In Moscow's Shadows 261: Happy Days for Putin?

Everyone keeps diagnosing Putin’s mood, not least given the CIA Director’s visit to Moscow. Putin is angry, he's frightened, he's desperate -- that seems to be the standard Western talking point these days, and hence the fear that he might do something dangerously escalatory.

But is he? Things might actually look rather more encouraging from his perspective. So, in this episode, I try and peer through the Kremlin's windows, to understand how he believes things are going, in war and potential peace.

Finally, I look at Nicole Grajewski's excellent new book, Russia and Iran. Partners in defiance, from Syria to Ukraine (Hurst, 2026) and what that may say not just about the Moscow-Tehran relationship, but also our understandings of the world.

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.

You can also follow my blog, In Moscow's Shadows, and become one of the podcast's supporting Patrons and gain question-asking rights and access to exclusive extra materials including the (almost-) weekly Govorit Moskva news briefing right here. 

Transcript

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Putin Desperate? A Quick Reality Check

MG 0:00

So Putin is angry, he's desperate, he's scared. That at least seems at the moment to be one of the prevailing talking points within the Western media and plundocracy spheres. Is that really true? Hello, I'm Mump Galeotti, and welcome to my view of Russia in Moscow Shadows. This podcast, of varying length, frequency and format, yet always reassuringly low production values, is supported by generous and perspicacious patrons like you, and also by the Crisis Exercise software company Conductor. Now before I start, just a quick note, I am recording this on the afternoon of Saturday the 29th of August, even though it will drop on a Sunday morning as per usual. So if something dramatic has happened in the past whatever it is, 18 hours or so, and I don't mention it, that's why.

Why The CIA Chief Went Moscow

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Anyway, I mean I'm sure there will be more news coming out, but we still, certainly we being outsiders, still don't really know what was behind CIA Director Ratcliffe's visit to Moscow. Because it was high profile, and yet I'm not even convinced that actually Western Allied governments know for certain. The particular big kind of claims as to what's behind it we've had, we've got the Wall Street Journal saying that it was because the American government had picked up signs that there was going to be some dramatic escalation by Russia against Europe, against NATO, whether it was some kind of military incursion or something else, and he had gone to warn them off. Well, I mean, apart from the fact that I'm not actually convinced you need to have the CIA director actually visiting for that, in many ways it'd be more effective for Trump to pick up the phone to Putin. But also at present, I'm not convinced that the United States is in a particularly strong position to be warning the Russians off of anything. And the whole kind of we know what you're doing, so don't do it, well, that hasn't worked so well in the past, so I'm not convinced it would this time. I think there's a lot of very practical reasons which are actually holding back any thought of serious Russian escalation. And then we had from the New York Times an alternative perspective, which is that the American government is convinced that Putin is being fed comforting lies by the people around him, and that's why he's still prosecuting the war in Ukraine, because he doesn't realise how badly things are going, and that therefore Ratcliffe went over there to straighten him out. Well, look, let's set aside the fact of whether or not actually an intelligence chief from another country is someone you'd necessarily trust to give you the inside gen on what's happening with your own country. As I've noted on X, the people who presumably are feeding Putin all this sort of comforting half-truth, and I I don't disagree for a moment that he is indeed being to an extent sugarcoated. His uh you know his uh perspective on what's going on has been sugarcoated. But anyway, who would be the prime figures who'd be responsible for that? It would be Sergei Narishkin, the head of the Foreign Intelligence Service, and Alexander Bortnikov, the head of the Federal Security Service. And who are the people that it seems that Ratcliffe meant? Sergei Narishkin and Alexander Bortnikov. And therefore who are the people who would be tasked with then bringing the outcome of those meetings to Putin? Sergei Nerishkin and Alexander Bortnikov. I I'm really not convinced that this frankly would be worth sending the CIA director around the world. I mean, I look, I honestly don't know. It's not that I can have an alternative. There's all sorts of other theories around, whether it's to do with prisonerslash hostage negotiations, whether there was something else very sort of specific that needed to be passed on. It could just be, as in fact Narishkin himself said, a reopening of intelligence to intelligence channels. One of the many potential channels which in recent years have become distinctly log jammed. I mean Narishkin said, yes, the meeting took place. There's nothing unusual about that. In the practice of special services, meetings between leaders or face-to-face meetings online are part of our work. I should tell you, for example, that I meet almost weekly with the leaders of one special service or another, an intelligence organisation, from every continent. I presume he doesn't mean Antarctica. So the meeting with John Ratcliffe is a working matter. But the

