Tuesday, February 11, 2025

Except for Submarines, Russia’s Northern Fleet Highlights Growing Gap between Moscow’s Ambitions and Navy’s Resources, Norwegians Say

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Feb. 7 – In its latest threat assess ment, the Norwegian Intelligence Service says that the Russian navy, except for its submarine arm, is increasingly struggling between Moscow’s ambitions and the navy’s resources and is often forced to choose between missions and maintenance.
    At its home ports, Russian warships “are filing up, staying in the dock ever longer and typically are serviced by equipment that doesn’t work,” the report says (thebarentsobserver.com/security/northern-fleet-faces-wide-gap-between-ambitions-and-resources-intel-report/424194).
    Scheduled refittings, the report continues, are “years” behind schedule, with some ships, like the Russian navy’s only aircraft carrier now likely not ever to return to service despite repeated promises that it will go to sea in the near future.
    According to the Norwegians, the only exception to this pattern is the submarine service. There ships are coming online at a speed not seen since the Brezhnev period; and they are being services and armed promptly.  

Monday, February 10, 2025

Far Fewer Russians who Left in 2022 are Returning than Putin Claims and Earlier Studies Suggested

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Feb. 7 – Only 10 percent of Russians who left in 2022 because of the war have returned to their native country, according to the Russian Academy of Economics and State Service, a figure lower than the roughly 20 percent the European Institute in Florence reported and far lower than the 50 percent Putin has claimed and that many have reported as gospel.
    According to the new study based on an online poll that also tracked where those who left have gone first and then settled, some 650,000 people left the Russian Federation in 2022 (vedomosti.ru/society/articles/2025/02/07/1090699-v-rossiyu-vernulis and actualcomment.ru/uekhavshie-iz-rossii-ne-vozvrashchayutsya-2502070947.html).
    While such a survey is not without its problems, it is certainly no more problematic than the Florence investigation; and it is certain to cast doubt on Putin’s claim and spark more worries about how his war in Ukraine has accelerated the brain drain from a country that can ill afford that.  

Novels Offering Alternative Histories for Russia Extremely Popular Among Russians and Useful to Regime

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Feb. 5 – Many have commented on how the Putin regime has rewritten Russian history, but far fewer have noticed something else: Russians are snapping up books that offer completely alternative stories about key events in history that had things gone differently then, everything afterwards would have been entirely different.
    Sergey Medvedev of Radio Liberty says that the popularity of such alternative histories reflects the trauma Russians have suffered because of the three major events of the 20th century in that country – the 1917 revolution, Stalinism and World War II, and the collapse of the USSR (svoboda.org/a/roman-s-popadantsem-/33300518.html).
    And he cites one observer, Dmitry Nekrasov of the Center for Analysis and Strategies in Europe who says that he has identified 600 such novels in Russia, compared to only 30 in all other countries combined. Nekrasov adds that the absence of a clear plan for the future makes interest in alternative versions for Russia more interesting as well.
    There are many consequences of this interest in alternative histories but perhaps the most serious is the willingness of many Russians to accept new versions of the past offered by Putin and his regime, versions at odds with what they had thought was the case but far less radically different than the alternative history novels they regularly read.

Sunday, February 9, 2025

To Fill Its Depleted Ranks in Ukraine, Moscow Now Planning to Draft Those with Venereal Diseases and Mental Problems

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Feb. 5 – To fill the ranks of its invasion force in Ukraine, Moscow has already been using convicts, something that did not happen before 2022 when Putin launched his expanded invasion. Now, it is planning to take in as soldiers those who would have been excused from service earlier because of venereal diseases or mental problems.
    A proposal to do that has now been published on a government website for purposes of discussion (regulation.gov.ru/Regulation/Npa/PublicView?npaID=153279), and many Russians, especially those with husbands or sons in the military already, are outraged by the idea (newizv.ru/news/2025-02-04/zdorov-goden-v-armiyu-pozovut-s-venericheskimi-i-psihicheskimi-boleznyami-435794).
    Despite this anger and despite the problems for health in the Russian military and unit cohesion, this proposal is likely to be approved, yet another indication of the problems Moscow is having in filling its depleted ranks in Ukraine and its willingness to use men it would have excused from service in the past.

