'No off ramps for Putin' - with Fred Kagan
With increasing talk about nuclear threats, we have three questions in this episode:
What do we know from Putin’s past behavior that could inform how high up the ladder of escalation he is prepared to go? What are the next rungs up the ladder of escalation before the nuclear threat is real? As Putin moves up this escalatory ladder, what are the calculations of Zelensky, Europe’s leaders, and President Biden?
Military analyst and Russia historian Fred Kagan returns to the podcast. Fred is the director of the American Critical Threats Project at the American Enterprise Institute and a former professor of military history at West Point, where he taught for ten years. Fred regularly advises senior US military commanders. He earned his PhD in Russian and Soviet military history at Yale University.
Fred has a contrarian take on possible off-ramps for Putin (spoiler-alert: he doesn’t think there are any). And Fred also has a contrarian take on President Biden’s recent comments about a “nuclear armageddon”.
To follow Fred Kagan’s work, the easiest way to do that is to go to AEI.org and understandingwar.org.
Transcript
DISCLAIMER: THIS TRANSCRIPT HAS BEEN CREATED USING AI TECHNOLOGY AND MAY NOT REFLECT 100% ACCURACY.
[00:00:00] Putin will have been paying very close attention. I guarantee you to anything that Biden says about possible Russian nuclear use and what he's going to have heard as a president saying. However far up the Russians go the escalation ladder, I'll have to go too. And if the Russians get to the point where they're launching a full intercontinental strike on me, I'm going to have to launch a full intercontinental strike on them.
In other words, the United States is actually going to engage in executing its requirements in the deterrence escalation ladder that has been underpinning deterrence theory. For eight six decades and that Biden is committed to that course of action
with increasing talks about nuclear threats I have three questions What do we know from Putin's past behavior that could inform how high up the ladder of [00:01:00] escalation? He's prepared to go What are the next rungs up the ladder of escalation before the nuclear threat is real and as Putin moves up this escalatory ladder?
What are the calculations of Zelensky, of Europe's leaders, and of President Biden? To help us think through all of this, military analyst and Russia historian Fred Kagan returns to the podcast. Fred is the director of the American Critical Threats Project at the American Enterprise Institute, and a former professor of military history at West Point.
Where he taught for 10 years. Today, Fred regularly advises senior U. S. military commanders. Fred earned his PhD in Russian and Soviet military history at Yale university. I was especially interested in checking in with Fred because he has a contrarian take on possible off ramps for Putin. Spoiler alert, he doesn't think there are any.
And Fred also has a contrarian take on President Biden's recent comments about a, quote, nuclear Armageddon. Fred [00:02:00] thinks that however ill advised the approach President Biden took in making those remarks, they're actually having an important effect in Moscow. I hope he's right. We'll talk to him about that impact at the end of this conversation.
This is Call Me Back.
And I'm pleased to welcome back to the podcast my long time friend and fan favorite on the Call Me Back podcast who tends to emerge on this podcast whenever things are going to hell in the world, uh, which is, uh, sort of like his calling card, uh, Fred Kagan. Fred, thanks for joining us. It's great to be back with you, Dan.
Uh, I, uh, I gave a, uh, a more, a more, uh, fulsome introduction in the, in the, uh, intro to this podcast. So I did, I don't only refer to you as the guy who's available when, when all hell is breaking loose. No, I get it. I look forward to having no opportunity to speak. Exactly. Uh, okay. So Fred, I want to start, [00:03:00] we have a lot to cover.
I want to start with two questions. One is, we're going to get to why you are skeptical that Putin will actually escalate in the direction of, of deploying a tactical nuclear weapon. And, and what the U. S. response should be on that escalatory road, even if he ultimately doesn't escalate to actual deployment of, of a nuclear capability.
Before we get to that, I want to start with, one, if you were to make the case that Putin is rational, and, and, and, and wanted to make the case why, why, Escalating to some kind of nuclear threat or the use of a nuclear threat made sense to him I guess my question is what would that case be and my second question is also, please for our listeners Just describe what a tactical nuclear attack is We hear this term [00:04:00] tactical nuclear weapon tactical nuclear attack.
This term is sort of thrown around And, you know, I don't think it's been defined in layman terms. I mean, the last, the last time there was an, a nuclear attack that we know of was 77 years ago. Uh, 1945, so we, and we obviously had nuclear brinkmanship, but not actual, um, use of a weapon in, in, uh, 62, the Cuban Missile Crisis.
But other than that, we haven't really had to live in a, in a world in which these kinds of threats are real, and now we're throwing around this term, tactical nuclear weapon, and I don't know if, if there's much understanding on, like, what that actually means. So those are my first two questions for you.
