Putin loses ability to prevent security threats | Mark Galeotti

this regime is still very strong let's let's be aware of that but increasingly brittle it can cope with the day-to-day problems what it doesn't do well and we saw this with the Mutiny is cope with the unexpected crisis and one thing we do know in politics is there will always be a crisis somewhere around the corner now I have no idea if it's going to be next month next year or even God forbid next decade but the point is they will come it'll be you know a collapse of the of the battle lines in Ukraine or Putin's you know falling very ill or economic troubles serious economic troubles at home or whatever else there will be other systemic crisis and I think we are seeing now Putin's regime is less able to deal with that kind of thing than again at any point before his foolish decision to invade Ukraine hello and welcome to Frontline for times radio with Me Kate chabo and today we are talking to a former adviser to the foreign office on Russian foreign and security policy Mark gallotti is a director of the consultancy M intelligence he's a senior associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute and the author of several books about Russia his most recent being Putin's Wars from Chia to Ukraine Mark gallotti good to see you again thanks for coming back to front line um I wanted to start with President Putin's virtual appearances this week at the emergency bricks meeting and the G20 Summit and let's start with the bricks emergency meeting that was convened by South Africa in response to the conflict in Gaza and Putin said there that us unilateralism has wrecked the chances of Peace in the Middle East um it's pretty obvious what he's trying to do here isn't it well he's trying to do two things really one is he needs to basically try and stay on the fence about the conflict itself because on the one hand he well Russia has a fairly good relationship with Israel or at least had one and Putin himself has quite a strong one with Benin nanahu there but on the other hand he can't possibly afford to alienate Iran and even Saudi Arabia so he doesn't want to get into the actually the weeds of who is to blame for what's going on at the moment is it Israel is it Hamas so instead it's a lot easier to blame the big bad United States but also more generally I mean the point he's trying to make is a point he's been hammering home in a lot of his other speeches it is essentially that pretty much every problem in the world is the fault of the United States the United States is trying to impose its will on the entire globe and frankly doing a really bad job of it so he's also using this as a case of saying that the Americans wouldn't let anyone else try and negotiate some kind of a peace in the Middle East and they have messed up it's time they stop doing so and in promoting that that Narrative of the us being the bad guys um The Institute for the study of war is noting a shifting in tone in the way that Putin is talking about the problems the the conflict in Gaza and that he's trying to suggesting that he's trying to undermine uh the United States to portray them as Hypocrites in order to uh stop and and and dilute their condemnation of Russia's invasion of Ukraine do do you think that is the case yes I mean in so many ways this is precisely the international crisis that Putin have been waiting for both genuinely and generally to distract attention from what's happening in Ukraine but also because look Modern War we got to be honest is a very brutal high-intensity process often and so every time we see a picture of let's say a hospital being hit in in the course of the attack the Russians will use that to try and say And yet when they claimed that we hit hospitals they made a big song and dance about it now look we have to be clear that actually there is a genuine difference in the kind of targeting processes used by the Israelis compared with the Russians but the reality often takes second place in propaganda what they are definitely doing is ISA picking on every opportunity they can to try and make it the case that the West are hypocrites when they challenge what Russia is doing in Ukraine but as they present it give Israel a pass in Gaza and do you get a sense that his message his messaging is getting through that people are actually starting to sit up and listen to him from this Summit I think in some ways what this Summit more does is is reflect an existing pattern I don't think it's a suddenly people who have been convinced by Putin and they think good gracious yes I think it's more that what Putin is doing is actually precisely playing to uh in many ways what is quite a widening Rift between what can very crudely be called the global North and the global South there's a lot of people in in the global South who frankly have not been particularly interested in what's going be going on in Ukraine have been very unhappy at the fact that in some ways the West has dragged them in by trying to you know put sanctions on Russian trade and such like and they're sitting there thinking well we want to buy cheat Russian oil we want to be able to buy cheat Russian cereals or whatever um and yet now the Americans are trying to tell us to stop so there is actually a sense of a bit of push back and therefore I think you know what Putin is doing is is calibrating his message quite carefully to present Russia in this respect as in some ways the the advocate of an anti-colonial movement for the 21st century and then at the G20 meeting uh President Putin said about Ukraine we must think about how to stop the tragedy of the war in Ukraine he called it a war and said that by the way Russia