The Media’s Desperation Narrative

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point is that what really struck me about all the various media speculation is how much of it actually did indeed hinge on this notion that precisely Putin is angry, which he may be, particularly when it comes to specific things like the degree of European support for Ukraine, the provision of British drones that are striking Russian targets, that kind of thing. But also that he's frustrated, that he's getting desperate, and that's why he could do something really dangerous, maybe even potentially use a nuclear weapon or risk an attack on the Baltic states, which it's worth noting, the Baltic states themselves have rightly played down and said, look, they see no signs that this is the case. So there is this notion exactly that why is the war now in a perilous state is because Putin is desperate. The thing is, I actually get the sense that the mood in the Kremlin seems quite upbeat. I'm not saying that they don't realise that there are certain challenges and problems around, and absolutely a sense that this war cannot be allowed to run on forever, which one can contrast with, you know, a year, a year and a bit ago, frankly, the way Putin and his various obedient mouthpieces were talking, it was almost as if they were just genuinely relaxed about whether the war would last one year, two years, or five years. Now I think there is a sense that essentially 2027 is the year in which one way or the other it has to be brought to, if not a final and total cessation, but certainly a dramatic scaling down. So I thought it would be useful today to try and give my sense of how the situation is as Putin sees it. And I cannot emphasize those last few words enough. Consider them to be in the verbal equivalent of larger fonts, bold and even underlined for good measure, however aesthetically displeasing that would make it look. This is not my take, and it may well not be your take, and it probably isn't Ratcliffe's take, but it's my best sense of how I think the current situation looks to Putin, who, let's be honest, remember must remember, first of all, yes, he is indeed to a degree managed by the people around him, though there's only a limit to how far that can go. You can't just simply keep telling him, no, no, no, this is actually 2024, and the war hasn't been going on anywhere as long as you thought. No, you know, there are certain basic facts where the where the front lines are, levels of casualties, what's happening in terms of strikes on targets within Russia, that you can't conceal from him. So he has a certain sense of what's actually going on, even if there is a lot of spin. He also has blind spots and prejudices, absolutely, especially when it comes to the Ukrainians, and I'll draw on that in a moment. And to a degree where there is desperation, it's precisely desperation to find good news. He does not want to have to do something dramatic and dangerous, in my opinion, because that's not who Putin is. Putin is not someone who decides to put everything on black for a spin of the roulette wheel with bankruptcy as a possibility. No, he likes safe bets. He's now being pressed by both the pragmatists and the hawks to do something dramatic, whether it's end the war quickly or escalate the war quickly. And although mobilisation still remains a possibility after the elections, but nonetheless, generally speaking, Putin doesn't want to make a tough decision, and therefore he will be more inclined to see things as being