All right. Thanks, Dan. Well, look, I mean, the first thing is right. We've been living in a world with nuclear weapons for 77 years. Um, and, but it's been a very long time since we thought seriously about nuclear war. And, uh, we need to be, we need to get thinking seriously about it now, because we have, uh, guys like Putin, uh, who are regularly threatening to use nuclear weapons.[00:05:00]
Um, and we have, we're in a different world from the Cold War world. We really have to get serious about nuclear strategy again in the way that we were during the Cold War, but haven't been since then. So it's actually not that easy to define what a tactical nuclear weapon is or more technically a non strategic nuclear weapon Which is how the how the military refers to them It can mean one of two things we talk about a strategic nuclear weapon based on its range and based on its size So in general terms the intercontinental ballistic missiles that we have aimed at Russia that Russia has aimed at us are strategic nuclear weapons because of their range and their size.
Uh, in general terms when you're talking about a non strategic nuclear weapon or tactical nuclear weapon, you're talking about a weapon that has a shorter range and is smaller. Um, there it actually takes a lot of advances in nuclear weapon, weaponeering to make smaller weapons. Uh, and there's been a lot of effort put into that and the Russians have them and we have them including [00:06:00] weapons that are smaller than the ones that we dropped.
Uh, on Japan in terms of their yield. Um, and the reason why people have developed, uh, small nuclear weapons, well, there are a number of reasons why people have developed small nuclear weapons, but one of them is because, uh, people have wanted to be able to use them on the battlefield to affect the course of combat.
And if you're going to do that, you can't drop a huge, uh, warhead because it'll just incinerate everything, including your own troops. So the tactical nuclear weapons that people are talking about are relatively short range in the sense that they would be Russia to Ukraine, not intercontinental, and they're relatively small in the sense that you could drop one.
And to give you a sort of a sense of what I mean by small, The, the immediate lethal radius of a tactical nuclear weapon can be as small as a mile or two. Um, as opposed to, you know, a large intercontinental weapon could have a lethal radius much, much, uh, [00:07:00] greater than that. And therefore its effect is more shock value.
and demonstration of power rather than, uh, as a, as a compliment to conventional forces one has on the ground. Well, the issue of its effect actually has to do with what you drop it on. So if you drop it on a field somewhere in the rear, then the point is shock value. If you drop it on a city, then the point is terror.
But the weapons are actually designed to be used, and this is the answer to your first question, is what would the rational case for Russian use be? They could be used against concentrations of Ukrainian troops, concentrations of Ukrainian equipment, logistics nodes. Uh, other things like that, that have operational significance to ongoing fighting, but are far enough away from the front line that the effects would not be immediately felt by Russian soldiers.
There's a whole lot of caveats there that actually help explain why I think Putin is [00:08:00] unlikely to do this. But that would be the theory. So the rational case, uh, for Putin using them would basically be that his army, that Ukrainians, uh, accelerate their counter offensives in such a way that his army in Ukraine breaks.
And begins collapsing and he decides that in order to stop the route and prevent the Ukrainians from just chasing them all the way to the border, he would use tactical nuclear weapons against Ukrainian concentrations points and logistics centers near, but behind the front line in order to paralyze the Ukrainian, uh, counteroffensives and give his troops time Uh, to recover and reestablish themselves somewhere.
That's the most, that that's the most straightforward, rational, uh, way in which he could, uh, decide to use tactical nuclear weapons in, uh, in Ukraine, other than for demonstration effect. Okay. [00:09:00] So now let's talk about where things stand right now. There's a, there's a, I feel like much of the discussion analysis, public discussion analysis about, uh, the provocations coming from Putin, although it's not clear that they're actually coming from Putin or they're coming from people around Putin.
We can talk about that. And then obviously the US government, the administration's response to those provocations. Where, where do you think things stand now before we get into where we think they're going to go? Okay. Where do you think things stand now? Well, you're right to make the distinction between what Putin has said and what the people around him have said, because Putin's statements have generally been much more cautious, much more veiled, and much more indirect than the statements of some of the people around him, including, you know, people around him who are getting a lot of attention, but who are not decision makers and are not necessarily even in the inner circle at this point.
So it is important to parse those things, but he has made nuclear threats. So we [00:10:00] do have to take that very seriously. Um, Putin has been proceeding up the escalation ladder. At most rung by rung, uh, in some cases, half a rung at a time, um, you know, there's no this image that Putin is somehow a gambler, which is the opposite of the truth.
Actually, Putin historically has been extremely cautious and has done things that look like gambles. I do assess out of a mistaken belief that they were not actually risky and the invasion of Ukraine being. Uh the prime example, I don't think he had any idea what he was getting into and I think let's let's spend a minute on That because I want you to expand on that because I when when people say wow, you know To your point putin's a madman putin's a gambler if you look at his behavior over the last couple decades And how the west has responded to his behavior One could make the argument that his February, his most [00:11:00] recent invasion of Ukraine, was totally logical.