had never refused peace talks with Ukraine it was Ukraine that was refusing to I mean what do you make of that it's quite a bit to unpack here it's actually quite interesting I first of all you're absolutely right to pick up on the fact that he actually called it a war now let's not forget that that is technically illegal under Russian law I don't think we're going to see the police coming for Putin any day soon though again he he was trying to basically tread a line between admitting what was happening and spinning it as as well as possible now when he says that we we know we're perfectly willing to talk which is a message that for example his defense minister shyu had said in Beijing a few weeks back and so forth we should realize that there's there's talks and there's talks in some ways the Russians are still at a point where they're willing to listen to the Ukrainian surrender um and you know In fairness if one looks at president zelinsky's own 10-point peace plan it really is an invitation for the Russians to to give in neither side is currently seriously willing to talk but nonetheless look this is Putin trying to sound reasonable trying to sound as if well I had no option but to engage in this this war because I think this this is his problem you know bricks he's talking to a relatively supportive audience skeptically pragmatically but nonetheless broadly supportive supportive G20 is very different and in fact a lot of the G20 members didn't even bother to tune in to his statement I mean I think the only the only European country off hand I think that that listened was Spain now obviously they're going to listen to the reruns and so forth but again symbolically they were saying we don't even want to listen to Putin being involved so you know he's he's trying to make his pitch but when it comes down to it he's not actually offering anything new he's just offering a slightly more moderate tone than in his other statements how much of this is all part of the trajectory by Russia of trying to seek closer cooperation with Iran with North Korea while trying to consolidate its influence in some afrian African countries what do he actually what is his game plan what is he trying to do geopolitically remember that as far as Putin is concerned the war in Ukraine is not about Ukraine it's actually about a much wider geopolitical struggle between Russia and the whole of the unified West essentially run by the United States he I mean again in the in the global South he presents his invasion obscenely enough as an anti-colonial war that basically Ukraine was being used by the Americans to try and force the Russians to bend the knee and Russia push back absolute nonsense but nonetheless particularly in countries whose experience of imperialism has been at the hands of the British or the French or the belgians or the Germans or whoever it's a little bit more compelling but the interesting thing is this none of this is actually winning him friends or to put it in another way Putin has as many friends as he can afford to buy you know the North Koreans they're providing ammunition but they're not providing it as a gift they're selling it to the Russians the Chinese they talk about a friendship with no limits but on the other hand they're certainly not willing to get involved in direct confrontation with the West they're not providing Putin with any direct military equipment or the like And So It Goes even Iran Iran which basically because it's under sanctions has leas to lose is happy to sell drones and missiles to the Russians but again it's selling them rather than giving them you know what we're finding is that Russia can't really win friends what Russia can do is mobilize a sort of a broad Consortium of countries that have their own grudges and beefs and problems with the west and take fullest advantage of those how about his tactics at home has he had to change the narrative over the war in Ukraine given the fullscale invasion it really didn't yield the quick capitulation that he expected and it now seems Without End how is he changing or is he changing the way he is messaging at home he certainly has changed and I think this is it it's essentially an attempt to try and spin it to the Russian people as well as this Grand existential struggle and you know it was most evident at the Victory Day Parade earlier this year which is meant to be a moment of sort of national coming together and pride in victory in the second world war and so forth and his speech had nothing Victorious about it it was coin of phrase all about about blood toil tears and sweat he was basically promising them that this is going to be a tough struggle and everyone had to come together that's his message at the moment and it's politically useful in some ways because basically what it says is there's no more half measures you're either Patriot or you're a traitor you've better decide but the point is the evidence we have is that this is not really having much Tru action with the Russian people sure they're not protesting because this is a brutal police state in which if you protest you will be arrested and bad things will happen to you but on the other hand nor is there any evidence really of a sort of a great widespread enthusiasm for the war or a belief that this is indeed something that sort of is really about Russia's survival as a Sovereign Nation so I don't think he's worked out some new line and given that he has elections coming up I mean we can safely say that he's going to win but nonetheless he has has to at least make some kind of show of trying to win over the country I think that really he's just going to be trying to entrench himself and say look I am the