Putin’s Biases And Risk Style

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relatively roseate so that he can just allow the war to continue in its current way and not make those tough decisions. Anyway, so how do I see his perspective? Well, first of all, winter is coming, and along with that, there will be another chance to try and break Ukraine's will through breaking its power grid, which remember is already two-thirds degraded compared with where it was at the start of the war. So there's a lot more opportunity, especially without patriot interceptors, to stop all those incoming uh ballistic missiles. Yes, Ukraine does have a lot more local generation, diesel generators, solar power, that kind of thing to try and make up the shortfall. But again, there's a limit to what that can do. And Russia still has something, an option that it hasn't used in the past, which is going after the crucial 750 kilovolt, that's ultra-high voltage substations. Now, these are really important because they make up the kind of primary national backbone, and particularly it connects the output from the nuclear power stations, which kind of provide high levels of sustained power with the rest of the network. So they're central distribution hubs. So take those out, and even if the power stations are still generating, the power isn't necessarily getting anywhere. And of course, there's always the risk that the Russians will also go after water treatment works. Take cut out most of the power and fresh water, and cities become pretty unlivable. And they've got this new Banderol cruise missile and an extended range Iskander missile, which they are increasingly using for these kinds of long-range strikes. So you know, there is that sense that you build on the previous winter's attacks and to do it properly this time. And this will bring the Ukrainians, as Putin would see it, into a more tractable frame of mind. Meanwhile, you're also cranking up drone production dramatically, and in particular these new jet-powered Giran IIIs and Geran IVs. Now, unlike the old turboprop or propeller ones, these are much, much harder to intercept. And if you've got a lot of them, you can launch attacks on Kyiv and other key cities with much greater frequency. And what we're actually seeing now are multiple attacks in the course of a 24-hour span, but also daytime attacks. So instead of people thinking, well, you know, yes, the night we we may go get air raid warnings and have to go and find shelter or whatever, but at least in the day we have a much greater chance of living a normal life, you can keep people under constant pressure. And again, this is as psychological as much as a material threat. And sure, a lot of these, the major the overwhelming majority of these, are still going to get shot down. But that doesn't matter in the sense of you still, you know, some will get through, and more to the point, everyone has to act on the principle that there's an airstrike coming. On the ground, and again, I I will unfortunately have to keep mentioning this as a little caveat because you have no idea what my um mailbox and uh Twitter messages and so forth can sometimes look like. But this remember, this is how the it looks to Putin, not what I'm saying. But on the ground, the Russian forces are slowly and advancing. Yes, there are Ukrainian counterattacks, especially around Liman, and the Russians are taking very, very high casualties, arguably pretty much the highest level, certainly since the battle for Bakhmut. But meanwhile, Russia has been able to not just move forward, Kastantinivka is pretty much taken, but they've stepped up drone and glide bomb attacks on these two crucial remaining Danetsk oblast cities, Slavyansk and Kramatorsk, from their adjacent footholds into the north and to the south. Meanwhile, yes, the Ukrainians are indeed able to strike oil refineries and wild berries depots, and now indeed Wildberries' main competitor, Ozone, though Ozone has a different kind of model, so it's actually probably rather less vulnerable. And these are problematic and have economic costs, but again, they're not actually critical. They're not the sort of thing which is going to dramatically impact the war economy, or indeed necessarily public opinion. Meanwhile, the Russians are paying back, shall we say. Taras Vysotsky, Ukraine's Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food, has said that Russian attacks have destroyed about 90% of Ukraine's modern storage facilities. Now, that doesn't mean to say that suddenly there is no food anywhere or no other goods. I mean there are workarounds and so forth, but still, actually, if we look at proportions of capacity being hit, Ukraine is suffering at least as, if not substantially more, than Russia. And the attacks on the Russian commercial infrastructure. I mean, there is there is some wild talk. There was a recent uh sort of enactment that allows the state to take over enterprises which are proven to be falling behind dramatically in defending themselves, protecting themselves against drone attacks. And to some, this is the sort of pretext for a massive round of nationalizations. The Institute for the Study of War, for example, that isn't bad for maps, but in my opinion, is not very good on its wider political analysis, it says Putin is setting conditions for the widespread nationalization of Russian private assets under the broad pretext of defending critical enterprises against Ukrainian strikes, likely in part to generate additional state revenues. I really think this is not the case. First of