Well, it was logical, but it wasn't rational, if I can use the distinction of it, rationality being connected to reality in some way. Okay. Look, at this point, we do have to talk about a kind of bounded rationality, because Putin is making logical decisions. But on the basis of a skewed perception of reality, um, and that is what led him to invade Ukraine, I believe.
Uh, he really did think that the Ukrainians wouldn't fight. I think he had drunk his vodka laced Kool Aid on the subject that Ukrainians really wanted to be liberated. And a whole bunch of other nonsense that his intelligence community had presented him with in the echo chamber that he was living in.
So, I really do believe that he thought that Ukraine would fold up in a few days and that this would be easy. And so he didn't think that he was engaging in a gamble. And in this sense, he's the opposite of Hitler. Uh, because Hitler was continually [00:12:00] engaging in gambles and trusted his luck. And by the way, he's the opposite of Hitler in my judgment in another important way.
Hitler was an apocalyptic thinker. Hitler embraced the apocalypse. Putin is not in any way an apocalyptic thinker. Putin desires this worldly success. Um, and he's not interested in, uh, you know, irradiating the world and then being the last guy standing. That's not That's not okay for him. So in that sense, he, it is a bounded rationality, but it's rationality.
But the key thing is, look, if you look back over, over the past two decades, Putin pushes, and when the West or his victim pushes back, he tends to pause and recalibrate and rethink. He's been generally very cautious and very deliberate. And he's shown a lot of those same characteristics, even in fighting this war, where he has been slow to escalate.
Slow to change what he's doing, [00:13:00] slow to take more risks, cautious about testing. I know it doesn't look that way, given what he's doing, but this is the same cautious Putin fundamentally, who really does not want to gamble, uh, any more than he has to. When you describe him as the opposite of Hitler and that he's, he's He doesn't have this apocalyptic view of the world in which he's the last man standing.
What if his choice is between that and defeat? If he, if he is defeated and all the risks that come with defeat, meaning there's no quote unquote easy off ramp, he can't market the defeat to his local population as a, as a win, it's a flat out defeat which Puts his position in the Russian political ecosystem in jeopardy And he could feel like a you know a cornered a cornered animal Why wouldn't he kind of have a burn it down?
Mindset because you [00:14:00] have to be a you because you actually have to be a crazy person to decide that you want to end the world If you can't be in charge of something anymore, and we just don't have, I just don't see reason to think that Putin is that kind of crazy person. There was plenty of reason to think that Hitler was that kind of person, but there's not a lot of reason to think that Putin is.
I don't think, look, his rhetoric regarding Ukraine is interesting. I love parsing it. Um, you know, it will oscillate between explaining that it's existential to Russia or it's not existential to Russia. The truth is, it isn't existential to Russia. He can lose in Ukraine and there can be a game that continues after that.
And as long as that is true, which it always will be true because there's not a world in which Ukraine invades and conquers Russia. Um, it's not actually existential. And, you know, one of the things that's important to remember about Putin and this, this kind of long distance, you know, sort of psychoanalysis is [00:15:00] always fraud, right?
So, I mean, I, I offer you all the caveats that are appropriate, but Putin has caused us to know a lot about himself, including his, you know, he's, he's a judo, uh, master or the Russian version of judo. Um, he doesn't think in terms of being backed into a corner. He thinks about being in a difficult place and finding a way to use the enemy's strength against him and continuing to play Um, and we're not going to back him into a corner because again No one is going to put the survival of russia on the table.
Now the dynamic is that ironically and I think unwittingly or reluctantly Putin is putting his own continued rule at risk by the way that he's mobilizing, by what he's doing in Russia, by pushing this war further. And he is facing Always very low, but much [00:16:00] greater than ever has been the case risk, um, of instability in Russia that could ultimately overthrow him.
But if you think about, and that's the only scenario in which it makes any sense to talk about, you know, ending the world because otherwise he's, you know, otherwise he just loses. But if you look at that scenario, now you're imagining Putin facing a serious challenge from his inner circle or, or his inner circle breaking in some way.
And by the way, he's been doing a lot to alienate the military, which still controls Russia's nuclear weapons, among other things. So now you're imagining a circumstance in which the inner circle is fracturing, Putin's reign is at risk, he decides he's had enough, and he, and he quote, pushes the button.
Okay, well, there is no such thing as pushing the button. That Russia has the same kinds of safeguards on the use of its nuclear weapons that we do. So now you have to assume that the people who would actually be responsible for executing that order would blow up the world rather than risk Putin [00:17:00] going down.
Maybe. But that starts to get dicey, and frankly I think in that circumstance he was much more likely to be preoccupied. With trying to stay in power than he is with thinking about blowing up the world okay, so fred because you know, you you're Your contribution to the to the study of what is going on Uh with this war has many facets not the least of which is Not only are you a military historian and analyst who actually works with us and and other western military Uh, commanders, but you're also a, uh, PhD in Russian history, Putin recently referenced and you, you and I just talked about this earlier, uh, not on the podcast, Putin recently referenced this peasant revolt in the late 18th century with like what's called Pugachev's rebellion.
