By Stephen Bryen, Asia Times, 4/12/25

​On June 28, 1914, Gavrilo Princeps, a Bosnian-Serb radical, shot and killed Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg. Princeps did not act alone.

He was one of at least six principals in an organization called Young Bosnia, and his group and others were seeking independence from the Austro-Hungarian empire. He also received help from a secret organization, the Black Hand, that provided training and weapons, including bombs and pistols.

The assassination of the Austrian Archduke, the immediate successor to emperor Franz Joseph I, was a provocation that a month later caused the so-called July crisis that culminated in a July 23 ultimatum to Serbia. By then, Germany had pledged support for Austria, and Russia and France would mobilize in support of Serbian nationalism.

World War I could have been avoided, but it was not. The perpetrators of the crime in Bosnia were tried, some jailed (because they were too young for execution, including Princeps) and others executed. The Austrians vastly overestimated their military capabilities. For them, at the end of the war, the Austro-Hungarian empire would cease to exist.

Are we in a similar situation today? There have been countless provocations by Ukraine and some of its supporters, including Joe Biden, who authorized long-range ATACMS strikes deep inside Russia, some aimed at Russia’s early warning radars and nuclear bomber bases.

Not to be outdone, the Ukrainians on May 3, 2023, launched drone attacks on the Kremlin, targeting Russian President Vladimir Putin’s office.

Such attacks are inconceivable without technical help from NATO, especially as long-range drones need satellites for communications and targeting. The White House has denied allegations it was involved recently in attacks.

At the same time, Ukraine and its supporters have promoted and carried out a cultural war against Russia. One of the top provocateurs is Estonia.

Estonia is the most northern of the Baltic states. It fronts on the Baltic Sea where its capital city, Tallinn, is located. Estonia’s town of Narva is just next to the border with Russia. About half of Narva’s population is Russian.

Estonia has a population of 1.37 million, based on data from 2023. Between 20-25% of Estonia’s population are Russians, depending on how the count is made.

For a number of years, Estonia has been waging a cultural war against Russia while at the same time utterly depending on NATO for its security. The Estonian army has only 7,700 active duty personnel, of which 3,500 are conscripts.

It has a reserve force that is significantly larger, but it does not have the equipment to support its reserves, so it is largely a paper force. Estonia has no air force to speak of, only two Czech-made (Aero Vodochody) L-39 trainers and two small M-28 Polish transports.

One would think that Estonia would not want to create trouble for itself, but it seems that the reverse is true, largely deriving from the Estonian belief that NATO is there to back it up and that Russia would not attack a NATO state.

Provocations are not something new for the Estonians, whose hate for Russians borders on the extreme. By practically denying citizenship to their Russian inhabitants to attacking the Russian Orthodox Church in Estonia through legislation, Estonia has made it clear it will do whatever it can to humiliate its own Russian population and Russia itself.

In April 2007, the Estonians decided to move the monument there known as the Bronze Soldier of Tallinn. That monument also was the site of a number of graves of Soviet Russian soldiers who were killed fighting against the Nazis.

The graves were dug up, their families in Russia notified they could collect the remains or they would be relocated in the Tallinn military cemetery along with the monument.

Now, in 2025, we have another round of monument-busting, as the Estonians are tearing down Russian war memorials once again. This includes defiling Russian graves in the Tallinn military cemetery and damaging and destroying war memorials.

If there is one single unifying principle these days in Russia it is the great importance given to Russia’s decisive role in the defeat of Nazi armies in World War II. Each year, on May 9, Russia holds its annual Victory Day celebration, which focuses on a show of military power.

It is followed by a more somber but clearly important citizen’s march known as the Immortal Regiment. In this march, families proudly carry posters and photos of family members who perished in the Great Patriotic War (Russia’s terminology for World War II.)

Estonia’s show of contempt for Russia’s World War II victory, along with its spotty, some would say, compromised behavior supporting the Nazis, is increasingly irksome to the Russians.

One can add attempts to keep Russians living in Estonia from achieving citizenship or even voting in elections. Estonia has now stepped that up by adding new legislation to make it even more difficult for Russian residents to be treated equally.

Estonia is also trying to block out any relationship between Russian Orthodox Churches in Estonia to the Moscow Patriarchate. It is not surprising that Estonia’s actions parallel and were perhaps inspired by Ukraine, which is doing the same thing.

