Alexander Baunov
Carnegie Politika is a digital publication that features unmatched analysis and insight on Russia, Ukraine and the wider region. For nearly a decade, Carnegie Politika has published contributions from members of Carnegie’s global network of scholars and well-known outside contributors and has helped drive important strategic conversations and policy debates.
While the war in Ukraine remains virtually at a standstill, Russia has crossed a new line in Europe. Since the meeting in Anchorage between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his U.S. counterpart Donald Trump, Russia has not only ramped up its attacks on Ukrainian cities, but has also, for the first time, attacked NATO countries in Europe—albeit without casualties.
Judging by his words and actions, Putin drew three conclusions from that summit. First, Trump is not prepared to hand victory to him and end the war solely at Ukraine’s expense. Second, Trump is willing to develop relations with Russia even without an end to the war, although he will not fully restore them until the fighting ends. Third, Trump does not rate Ukraine very highly and will only intervene to save it as a last resort, and not at any cost.
All of this gives Putin ample room for creativity between the current state of affairs and that same last resort. At Russia’s Valdai Discussion Club last week, the Russian leader’s opening remarks were that compared with the past, the new world order is a “creative space.”
To stop the Ukrainians from continuing to put up a fight, Moscow needs to knock Europe out of the game. Since the meeting in Anchorage, Russia has applied itself single-mindedly to this task. After all, in Russia’s calculations, Trump does not like Europe either, is convinced that people who think like him are prevented from coming to power there, and views NATO as a freeloader and the EU as a competitor.
Russia hasn’t only seen an opportunity to turn the screws on Ukraine by scaring Europe away. The very concept of victory has changed. Moscow is now feeling out opportunities to reverse the order: instead of defeating Ukraine and, through it, the collective West, it is seeking to inflict a kind of hybrid military-propaganda defeat on the collective West itself—Europe and NATO—and in that roundabout way, on Ukraine.
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