By Gordon Hahn, Website, 3/2/26
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov revealed on March 5th that Russia made compromises in the agreement concluded at Anchorage between Presidents Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump. However, he did not reveal the nature of those compromises nor the issues on which they were made. At a roundtable of ambassadors, Lavrov seemed to be responding to elite and or general public criticism of the Kremlin’s insufficiently hard line in relation to the talks and/or the claim made by some that the Abu Dhabi-Geneva peace talks or process is a cover for unidentified aggressive Western or Ukrainian designs. As I explained in a previous article, the U.S.-Israeli use of negotiations apparently as a cover to lull Iran into complacency and then attack the country and indeed to ‘decapitate’ its leadership, would encourage suspicions in Russia that the West was doing the same with the Russians to one or extent to another. In fact, I noted that the Russians had already had a fully similar experience when, during the peace discussions with the U.S., Ukraine attacked President Putin’s Valdai residence with drones likely using CIA intelligence and other data to do so:
In particular Lavrov said: “At the moment, we see no reason to suspect that these negotiations are also a “cover,” since we are in direct contact with our American colleagues. But our political scientists, analysts, politicians, and members of parliament, who are not involved in this, by definition, closed process, are beginning to draw parallels and ask how these negotiations can end. They say that because of the actions of the United States, the “spirit of Anchorage” has been destroyed.” The Russian foreign minister went on to say: “The main thing in Anchorage was a concrete understanding reached on the basis of proposals made by President Donald Trump and his negotiating team. President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly commented that we have accepted these proposals, including those aspects of these proposals that are already a serious compromise for us.” (https://mid.ru/ru/press_service/minister_speeches/2084269/).
In this way, Lavrov revealed that the Russians made compromises to agree to the Anchorage agreement proposed by the U.S. However, the nature or issues regarding the Russian compromises were left for us to guess. Over the months since Anchorage various media reports have reported that Moscow had dropped its demands for all the territory of Zaporozhe and Kherson oblasts in southern Ukraine and would settle with the withdrawal from and ceding of all of Donetsk Oblast. Luhansk is already under full Russian control. This revelation and the suspicions about Russian territorial compromises are unlikely to assuage those criticizing President Putin for: too soft an approach in his ‘special military operation’ (SMO); the careful tactics and resulting slow advancement of Russian troops; the unwillingness to destroy all the key decision-making centers in Kiev such as the Ukrainian military’s General Staff, the Defense Ministry, the SBU headquarters, the Office of the President building, the Verkhovna Rada parliament building; and the refusal to decapitate the Maidan regime that many Russian elites, including himself, regards as illegitimate and terrorist at least in its actions.
In a recent statement expressing his condolences to the Iranian people in the wake of U.S.-Israeli ‘decapitation’ of the Iranian regime by assassinating Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Putin characterized the attack as “a cynical violation of all the norms of human morality and international law” (http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/79238). It is not unlikely that in composing this message he had in mind the criticism being leveled against him for refraining from issuing similarly heinous orders to his military and intelligence forces. Whatever the reason for Putin’s restraint in conducting the SMO – retention of the moral high ground or basic ‘human morality,’ a personal abhorrence of excessive violence and/or a desire to maintain the viability of international law either as a legal or political instrument for Russian foreign and security policy and practice – he is still unable to shake his reputation on the more hard line part of Russia’s political spectrum as being too soft when confronting sufficiently neofascist-infested Maidan Ukraine and dealing with a West that has repeatedly broken promises and agreements with Moscow since the end of the Cold War. Thus, the breaking of the ‘spirit of Anchorage’ is nothing new, but it does push Russian patience towards the breaking point. Given the numerous provocations from Kiev and its Western sponsors during the NATO-Russia Ukrainian War it is surprising that Putin has been able to remain so patient. Putin may have to toughen his line, but he is unlikely to toughen against the U.S. The Europeans are a far less dangerous target for a political or economic press that might assuage some of his critics.
There is also a cultural factor driving the political tectonics here. The historical legacy of the Great Patriotic War against Nazism and its deep imprint on Russian political and strategic culture makes the presently cautious warfighting under the SMO a culturally and thus politically risky gambit. Similarly, approach of accommodation of the West perceived as being adopted by him violates Russia’s security vigilance culture formed over many centuries of less than friendly Western (and others’) policies directed against Russia. On the other hand, the risks of a more aggressive war raise the prospect of public and elite opposition from the other end of the spectrum of calculus. A far greater number of ‘body bags’ returning home can provoke criticism for having begun the SMO in addition to that for the slow-attrit-then-advance tactics that some claim is prolonging the war and also increasing Russian casualties.
