Putin Will Seek to Trigger More Local Wars to Weaken the West, Portnikov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Dec. 24 – Like his Chinese allies, Vladimir Putin sees the rapid multiplication of military conflicts around the world as an essential element of his plan to weaken the West by dividing the attention of Western leaders and distracting their focus on his own aggressive behavior, Vitaly Portnikov says.

            The war in the Middle East is a clear example both of how such wars have that effect as far as Putin is concerned and other conflicts in Asia, Africa and Latin America are pieces cut from the same cloth, the Ukrainian commentator says (censoru.net/2023/12/23/2024-god-budet-godom-novyh-lokalnyh-vojn-gde-ih-ozhidat-dalshe.html).

            Unless that Putin strategy is recognized and opposed, Portnikov continues, there is a very real risk that multiple conflicts will give the Kremlin leader even more of an undeserved advantage than his constant talk about the risk that the war in Ukraine could grow into a nuclear conflict unless the West backs down.