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Russia’s Strategic Defeat: The Case For a Western Alliance

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03/02/2022

Russia’s Strategic Defeat: The Case For a Western Alliance

Three questions to Max Bergmann

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Russia’s Strategic Defeat: The Case For a Western Alliance

Max Bergmann

Senior Fellow at American Progress

Russia’s potential invasion of Ukraine represents a critical junction and unique opportunity for the West, in particular, US-EU relations. In order to apply pressure on Russia’s geopolitical decisions, the US and EU require a cohesive economic and defense strategy - one that will strengthen the transatlantic alliance, and mitigate the EU’s dependency on Russian energy supplies. Max Bergmann, Senior Fellow at American Progress, weighs in on how the US and the EU can strengthen their relationship in order to face the Ukraine crisis and evict corruption from the global economic system.

You recently published a report for the Center for American Progress (CAP) in which you propose several steps that the US should take if Russia were to invade Ukraine. Could you describe the main areas in which both the US and the European Union should be playing a key role in responding to Russia?

Should Russia invade Ukraine, a strong response from the US and the EU is absolutely essential. The key objective of the West should be to turn Russia’s invasion into a strategic defeat for the Kremlin. That will take time and will require a concerted commitment.

The US and Europe have considerable economic levers at their disposal. While there is no silver sanctions bullet, there is much the West can do. In particular, the US and EU should levy sanctions against Russian banks and target Russian sovereign debt. These steps were not taken after Russia’s 2014 invasion, and will significantly impact the Russian economy and force Russia to tap into its reserves. While high energy prices have helped Russia build up its foreign reserves, coping with sanctions and paying for a costly invasion will put immense economic pressure on the Kremlin over time. This will eventually force some tough budgetary choices, such as whether to invest in its military, pay for occupations and other costly geopolitical pursuits, or prop up the domestic economy to maintain political support.

Additionally, it is critical that the US and Europe take steps to bolster European security. For instance, the US, NATO, and the EU should look to finance the modernization of Eastern European militaries, many of whom still operate old Soviet equipment.

It is critical that the US and Europe take steps to bolster European security.

Furthermore, there will need to be a discussion about how to structure European security. Neither the US nor the EU is content with the current arrangement. From the US perspective, despite a $750bn defense budget, the US military is not capable of handling both China and Russia simultaneously. America is simply stretched too thin.

The US therefore needs Europe to become a more capable defense actor. This means not just spending marginally more on defense in pursuit of the "2 percent" goal, but investing in the acquisition of major high-end capabilities. That can likely only be done jointly, by European states working together through the EU.

Unfortunately, the US has long opposed EU defense initiatives, but there is some hope that the US may be open to change. However, for the US to endorse EU defense, the EU needs to come up with some concrete proposals. While France has pushed for "strategic autonomy", it has not clearly articulated what this means in terms of defense. In response to a Russian invasion, the US and France should work together to push the EU to develop a NextGenEU II to invest in high-end defense capabilities, such as air and missile defense assets or transport aircraft, as well as energy investments to accelerate the green transition. These could be controlled and operated by the EU but provided to a lead member state or to NATO in the event of a crisis.

You point out in your report that Russia would be prepared to cut off gas to Europe if sanctions were applied. Since more than 40% of the EU's natural gas is imported from Russia, what solutions could be considered by European countries to be less dependent on Russia for their energy supplies?

This crisis should be a huge wake up call for the EU. For almost a decade, the US has been shouting from the rooftops that EU dependence on Russian gas was a huge liability for the security of Europe. But Berlin didn’t listen and Merkel’s government doubled down on Russian gas with the construction of the Nord Stream II pipeline. The fact that the EU is in this position represents a total failure of the EU to think strategically about its energy security, as well as about geopolitics.

The EU needs to act boldly to address this vulnerability. In the short term, the US and EU are working to surge liquified natural gas (LNG) and gas from other suppliers, but it will be impossible to make up the shortfall. The EU will need to do whatever it can now to surge LNG, stop closing down nuclear power plants, and unfortunately possibly rationing energy usage.

But the EU should also be acting to make sure its energy security can never be threatened again. To do so, the EU needs to act with urgency and engage in war-time like mobilization in order to decarbonize and reduce Russian gas dependence. It is shocking that the European Commission released a "Green Taxonomy" that sees natural gas as central to the EU’s energy future at the very moment that European security is threatened by gas dependence on Russia.

The EU should also be acting to make sure its energy security can never be threatened again.

Instead, the EU should be hurriedly preparing a massive NextGenEU II investment package to accelerate the deployment of clean energy by developing solar units on roofs, erecting windmills, and upgrading transmission lines. This won’t solve Europe’s energy crisis overnight but it could have a real impact fairly quickly, since any reduction in the reliance on Russian gas would increase Europe’s energy security. It is long overdue for Europe’s political leaders to start acting with urgency.

You wrote that the first step in the US response should be to "target and uproot oligarch wealth and influence". Why do you think targeting individuals specifically could apply more pressure on Russian geopolitical decisions?

Targeting the oligarch class could potentially have a significant impact. The oligarch class is a pillar of the Putin regime as well as a major source of Kremlin influence in the West. They are also prime targets as they hold their assets in the West - from the Chelsea football club in London, to condos in Trump properties in Miami, to villas in the south of France. The US, UK, and EU should work together to develop sanctions, seize oligarch assets, and apply visa bans. Such steps will hit oligarchs hard and could also cause a rift within the Putin power structure. While Putin has co-opted the oligarch class and may feel fairly stable politically, it is still very risky for Putin to be at odds with such a rich and powerful segment of Russian society. Oligarchs may consider Putin’s decision to invade as reckless and a sign that things have gone too far, leading to increased internal discord.

But even if there is little internal blowback on the Kremlin, cracking down on corrupt Russian wealth is worth doing in and of itself. It will undermine a key vector for Russian influence and will result in a more transparent financial system.

A Russian invasion of Ukraine will be a catastrophe for Ukraine and incredibly costly for Russia. But if the US and the EU work together, they can not only impose real costs on the Kremlin but can use the crisis to strengthen the transatlantic alliance, accelerate the green transition, and evict corrupt money from our economic system. Should we take those steps, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine will be a strategic disaster for the Kremlin.

Copyright: Kay Nietfeld / POOL / AFP

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