Russia-Ukraine reality check | Ian Bremmer’s Quick Take

Hi everybody, Ian Bremmer here and a Quick Take to kick off your week. I think it’s a good time to talk about Russia. Vladimir Putin, just back from a trip to the Hermit Kingdom. Not many people go there. And those that do frequently don’t come back. North Korea. Kim Jong un. Lots of pomp and showing of very close friendship, engagement, alignment. Kim Jong un said that they’re now allies. Putin notedly did not use that terminology, and I’m sure advisedly. So, first time that Putin has been there in decades. And lots of ways to think about it. I mean, on the one hand, you can say that Putin’s reduced to traveling to meet the world’s worst dictator because there are very few countries in the world that are willing to provide wholehearted support for Russia’s illegal invasion into Ukraine. The Iranians will. The North Koreans will. The Syrians and Belarus. And that’s kind of about it. And so that doesn’t speak very well for Putin being able to get weapons, for example, to continue to fight his war. Even the Chinese won’t do that because they’re worried about US and other knock on secondary sanctions. So, you know, that’s the positive spin that you can put on this from the United States and the NATO position. But there’s a negative spin too, and that is that Russia is increasingly allied with a very dangerous nuclear country with cyber capabilities, history of human trafficking, illegal drug transit and export, and a country that is already maximally sanctioned that benefits from chaos, and that previously their top friend was China who wanted more stability in the global order. And the Russians certainly don’t. So this provides cover for North Koreans to cause more trouble vis-à-vis South Korea and Japan and the rest of the world, and also gives lots of weaponry to the Russians and lots of technology to North Korea, none of which is good, not good for the world at all. And while it’s true that Russia is isolated in terms of its war and its war goals, that doesn’t mean that it’s isolated. And what I mean by that is the willingness of the United States and Europe to put really tough sanctions on Russia. I mean, the kind of sanctions that would reduce Russia and its ability to fight the war. They’re not there. They’re not there. They talk tough. But the reality is Russia is the largest country in the world geographically and within that territory. They have an awful lot of very important natural resources. They’ve got oil, they’ve got gas, they’ve got platinum, they’ve got diamonds, they’ve got uranium, they’ve got food, they’ve got fertilizer. And the United States and Europe, if they were so concerned about the war in Ukraine that they were truly willing to cut that off, they could. But it would cost them. It would cost them because the world would be in a global recession out of not getting that oil and gas. It would cost them because a lot of the nuclear plants in the West wouldn’t have uranium, and the prices would go way up. And they don’t want to spend that money. And it would cost them because a lot of people in the Global South would starve, because they wouldn’t have access to the food and fertilizer, except at a higher cost that they can’t afford to pay. And the West isn’t willing to pay that cost to take that risk and to squeeze the Russians that hard. They’re willing to make the Russians less profitable in terms of the oil and gas they sell. They’re willing to freeze and even increasingly seize hundreds of billions in Russian assets and use that to fund the Ukrainians, because it’s better than having to pay for the Ukrainians yourself. But that’s very different from saying we’re going to force the Russians to pay a price that they would be unwilling to pay. The price that the Russians are presently paying is at the margins. It isn’t an existential for Putin, and it’s certainly a much lower cost than he’s willing to exact for continued war on the ground in Ukraine, territorial conquest, and perhaps the ability to remove Zelenskyy in the future and have someone that is more aligned with his sensibilities. That’s where we are. And the reality there is that Russia can keep on keeping on as a consequence. Now, you know, we saw, this peace conference, as it’s called, supporting Zelensky with representatives of over 90 countries and over 40 heads of state and heads of government. And it was an impressive display in Switzerland just a couple of weeks ago. But it’s also true that behind the scenes, Zelensky really, really, really wanted to have that meeting. And the Americans and many NATO allies were saying, maybe not so fast, because of course, every time you have one of these big global shows of support, you lose a little bit of the urgency and the support you show that there are fewer countries that are willing to support you as much as they were six months before, 12 months before. The Chinese didn’t show up, the Indians showed up at a relatively low level. They didn’t sign on to the ultimate memorandum. Neither did the Saudis. I mean, you know, this is an issue, right? The fact is that NATO is very strongly supportive of Ukraine and of continuing to allow them to have the types of support to defend themselves and rebuild their country. The Global South is increasingly “let’s have a cease fire right now.” And China is “let’s have a cease fire right now and we’re kind of more in the Russian camp than we are in the West camp or in Ukraine’s camp.” And Putin sees that and he sees that over time, if he waits these countries out, the likelihood that he’ll end up in a better position than the Ukrainians goes up. And this is why when you talk to members of NATO and you say, well, what’s your position on negotiations? And their public statements are, look, it’s it’s completely up to the Ukrainians to decide. The reality is that you’ll need to pressure the Ukrainians, both with carrots and sticks, to get to a place where you can negotiate, even if the Russians aren’t yet ready to do that. And they aren’t in reality though Putin says, “sure, I’ll negotiate if you move out of the territories that I’ve illegally annexed, including those that you’re presently occupying.” That’s a nonstarter. But you have to get the Ukrainian there. You have to prepare them to be there. And there are a couple of ways you do that, right? One is you give the Ukrainians the support to rebuild their country. You fast track them into the European Union, so they have a shot at better rule of law, improving their democracy, reducing their corruption that gives them a future. And you also give them some harder security guarantees for the parts of their territory that Russia hasn’t occupied and hasn’t illegally annexed. And if you do all of those things, you’re in a better position to get the Ukrainians to the negotiating table. You provide more cover to Zelensky or the future leaders of Ukraine and the future leaders of Ukraine. And you also make it more compelling multilaterally before you’re in a position where Ukraine gets thrown under the bus as they might, for example, if Trump wins, come November, as they might, for example, if Le Pen gets a majority, in the European, in the French Parliament, and then the French are suddenly vetoing European additional gives to Ukraine. I mean, this is the problem is that a lot of the uncertainty about Ukraine isn’t only about what Russia does, isn’t only about Ukrainian capacity, but it’s also keeping that multilateral effort, which has been strong and united together. And there have been a couple of almost misses, especially the US, the six months getting them $61 billion, but also coming up with the electoral cycles. And the longer you push that out, the more dangerous it is for Ukraine and ultimately for the NATO alliance. So that’s a little bit of the sort of real talk about what’s happening in Russia and Ukraine on the back of the news of the past week. As always, what you want to happen is not the same as analysis. And if it is, it means that your analysis is crap. That is not what we do here. And I hope all of you have a great week. Talk to you soon.