And you found this very interesting, revealing that this is what he was [00:18:00] talking about. And he was meeting with some school or school teachers or something in Russia. And you and the Institute for Study of Wars, you know, tracking, um, a lot of movements and a lot of commentary and a lot of public statements coming out of Russia to try to make sense of this, I, we will put the links to various resources as we always do in our show notes.
Um, you're, you're a Russian historian, so first of all, what is Pukajev's Rebellion? Why are we talking about it on this podcast? And why do you think it's important? So, uh, look, so the other thing to know about Putin We're really geeking out here on Russian history, by the way. When we're talking about, like, the era of Catherine the Great, and peasants, the greatest peasant revolt against Catherine the Great, this is, we're going, we're going, we're deep, we're going deep here.
And I'm grateful to you. This is, I, I love this. This brings me back to my roots. Um, look, one of the things to keep in mind about Putin is he meditates on Russian history. Um, because he, this is a, you know, this is a Russian nationalist [00:19:00] ideology that he's pursuing. And so he delves deep into Russian history to pull up a lot of very obscure references to things.
This one isn't that obscure, uh, but it's weird. So here's what was going on. Putin was meeting with the winners of some student competition, um, and their teachers and. Uh, he was talking to them and this is recent. I mean, this is, yeah, this is last week. I think, yeah, um, time has no meaning for me anymore, but I think it was last week.
Um, and basically apropos of nothing. He asks a teacher from one of the towns that was involved in Pugachov's Rebellion, which I'll tell you what that was in a minute. He asks this teacher, um, you know, how do you teach what the cause of Pugachov's Rebellion was? And you could see this teacher go, I mean, you could, you could basically see this teacher's rock back and it's like, [00:20:00] um, sir, uh, okay.
And he sort of fun for us around a little bit. So Pugachev's rebellion. So what happened, okay. Um, in the middle of the seven years war, this is the mid 18th century, um, Tsar, um, the Russian, Russian Tsaritsa who had been fighting, uh, the war and fighting Frederick the Great dies. Uh, Peter the third becomes Tsar.
Peter the third was, uh, an admirer of Frederick the great, and he immediately ends the war. And thereby saves Prussia and sets Europe up for a whole bunch of other problems, uh, to come. Uh, the Russian court is not enthusiastic about this, uh, course of action. And so they assassinate him and put his wife on the throne, Catherine, uh, who becomes Catherine the Great.
Um, this leads to various interesting dynamics. But among them, [00:21:00] the, uh, rumors begin to propagate that Peter III didn't actually die. And a, uh, uh, guy by the name of Pugachev, uh, announces that he, in fact, is Peter III, who didn't die, but voluntarily abdicated for the good of the realm and all of that kind of stuff.
But now Catherine is misbehaving. And so by 1770s, Pugachev has formed an army and is in open rebellion against Catherine, claiming to be Peter III, um, her assassinated husband. It's a great thing. There's a wonderful Pushkin Uh, uh, story about the captain's daughter. Right. Um, and it's, it's a very dramatic thing.
And Pugachov actually makes a lot of trouble for Catherine who is slow to respond. Uh, and ultimately has to fight a bunch of big battles to put him down. So that's the Pugachov Rebellion, which happens, uh, the climactic events are in 1774 and 1775. Okay. So Putin asked this teacher, what was the cause of the rebellion?
And the teacher fumpers around and he says, [00:22:00] well, it was the harshness of, of serfdom and, and a few other things. And, and Putin gives him a hard time. Putin is not satisfied. So he gives him the answer. He said it was caused because Someone decided that he was Tsar, and then Putin continues, and why did that happen?
Because of an element of the weakness of the central power. Okay. Now, it's not new for Putin to be emphasizing the dangers of being weak. He is saying weakness is lethal. He says this all of the time. So, that, that isn't surprising. But the things, there are two things that were surprising about this to me.
One is That wasn't the first point he made. The first point he made is the rebellion occurred because someone decided he was Tsar. Now that is a fascinating artifact. That's not, it's even a somewhat strange way [00:23:00] of articulating the cause of the rebellion. Why is that on Putin's mind? But even beyond that, why is any But your point is that he lives in fear, or at least is very mindful of some other political actor asserting themselves as leader.
And arguing that Putin has passed a sell by date and there needs to be change. Yeah, yeah. I think that was a, at least an externalization of a paranoia. At most, a warning shot across the bow of anybody who might be thinking about that. But at a minimum, it was an externalization of a paranoia. Why is Putin thinking about a rebellion?
Well, look, there is the nearest thing to a rebellion that we have seen in Putin's entire tenure going on in Russia right now. And there are challenges Manifest, manifested how? Manifested with, well, in a sort of passive aggressive way, [00:24:00] hundreds of thousands of Russian men fleeing, rather than, uh, being, allowing themselves to be called up.
