Brian M Downing
Western policies can weaken the Russian economy. Speeches and broadcasts can underscore Putin’s accumulation of Romanov-like wealth. The West can also point out problems with his China alignment and the concentration of power in his hands. What comes after him, a smooth succession or years of tumult and vulnerability? These points will resonate in the public, senior officer corps, security bureaus, and business oligarchs, even those presently loyal.
Alignment with China
Putin has rebuilt Russian power prestige since the fall of the Soviet Union. He’s focused on that as doggedly as Peter and later Stalin pursued modernization. All three strongmen were determined to defend Russia from forces to the west.
Putin has aligned with China for economic and geopolitical reasons. He’s selling copious amounts of oil and gas and military gear to Beijing, conducted joint military exercises, and cooperated diplomatically against the US around the world. Russian power has increased, but not nearly as much as China’s has. Russians might well view this with ambivalence or even dismay. Putin is ignoring longstanding conflicts between Russia and China. Over the years Moscow imposed treaties on weak emperors in the Forbidden City, annexed expansive territories, and even fought battles with Chinese troops some only fifty years ago.
Russian generals know all this, so do Chinese counterparts. Russian generals and security figures welcomed the seizure of Ukrainian lands and the construction of bases in Syria and Libya. But they also know that China is large, powerful, and rapidly extending its power into Central Asia – an area that Russians have long seen as their backyard, or Near Abroad.
The generals know well their best troops are in the west, Syria, Africa, and Libya and that the troops along the Near Abroad are not well trained or equipped. The Russian military is based more on Potemkin than Clausewitz.
Generals and subjects alike may come to see their standing in the world as a welcome but brief respite between the collapse of the Soviet Union and the consolidation of a Chinese empire, which Putin is ably assisting.
Concentrated power
Russian greatness rested on stable leadership, whether by tsars or general secretaries or presidents. Tsars decided their successors, though their retinues and senior aristocrats often played roles. In the Soviet era the communist party elite chose the next ruler. There were of course exceptions over the centuries when succession did not go smoothly.
Putin is not establishing his family as hereditary rulers of all the Russias. Nor does he stand at the head of a party organization that will choose a successor. He has killed, exiled, or intimidated rivals and concentrated power in himself. Who will come after him? What will come after him?
Russian history is replete with succession troubles. Ivan IV was succeeded by an inept son, elite intrigue, and foreign invasion. Peter’s death was followed by weaklings and unexplained deaths. Stalin’s death led to a power struggle by lesser figures – Malenkov, Bulganin, Molotov. Khrushchev came out on top but was ousted a few years later. Who remembers the two men who came after Brezhnev?
Putin has almost certainly promoted loyal generals but loyalty does not ensure competence. This was made clear after Stalin’s purges on the late 30s, when the Third Reich tore into Russia and neared Moscow. Less favored generals and midlevel officers know this. They must also fear another Stalin-like purge by an omnipotent autocrat.
Loyal oligarchs atop the country’s businesses must wonder, if not for their country’s sake then for their own, what comes after Putin. Will a chosen successor be accepted and capable? Will the military intervene as the Decembrists did long ago? After Putin, a deluge?
Objectives
Western broadcasts and speeches can focus on and exacerbate concerns inside Russia that today cannot be uttered publicly without fear of consequences. The matters of Putin’s personal wealth, unchecked power, misallocation of state money, disregard for public welfare, deference if not subordination to China, and obliviousness to China’s threat can, in time, become more widely believed – part of a common stock of political knowledge. Note this isn’t disinformation; each point is based on fact or reasoned analysis.
The effort to press these points to the public and elite would not likely bring state collapse. That would cause severe problems of civil conflict, disruption of energy supplies, hardships, Islamist uprisings, and loose nukes. More likely outcomes would be a devolution of power to civil society and the Duma, less confrontation with the West, and greater suspicion toward Chinese power in Central Asia and the Russian Far East.
Tsars and general secretaries that were once loved and respected eventually found themselves disliked and merely feared. Former pillars of the state such as the generals, Church, and security bureaus saw the need for change.
© 2021 Brian M Downing
Brian M Downing is a national security analyst who’s written for outlets across the political spectrum. He studied at Georgetown University and the University of Chicago, and did post-graduate work at Harvard’s Center for International Affairs. Thanks as ever to Susan Ganosellis.