Displaying items by tag: Ukraine

Tuesday, 17 February 2026 16:32

Russia’s Strategic Losses Are the US’ Gain in Eurasia

By Mamuka Tsereteli

A weakened Russia is still a Russia that is more comfortable with taking risks.

Russia’s war in Ukraine has produced a paradox for US strategy: it has significantly reduced Russia’s strategic long-term power while hardening Moscow into a more dangerous, risk-tolerant adversary for the United States and its allies and partners in Europe, the South Caucasus, and Central Asia. The challenge for policymakers is to lock in the strategic setbacks Russia has incurred—geopolitical, economic, demographic, and technological—while managing escalation risks and preparing for a prolonged confrontation in the Russian neighborhood.

Russia’s most serious long-term strategic vulnerabilities are structural: adverse demographics, growing dependence on and asymmetry with China, and persistent risks of Islamic radicalism and separatism in the North Caucasus, the Volga region, and parts of Siberia. NATO enlargement, often presented by the Kremlin as an existential threat, has served more as a domestic mobilization tool than as Russia’s most acute security challenge. Yet the narrative of Western encirclement and historical invasions was a central ideological driver of the decision to attack Ukraine in 2022; it must be taken seriously when assessing both Russia’s losses and its adaptive gains.

Four years later, Russia has failed to achieve its declared objectives in Ukraine and has instead exacerbated nearly all of its long-term strategic weaknesses. At the same time, it has adapted militarily and politically in ways that complicate Western assumptions about coercion, deterrence, and the durability of authoritarian war economies.

Russia's Wartime Resilience and Adaptation

Militarily, Russia today has a more combat-effective force than on the eve of the invasion, despite massive losses. Its armed forces have adapted to large-scale attritional warfare, integrating drones, electronic warfare, artillery, air defenses, and glide bombs into a coherent operational system optimized for prolonged, high-intensity conflict in its neighborhood.

Economically, sanctions have constrained access to advanced technology but failed to collapse Russia’s war-making capacity. Most Russian missiles still contain Western components, indicating that Russia has found ways to circumvent sanctions. Moscow has rapidly expanded munitions and drone production, relying on simpler designs, stockpiles, and third-country supply chains. This experience calls into question assumptions that broad economic pressure alone can quickly neutralize the military capabilities of such a large, mobilized authoritarian state.

Politically, the Kremlin has used the war to tighten internal control, suppress dissent, and bind elites more closely to regime survival. The absence of large-scale unrest despite military mobilization and high casualties indicates a degree of internal resilience that Western observers underestimated and suggests that regime stability cannot be assumed to erode simply because of the costs of an extended war.

Russia has also learned to incorporate Western domestic politics into its strategy, banking on legislative delays, industrial bottlenecks, and public fatigue in the United States and Europe. For policy purposes, this underscores that timelines favor actors with fewer internal constraints and that adversaries are actively planning around perceived Western political fragility.

Large-scale emigration adds another layer. The departure of hundreds of thousands of skilled Russians has created globally dispersed communities embedded in allied economies that present a persistent counter-intelligence and sanctions-evasion challenge. This is less an immediate security crisis than a slow-burning vulnerability that will require long-term attention from intelligence, law enforcement, and financial regulation communities.

Russia is Losing Its Periphery

Geopolitically, the war has produced outcomes directly contrary to Moscow’s core stated aims. Russia sought to halt NATO enlargement and push Western forces away from its borders; instead, Finland and Sweden have joined the alliance, bringing capable militaries and advanced economies into NATO’s fold. Finland’s accession alone adds more than 1,000 miles of NATO-Russia border and transforms Northern Europe into a reinforced, integrated theater for allied defense planning. This represents a net strategic gain for the United States and its allies, achieved without direct combat with Russian forces.

Even more consequential is the transformation of Ukraine. After four years of large-scale war, Ukraine now has one of Europe’s most experienced, innovative, and resilient land forces. In practice, it functions as a de facto frontline NATO partner, anchoring the defense of Europe’s eastern flank and extending allied strategic depth eastward even without formal membership.