Russia may be isolated in terms of its war and its war goals, but that doesn’t mean that it’s isolated. The reality is Russia is the largest country in the world geographically and they have an awful lot of very important natural resources. If the US and its allies were so concerned about the war in Ukraine that they were truly willing to cut that off, they could. But it would cost them and the world would be in a global recession.

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Ian Bremmer’s Quick Take: Hi everybody, Ian Bremmer here and a Quick Take to kick off your week. I think it’s a good time to talk about Russia. Vladimir Putin, just back from a trip to the Hermit Kingdom. Not many people go there. And those that do frequently don’t come back. North Korea. Kim Jong Un.

Lots of pomp and showing of very close friendship, engagement, alignment. Kim Jong Un said that they’re now allies. Putin notedly did not use that terminology, and I’m sure advisedly. So, first time that Putin has been there in decades. And lots of ways to think about it. I mean, on the one hand, you can say that Putin’s reduced to traveling to meet the world’s worst dictator because there are very few countries in the world that are willing to provide wholehearted support for Russia’s illegal invasion into Ukraine. The Iranians will. The North Koreans will. The Syrians and Belarus. And that’s kind of about it. And so that doesn’t speak very well for Putin being able to get weapons, for example, to continue to fight his war. Even the Chinese won’t do that because they’re worried about US and other knock on secondary sanctions. So, you know, that’s the positive spin that you can put on this from the United States and the NATO position.

But there’s a negative spin too, and that is that Russia is increasingly allied with a very dangerous nuclear country with cyber capabilities, history of human trafficking, illegal drug transit and export, and a country that is already maximally sanctioned that benefits from chaos, and that previously their top friend was China who wanted more stability in the global order.

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38 comments

  2. The French voting extreme right is because the sanctions on Russia made energy and food in Europe so expensive. When people believe there will be not enough to go round, they vote far right. So if the far right will stop the aid to Ukraine, which they will surely do if our economies get worse, it is our own doing supporting this proxy war. We were told to support the proxy war to defend democracy. We all know what happens in Europe with democracy when the far right get's in power.

  3. Russia will not stop, ever. Stopping the support for Ukraine or negotiating a crease fire will allow Russians to recuperate, rebuild and attack again. They have been going at it for over three centuries, and still no one seems to learn.

    Only a defeat for Russia, that's the only way the West will be safe. Russia is already crumbling, the oil and gas production can't go on without Western support, the infrastructure is defunct, they'll slowly deindustrialize – I just don't understand the talk about stopping, this is an incredibly reckless and dangerous stance.

  5. NK just renounced reunification objective with SK. Why is this not good for SK? It creates an incentive for SK to cease supporting the West, and be secure.

  7. Careful Ian, your Putin-apologist is showing. Man, what happened to you? or have you always been in the bag for uncle Vlad? Either way, your super wrong here, your propaganda is bad and you should feel bad about being on the wrong side.

  10. Thanks. Putin has a pretty good hand. He'll make a mistake, tyrants always do. But it's kind of silly for us to be condemning someone that we're supporting that were supporting. Looks like it's tyrants can thrive in open international markets.

  12. Russia will host the BRICS summit in two months. To say that Russia is "isolated" is a complete nonsense. But yes Ian, your analysis is lacking because right now you just told things that are contradictory to everything you ve been saying for 2 years.

