Below is a link to Part 2 of the TASS news agency’s interview with Vladimir Putin on 20 topics. Unfortunately, I’m unable to embed the videos.

https://putin.tass.ru/en/ob-ukraine/

The constitutional committee appointed by Putin to consider additional possible amendments and changes to the Russian constitution has reportedly received hundreds of proposals on a range of issues, from both the public and those in government. But the deadline for submission of proposals was March 2nd. On that date, several additional proposed constitutional amendments were submitted by Putin himself.

These new proposals, which were accepted by the Duma and will be included in a national vote by Russians on the whole package of constitutional reforms on April 22nd, were obviously intended to placate certain groups in Russia, including lower income Russians, those advocating Russian national independence, and the Orthodox Church whose stance on certain cultural issues reflects the attitude of many Russians.

These proposed amendments include the following as nicely summed up by Russia-based journalist Bryan MacDonald:

• The need to mention God in the document.

• Civil servants being prohibited from holding foreign bank accounts and citizenship.

• A ban on giving away any Russian territory.

• The restriction of marriage to the union of a man and a woman, ruling out gay marriage.

• Provisions to recognize the modern Russian Federation as the successor to the USSR (a move which enshrines its legacy as the victor in World War Two).

• A mention of “historical truth” to protect “the great achievement of Russians in their defense of the Fatherland” (This is also a reference to the role of the USSR/Russia in World War II and a response to the EU’s attempt to re-write history on behalf of certain elements in Poland and the Baltic states – Natylie)

• The Russian people will be recognized as the founders of the state (which also implies that the national language is Russian).

• A guarantee that the minimum wage will not be lower than the cost of living.

What has received even more attention recently, however, is a peculiar turn of events in the Duma in which parliamentarian Valentina Tereshkova, the first Soviet woman in space, proposed that the “clock be reset to zero” – so to speak – on presidential terms at 2024. That would mean that Putin would be able to run again in 2024 and serve what would be the constitutional limit of 2 terms. According to reports, this suggestion seemed to throw the Duma into confusion and Putin subsequently made an unscheduled appearance at the Duma to address the issue. He then said that resetting the clock on presidential terms was possible but would have to be approved by both the Constitutional Court and the Russian people when they vote on April 22nd.

Needless to say, I’m not the only one who has been flummoxed by this. As Paul Robinson explains:

Was this Putin’s aim all along? Did he put Tereshkova up to it? Or was he as blindsided by her proposal as everybody else? It’s not clear. If he’d wanted this, it would have been simpler just to include it in the original amendments. On the other hand, it arguably looks better if it appears to come as a result of some sort of demand from below, especially when voiced by somebody like Tereshkova who has something of a heroic status. But then again, that status means that she has some independent moral authority and doesn’t have to do whatever the Kremlin asks her. So maybe it was her idea after all, and she was acting on her own. In that case, though, why didn’t Putin reject it?

There are several possibilities to speculate on. Was this staged so the Constitutional Court can judge it unconstitutional and Putin can abide by the ruling – there, see, the system works, we have checks and balances?

It makes strategic sense to me that Putin may want to keep the political class guessing as to what exactly he’s going to do and when he exactly is going to do it in order to prevent the jockeying for power he knows will come if he’s perceived as a lame duck who’s leaving soon.

The bottom line is that however impressive of a job Putin has done pulling Russia up from a failed state to a country with a decent standard of living and a force to be reckoned with on the world stage, Putin is mortal and there must be some preparation for taking the training wheels off so new leadership can step in and keep steering the country on the forward path. I believed that is what he was starting to do with his announcement of reforms in January.

For the reasons mentioned above, I think it would be a mistake for Putin to remain president past 2024 rather than stepping back to a behind-the-scenes advisory role. Unless, of course, the plan is to keep him around forever – eventually having his dead body stuffed and propped up in a corner of the Kremlin and governing via seance.