From Moscow’s perspective, this is a strategic nightmare. Instead of a neutral or pliable neighbor, Russia now faces a hostile, permanently militarized state that constrains its military options across Eastern Europe. From a Western perspective, Ukraine represents a cost-effective force multiplier, in which relatively modest budgetary support yields substantial increases in Russian military attrition and in European security. This is a major strategic benefit for the United States in any future relationship with Russia, whether adversarial or friendly.

Russia has also lost influence across the post-Soviet space. Its failure to prevent renewed conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan severely damaged its credibility as a security guarantor in the South Caucasus. It opened space for deeper EU and, most importantly, US engagement. In Central Asia, governments are increasingly hedging among Russia, China, the EU, Turkey, and the United States, taking advantage of Moscow’s reduced capacity to enforce its preferences.

Meanwhile, Russia’s position in Syria and parts of the Middle East has eroded as other actors, including Turkey and the United States, test and expose the limits of Russian power projection. Recent developments in Venezuela and the Russian shadow oil fleet further damage Russia’s international reputation and mythology of its “global power” capacity.

These trends collectively undermine Russia’s claim to be the indispensable security arbiter in its neighborhood and reduce its ability to trade regional influence for concessions in Europe or elsewhere. For US policy, they create openings for calibrated engagement in the South Caucasus, Central Asia, and the Middle East, where modest investments in diplomacy, security assistance, and economic connectivity can yield outsized strategic returns.

Russia’s list of strategic losses includes demography and human capital. According to CSIS, Russian forces have suffered approximately 1.2 million casualties, including as many as 325,000 killed, since February 2022. A sizable share of young men are no longer able to join the labor force and form families. The casualty rates are higher in areas populated by ethnic minorities, increasing discontent with the federal government in those areas, and igniting separatist feelings in the North Caucasus, Volga region, and Siberia.

Emigration has compounded these battlefield losses. Estimates vary, but it is clear that hundreds of thousands left after February 2022 to avoid mobilization and for political and economic reasons. These flows have disproportionately involved young, urban, highly educated professionals: engineers, programmers, scientists, finance specialists, and entrepreneurs.

Economic trends reinforce the picture of Russian strategic losses. Following the 2023–2024 growth driven by defense spending, Russia’s GDP growth slowed sharply in 2025. Budget deficits are growing. Oil revenues, initially resilient, are now subject to structural pressures from price caps, discounts on Russian crude, stricter enforcement of sanctions, and unfavorable exchange-rate developments.

The most significant loss is that of natural gas exports. Before the war, Russia supplied 40 percent of EU gas consumption; by early 2023, pipeline deliveries had fallen by roughly 90 percent from historical levels, and exports dropped from about 142 bcm in 2021 to 31 bcm in 2024, further reduced to 18 bcm in 2025.

Russia’s pre-war model of energy leverage over Europe has effectively collapsed. Increased volumes to China and continued exports to Turkey and some post-Soviet markets cannot fully compensate for the loss of volume or political leverage.

The Ukraine War's Implications for US Partners in the Caucasus and Central Asia

The war has imposed profound demographic, economic, technological, and geopolitical costs on Russia, many of them structural and not easily reversible. Yet Russia is not strategically broken: it has adapted militarily, reoriented its economy toward war, and demonstrated political resilience. The United States, therefore, faces a Russia that is weaker in aggregate power but more experienced in high-intensity warfare, more dependent on China, and more willing to accept risk.

US strategy must therefore treat Russia not as a declining power to be waited out, but as a weakened yet embittered adversary that will remain capable of sustained confrontation, particularly if supported by China. A major strategic question for the United States is whether Russia can still be decoupled from China, or whether this has become a lost cause.

The next major risk from post-war Russia will be its desire to restore its position of power in parts of the post-Soviet space. Russia will most likely continue to conduct coercive operations in the Baltics, testing NATO’s cohesion. However, its primary focus will be on neighbors in the South Caucasus and Central Asia, where Russia retains greater influence and expects less resistance.

