PUPPET MASTER
How Putin is using Biden to make Russia great again
THE two-hour video tete-atete on Tuesday between President Biden and Russian strongman Vladimir Putin has predictably not borne fruit for America. Biden issued stern warnings about sanctions that were widely celebrated in the American press. But Putin was already well aware of these warnings. The session was, in fact, a hollow exercise in showmanship. And Putin stole the show.
Instead of being a moment for projecting US resolve, the meeting was just another step in Biden’s ongoing, unintentional plan to help Putin make Russia great again by allowing the Russian president to reassert his influence over the nations of the former Soviet Union.
The mere act of Putin having a oneon-one meeting with the US president is a win for Moscow’s spymaster, who craves being perceived as a top dog in global geopolitics. It makes Russia seem on a par with the United States, which it certainly is not.
The call was followed by a terrible blunder. Biden granted Moscow the guarantee that the US will not use force to stop Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
While using force against Russia is a bad idea with respect to Ukraine, which is not part of NATO or a critical US asset, Biden abandoned a valuable tool, the principle of strategic ambiguity. Biden could have kept Putin off balance and unsure of what we would do. But by stating that force was “not on the table,” Biden may have guaranteed that Russia will proceed militarily into Ukraine.
The US president’s threat of sanctions has little effect on the Russians, who have historically endured far worse deprivation than anything US economic measures could inflict on them. For Putin, control of Ukraine is a “red line,” and he will do what he has to in order to maintain it.
Meanwhile, Putin has noticed Biden’s other weaknesses toward Russia. The US president backed completion of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline into Europe, giving Russia a useful spigot to turn on and off in order to force Western Europe to do his bidding. Although the White House reportedly would push Germany to halt the project if Russia attacks Ukraine, Washington is unlikely to sway Berlin, which views Nord Stream 2 in purely commercial terms and has been enjoying a blossoming relationship with
Moscow. And Putin is already ratcheting up the pressure on Europe — which is critically dependent on Russian gas — by colluding with Saudi Arabia on engineering a potential suspension of OPEC’s collective increase in crude oil production. How long will sanctions last when Putin is in charge of heating the homes of the European Union?
And where were the sanctions after cyberattacks earlier this year — likely approved by the Kremlin — stymied our critical infrastructure, including energy reserves and the food supply?
Putin views Biden as weak, and believes his presidency presents a unique window of opportunity. And so, he is working to both intimidate Biden and butter him up.
Last month, Russia conducted two highly consequential weapons tests that served as a direct message to Washington.
On Nov. 29, the Russian navy successfully test-fired a hypersonic cruise missile, which Putin has been touting as capable of piercing the US missile defense umbrella. And a recent antisatellite missile test, in which Russia bashed one of its own defunct spy satellites into smithereens on Nov. 15, was Moscow’s demonstration of intent to cripple America’s warfighting capability, which is critically reliant on space birds for targeting, missile warning and command and control.
In the past year, Putin has “worked” Biden to convince him that Russia and America could be partners. The Kremlin, aided by the Russian press, showered Biden with sweet talk after the virtual meeting. The official statement by the Kremlin noted that “the two presidents reminisced about the alliance between the two countries during the Second World War” and “stressed that such an alliance must serve as an example for today’s framework for the Russo-US relationship and collaboration.”
Putin’s assistant, Yuri Ushakov, called the dialogue “candid and business-like” with “successful” exchanges of compliments and joking around.
As an intelligence operative, skilled at convincing foreign leaders that he has a soul, Putin is manipulating Biden to craft a US-Russian relationship on Moscow’s terms. And as the Biden presidency oversees a diminution of US power, Putin will continue his long-term project of reconstituting the Soviet empire, with Ukraine as the next step.