The greatest threat to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s authority in his 23 years in power might seem like the perfect time for the United States to take an even tougher stance toward Moscow, but some experts say that the focus should remain on helping Ukraine.
After Russian warlord Yevgeny Prigozhin led an armed group to within 120 miles of Moscow on Saturday, the international community is questioning how much power Putin has over Russian military.
At a panel discussion of experts on Russia sponsored Wednesday by the Atlantic Council, a nonpartisan think tank, one warned that it would be a “mistake to exaggerate the divisions within the Russian military establishment.”
Stephen Sestanovich, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said that figuring out how to support Ukraine should be the focus, “and anything else is a distraction.”
Rather than confronting Putin by working to remove the country from the United Nations Security Council, for example, the Biden administration should consider accelerating Ukraine’s integration into NATO or providing more military training and equipment to Ukrainian troops, he said.
Dylan Myles-Primakoff, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center, echoed this idea, saying that “support to Ukraine is still the best step forward.”
At the same time, however, there may be a way for the U.S. to take advantage of Russian doubts on the war.
Sestanovich said that Prigozhin, who runs the mercenary Wagner Group, a paramilitary force that has been funded by the Russian government, made claims over the weekend that the reasons given for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine were lies. Though Prigozhin never said so explicitly, Sestanovich said most Russians understand that Prigozhin meant those lies have come from Putin himself.
Sestanovich argued that “exploiting this moment of truth telling is something that should be a high priority” for the West, which has been too cautious to comment on this claim, he said.
The U.S. should leave the fighting to Ukrainians, but there is a place for Washington to undermine Putin by promoting skepticism within Russia, Sestanovich said, adding that that U.S. foreign policy should aim to “divide Russians who have so far been too quiet about their doubts about the war.”
Read the full article here