Winter Strikes Against Ukraine’s Grid

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all, I mean this is actually not the essence of what that particular enactment says. I mean, there's a relatively high bar. It's not actually just sort of, oh, we don't think that you're doing enough, not enough sandbags, we're now going to take you over with no compensation. It's more complex than that. Secondly, Putin does remain an economic liberal. Remember, this is the irony of all those leftists who somehow think that the Russian Federation is the natural inheritor of the red flag of the Soviet Union. No, I mean, in many ways, it's a particularly sort of predatory neo-con liberal economy. And in that context, sure, there's increasing state control in time of major war, as happens in any country in these kinds of circumstances. But this is not actually, I think, an ideological shift. This is not actually that Putin is therefore now committing himself to a massive renationalization. If anything, he has pushed back against those people within the nationalist wing and the communists and such like who have argued for this. And thirdly, look, forced nationalization does not lead to those kind of real revenue growths that is being suggested. So, you know, let's keep this in context. This is a serious issue, but it's not that dramatic. And meanwhile, recruitment seems to be being managed. Firstly, recruitment, which had dipped quite dramatically below the casualty rate in the earlier parts of this year, does seem to have stabilized slightly, gone up a bit, even though it has meant that the overall size of the Russian force has fallen slightly. But it's also being supplemented increasingly by what we could think of as low-level rolling mobilization. So not a great big mobilization wave, but as we've seen locally, particularly where particular regions are falling behind their quotas, mobilization of forces. And that actually is allowing them to pretty much maintain a fairly stable level of manning of the war effort without the kind of huge public crisis in confidence that a mobilization wave would involve. Which again, we should stress, has not been ruled out, but nor has, I think, is it absolutely locked in. We may see it after the September elections. We'll just have to wait and see. But of course, it's often worth noting that again, once again, the situation in Ukraine is perceived with good pretty good reason, I think, by the Russians as being actually rather worse. I mean, there not only is the Ukrainian armed forces depending more and more heavily on so-called bussification, which basically we think of as press ganging, just grabbing people off the streets, checking their documents, and dragging them away. But actually attacks on the press gangs do seem to be mounting. And there's now talk, for example, also of mobilising women, which is in an interesting little twist being presented as almost as some kind of feminist triumph. Yes, you too can be press ganged. But what I thought was particularly striking, and I hadn't realized actually the situation had reached such a pitch, though as ever, you know, with any one statement one has to treat it with a bit of caution. But Kirilo Budanov, the former military intelligence chief, now turned chief of staff to Zelensky. Well, he recently said that Ukraine needs to recruit 30,000 people a month, just simply to, again, maintain their forces. Now, that's basically what the Russians are having to recruit to maintain their forces. So if that, again, all sorts of caveats, but if that is the case, and remember, the Ukrainians are more likely to let people go from service than the Russians, so it's not just about dead and wounded and seriously injured and missing in actions. It's also about some people who are actually allowed to, for various reasons, leave the service. But nonetheless, if the Ukrainians are having to recruit as many as the Russians, that actually says something about their casualty rates too. And some of the sort of cosy assumptions about the Russians' casualty rates being sort of massively almost order of magnitude higher than the Ukrainians may well be wrong. I don't know. But again, I imagine that's a little a little factoid that is going to be making its way into Putin's briefings. Politically, look, the presidential administration's technocrats had a bit of a scare with Yabloka and the way it suddenly acts as a lightning rod for general dissenting opinion. But Yabloka is now essentially blocked. There are some Yabloka candidates who might still make it onto the ballot, but essentially it's no longer on a movement level problematic. And they seem once again to be coming fairly confident that the elections are going to go smoothly. United Russia may be allowed to slip a little, so in other words, to bring its actual sort of declared results more in line with probably its real results, but nonetheless, by apportioning the other votes in a suitably sort of cunning way, it'll ensure that United Russia is still absolutely dominant within the Duma. And anyway, who cares? I mean, yes, what happens in you know the vote matters because it's sort of symbolic of the power of the state, but in practical terms the Duma is not exactly a locus of opposition. Indeed, as Farida Rustamova notes in her excellent last uh newsletter, I very much would recommend you to follow and read that if you don't already. While anxiety levels certainly seem to be up, that's according to the Kremlin Linked Public Opinion Foundation form. I think we've got anxiety rising above 50% in April, and in other words, the start of the deep strikes, and hasn't eased over summer. There's no real evidence, she says, that more Russians want to see peace negotiations. Actually, in some way support for negotiations might have fallen or at least been supplemented by anger. Quote, Poland shows more anger towards Ukraine in tandem with growing unhappiness with the Kremlin, according to a source at one of Russia's political parties that is conducting focus groups as part of its campaign for upcoming parliamentary elections. And she goes on to quote, one survey at the end of July found Russians were wondering why Putin hasn't just, and I'm gonna guess that those asterisk means fucking bombed the hell out of Ukraine and brought all this to an end. I mean, on a purely anecdotal level, that's that's what I'm getting to. That sense of people can be exasperated with the war, unhappy with the management of the country, and yet at the same time becoming increasingly angry with Ukrainians, and therefore more tolerant of, as long as they don't actually have to be involved in it, tough measures. And as that were not enough, I'm sure Putin is gaining great satisfaction from the political woes that are assailing Zelensky. I mean, it's not just the whole Fyodorov calling for elections, not being willing to return to the fold after his sacking as defence minister. And indeed, saying that at the current rate Ukraine is losing, I can guarantee you, I mean, I could