The Estonian action against the Moscow-led church would create revulsion and horror elsewhere if, for example, European or American Catholics were not allowed to communicate with the Pope in Rome.

Among the pro-war advocates in Europe, Estonia is at the forefront. Its former Prime Minister, Kaja Kallas, is now the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy.

She is now a major voice in promoting a massive European defense expansion and sending troops to Ukraine. Of the six nations who have apparently pledged to send troops to Ukraine, Estonia is leading the list even though it does not have anyone to send.

The trouble with provocations is that they can cause wars. The hysteria now apparent in official channels in parts of Europe (for example, France, UK, Germany and Estonia) reflects huge anxiety that Ukraine will not survive the Russian onslaught.

Instead of helping US President Donald Trump find a peaceful solution to the conflict, the French and British, in particular, have done their best to undermine his efforts.

While some of this can be explained as a bailout for Europe’s economic issues by substituting military production for civilian manufacturing, deficit spending of this kind will never be enough to salvage Europe’s economic and industrial problems.

Meanwhile, small countries such as Estonia can cause big problems and an escalation leading to conflict in Europe.

RT, 4/29/25

Moscow’s victory in the Ukraine conflict will lay the groundwork for a more just world based on mutual respect and stable development, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has said, adding that this vision is supported by most of the world’s population.

The senior official, currently serving as deputy chair of the Russian Security Council, outlined Moscow’s foreign policy priorities and recalled the history of the West’s confrontational approach to Russia during a public lecture in Moscow on Tuesday.

Here are the key points of Medvedev’s speech.

1. Ukraine Conflict

Medvedev stated that the Ukraine conflict stems from decades of Western hostility toward Russia and the fostering of neo-Nazism in Ukraine by the “Anglo-Saxon crowd.” He argued that Russia’s military response was necessary to address these provocations, stating that even US President Donald Trump acknowledged that Washington, Brussels, and Kiev are responsible for the Ukraine crisis which has nearly triggered World War III.

The former president also stressed that Russia’s ultimate goal is to destroy the “Kiev neo-Nazi regime,” not the Ukrainian state itself. He emphasized that Russia would not allow hostile regimes to re-emerge on its borders and called for a complete denazification of Ukraine, as well as Europe. 

He also warned that all foreign fighters and any future foreign contingents in Ukraine are legitimate military targets under international law, and promised that war criminals would face justice.

Commenting on Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky, Medvedev described him as a “pathological figure” and suggested he would “end very badly.”

He predicted that after the conflict ends, Russia would establish a new national holiday to commemorate its victory in Ukraine which, according to Medvedev, is essential to ensure lasting security.

2. Russia and the West

Medvedev has described Russia’s relationship with the West as a long history of confrontation, rooted in persistent efforts by ”Anglo-Saxon powers” to weaken Russia. He recalled that even during World War II, Britain and the US considered plans to attack the Soviet Union, referencing ”Operation Unthinkable,” which was secretly developed under Winston Churchill’s orders in 1945. Medvedev argued that after the war, the West squandered the chance to build a fair international order, instead creating a system based on double standards, cynicism, and attempts to isolate Russia.

Medvedev stated that while Russia had always sought peaceful coexistence, it now faces a situation where it must counter the West’s ”peace through strength” strategy with its own doctrine of ”peace through fear,” asserting that only the threat of strong retaliation, including nuclear deterrence, can keep the West from taking hostile actions.

At the same time, he rejected claims that Russia might attack Europe, calling them ”nonsense” designed to frighten European populations and justify rampant militarization.

The former president also concluded that Russian-EU relations have passed the ”point of no return,” arguing that there are no independent, strong leaders left on the continent, only ”spineless Russophobic figures” and ”cowardly marionettes.” Medvedev expressed little hope for meaningful dialogue with current EU governments, and suggested that future interaction would be limited or nonexistent. At the same time, he claimed that many ordinary Europeans are growing disillusioned with their leaders’ policies toward Russia.

3. EU’s decline

Medvedev described today’s Western Europe as suffering from “feeblemindedness without courage.” He argued that the continent has abandoned its traditions and fallen under the control of radical, Russophobic leaders.

He claimed that Western Europe is increasingly embracing extremist ideologies and must also undergo a process of denazification alongside Ukraine. Medvedev pointed to the decision by European authorities to invite Ukrainian nationalists – whom he linked to WWII-era Ukrainian far-right leader Stepan Bandera – to the 80th anniversary celebrations of the end of World War II, while deliberately excluding representatives from Russia, calling it an act of profound cynicism.

