The Red Line: Belarus: The Next Crimea?

 Since 1994 Belarus has been ruled by Alexander Lukashenko, often dubbed Europe's last dictator. 2020 though brought a brand new wave of protests and Lukashenko's position in power has become somewhat shaky, and he is beginning to outlive his usefulness to the Kremlin. Will the Kremlin fight to keep him there, or place someone else on the throne? Is there a future for Belarus in the West?

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Deutsche Welle: Russia removes Vladimir Putin mosaic from military church

An image of the mosaic, which showed Putin alongside Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, was first made public in Russian media last week. While the Kremlin has not publicly commented on the mosaic, the decision to remove it apparently came from Putin himself.

Bishop Stefan of the church in question denied reports that the mosaic had been dismantled, but told Russian media that it had indeed been removed from display "in accordance with the wish of the head of state [Putin]." [...]

Meanwhile, Vladimir Legoyda of the Synodal Department for Relations between the church and the media told Russian media that a second mosaic depicting former leader Josef Stalin should also be removed.

"With his name associated with many troubles in the lives of people who can not be crossed out of history," he told Russian radio program Faith, while acknowledging that the featuring of secular figures in churches is not abnormal.

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WorldAffairs: Ukraine Explained

One question at the heart of the impeachment case against Donald Trump is whether the president threatened to withhold US military assistance from Ukraine. In this episode, we explore why the US has been supporting Ukraine in Europe’s only active war and why Ukraine needs help defending itself against Russian aggression. John E. Herbst, Atlantic Council and former US Ambassador to Ukraine, Oxana Shevel, Tufts University, and Simon Ostrovsky, Filmmaker and Journalist at the PBS NewsHour, speak with Ray Suarez.

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The Bell: Romanticism, nostalgia, regret: why are Russians discussing the 1990s?

For much of the last two decades, the 1990s have been used by supporters of President Vladimir Putin as a bogeyman to highlight the contrast with post-2000 stability. But the period still evokes some romanticism: a survey (Rus) released Thursday showed most business people think that, despite the lawlessness and real physical danger, running a business was easier in the 1990s than in the 2010s. [...]

As many as 53 percent of Russians aged between 18 and 24 want to leave the country, according to a survey (Rus) published Tuesday by independent pollster the Levada Center. This is the highest figure in a decade: put simply, more and more young people do not have faith in the path the country is taking. [...]

Everyone worries about their children’s futures and healthcare. But the mood is changing among young people; the post-Crimea annexation euphoria that led to less talk of emigration has definitely passed. And it will be challenging to convince them otherwise: between 2016 and 2018, the number of young people getting their news primarily from tightly controlled state-owned television fell from 75 percent to 42 percent. [...]

It emerged this week that U.S. tech giant Apple has decided to label Crimea as a part of Russia, more than 5 years after the region was annexed. For Russian users in Russia, Apple’s ‘Weather’ and ‘Maps’ apps now show Crimea as being Russian territory — while, for Ukrainians, Crimea remains Ukrainian and for other users around the world it is a disputed territory. The move prompted furious protests from Ukrainian officials, but Apple is following in the footsteps of Google, which made the same switch in March. The changes come after months of negotiations between Apple and Russian Duma deputies.

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Politico: What Putin Got From the Trump-Zelensky Phone Call

Five years on, it’s still a hot war, with Russia constantly pushing forward the line of occupation. Some 1.5 million people have been displaced. The shifting mass of regular and irregular Russian troops in eastern Ukraine — soldiers and mercenaries; “separatist” proxies and militias; a lot of guys with pseudonyms using advanced Russian weaponry that Russia claims must have been bought at the local corner shop (note: it is supplied from Russia) — constantly test and adapt new capabilities, especially electronic warfare capabilities, on the battlefield. [...]

The dirty, confusing, irregular conflict in Ukraine is part of a broader political war waged by the Kremlin. In countless ways, this is the inevitable evolution of Russia’s aggression against its neighbors after Putin paid so little price for invading Georgia in 2008. I worked as an adviser to the Georgian government in the years after that war, and we watched as almost everyone normalized Putin’s behavior, emboldening him to press forward. Now, Russia’s army sniper school has been transferred to the Ukrainian front, training the next generation of elite Russian marksmen by having them pick off Ukrainian soldiers. Soldiers like Baklanova. [...]