The key case to watch this year is Armenia. Upcoming parliamentary elections in June create opportunities for manipulation to generate chaos and instability. Armenia is currently perhaps the most significant irritant to Russia in the former Soviet space. Some Russian propagandists have already called for a “Special Military Operation” in Armenia, similar to the invasion of Ukraine. The Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP) project—connecting mainland Azerbaijan with the Azerbaijani exclave of Nakhchivan and onward to Turkey via Armenian territory—represents a major strategic challenge for both Russia and Iran.

On January 13, 2026, US secretary of state Marco Rubio and Armenian foreign minister Ararat Mirzoyan announced a TRIPP Implementation Framework (TIF) following their meeting in Washington. US vice president JD Vance then visited Armenia and Azerbaijan, emphasizing the strategic level of engagement.

While Russia has not expressed open opposition to the project, this level of US engagement in the South Caucasus runs counter to Russian strategic interests. Russia still maintains significant leverage over Armenia: it operates a military base in Gyumri and controls major strategic assets, including the country’s railway system and energy infrastructure. Russia also possesses significant soft-power tools to influence Armenian elections.

US interests in resource-rich Central Asia dictate American leadership in Black Sea-Caspian connectivity. A strategy focused on targeted diplomacy, infrastructure initiatives, and security cooperation can balance Russia’s residual influence without requiring large-scale US engagement. The United States has already taken several proactive steps. The TRIPP project is a powerful signal, and inviting Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan to the G20 Summit in Miami in 2026 is another move to elevate the region’s global significance. The next step should be to build on the TRIPP and C5+1 initiatives and expand the political scope of TRIPP to encompass the entire Black Sea-Trans-Caspian connectivity space, covering energy, minerals, fertilizers, data, and related sectors.

Finally, time in the Ukraine War is not neutral. Prolonged conflict tends to benefit actors capable of suppressing dissent, mobilizing societies, and absorbing losses more resiliently. This is placing democratic coalitions at a structural disadvantage unless they adapt politically, militarily, and economically. The central task for US policy is to convert Russia’s current losses into durable strategic realities while preparing institutions, alliances, and industrial and infrastructure bases for a prolonged period of strategic competition in Europe and Eurasia.

About the Author:

Mamuka Tsereteli is a senior fellow for Eurasia at the American Foreign Policy Council (AFPC) and a senior fellow at AFPC’s Central Asia-Caucasus Institute. He has more than thirty years of experience in academia, diplomacy, and business development, with a focus on economic security, business, and energy development in the Black Sea-Caspian region. Previously, he served as a research director at CACI and as a professor at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). He also directed the Center for Black Sea-Caspian Studies at the School of International Service (SIS) at American University (2009-2013) and served as an assistant professor at SIS (2007-2011). Dr. Tsereteli is also a co-founder of the American University Kyiv, a newly established university in Ukraine, in partnership with Arizona State University.

Read the article here: https://nationalinterest.org/blog/silk-road-rivalries/russias-military-losses-are-the-us-gain-in-central-asia

Published in Staff Publications

Thursday, 04 January 2024 17:01

Some Lessons for Putin from Ancient Rome

By S. Frederick Starr
American Purpose
January 4, 2024

Vladimir Putin, having sidelined or destroyed all his domestic opponents, real or imagined, now surrounds himself with Romano-Byzantine pomp and grandeur. The theatrical civic festivals, processions of venerable prelates, cult of statues, embarrassing shows of piety, endless laying of wreaths, and choreographed entrances down halls lined with soldiers standing at attention—all trace directly back to czarism, to Byzantine Constantinople, and ultimately to imperial Rome. Indeed, Putin considers himself as Russia’s new “czar,” the Russified form of the Latin “Caesar.”

