"No, the West does not need to fear Russia, but should treat it very carefully."
Dmitri Trenin, retired colonel of the Russian Armed Forces and director of the Moscow Carnegie Center
The central pillars of post-Soviet Russia's foreign policy - becoming more intimate with Europe while simultaneously keeping the former Soviet republics within its sphere of influence – both collapsed at the same time in the first half of 2014. The implosion was caused by Moscow's decision. In that tense spring, Russia annexed Crimea, a territory ceded to Ukraine in 1954, but that had not ceased to contain a population of predominantly Russian origin.
It became clear that Moscow no longer believed in its rapprochement with Europe. It would not hesitate to forcefully prevent former Soviet republics from straying from their orbit to gravitate around Europe, said the director of the Carnegie Center in Moscow, Dmitri Trenin, a retired colonel of the Russian Armed Forces (and formerly the USSR), in a lecture at the Fernando Henrique Cardoso Foundation.
I predicted this outcome six years earlier, when Russian troops intervened on behalf of Georgian separatists, from South Ossetia, the Russian-majority province of Georgia. On that occasion, however, Moscow ordered the withdrawal of its troops and entered into an agreement with the Georgian government, under the mediation of the European Union.
“Since the annexation of Crimea, Russia turned inwards, and to the difficult and not yet completed transition from a country that was an empire (Soviet) and that is now seeking to structure itself as a multiethnic state. Russia feels it can not count on any country but itself, it to ensure itself alone”, said Trenin, author of "Should We Fear Russia"(Global Futures, 2016), among other books.
"Where does Russia stand today on the global geopolitical map? It is neither Western nor Oriental. Despite its central location in the so-called Eurasia, it no longer has influential allies in the world (read more about the relationship with China below) and has had difficulty in gaining the status it deserves”.
Trenin drew attention to the effect that lacking influential allies has on Russian leaders’ perception of threat .They are committed to the preservation of a vast territory rich in mineral resources, oil and gas, that stretches from the border of Scandinavia to the limits of North Korea, being contiguous to several countries of the Middle East and Central Asia, not to mention China, and bathed by the Atlantic, Pacific and Arctic Oceans.
"Today, when we Russians speak of being a great power again, we really want to say that we will not accept any other country imposing itself upon us. But, while there is no doubt that we are a major player in the world, we must not exaggerate this importance”, said Trenin, who is also a member of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), a prestigious center of studies on military affairs and security headquartered in London.
The force of Putin
Dimitri Trenin was at the Fernando Henrique Cardoso Foundation on the eve of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s inauguration for a fourth term, which began on May 6, and runs until 2024. "The Russian Federation is, in fact, a quasi-monarchy. Historically, we have not changed leaders every four or six years (like most Western democratic countries). With Putin, despite the difficulties, which are not in shortage, we have the feeling that we live a more or less normal existence, which we did not have in the last hundred years, including the socialist / communist period (1918-1991)”, he explained.
Putin has effectively ruled Russia since Boris Yeltsin's resignation in 1999. He was prime minister between 1999 and 2000, president from 2000 to 2008, then Prime Minister again in the following four years and returned to the presidency in 2012. In 2018, he was re-elected with 76% of the votes. "In recent years, the economic situation has worsened and there is no immediate prospect of improvement. However, in comparison to the political and economic situation of the country in the 70’s (absence of freedom), 80’s (decay from communism) and 90’s (the first years after the dismantling of the USSR), the last 18 years have been a gift from God”, said Trenin.
The main motto of the long-standing Putin Era is "let's make Russia great again". Shortly after his re-election last March, he said the country was "destined for success." In the same month, in response to the new nuclear policy announced by US President Donald Trump, the Russian leader announced the development of a new line of strategic nuclear weapons that could hit targets in the United States before the country is able to defend itself. Among the novelties, a high-precision hypersonic missile and underwater drones capable of carrying nuclear warheads. In a seminar held at the Fernando Henrique Cardoso Foundation on the 50th anniversary of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, analysts warned of a new nuclear race between the major nuclear powers.
However, according to Trenin, Putin's dreams of greatness run counter to the lack of "sound economic fundamentals”. "Putin promises to make Russia more relevant from an economic and technological point of view, but a very centralized decision-making system undermines the efficiency of the economy”, he said.
'The worst elite I can remember'
One of the leading independent think tanks in the country is Carnegie Center in Moscow. According to its director, the technological blockade is the most ominous aspect of the sanctions imposed by the US and other Western countries to Moscow after the annexation of Crimea. However, the crux of the economic difficulties of Russia is not the result of sanctions, but of self-inflicted problems such as high levels of corruption.
