We need to talk about post-Putin. It's fruitless at this point to try and come up with names of potential successors -- but maybe we can identify potential archetypes, the kinds of people who might succeed him, depending on the perceived needs of the day.

The Julian Waller article I mention is here.

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The forthcoming release of the updated version of my WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT PUTIN gives me an excuse to consider whether and how Putin has changed since I originally wrote the book in 2018. My conclusion: not so much a different Putin as 'Putin squared.'

In the second half, I discuss and riff off Russia’s Turkish Wars. The Tsarist Army and the Balkan Peoples in the Nineteenth Century by Victor Taki, published by University of Toronto Press.

Sign-up for the Wikistrat webinar I mentioned on 5 November is here.

The Morris/Tickle/Pierce podcast is Russia Unfiltered.

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After a brief comment on the frozen peace process, I look at the case of Sergei Markov, voluble Kremlin loyalist, who has just been declared a Foreign Agents. What's going on - he seems to have been caught by Russia's escalating feud with Azerbaijan - and what does this say about the decay of late Putinism?

In the second half, I consider three recent books and what they say about how we discuss and think about the war in Ukraine. They are:

Colin Freeman, The Mad and the Brave. The Untold Story of Ukraine’s Foreign Legion (Mudlark)

Tom Mutch, The Dogs Of Mariupol (Biteback)

Medea Benjamin & Nicholas Davies, War In Ukraine. Making Sense of a Senseless Conflict, 2nd Ed (OR Books)

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So, surprise, surprise, Putin's standing for re-election. A few thoughts on how it was announced and the vibe around it, before I look at 'Preventing the Next War,' a report from DGAP, the German Council on Foreign Relations, that believes Russia could rearm within 6 years of the end of the war, and that if NATO has not already armed itself to match by then, it would invade. I'm not convinced -- but think it is crucial to have the debate.

The DGAP report is here.

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There's a myth that authoritarian leaders don't have to worry about public politics: arguably they have to worry all the more. Spinning off from the recent bizarre criminalisation of the mythical 'international LGBT movement' and one or more raids on gay clubs, I unpack how I think Putin's political 'offer' to Russians will emerge over the months leading up to presidential elections: social conservatism, a warfighting nation rather than a nation at war, a scapegoated country, but also a 'normal country.'

The Denis Volkov article I mention is here.

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Has hell frozen over? Left Front leading light Leonid Razvozzhaev is backing the inclusion of ultra-nationalist Igor 'Strelkov' Girkin in unofficial 'people's primaries' for presidential opposition candidates. How is the Russian left different from the West's, and why does this make 'red-brown' alliances with the nationalists more plausible and worrying?

And after the break, how some of my writings have been interpreted of some kind of signal of Western willingness to make a deal over Ukraine, and why it's both dangerous and illuminating that every Russian is a closet Kremlinologist.

The article from Top War I discuss is here, my writings in the Sunday Times (for those of you who subscribe) are collected here.

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After looking at a few recent news stories that caught my eye, on everything from the Ministry of Happiness to a surprisingly subversive economic plan, I look at four conventional wisdoms about Putin. He knows what he wants and it never changes. He doesn't have to care about public opinion. He needs the war to go on for ever. He can't be negotiated with. It's not, in my opinion, that they are all outright wrong, but two of them are, and two need more nuance. Without understanding that, we condemn us all to the current status quo so long as Putin is in the Kremlin -- at the very least.

The events I mentioned are at De Balie in Amsterdam on 20 November (details here) and Pushkin House in London on 4 December (details here).

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What can we learn from the ugly anti-Semitic riot at Makhachkala airport? Officially sanctioned, foreign-inspired subversion, a symptom of state failure or societal anti-Semitism? I don't think any of these capture the significance of the incident, but instead it highlights some fundamental challenges for Moscow, and reasons why the North Caucasus is almost uniquely problematic for the regime.

The Moscow Times article by Almut Rochowanski that I mention is here.

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In what sounds more like a scene from Armando Ianucci's Death of Stalin, an anonymous Telegram channel tells us Putin is dead, his body stuffed into deep freeze while Patrushev takes over. Credible? Not really, but that doesn't stop many Western media outlets running with the story. So, why this fascination with Putin's health, why does it matter, and what do I think would happen, if Putin really did die in office?