But besides all the parallel heroics, Roman history offers profound lessons for today’s world. All of America’s Founders saw the Roman Republic as the best model for their own constitution. Napoleon, Mussolini, and Hitler, by contrast, found in imperial Rome a stunning model for their own grandeur. True, some of Rome’s ancient chroniclers, including the celebrated Livy, so admired specific politicians that they saw only their good sides and ignored the problems and failures. Yet there were others, notably the pessimistic Sallust, who not only wrote bluntly of history’s painful issues but delved deep into their causes and consequences.

Is Putin likely to delve into the history of Rome for insights on his own situation? Unfortunately for Russia, Putin is not a reader, preferring instead to engage in exhibitionist athletic activities, preside at solemn ceremonies, or offer avuncular obiter dicta. However, if he would study the Roman past, he might come to realize that that model presents more than a few chilling prospects that he will ignore at his peril.

To take but one example, a glance at Roman history would remind Putin that self-declared victories may not be as victorious as he and Kremlin publicists want to think. Back in the 3rd century B.C., when Rome was still a small state in central Italy, it was attacked by a certain King Pyrrhus, a rival ruler from Epirus, a region along today’s border between Greece and Albania. In his first battles Pyrrhus routed the Roman legions, and celebrated accordingly. But matters did not end there.

Like Pyrrhus, Putin’s army scored some early victories in its war on Ukraine. As recently as December 1, Putin’s Minister of Defense Sergei Shoigu was still claiming, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, that Russian forces “were advancing on all fronts.” Pyrrhus made similar false claims, only to discover that his own soldiers were no match for the determined Romans. As the Romans drove Pyrrhus’ army from the field, he groused, “If we win one more such victory against the Romans we will be utterly ruined,” which is exactly what happened. Pyrrhus’ statement gave Romans the term “Pyrrhic victory,” which we still use today. Putin should apply it to his “victories” at Bakhmut and Avdiivka.

Another crisis in Rome’s early formation as a nation occurred when a peasant uprising threatened Rome itself and, according to the historian Livy, caused panic in the Roman capital. In desperation, the elders turned to Lucius Cincinnatus, who was neither a military man nor a professional politician, but who had earned respect as an effective leader. It took Cincinnatus only fifteen days to turn the tide, after which he returned to his farm. George Washington rightly admired Cincinnatus and consciously emulated him, returning after the Battle of Yorktown to Mount Vernon. By contrast, Putin’s “special military operation,” planned as a three-day romp, is now approaching the end of its second year. Putin, no Cincinnatus, doomed himself to being a lifer.

Roman history is a millennium-long showcase of motivation or its absence. In this context, Putin might gain further insights by examining Rome’s centuries-long battle against the diverse tribes pressing the empire from the north. For centuries Rome’s legionnaires were well trained, disciplined, and committed. The list of their early victories is long. Both Julius Caesar and the philosopher-emperor-general Marcus Aurelius succeeded because they motivated and inspired their troops. But over time the Roman army was increasingly comprised of hirelings, déclassé men who fought not to save the empire but for money or a small piece of the bounty. Inflation and rising costs outpaced pay increases. Punishment was severe, in some cases including even crucifixion. In the end, Rome’s army eroded from within.

This is what is happening to the Russian army today. Putin attacked Ukraine in February 2022 with what was then an army of several hundred thousand trained professional soldiers. But after the Ukrainians killed more than 320,000 Russian troops, their replacements were unwilling and surly conscripts and even criminals dragooned from Russia’s jails. Putin quite understandably fears such soldiers. Putin’s army, like that of the late Roman Empire, is collapsing from within.

By contrast, Ukraine’s army at the time of the invasion was small and comprised mainly Soviet-trained holdovers. Both officers and troops of the line had to be quickly recruited from civilian professions and trained. Yet they quickly proved themselves to be disciplined and resourceful patriots, not tired time-servers. True, Ukraine is now conscripting troops, but these newcomers share their predecessors’ commitment to the nation and to their future lives in a free country.