But in all seriousness, in my perusal of Russian history, I’ve noted that any time a leader wanted to institute reforms, they were always inevitably unleashing forces they couldn’t always control. There are going to be unintended consequences. As Russia analyst Gordon Hahn writes:

The entire process is not only mobilizing society and the opposition on the eve of the federal election process, which begins with the Duma election set for September 2021, but may also raise expectations as to the importance of the reform or of the adption of one or another reform to one or another constituency. Herein lies a danger for Putin and Russia’s political stability. ‘Below,’ in society, pro-democracy opposition groups likely have a low enough set of expectations regarding Putin that they expect little in the way of what they regard as positive results, in particular political liberalization or democratization. However, more radical opposition groups as well as more or less pro-regime elements such as the Russian Orthodox Church or nationalists of one stripe or another might pose a bit of a problem. Some among the latter, ‘conservatives’ or traditionalists less interested or even opposed to democratization, are putting forward proposals of another sort. The idea of including the word ‘God’ in an as yet unclarified way or a declaration to the effect that ‘marriage is an institution binding together a man and a woman’ are being put forward. Should the final amendments exclude these or other proposals coming from groups with expectations their proposals would be included, the result could lead dissent and division.

Similarly, the extent to which the amendments touching on the political system affect the duration of Putin’s tenure in some non-presidential office and thus the tempo and depth of the change inherent in 2024, potentitally weakening the political and business prospects of one clan or another, the debate over systemic changes could provoke a split with the ruling elite. Such a split could revolve around disagreements between those who would prefer Putin stay at least until 2024 and take up a serious office or several offices under a new ‘caretaker’ president and those who would prefer a more rapid departure, perhaps even with mid-term presidential elections and a minimal or no role for Putin under the next president.

Perhaps that sheds more light on Putin’s second set of proposed amendments listed above. Bottom line: reform is not easy. Things can get complicated. Putin may just be keeping his options open in case those unintended consequences become too destabilizing – at least, in his mind.

Oil prices have plummeted in recent days as a result of the collapse of negotiations between OPEC and Russia to continue agreed upon production cuts to oil, which would have kept prices more stable.

According to reporting by both Ben Aris and Chris Weafer, Russia decided to let prices drop in order to end what they considered to be buoying of the U.S. shale industry. According to Weafer:

At last week’s meeting, Russia only offered to extend the existing OPEC+ deal, which is set to expire at the end of this month, for a three further months and then to assess the situation. Saudi Arabia wanted Russia to participate in cutting an additional 1.5mn barrels per day (bbl/d) through Q2 in order to try and balance the global oil market. Having been rejected by Moscow, Saudi has responded very quickly with an announcement that it has no intention of extending the current deal and will “open up the oil taps” from April 1. It is already reported that the Kingdom is offering discounted oil.

At first glance, this looks like a battle between Russia and Saudi over oil policy. But the context of the relentless rise in US oil production over the past ten years is also an important factor. Both Russia and the major OPEC producers have been openly annoyed with the refusal of the US producers to participate in past production cuts and the fact that the US industry has been the major beneficiary of the price support mechanisms. It is a stretch to say that Moscow and Riyadh are in any sort of cooperation to try and reduce US oil production; the body language at the Vienna meeting strongly suggests otherwise. But if a price war results in some US casualties and a greater reluctance by investors and lenders to fund future US marginal production, then Moscow and OPEC will be relieved.

The coronavirus has already cut global demand for oil in conjunction with a general economic slowdown. This all is giving rise to the question of what countries are best prepared to withstand a low oil price. The usual suspects in the west will contend that Russia will be in deep trouble if this goes on for any length of time. After all, they are simply a gas station posing as a country, right?

As I’ve discussed in previous posts, Russia has intentionally implemented economic policies to shield itself from economic instability. With oil sales only comprising 35% of Russia’s budget now, they are in a much better position to withstand lower oil prices than Saudi Arabia. Weafer explains:

Russia has had to allow the ruble free-float from early 2015. This was a policy forced on the Kremlin as a result of the combination of western sanctions and low oil. That has turned out to be a major silver-living for the budget, as well as for economic competitiveness, and it means that the budget break-even oil price moves lower as the ruble weakens. Assuming the ruble-dollar exchange rate drops below 70 then the breakeven will drop to $45 per barrel. If the ruble-dollar rate hits 75 then the budget will breakeven around $40 per barrel without any cuts to current planned spending. This compares with a breakeven of $115 per barrel in 2013.

Saudi Arabia reportedly needs $85 per barrel to balance its budget and does not gain from a currency offset as the Riyal is pegged to the dollar.

Russian oil producers now have a very low production cost, exactly for the same reason of the ruble flexibility and also efficiency gains that the industry also had to adopt because of western sanctions.