Trenin described the Russian elite that emerged in the post-communist period (since the 1990s) as the main obstacle to the country's development: "The elite uses the country as a source of income source and invests what it profits abroad, where it also educates its children. We urgently need a new elite, but we do not know where to find it”. (Read the article "Money Laundering and Clearing Reputations”, published by the Journal of Democracy in Portuguese at the end of May).
The 'tragedy' of the US-Russia relationship
According to Trenin, there is a clash between what he called "Russian DNA" and "American exceptionalism”. "It is simply impossible to build a compromise on which the two sides agree. The US will never give equal status to any other country. They will not do that to China and they certainly will not do so with Russia. Russia, as I said before, will never accept any attempt of imposed leadership by part of the United States and the West", he said.
In the 25 years between the fall of the Berlin Wall (1989), the end of the USSR (1991) and the crisis in Ukraine (2014), both parties had made mistakes. In what he described as an "analytical error”, the United States bet that Russia would enter an uninterrupted trajectory of political and economic decay and, facing this situation, it then thought "why should we care so much about that country?".
"Since then, and especially after the annexation of Crimea and the imposition of economic sanctions, the US has increased the pressure on Moscow with the aim of causing Russia to collapse once and for all. But even if this approach works, what would Russia become? It is an illusion, because there will be no winning parties”, he said.
On the other hand, even if the US had generously opened the doors of NATO to post-Soviet Russia, giving all full-party privileges to the country, Moscow probably would not have behaved like a loyal member of the alliance. It would have tried to build alliances with other countries with the goal of undermining NATO itself, said the retired colonel.
"I do not see any possibility of rapprochement between the US and Russia, simply because neither side has a clear and viable strategy towards the other", he said. Trenin mentioned that, with Trump’s election (2016), the United States also faces a phase of political turmoil, both domestically and externally, and " it is more likely that the improvement of the Russian-American relationship will today depend much more on what will happen within each country, rather than a possible mutual agreement”.
He downplayed, however, suspicions that Moscow would have interfered in the last US presidential election, supposedly privileging Trump over the Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. "I do not think Putin had a defined strategy to help elect Trump, but in 2012 he accused Hillary, then Secretary of State, of lobbying demonstrations that brought together 100,000 opponents in front of the Kremlin. It is possible that members or people linked to the Russian government have thought 'if they can get involved in Russian politics, why can’t we get involved in theirs?' I cannot say (if that actually happened), but it is possible", he concluded.
Moscow and Beijing: 'ambivalent relationship'
"China and Russia do not (officially) stand against each other, but they are also not always together. They manage their differences", said the speaker. As an example, he cited the fact that China did not support Moscow's actions in Ukraine and Russia did not admit Beijing's territorial claims in the China Sea.
Trenin pointed out, however, that with the removal of Moscow from the European Union after the annexation of Crimea, there was a move towards the East. "Before 2014, Russia wanted to be 'east of the West', now it's more like the 'West of the East'. And that distance (between Russia and the West) is growing”, he said.
The expert explained that the Russian elites "do not know and do not identify themselves with Asia, but they do so with Europe”. "The potential (of a deeper relationship with the Far East) is greater than the concrete results", he said.
Beijing, which competes with the United States for world economic leadership, does not restrict the Russians and has an interest in closer ties. "But Washington has made it clear that those who maintain close relations with Moscow will face retaliations from the US", he added.
Syria: 'tactical but not strategic victory'
Already at the end of the talk, questioned by a member of the audience, Trenin briefly commented on the recent Russian intervention in the Syrian war on behalf of President Bashar al-Assad. According to some analysts, Putin would have shown that it may still be relevant on the international scene, by challenging the US in the region and regaining some of the lost space in the Middle East.
"The Russians managed to help defeat the opposition force to Damascus and, in that sense, bothered the US and its European allies (opposed to Assad). But what is the future strategy (in relation to Syria and the Middle East)? Putin is good at tactics and operational aspects, but not in strategy. I do not see large gains (for Russia) in the medium term (in the Middle East)”, he said.
Otávio Dias, journalist, is the content editor of the Fernando Henrique Cardoso Foundation. He was the Folha’s correspondent in London, editor of estadão.com.br and chief editor of the Brasil Post, a partnership between the Huffington Post and Grupo Abril.
Translated by Thomas Garman.