Manpower, Mobilisation And The Grinding Front

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see I that that appeared on all of the Russian press. Um, but also that corruption investigations continue to nip closer and closer to him. And this is the thing. There seems to be a sense, and again, look, again, this is secondary because I'm not a Ukrainianist, but from what I'm talking to people, and what I'm learning from people I'm talking to, is that there is this sense that Zelensky himself, do people think he's corrupt? Some do, obviously, but in the main, it's not so much that they think he's corrupt. It's that in some cases there are people who resent that he hasn't done more to clamp down on corruption. And more, I think, important than that is a sense that the people he has chosen, he hasn't necessarily chosen well. And he's standing by his team, but too many in his team are either involved in or turning a blind eye to corruption. So again, these are things that Putin's people will be telling him, and he'll be happy to see. And he'll also be very glad to see that in the first half of this year, Ukraine spent the money that was intended to cover defence expenditure in the second half of the year. So it's now going back to Europe cap in hand because it's got a 23 billion euro hole in its defence budget. And as if that were not enough, I mean the United States still isn't really that interested in Ukraine these days. And above all, it's mired in the Gulf, this Gulf War, which has so fortuitously devoured such a large share of American patriot interceptors, and also meant that countries like Israel and Gulf states, which I'm not sure about Israel, but anyway, that use patriots actually now have priority requirements for them, so that it's hard to source more patriot interceptors for Ukraine. A few were handed over as kind of a happy Independence Day celebration gift, but those seem to have actually been already used up. And finally, Europe remained divided. Again, this is Putin's perspective, divided, feckless, still supporting Kyiv unquestioningly. But on the other hand, with nothing new, I mean this this business of handing over the blueprints to produce the um storm shadow or scalp, depending on your way, whether you're British or French, cruise missile, I mean that's all very well, but how long will it take to actually have production scaled up? Especially because presumably the Russians are going to hit whatever facilities are being used to build them. And Europe has its own winter crisis. It's facing winter with its stocks of liquid natural gas below historic levels and also below their own target. So I mean this might well be a very mild winter. There are some weather forecasts suggesting that, which will be very good for Ukraine, very good for Europe. But if it's not, then it could be much more problematic. So put all that lot together, and I think that from Putin's point of view, it becomes a lot easier to minimize the very real problems facing Russia and maximize the problems facing Ukraine, and to feel that a winter, and remember, you might say it used to be that winter was the point at which campaign seasons stopped, because precisely it it was not just a poor visibility, mud, all that kind of thing. Your tanks weren't necessarily going to be operating that well. Now, actually, winter, if it brings bad weather, bad weather not being at all good for drones, winter can actually be a point of accelerated military operations. So, you know, for all of those reasons, you might think, well, winter we're gonna see the us successfully hammering the Ukrainians, reducing, degrading their morale further, and advancing further. Sure, we're we're not likely to have taken Slavansk and Kramatorsk, but the closer we get, the more heavily under fire control we bring them. In other words, the more we can hit them with, and the more frankly, unsustainable does civilian but maybe even military life in these cities become. And so the prospect of being able to take the Donbass, that last bit of Donbass, becomes rather more plausible, just as you might say the Ukrainians might well be in a more receptive frame of mind to whatever peace terms you make. So this is why, I mean, I although I'm sure that we are going to see a continued escalation in Russia's non-military hybrid war, sub-threshold grey zone, call it what you will, campaign against Europe for a variety of reasons, including just frankly that they can, I don't actually see this kind of desperation that optimists think is going to drive Putin to the peace take peace talks quickly, and pessimists think is going to drive Putin to some dangerous and dramatic escalation. But of course, does that mean we're any closer to peace in our time? Well, let's talk about that after the

Sponsor Break And Support Options

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break. Just the usual mid-episode reminder that you're listening to the In Moscow Shadows podcast. Its corporate partner and sponsor is Conductor, which provides software for crisis exercises in hybrid warfare, counterterrorism, and civil affairs. But you can also support the podcast yourself by going to patreon.com slash in Moscow Shadows. And remember that patrons, as well as knowing that they're supporting this peerless source on all things Russian, get a variety of additional perks depending on their tier, including articles I've written, the most weekly Gavarit Moscovar press briefing, and other bonus content like the Chronicles of a Different Russia alternative histories. And you can also follow me on Twitter at Mark Galliotti or on Facebook, MarkGaleotti on Russia. Now back to the episode.

Why Peace Talks Wait Until Spring

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Okay, so we can presume there's no real prospect of peace talks this side of spring for now. I think the window for opportunity for that has closed. Why would, again, barring some kind of dramatic and unexpected setback, why would Putin not wait until after the winter campaign? That said, though, I also think that there is a sense not only that 2027 needs to be the war, the war-ending year, but also from the Russians' point of view, a sense that a favorable end game may well be nearing. Because we do we have had well-connected voices saying that once that last piece of the Donbass is quote unquote liberated, then it will be the time for talks and for peace. Which is interesting, because remember, we we had earlier in the year pragmatists saying that, but essentially hinting at actually, do we really care about Slavyansk and Kramatorsk? How about just freezing the front lines now? And obviously, that for the moment at least, again, things can always change, but that for the moment seems to have failed. But nonetheless, there does almost seem to be a growing consensus that once those last cities have been taken, once the rest, you know, basically Putin can say we have liberated the whole Donbass, that will be the moment. Even though, of course, there are there are hawks who say this is not enough. And Putin himself, even if he's inclined that way now, may well change his mind if, for example, we see sudden collapse of Ukraine or Ukrainian armed forces or the like. So barring those kind of opportunities, he will get greedy. But otherwise, it does seem to be the case. And the latest voice that was saying this was Alexei Chesnakov in Komsomolska Pravda this week. Now that's interesting. I mean, Chesnakov, he's a smart chap, he's a well-connected chap. He was once upon a time one of Surkov's acolytes, if you remember, the the architect of the whole theatrical pretense for democracy in in Russia, who also was at one point, shall I say, the impresario behind the management of the uh pseudo-states of the Donbass. But since then, I mean Chestokov, I think I think he's affiliated with the Higher School of Economics. He's also centre for political conjecture. And as I say, someone who is well enough connected that A, I think he he does have a sense of what the kind of prevailing opinion is. And remember, no one truly knows Putin's mind. But some are better better placed to try and sort of get a sense of where it's going. But anyway, so he's at once well connected there, but also I think enough of a political survivor that he's not going to stick his neck out on something that he thinks is a definite non-starter. And anyway, he said, it's enough to liberate the remaining part of Donbass. It's enough to secure our borders. It's enough to stop attacks on Russian territory. It's enough to inflict enough damage on the Ukrainian armed forces to prevent them from attacking Russia in the future. It's enough to get the West to end some of its sanctions against our country. That, I think, would be enough to call it a victory. And that's interesting because there's no hedging there. It sounds like he is pretty confident that this is the case, and that this is policy or at least one of the accepted policy options. And I would stress just a couple of points. He's talking about inflict, you know, it's enough to inflict enough damage on the Ukrainian armed forces to prevent them from attacking Russia in the future, which is not the

