By: Janusz Bugajski
Translation: Telegrafi.com
We are currently witnessing the unfolding of a revolution in global security for which Western policymakers are clearly unprepared - the imminent collapse of the Russian Federation.
However, instead of planning for future opportunities to influence third parties and capitalize on Russia's de-imperialization, Western officials appear to be stuck in a bygone era, believing they can return to the status quo. post-Cold War, with some even offering Moscow a security bailout to keep the country intact.
But Russia is a failed state. It has not been able to transform itself into a nation-state, a citizen state or even a stable imperial state. It is a federation in name only, as the central government follows the policy of ethnic and linguistic homogenization and denies any power to the country's 83 republics and regions. However, hypercentralization has exposed the country's many weaknesses, including a shrinking economy that is being squeezed by international sanctions, military losses in Ukraine that reveal the incompetence and corruption of its ruling elite, and many regions' worries about their budgets. reduced.
Moscow is finally emerging as a violent imperial center that is exhausting its capacity to hold the country together. However, most Western leaders still fail to see the benefits of Russia's disintegration.
The breakup of the Russian Federation will be the third stage of imperial collapse – after the breakup of the Soviet bloc and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. It is driven by elite power struggles and intensified rivalries between the central government and disaffected regions, which in some parts of the country may spill over into civil wars and border disputes. However, it will also encourage the emergence of new states and inter-regional federations that will control their own resources and no longer send people to die for Moscow’s empire.
As Moscow closes in, its capacity for external aggression will diminish. And, as a flawed state, under harsh international sanctions and cut off from its resource base in Siberia, it will have a greatly reduced ability to attack its neighbors. From the Arctic to the Black Sea, NATO's eastern front will become more secure; while Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova will regain the occupied territories and petition for integration into the European Union and NATO, without fear of Russia's reaction.
Countries in Central Asia will also feel increasingly liberated and will be able to turn to the West for energy, security, and economic ties. China will be in a weaker position to expand its influence as it can no longer cooperate with Moscow and with the new pro-Western states that may emerge from the Russian Federation, thereby increasing stability in some regions of Europe and Eurasia.
Although nuclear weapons will remain a potential threat, Russia’s leaders will not commit national suicide by launching them against the West. Instead, they will seek to salvage their political future and economic fortunes—as the Soviet elite did. And even if some developing countries acquire such weapons, they will have no reason to deploy them as they seek international recognition and economic assistance. Post-Russian states are likely to pursue nuclear disarmament—much as Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan did after the Soviet collapse.
The notion that Western leaders will only help President Vladimir Putin if they talk about the collapse of Russia is false. Despite current policy, the Kremlin claims the West wants to destroy Russia, while denials from Washington and Brussels are simply fueling Kremlin plots.
Rather, the far more effective approach would be to clearly specify what the West is supporting. Openly supporting pluralism, democracy, federalism, civil rights and the autonomy of its republics and regions can help encourage Russia's citizens to prove that they are not globally isolated. They will also need access to information that Moscow withholds, especially when it comes to security, economic development and building peaceful and beneficial relations with neighbors.
After the horrors of Russia's attack on Ukraine, and after the justifications that the country's government leaders and advisers have given for genocide, the hope of Western officials that beneficial relations can be established with a post-Putin Kremlin, or that liberals can democratize the empire.
The West made a grave mistake when it assumed that the collapse of Soviet communism meant the end of Russian imperialism. And while imperial states always collapse when they cross the line and when centrifugal pressures are driven by economic concerns, regional grievances, and national revivals, this time it must avoid repeating the aforementioned mistake - by mistakenly assuming that the current empire is permanent. /Source: politico.eu/Telegrafi/