As a natural follow on, in the second part, I look at PM Mikhail Mishustin's chances of being the successor: his best asset may be his very lack of allies...

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Alexei Navalny has posted a list of 10 questions he thinks all movers and shakers in the Russian (opposition) political scene ought to be asked ahead of the 2024 presidential elections. His questions, and his list of those whom he thinks should answer them, and an interesting bid to remain politically relevant - but also tell us something about his thinking.

On the other end of the political spectrum, uber-hawk Nikolai Patrushev has written an article (available in Russia and a PDF here) which is the best encapsulation yet of his conspiratorial worldview and his idea of how Moscow can assemble a "The Rest vs the West" political coalition. He's wrong.

Two very different men, with very different worldviews. But are there also some telling similarities in their manifestos?

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A quick and early episode looking at what roles and goals - if any - Russia has in the current Hamas-Israel war. The bottom line is that Russia was not behind the terrorist invasion, doesn't really know how to respond, is putting out different and even contradictory messages and yet will taken whatever advantage from it that it can.

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The Russian police are increasingly under pressure. The National Guard is getting into the mercenary game. There is talk (probably empty) of Wagner being reconstituted under Evgeny Prigozhin's son Pavel. These three apparently separate developments all point to the way Putin is not learning the lessons of past mistakes.

In the second segment, another profile of a potential successor to Putin: the fixer-technocrat with the 'Cheshire Cat' smile, Dmitri Kozak.

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The easy cliche that the Ukraine conflict may become a 'forever war' is a convenient notion for Putin - it may help dismay his enemies, and provides an organising principle for 'late Putinism.' To paraphrase the SF game Warhammer 40,000, in the grim darkness of the present, there is only war.

Yet, of course, no war last forever and, in particular, Russians themselves don't seem to be buying this notion. Even government pollsters suggest only a small minority are really enthused by the war - and not even they embrace the idea of war eternal for it's own sake.

I also indulge myself with the first segment in an occasional series of 'Why Everything Bad is Britain's Fault' (at least as far the Kremlin is concerned).

The Fedorov interview I mention is here.

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Alaska was owned by Russia - was the summit also? Where is the world after the Alaska summit? Putin won, but did Trump really lose (I'd suggest not really, because his interests are not that opposed)? And if - if - we are any closer to a peace, what might that look like?

Tickets for the Waterstones book event I mentioned in London on 4 September are available here.

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Is Kadyrov dying? If so, who might replace him - and what may this mean for Russia. If Chechnya again becomes unstable, will Putin be faced with a choice of losing in Ukraine or in Chechnya?

In any case, Kadyrov was one of the first and most successful of Russia's 'conflict entrepreneurs,' able to monetise the threat or actuality of war. The invasion of Ukraine is creating  a whole slew of new conflict entrepreneurs, who will represent not just a constituency with an interest in continued conflict, but also may be being nurtured as the state looks to find a new support base.

The BBC report I mention is here, and the podcast on the Rosgvardiya and its business empire is episode 11, here.

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As a way of getting away from the perennial talk of Wagner and the Ukrainian counter-offensive, I look at current stories relating to six individuals - Dmitri Medvedev, Anton Siluanov, Sergei Surovikin, Sergei Sobyanin, Valentin Konovalov and Sergei Aksenov - and what they tell us about today's Russia, Nepotism, statism, warlordism, and the limits of Kremlin power...

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After looking at Prigozhin last time, this episode I focus on Wagner. Will it survive in Africa (I suspect not), what this may mean for Russia's Africa non-quite-a-strategy, and will we see a 'Wagnerisation' of the Russian military (probably) and society (hopefully not). And why Wagner was like one of the great global football teams...

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What can we say about the death of Prigozhin (beyond good riddance?). At the risk of overstating the case, I feel this is a watershed moment, and Putin's willingness to turn on his own, at the expense of his own promises, is both symptomatic of deep decay in the system and also something that will further undermine it.

The Sunday Times article I mention is here.

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Marking the anniversary of the second day of the 1991 August Coup, the day when momentum began to shift away from the hardliners behind the seizure of power, a look at how the Putin regime - the spiritual descendant of those same plotters - is getting jumpy, cracking down on critics left and right and unable to win the loyalty of society.