Central Asia Needs Help to Exploit Its Critical Mineral Reserves, Meirkhanova Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Feb. 5 – Central Asia has large reserves of critical minerals that could help power its economic development, but so far, it has failed to overcome problems with exploration, extraction, and processing, according to Aruzhan Meirkhanova, a researcher at Astana’s National Analytic Center.
    To achieve breakthroughs, the countries of the region will need significant outside help, she argues; but unless the countries themselves take action to ensure that they are full participants in this process, what could become “a lasting blessing” could easily become “a resource curse” (carnegieendowment.org/russia-eurasia/politika/2025/01/central-asia-crm-offers).
    “Modernizing exploration is a crucial first step, Meirkhanova says, noting that most maps are based on Soviet-era explorations and that Kazakhstan spent more on exploration in 1990 alone than it did  for the total amount it spent between 2003 and 2023” (dprom.kz/geologorazvedka/natsionalnaya-geologicheskaya-sluzhba-kazahstana-rabota-po-vospolneniyu-msb/).
    But that is only the first step, she continues. The Central Asian countries must address problems involving extracting including shortcomings in their institutional frameworks, inconsistent tax regimes and lack of ability to control environmental impact of mining (documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/099081823001539573/pdf/P17674501063760b08b290a4ae6547845d.pdf).
    And they must overcome problems in processing so that they can get full value from their reserves rather than being paid by other countries only for unprocessed ores (unctad.org/news/critical-minerals-boom-global-energy-shift-brings-opportunities-and-risks-developing-countries).
    China has been the dominant outside player up to now, but Western countries are increasingly active – and their appearance has given the Central Asian countries new opportunities to play one outsider against another in order to advance their own national interests.

Residents in 30 Federal Subjects Take Part in ‘Thanks to Navalny’ Action of Their Own

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Feb. 5 – Supporters of Aleksey Navalny plan to assemble in Moscow on Feb. 16, the first anniversary of his death in a Russian prison camp, to say thank you to the late Russian politician for his contributions and to pledge their support for implementing the ideas he put forward.
    But many people beyond the capital’s ring road who would like to participate simply can’t, and so an Altai poet, Artyom Sakharov, urged people in the federal subjects to take part by sending toys or pictures of toys to regional groups.  Approximately 150 in 30 federal subjects have now done so (semnasem.org/news/2025/02/05/zhiteli-30-regionov-pouchastvovali-v-akcii-spasibonavalnomu).
    Russian siloviki have taken such a hard line against such activism outside of Moscow that many people have been afraid to deliver the toys in person but instead are sending scanned images to the Navalny groups, Sakharov says. About a third of the 150 who took part chose that approach.
    But even this figure is impressive for three reasons: the campaign in the regions received little attention, many in the regions disagree with Navalny’s stance on federalism, and the risks of taking action far from Moscow are far greater because there is far less chance that Western journalists or diplomats will cover what goes on.   

Russian Government’s Failure to Support Villages and Roads Linking Them to Urban Centers is ‘Above All’ an Attack on Country’s Ethnic Minorities, ‘Free Idel-Ural’ Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Feb. 5 – The Russian government’s refusal to maintain facilities in villages or to build roads linking these population centers to urban centers is not only destroying the rural way of life in that country but is “above all” an attack on Russia’s ethnic minorities, according to the Free Idel-Ural portal.
    That is because, the portal says, in many republics, non-Russians dominate villages and thus maintain their language and identity there whereas once such people are forced to move to cities dominated by ethnic Russians, they lose both (idel-ural.org/archives/chynovnyky-v-chuvashyy-nazvaly-neeffektyvnym-stroytelstvo-dorog-v-malonaselennye-punkty/).
    Consequently, Putin’s “optimization” campaign is not just about saving money but about destroying non-Russian minorities and forcing their Russianization and ultimate Russification, an attack which must be recognized and opposed, the portal which works to defend non-Russian groups in the Middle Volga says.
    What is striking, the portal continues, is that officials are now openly admitting that they don’t see it as economically efficient to build roads linking villages to urban centers let alone maintain medical and other services in villages. As Chuvashia head Vyacheslav Borisov said recently, “we don’t have enough resources to tackle al this at once.”
    But behind that “economic” argument is a Russification agenda, Free Idel-Ural says; and no one should be deceived into thinking that is not the more important factor not only in Chuvashia but in the Russian Federation as a whole.