Putin on the Ritz

"Either Putin is serious, and we don't know about something, or this is a colossal bluff."

Is there something not quite right with the story fed to us around the Russia and Ukraine crisis? I ask because even the Ukrainian president, the supposed victim in this saga, wants the West to cool it.

I'm pretty sure that Putin is thuggish. No doubt he will use military force to achieve political objectives. For example, faced with a Georgian bid to join NATO in 2008, his tanks went in and won. In 2016, he again won with an intervention in Crimea that used irregular troops. His 'little green men' did the job.

All the time, the West huffed and puffed but did nothing beyond a few token troop deployments. Even after his agents splashed a nerve agent around Salisbury and highly toxic Polonium-210 in London, the response was lame with a series of tit for tat expulsions.

As the drumbeat for war builds in the West, I'm having trouble weighing ambition with resources. One hundred thousand soldiers will not be enough to take and hold a country the size of Ukraine. Putin may have air superiority and loads of tanks, but suppressing 41 million Ukrainians will take a lot more manpower than he has deployed. 

So what is the issue? The geopolitical positions are, on the surface, straightforward:

1. Russia wants the US and NATO to stop expanding eastward because it sees that as threatening.
2. Putin wants NATO to accede that Ukraine will never be a member.
3. Russia fears encirclement by NATO that it sees as encroaching on its region of influence. 
   
   

NATO, led by Washington, seeks a de-escalation with Russia pulling back troops from the border with Ukraine. 

Putin set out his store in an essay published here. This thesis traces a common heritage of Russians, Ukrainians, and Belorussians going back to the 17th century. No matter his interpretation of history is debatable, the point is he believes it, and that shapes his actions. 

The White House claims — based on 'intelligence' — that Russia may conduct a false-flag operation to kick-start an invasion. The Brits joined in with more details that Russia plans to install a puppet government in Ukraine. At the same time, the Germans are saying that Russia has not yet decided to invade. 

The value of much of this 'intelligence' deserves measuring against the recent stunning failures in Afghanistan. Predicting the Afghan forces would hold out against the Taliban, the Americans conducted a hasty retreat.

​Within days they found themselves surrounded at Kabul Airport by triumphant Taliban fighters, who'd run over the Afghan forces with ease. Add to that lies about WMDs in Iraq to see that the public have a jaundiced view of 'intelligence.' 

So looking at Putin's manpower and posturing, I guess his objectives are somewhat smaller and more digestible. Maybe he's making the point that he won't be pushed around and deserves respect. Indeed, a German admiral asserted that and he lost his job for that moment of openness.

Yet, if he does invade Ukraine, Putin will turn most of Europe against him. Sleepy countries who believed they were living in the age of ‘the end of history’ will awake to rearm and act against Russian interests. The reaction will not be insignificant. 

So I'm curious what are we missing in the risk-reward analysis. Either Putin is serious, and we don't know about something, or this is a colossal bluff.

Putin is a savvy operator and a lot brighter than he's given credit for by most Western politicians. Atop that, he sees that his opponents as divided and weakened under the leadership of a bumbling president. Biden's mixed signals don't fill anyone with confidence.

Then you have the clown Boris Johnson seeking to shoe-horn himself into the crisis to distract from his troubles at home. He's under siege from the police, members of his party and a confident opposition. 

Johnson longs to mimic his hero Churchill by striding the international stage to put the world right. Only one problem - the rest of Europe doesn't want to indulge Johnson's fantasy, while France has already stolen the lead by direct talks with Putin. 

As Putin mulls his options, he won't have missed that German support for Ukraine amounts to 5,000 helmets. That is against the Brits sending anti-tank missiles and the US dropping in a whole load of kit. France is deploying a couple of hundred troops to Romania, which looks like a gesture only. 

Of course, the Germans are reluctant to jump in given that they rely on Russia for energy, as do other European nations to various degrees. Some 30% of the EU's petroleum imports and 39% of gas imports came from Russia in 2017. That gives Putin loads of leverage.

As the war drums beat, I’d point out that a couple of crucial actions you'd usually see if Russia seeks to invade are missing from all this activity. First, Putin is low profile and has been absent from the airwaves, while there is no attempt to rally the Russian people behind a war. Second, Russian TV pundits are busy portraying the West as unhinged and creating a crisis by over-reacting. 

Accepting that Putin is a ruthless but rational actor, I don't see a complete invasion of Ukraine because even if he captures the country, the question is, what next? 

In any case, without firing a shot, Putin has exposed the disharmony in the West and has them scrambling around to a meet a threat that may not exist. If that's his game, he's played his hand brilliantly.