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Putin's next move won't be a Baltic invasion that could unify NATO
Today we're taking a look at a recent op-ed from Politico, penned by Russian studies scholar Leon Aron of AEI.
And the title asks a provocative question, "Could Putin launch another invasion?" Aron links the current political moment in Russia, big protests, struggling economy, and Putin's own thirst for power and popularity, with the factors that led to Russia's incursion into Ukraine and annexation of Crimea in 2014. He lays out the possibility that Russia could make military moves yet again, potentially against Estonia, Latvia, or Lithuania, the three Baltic states that all happen to be members of both the European Union and NATO.
Some context: This has been quite a week for US/Russia relations. President Biden in an interview with ABC News agreed with an assertion that Vladimir Putin is a "killer," I think he called him "soulless," too. And Russia responded by recalling their ambassador to the United States. All this comes as the American intelligence community released a report this week claiming that Russia had launched yet another campaign in the 2020 election to undermine Biden.
So a logical question would be: What is Putin's next move? Could he wage yet another military campaign?
Now, as with many of the pieces that we look at, some points Aron makes are right on the money. Yes, Putin did gain a lot of popularity after the operation in Crimea, especially. And yes, NATO faces real issues; Turkey is barely an ally these days, countries are slow rolling in terms of spending cash that they're promised, the French are talking about strategic autonomy, and yes, Putin always seems to have a surprise or two up his sleeve. But we are completely not convinced by the argument that an invasion of the Balts may be on its way.
So let's take out the Red Pen.
First, Aron writes that Putin's interventions, especially in Ukraine "worked," driving a "Crimean consensus" that victory in war overshadows troubles at home.
Sure, the Crimea intervention "worked" for Putin. Until it didn't. Putin has had to downplay military involvement in Ukraine of late to avoid a backlash from a Russian public that cares primarily about domestic issues still, like pensions, for example. And let's not forget that getting involved in Libya, in Syria, even in Nagorno-Karabakh didn't yield any real popularity bump of note for Putin.
Next, Aron writes that "we tend to repeat what worked." That is, Putin reached for the military lever before when he faced trouble, so he might do so again.
Well, Putin's decision making doesn't occur in a vacuum. Every past intervention was driven by national interest and foreign policy goals. Does Putin care about Putin? Of course. But Putin can't be sure that cooking up a foreign war would help matters it home. In fact, it might actually make them worse.
Finally, Aron says that Putin may consider a "fast and victorious poke at NATO's eastern flank," targeting the Baltic states and breaking NATO.
An attack on the Balts may be fast or it may be victorious, but probably not both. And Putin knows this. Western leaders are conflicted about the alliance, but an assault on full-fledged NATO State and EU members is exactly the kind of provocation that could awaken it. Putin understands this. He hardly wants to bring the alliance together as it's eroding. Low-cost efforts to steadily undermine legitimacy and grabbing targets of opportunity when available, that is much more Putin's speed.
Putin certainly seems to want to be president for life and probably is going to end up running for a fifth term, though a lot can happen in three years. Military moves that diminish his popularity or lead to further widespread protest, never mind bring together his adversaries, that is a strong NYET for now tovarishchey.
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Donald Trump's relevance to US politics doesn't disappear on Jan 20, 2021
Let's get into it. First, Harris writes, "There are abundant precedents suggesting that Trump does not have another important act in national politics." He points to Joseph McCarthy, George Wallace, and Ross Perot. And he argues that while cults of personality in American politics are quite common, they never live long, and Trump has offered no reason to suppose he will be an exception. Well, hold on a second.
The biggest difference between Trump and McCarthy, Wallace, and Perot is that Trump actually got elected president. He's got a very broad base of support, unending media presence, and the ability to fundraise at a massive scale. Ross Perot got 8 million votes when he ran as a third-party candidate against Bill Clinton and Republican challenger Bob Dole back in '96. Trump lost the 2020 election as the incumbent Republican president and he got more than 74 million votes as he keeps reminding us. Big, big difference there.
Next Harris argues, "No one can seriously believe that Trump cares more about the public's problems than his own and that is not a recipe for sustaining political power in contrast to his 2015 agenda, which addressed trade, immigration, globalization and perceptions of national decline."
That's not exactly breaking news to anyone who is a critic of Trump on both sides of the aisle, but clearly, it's not how Trump's supporters feel. Remember, if it wasn't for coronavirus, Trump wins this election. He still did better with Black and Hispanic voters than in 2016 and among people who thought the economy was the most important issue in the election. And Republican voters who stood by Trump are angry. Most of them believe the election was stolen and that's not a sentiment that can be waved away on inauguration day.
Harris also writes that, "Trump is essentially a one trick pony. He goes to extreme and he doubles down no matter what. That combination of flawed judgment and impoverished imagination hardly supports optimism about his ability to retain power after January 20th," he writes.