Since the annexation of Crimea, there has been a lot of speculation about Putin’s long-term goals for Ukraine and the region, be it rebuilding a kind of Russian empire or disrupting what he views as another empire moving toward his borders. But in the near term, Putin knows that pushing for a pro-Kremlin alignment in Ukrainian politics — especially with the war still on — is a waste of effort. Far better to hope for what has succeeded elsewhere along the Russian rim, and in Europe, and in the United States: the sense that it would be nice to get along better with Russia, because it’s exhausting to live under a constant existential threat.

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Foreign Policy: In Ukraine’s Election, Pro-Russian Candidates Can’t Win

In the other 93 percent of Ukraine, however, things have not gone in the Kremlin’s favor. For Ukrainian politicians focused on consolidating their country’s independence and national identity—and that includes Poroshenko and most of the country’s political class—the status quo is tolerable. They would prefer to get Crimea and the Donbass back, yet Russia’s ongoing occupation has its benefits too. In seizing those areas, Russia chopped off the two regions with the least-developed sense of Ukrainian identity. And with them gone, no pro-Russian candidate could win a Ukrainian election. Long gone are the days when candidates such as former President Viktor Yanukovych, who was openly sympathetic to Russia, could win a majority of votes. [...]

It is less clear what Russia is getting from the status quo. The Kremlin has proved willing to bear the costs of occupation, paying for soldiers’ salaries, tolerating the collapse in Russia-Ukraine trade, and putting up with Western sanctions that will persist until Moscow agrees to return the Donbass to Ukrainian control. Why? There are several potential explanations. [...]

Yet Russia’s neighbors do not seem to have gotten the message. Just last year, Armenia tossed out its pro-Russian government, installing a younger crowd that wants better ties with Europe. Fearing blowback, the new Armenian government has insisted that its revolution is not anti-Russia. But the country is tacking closer to the West all the same. [...]

European Union membership for Ukraine is no more likely in the short term. But here, too, the Donbass is not the most important factor. More significant is the EU’s own expansion fatigue. Ukraine, with 44 million people, would be the most populous country to join the EU since Spain joined the then-European Communities in 1986. Integrating countries such as Romania and Bulgaria caused plenty of difficulty. Ukraine is significantly bigger, and it would be significantly harder to integrate. Existing member states aren’t eager to take on that challenge now.

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Politico: Ukraine’s crisis of faith

As the fighting between Ukrainian government forces and Kremlin-backed separatists in the country’s east has dragged on, it’s become increasingly difficult to separate the centuries-old ideological conflict from the ongoing political and military conflict. [...]

With his popularity plummeting ahead of Ukraine’s presidential election in March, Poroshenko likely saw the issue as an opportunity to win back public support. With an independent church, Ukrainians would finally gain “spiritual independence that can be compared to political independence” from Russia, he said in December. [...]

Speaking at a Russian Orthodox Church event alongside Kirill in Moscow last month, Putin doubled down, saying Russia “reserve[s] the right to respond and do everything possible to protect human rights, including freedom of religion.” The thinly veiled threat resonated with officials in Kiev who recalled the Russian leader’s justification for annexing Crimea in 2014 and backing pro-Moscow separatists that same year: defending Russian speakers.[...]

Religious leaders from the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine are quick to point out that the 300 or so churches that have changed allegiances in the past month are a relative drop in the bucket, given there are still some 12,000 to 14,000 Moscow-aligned churches in Ukraine. [...]

Some 5,000 parishes that previously adhered to the two unofficial Ukrainian churches — the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church-Kiev Patriarchate — have also become part of the new independent church. Most are located in Ukraine’s predominantly pro-European west and center, while the Moscow Patriarchate’s influence in strongest in the east and south.

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Politico: Europe’s Russia sanctions are not working

The motives behind the Kremlin’s operation are not mysterious. Moscow is seeking to reinforce its position in the Azov Sea and limit Kiev’s access to Ukraine’s eastern ports. In doing so, the Kremlin appears to be pursuing a similar strategy to what it did in Georgia, where its creeping annexation also took the form of constantly changing “borders” between Georgia and South Ossetia.

Intervening violently in Ukraine also shifts the Russian public’s focus away from domestic politics and back to the war in the east, at a time when Putin’s popularity has dropped to its lowest point since the 2014 annexation of Crimea, following a controversial pension reform. Today, some 58 percent of Russians say they support Putin, down from a 75 percent high last year, according to a recent Levada Centre survey published in October. [...]

