Putin’s ramblings offer lessons for his successor and managing China

Pundits and commentators gutted the two-hour interview between Tucker Carlson and Vladimir Putin. Any journalistic pretensions Carlson may have had before the interview were shattered. In Leninist terms, he was a “useful fool” and a direct opponent of the Kremlin establishment.

President Putin’s rambling 40-minute speech on why Ukraine is part of Russia was dismissed by Western countries. His repeated rationale for the invasion to reunite Ukraine and Russia, protect Russian-speaking Ukrainians, and destroy the stain of Nazism remained incredible. And he continued to blame the US and NATO for causing the current crisis with Russia.

That said, let’s get rid of the clichés and rhetoric. What can we learn from watching Putin’s two-hour debate? Several points emerge.

Firstly, although President Putin claimed that Russia always stands at the diplomatic high ground and tolerates all the mistakes and misjudgments of the Western countries, the disrespectful disregard for Russia and its interests is clearly the most upsetting for President Putin. It was a problem. The need, and indeed the desire, for respect and recognition was instinctive.

Ironically, while he has admitted to liking George W. Bush and has had good things to say about the former president, most of his provocations against Russia have been focused on the past five expansions of NATO since the collapse of the Soviet Union. It was under the jurisdiction of the Bush administration.

Putin did not mention Bush 43’s abrogation of the Ballistic Missile Treaty, but the list is long. Deploying a missile defense system called Aegis Ashore to NATO Europe was actually an action against Russia against what Putin rejected as a non-existent Iranian threat. That would require a Russian military response, which Putin said brought far more advanced technology than Western countries.

At the 2008 NATO Bucharest summit, President Bush’s unscripted comments pledging the membership of Ukraine and Georgia caused a nervous breakdown for President Putin. That year, Russia occupied part of Georgia in Abkhazia. And in 2014, Russia occupied Crimea after what Putin called a CIA coup to remove Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych. Western countries’ reaction was negative.

The key takeaways from this interview came in the form of two questions and recommendations. First, how many of Putin’s colleagues in the Kremlin actually agree with the president, not as supplicants, but essentially? Second, at some stage Putin will step down. Will his successors share these views?

However, this recommendation is important. Ignorance, amnesia, arrogance, and the belief that the United States is an “indispensable power” have prevented the United States from respecting other nations and treating inferior nations with dignity. Perhaps one reason Donald Trump initially seemed to get along so well with President Vladimir Putin and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un is because as a salesman, he was always concerned with treating customers well. Indeed, dignity and respect may be as important, if not more important, than concrete diplomatic posturing in efforts to ease tensions with China.

For now, it is unclear who will follow Putin and when. However, the line of succession since the founding of the Soviet Union in 1922 may provide some insight. The triumvirate of Lenin, Stalin, Khrushchev, Bulganin and Malenkov was followed by Khrushchev, Brezhnev, Andropov, Chernenko and finally Gorbachev.

Lenin was shot in the head in 1918 and died six years later. Some transition was necessary until Stalin defeated (and later killed) Trotsky. After Stalin’s death, changes continued. Brezhnev had been ill for years, and his successors soon passed away, leaving a clear path for Mikhail Gorbachev.

Despite some reports, Putin appears to be in good health and is 71 years old. The law provides for a succession process, but unless he appoints a successor, as Boris Yeltsin did in 2000, the next president will likely rely on a transition group similar to his successor. Stalin. The difference is that elections are required under the constitution. Only then may a true successor emerge.

What is important is whether the next leader has a worldview similar to President Putin’s. Stalin was probably much more ruthless than Lenin. Interestingly, Khrushchev was a reformer and unsuccessfully tried to shift his spending from national defense to the public sector. Brezhnev and his successors were bureaucrats. And Gorbachev, in his zeal to modernize and reform the Soviet Union, caused it to collapse.

More likely, technocrats and bureaucrats could take over after three decades of Putin’s rule. This could also improve relations with Western countries.

The question is whether Western countries can wait that long. The answer is a resounding no unless the Ukraine war is resolved quickly.

Dr. Harlan Ullman He is a senior advisor to the Atlantic Council and the primary author of the “Shock and Awe” military doctrine. His 12th book, The Fifth Horseman and the New MAD: How Massive Attacks of Disruption Became the Pooming Existential Danger to a Divided Nation and the World at General, is available for purchase on Amazon. X/Twitter: @harlankullman.