candidate who offers you security and not expecting huge amounts of enthusiasm Putin it said has an endless supply of people to Sender the war in Ukraine but how long do you think his military will support him will they tolerate a protracted meat grinding war with no victory in sight no no end in sight with no questions asked well yes is the thing does he actually have that endless supply of of course Russia's population is huge but the point is how coercive how brutal can he afford to be enforcing people into this fight when back in last year September October they launched a wave of mobilizations to actually call people who had done the national service back to the ranks it was massively unpopular you for every one soldier they actually gain for the front two to three young men or middle-aged men in some cases fled the country and it's clear that actually Putin has realized that the more he does this kind of thing the more of a public backlash you'll have and although yes he's got a brutal police date but even brutal police dates ultimately can push their populations to the limit so he's treding to avoid that now at the moment it seems to be that he can because there's enough frankly impoverished Russians who are being offered a lot of money to go and fight and even more money for their families they die and so in in you know the out outlying parts of the Russian Federation where there aren't many economic opportunities at the moment there's still a flow of people going there that's not going to happen forever and so this is going to be the big question is Putin going to take the chance of other waves of mobilization and if so what's the backlash going to be he's clearly scared of this he's clearly put it off until after the elections but that's going to be the question so yeah he he cannot assume that essenti Russians especially since Russians are not really buying into this war the Russians will continue to be happy be fed into the meat grinder especially when there's no real victories in sight how long do you think he can wait out the war then if that is the strategy as many people say I mean I think the question is really how many casualties can he take it's you know I mean in terms of the economy he can certainly last through this coming year the Russian economy is doing surprisingly well in part because the people who manage the Russian economy we have to knowledge much more effective than Russia's generals but also because actually there's a lot of money being spent on tanks and guns and missiles and that means a lot of employment and a lot of money sloshing around the system but it's quite interesting if you look at the 2024 budget which basically about a third of the whole National budget is going on the war effort which is massive but if you dig deeper into the planning assumptions the Ministry of Finance is assuming that in 2025 defense spending will be able to be cut quite dramatically so so in some ways they're they're taking a gamble taking a gamble that basically this year incidentally the year in which Donald Trump is likely to be standing for American election will be the year in which they can if not win but essentially have made the decisive moves towards winning and that then things will get better so I think both in terms of Manpower and in terms of the economy this coming year Putin's okay but then the real problems are likely to come in so so are you saying that the Russian are Russians are then gambling that the war will be over by 2025 over or well on the way to being one and of course quite what over means you know there's no clear sense of Victory I mean I think Putin's assumptions that he could one day control all of Ukraine I think he must even Putin must have realize that that's not going to happen but something that he can call a victory which probably means control of Southeastern Ukraine and some kind of an ugly harsh peace treaty with Ukraine that forces it to remain neutral something like that I think I think the Russians are still hoping that they can pull out of this something you mentioned before about the the numbers of casualties that the Russians are suffering I mean those numbers are very hard to establish for anybody um and and the fact that um that families are being offered uh soldiers are being offered huge money uh to actually go and fight is an incentive but in the same time the compensation that you alluded to I mean for some families um they cannot even find out or establish that their loved ones who don't come back have died because they've just disappeared and they're not getting the compensation there and there seems to be a growing uh sense of um demonstration against this because we've had we've had we have had demonstrations this week against the treatment of soldiers the fact they're not rotating coming home do you think that is something that is going to build is that voice going to get stronger uh pretty much undoubtedly look at the moment the authorities are doing everything they can to prevent there being some kind of a movement and that means a lot of of you know slight of hand precisely people who whose bodies have not been recovered are sort of down as missing in action or or whatever or even in there's even been cases where people who are killed on the front line are actually put down as having deserted um but at the same time you've also got the fact that look this is this one thing that Putin's Russia does very well it's to be a brutal and authoritarian police state so we are seeing particularly the Federal Security Service the FSB which is the main sort of essor really to the old KGB doing a lot of work trying to stop people from making a fuss they have this