Medvedev went on to state that the EU is not only politically weak but also morally degraded, lacking any real leadership or strategic independence, and on the verge of collapse. He predicted that the bloc would continue to oppose Donald Trump and traditionalist forces in the US, reflecting a deep ideological split between globalist elites in Europe and rising conservative movements elsewhere in the West.

4. Just world order

The former president suggested that Russia is fighting with “truth and justice” on its side, positioning itself as the defender of genuine international law against Western hypocrisy.

He argued that Russia’s victory in the Ukraine conflict would mark the first step toward the creation of a fair, multipolar world order.

Medvedev claimed that the Western “rules-based order” is illegitimate and called for its replacement with a true international system grounded in mutual respect and real international law. He noted that most of humanity, particularly the Global South, already supports this vision, while acknowledging that creating such a multipolar world would likely take many years.

Medvedev also stated that despite their geopolitical rivalry, Russia and the US do not have to be permanent enemies and argued that pragmatic cooperation between the two countries is crucial for global stability, especially given their roles as the largest nuclear powers and permanent members of the UN Security Council. He expressed cautious hope that dialogue with Washington could resume on a more pragmatic basis, while dismissing the EU as an increasingly irrelevant actor.

By Thomas Graham, The National Interest, 4/14/25

Thomas Graham, a distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, served as the senior director for Russia on the US National Security Council staff during the George W. Bush administration and as managing director of Kissinger Associates from 2008 to 2019.

As the United States pivots toward Russia under President Donald Trump, speculation is mounting that his strategy reflects a “reverse Kissinger.” That is, instead of playing the China card (allying to wedge the two communist powers apart) against the Soviet Union as Kissinger allegedly did in the 1970s, Trump seeks to play the Russia card against China. 

His strategy is to use the promise of restoring diplomatic relations to decouple Russia from China, thereby diminishing the strategic challenge that the Asian giant poses.

These suppositions are absolute fantasy. 

Russia’s Positions Against the United States and Alongside China

Russia has good strategic reasons for sustaining close working relations with its dynamic neighbor in Asia. 

It wants to share the economic vitality China exudes, which Russia lacks. Fifteen years ago, China became Russia’s leading trading partner; since the onset of the Russia-Ukraine war, it has become the largest importer of Russian oil and natural gas.

Geopolitically, Moscow benefits from maintaining tranquility along the 4,000 km-long border with China, which has been a source of tension throughout history. The Kremlin will not abandon those benefits for a relationship with the United States, and this status quo will endure beyond Trump’s term as president, especially given the deep-seated anti-Russian animosity within the American foreign-policy establishment.

Russian president Vladimir Putin might, however, be tempted to play the role of Kissinger himself, to use the “U.S. card” to rebalance relations with China. Although he regularly boasts that relations have never been better, and he and Chinese President Xi Jinping talk of taking the lead together in building a new world order, Putin has to be wary of how a future Chinese leader might exploit the burgeoning asymmetry in power and fortune that separates the two countries today to China’s advantage.

Depending on how it is measured, China’s economy today is five to nine times larger than the USSR’s GDP in the early 1990s. 

China has overtaken Russia as a technological power, mounting stiff competition against the United States in artificial intelligence and robotics, among other things. Further, China is a rising space power, while Russia is falling behind.

How Will Russia Keep Up with China?

To preserve its strategic autonomy in these circumstances, Russia needs a hedge against China. 

In the short term, that would ensure that the deals it cuts with China are not tilted so heavily in the latter’s favor as they are today. In the long term, a hedge is necessary to protect against China’s abandoning partnership in favor of strategic competition with Russia.

Putin understands this logic, so he supports the BRICS alliance and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, of which Russia and China are leading members. He hopes that enmeshing China as a web of relations will somehow constrain its ambitions. However, the hard truth is that Russia will not be able to forge a reliable hedge out of the countries of the global south; their power potential simply does not measure up to China’s. 

For better or worse, the United States offers the only reliable strategic hedge against the Chinese superpower.

Just as Kissinger exploited hostility between the Soviet Union and China to advance U.S. strategic goals, Putin could do the same with the United States and China. Like the American statesman confronting the Soviet Union and China, he would have no interest in exacerbating the growing tension between the United States and China. That would only raise the risk of an economic or military confrontation with debilitating consequences for Russia and the two belligerents. 