Starting in 2016, the EU added another strand to its Russia strategy: selective engagement on issues of common interest. This two-pronged strategy had the double merit of securing political unity — to Moscow’s surprise — among EU member countries, while also arguably preventing the conflict from escalating further. [...]

This political unity will not be a response to violations of the Minsk agreement. It’s become crystal clear over the past few years, in fact, that the Minsk agreement will not be fully implemented. Neither Moscow nor Kiev is likely to budge first in fulfilling their side of the deal. They don’t see the point.

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openDemocracy: Mimetic power: how Russia pretends to be a normal member of the international community

While explaining the concept to Russian diplomats, Putin viewed Russia’s soft power as either diplomacy, or most likely, propaganda that can be made available, or even enhanced or intensified, at will. Soft power, however, according to Joseph Nye’s discussion of the concept, is the pre-existing ability to influence other countries through attraction, with resources of soft power being a nation’s political values, culture and foreign policy. Being a pre-existing ability, soft power differs from an immediate action that, for example, can be a diplomatic action, propaganda effort or humanitarian gesture.[...]

What happened when Moscow realised that it was dramatically failing to use “soft power” to influence Western nations through attraction? Not only after 2014 but even before, they must have realised that the Kremlin’s political values did not match prevailing Western values and that its peculiar international behaviour – no matter how assured they were of its legitimacy and credibility – was one of the reasons for the deterioration of the relations with the West. Russian official diplomacy and public diplomacy can still draw upon what they believe to be Russian high culture as an important resource of soft power, but it has limited value considering the failures that overshadow Russia’s cultural achievements.[...]

Russia’s mimetic power is the ability to influence Western nations by creating the impression that Russia is a normal member of the international community and emulating what pro-Kremlin actors perceive as Western soft power techniques. By presenting Russia as a credible and responsible international partner, Moscow is trying to convince the West – especially following the Ukraine-related escalation of the conflict between the West and Russia – to lift the sanctions, go back to “business as usual”, and ultimately stop any attempts to democratise Russia (Moscow sees the latter as Western attempts to bring about a regime change in Russia). The emulation of perceived Western soft power techniques serves two objectives: first, to contribute to the creation of the image of Russia adapted to the Western normalcy, and, second, to undermine Western resolve to stand up to Moscow’s subversive activities.[...]

For example, Russian officials would regularly slam Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania for allegedly infringing on the rights of Russian-speaking minorities, while Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs would publish a series of “white books” discussing “violations of human rights and the rule of law in Ukraine” at the same time as other Russian agencies send military forces to invade Ukraine. Yet when human rights “go too far”, implying that Moscow fails to wriggle out of particular criticisms, Russian officials have a readymade excuse: Western human rights contradict “the fundamentals of our culture based on Orthodox Christianity”.

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Foreign Affairs: Sanctions on Russia Are Working

This was also a landmark in sanctions history. No economy as big as Russia’s has been subject to major sanctions in recent times. Only the restrictions imposed by the League of Nations on Italy, and by the United States on Japan, before World War II bear comparison. But unlike Italy and Japan back then, Russia is a key supplier of oil and gas to the rest of the world. An embargo on its major exports—a traditional sanctions tool—is all but unthinkable. Designing effective sanctions against such a hard target was a new challenge. 

How have the sanctions fared? Russia has not returned Crimea or withdrawn from Ukraine. Nor has its economy collapsed. But sanctions were never intended to achieve those things. Rather, they were designed for three goals: first, to deter Russia from escalating military aggression; second, to reaffirm international norms and condemn their violation; and third, to encourage Russia to reach a political settlement—specifically, to fully implement the Minsk agreements, which oblige it to observe a cease-fire, withdraw military equipment, and allow Ukraine to restore control over its borders—by increasing the costs of not doing so. [...]

Sanctions have failed only in their most ambitious goal, to nudge Russia toward fulfillment of the Minsk agreements. Russia’s routine violations of the agreements and its other actions, such as its recognition of identity documents issued by the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics within Ukraine, make reaching this goal less likely than ever. Russia is prepared to incur large costs to maintain its influence in Ukraine. [...]