Sheer spite and a passion for avenging past failures figured prominently in Putin’s decisions to invade both Georgia and Ukraine. Roman history suggests that this isn’t smart. Back in 220 B.C., Rome defeated its great enemy, the North African state of Carthage. Anticipating Putin, the Carthaginian general Hannibal sought revenge. Acting out of spite, he assembled 700,000 foot soldiers, 78,000 mounted calvary, and a force of war elephants, and crossed the Alps. Though he was a brilliant general, Hannibal’s war of spite turned into a disaster.

Why did Hannibal lose? Partly because of his sheer hubris and the spite that fed it, and also because the Romans avoided frontal battles and simply ground him down. They were prudently led by a general named Fabius Maximus, whom later Romans fondly remembered as “the Delayer.” Today it is the Ukrainians who are the Delayers. By grinding down Putin’s army and destroying its logistics they have positioned themselves for victory.

The Roman Republic fell not because of any mass uprising but because of the machinations of Julius Caesar. A victorious general, Caesar looked the hero as he was installed as imperator. As was customary at such ceremonies, an official retainer placed behind the inductee solemnly repeated over and over the admonition to “Look behind you!” Caesar failed to do so and underestimated the opposition of a handful of officials and generals who feared the rise of a dictator perpetuus. Even if Putin chooses not to read Cicero, Plutarch, or Cassius Dio, he could productively spend an evening watching a Moscow production of Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Julius Caesar.

Turning to a very different issue, Putin seems blithely to assume that whenever Russia defeats a neighboring country it can easily win the hearts and minds of the conquered, whether by persuasion or force. This is what many Roman generals and governors thought as well, but they were wrong—fatally so. Speaking of the impact of corrupt officials sent by Rome to the provinces, the great orator-politician Cicero declared to the Roman Senate, “You cannot imagine how deeply they hate us.” Does Putin understand this?

Finally, it is no secret that Russia today, like ancient Rome, is increasingly a land of immigrants; its economy depends on impoverished newcomers from Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and elsewhere in Central Asia who fled to Russia in search of work. Yet Moscow treats them as third-class citizens and dragoons them as cannon fodder or “meat” to die by the thousands on the Ukrainian front. Rome faced a similar problem and wrestled with it unsuccessfully over several centuries. Over time the despised immigrants who poured across the Alps from Gaul demanded a voice in Roman affairs, and eventually took control of the western Roman Empire.

Sad to say, neither Putin himself nor any others of Russia’s core group of leaders show the slightest interest in learning from relevant examples from Roman history or, for that matter, from any other useable past. Together they provide living proof of American philosopher George Santayana’s adage that, “Those who forget history are condemned to repeat it.” In Putin’s case, though, he seems never to have known it.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS: S. Frederick Starr, is a distinguished fellow specializing in Central Asia and the Caucasus at the American Foreign Policy Council and founding chairman of the Central Asia Caucasus Institute.

Published in Staff Publications

Friday, 03 November 2023 18:30

CACI Chairman S. Frederick Starr comments on "Preparing Now for a Post-Putin Russia"

Whether Russian President Vladimir Putin dies in office, is ousted in a palace coup, or relinquishes power for some unforeseen reason, the United States and its allies would face a radically different Russia with the Kremlin under new management. The geopolitical stakes mean that policymakers would be negligent not to plan for the consequences of a post-Putin Russia. On November 2, 2023, CACI Chairman S. Frederick Starr joined a panel organized by the Hudson Institute’s Center on Europe and Eurasia for a discussion on how US and allied policymakers can prepare for a Russia after Putin.

Click here to watch on YouTube or scroll down to watch the full panel discussion.

Published in News

Monday, 18 September 2023 14:14

Is CIA Director Bill Burns Helping Ukraine to Win or Blocking It?

By Frederick Starr and Andrei Piontkovsky
The Kyiv Post
September 18, 2023

Almost 600 days of Russia’s war in Ukraine have given rise to almost 600 days of confrontation between pro-Ukrainian and Kremlin-appeasing groups within the US administration.

