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Your guide on what the US elections of 2024 mean for Washington and Le Monde
The writer is director of Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center in Berlin
When Vladimir Putin ordered the large -scale invasion of Ukraine three years ago, it was a moment of the watershed similar to that of September 11. The assault of Russia against its neighbor, although it was in the country’s fragmentary journey in the dark, was not inevitable. Once this happened, however, war has changed the course of history. The perfect storm of the challenges faced by Western leaders is unprecedented in living memory, and managing the relationship with Russia rogue is one of the most consecutive.
Now entering its fourth year, the war has devastated Ukraine, the main victim of an unnecessary horror launched by the Kremlin. Russia is a distant second, but nevertheless war is also a strategic disaster – especially if it is measured in relation to all the peaceful alternative trajectories that the country could have taken. The sad irony is that by invading Ukraine, Putin created long -term security challenges for Russia which did not exist before. Three years ago, it was barely conceivable that Western missiles were fired on military targets in Russia with almost impunity, that a non-nuclear country would occupy a piece of Russian territory, that Finland and Sweden would join ‘NATO, and that Moscow of Moscow a special precious relationship with Germany would be ruined. However, it all happened. In addition, Putin transformed Ukrainians into an armed nation armed with the teeth and to seek means to settle the scores for the atrocities committed by those who called them “brothers”.
Russia has indeed suffered a “strategic defeat”, like the American secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said it in March 2022 while the offensive against kyiv collapsed, humiliating Russia. But forward in 2025, and the image is much worse than the triumphant expectations that many in the West preached to their audiences and the Ukrainians. Russia has absorbed the backhands and, despite the arrow victims and the destroyed equipment, pushes against the beaten Ukrainian army. In addition, the Kremlin has embarked on a military reconstruction. By 2030, his war machine is probably larger and better.
Faced with a tsunami of Western sanctions, the Russian economy had to be in tatters a long time ago. But unlike the USSR, it works on market principles and is managed by capable technocrats. The country is also an important exporter of oil and other products that are difficult to cut completely without disturbing world markets. This, as well as the interested support of China and other non -Western countries, explains both the gradualism of the sanctions as well as the resilience of Russia. Finally, Russian society – atomized before the war – was intimidated by repression, and the also atomized elites gathered around Putin.
Then, in the torsion of the most surprising plot, Putin was lucky with the elections in the United States of Donald Trump, who seeks to end the war and reduce American participation. The war has been on a negative trajectory for some time – at least since the sloppy counter -offensive in 2023 of Ukraine. But Trump’s election worsens the problem. The Kremlin hopes that since it is looking for a rapid agreement, it can also be a dirty business which will simply cease hostilities but will leave Ukraine without credible security guarantees and place it on an implosion path – including by the polarization of presidential elections.
Whatever the unpredictable result of Trump’s diplomatic cavalry burden, one thing is clear: even if firearms in Ukraine are hoped for, and even if Trump raises American sanctions against Russia, the current Kremlin regime will continue to Consider the West as a fatal mortal enemy. Putin’s triumphalism, revenge and the desire to make a mark on Russian history, as well as the blatant lack of checks and counterweights in the Kremlin, will encourage Moscow to start preparing for the next war while intensifying its campaign intimidation against Europe.
Three years ago, Western capitals thought Kyiv would fall in a few days. A combination of courage and ukrainian ingenuity, Russian negligence and Western support avoided this scenario. Ukraine is still standing, Europe has painfully reduced its dependence on Russian raw materials and investments in deterrence were made. But by other measures, the situation of Europeans is worse than at the beginning of 2022. Progress in the upgrading of the industrial defense base remains unequal. The difficult post-housing difficulty has been derailed in many countries by the impact of war, which makes the defense expenses increased to sell hard for voters. More importantly, instead of its traditional role of founding European security, the United States under Trump is itself a source of risk. To top it all, unity inside the EU and in large countries is more fractured. Even if competent road cards such as the Draghi report are written to solve these problems, will there be the political will to follow them?
A problem that the West can and should solve is its vow for shortcuts to defeat Putin and manage the challenge of Russia. The unrealistic expectations of a pure and simple victory, rooted in a blatant lack of perspective with clear eyes, have always been part of the problem. It is time to have a silent and sober conversation on how to mitigate the threats that emanate from Russia in the next decade, and how to prepare for what could come.
