Well, This Is A Nonstarter
By Russia has released a text of a proposed treaty with NATO for security assurances in Europe. It’s short. It’s also not going to happen. The short version is that Vladimir Putin, as he has been saying, wants a sphere of influence in which smaller countries are vassals of the Russian Empire and other major powers agree to stay out.
Russia has been massing troops around Ukraine in a threatening way while claiming that nothing abnormal is happening. Putin has made a few speeches lately that are consistent with this morning’s text. The question is why he feels an urgency to make this happen now.
Does he really believe that NATO is planning an imminent attack on Russia? Does he see NATO and the United States as particularly weak now, with Covid and political dissension? Is it because Germany has a new government and he wants to put them in their place? All of the above, and more?
It’s common for American observers to miss what is much more important to other actors, but Putin’s views are really off the map.*
It’s been clear for a week or so that there may be a way through this by talking. I had envisioned something like the NATO-Russia dialog of the 1990s, in which a role for Russia in European security might be defined. This suggestion is somewhat similar.
I don’t have a lot of time just now and hope to come back to this with a more detailed look at the Russian draft treaty.
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*If you want to complain about Ded Moroz (Father Christmas) and such, please read the next tweet in that thread.
Cross-posted to Nuclear Diner