Aris adds the following details on what the Putin government has done in terms of buffeting the Russian economy against potential instability:

Russian President Vladimir Putin has spent much of the last four years building a “fiscal fortress” to sanction-proof Russia. He has sold down Russia’s US debt holdings, paid off debt and built up gross international reserves (GIR) to around $570bn now – enough to cover Russia’s entire external debt and still leave $100bn of cash. Moreover, a revolution of Russia’s tax service and new taxes, as well as a hike to the retirement age, have cut the breakeven oil price for the budget to around $42 from its peak of $115 in the boom years. All this means Russia can sustain a long war of attrition on US shale production.

In response to the drop in oil prices earlier this week, U.S. president Trump suggested the possibility of a government bailout of the shale industry, which is mired in debt and could be in deep financial trouble if the oil price drop lasts for any length of time. Common Dreams reported that executives from the industry had already reached out to the Trump administration to request assistance:

The administration began weighing a bailout after Trump supporter Harold Hamm—a Trump supporter whose company’s stock plunged Monday, losing Hamm $2 billion of his 77% of the company’s shares—reached out to the administration. Hamm confirmed the conversation to the Post. 

Hamm was not alone—the Post revealed that a number of executives have made overtures to the White House on policy aims that run counter to public health.

I always thought that major capitalists were ideologically opposed to the government providing any financial assistance to anyone. But I digress…

Some sources, such as Russia-based journalist Bryan MacDonald, have been reporting that Russia has been preparing for a rocky global economy for some time: “Moscow has been preparing for a major recession for years. Kremlin insiders believe it will devastate western economies.”

*Next post will discuss latest developments relating to the constitutional changes in Russia, including a bombshell on presidential terms

After a tense phone call over a week ago that reportedly devolved at one point into a shouting match between Putin and Erdogan, the two leaders met in Moscow and agreed to another ceasefire in Syria’s Idlib province. The talks lasted for 6 hours last Thursday and concluded with agreement to a ceasefire and the establishment of a buffer zone, along the M4 highway, to be patrolled jointly by Turkey and Russia. Additionally, the “rebels” are supposed to evacuate from south of the highway.

Thursday’s agreement is considered an “additional protocol” to the Sochi Agreement of 2018. The ceasefire took effect on Friday morning and the joint patrols are due to start on March 15th.

Scott Ritter describes the reality on the ground after about a week of clashes between the Syrian Army and Turkish forces – the latter of which received no substantive support from Washington/NATO, which motivated the talks between Erdogan and Putin:

This [Turkish] operation soon fizzled; not only was the Turkish advance halted in its tracks, but the Syrian Army, supported by Hezbollah and pro-Iranian militias, were able to recapture much of the territory lost in the earlier fighting. Faced with the choice of either escalating further and directly confronting Russian forces, or facing defeat on the battlefield, Erdogan instead flew to Moscow.

The new additional protocol, which entered into effect at midnight Moscow time on Friday, March 6, represents a strategic defeat for Erdogan and the Turkish military which, as NATO’s second-largest standing armed force, equipped and trained to the highest Western standards, should have been more than a match for a rag-tag Syrian Army, worn down after nine years of non-stop combat. The Syrian armed forces, together with its allies, however, fought the Turks to a standstill. Moreover, the anti-Assad fighters that had been trained and equipped by the Turks proved to be a disappointment on the battlefield.

One of the major reasons behind the Turkish failure was the fact that Russia controlled the air space over Idlib, denying the Turks the use of aircraft, helicopters and (except for a single 48-hour period) drones, while apparently using their own aircraft, together with the Syrian Air Force, to pummel both the Turkish military and their allied anti-Assad forces (though neither side has officially confirmed the Russians bombing the Turks – that would be a disaster for the talks). In the end, the anti-Assad fighters were compelled to take shelter within so-called ‘Observation posts’– heavily fortified Turkish garrisons established under the Sochi Agreement, intermingling with Turkish forces to protect themselves from further attack. [Turkey’s] Operation Spring Shield turned out to be a resounding defeat for the Turks and their allies.