process which they inherited from the Soviets of what sounds bizarre when it's translated of what they call prophylactic chats which is essentially where if you're starting to kick up a bit of a fuss you'll be invited in for a conversation by some genial or not so genial Captain major or colonel in the FSB who will just simply you know talk to you a bit and you know how are things going I know I hear your kids kids can planning on going to University and so forth no explicit threats but making it clear we're on to you we're watching you and by mentioning for example your family we could reach out and cause trouble for them so things like that and they can help keep the lid on for quite some time look I did my doctorate back in the time of when we looking at the Soviet war in Afghanistan back at the very end of the Soviet era and the thing that struck me was that in those days the Soviet Union the Soviet state was able to keep lid on what was happening in Afghanistan for several years but of course that was in the pre- internet age now things are moving so much more quickly we're beginning to see precisely people being aware of oh gosh there's someone else in this the next the next street also had a you know a soldier who didn't come back from the war you know beginning to realize it's a critical mass beginning to find ways of actually connecting with each other over social media and so forth and beginning to as you say protest and if we take the last point this uh recent protest we saw in Moscow as I understand it Moscow mayor Saban who's been treading a fine line you know he needs to show that he's supportive of the state but he's clearly not very happy with the war himself um he had the opportunity to close down the square on which they were meeting some some some suggestions were made well basically we just dig up the square claim we're you know replacing paving stones or whatever he didn't do that he let the protest go ahead so we're already beginning to see signs of people even within the system who are not going to encourage the protest don't necessarily want to get in front of them it's interesting and you mentioned earlier the presidential elections in Russia next year um just wanted to ask you about this this dramatic move ahead of those elections this new candidate who's thrown his hat into the ring issuing a statement of his intention to do so from jail um can you tell us a bit more about this man eigor girkin who is he exactly I mean Igor girkin is I mean a a a fascinating character for a war criminal I mean he is an ultr nationalist there's no question about that and he's he's a man who has been involved in or associated with a whole variety of offenses as I said up to including war crimes he went as a volunteer to support the serbs during the Balkan Wars um in the late 90s he then served in the second Chetan War where again his unit was associated with with some really quite terrible abuses of gorillas and and their supporters so no one would necessarily say he's a nice guy but he's exactly the kind of person who one would have thought would have been supportive of the state and he was one of the key people when you know essentially separatists and their Russian backers created this undeclared war in Southeastern Ukraine back in 2014 that in many ways has led to the current conflict he was their defense minister for a while he was behind the shooting down of an airliner the mh17 which killed everyone on board now again there's no suggestion that he knew it was an airline and they they thought shooting down Ukrainian plane but that's no excuse but the point is that increasingly he has become very critical of the Kremlin not because he had a necessarily a problem with the invasion in the first place but because he had a problem with just how damn badly it was being done the incompetence the amateurishness the corruption that was evident and for a long time the Kremlin didn't really know what to do with him because there's a lot of people particularly within the security apparatus who actually agree with him and think that in some ways he's a standup guy because he has been willing to go out there on the front lines and put it put himself In Harm's Way he's not just some armchair General sitting back in Moscow eventually after the the Mutiny by the Vagner mercenaries I think the Kremlin decided he was just too dangerous and put him in prison but the interesting thing is precisely even from in prison waiting trial on extremism charges he's still finding ways to needle the Kremlin he's not going to get on the ticket for the presidential elections there's no way the Kremlin will allow that but the point is this gives him that chance to once again reach out to Russians and say basically you might have thought that it was a choice between Putin and kind of Airy fairy pro-western liberals well no actually there are also people who are opposed to Putin but who are also tough muscular nationalists and that's what really is a problem for Putin because now he's facing opposition from both sides and although the nationalists are few in number to be blunt they're much more highly represented amongst the guys with guns so he wants to unite patriotic forces against Putin How much of a following does he have it's very hard to tell to be honest again that's we can't really rely on opinion polls and and the like I mean his following is is I said small I mean we're talking probably hundreds of thousands rather than Millions but I say I mean on the whole they they come from current and former members of the security apparatus people on whom Putin needs to rely certain number of people within the military but also what's really interesting