How the West called Putin’s bluff
No one doubts Russia’s ability to cause disruption, but a broader campaign to contain Moscow is underway
If the Syrian air strikes have taught us anything, it is that, when it comes to defending the Bashar Al Assad regime, Russia is little more than a paper tiger. Only a few days ago, Kremlin was trying to make everyone believe that any western military intervention in Syria would provoke Armageddon. It was certainly a message the BBC was readily prepared to take on board, with its news bulletins giving dire warnings that the Third World War was about to break out.
And yet, here we are, with the United States, Britain and France having successfully completed their mission to disrupt the Al Assad regime’s chemical weapons infrastructure, and the Russians have hardly fired a serious shot in anger.
The make-believe world of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s Kremlin would, of course, still like us to believe otherwise, claiming that its air defence systems managed to shoot down the majority of the 100 or so missiles fired at the Al Assad regime in the early hours of last Saturday morning. But even this canard bit the dust after Al Assad loyalists unhelpfully provided the media with pictures of the various sites the air strikes had reduced to rubble.
Nor were Moscow’s dire warnings of unforeseen military consequences the only blatant lies emanating from the Kremlin. In a pathetic attempt to distance themselves from accusations of involvement in chemical weapons, the Russians tried to suggest that the British authorities were responsible for the Salisbury poisoning. When that failed, they claimed British intelligence had arranged the chemical weapons attack on rebel-held positions in the Damascus suburb of Douma.
Sadly for the Russians, no one gave these claims a second thought. Despite putting their propaganda machine into overdrive to prevent the air strikes, the Russians failed miserably. Instead, the West called the Kremlin’s bluff, and now Putin and his cronies have made themselves a global laughing stock.
British Prime Minister Theresa May and Britain’s Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, who has played a prominent role in justifying the United Kingdom Government’s stance on Syria, deserve credit for not succumbing to the Kremlin’s propaganda onslaught, and sticking to their guns by holding the Al Assad regime to account for using banned munitions on Syrian civilians.
But just because the West has succeeded in humiliating the Russians over their ludicrous posturing on Syria does not mean one can discount the threat they pose in other spheres.
Resorting to less conventional means
Putin may have failed in his clumsy quest to protect his Syrian ally in Damascus, but he remains committed to undermining the West by any means possible. And if, as recent events in the eastern Mediterranean have demonstrated, the Russians are no match for the West’s superior military firepower, Putin will simply revert to resorting to less conventional means, such as cyberwarfare.
Soon after the Syria air strikes, the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre issued a warning that the threat of a crippling cyberattack from Russia was now at its “highest possible level”. In the immediate aftermath of the attacks, the Kremlin authorised an increase in its bot-fuelled fake news campaign, spreading stories like the one alleging that the Russians had shot down Britain’s missiles. Officials warned this was a sign Moscow was preparing for a sustained cyberattack on Britain’s critical infrastructure, including energy networks, the emergency services and the armed forces. No one doubts Russia’s ability to cause such disruption. They have already targeted a number of European institutions, ranging from the National Health Service in the UK to the Bundestag (the German parliament) in Berlin.
The problem the Russians face, though, is not just that Europe and the United States have improved their ability to detect and defend themselves against such attacks. They have also developed their own offensive capabilities which — I’m told on very good authority — could cause widespread devastation throughout Russia.
Let us hope that, as with Syria, the Kremlin, for all its bluster, has no interest in a confrontation with the West that would cause the Russians far more harm. Washington has already taken measures to isolate Russia’s access to the West by imposing punitive sanctions against oligarchs deemed to be close allies of Putin. Britain, by contrast, has still to address the issue of whether to take action against oligarchs like Oleg Deripaska, whose energy company En+ was allowed to float on the London Stock Exchange at the end of last year.
The limited military intervention against the Al Assad regime may have drawn to a close, but there is still no end in sight to the broader campaign to contain the threat posed by states like Syria and Russia.