Since 2000 international relations have been dominated by Russian aggressive revisionism under the direction of Putinism. The Cold War was said to be over in 1991, though Russian-Western relations reached new levels of hostility after Vladimir Putin took over.
The West, America in particular, “lost” Russia due to its diplomatic incompetence and Russian brinkmanship. During the presidency of Boris Yeltsin, Russia was amenable to becoming a member of the Western comity of nations, but the door was kept closed. Under Putin’s presidency the worm finally turned, resorting to an increasingly provocative posture, including unlawful practices such as the occupation of land by force in its near abroad, and hostile propaganda.
After the Munich Security Conference on February 10 2007 Putin vented his frustration, declaring that “America’s unilateral and frequently illegitimate actions have made the world a more chaotic place, created new centres of tension and caused human tragedies”. In hindsight, this was his ultimatum to the West, warning of things to come.
After Munich, Russian-Western relations got progressively worse under protests by the former that its legitimate national interests, particularly its national security, were threatened by an expanding and encroaching Nato. This concern spilt over into provocative, unlawful behaviour in the near abroad, particularly in Ukraine, where the war turned into a proxy struggle between Russia and the West.
The West’s worst diplomatic error was that it failed to foresee the catastrophic consequences of turning Russia into an enemy, and particularly being outsmarted by Putin. Knowing Russian diplomatic, military and cultural history would have helped explain and confirm much of his present course of action. It boils down to the fact that he rules like a latter-day tsar, Bolshevik or dictator, with an eye on a place in the pantheon of Russian history.
Russia has largely won the propaganda war, at home and abroad, as it boasts of its historic victories while exploiting the concurrent demand for patriotism and heroism. In most cases the Kremlin has outsmarted the West, restoring its former world prowess and national pride.
After the Munich dressing-down Putin was portrayed in Western media as a neighbourhood bully, and Russia as a “sick society”. But Putin rolled on relentlessly with his propaganda and disinformation campaign. Unlawful territorial piracy continued, seemingly unstoppable and with impunity.
According to some “Sovietologists” Putin has outlived all Western doomsday scenarios, with a new “Putin forever” phenomenon appearing in the Western narrative. American academics Michael Kimmage and Maria Lipman wrote in Foreign Affairs on July 16, under the headline “The Limits of Putin’s Balancing Act”, that “Putin has brought Russia to a point of equilibrium. Russian life can now be soothingly predictable”.
This observation vindicates Kremlin propaganda and would have come to Putin like manna from heaven. The Kremlin has always wanted the West to believe that sanctions have failed hopelessly; that the Russian economy remains unaffected; that Russian society is happy and contented; that European/Nato resistance is in disarray; that Putin’s leadership is unassailable; and that US President Donald Trump is a reliable gatekeeper.
Perceptions like these convey the notion that Putin can virtually walk on water when in fact he is on extremely thin ice (though recently rescued by what he gained from his recent meeting with Trump in Alaska). Verifiable empirical evidence indicates that his time is running out, as Russia’s overextension has reached its limits. New sanctions are in the pipeline, losses of manpower (250,000 casualties since 2024) and materiel in Ukraine have become staggering, and the cost of running an Orwellian police state is increasingly unaffordable.
Russia has by no means won this war, and it is improbable that the long-suffering Russian populace will tolerate the waste and loss of life indefinitely. Putin boasted at the time of the invasion that the war against Ukraine would be “over in a few days”. Yet it drags on, now almost as long as the Soviets’ war against Nazi Germany. It seems the continuation of the war has become the only way Putin can save his authoritarian presidency.
From the first day Putin has routinely been overestimated in the West given his intellectual and leadership deficiencies. His KGB DNA runs deep; essentially he is still a “homo sovieticus”. His brutal Orwellian approach and style are largely based on tsarist and Soviet role models. He will not tolerate opposition, and those who threaten his leadership are brutally eliminated — Alexei Navalny, Boris Nemtsov, Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Yevgeny Prigozhin are just a few examples. Scores of critical journalists have been poisoned or imprisoned, and many have fled the country.
To legitimise this brutality in the eyes of the public Putin has played the patriotism card, extolling Russian greatness and historical achievement, rewriting (and lying about) Russian history to “re-educate” the masses about the Rodina’s greatness, and lamenting what he calls the moral decline and “decadence of the West”, to justify his insane policies.
Most damning is that his image as a conquering hero is largely a product of Western diplomatic incompetence. Until his first Ukrainian land grab early in 2014 the West simply lacked the strategic nous and resolve to stop him in his tracks, even though he had done the same in Georgia, Transnistria, South Ossetia and Syria. Some, like the ever gullible Trump, even expressed gushing admiration for his “crafty leadership” and the warmth of their friendship.
Yeltsin had warned amid the botched putsch of August 19 1991: “You can make a throne of bayonets, but you can’t sit on it for long”, confirming the Shakespearean wisdom: “Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.” Political history, marked by turmoil, revolutions and assassinations, has always played a role in shaping the treacherous Russian political landscape. The question is, can Putin last on his throne of bayonets until 2036, when his time legally runs out?
With his usual bravado Trump boasted during the most recent election campaign that he would “solve the war in Ukraine in one day”. However, after 11 years the war is still on and has stalemated. This is a huge climbdown for Trump and Putin, who has already gone to extremes to achieve his ends. The US made a big mistake by releasing the pressure on Russia at the recent meeting in Alaska, since Putin certainly won’t bring his side of any deal.
For Russia, the downside of its dilemma is formidable. The longer the war lasts, the greater the cost in lives, materiel and money. The war has been a wake-up call to Europe and Nato, alerting them to the consequences of American reticence and a Russian takeover of Ukraine. Europe is now starting to get its act together, Finland and Sweden have both joined Nato, Russia is losing its traditional support elsewhere in its “near abroad” and the Middle East, and it is suffering overextension and war-weariness among its fighters in Ukraine.
Putin is getting weaker and more vulnerable politically, while China — its “eternal friend” — keeps a careful distance. Its final saving grace is an obsequious but unpredictable Trump, and who knows how long that will last?
• Olivier, a former SA ambassador in the Soviet Union, Russia and Kazakhstan, is professor emeritus at the University of Pretoria.
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