is we actually recently saw um a situation in which one of the most high-profile leftist opposition figures in Russia Man by the name of Leon rayv who himself has has done time in prison on trumped up political charges but actually saying look you know stov girkin I mean he goes by this sort of code name stov you know this guy girkin he's not one of us but he is genuinely opposed to the the kleptocrats the thieves in the Kremlin so in some ways he ought to be given his chance so you got this weird Alliance of the I would wouldn't say extreme left but certainly the left and extreme right who are kind of in a bizarre Alliance because they're all opposed to Putin and why would he do this from prison I mean he knows he has no chance of getting on the ballot paper what does I mean you you talk about him wanting to undermine and Putin but I mean he know he must know that his life expectancy is pretty short by doing that I mean look it's it's very hard to put yourself in the head of a war criminal I mean I think that the honest answer is this is a guy who I think genuinely believes the things he believes he is angry he feels that Russia has been stolen by people who wrap themselves in the Russian flag but essentially are just interested in themselves in their yachts and in their palaces and such like who are basically driving Russia closer and closer to I can mix my metaphors a cliff Edge and I think from his point of view what do he really got to lose I mean this is a guy who precisely has has been in war zones time and time again has volunteered for war zones I think he sees that he's in really Just Another War Zone and this this Alliance weird Alliance that you you talk about between the left and the right um this fragmentation of the relationship between nationalists the Russian Ministry of defense and the the Kremlin do you think this could be the start of something that poses a real risk to Vladimir Putin look my view is that if Putin is ever ousted and if it's not that he dies in office or whatever it's not going to come from the streets and it's not going to come from the Liberals I mean the the Liberals have been basically they're either behind bars or they've been pushed out of the country the streets are still heavily so basically controlled it's going to come from a coup from within his own system now I'm I'm not suggesting for a moment that we're anywhere near there yet but we are beginning to see the signs that even the people who Once Upon a Time were Putin's most fervent supporters um and even look people I knew and ever since June of last year I've been barred from Russia but when I when I could I travel there a lot and I often try to talk to the people who Western Scholars don't usually talk to precisely the these unpleasant figures within the the apparatus of the security machine and you know I I I knew that even then there were people who Once Upon a Time were fervent putins but really feel that you know he's let them down and I think this is this is accelerating and we saw this with the the Vagner Mutiny in which you didn't get many troops joining the Mutiny but what you also saw was a huge majority of of the security apparatus in the Army were not willing to try and stop it either they just kind of looked the other way and decided well we'll just wait and see what happens you if that was a vote of confidence in Putin on the whole they abstained and that's I think a really important change it's one thing that you know Putin's been in power directly and indirectly for 23 years and really until about the last year or so we could say that if all else failed he had the security apparatus behind him we're beginning to reach a point where that might not be true so is it just a matter of time then well all authoritarian regimes fall that's the kind of the comfort of history but I mean I what I think we're in the position is look this regime is still very strong let's let's be aware of that but increasingly brittle it can cope with the day-to-day problems what it doesn't do well and we saw this with the Mutiny is cope with the unexpected crisis and one thing we do know in politics is there will always be a crisis somewhere around the corner now I have no idea if it's going to be next month next year or even God forbid next decade but the point is there will come it'll be you know a collapse of the of the battle lines in Ukraine or Putin's you know falling very ill or economic troubles serious economic troubles at home or whatever else there will be other systemic crises and I think we are seeing now Putin's regime is less able to deal with that kind of thing then again at any point before his foolish decision to invade Ukraine we can't ignore uh the anniversaries of the orange and Maiden uh Revolutions in Ukraine this week marked with International visits by the US defense secretary and the German defense minister both uh saying they will commit more money to supporting Ukraine both of these uprisings um attempts to break away from the Russian influence and interference in Ukraine and again at the G20 Summit Putin says people who are shocked at the war in Ukraine should be instead shocked by what he described as a bloody Revolution back then which led to Ukraine turning against its own peoples it's a very convenient rewriting of History isn't it yes I mean Putin has always tried to present the the revolution of dignity the maidan um as not just a coup but actually a western coup I mean the number of times he has alluded to the fact that essentially this was created by the CIA or indeed actually MI6 it's worth noting the degree to which we we always play a role in these things as being sort of somehow behind all the misfortunes