For years, Vladimir Putin has tried to paint Russia as a trusting victim exploited by an abusive West. But in a major foreign policy speech on Thursday, he added a new wrinkle: a “pitch for a broader, anti-Western coalition,” suggests Leonid Bershidsky for Bloomberg View.
Putin “is talking to fellow leaders and elites in countries that are not solidly part of the Russian or Western orbits, like some Middle Eastern nations who feel burned by their brief experiment with opening up during the Arab Spring. He’s telling them not to trust the U.S. unless they want to end up humiliated too. He’s telling them that Russia is willing to treat them as equals, willing to intervene quickly if they face internal and external threats as it did for Assad in Syria,” Bershidsky writes.
“If Putin’s offer of Russia as an alternative center of gravity sounds a bit implausible, it’s worth remembering that, just three years ago, so did the largely successful Syria intervention, which has revived Russia’s role as a go-to power in the Middle East. Talk of a pivotal Russian role in tilting last year's U.S. presidential election only makes Russia look more attractive as a nimble, tech-savvy alternative to the U.S. in the eyes of underleveraged rulers who fear the U.S. might seek to undermine them.”
Putin “is talking to fellow leaders and elites in countries that are not solidly part of the Russian or Western orbits, like some Middle Eastern nations who feel burned by their brief experiment with opening up during the Arab Spring. He’s telling them not to trust the U.S. unless they want to end up humiliated too. He’s telling them that Russia is willing to treat them as equals, willing to intervene quickly if they face internal and external threats as it did for Assad in Syria,” Bershidsky writes.
“If Putin’s offer of Russia as an alternative center of gravity sounds a bit implausible, it’s worth remembering that, just three years ago, so did the largely successful Syria intervention, which has revived Russia’s role as a go-to power in the Middle East. Talk of a pivotal Russian role in tilting last year's U.S. presidential election only makes Russia look more attractive as a nimble, tech-savvy alternative to the U.S. in the eyes of underleveraged rulers who fear the U.S. might seek to undermine them.”
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