If a critical mass of oligarchs feels its core interests are harmed by Western responses to the Kremlin’s behavior, it may begin to view Putin in a different light. The interests of political power and wealth in Russia will become less aligned than at any time since Putin asserted dominance over oligarchs in his first term, from 2000 to 2004. This will not lead to change today or tomorrow. But as the “2024 question” looms—will Putin leave office as the constitution mandates, and if so, who will succeed him?—tensions between power and money could create an important new force for change, not only on Russia’s actions but also on its governance.

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openDemocracy: How conservative is the Russian regime?

The flip side of this prevailing conservatism is individual self-concern, the priority of private interest over the common good. The sustainability of the government’s conservative rhetoric, combined with market-driven social atomisation, was especially evident during Putin’s previous term as president (2012–2018). This was a period that witnessed the growth of state-promoted nationalism, especially after 2014, when the annexation of Crimea and confrontation with the west dovetailed with the commercialisation of medicine and education, as well as an overall reduction in the Russian state’s obligations to society. The so-called “Crimean majority” (the silent majority of patriotic Russians who rallied around the Kremlin’s foreign policies) was marked by its pride in the revival of “historic” Russia and its ever-growing distrust of specific government institutions. [...]

Despite the authorities’ rhetorical embrace of Russia’s “special path”, the current ideological conjuncture can be fruitfully compared with the neoconservative turn in the west, as exemplified by the policies of Thatcher and Reagan 30 years ago. It was then, during an economic crisis, that the right’s attack on the welfare state took the shape of an authoritarian populism featuring previously incompatible ideological components, such as the appeal to conservative values and the defence of the market’s unlimited sway. Thatcher’s famous adage (“There’s no such thing as society”) directly contradicted the foundations of the conservative worldview, in which society had been a defining category. Thatcherism was a break not only with the previous social democratic consensus, but also with conservative political tradition.[...]

The phase of the Putin regime’s evolution that kicked off in 2012–2014 has thus been marked by simultaneous radicalisation of both halves, neoliberal and conservative, of the ideological symbiosis. At the same time, their discordant unity has acquired an ever more coherent shape in which the idiom of axiological conservatism has served as the natural expression of neoliberal content. Thus, Russia’s unconditional sovereignty and the moral and political unity it imposes on society has been proffered as a necessary condition in the global fight for resources, a fight depicted as a natural extension of the law of competition amongst individuals, while conservatism’s scepticism towards doctrines that limit sovereignty in favour of universal rights has led to the suspicion that all appeals to defend society’s interests are hypocritical.

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Vox: Why Eastern European countries aren’t attacking Trump over NATO

For some countries in Western Europe that belong to NATO, which was created during the Cold War to counter Russian expansion, Trump’s erratic behavior was a step too far. But on the other side of the continent, Eastern Europeans who have historically felt the most threatened by Russia were singing an entirely different tune. From Estonia to Romania, current and former leaders said they saw nothing to fear from Trump’s tough talk on NATO. [...]

More spending on NATO’s defenses has been a goal for many Eastern Europeans since Russia’s invasion of the Republic of Georgia in 2008 and the beginning of Russia’s “shadow war” in Ukraine in 2014, so their support of Trump’s demands in Brussels is nothing new. But more surprising were leaders’ reactions to Trump’s summit with Putin in Helsinki, where Trump failed to challenge Putin on a litany of international offenses, such as his annexation of Crimea in 2014. [...]

Eastern European countries’ worst fears about Russia were finally realized when Russia invaded Georgia in 2008, bringing its prospects of NATO ascension to a grinding halt. But the Russians weren’t finished yet — in 2014, following the Ukrainian revolution in which pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych was overthrown, Putin invaded and annexed Crimea and began to foment a proxy war in Eastern Ukraine between pro-Russian rebels and government forces.  [...]

Trump has personally questioned the need to counter Russia’s expanding regional reach. But his pro-Putin stance remains at odds with that of the State Department, the US military, and the US intelligence community, all of which continue to maintain that Russia is a US rival that needs to be checked.

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Vox: A Russian newspaper editor explains how Putin made Trump his puppet

Mikhail Fishman It is strange. It looks a bit irrational on Trump's part to be sure. Why does he have this strange passion for Putin and Russia? I have to say, I don't believe in the conspiracy theories about "golden showers" and blackmailing. I don't believe it exists and I don't believe it's a factor. But this, admittedly, makes the whole thing that much stranger. [...]