The good news is that friends of Ukraine have largely succeeded in overcoming the artificial and self-destructive taboo against supporting Ukraine that the US has imposed on itself. The bad news is that – each time – Kyiv’s American skptics seem to succeed in significantly slowing down US support.

Unacknowledged in large parts of official Washington is the reality that thousands of Ukrainian soldiers and civilians have had to pay for this procrastination with their lives. Had there been a hundred or more F-16 fighter jets in the Ukrainian skies a year ago, this cursed war would now be history.

Meanwhile, the US’s puzzling taboo has deliberately tied the hands of the victims of criminal aggression. The US press has reported in detail on how Russia invaded Ukraine, is destroying its cities and villages, and is daily murdering civilians with rockets launched from Russian territory. Yet Washington has effectively prohibited Ukraine from delivering answering strikes on the sources of Russia’s bombings.

Not one US official has publicly admitted that this line has been adopted. Worse, some act as if it doesn’t exist. While his colleagues in the White House have dragged their feet on providing Ukraine with military aircraft, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken has unambiguously asserted Ukraine’s right to utilize any weapon at its disposal to expel the occupiers, including strikes on the territory of the aggressor.

An illuminating article published earlier this summer in Newsweek –“Exclusive: The CIA’s Blind Spot about Ukraine War” by William Arkin, revealed the origins and inner workings of the confused US approach.

At Biden’s behest, CIA Director William Joseph Burns established direct communication with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow as early as in November 2021, that is three months before Russia launched its full-scale attack on Ukraine.

"In some ironic ways… the meeting was highly successful," a senior US intelligence official told Newsweek. “The United States would not fight directly nor seek regime change, the Biden administration pledged. Russia would limit its assault to Ukraine and act in accordance with unstated but well-understood guidelines for secret operations.”

But, according to Newsweek, “Once Russian forces poured into Ukraine, the United States had to quickly shift gears. The CIA, like the rest of the U.S. intelligence community, had misread Russia's military capacity and Ukraine's resilience as Russia failed to take Kyiv and withdrew from the north.”

Nevertheless, certain clandestine rules of the road apparently agreed to by Burns and Putin were adhered to by the US side. Washington would prohibit Ukraine from carrying out strikes on Russian territory. And, in return, speaking as if for all NATO, Burns sought and gained a promise from the dictator not to attack NATO member countries.

Burns met with Russian foreign intelligence chief Sergei Naryshkin in Ankara in November 2022 and then is believed to have briefed Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky about his “non-agreement” with the Russians.

Far from criticizing Burns, Arkin emoted on the CIA’s difficulties in keeping an eye on the increasingly unruly Ukrainians, who repeatedly attempted to deliver strikes on targets both in Russian occupied Crimea and Russia itself.

Naryshkin revealed that he and Burns discussed, "thought about and deliberated on what should be done about Ukraine" in a lengthy phone call on June 30, initiated by the US side.

Over the 560+ days of Russia’s so-called “special military operation,” and tens of thousands of documented warcrimes, instances of torture, shootings and rape, Burns and the CIA have remained silent on Russia, while apparently issuing threats to Ukraine. On July 5, a CIA spokesperson warned that if Kyiv continued acts of sabotage within Russia it could have “disastrous consequences.”

What other catastrophic consequences are the people in Burn’s office expecting will occur through the fault of the Ukrainians?

All thinkable and unthinkable catastrophes have already happened as a result of the covert Burns-Putin deal. Yet Newsweek was beside itself with pride at Burns’ diplomatic success and expressed anger at the Ukrainians for trying to defend their country by violating the “ground rules” that Burns was seeking to impose on them without their consent.

With Russia’s war against Ukraine dragging on and on, and the Ukrainians eager to break through with the proper support of their supporters, should this cruel state of affairs be allowed to continue?

The bipartisan pro-Ukrainian majority in the post-vacation Congress would do well to organize hearings to which they should invite Blinken, Burns, Arkin and those sources in the CIA whom he cites in his article. They should also invite National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, who has been singing in the same key as Burns.