  13. Ian, may I show my cards and say how I think we can dumb down nuclear saber rattling and neutralize plans by autocratic leaders to invade and seize smaller and thus weaker neighboring countries? Autocratic vis-à-vis to western leaders see the world they want to inhabit and everyone has the right to have their vision of how they would like the world to be. The problem is that everyone does not agree. What we have to do is have Ian start conversations that go something like this: Our stance on sovereign countries puts us into a bind versus autocratic regimes in that we simply cannot allow a sovereign country to be taken over and its territories annexed and its civilization erased solely for the cause of empire. We have absolutely no beef against the people of Russia for example, and all we are asking is for President Putin to walk in our moccasins for a fortnight. I would say to President Putin that we are at a crossroads of an existential crisis for both sides and we all know that one side will come away victorious on the battlefields of freedom against tyranny, but why push the envelope any further when we can talk our way through this thing to make it a win/win situation for both sides?

  15. Humans, weapons and drug trafficking. This is all the collective West has left to make money. The US and their EU partners in crime dominate the global trade in slavery, terrorism and drug trafficking.

  16. I totally disagree to Bremmer's approach. Ukraine only needs the right weapons to show Russia that there is no win possible. The US till today only provides second grade tier 2 or tier 3 weapons.

  17. You never lived under russian rule with KGB in power. You were lucky – they were too far from you. You don't understand their behaviour, completely. If you would, you wouldn't talk all this. (All my youth was spent in USSR. And I am very happy that my country found it's way out of that. I really hope it will stay this way in the future.)

  18. A rare honest analysis from a dim-witted liberal. But, on that trip, Putin also visited Vietnam, not only NOKO!

  20. You see that Ian, just be honest and truthful, and you will get love and respect instead of liberal lies!

  21. Russia can never be a pariah nation. It can never be isolated. The West is just being stupid and delusional. Russia is a darling of the rest of the world. Russia's influence is going deeper and wider across Asia, Africa, and South America.

  22. agree with most exept a part "you give them harder secutity garanties on the part of their territory that russia hasnt occupied"

    no security guarantees, exept joining nato (wich is impossible at this state 100% or even ever, depending on how things go), will exclude the possibility of a recurrence of war in the future. Russia shares a border with a lot of contries with much weaker armies and somehow dont fight with them – its not about a security, its about a polisies that west dictates.

    be a neutral country – receive security guarantees. Push west agenda – conflict will continue dosnt matter how big your army is – because for Russia goal number two is control over the Ukrainian asset. Goal number one is that this asset does not go to the West, i.e. in extreme cases, you can simply render it unusable.

    Since 1991, nothing has prevented Russia from using Ukrainian ports and its bases on its territory. You don't need to "control" Ukraine entirely for this. You don't have to conquire it. But it is necessary that it not be in a total alliance with the West.

  26. oh dear … ian’s trying to give us a balanced perspective. i like ian, do you ?

    the comments here seem to mostly be insisting on Western prejudice rather than re-examine the world.

    we love the West’s views. we’ll never change.

    but the world is changing.

    what if the so-called peace conference in switzerland was a vanity project?

    i mean if putin wasn’t there and biden wasn’t there, can you really call it a peace process (or is it just Western vanity ?)

    have you watched john mearsheimer or jeffrey sachs ?

    please do this 👆🏽

    cos … truth is … russia IS a country that NATO cannot destroy. fact. they have nukes.

    NATO destroyed Libya, Yugoslavia plus Iraq & Afghanistan… i’m not sure why we in the West praise NATO for this ? smells like genocide to me 🤷🏽‍♂️

    but russia cannot be destroyed. ukraine can definitely be destroyed.

    so ukraine is the loser here. period.

    and maybe europe is the next loser here for following the USA’s aggression towards russia 🤷🏽‍♂️

    feeling triggered ? want me to tell you something that makes you feel you’re right ? sorry. truth is more important than that 🤔

  29. Negotiate???? World is asking to negotiate? What then? Wait until the next round…..in 50 or so years or even sooner

  31. so the reality is the West supported a coup in 2014, provoked Russia with multiple NATO enlargements. Dragging Ukraine into NATO was the final straw. so Putin fell for this provocation. Yan was the one, who always promoted this provocation, and now .. "surprisingly" sees the results of this blunder. the West and Kiev regime are equally responsible for this conflict as Russia is.

  32. Russia has always been a global joke. A whole nation with a chronic inferiority complex that makes it violently lash out in all directions.

  36. So… Biden and the West should betray Ukraine now so that Trump and the West can't betray Ukraine later?

  37. Ukraine won’t an accept any security guarantee besides getting in NATO. We gave them security guarantees via the Lisbon protocol already and no one followed through when they got invaded.

    I also don’t think they will let go of any territories. Ukraine armed forces is gaining capabilities and strength, fighters jet coming soon, red lines moving constantly. They’re about to get Crimea back, that will change the dynamic of the war.

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