But actually, protests, there had been protests at the beginning of the mobilization that were extremely unusual in extent, uh, in Russia. And we're having regular Uh, occurrences of Russians throwing Molotov cocktails at recruitment centers and physically attacking, uh, people and there's, there's, there's a, there's a degree of anti government mayhem, which is, you know, very, very small by normal standards.
You know, Western, by other, by other standards, none of, you know, these kinds of things would not on the whole, well, I mean, I mean, it's, it is significant when you have people running around, like Molotov cocktails at government buildings and stuff, but it's, you know, it's not earthshaking stuff, but it's earthshake, it's earthshaking in Russia.
And it's earthshaking to a guy who thinks. That he is cohering his society [00:25:00] around the nationalist dream that he's fighting for in Ukraine, and that isn't happening and it's earthshaking in the context of the explicit and growing chorus of criticism directed at his people in, in, in his inner circle. And now finally starting to be at him.
So this is obviously put in his mind, a fear that he is externalized through a historical reference, which was just absolutely bizarre. So. Against that backdrop, what are the next? And you touched on it a little bit at the beginning of this conversation, but I just want to get a little deeper into it.
What do you believe? If you believe he's not racing to use a nuclear capability, what are the steps? that he has available to him on the, on the escalatory ladder, as you said. He's been moving like half a step, a step, not much more than that. So let's live in a world in which he [00:26:00] keeps escalating short of use of a nuclear capability.
What does that escalation look like? Well, his problem and his problem is that he has very limited capability to escalate. Um, so he's engaging in a mobilization, which I think is It's probably slightly beyond the targets that he set are probably slightly beyond Russia's capabilities. Um, but they're working at a mobilization to put 300, 000, um, guys back in the army and get them into Ukraine, um, which is going to have a limited effect on the conflict and a much lesser effect than the number would suggest.
Um, And then he's, you know, unleashing, uh, uh, barrages of attacks on, uh, Ukrainian civilian targets and infrastructure and expanding the range of war crimes and atrocities that, uh, he's committing. The problem is that, as has been widely reported, Russia's stockpile of the, of the [00:27:00] systems that he's using to conduct those attacks is limited.
Uh, Russian military industry is not able to replenish them. And so he's not going to be able to sustain. This kind of barrage, and as long as the West continues to support Ukraine with air defense systems, he's not going to be able to turn to the other kinds of things that he did in Syria of, you know, flying manned bombers over Ukrainian cities and carpet bombing them, which is what he did in Syria.
But he can't do that in Ukraine because the Ukrainians will shoot down the bombers. So as long as the West continues to supply Ukraine with air defense, Putin's actual abilities to escalate conventionally are limited. Nevertheless, he's in the midst of a mobilization now, partial reserve call up now. Uh, the Russian normal annual conscription cycle will begin.
It was actually delayed by a month. It will begin on November 1st. So, I think if Putin imagines that he will [00:28:00] Well, so there will be more troops coming online. I think he imagines that those troops will make the difference But beyond that I think he has another theory of the case Which is that he thinks he's going to freeze europe into submission and this is important for our thinking about timelines because You know russia has never yet subjected europe to a just full energy cutoff through an entire winter, and he is certainly intending to do that this year.
Um, he, I believe, is banking on that to break Europe's will to continue to support Ukraine and at minimum separate Europe from us if we retain the will to support Ukraine and force Ukraine to its knees. That proposition testable for months from Putin's perspective. It won't be falsifiable. Until after the new year.
And I think that he is very unlikely [00:29:00] to move to a step like nuclear weapons use. Unless something weird happens in Ukraine itself that I don't think probably will. Um, before he has let these things, this mobilization, the conscription and the freezing of Europe play out. Uh, and I don't, I frankly am not at all sure that he would escalate to nuclear use even then because there are a lot of reasons why he rationally shouldn't.
But um, I just, I don't think that this is imminent. Okay. So now I want to ask you about three leaders, Zelensky in Ukraine, Olaf Scholz in Germany as a proxy for where Europe will be during those freezing months. And then President Biden and the comments he made recently about nuclear Armageddon. Let's start with.
President Zelensky there's, it, it, it, my sense, my impression is, and based on people who are close watchers of, of Ukraine and Ukrainian politics. Uh, that he feels that he has real momentum now, that [00:30:00] he, that he has the edge, that Putin is on his back foot. And while maybe there was a world in which Zelensky would have agreed to some kind of cessation of hostilities, uh, a temporary peace agreement, whatever you want to call it in February, March, or April, that would have made, that would have been acceptable to Zelensky to make for Ukraine, to make serious concessions.