What Moscow Would Call Victory

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same as saying, and therefore we need to have limits on the size of their military or something, which was always one of the earlier demands, and it was always a non-starter. And also, it's enough to get the West to end some of its sanctions against our country again. That's important. Not the whole lot being lifted, but just something. So here's the thing. Incredibly, I can't see an alternative peace deal. Not one that can happen again without some very, very amazingly dramatic things changing one way or the other. Than one that essentially follows this line. Firstly, with a ceasefire that freezes the front line. And the only question really is where that front line is. Does Putin get that last bit of Donbass or does he stop before that point? I I feel that he has invested too much of himself and his credibility now, at this stage. Beginning of this year, he could have stopped the war wherever the line was. I think by now, though, he really has to take those two last cities. So, you know, yes. So at some point, it's just a freezing of the front lines. Then ceasefire and talks. And well, what's that going to lead to? First of all, the Russians are not going to withdraw. I mean, there might be some very minor little how can I put it, um rationalizations of the front line. Because remember, there's no nice, neatly defined front line. This is a war, particularly sort of where it's all this infiltration and interpenetration of forces. So, you know, again, there will have to be a drawing of the front line, but basically speaking, where Russian soldiers are, Russian soldiers are going to be staying, like it or not. On the other hand, Moscow will have to recognize Ukraine's sovereignty. And that means whatever Ukraine wants to do with itself. Yes, of course, Moscow is actually at the moment quite open to Ukraine going for European Union membership, A, because it thinks that that won't happen anytime soon, and B, more importantly, I would say, because Moscow thinks that actually bringing Ukraine into Europe will break Europe. Now again, this podcast is devoted, this particular episode of the podcast is devoted to seeing the world through Kremlin eyes, peering out through those little narrow arrow slits in the Kremlin walls. You can argue that in fact it would be the greatest thing for the European Union, but that's not what Putin, that's not what the people around Putin, including, I understand, especially Ushakov, Putin's main foreign policy advisor. Apparently he, who is really by experience and temperament sort of America focused, he actually, I think, really has pushed this idea that essentially Europe would not survive Ukraine's accession for all kinds of reasons, not least what it would do to the common agricultural policy. I do not intend to get into the common agricultural policy. Look it up if you want. It is not an exciting topic. But what about NATO? Well, look, again, I don't think there's any real belief that Ukraine's going to join NATO. It might be that Ukraine will be forced to accept some kind of time-limited NATO exclusion. So in other words, not just you will never join NATO, but you commit to not joining NATO over the next, I don't know, 15 years or whatever. So maybe that. But essentially that 80% of Ukraine that is left is totally independent and sovereign. No limits to its armed forces and such like. But on the other hand, I would also imagine there would have to be some kind of deal that says, in peacetime at least, no foreign military forces on Ukrainian territory. Doesn't stop Europe surging forces in in time of war if they really want, and if they're happy to go toe-to-toe with the Russians. But that's the whole point. Once war happened, then all bets would have been off anyway. There would have to be promises of mutual non-aggression, of course, because that's what treaties tend to involve. I don't think either side would actually believe it. So of course it'll be backed by both sides arming. Now we, you know, we again, that's not something that that is really in question. Of course, Russia is going to reconstitute its armed forces after this war. And likewise, Ukraine is going to arm itself as much as it can possibly afford, as much as it can get its allies to possibly afford it. And on this subject, by the way, I'd mention, back in I've got to look it up, 14th of September of last year, 2025, in Moscow Shadows 216, what security guarantees for Ukraine might work. I do dig into this whole question of how practically do I think that Ukraine's allies can actually help it be genuinely secure. So I think it can be done, but again, I think we have to be realistic. It's not going to be done because Britain and France put troops on the border or anything like that. It's going to be done because Ukraine is empowered, allowed, encouraged, and supported to defend itself. And yes, there may well be direct promises from the West to Ukraine as part of this deal. Whether it's in terms of reconstruction money, whether it's in terms of future military support or whatever else, or it might just need to be left open, not covered in the deal, but then to be something that is handled separately purely in terms of Ukrainian relations and negotiations with its allies. And finally, yes, there would have to be some degree of sanctions relief. In part because Russia will demand it. It needs to have something. The Kremlin needs to have something, it can go back to its own people and say, you see, these people were trying to strangle our access to this or our capacity to do that, but we forced them to back down. But frankly, so many within the West will also probably demand this. I don't think there's any great enthusiasm at the moment for investing in Russia, but there is a lot of enthusiasm still, and certainly my sense is growing enthusiasm for trade with Russia. The point is investment, that's building factories, that means that you are then trapped at the whim of a Kremlin that you don't trust. Trade, you give me money, I give you this trinket. That actually pulls money out of Russia, so arguably the West should be happy about it, but also doesn't involve that same degree of risk. So that's how I see the war ending. And that's how I see it ending, and here I will say that is actually how I personally see the war is most likely to end. I'm not saying this deal is morally right. I'm not saying this deal is legally sound. I'm not saying that it's either elegant or elevated. I'm just saying that I can't really see an alternative to stopping the killing. Sure, as I say, if it looks like Ukraine is crumbling, Putin will be tempted to go further. Maybe think, ooh,