The hearings should seek answers to the following questions:

1. Does there exist an agreement between the governments of the US and the Russian Federation about “rules of the road” of the Russo-Ukrainian war?

2. If so, why were Congress and the American people unaware of them until now?

3. If not, then on what basis is Burns imposing these “road rules” on Ukraine?

4. Should Congress even regard Burns’ actions as treasonous?

Burns and Sullivan live in a world where the great powers set the rules and small countries must humbly obey. So does Putin.

We do not have to live in such a world and accept the rules they seek to impose on us.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS:
Dr. Frederick Starr, a co-founder (with George Kennan and James Billington) of the Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies, is chairperson of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute, and has written two dozen books on Russia and the USSR.

Dr. Andrei Piontkovsky is a Russian scientist, political writer and analyst, member of International PEN Club who was forced to leave Russia in 2016. For many years he has been a regular political commentator for the BBC World Service, Radio Liberty, and Voice of America. Piontkovsky is the author of several books on the Putin presidency. In 2017, Piontkovsky was awarded the Andrei Sakharov Prize for “Courage in Journalism.”

Published in Staff Publications

Friday, 08 September 2023 15:53

A White House Divided on Russia and Ukraine?

The Biden administration, paralyzed by its desire to appease Russia, is refusing to enable a win for Ukraine – only that Russia does not lose.

By. S. Frederick Starr and Andrei Piontkovsky

September 8, 2023

The Kyiv Post

A prime task of Russia’s State Security Service (FSB), successor to the KGB, is to devise and execute active measures in the sphere of foreign relations. During Russian President Vladimir Putin’s era, one of the most successful initiatives to arise from its headquarters in the infamous Lubianka in Moscow, has been the proposal to relaunch Track II (unofficial and backchannel) negotiations between Moscow and Washington.

When Putin concluded that official diplomatic contacts were failing to produce the results he wanted, he embraced the FSB’s proposals to establish an informal working group of retired US and Russian officials and experts who are “close to decision-making centers.” Meeting in picturesque locales and in a relaxed atmosphere that excluded neckties but could include swimming trunks, the respected participants, so it was thought, would be able to reach unexpected but useful conclusions that could then be couched in diplomatic language and transmitted privately to key policy makers.

To head the US delegation, the Kremlin would draw from the narrow circle of Americans whom it had judged to be agents of influence at the top of the US political beau monde and, at the same time, sympathetic to Moscow’s concerns. It would be led by an individual with long and positive links with the Kremlin. This person would be surrounded with an entourage of other Americans known to be sympathetic to Moscow – the kind of folks Vladimir Lenin once described as “useful bourgeois idiots.

Heading the Russian group would be a kind of comrade general, now in civilian dress, necktie-less, of course. To lend credibility to the Russian delegation and foster an atmosphere of free thinking, several known Russian liberals would also be included, but without bringing them in on the project’s core purpose. \

Guided by these considerations, the organizers at the FSB’s headquarters in Lubianka named Army General Viacheslav Trubnikov, director of the foreign intelligence service, to head the Russian team; and Thomas Graham, former senior director for Russia on the National Security Council staff, to head the US “experts.” One of their early meetings took place on the Finnish island of Boisto, halfway between Helsinki and the Russian border, in June, 2014.

This session gave rise to the conceptual contours of the Minsk Accords, which Washington and Moscow jointly imposed on Ukraine. This agreement was nothing less than a modern version of the infamous Molotov-Ribbentrop pact of 1939, which specified Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin’s future spheres of control. Falling into line, Putin’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sergei Lavrov, would assert eight times that “we shall never allow Ukraine to get off the hook of the Minsk Accords.”

Graham and his group then briefed Jake Sullivan, US President Joe Biden’s director of the National Security Council, on the results of the meeting and on the working group’s further plans. We note that, for three months, the NSC maintained a stoic silence on the meeting’s existence and the group’s activities.