Forget about that happening now. He's not going to make major concessions to, uh, to Putin now. And in fact, any agreement he reaches with Putin is gonna have to go to a referendum in Ukraine and Ukrainian, uh, public opinion is certainly on the side of we're not. We're not now bending to Putin. If anything, he should be bending to us.
So, we all talk about off ramps and creating a world in which Putin can, can kind of, um, gradually pull back from all this in a face saving way, if he's being rational, but that the, the politics in Ukraine right now wouldn't allow for Zelensky to do that. [00:31:00] Well, that, that is, that is true. Um, but the entire world in which the conversation is being had about off ramps and negotiations is a fictional world.
Uh, Putin is, every now and then, causes it to be suggested that he would be willing to negotiate and he makes clear what his terms are, and his terms are Ukrainian surrender. Uh, Putin has never offered anything, uh, along the lines of what people who talk about off ramps suggest. Putin hasn't ever indicated that he would be okay with freezing the lines where they are.
That's, that's, that's not, it's not an offer that he's made. That's an offer that other people have been making on his behalf. So the first thing is that Putin's demands remain the same as they were at the start of the war, which is Ukrainian surrender and regime change. Well, no, I mean, Zelensky and the Ukrainians are not going to accept that.
But you know, Dan, it is time for us to recognize that this is a genocidal war. [00:32:00] The aim of this war is to destroy Ukraine as a country and basically destroy Ukrainians as a people. And it is based on the premise that. There really is no such thing as Ukrainian ethnicity, that that's an invented ethnicity.
Um, and what the Russians have been doing to Ukrainian civilians. Um, is, you know, there are things that the Russians have been doing that explicitly violate the Genocide Convention. Um, leave, leave aside the question of whether the Ukrainians think they're winning or not. Would you negotiate with somebody who's waging a genocidal war in your country?
I mean, we need to be clear about what, what it is that we think we're asking the Ukrainians to do here. And somebody who's made it perfectly clear that, at best, you would, they would be buying themselves time for him to get strong enough so that he could launch the next invasion and finish them off. So this was, when there was debate about some face saving off ramp agreement that Zelensky could agree to, it was before the mass graves, it [00:33:00] was before the mass bombings of, of civilian areas, and, I mean, that, that's, that was awful.
Okay. It, it was right when, when people were sort of floating this idea earlier on, it was. When it appeared that the alternative might be Russian victory. And if there was a way to save a part of Ukraine by sacrificing another part, then, okay, you know, maybe one has that conversation. Now, when that is not on the table, and Ukraine is going to be an independent state, but the question is, does it, you know, try to negotiate with someone in these circumstances, leaving that someone, by the way, and this is another thing that we're not talking about enough, Leaving that someone with positions that would be extremely advantageous for the next invasion.
All of this terrain matters. Let me just give me just a second to make a point about this terrain, which I'm going to, I'll be publishing on, but I'll preview here. [00:34:00] Excellent. Um, exclusive, exclusive reveal here on the call me back podcast. Look, I've seen it, you know, some. People saying, why should we be fighting and risking nuclear war for these terrain, these areas in the Ukraine's far East that are only of interest to the Ukrainians and the, and it's, it's just a ideological absolutism on the part of Zelensky, which is completely false to fact.
Um, first we need to start by understanding that Putin's objectives are not going to change. Putin seeks the destruction of an independent Ukraine and whatever he agrees to now, if even if he did agree to something that was more limited than that. Would not be reflecting any fundamental change in his objective which has been consistent for decades So it would be at best a truce in which russia rearms and prepares for the next attack Okay If the russians if that ceasefire freezes things something along current lines where the russians are on the [00:35:00] west bank of the nepal river As they are now then the next invasion begins With russian mechanized forces seizing the entire ukrainian southern coast and unhinging the entire ukrainian defensive line along the nippur And probably rapidly collapsing ukrainian defenses in a way that ukrainians will not be able to defend against that's what the current battle space geometry leaves Even if the ukrainians just push the russians back across the nippur river The Russians will still be in an extremely advantageous position for a future invasion, much more advantageous than they were in 2014 when they started this thing.
And it will be much harder for Ukraine to defend itself. Then Ukraine will also be badly compromised economically and much more dependent on long term Western financial aid. Than if the ukrainians re uh regain control of the critical industrial areas in the east that they Russians are now occupying so this terrain matters And where the camp the [00:36:00] the war freezes if and when it freezes matters now, we can talk about crimea Although by the way Crimea is much more geostrategically important for nato than it is for ukraine in many ways Because the fact that the russians have Bases in Crimea and can station aircraft missiles air defense and anti shipping missiles in Crimea Makes them a dominant power in the black sea and allows them to threaten nato's southeastern flank very directly If the russians were actually confined to what their international border really is They would be out of missile range of much of the western black sea Have a much harder time threatening nato's southeastern flank and a much harder time supporting operations against ukraine again in the future In ways that can move rapidly toward the nato border So it's actually it is in nato's interest for the russians not to be in control of crimea Almost as much or in some respects more than it is in ukraine's [00:37:00] interest So all of this ground matters and we we have to get out of the out of the mindset That is fundamentally an ignorant and just not paying attention to things mindset that says, well, who really cares exactly where the line is?
