US-Russian Showdown Brewing? Navalny Is Not The Issue

 

The strategic situation vis a vis Russia is entering a dangerous phase. Historically, Russia has on many occasions made a strategic move against the West as a provocation or test of a new Administration's resolve, posture, reaction time, and unity. I posted a Blog article on this early last week.

https://therosenreport.blogspot.com/2021/01/putins-arrest-of-navalny-typical.html

Additionally, Putin has a growing internal crisis due to the combination of the pandemic, Western economic sanctions, and outraged popular opposition to the corruption of his regime, including emphatically the vast stolen personal wealth of Putin himself. These factors are fueling the growth of the democracy movement in Russia and support for Navalny.

Putin has expressed the view that Navalny is an agent of Western intelligence agencies bent on destabilizing Russia. Given the nine century long history of repeated invasions of "Mother Russia", his paranoia is understandable and has been a hallmark of Russia's leadership over many years. And he is not entirely wrong. (a brief history of which I wrote here, in November of 2019)

https://therosenreport.blogspot.com/2019/11/czar-vladimir-terrible.html

Putin has committed crimes against the US which have verged upon acts of war in recent years.  Of course there was election interference in 2016 and 2020, massive hacking, and covert support for right-wing white supremacist terrorism here and in Europe. The difficulty for the Biden administration is that in confronting the Russians on any one of these matters, it will soon degenerate into a "tit for tat", in which their diplomats will in turn produce evidence that the US has been engaged in similar activities against Russia.

The immediate danger is that if the mass demonstrations and arrests in Russia escalate significantly, the Putin regime might feel compelled to launch a military move somewhere, both as a distraction, and to also serve as pretext for a huge domestic crackdown in the name of national security and unity, as he did upon being appointed Prime Minister by Boris Yeltsin 20 years ago when his first order of business was to launch the 2nd Chechen War to consolidate power. (Background here)

https://therosenreport.blogspot.com/2020/07/the-dirty-dirty-secret-of-how-putin.html

He needs the whip of a external national crisis to implement emergency measures domestically and decapitate the opposition leadership. And he is aware that the new US Administration has its hands full with the pandemic, Trump instigated domestic conflict, and a degree of disarray thanks to the Trump/GOP sabotage of a smooth transition.

The big question is where? Poland, Ukraine again, Latvia, Nagorno-Karabakh? And on what scale? The US must convey to Putin that if he does not wish to be hit with far more draconian sanctions that he needs to stand down. Rather than trying to back him into a corner however, the offer of partial lifting of sanctions in the next half year could be put on the table. Additionally, after a probationary period of good behavior, rejoining the G-8 would also be up for discussion.

But it is vital that Putin be forewarned that the US is on alert, and that any strategic moves by Putin outside of the Russian Federation will be unacceptable, and will meet commensurate retaliation that will serve to isolate Russia further internationally, including steps taken to cut off Russia's markets for their energy exports.

Putin needs to know that we are no longer the United States of Trump, and that since our new President is not going to be his "Sub", who is leveraged by "kompromat", he'd be wise to think twice before doing anything destabilizing.

First and foremost, the US needs to negotiate with Russia the most critical areas of mutual need and interest, such as extending the START Treaty. That is a beginning. We can engage with them on climate science and space cooperation. We can even expand US-Russian scientific cooperation through a new joint task force on dealing with future pandemics. There are areas of policy in which a certain cooling off can occur, and gradual building of a measure of trust which is sufficient to reverse a further free fall in our relations, which is in no nation's interest.

There should be an understanding that as part of a "reset" in US Russian relations, that Putin will respect the legitimacy of Russia's democracy movement, and make needed reforms to fight corruption. The Biden administration can signal that we are doing likewise, by prosecuting the organizers of the January 6th coup plot, and by cleaning up the Trump organized crime family and their legacy of kleptocracy and dirty money. (Putin will appreciate the irony of that offer)

These are broad brush outlines of a way to address Russian-US relations, not a formula. What we don't need is some grouping in Biden's team going off the rails in launching "Cold War II." (Beware Victoria Nuland and Susan Rice) What we do need is for the Biden administration to deliver a clear message that we are not going to allow domestic division to disrupt our national security posture, and that Russia should take no liberties. There are many ways to deliver that message. After all, the transcripts of Trump's phone calls with Putin archived on the White House secret server are likely backed up, somewhere. It would be very very bad for Putin if any of those files were to pop up, just like magic.

