Category: Daniel Serwer
Stevenson’s army, September 9
– CIA director calls Russian invasion of Ukraine a failure.-
– Fred Kaplan says not to worry about latest Putin announcement.
– North Korea allows preemptive nuclear war.
– WOTR article sees dangers in dual-use technologies.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Turning point, but no timetable
@IAPonomarenko tweets:
This is incredible, folks. Balakliya has been retaken. I think the next main goal is Kupyansk — the key railroad and automobile transportation center between Russia and northern and central Donbas. Sever this GLOC and Russians are in the world of shit.
The Northeast
Russian forces are reportedly collapsing southeast of Kharkiv. Moscow thinned its forces there to prepare for a much-ballyhooed Ukrainian offensive in the south near Kherson. That southern offensive has relied however less on infantry and more on artillery. The Ukrainians apparently kept their infantry in place in Donbas and appear to have snookered the Russians into a serious defeat.
Of course a few nights advances do not make a victory. The Ukrainians will need to be careful not to overextend themselves. Russia still has massive capabilities that have not yet suffered the kind of defeat that would make them turn around and head back to Moscow. Kupyansk and Izyum are close to the Russian border, making it relatively easy for Moscow to reinforce its troops there.
Putin’s hollow defiance
President Putin is still projecting defiance. Yesterday he said:
We haven’t lost anything and we won’t lose anything. The main gain is the strengthening of our sovereignty.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/sep/07/putin-threatens-to-tear-up-fragile-ukraine-grain-deal-in-bellicose-speech
I wonder how the tens of thousands of families of Russians killed and wounded feel about that, not to mention the destruction of a good part of the army, navy, and air force. Russia’s far right bloggers have already foreseen Moscow’s defeat.
The South
The Ukrainians have also made small gains near Kherson, but the big challenge in the south is the fighting near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant:
The Russians are using it to shield military operations. The big risk is that a stray shell from either side could damage non-nuclear electrical or cooling systems at the giant nuclear facility, precipitating a loss of coolant and a meltdown of the fuel within the reactor. Such an event could easily rival or exceed the Chernobyl disaster of 1986, which killed only hundreds because of heroic efforts on the part of the Soviets that would not be possible under today’s conflict conditions.
The IAEA, which now has experts at the power plant, is calling for a demilitarized zone around the plant. Putin isn’t likely to go for that. My guess is the Ukrainians will in due course try to surround it and await Russian withdrawal.
Defeat is certain, timing is not
However the tactical advances of the Ukrainians work out, it has been clear for some time that the Russians have suffered a massive strategic defeat. Their forces and supplies are severely damaged. They may be able to hold on to part of Ukraine when the fighting stops, but they have no capability to populate it or develop it. Their best bet is Crimea, not Donbas, but even that may prove a (Kerch) bridge too far. Unless the Americans and Europeans call a halt, the Ukrainians are likely to make further incremental progress. I might hope the Ukrainians could celebrate their Christmas (January 6) in Luhansk, Donetsk, Mariupol, Kherson, and Sevastopol, but it might not be in 2023.
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Stevenson’s army, September 8
– NYT notes shock waves to global economy.
– A former student who is a China watcher recommends this article on Xi Jinping by a longtime professor at the CCP’s party school.
– NYT notes widely disparate punishments for the few cases of voter fraud.
– Journalist Josh Barro has an interesting explanation for why Biden’s low approval ratings don’t seem to hurt Democrats much.
– SecState Blinken in Kyiv announces more military aid.
– DOD wants military testing facility in Saudi Arabia.
– AP says Retired LTG Flynn is building a political movement.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, September 7
– 538 notes how many election deniers are running for office.
– AP finds policy, other officials as members of Oath Keepers.
– WaPo says Mar-a-Lago documents included information on foreign nuclear capabilities and highly limited access material.
– Putin has a new doctrine about a Russian world. [DPS note: is isn’t new]
– Apple can’t shift production of iphone out of China
– House GOP plans rerun of 1994 tactic
– Despite increase in budget for House pay, Legistorm reports:
85% of representatives haven’t touched their MRA increase, LegiStorm data shows
Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Sept. 6, 2022
Months after an unprecedented increase to the Members’ Representational Allowance, 85% of representatives haven’t used even a dollar of those additional funds, according to a LegiStorm analysis.
In March, Congress authorized a 21 percent increase to the House’s office budgets for the 2022 fiscal year. That increase – the highest since the MRA’s creation in 1996 – gave the average office an extra $317,241 to spend in 2022 year, equivalent to $79,310 per quarter.