No, it matters that so that's that's that's the other thing and that bring that together With the genocidal nature of this war and what Putin is doing and the total objectives that he's pursuing Of course the Ukrainian if course Zelensky is not going to be willing to negotiate on anything like these terms Okay.
So now let's talk about Uh, Olaf Scholz and other European leaders, how do they, what are their incentives and how do they exist, so to speak, in their political decision making and geopolitical decision making? Over the next few months as we get into a, what will be a very cold winter for Europe.
They're going to have, uh, I think a bunch of conflicting [00:38:00] pressures on them. Uh, of course their populations are going to be unhappy with energy prices and the economic damage and it's cold and all of that stuff. And they're going to be under pressure to solve those problems. Um, it'll be, it'll be interesting to see exactly how that plays out because Normally, when people are unhappy about stuff like that, they get mad at their government for solving the problem, rather than Demanding a specific solution like we should make ukraine surrender so that we're not cold anymore.
Um, That will be obviously a talking point But I don't know that we'll we'll have to see how that pressure actually manifests on schultz and the other uh, european leaders but the other dynamic is Um, this is where putin has been doing us all a huge favor because he started this war and very rapidly He sort of ripped off the putin mask And then you could see under it satan And at regular [00:39:00] intervals, as, as if we have forgotten how evil he is, he will do something like launch a barrage of using precision guided munitions to kill Ukrainian civilians.
And basically do it on live television They we will have the revelations of the absolute atrocities and torture and all of the things the russians been doing to ukrainian civilians mass rape mass deportations All of these things which have come up at regular intervals That continue to make it clear exactly how evil he really is and that is going to create an it continues to create an environment in which even if schultz Wanted to sort of surrender to Putin, um, or give in in some way.
The political headwind against actually doing that in a straightforward way is strong, and it's going to continue to be strong, uh, because Putin is going to continue to go down this path. And [00:40:00] so this is why I think on balance, if you just think about this in a business perspective, if you just think about this in a, you know, economic economics are the only thing that matter and people just put their pocketbooks, you will imagine that the Europeans will inevitably surrender.
And I think Putin is making that calculation. But if you think about what it looks like to be a political leader. Who actually has to contemplate getting up on television and saying, Yes, I know that the Russians have conducted mass rapes of Ukrainian women. Yes, I know that the Russians are deporting Ukrainian children and violating the Genocide Convention.
Yes, I know that they're deliberately targeting civilian, civilian populations. Yes, I know that he's threatened nuclear war and he's done all of these horrible things. Nevertheless, I'm going to surrender to him so that your heating prices will drop.
It's a difficult speech to give maybe maybe he will but I don't think we should underestimate how unpleasant That experience would be for him or any other [00:41:00] european leader who wants to do that That's always assuming by the way that they're actually not paying attention to the geostrategic situation Not recognizing how important it is not to allow putin to win and so forth And I think they increasingly are recognizing those things Which makes it, will make it even less likely that they will be in participation.
But could they make the calculate, could they make the calculation, you know, yes it is horrible for us to negotiate with a monster. But we are, we are in so doing heading off more bloodshed, more human catastrophe. In the future. So unfortunately, we have to do this deal with this monster, with this, you know, this devil, as you said, and that, you know, we will get a pause in the, in the horror that's being subjected to the Ukrainian people.
Sure, you could, you could make that argument and then you will immediately have to explain why you have just done something other than give away the Sudetenland and why given you've had that you have somebody who has demonstrated [00:42:00] that in many other respects, he kind of is like Hitler. Um, and is willing to do these things and is determined to achieve total domination over Ukraine, why you would appease him.
That's, that's also a difficult speech to give. Because you're likely just, you are Chamberlain, and that you are potentially just inviting future aggression. Not potentially, almost certainly. So, it's, it could, all of these things could happen. You know, Schultz could cave, Macron could cave. But, I just don't think we should underestimate the, the The downside risk to them of making these decisions, uh, that are focusing on, on dealing with economic, uh, problems.
Okay, so now let's talk about President Biden. I will posit that the location of where he made these comments about nuclear Armageddon and, and what the implications would be were grossly inappropriate. Uh, I will posit that if the president [00:43:00] has a message, uh, to start. Uh, educating and setting expectations for the American people.
There are other ways and places to do it. So let's just, you know, leave that aside for now. Let's talk about the substance of what president Biden said, and let's, in fact, we'll play it. We have not faced the prospect of Armageddon since Kennedy and the Cuban missile crisis. The president said at a private fundraiser, I don't think there's any such thing as the ability to easily use a tactical nuclear weapon and not end up with Armageddon.
