Vladimir Putin is a “genius,” Donald Trump said with a chuckle. The former American president was speaking on the eve of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. He was filled with admiration for the “very smart” man in the Kremlin.
And what did this genius accomplish? Four days after the invasion was launched, Russian troops still have not won the quick victory that Putin had been counting on. Ukrainian resistance is much stronger than the Russian leader predicted; the Ukrainian army is fighting back, and the population is mobilizing. Captured Russian soldiers were filmed complaining that they had been told they were going on a training mission.
The global reaction is being stronger, more coordinated and more united than Putin anticipated. Russia is being excluded from the global financial system. Most of European airspace has been closed to Russian airlines. A historic reversal has taken place in Germany’s foreign and security policy: finally, Berlin is sending arms to Ukraine and has promised to spend more than 2% of its GDP on defense. The NATO alliance gained a new sense of purpose. Russia is becoming a pariah, and even China has not supported it at the UN – instead, it has abstained.
In the Russian countryside, panicked citizens are rushing to withdraw money from banks. The ruble was tremendously devalued, as was the Russian stock market. Small public protests against the war spread across the country, with protesters being quickly arrested. Local celebrities, oligarchs and even the children of some senior Russian officials have condemned the conflict.
Putin’s own subordinates look visibly embarrassed when they take their orders in front of television cameras. Russian official media found themselves in the unbelievable position of denying the extent of the war and continuing to insist that it is just a special military operation to support the breakaway regions of Donetsk and Lugansk.
Meanwhile, Ukraine has received an unprecedented degree of international admiration and recognition since the country gained independence in 1991. President Volodymyr Zelensky, once derided as a comic actor who faced a challenge he was unprepared for, is being internationally acclaimed for his inspiring leadership.
His physical bravery on the streets of Kiev stands in stark contrast to the cowardice of Putin, who is so afraid of a virus that he won’t let his own subordinates get close enough to breathe its air. Demands are growing for Ukraine to enter a “fast track” to be accepted into the European Union.
Putin accomplished all this in a mere four days. Brilliant, pure and simple genius!
But it is very possible that a humiliated and cornered Putin will become even more dangerous and ruthless. That fact was highlighted on Sunday, when the Russian leader put his country’s nuclear forces on alert. Having not won the easy victory he was predicting, Putin seems unlikely to back down. Pride, paranoia and their own personal survival point to the use of increasingly radical and dangerous tactics. A senior Western official predicted, “Putin will just hold on to his positions more and more, and the situation will get very ugly.”
Western security analysts have been warning of the possibility of using thermobaric missiles against Ukraine – the so-called “flamethrower” bombs Russia has used in Chechnya and Syria, which could cause massive loss of life.
The nuclear threats that Putin has been making, while clearly intended to intimidate, cannot be entirely discounted, given the Russian leader’s state of mind.
As it seems highly unlikely that Putin himself will back down, there are few peaceful ways out of this conflict. A small ray of hope is offered by the fact that Russian and Ukrainian negotiators have met on the Belarusian border.
But there is still no sign that Putin is willing to back down from his maximalist demands, which involve further dismemberment of Ukrainian territory and the “de facto” end of the country’s independence. The fact that the man originally called to head the Russian delegation was a former junior official known for his extreme nationalism is not a promising sign.
Perhaps the only real path to peace would be for the Russian ruling elite to somehow force Putin out of power. The videos his leader has released that show him humiliating members of his security establishment while forcing them to endorse his policies are meant to demonstrate the full authority he wields. But they also highlight the divergences and reservations of figures within their own inner circle.
However, the current Russian system is less collective than the post-Stalin Soviet Union was. High-ranking Soviet officials were able to remove Nikita Khrushchev from power in 1964. But Putin rules more like a pre-Soviet tsar. It is difficult to see how an internal opposition to him, within the government, could be mobilized.
It is possible, however, that as the human and economic costs of war accumulate, it will become increasingly difficult to contain public protests against the conflict. Russian troops inside Ukraine may become demoralized as they rack up defeats and are ordered to employ brutal tactics against civilians.
Eventually, some combination of elite anxiety, military failures and popular dissatisfaction could force the Russian leader out. But for now, at least, the danger Putin poses to Ukraine, Russia and the world is only growing.