For most of Congress, the old funds would have been enough: 85% of representatives disclosed Q1 and Q2 spending at rates that would have been sustainable without any MRA increase.
The MRA increase was intended to bolster staffers salaries in order to attract and retain talent. The average personal office spent just 36.34% of its budget in the first six months of the year, leaving the average office more than $91,000 shy of even touching the increase.
Democrats on average have spent 1.72% more of their office budgets than Republicans, a difference of about $32,500 per office.
The House’s minimum salary of $45,000 per year went into effect on Sept. 1. The extent of staffer pay increases from the new salary floor won’t be clear until the House releases its Q3 expense data in late November.
As Politico reported this morning, the House Select Committee on Modernization of Congress and the House Administration Committee plan to announce a resolution today that includes a reevaluation about how the MRA is calculated.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, September 6
– WOTR has major joint statement by several former SecDefs and CJCSs Background in WaPo.
– WaPo has Tom Ricks op-ed, less worried about civil war.
– Sebastian Mallaby is hopeful about Liz Truss.
– Politco discusses the congressional agenda this month.
– NYT explains where CHIPS money is going.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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The best we can hope for
News from Russia these days is striking:
- Moscow has shut off a main gas supply to Europe, in retaliation for European sanctions responding to the invasion of Ukraine.
- President Putin has approved a new foreign policy based on the “Russian Home” concept, which denies the sovereignty and territorial integrity of neighboring states.
- A Russian court has revoked the license of an independent newspaper (Novaya Gazeta) anad another has condemned a journalist to 22 years in prison for treason.
Fiona Hill and Angela Stent have detailed the distorted understanding of history that drives Putin’s future ambitions. The question remains: what to do about it?
Gas cutoff
Europe has been preparing for a Russian gas cutoff, expected this winter. Germany has had some success in filling stocks and lining up alternative supplies. That may well have triggered the earlier-than-anticipated Russian move. Prices have skyrocked will generate a political backlash in much of Europe, weakening support for Ukraine.
European countries are moving quickly to shore up their energy companies and line up alternative supplies. Germany is restarting coal plants. It can also restart some of its nuclear plants, if need be. American exports of natural gas to Europe are booming, but shipment and delivery capacities are limited. Conservation has already saved a good deal of energy in Europe. Heightened prices will save more.
Russian Home
The Russian Home doctrine is one that imperils all of Russia’s immediate neighbors. It signals that Russia feels entitled not only to protect Russian-speakers living beyond Russia’s borders, but that it is prepared to intervene politically and militarily to protect them from whatever Moscow regards as persecution, real or imagined.
Serbia’s President Vucic treasures a similar doctrine, the Serbian Home, that justifies Belgrade’s interference in Kosovo as well as Bosnia and Herzegovina. No doubt Xi Jinping will come up with a Chinese Home if he feels it required to intervene in Taiwan.
Putin won’t stop interfering in his neighbors’ yards until something stops him. For now that means mainly NATO supplies of equipment and training for the Ukrainians in addition to heightened NATO deployments in the Baltic countries and Poland. Soon it will also mean Swedish and Finnish membership in the Alliance. Moscow has hinted it is ready for negotiations, but only if its conditions are met. The Ukrainians have heard this offer before and appear ready and willing to resist it.
Autocracy 2.0
Russia’s political system has gradually degenerated into an Autocracy 2.0. Putin grudgingly tolerates some individual freedom of speech, but not freedom of the press, freedom of association, or any serious political competition. He distributes economic benefits for the purpose of political control. Moscow tolerates and rewards minorities so long as they remain subservient to centralized power and do its bidding. The leadership of even the once-rebellious Chechens has accepted that bargain.
Putin has wisely left the door open for Russians who don’t like authoritarianism to leave. Hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, have taken advantage of the opportunity since the invasion of Ukraine. Some are political refugees, others economic migrants. There is little sign of dissent from the Ukraine war left inside Russia, though recently stepped-up efforts to recruit much-needed manpower for the army may generate some resistance.
The most committed anti-Putin voice is still Alexei Navalny, who returned to Russia voluntarily in 2021 after German doctors helped him recover from a Moscow poisoning attempt. He is now in solitary confinement in a maximum security prison. But his lawyers and supporters continue his campaign against Putin’s perfidies, in particular corruption and the war in Ukraine.
Not much choice
There really isn’t much choice when it comes to dealing with Putin. Giving in would whet his appetite. Continuing the war in Ukraine will bring lots of economic pain to Europe, Ukraine, and Russia, including a possible nuclear meltdown. But maintaining the West’s robust posture at least opens the possibility that the consequences of aggression will hit Putin at some point. That is the best we can hope for.
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