An aspect of this, which I explore in the second part, is how a Russian policeman's lot is not a happy one, and not only is Russia not the massively-heavily policed society that is often claimed, but that the expansion of the public order forces at the expense of the regular police is something that may come back to bite the Kremlin.

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He may have just been sentenced to another 19 years, now in a 'special regime colony', but the indomitable Alexei Navalny has just produced a broadside against the 'reformists' of the 1990s - whom he considers nothing of the sort, but instead the architects of kleptocracy and authoritarianism. And it's hard to disagree with that. I go through what is in effect his manifesto, with lots of quotes and also lots of my own marginalia, and conclude by questioning whether Navalny's very purity of purpose may be a problem - and the lessons for the West.

The translation of his article in Meduza is here.

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Can one draw meaningful parallels between the Soviets' 1979-88 war in Afghanistan, and the Kremlin's invasion of Ukraine? The wars may have been very different, but I would suggest there are ways in which the Afghanistan experience helps inform our understanding of the Ukraine war - and above all, how this will affect Russia politically, socially and economically in the future. The good news is that this is one reason why, just as Afghanistan was the Soviet Union's last war, Ukraine should be Putin's.

If anyone is interested, the 'book of the PhD' is Afghanistan: the Soviet Union's last war (Routledge, 1995), while the later book I mentioned digging into the initial seizure of Kabul is Storm-333 (Osprey, 2021).

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Is there a post-mutiny purge of the military going on? What can we learn from the apparent dismissal or detention of figures such as Generals Surovikin and Popov? And what does this mean about the prospects of the war and whether there will be the military coup some seem to be anticipating?

The Dara Massicot (@MassDara) twitter thread I mention starts here.

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There still seems no escaping the fallout from Prigozhin's mutiny, whether we're talking about the fate of Wagner in Africa or those bizarre wig selfies. I take a series of questions from Oligarch/Hetman patrons as a structure to look at what we do - and don't - know at present.

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A shorter episode, because there is still so much about the causes, course and consequences of Prigozhin's mutiny that we still don't know. Instead, I focus in on the spook side: what were the FSB, FSO and GRU doing? To a large degree, the answer is> failing. Will they be taken to account? I doubt it, and this underlines the way that 'late Putinism' is characterised by its refusal or inability to reform.

The previous episode I mentioned looking at Russia's complex mercenary ecosystem is  In Moscow's Shadows 98: Dogs of War (and Racoons).

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So Trump and Putin are meeting in Alaska on Friday. Are we on the brink of peace in Ukraine or another mess? I wish I could be more optimistic.

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Prigozhin's mutiny... or, 36 hours of what-the-hell? It's too close for a really judicious take on this weekend's hijinks, but first thoughts on why Prigozhin did it, what happened, and what this all actually means.

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After the usual quick run-through of war-related news, I consider the rise of mysticism and occultism not just in Putin's circle, but Russia as a whole. Tales of rituals in the Kremlin; the Communist 'battle mage;' predictions of triumph in Ukraine. What is the reason? My view is that it is a response to anomie and despair - but also incubates hope for change, and illustrates a desire for that change. So, however bizarre, it may be grounds for optimism.

The Carnegie article by Ksenia Luchenko I mentioned is here; the FT piece on PMCs here.

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After the inevitable quick look at the Ukrainian counter-offensive (too little to say really about the operation on the ground, but some points to make about the political context), I drill down into the life of Dmitry Patrushev - minister for agriculture and, arguably rather more important, son of Security Council secretary Nikolai Patrushev. Could he be a candidate to succeed Putin, and if so, what would this mean?
 

If Patrushev senior is regarded as one of the grey cardinals, Jr is more of a grey cardigan – undistinguished, unfashionable, yet cosy and comforting for the old men around Putin.
 
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A spat between Wagner's Prigozhin and Chechnya's Kadyrov provides a good opportunity to look at the role of the Chechens in the Ukraine War - or, rather, just how small a role they are playing. Why is that? Because the war is a microcosm of the Putin system in so many ways, and in that system Kadyrov has managed to create a comfortable place in which he loudly performs loyalty while actually exploiting Moscow as far as he can.

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Bakhmut has (probably, kinda) fallen and Belgorod raided. The first is hardly a real defeat for Ukraine nor a real victory for Moscow. The latter may prove more significant, not so much for the raid itself but the dilemmas it imposes on the Russians ahead of the Ukrainian counter-offensive.

