Photo: Sergei Savostyanov, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via APAmerica has not accepted Russian demands to limit the expansion of NATO to the east and is proposing negotiations on the deployment of short- and medium-range missiles. Russia is not satisfied with that answer. Tensions between Russia and the West are not abating, and the expected next moves of both sides speak in favor of deepening the crisis.
On the evening of January 26, the United States Ambassador to Moscow, John Sullivan, arrived at the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs with the official US response to Russia's demands for guarantees for its security. The document was expected in Smolensk Square almost two weeks after Russia delivered a document to Washington suggesting that its own security should not be strengthened at the expense of another party's security. The document states, among other things, that all states that have been members of the North Atlantic Treaty since May 27, 1997 undertake not to deploy their armed forces and weapons on the territory of other European states; that NATO will not accept new members that were part of the USSR, that is, Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova; that medium- and short-range land-based missiles will not be deployed in areas from which they are able to hit targets on the territory of the members of the opposing parties, that is, that the missiles of the Western military alliance will not be near the Russian borders.
In a document delivered to Moscow, but not (yet) publicly published, Washington rejected Russia's demands to limit NATO's expansion to the east, and accepted negotiations on the deployment of medium-range missiles, confidence-building measures and arms control.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Russia, Sergey Lavrov, in response to the media's question about the reaction of the Americans to the Russian proposals for security guarantees, pointed out that "in this document there is no positive reaction to the main issue, which is the Russian position on the unacceptability of NATO's expansion to the east and the deployment of shock weapons , which could threaten the territory of the Russian Federation". He announced that President Vladimir Putin will be informed about the interdepartmental evaluations, who will decide on Russia's next steps.
Kremlin spokesman Dimitriy Peskov confirmed to journalists that all these papers are with President Putin, that their analysis will take some time, and appealed not to hastily draw any conclusions. He also said that the discussion on limiting medium- and short-range missiles is not sustainable in isolation from the overall security architecture, although it is certainly useful.
The scientific director of the Valdai Club and the editor-in-chief of the magazine "Russia in Global Affairs", Fyodor Lukyanov, told the newspaper "Izvestia" that Putin's answer will depend on the proposals of military experts, and that in the event of a negative response from the US or a delay in the negotiations, he will take military-technical measures. which Putin announced, but did not specify them. Lukyanov thinks that Russia will now declare that Washington's answers do not suit it (which it has practically already said) and that it will take some measures, but that he does not know what they will consist of. He assumes that it will most likely be a large-scale demonstration of force, such as the exercises in Belarus, Crimea and the Baltic Sea, or the deployment of combat systems on territories bordering NATO members.
Lukyanov believes that, in parallel, diplomatic communication will most likely continue. Russia's attack on Ukraine, which everyone expects, will not happen in his opinion. Reactions will be reduced to the demonstration of force, not its use.
And then everything will depend on the other side.
The director of the Carnegie Moscow Center, Dmitry Trennin, makes a similar forecast:
"For a long time it was believed that if Russia is militarily dissatisfied in Europe, it can deploy more Iskander missiles in Kaliningrad. The Kaliningrad region was considered an advanced springboard from where Russia could threaten all kinds of adversaries. But Kaliningrad is physically separated from the rest of Russia, it is quite difficult to deliver something there and maintain communication, especially in conditions of hostility with the West. It is possible, but not easy. It is much easier to set something up on the territory of friendly Belarus, an ally, where until now there were no Russian bases and missiles, especially not nuclear ones.»
To your chronicler, those assessments of the development of conditions in the east, that is, of Putin's next moves, seem realistic.
In any case, it is more certain that in the given context a headline like the one in the "Wall Street Journal" of January 26 «Waiting for the last days of Putin» premature.
It is likely that with the continuation of negotiations with the show, but not the use of force, the Russophobic sweet chill in the Western media will continue in order to defend Ukraine to the last Ukrainian and separate Ukraine from Russia, because this has been the obsession of the media and politicians for a whole decade, although it to a journalist with a lot of experience, it seems pointless, counterproductive and dangerous.
In this particular case, the euphoria is based on the thesis that the Russian General Staff (or Putin for short) intends to occupy the nationally divided and unstable Ukraine with over 100.000 million inhabitants with 44 soldiers. Any corporal would tell you she's an amateur.
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