Okay, Fred, so can you. You have a more charitable view of the, of what the effect of what he said, most of the press coverage was hysterical, full disclosure, my reaction too was a little hysterical about what he said and how he said it, but you actually think on the substance that there may have been a positive effect, uh, in terms of how this, how this is.
Analysis, if you will, [00:44:00] or predict or forecasting from the president arrived in Moscow. Yeah, look, I wish he hadn't said it. I don't think that it's good for the president to be talking about Armageddon. And I also think that it's not good to suggest that, um, certain kinds of escalations will inevitably lead to Armageddon because I don't actually think that's true.
Um, but I also think that if you parse the logic of that, first of all, World leaders like Putin, dictators like Putin and Xi Jinping and stuff don't parse the context in which things are said as finely as we do. Whatever Putin says is Russian policy. Whatever Xi says is Chinese policy. They assume that the same thing is true of Biden.
Whatever Biden says is US policy, wherever he says it. So we. We just, we need to understand that this is the [00:45:00] way they interact with us because they, there's mirror imaging that goes on there too. So, a presidential statement is a presidential statement. That's the first thing. Putin will have been paying very close attention, I guarantee you, to anything that Biden says about possible Russian nuclear use.
So Biden says, basically, if, if, you know, if Russia uses nuclear weapons, then, then, you know, it'll lead to Armageddon. Okay. There's a logic in that statement. The logic is as follows. If Russia uses tactical nuclear weapons, the West will escalate. The West, um, not escalate. The West will respond to that escalation by engaging in some military activity against Russia.
And then the Russians will escalate in response to that Western engagement. Using nuclear weapons at a higher level and the West will respond by using nuclear weapons and that will go all the way up to a [00:46:00] full thermonuclear exchange. Okay, we'll flip that around for a minute. If you're Putin, what are you hearing?
If I use tactical nuclear weapons, the West will attack me. That is an inevitable logical part of the assertion that it leads to Armageddon because if Putin uses nuclear weapons and the West doesn't attack, then there's no escalation.
So you can know you can say Putin isn't going to parse this that finally and I'm going to say nonsense Of course, he's going to parse it that finally he's going to have listened to that and what he's going to have heard It's a president saying sadly basically, however far up the Russians go the escalation ladder I'll have to go to and if the Russians get to the point where they launch Where they're launching a full intercontinental strike on me.
I'm gonna have to launch a full intercontinental strike on them In other words, the United States is actually going to engage in the, in [00:47:00] executing its requirements in the deterrence escalation ladder that has been underpinning deterrence theory for six decades and that Biden is committed to that course of action.
That's in, that's an inherent implicit and inevitable in the statement that Biden made. And I guarantee you that Putin heard that part. Along with all of the other downside stuff And he lives and you've also made the point that putin lives in fear of russian conventional forces being decimated So in all of this he hears this means the west is going to get really involved like they've been pretty involved But now they're going to get directly involved not kind of pretending that they're not involved But like really involved and what that means for russia's conventional military capability Is potentially terrifying to Putin because if he loses his army, he's got nothing.
Yeah, and look the one thing that's very very clear is Putin does not want a war with the west This is just incredibly clear. He has [00:48:00] had all kinds of opportunities To attack NATO in any way, from large, from small scale to large scale, he could perfectly well have fired missiles at Poland or Romania in response to NATO provision of weapons to Ukraine.
In fact, many people expected him to, he didn't do that. Why? He does not want a war with NATO because he knows he will lose it and it will end with the destruction of the Russian conventional military, if nothing else. So this is another factor that is restraining him. And this is why this is the answer to the question that you asked at the top.
of the show that I want to answer now, which is how do we deter Putin from using nuclear weapons? How do we deter Putin from continuing to escalate in ways that are unacceptable? We make it clear that we actually will engage. We actually will fight him. We actually will, uh, attack Russian forces in Ukraine conventionally with our conventional forces.
If he uses nuclear [00:49:00] weapons, we will destroy the Russian military in Ukraine. If he threatens to escalate nuclear beyond that, then the answer is, okay, nuclear deterrence works. Fred, we will leave it there. Thank you, uh, for providing some important context and history, a history lesson. Everyone now is going to be Googling Pukachev's Rebellion.
And, uh, and also giving us what is at least a contrarian take, contrarian to what the conventional wisdom is out there, um, on, on this particular issue, which is generating so much well deserved heat. Um, and we'll have you back on. Great. Thanks, Dan.
That's our show for today. To follow Fred Kagan's work, the easiest way to do that is to go to aei.org or go to understanding war.org. That's the website of the Institute for the Study of War, which Fred is very involved with, and they produce tremendous amount of content, almost on a daily basis on Battlefield Developments going [00:50:00] on.
In the russia ukraine war theater call me back. It's produced by Ilan Benatar until next time. I'm your host Dan Senor.