that that Beall Russia you know as far as he's concerned essentially this was not a natural and organic Rising within Ukraine itself against a thoroughly thoroughly corrupt government which was also trying to deny them the opportunity of getting closer to the West no as far as he's concerned this was all some kind of plot to effectively steal Ukraine from Russia's rightful sphere of influence because this is the thing Putin still does not really believe Ukraine as a country he doesn't believe the ukrainians are a people and you know he's written lengthy tedious essays about this so his point of view Ukraine's only real place in the world is as part of Russia's sphere of influence and anyone who tries to do that do do anything against that is essentially going against the natural order so it's politically convenient for him to rewrite history that way but I think it also reflects what he genuinely believes however wrongly and do you think the Russian public believe what he says as well did did they actually buy this version of History it's a difficult one to answer on the one hand look I think most Russians do see ukrainians as kind of part of the same family in a way the the question is we're not quite no one's quite sure if it's brother or cousin you know there clearly is kinship and let's be honest it's true I mean the Ukrainian and Russian peoples have been intertwined over centuries of common history and as a result you might say if they're told that essentially the West is trying to steal Ukraine there is a natural push back on the other hand what is clear is that especially if you think of of younger Russians people who were were born or at least sort of you know have most of their experiences since 1991 the end of which is when Ukraine actually became an independent country I think they basically have internalized the idea that that Russia is a different country from Ukraine so I think this is a generally a generational issue and of course the interesting thing is that the soldiers who are being expected to go and fight are increasingly going to be drawn from that post 1991 generation whereas the pensioners who vote for Putin are still of that view that of course you Ukraine is just bit of Russia really um we started uh by mentioning Putin's comments at that emergency bricks meeting um when the conflict between Israel and Hamas broke out it was supposed supposed that Vladimir Putin would would see this as an opportunity he's taking that opportunity he's maneuvering to try and use the instability in the Middle East to his Advantage where do you think how far do you think he's trying to take this I think there was a danger with this in terms of Putin Putin is not a chess player he does not work out six moves to Checkmate or whatever he is opportunist other metaphor he a judo fighter you know it's it's all about grabbing the opportunity of the moment and sometimes you're going to make a mistake when you do that and sometimes it'll work out really well so I think this is what he I I think you know basically as regards the Middle East he will try and spin it the best he can he will I mean I don't think he's going to get involved on one side or the other I mean although sort of rhetorically they're more close to Hamas than than Israel but basically he's sitting back and seeing what the opportunities are going to be and particularly you know if if essentially Israel is forced to pull back from from Gaza which it seems unlikely but is not inconceivable he will spin this as American proxy Israel loses especially in the Arab world and in in the global South if on the other hand Israel goes further in we will inevitably see other cases of people criticizing Israel for its conduct and such like and and Putin will be able to say again look at these Hypocrites especially in Europe look at these Hypocrites who criticize us for allegedly committing atrocities in Ukraine but now we see what's going on in Israel and they they're doing nothing so again I I think he will just take the momentary opportunities he doesn't really have much opportunity to actually change what's going on in the ground but he can try and spin what happens and so so just briefly um to conclude mark um how do you think the next year will look what events can we expect in Russia I mean we've got the presidential election coming obviously what do you think will be uh the events will unfold that we we should look out for I mean the two key things is one is see if the economy manages to avoid overheating inflation is high interest rates are high and the second one is the elections yes of course Putin's going to win but they're going to have to rig them a lot to get the result they want is there going to be a popular back backlash from that so that's what I'm watching next you've been watching Frontline for times radio with me K jao you can subscribe now to support us or listen to times radio or go to the times.co.uk my thanks to today's producers Morgan berdick and to Lou Sykes and to you for watching bye-bye for now

Channel: Times Radio

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Keywords: ukraine, russia ukraine war, ukraine war, russia ukraine, war in ukraine, russia vs ukraine war update, russia vs ukraine, putin ukraine, ukraine russia news, russia ukraine news, russia ukraine war news, putin on ukraine, ukraine counteroffensive, russia ukraine conflict explained, ukraine troops, russia ukraine conflict, russia war ukraine, east ukraine, wagner group, russia ukraine war live, ukraine military, us supports putin coup plan, mark galeotti, times radio

Id: mNvPQBJSVTk

Length: 32min 53sec (1973 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 24 2023