Some in the West assert, many hope that disgruntlement and grumbling in Moscow represents the threat of a coup should the NATO-Russia Ukrainian War drag out much longer. Economic collapse is said to be imminent, and some in Moscow would argue that requires an escalation to victory and an end to the SMO. One often astute observer recently ventured to say that if Putin receives Steven Witkoff in the Kremlin one more time ‘he will be out.’ I think matters are still quite a distance from crisis politics. The politics of war are always a hazardous affair, but Putin’s position in this respect remains relatively secure. There is no pre-coup situation in Moscow. This stands in sharp contrast to that of Putin’s main foe in the NATO-Russia Ukrainian War, Ukrainian leader Volodomyr Zelenskiy.
I tend to doubt – for both practical and moral reasons – that Putin will sharply escalate. Despite numerous escalations from the Ukrainian and Western side, he has resisted declaring war on Ukraine and undertaking an actual ‘full-scale invasion’ and the kinds of attacks that would be commensurate with one. For the rest of this year, Putin is unlikely to escalate or make any more compromises on Ukraine, assuming he made any at Anchorage. The agreement hatched there may be a dead letter. He will certainly continue talks with Washington on improving U.S.-Russian relations, despite the U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran, which will also continue to receive weapons and intelligence support from Moscow.
Putin has always been a cautious balancer, finding the golden mean between the extremes—for example: soft rather than hard authoritarianism; controlled rather than no elections, free speech, freedom of association; mixed economy rather than a state economy; coercive diplomacy instead of solely coercion or diplomacy; and the SMO instead of outright war and a ‘full-scale invasion’ (https://gordonhahn.com/2017/06/14/putin-the-balancer-containing-and-balancing-russias-multifarious-forces-through-soft-authoritarianism/ and https://gordonhahn.com/2015/11/24/putin-the-risk-taker/). He will likely do the same now. However, if pushed, Putin will have no compunctions about acting firmly in the face of risks, and he will have major domestic support if and when he does so.
The most logical political solution is: resign. And by so rescue the Russian country and people from this tragedy, which is destroying Russia from within.
Don’t know what Mr. Putin is waiting for. You can’t trust the west. Their word means nothing. Just get the job done and get it over with.
Putin has shown that he can act decisively and forcefully. For example:
(1) Georgia 2008
(2) extracting Yanukovych from Ukraine 2014
(3) Crimea 2014
(4) SMO 2022.
These examples also show that Putin will only act forcefully when he has run out of other options. The SMO was launched pre-emptively because a US-pushed UAF invasion of Crimea was imminent, and apparent since March 2021, putting Putin on the horns of a dilemma. Putin sought to avoid that by negotiations between March 2021 and February 2022, only to be rebuffed by US/NATO.
American strategy everywhere is to confront adversaries with strategic dilemmas, and this will succeed sometimes, as in Syria, where Putin could raise the stakes or fold. After exploring his options with both Assad and Iran (and probably Turkey), Putin chose to fold hoping for better luck next round. Was this a tactical retreat? Time will tell. Syria’s new ISIS/al-Queda president Al-Sharaa has now visited Moscow, and Russia’s navy is still in Syria.
Venezuela presented a dilemma to both Russia and China, but the real dilemma here was the seizing of Russian- and Chinese-flagged ships. Given that these ships were vulnerable, hard-liners reasonably questioned why they weren’t protected. It seems Putin was caught off-guard, but this week we hear that Wagner PMC militia will now accompany vulnerable ships to make sure that they are not surrendered to the US or its allies. Putin made the decision to defend the ships because he had no other choice. But he did have choices about how they would be defended, and he landed on the PMC option. Your move America.
Putin will act forcefully if that’s his only remaining option. He will first exhaust less-forceful options as a way to minimize escalation. The Ukrainians and Americans and especially the British will have none of it and are constantly trying to provoke Putin into a major escalation through terrorist acts like Crocus, perfidious US/UK-assisted attacks on nuclear capabilities and more recently Putin’s residence at Valdai. NATO will occasionally succeed (dilemmas) but Putin is still intent on minimizing the escalation, for better or worse. There are many in Russia who think it is for the worst, and not just among hard-liners.
Putin tells us that he is pursuing a broad peace treaty that will last a generation or more. He wants Russia to be AT peace with its European neighbours and with the US and with China. Being at peace with your fellows is radically different than not being at war. The Scandinavian countries are at peace with each other. People who are at peace with each other live in harmony.