We say again, "Is that news?" Trump has been going to extremes and demonstrating flawed judgment for four years and yet he still has tens of millions of supporters and he will now have tons of free time and the largest megaphone in the Republican party to promote his message. It's a recipe to stay prominent.
Finally, Harris argues that, "Republicans who want to regain control of the party and become president themselves can simply transcend Trump. They can make Trump look irrelevant, an artifact of an era that has passed." Yeah, they've done such a great job of transcending him so far. Look, let's face it, the GOP right now has very little bench. There is no real era parent to claim that mantle and begin the road to 2024.
Rather than comparing Trump to McCarthy or Ross Perot, we should look a little deeper into American history at Andrew Jackson, the seventh US president. In a very divided 19th century America, Jackson embodied all the same anti elite and populous arguments as Trump and had a very similar band of aggressive and highly motivated supporters. Trump has expressed his admiration for Jackson several times in his presidency, he even put a portrait of Jackson right in the oval office. (I think that's probably coming down on the 21st of Jan.) Jackson, by the way, served two terms. They were consecutive, and that is certainly not happening this time. But it's way too soon to say that President Trump has no voice beyond January 20th.
That's your Red Pen this week and for this year. We'll see you again real soon in 2021.
US-Russia: An all-or-nothing approach leaves US with nothing
Both letters talk about the road ahead for US relations with Russia. The one I signed argued that the US needs to know when there will be opportunities to work with Russia and when Washington has to push back. The central argument in this article is that there's no point in talking to Russia until Putin changes his mind. So, what we have here is an open debate about the issue. Don't get me wrong, there's plenty we agree on and plenty of places where no red ink is required.
We agree that Russia bears plenty of responsibility for the current state of affairs. It occupies territory that belongs to Georgia and Ukraine, two sovereign states. And it interfered in the 2016 US election and continues to do so as we speak. Moscow has also killed dissidents in Europe, assassinated them. So, I mean, you know, no one is trying to justify any of that belligerent behavior. And we also agree that while the United States can fine tune its policy all we want, it actually takes two to tango. Recent talks with the Russians have not been too successful, but since the red pen is here, it is time to highlight some areas of disagreement. So, here they are.
Point one, the authors argue that there's no point in talking to Russia about much of anything until Putin changes his act. They write that "by arguing that it is the United States and not Russia that needs a 'current change of course' the authors of the open letter (that's us) get it exactly backward."
If the US takes an all or nothing approach with Russia, it will end up with nothing. Look, I mean, I certainly expect and understand that we should have a more hawkish line on a bunch of things with the Chinese as well, but that doesn't mean you can't work with these countries on climate change, on space, on a bunch of areas where it's actually really important. These are still large economies. In the case of the Russians, the largest nuclear arsenal in the world along with the United States, and I would argue that leaving the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Agreement was a mistake, leaving the Blue Skies Agreement, the Open Skies Agreement was a mistake. That you have to work even with your antagonists, and that's important. That means that we should be pursuing diplomacy and cooperation where we can while also vigorously defending our own interests where we can't. This strikes me as a fairly obvious baseline understanding of international diplomacy, and I'm always surprised when people push back against it.
Point two, the authors write that the US should "maintain, even enhance sanctions" on Russia unless a long list of demands are met, like withdrawing troops from Ukraine, including Crimea, and ending cyberattacks and election interference.
Nobody is saying we should give in to Russia on any of those issues. The bottom line is that the above list of demands is already US policy. How more sanctions would change Russian behavior? Doesn't make a lot of sense. You need your allies on board for sanctions to work. And sanctions work best when they're calibrated and targeted. When they have clear benchmarks that when met, lead to easing of those sanctions. And when they're paired with diplomacy. Russia's a big nuclear armed country, unlike, say, South Africa. Russia's not going to simply be sanctioned into surrender. Maintain the sanctions but expanding them at this point strikes me as having very little likelihood of return and only marginal increase of sanctions that we could do.
Point three, the authors say that the US should not resign itself to accepting "Russia's repression, kleptocracy and aggression" as that provides no incentive for Putin to change.
Now, we agree. The US cannot accept Russian misbehavior, but we need to be realistic about what we can actually change, like stopping Russian election meddling, and what we can't, like Russia's kleptocracy. We can and should do our part to stop dirty money from coming into the US and Europe but changing Russia's domestic system is another story.
So, in conclusion, the Russians are an antagonist of the United States. Their revisionist power, they're in decline. They are trying to undermine the Americans, the Europeans, and the transatlantic relationship. All true. But I actually think that there are areas where we still need to be working with lots of states that we really don't like and don't trust, and yes, Russia is one of them. By the way, New START, the nuclear arms reduction treaty signed in 2010 by the US and Russia expires in February 2021. Open dialog right now could save it and I think it's worth saving. Let's work on that.