The Russia That Might Have Been

[Uncle Joe]

How Moscow Squandered Its Power and Influence

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Now, Putin has squandered all that. Driven by his growing appetite for power, Russia has been transformed into an authoritarian regime over the past decade, with Russian society and the country’s elite largely unable and unwilling to hinder the process. That transformation is largely responsible for Moscow’s failure to grasp these opportunities and redefine Russia’s world stature. Instead, Putin’s steady accumulation of power transformed a robust foreign-policy-making process, rooted in impartial analysis and interagency deliberations, into an increasingly personalized one. As a result, Putin and his inner circle succumbed to growing paranoia about perceived military threats from the West, and their decisions did not undergo the intellectual and institutional scrutiny they needed. Ultimately, this drove the nation into the strategic and moral catastrophe of its war in Ukraine.

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A DARK AND UNNECESSARY TURN

Against this uniquely favorable backdrop, Russia had a chance to pursue an entirely different foreign policy from the one on which it ultimately embarked. For the first time in its history, Moscow didn’t need to spend the bulk of its precious resources on defending itself against external threats or making a bid for global supremacy. With the end of the Cold War, Russia seemed to be out of the game of seeking global dominance once and for all. It could have focused its foreign policy on one goal: maximizing the prosperity of the Russian people through economic growth while guaranteeing their security at comparatively minimal cost. Given its favorable economic and security relationships, Russia could have evolved into a nation with an economy similar to Canada’s, with a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, a large stockpile of nuclear weapons, and geopolitical neutrality. In short, Russia had the foundations it needed to become a prosperous, confident, secure, and trustworthy major twenty-first century power—a country that could help tackle some of the world’s pressing problems.

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The main reason for Russia’s missed opportunities lies in the choices that Putin and the country’s elites have made over the past two decades, and the direct connection of these choices to Russia’s domestic politics. Concerns about U.S. efforts to impose democracy via “color revolutions” in Georgia and Ukraine fed into Putin’s growing suspicions and hostility toward the West. The decision to center Russia’s prosperity on the state-controlled extraction sector instead of building a diversified economy anchored in the rule of law was also a fateful choice that set Russia on its current course. Over the past decade, Putin and his inner circle gradually suppressed the discussions that had been taking place in society and among the elite about a new, more open Russian state and replaced them with propaganda and imperial nostalgia, which fell on fertile ground following the trauma of the Soviet collapse.

In seeking to define itself as a great power in the twenty-first century, Russia has adopted a contemporary version of the Soviet Union’s Cold War standoff with the United States: only by controlling more territory, confronting the West, and opposing Western security alliances, Moscow has decided, can it assert its power in the world. The contrast with what might have been is hard to overstate. Instead of invading Ukraine, the Russian government could have offered a vision of a secure country with a high degree of strategic autonomy and inclusive economic growth, resulting in Norwegian-level wealth, Japanese-level life expectancy, and science that, among other things, would enable it to be a leading power in addressing climate change and pursuing the next frontiers in space exploration. But such a vision, in addition to being utterly new to Russian strategic culture, would also have required robust state institutions and effective checks and balances, both of which have long been anathema to Putin and his entourage.

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https://www.foreignaffairs.com/ukraine/russia-might-have-been

[Rhiannon12866]

1. I actually visited the USSR back in the late '80s with my grandmother and a peace group she joined

Back then, under Gorbachev, hope was alive with his more progressive policies of glasnost and perestroika, openness and transparency - though the Soviet hardliners were trying to roll them back in the face of Reagan's tough stance towards Russia and Gorbachev at the time. I cannot imagine what the people are facing now with Putin's attempt to recreate the worst days of the USSR, let alone his horrific unprovoked war which has decimated the male population of all ages.

[Wonder Why]

2. There but for the grace of Biden would go we in 2020.