Forgive my cynicism but this sounds reminiscent of previous agreements that have broken down. The Turks did not live up to their obligations under the Sochi Agreement to remove jihadists such as terrorist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS aka Al Qaeda/Al Nusra re-branded) from established de-escalation zones. Turkey’s failure to do this prompted the Syrian Army to remove the terrorists (“rebels”) themselves. According to Ritter, the additional protocol just agreed on reiterates the goal of pushing out the terrorists but does not elaborate on how it is to be achieved.

As military analyst Moon of Alabama points out:

This ceasefire is unlikely to hold over a longer period. But it brings a useful pause for the Syrian army that will allow it to recover a bit and to take care of its men and equipment.

This for now also ends the Turkish threat to attack the Syrian army and to reconquer all areas it had liberated over the last months.

Erdogan, who had made many demands, saw none of them fulfilled. The agreement will cost him political points within his party.

So it sounds like Erdogan took a big risk with his blustering action in Syria and ended up laying an egg. But I doubt Erdogan is suddenly going to give up the ghost rather than continue to find ways to throw sand in the gears of Syria’s push to regain full control over their sovereign territory.

A Redlines interview by Anya Parampil with Iranian professor, Mohammad Marandi, who just got back from Idlib, gives an update from on the ground as well as a good discussion of the history of the Syrian war.

For those who like symbolism – and have a propensity for Schadenfreude, here is a photo of Erdogan’s visit to Moscow and the decor he was subjected to during part of his meeting with Putin – courtesy of Russian historian and geopolitical analyst Nina Byzantina. (Note: you will only be able to see this image if you go to this post on my blog, it will not show up in the email version of this post – NB).

Today, Putin held his meeting with Erdogan underneath Lanceray’s sculpture Crossing the Balkans. The sculpture depicts victorious Russians in the Russo-Turkish War 1877-8, which resulted in the independence or autonomy for Ottoman-occupied Serbia+Montenegro, Romania, Bulgaria. ? pic.twitter.com/zuASGL0wfu

— Nina ☦️ Byzantina (@NinaByzantina) March 5, 2020

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In response to Putin’s January call for a summit of the 5 permanent UN Security Council members to discuss peace and other global issues of importance, France and China had quickly announced their receptivity. The US and UK, however, had been mum.

Last Wednesday, Russian news agency TASS reported that Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov confirmed that president Trump has now agreed to the summit, which might take place at the UN on the sidelines of a General Assembly meeting in New York. Izvestia reported the following on March 4:

According to Lavrov, besides the challenging issue of nuclear disarmament, the parties are expected to discuss regional conflicts, new challenges and threats such as international terrorism, drug trafficking and other forms of organized crime, as well as human trafficking, migration issues and new technologies, which could slip out of control and pose a serious threat to humanity.

It’s easier to arrange this meeting of the five UNSC permanent members in New York, said Pavel Podlesny, Head of the Center for Russian-American Relations at the Institute for the US and Canadian Studies. “China and France backed the idea to meet a long time ago and now the US has agreed, and therefore Britain has no other option. It’s easier to hold the discussion in New York ahead of a session of the UN General Assembly as Donald Trump has offered,” he noted.

Matt Duss is Bernie Sanders’ adviser on foreign policy. He represents a mild improvement on post-Cold War foreign policy – he’s not a Neoconservative and he acknowledges that the Palestinians have rights.

However, I’ve noted some very poor takes by Duss on Twitter such as one comment in which he seems to suggest that the main problem with Trump’s Venezuela policy is that it has been handled incompetently and allowed “Russia to screw with us in our own backyard.” He invokes a cold war narrative against Russia and seems to suggest that our interference in Venezuela isn’t really a problem – all in one tweet. He did receive significant criticism from Bernie supporters about it.

More recently, he put out a tweet supporting an article in The Guardian in which he suggested that the United States should support democracy activists in Russia and highlighted Alexey Navalny as representing the democratic opposition there. Others had to school him on who Navalny actually is: a right-wing racist xenophobe who actually referred to Central Asian immigrants in Russia as cockroaches.

This underscores the problem with Bernie Sanders and his campaign’s dangerous ignorance on the world’s other nuclear superpower in particular, as well as with their overall Manichean framework of the world’s democracies taking on the world’s “authoritarian” governments as outlined in a major speech given by Sanders on foreign policy in 2017 at Westminster College.