A denial finally came on July 27. On that day, the Moscow Times published an extensive interview with an “anonymous” head of the US negotiating group, who was visiting Moscow. The lengthy article was entitled “Former US Official Shares Details of Secret ‘Track 1.5’ Diplomacy with Moscow.” It featured an extended interview with the leader of America’s unorthodox team of self-styled diplomats. Though not identified by name, Thomas Graham waxed eloquent:

“They don’t know how to define victory or defeat. In fact, some of the elites to whom we spoke had never wanted the war in the first place, even saying it had been a complete mistake.

“But now they’re at war — suffering a humiliating defeat is not an option for these guys.”

Graham added: “It was here that we made clear that the US was prepared to work constructively with Russian national security concerns.” In doing so, he broke from the official US line of squeezing Russia financially and isolating it internationally so as to prevent it from continuing its war against Ukraine.

“An attempt to isolate and cripple Russia to the point of humiliation or collapse would make negotiating almost impossible – we are already seeing this in the reticence from Moscow officials,” Graham said.

“In fact, we emphasized that the US needs, and will continue to need, a strong enough Russia to create stability along its periphery. The US wants a Russia with strategic autonomy in order for the US to advance diplomatic opportunities in Central Asia. We in the US have to recognize that total victory in Europe could harm our interests in other areas of the world. Russian power is not necessarily a bad thing.

“If Russia thought it might lose Crimea,” the former official said, “it would almost certainly resort to [using] tactical nuclear weapons.”

Graham’s readiness to succumb to Putin’s nuclear blackmail is astonishing, but yet more so is his readiness then to propose US policies based on it. Never mind that he was then, and still is, employed by Henry Kissinger, and has no formal relationship with the US government.

Yet he confidently reported to the Russians that Washington would offer to help conduct fair referendums in the Russian-occupied territories of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, in which residents would vote on whether they wished to be part of Ukraine or Russia. That tens of thousands of those residents had already fled or been killed by the Russian army attests either to his ignorance or cynicism, or both.

“The United States has not requested any official or former officials to open a back channel and is not seeking such a channel. Nor are we passing any messages through others. When we say nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine, we mean it.”

Sullivan’s claim that he did not even know about the Track II negotiations with the Kremlin might have been reassuring, except for one problem: he lied. We now know that he had been thoroughly briefed about all the details of the meeting that Graham and his two “useful idiots” held with Lavrov on April 24 in New York.

Finally, the most important thing: The above-mentioned published statements by Graham correspond closely with the concept of the war in Ukraine that both Sullivan and CIA director William Burns had been championing within the US administration for a year and a half. Not once have either of these two officials called for the return of all occupied territories to Ukraine, let alone uttered the words “Victory for Ukraine.”

For them, America’s objective in this major European war is not for Ukraine to win but to assure that Russia is not defeated. Devoted to this goal, they have delayed the delivery to Ukraine of weapons that are essential if it is to achieve a decisive victory, and even for its survival as a state.

Ukrainians are dying today because the Biden administration, paralyzed by the Burns-Sullivan philosophy of appeasement, refuses to act. Is it not high time for Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy to do his job and bring Burns and Sullivan under oath to account for their private and secretive talks with Putin?

About the authors:

Dr. Frederick Starr, a co-founder (with George Kennan and James Billington) of the Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies, is chairman of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute, and has written two dozen books on Russia and the USSR.

Dr. Andrei Piontkovsky is a Russian scientist, political writer and analyst, member of International PEN Club who was forced to leave Russia in 2016. For many years he has been a regular political commentator for the BBC World Service, Radio Liberty, Voice of America. Piontkovsky is the author of several books on the Putin presidency, including Another Look into Putin's Soul and Russian Identity (published by Hudson Institute). In 2017, Piontkovsky was awarded the Andrei Sakharov Prize for “Courage in Journalism.” In 2019, he was recognized by the Algemeiner publication as one of the Top-100 People Positively Influencing Jewish Life.

Published in Staff Publications