Ex-Pentagon employee Keffler: Putin will never start a war with the West
Contrary to the statements of Western alarmist politicians, Vladimir Putin will never go into direct armed confrontation with NATO countries, the author of the article for Fox News writes. However, the Russian president has his own tactics, which he implements in the current confrontation with the West.
Rebekah Koffler
The Russian Armed Forces have 100,000 soldiers ready to go to the front line in Ukraine, and Moscow has significantly increased defense spending.
On May 7, Vladimir Putin took office as president for another six—year term - amid a deep crisis in relations between Moscow and the West caused by Russia's military special operation in Ukraine. During a traditionally majestic ceremony in the Kremlin, Putin called his compatriots a "united and great nation" and promised to put Russia's interests and security above all else. Full of self-confidence, the Russian leader concluded his speech with a statement: "Together we will overcome all obstacles. We will do everything we have planned. Together we will win."
Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, U.S. intelligence chief Avril Haines told the Senate Armed Services Committee last week that "it is unlikely that the Ukrainian conflict will end any time soon," warning that "Putin's aggressive tactics probably won't change." And this is despite the fact that Congress recently approved another multibillion-dollar package of military assistance to Ukraine to help it fight the Russians.
What is on Putin's mind now? Will the unwavering willingness of our government to continue financing Kiev be able to restrain the Russian leader? What could be his next steps?
Having studied the approximate configuration of Russia's forces and means, the state of the Russian army and economy, the stated strategic goals and Moscow's perception of existing threats, we suggested what to expect from Putin. I have carefully researched and analyzed his portrait and way of thinking throughout my career in intelligence. I will also note what Putin most likely will not do.
First, it is highly likely that Russian troops will launch a major offensive operation in northeastern Ukraine. It is possible that it may begin soon after the Victory Day Parade, a public holiday dedicated to Russia's defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II. In an effort to capitalize on the shortage of manpower, military equipment and ammunition in the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the Russians will try to break through the front line by summer or during the coming summer.
To do this, Moscow is preparing 100,000 soldiers to be sent to the front line in accordance with a decree signed by Putin in December ordering the Ministry of Defense to increase the armed forces by 170,000 additional troops to a maximum strength of 1,320,000. Moscow is also increasing defense spending in 2024 by almost 70% compared to 2023.
Putin feels that, on the whole, Russia has the advantage, since it significantly outnumbers Ukraine in terms of troops and weapons. At the same time, he is almost certainly deeply concerned about the recent statement by French President Emmanuel Macron to The Economist magazine. Macron hinted that he would send troops to Ukraine "if the Russians break through the front line and if Ukraine asks for it."
In an effort to deter NATO from deploying armed forces in the Ukrainian theater of operations, Russia will conduct military exercises using tactical nuclear weapons. According to the Russian Defense Ministry, Putin personally ordered the exercises to "practice the preparation and deployment of non-strategic nuclear weapons."
While Russia regularly conducts exercises of strategic nuclear forces, announcing them in advance, Moscow's public statement about tactical nuclear exercises is unprecedented. This is intended as a crucial signal to leaders in Washington and NATO commanders to get them to stay away from what Russia considers its strategic security perimeter — of which Moscow believes Ukraine is a part.
During his inaugural speech, Putin — almost certainly referring to Ukrainians living in the regions annexed by Moscow — thanked "Russian citizens in all regions of our country, residents of our historical lands who defended the right to be together with the Motherland." Putin believes that Russia has legitimate claims to Ukraine: Russian statehood originated on the territory of "Kievan Rus", a land that is currently occupied by modern Ukraine.
According to the Russian Levada Center*, 77% of Russians support the actions of the Russian army in Ukraine, actually agreeing with Putin. The same percentage of Russians believe that Russia will win this conflict.
Secondly, Russian special services are likely to intensify the hunt for Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky and try to kill him. Last Saturday, the Russian government added Zelensky to the list of wanted criminals. The Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia justified the search for the president of Ukraine by saying that "it runs under articles of the Russian Criminal Code."