Ceasefire Terms NATO And Sanctions

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perhaps Odessa's in play or something. Conversely, if Russia is in greater trouble than I expect, maybe Ukraine can demand more. But barring these kind of black swanish situations, this is the likely middle ground. So while it's undoubtedly true that there is an escalating curve to the hybrid war operations that Moscow is launching, the sense that Putin is desperate enough for some kind of risky gamble does seem rather wider the mark, because this kind of peace deal, even on his terms, which is essentially with Russia in control of the whole of the Donbass, does seem, to a degree, within reach. And that really to me highlights a final point I would want to discuss in this particular episode, which is how far our assessments these days of what's going on in Russia are based on wishful thinking, on ideological blinkers, and on political expedience. Just like, in his own way, Putin's perspective on the West and on Ukraine. I mean, for example, I make this point about, look, I I had no idea of the degree to which there was a discrepancy between what we thought were the manpower needs of Ukraine and what Budanov is saying. Just like this the level of Russian strikes against warehouses and other commercial properties within Ukraine. And this is the weird thing. We have so many more journal, Western journalists in Ukraine than we do in Russia these days. And yet we learn a hell of a lot more about every strike on Russia compared to every strike on Ukraine. And that is a problem. And again, I'm not saying that it's because of some kind of conspiracy or anything like that. A lot of it is driven by public demands, what editors assume the public is demanding, the natural desire to be on the side of the people you think of the white hats against the black hats, you know, the good guys against the bad guys, and the fact that actually some forms of information actually are more easily available from Russia than from inside Ukraine. But nonetheless, you put it all together, and how far are we then, are our perspectives and thus the kind of political imperatives being shaped by a distorted sense of reality?

When Our Assumptions Distort Policy

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And I was very forcefully reminded of this while I was reading an excellent new book, which is Nicole Grajevsky. Grajevsky, my apologies, Nicole, if I'm no doubt have butchered your last name. Russia and Iran, partners in defiance from Syria to Ukraine, which Hearst published this year, 2026. And let me start with, ironically enough, the very final paragraph. Let me see, page 335. Russia and Iran's partnership of defiance emerged not from deliberate design, but from circumstance. A reactive alignment forged in response to perceived encirclement, domestic vulnerability, and marginalization within a US-led international order. It was shaped through necessity, not strategy. Repeated crises, overlapping threat perceptions, and the shared experience of isolation gradually fostered habits of coordination and a deeper recognition of their intertwined political fates. Over time, the reactive logic that once defined the relationship gave way to a more durable foundation. In the end, the Russia-Iran relationship is best understood not as a fixed axis, but as a dynamic and adaptive compact, tempered by constraints, hardened through conflict, and unexpectedly fortified by the very instability it was built to resist. There's lots of really good stuff here. Let me just unpick a few of the points just from that paragraph. And very much, first of all, the key thing is not deliberate design but circumstance. Again, time and time again, we still have this notion, and obviously I'm bringing this back to Russian in this point, that it's all about grand plans and conspiracies and so forth, rather than just a political leadership that finds itself in a war that it hadn't prepared for, and doing the best it feels it can under its circumstances, under its own particular practical and perceptional constraints. Perceived encirclement, domestic vulnerability, and marginalization within a US-led international order. Again, this sense that, as it were, the prevailing world order, the one that we say that we are committed to upholding because we think it's right, is perceived as actually something that we are committed to upholding because it works in our interest. It's our world order, not theirs. That is an important point. And again, helps explain, I think, some of the obduracy of the Russian position and their increasing stridency of their I almost can hesitate to call them diplomats because of how undiplomatic they so often are, but nonetheless within its foreign policy establishment. That very shared experience of isolation gradually fostered habits of coordination. Again, I think that's really important because it reminds us that what our Often the processes at work are that you do something because of the needs of the moment, and then you find yourself doing something similar again because of