In the second half I kick off an occasional series of profiles of the next generation of insider political leaders by looking at Marat Khusnullin, the Deputy Prime Minister in charge of Construction and Regional Development, whose status as a (re)builder could conceivably what Russia will eventually need after Putin.

Anna Arutunyan's Spectator piece I mention is here.

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As a change from the usual, I look through the top six news items currently on the website of Rossiiskaya Gazeta, the main government newspaper of record, on today, Sunday 14 May. What can one learn about the state of Russian politics, intra-elite conflicts, the survival of real journalism and how comfortable Russians are with being global outsiders, based on stories about everything from missile attacks in the Donbas to easier regulations on building sheds?

As websites change, the six stories are:

FT: G7 и ЕС планируют запретить возобновление поставок российского газа

"Фиксируем все разрушения для будущего суда над преступниками": как работает полиция на месте удара крылатыми ракетами Storm Shadow в День ЛНР

В Турции начались президентские и парламентские выборы

Эрмитаж возвращает в Александро-Невскую Лавру раку Александра Невского. Михаил Пиотровский рассказал "РГ" о смысле и условиях передачи раки Церкви
Эксклюзив

В Минстрое разъяснили, почему сараи и бани стало строить проще

Александр Бастрыкин выступил за введение уголовной ответственности для юридических лиц

The episode of the Kennan Institute's The Russia File podcast I mention is here. For Bastrykin's rather more explicit attacks on corruption in the defence-industrial complex, see here.

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It's an easy journalistic shorthand to hall Putin a new tsar (I've done it myself), but what might it mean? Coronation weekend in the UK seems a fitting time to consider the pitfalls for Putinism of its pseudo-monarchic tilt.

In the second part a quickfire look at Ukraine's war of sabotage inside Russia, the incredible shrinking Victory Day parade, and the even more quickly shrinking Prigozhin.

My articles on the drone attack and sabotage campaign are in the Spectator and Sunday Times; the Meduza piece on Mediazona's research about proxy attacks is here.

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News that gas corporation Gazprom appears to be sponsoring a mercenary unit in Ukraine prompts me to explore the complex ecosystem of Russian private military companies and mercenaries. Not so much the onset of a new era of warlordism, I see it as a reflection of Putin's adhocratic mobilisation state. In the second half, I provide a guide to some of the varies organisations in question, from MOD fronts to ultra-nationalist thugs.

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Even loyalists seem in some cases to be taking a step back, not for a moment standing against the Kremlin but less able or willing to be so vocal and visible supporting it. I look at four such figures - Alexander Bortnikov, director of the FSB, Dmitry Kiselev, general director of Russia Today, Alexander Bastrykin, head of the Investigatory Committee, and Alexei Dyumin, governor of Tula - and wonder what their different political strategies portend.

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What can we learn from the massive trove of US secret documents recently and incautiously leaked? And what are the signs that Russia really is digging in, not for a 'Forever War,' but certainly a lengthy one?

The Moskovskii Komsomolets article I mention is here.

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With calls for WhatsApp to be banned and searching for 'extremist' material punishable by fines, there is much talk of a 'North Koreanisation' of Russia, of a 'digital gulag.' After a first half looking at developments in Ukraine, the war and international perceptions of threat, I dive into this issue. There are some interesting parallels with Soviet times, with different generations having different ideas about quite what to do with the online world.

More details on my forthcoming new book Homo Criminalis: how crime organises the world, here.

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Something for everyone? What we may conclude from the murder of milblogger 'Vladlen Tatarsky', thoughts on the hostage-taking of journalist Evan Gershkovich, the madness of Nikolai Patrushev and a new report on guns in Ukraine.

The Spectator piece I mention is here (paywalled), Patrushev's latest interview is here, the report 'On U.S. Objectives With Respect to the USSR To Counter Soviet Threats to U.S. Security' is here, and our report 'Peace and Proliferation: the Russo-Ukrainian war and the illegal arms trade' is here.

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Spinning off from a recent piece for the Spectator, I look at Dmitri Medvedev's decline and fall, from technocratic liberal hope to peddler of toxic anti-Western vitriol, and what this tells us about late Putinism: the hawkish turn, chameleonic politics, the need for scarecrows and the downside of Putin's loyalty.