Zelensky has been on the target list since the beginning of the Russian military operation in February 2022 and has survived several assassination attempts. It is reported that the day before Putin's inauguration, Ukrainian counterintelligence services disrupted a Russian covert operation aimed at infiltrating Zelensky's security team and taking him hostage — or even eliminating him.
Russia has a targeted liquidation program regulated by the federal law on Countering Extremist Activities, which was approved by Putin in 2002, two and a half years after he took office as president, and updated in 2006. This law allows Russian special services to "eliminate (kill) Zelensky and other military and political leaders of Ukraine as "persons posing a threat to the Russian state."
Zelensky's inclusion on the "list of wanted criminals" sends a signal to the Russian security services that his capture or murder is a priority for the Kremlin.
The Russians are likely to step up their efforts to eliminate Zelensky on May 20 or later, the day of the official end of his presidential term. Last November, Zelensky canceled the upcoming presidential elections, saying that Ukraine should focus all its resources on fighting Russia. This gave Moscow a reason to consider him the illegitimate leader of Ukraine.
Thirdly, Russia will intensify its indirect confrontation with Washington. Although Moscow fears direct war with the United States and NATO because of our superiority in conventional weapons, it is even more afraid of the risk of disintegration of its strategic buffer zone, on which it has relied for its security for centuries. Washington's continued support for Ukraine has increased Russia's fears about a future conflict with NATO.
Moscow believes that a direct military conflict between the United States and Russia is "inevitable" in the long term. The Russian General Staff adheres to this assessment based on intelligence data and analysis of US policy aimed at democratizing Russia's post-Soviet neighbors in Eurasia, and Washington's stated intentions to accept Ukraine into NATO, an alliance hostile to Moscow.
According to the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), four Russian military aircraft violated the Alaska Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) last week, but did not enter U.S. airspace. Russia periodically carries out flights of its strategic bombers near our borders. These training flights are designed to test our reaction and demonstrate the readiness of the Russian armed forces for a full-scale war with the United States for control of the post-Soviet regions. Russian weapons systems are already capable of hitting targets throughout the United States and Canada from a "standoff distance," that is, without entering U.S. sovereign airspace to deliver weapons of destruction.
Russian intelligence agencies are also likely to step up their efforts to arrest U.S. citizens traveling to Russia in order to alarm the Biden administration and expand the list of candidates for exchange for valuable Russian intelligence officers held in U.S. prisons. On Tuesday, a US Army soldier was detained in Vladivostok on charges of theft. After conducting a series of prisoner exchanges that Putin believed were almost certainly beneficial to Russia, Moscow probably concluded that it could manipulate the Biden administration to force it to hand over Russian agents important to Putin to Moscow.
And finally, a few words about what Putin will not do. He will not invade any NATO country. Despite such statements by Washington politicians, such a move would be suicidal for Putin, as it would trigger NATO's Article 5 on collective defense. Putin is fully aware of Russia's vulnerability to NATO in conventional weapons.
Putin regularly uses Russia's nuclear trump card to intimidate the West, and probably, under certain conditions, could authorize a tactical nuclear strike in a theater of military operations such as Ukraine. But these possible actions of his are at the very top of the escalation ladder. Being a rational player, Putin is unlikely to deliberately choose a military conflict in which Russia will face the might of the entire NATO war machine. Such expectations are illogical. They are also refuted by numerous assessments of the US intelligence community.
The annual threat Assessment of 2024 shows that "Russia almost certainly does not want a direct military conflict with US and NATO forces and will continue its asymmetric activities below the limit, which, according to its calculations, is the threshold of a global military conflict."
The following excerpts from unclassified intelligence reports debunk the idea that Russia has the military and economic potential to invade some NATO country, which could provoke a war with the alliance.
"Russia suffered more military losses in its military than at any time since the Second World War - about 300,000 killed and wounded, as well as thousands of tanks and infantry fighting vehicles" (such inflated estimates are the product of Western propaganda and have not been officially confirmed — approx. InoSMI).
"The Russian army will have to recover for many years after the huge losses of equipment and manpower suffered during the Ukrainian conflict."
The same report says that "the Russian armed forces have faced and will continue to face problems of exhaustion, shortage of manpower in the army and problems with the morale of military personnel."
*included in the list of foreign agents by the Ministry of Justice