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A Postscript, 13 Months Later-

February 26, 2022

**What I Saw From The Outside One Year Ago--

I posted this forecast and assessment (above) on January 24, 2021. The comments here today are a kind of postscript companion piece which I've included in this archived Blog version for sharing. 

My assessment then was that with Putin's decision to jail Navalny, he was making a statement of intent which foretold of Russia launching a strategic military move within the year as a test of the new incoming Administration, which it now has. I documented the repeated history of such Russian provocations over the last Century, including the Cuba and Berlin crises thrown at JFK in his first year or two.

I wrote two dozen articles on Putin's growing hostility, driven in part by desperation, given that he miscalculated badly on a second Trump term, and was humiliated when his FSB turned in an "amateur hour" performance in bungling the great "Novichok underwear caper" attempt at a Navalny assassination, even to the point of leaving a forensic trail directly to "The Boss" as documented by CNN and Bellingcat. 

A combination of factors, the defeat of Trump, the Pandemic, the support of 90% of Ukrainians to align with the West, the economic effects of the pre-existing sanctions on Russia, the emergence of an authentic Russian "anti-corruption" movement, and Putin's revanchism driven paranoia and arrogance, all pointed toward the crisis we have now. 

My intent is not to be a "Biden critic," or imply that we, the US somehow invited this action by Putin through some failure of vision or misconduct. It is to reiterate that strategically right now Putin is deploying to unleash maximum chaos and division inside the US. That is his end game, it is why he interfered in our elections twice on behalf of Donald Trump, and why he is still trying to orchestrate right vs left civil conflict through playing a number of his manipulated or compromised assets.

He justifies his authoritarian actions in Russia with the claim that Navalny is a Western intelligence agent bent on destabilizing Russia and bringing about regime change. Therefore in an effusion of Fox News like "whataboutism" he defends his operations as "tit for tat" for what we did to him. (You can see why he and Trump get along so well).  Likewise he has made the equally false claim that the Ukrainian government of Zelenskyy is Nazi, and Russians in Ukraine are the victims of genocide. 

There has been an eight year long partisan conflict in the Eastern region of Ukraine. Yes, there are fascist militias (The Azov group) joining in the fighting. But much of Putin's propaganda is indeed rooted in Russian false flag operations and disinformation, using irregulars (and Wagner Group mercenaries) trained in Russia to carry out fabricated provocations against Russians, giving Putin his excuse to move in as has been made clear recently by the White House. 

My purpose in reposting this year old piece is to help people to rise above the agonizing and tragic reports of war news, heart rending as it is, in order to look at the dynamics from above which caused it. This is how we the citizens can understand more fully just what it is that we can do. 

Hours after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, President Roosevelt ordered his Commanders to organize a counterattack on the Japanese mainland, saying with deep emotion that the American people wanted and needed us to "hit back". This evolved into the near suicide mission which we know today as "The Doolittle Raids". These were successful but not decisive at all and mainly symbolic in its effect. 

Our efforts to "hit back" at Putin should by no means be confined to financial sanctions against Putin, Russian officials, companies and Oligarchs. 

We should hit back at Putin's Western "Fifth column." Joe Biden and Merrick Garland must commence a full deployment of presidential power against the entity which we now know as "The Insurrection". They are responsible for enabling Putin, and the blood of Ukrainians is on their hands, not Joe Biden's. Donald Trump's partnership with Putin let this "Joker" out of the box, this thing which has both unleashed bloody violence at our Capitol, and empowered Vladimir Putin to attack US and NATO interests. Trump's MAGA movement is Putin's asymmetric warfare capability, and this is what needs to be disabled and scattered to the four winds. Anything else will be a waste of our energy, and our remaining valuable time.