The weekend mutiny of the Wagner Group, pathetic as it may look in hindsight, is certain to affect Russia’s ability to sustain its aggression against Ukraine and to repel the ongoing Ukrainian counteroffensive. But it will also resonate in a much wider sense.
Author: Pavel Baev
Russia Stays on the Course of Economic Delusion and Military Attrition
The summer economic forum in St. Petersburg used to be a vanity fair of Russian opulence and corruption. But last week’s modest, if not frugal, event was rather an exercise in self-reassurance of sustainable stagnation.
The Counteroffensive, the Dam and the Proliferation of ‘Peace Plans’
The protracted deadlock in the trenches of the war in Ukraine is giving way to high-intensity battles, and this escalation instantly generates widespread international resonance, in which expectations of a Ukrainian victory are mixed with concerns about a Russian defeat. Now, the initiative is clearly with the Ukrainian forces, which, from June 5, started a… Read more »
Ukraine Takes the War Deep Into Russia
Sun Tzu, the great Chinese military philosopher, was rarely studied in Soviet military academies, but the Ukrainian high command — seeking to “win first and start fighting after” — appears to be taking a page out of his treatise, The Art of War. Naturally, the intentions for a spring offensive have now become a plan for… Read more »
Three Russian Discourses and Significant Silence on the War in Ukraine
The noise of jingoist propaganda and anti-Western hysteria emanating from Moscow is not as monotonous as it often seems, and the variations expose significant differences between and within Russian elite groups. Recent military setbacks, such as the destruction of a mixed air group over the Bryansk region on May 13 and the incursion of a… Read more »
Summit in Hiroshima Charts Ending for War in Ukraine
From May 19 to 21, Japan hosted the most recent meeting of the seven heads of state (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States) as well as the European Union in the so-called G7 format. Overall, the key point on the agenda was certainly strengthening the unity of democratic states… Read more »
Central Asian Leaders Opted to Attend Curtailed Parade in Moscow
The Victory Day celebrated on May 9 is a hugely important and emotionally loaded holiday for the majority of Russians and Ukrainians, Kazakhs and Uzbeks, whose grandfathers fought together and defeated Nazi Germany back in 1945. In Russia, this solemn Remembrance Day was gradually converted by all-pervasive propaganda into a manifestation of militarism and aggressive… Read more »
Muted V-Day Celebrations in Russia Amid Disastrous War
Victory Day in Russia continues to resonate throughout Russia society, and official propaganda in the past decade has strived to change the meaning of this emotionally charged and solemn day of remembrance into a feast of militarism and jingoism. The slogan “we can do it again” (mozhem povtorit) pervaded loud festivities even during the pandemic-caused… Read more »
The Demand For US Leadership Outpaces Resentment Against It
President Joe Biden’s long-awaited announcement of decision to run for the second presidential term has brought into a sharper focus the new quality of US leadership in global affairs, which he has delivered, perhaps without any grand strategic design. The 2024 US elections will be run and determined primarily by competing domestic agendas, as is… Read more »
Moscow Engulfed by Anxiety About Impending Ukrainian Offensive
Combat operations in the Donbas trenches remain deadlocked, but their diminishing intensity does not signify an impasse in the course of the Russo-Ukrainian war, which continues to evolve on the ground. One notable change has been the cessation of Russian long-distance missile and drone strikes on Ukrainian energy infrastructure and other civilian targets since the… Read more »