In their habits, they're radically different. Trump is a posturing performer, full of idiotic narcissism. He appears to be a disorganized fool, to be honest. Putin, on the other hand, is calculating, organized, and he plans everything. He also hides much of his personal life in a way that Trump does not.

Then there's also the fact that Putin is so much more experienced than Trump. He has more than 15 years of global political experience. He knows how to do things, how to work the system. He makes plenty of mistakes, but he knows how to think and act. Trump is a total neophyte. He has no experience and doesn't understand how global politics operates. He displays his ignorance every single day. [...]

Mikhail Fishman Because he knew that would mean an extension of Obama's harsh orientation to Russia, perhaps even more aggressive than Obama. Putin has experienced some difficult years since his 2014 invasion of Crimea, but he didn't expect this level of isolation. He saw — and sees — Trump as an opportunity to change the dynamic.Mikhail Fishman Because he knew that would mean an extension of Obama's harsh orientation to Russia, perhaps even more aggressive than Obama. Putin has experienced some difficult years since his 2014 invasion of Crimea, but he didn't expect this level of isolation. He saw — and sees — Trump as an opportunity to change the dynamic. [...]

Mikhail Fishman He didn't believe Trump would win, so he was preparing to sell Clinton's victory as a fraud. And this is part of his broader message across the board, which is that democracy itself is flawed, broken, unjust. Putin actually believes this. He doesn't believe in democracy, and this is the worldview that he basically shares with Trump: that the establishment is corrupt and that the liberal world order is unjust.

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Deutsche Welle: Russia drops Eurovision after Kyiv bans singer

Ukraine, the last year's Eurovision winner, is set to host the competition next month. However, the Ukrainian security services have decided to deny entry to the contestant from Russia, the 27-year-old, wheelchair-bound Yulia Samoylova. The reason, according to Kyiv, is that Samoylova toured Crimea after it was annexed by Russia in 2014.

Last week, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko reaffirmed the ban, saying his country acted consistently towards all who entered Crimea without asking Ukraine's permission. [...]

The rules of the Eurovision Song Contest ban political gestures, and the organizers said they were "deeply disappointed" by the ban. Ukraine might find itself excluded from future Eurovision events if the ban stays in power, the EBU warned.

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Politico: A Russia reset? Maybe not yet

But interviews with more than a dozen officials and experts contacted by POLITICO since the election reveal an unyielding bipartisan and institutional opposition to any perceived effort by Trump to appease Putin. Such a gesture would be met with strong resistance from Congress, European allies, career national security officials and possibly even some key Trump officials. [...]

Trump has also repeatedly expressed admiration for Putin and bragged that the Russian has called him “brilliant” — Putin actually used an adjective closer to “impressive” —leading critics to worry that the New Yorker may be dangerously eager for Putin’s friendship and approval.Many analysts expect that Putin will offer Trump military cooperation against the Islamic State, which has not been a focus of Russian operations in Syria. In return, Putin will seek recognition of Russia’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula; an end to economic sanctions; and reduced U.S. military and political engagement in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. Earlier this month, Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told the Associated Press that a “slow down or withdrawal of NATO’s military potential from our borders” could “lead to a kind of detente in Europe.” [...]

The first obstacle to Trump’s outreach could be within his own circle of top advisers. Vice president-elect Mike Pence derided Putin in an October debate as “small and bullying,” and said that recent “provocations by Russia need to be met with American strength.” Trump’s pick for CIA director, Rep. Mike Pompeo, has called the U.S. response to Putin’s aggression in Ukraine “far too weak.” [...]

Most top Republicans in Congress take a far more hawkish line towards Putin than Trump does. In September, House Speaker Paul Ryan rebuked Trump’s praise of the Russian, calling Putin “an aggressor that does not share our interests.” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said he would send arms to Ukraine’s government and expand U.S. missile defense systems in eastern Europe—moves that would enrage Putin.

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The New York Times: What Russia After Putin?

The map of post-Putin Russia might undergo other changes. The country inherited a complicated federal structure from the Soviet Union: It contains 83 republics, regions and administrative districts — or 85, according to Russian law, including annexed Crimea, which alone counts for two — all of them with different formal rights relative to the government in Moscow. Since Mr. Putin took power in 1999, members of the Russian Federation have lost most of their autonomy: They can no longer elect their governors, and they control only a tiny portion of the taxes collected on their territories. But even as Moscow has exerted ever-greater control, the centrifugal pull on the regions has increased.