Last week, Duss was interviewed at a conference put on by the new think tank the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, which advocates for restraint in U.S. foreign policy. A video was posted this past weekend of the event and I watched the first half, which included a discussion with Gen. David Petraeus – who said what one would expect him to say while also engaging in a lot of what Tim Black would call ear fatigue, yammering on about a lot of stuff that has nothing to do with the question asked until most people in the audience were wishing someone would pull the fire alarm and force an evacuation.

Congressman Ro Khanna also made an appearance and said some reasonable things, which cleansed the palate a bit after the bad taste left by Petraeus.

About an hour and a half into the conference Matt Duss was interviewed, along with Joe Biden’s foreign policy adviser and program director at the German Marshall Fund, Julianne Smith. Here are a few highlights of what Duss said in response to an initial set of questions from the moderator, Jonathan Tepperman – editor of Foreign Policy Magazine:

Most worrisome foreign policy issue facing a new president – Duss said climate change. It needs a multilateral response and will affect many other issues such as immigration.

How can damage Trump has done to alliances and “rules-based order” be repaired – Duss said that based on some of his conversations with allies in Europe, the election of Trump and his policies has made them begin to wonder if they’d misunderstood the U.S. Duss, however, did state that we should realize that Trump is not such a departure from the U.S.’s foreign policy of the last 20 years – i.e. after 9/11, which saw the “securitization of immigration,” the vilification of Muslims and a general demonization of diplomacy.

Moving forward – Duss said that we shouldn’t necessarily just return to the past on all foreign policy issues. Some challenges will require creating a new consensus and a comprehensive review of what institutions and policies are needed to meet current challenges. He also said that foreign policy should be rooted in an overall U.S. political consensus. I wasn’t really sure what this meant as he didn’t elaborate.

Israel/Palestine – Duss reiterated the need to return to a 2-state solution framework and international law and resolutions governing this basic framework. He did note that Israel’s actions, such as expansion of settlements, has undermined this. He said that Sanders would be more willing to put pressure on Israel to abide by its obligations. He mentioned Sanders’ characterization of Netanyahu as a “right wing nationalist” and connected that to the campaign’s overall critique of “right wing” “authoritarians.”

At this point, questions from the audience were allowed.

Are there any justifications ever for regime change wars and, if so, what are they? – Duss eschewed regime change wars, saying simply “Let’s not do it.”

What is the guiding principle or “north star” of your foreign policy? – Duss said that the strength of our democracy would guide our foreign policy in addition to reliance on allies and partnerships with other countries to create a “democratic consensus.”

This sounded vague to me. What does this actually mean in practice?

What role should sanctions have in foreign policy? Individual v. sectoral sanctions? – Duss said there should be more coherence on the use of sanctions, acknowledging that there had been an “over use” of them and that they sometimes have the effect of preventing diplomacy. He seemed to be more amenable to individual sanctions over sectoral sanctions so as not to harm civilian populations.

Duss was asked about the Manichean framework of democracies v authoritarian governments and whether democracy promotion could just be used as a tool for regime change – Duss stated that Sanders is not neutral on the issues of democracy and human rights. Although the U.S. needed to be more humble in terms of intervening in other countries, there should be a push for international norms.

Again, I’d like to know what exactly this means. What types of intervention are acceptable under this framework and who defines what constitutes democracy and violations of human rights? Do small countries get to tell larger (more powerful) countries that they are violating democracy and human rights? If so, what recourse do they have in effecting change in the larger country? If the U.S. is going to decide whether Russia, for example, is violating democracy and human rights, what sources are they going to be relying on to determine that? Alexey Navalny? Matt Duss – who clearly knows squat about Russia?

Grayzone journalist Max Blumenthal asked Duss about Ro Khanna’s recent twitter comment in the aftermath of the Russiagate accusations against Bernie’s campaign that we should trust the intel agencies. He also asked why Bernie is not demanding proof of the allegations – Duss said that Sanders had been briefed convincingly regarding Russian election interference (for 2020) and that Sanders would oppose any election interference by any foreign country.

What should our nuclear posture and position on “no first use” of nuclear weapons be? – Duss said Sanders supported a no first use position.

Interestingly, one member of the audience asked about reining in the defense budget and how such a reduction could be implemented with respect to congress, etc. This question was ignored.

[Recording] FP-Quincy Institute Forum: A New Vision For America In The World