Russia Iran Partnership Without Myths

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the needs of that particular moment. And bit by bit that becomes habit, habit becomes policy, policy becomes doctrine. And one of the things that I think we should be thinking much more about with Russia, with Iran, with all the countries with whom we have the rather more antagonistic relationships, and yes, China is absolutely one of them. How far do our behaviors at the moment foster the kind of long-term attitudes, responses, and relationships that we would like? Because I don't think we think about that anywhere near enough. And finally, again, the Russia-Iran relationship is best understood not as a fixed axis, but as a dynamic and adaptive compact. That is absolutely crucial. Again, this is not some kind of rigid alliance. These are two countries with their own perspectives, their own very, very different sort of strategic cultures, and also their own different interests, which are often have been actually as rivals, they are at best frenemies, except when we force them to be something more than that. So again, I think there's a lot here that actually has much wider traction. And I mean, broadly speaking, I mean this is a really I mean it's a very big and solid analysis, this book, of an intrinsically complex relationship that I would say is perhaps second only to the Russo-Chinese relationship in the degree to which it has been mythified and misrepresented in the West. And as Grojevsky shows, it's intensely pragmatic, often tense and indeed antagonistic relationship, but one in which these two nations, both of which have very proud histories and very strong senses of grievance, have been all but pushed together. I mean, after all, as she notes, once I mean the Persians felt equally assailed by the quote, deceitful English, we there's no escaping us, but also the ominous Russians. While the 1979 Islamic Revolution was a real shock to Moscow, which was swept with fears of sort of an Islamic green wave rolling into Central Asia, and also this absolutely helped clinch their fateful decision to invade Afghanistan at the end of that year. And I must admit, I did very much appreciate the historical context that Krashevsky provides, as well as the fact that this is not a book on Russian-Iranian relations from Moscow's perspective or of Iranian-Russian relations from Tehran's, but properly explores both. And as such, I think Grashevsky very nicely juxtaposes moments where countries' interests were clearly at odds, such as Iran's role, I didn't know about this actually, in fabricating social media claims in 2024 that Putin had committed Russia to support Iran if attacked, and he didn't, and indeed they didn't, with those areas where they can and do work together. And it's particularly well framed in how Russia at first could help Iran with its what they call their resistance economy against sanctions, and then in due course came to study it for its own samodostatojnost, self-sufficiency. But again, to return to that opening point, the detailed, nuanced, often very counterintuitive picture that emerges in this book is one that, on one level, I'm sure is broadly familiar to many analysts buried in the bowels of intelligence agencies, or indeed frontline diplomats, but scarcely seems to make it to the the news articles, the op-eds, the politicians' speeches. And it raises the question, is this just an impoverishment of public discourse, or is it an impoverishment of policy making itself? And I worry that based on current policy both in and towards Russia, far, far too often it is the latter. So as I close this uh Kremlin perspective episode of In Moscow Shadows, I think it is worth trying to step outside some of the mainstream assumptions. And whether it's in terms of how we understood Ratcliffe's mission to Moscow, or whether it's how we understand Putin's current uh risk calculus and his perspective on whether he needs to do something dramatic to change the current situation. Too often I think we are essentially caught in self-referential feedback loops, and we don't spend enough time trying to assess how things look viewed through those Kremlin windows. Or indeed in Moscow Shadows.

Final Thanks And Where To Follow

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Anyway, thank you as ever for listening. Well, that's the end of another episode of the In Moscow Shadows podcast. Just as a reminder, beyond this, you can follow my blog, also called In Moscow Shadows. You can follow me on Twitter at Mark Galliotti or Facebook, MarkGaleotti on Russia. This podcast is made possible by generous and enlightened patrons, and you too can be one. Just go along to my Patreon page, that's patreon.com slash in Moscow Shadows, and decide which tier you want to join, getting access to exclusive materials and other perks. However, whether or not you contribute, thank you very much indeed for listening. Until next time, keep well.