Parts of the Far East have forged stronger economic ties with China and South Korea, and Moscow has had to expend both brutal force and extravagant investment to keep Chechnya and other republics of the North Caucasus in line. Participants in October’s Free Russia Forum generally took it as a given that in the event of regime change, Moscow’s relationship with the other 82 regions will have to be renegotiated — and that the chances of those negotiations being peaceful, and of Russia retaining its current borders, were slim. [...]

The transition will require a wide-ranging public discussion. But what will be the language of a post-Putin Russia? That is, where will the Russian words for a new country be found? Key concepts have been distorted by misuse and discredited by decades of Soviet and then Putin-era propaganda. “Democrat” has become an insult; “freedom of speech” is invoked to legitimize hate speech even while people are being jailed for expressing their political views. The corruption of language reflects a general lack of trust in democratic mechanisms and widespread dismissal of democratic values.

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Business Insider: Putin's chaos strategy is coming back to bite him

Over the course of a wide-ranging conversation, it became clear that we agreed on one key characteristic of Vladimir Putin. He called it the “Putin Paradox” and defined it thus: The Russian president’s tactical instincts for how to seize an opportunity are so brilliant, and yet the strategic outcomes are almost invariably disastrous. [...]

Rather, the aim of all of Russia’s election interference was to do two things. First, to weaken Clinton, such that on her inauguration she would be too busy coping with a disgruntled Democratic left, an embittered Republican right, and a divided country in between to devote energy to confronting and toppling Putin. It is too early to be sure, but if anything, the hacks actually seem to be doing the unthinkable and bringing Democrats and mainstream Republicans together in their shared anger at Moscow.

Second, by undermining the very legitimacy of U.S. democracy, Russia’s hacking sought to weaken U.S. legitimacy abroad, dismay its friends, and provide fuel for a global propaganda campaign that, at its heart, tries to convince people not that the Russian system is better than the rest, so much that it isn’t any worse. That propaganda has resonated somewhat, but it is hard to demonstrate that anything the Russians are doing is more damaging than the Trump campaign itself.

But just like the Crimean annexation (which led to sanctions and massive costs to the state treasury), the Donbass adventure (which led to more sanctions and has mired Russia in an expensive, undeclared war), and the Syrian intervention (where Putin backed away from an early withdrawal, leaving him stuck in yet another open-ended war), today’s Russian achievement is poised to become tomorrow’s debilitating disaster. Russians who chortled at the original WikiLeaks revelations and felt sly satisfaction at the havoc created by “their” hackers are now expressing concerns about possible U.S. retaliation and, more importantly, what this will mean for future Russo-American relations. As one bitterly grumbled, “Let’s get used to sanctions until we’re in the grave.”

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The Guardian: Vladimir Putin may believe time is ripe for another invasion

The new Crimea crisis has come from nowhere. Over in the east there have been daily clashes between pro-Russia rebels and Ukrainian government forces in Donestk and Luhansk, with a spike in recent weeks. But the Perekop isthmus, the rustic sliver of territory between Crimea and Ukraine’s southern Kherson province, has been quiet. There was no fighting here even in 2014, when Putin staged his land grab.

All of this leads to the suspicion, voiced by Carl Bildt, Sweden’s former prime minister and others, that Russia may be about to invade again.

When it comes to the month of August, Putin has form. His previous invasions have coincided with Olympic Games, a time when the international community is distracted or on holiday - Georgia in 2008 after Beijing, and Ukraine in 2014 (after the Winter Games in Sochi).

There are other propitious circumstances this summer. The presidential election is paralysing the US, and the Republican candidate, Donald Trump, has hinted that as president he might recognise Russia’s annexation of Crimea. He seems uncertain as to where Ukraine actually is. Europe meanwhile is in disarray in the wake of the Brexit vote and an ongoing migration crisis. [...]

At this point there seem to be three possible scenarios. One is that Putin will try to leverage this latest crisis to persuade EU countries to drop the sanctions imposed over the Ukraine conflict. Another is that he is preparing a limited military incursion, possibly to set up a security corridor, which doubtless would include the electricity station in the nearby Ukrainian city of Kherson. A third is that he is planning something bigger.

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