP probably could have stopped Khan’s visit but it chose not to - and indeed, it may have organized it.

It’s highly plausible that Khan is in Moscow at Beijing’s request. If Beijing sought to deniably express political support for Putin then it might find some advantage in dispatching one of its closest partners to Moscow on the eve of an escalation. A visit by Khan could prove to be a deniable but effective instrument for Beijing. Beijing’s involvement in organizing the meeting is circumstantial and difficult to prove. Khan’s meeting will likely do little, if any, damage to the PRC’s relationship with Europe and North America. However, just as CSTO troops reinforced Tokayev during Kazakhstan’s intra-elite conflict, Khan’s visit limited Russia’s international isolation and may have warned the Russian elite that Beijing would not tolerate opposition to Putin.

5)      Xi Jinping did almost nothing to stop the war

I am not aware of any evidence that Xi Jinping and the CCP substantively tried to stop the war. Chinese authoritative state media began an article series attacking the US intelligence and military apparatus immediately before the US warned Europe about a potential Russian invasion of Ukraine. The People’s Daily apparently wrote the series to (deniably) undercut US warnings, muddle the Western response, and implicitly assist Putin’s military plans. Most damningly, Xi hosted Putin on February 4th, his first in-person meeting with a foreign leader in nearly two years. While the CCP sees risks to the conflict I am not aware of any indication that Xi or any other CCP figure asked or warned Putin not to invade.

Beijing was not oblivious to the risks of a conflict: it appears to have requested that Putin delay military action until after the Olympics. Xi Jinping probably could have stopped this conflict. He chose not to.  

v/r,

Joe Webster

The China-Russia Report is an independent, nonpartisan newsletter covering political, economic, and security affairs within and between China and Russia. All articles, comments, op-eds, etc represent only the personal opinion of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the position(s) of The China-Russia Report.