The Spectator piece is here

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Isn't it time to scrap the term 'oligarch'? In Russia - as perhaps, not in Ukraine - the time when rich people able to assert power because of their wealth (as opposed to getting wealthy because of their power) seems long gone.

And a justice vs pragmatism question: will the International Criminal Court's decision to issue an arrest warrant against Putin on war crimes charges, help the cause of peace? Sadly, although I don't think there is any doubt he is a war criminal, I fear not.

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Why did Budapest 2023 remind me of Moscow 2007? Are Hungary or China 'pro-Russia'? What can we read into pro-Ukrainian neo-Nazi incursions into Russia and Kadyrov's claims that he wants to set up a mercenary company? And speaking of which, what on earth is PMC Ryodan?

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Putin has finally set a date for his annual address to the Federal Assembly, 21 February. He will likely try to tread the balance between scaring and reassuring his audience, but it takes place at a time when there is evidence of the security state digging in for the long haul, not least with a reshuffle at the Security Council Secretariat.

In the second half, I talk about Russian scifi, especially of the imperialist variety, and what we can learn from it.

For those interested, I write about the Security Council here. Mikhail Suslov's article 'Of Planets and Trenches: Imperial Science Fiction in Contemporary Russia' is here, 

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The apparent hit on a Russian rightist, propagandist, and self-styled "swindler and  mercenary" raises a range of questions about coordination in the Russian forces, the role of Evgeny Prigozhin and Russia's slide back towards the 'wild 90s.' Still, that's a better prospect than Putin's repeated invocation of the 1940s, most recently at the 80th anniversary of the battle of Stalingrad...

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What does it mean that Western-designed tanks will now be supplied to Ukraine, and what - if any - potential responses does Putin have? At the very least, it will be used to hammer home the new notion of the 'New Patriotic War,' in an attempt to provide a rationalisation for totalitarianism. However, any unity imposed is just superficial - as the recent spat between Igor 'Strelkov' Girkin and Evgeny Prigozhin illustrates, there are growing divisions within the system.

The Tsargrad article on Dugin I mentioned is here, the Izvestia one on Petr Pavel is here.

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So what might it mean for Chief of the General Staff Gerasimov to be made the new overall commander of Russian operations in Ukraine? I suspect Putin is impatient for some kind of victory - and if Gerasimov absolutely has to provide it, then he will need to find some form of escalation.

Details of the Chelsea Society event on 16 January I mentioned are here, and the Lewes Speakers Festival event on the 22nd (lots of other interesting authors, by the way) is here.

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A collection of topics: Putin's rather bellicose New Year Address and what to make of it, the limits of Russian politics, what to make of Medvedev's and Prigozhin's bizarre statements, and some good news, especially for those who consider Peruvian shaman to be soothsayers...

The Russian cyber report I mentioned is here, Prigozhin's latest broadside is here, and news of the Peruvian shaman (in Russian) is here.

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Is Putin contemplating fleeing to Venezuela? Is Medvedev more powerful than Patrushev? Does it make sense to decolonise Russia? Is a maverick spook spilling the beans on Putin's personal life? As a lack of hard information on inner Kremlin politics generates rumours and assumptions to fill the data vacuum, I ponder our analytic biases.

The survey of 100 top politicians is here.

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In the first half, I offer a (rather pessimistic) assessment of not just Trump's 50-day ultimatum but also recent EU and UK sanctions, before pivoting to explore how the US president has inadvertently made it clear that it is not him but China's Xi Jinping who has more influence with Putin. What is the nature of the Sino-Russian relationship, and where is it going?

The podcast's corporate partner and sponsor is Conducttr, which provides software for innovative and immersive crisis exercises in hybrid warfare, counter-terrorism, civil affairs and similar situations.

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What broader lessons about the changing nature of war, peace and power can we draw from the Russo-Ukrainian conflict? A more conceptual and rambling episode than usual...

The Meduza article on FSO polling I mentioned is here.

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My own contribution to the current discussion about how Putin tries to use and abuse history, and how he doesn't even get Russian history right.

And, after the break, the costs of the war to Russia and the all-too-often overlooked (not least by Putin) regional dimension.

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A fresh batch of Patrons' questions, clustered around Putin, his influences (no, Ivan Ilyin is not his guru) and decision-making; and then in the second half, how are the effects of invasion and sanctions reshaping Russian organised crime?

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