Aligning with the United States against China would make no strategic sense, given the reasons noted above, while forging an ever-closer alignment with China against the United States would jeopardize Russia’s strategic autonomy. As Kissinger did, Putin would need to pursue more subtle diplomacy, one that creates incentives for each side to seek better relations with Russia by playing on each one’s fear of the consequences of Russia’s strategic alignment with its rival.

It is Putin’s good fortune that Trump, for his purposes, wants to normalize relations. That means that he has to make fewer concessions to draw closer to the United States than he would have had to if he had sought to restore relations during the Biden administration. This reality is already evident in the way Putin is manipulating Trump’s avowed desire for an early settlement of the Russia-Ukraine war to gain U.S. support for Russian goals vis-a-vis Ukraine.

How far this rapprochement with the United States will go and whether it will be sufficient to rebalance relations with China remains to be seen. Trump’s continuing support for normalization and hints of some nervousness in Beijing suggest that Putin is on the right track if he is channeling Kissinger. 

However, he must tread carefully. As was true for Kissinger, success requires that all sides draw some benefit from the triangular relations. Thus, Putin needs to enable the United States to advance some of its strategic goals due to improved relations while creating concern that the rapprochement could harm China’s position so that Beijing can make concessions to Russia without backfiring. 

It is an intricate game, especially for a country that is the weakest of the three parties, but perhaps Putin learned something from all those conversations he had with Kissinger after he rose to power.

By Dave DeCamp, Antiwar.com, 4/29/25

Russian President Vladimir Putin continues to demand full control of four Ukrainian oblasts claimed by Russia as a condition for a potential peace deal, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday.

The report said that President Trump’s envoy, Steve Witkoff, sought to convince Putin to drop the demand and agree to a ceasefire that froze the current battle lines, but the Russian leader declined and maintained his demand for complete control of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia.

The Financial Times reported last week that Putin was willing to freeze the current battle lines for a peace deal, but the Kremlin quickly signaled that this wasn’t the case.

Ukraine has also appeared to reject the conditions of a US proposal for a potential peace deal. The Bloomberg report said that negotiations are now at an impasse as an agreement seems less and less likely.

When Russian and Ukrainian officials held peace talks in the early days of Russia’s invasion in 2022, Russia’s main demand was for Ukrainian neutrality. Those efforts were discouraged by the US, and later that year, Russia declared its annexation of the four Ukrainian oblasts and added the recognition of that territory as Russia to its demands to end the war.

Since Russia has the momentum on the battlefield, it’s unlikely that it would accept a peace deal with terms dictated by the US. If the negotiations fall apart, it remains unclear if the Trump administration would continue fueling the war by arming Ukraine. As time goes on, the terms of a settlement will likely get less favorable for Ukraine.

On Monday, Russia declared a three-day ceasefire starting on May 8, but Ukraine rejected the idea and proposed a 30-day truce. Russia has dismissed the Ukrainian counteroffer and is casting doubt on whether the three-day ceasefire will hold.

***

Moscow ready to seek ‘balance of interests’ with Ukraine and US – Lavrov

RT, 4/27/25

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has rebuked CBS host in an interview on Sunday repeating that Moscow is ready to seek a “balance of interests” both with Ukraine and with the US. The network’s journalist Margaret Brennan has said that she haven’t heard from the top diplomat that Moscow “is willing to make any concession on anything to date.”

“No, my brief answer is you are wrong,” Lavrov told Brennan.

“I have been emphasizing repeatedly, in relation to Ukraine, in relation to strategic relations with the United States, I have been emphasizing our readiness to seek balance of interests. If- if this is not what your station considers readiness for negotiations, then I don’t know how to be even less eloquent in trying to be brief in my answers,” he added.

Lavrov confirmed that Russia is continuing contacts with Washington regarding Ukraine and welcomed US President Donald Trump’s efforts to mediate.

“There are several signs that we are moving in the right direction,” Lavrov said. He emphasized that Russia demands guarantees that any ceasefire “would not be used again to beef up Ukrainian military” and that arms supplies to Ukraine should stop.

Russian President Vladimir Putin held lengthy talks on Friday with US special envoy Steve Witkoff at the Kremlin. Presidential adviser Yury Ushakov described the meeting as “constructive and very useful,” adding that the discussion touched on the idea of resuming direct negotiations between Moscow and Kiev.

Trump, commenting on the state of the negotiations, said Ukraine and Russia “should now meet, at very high levels, to ‘finish it off.’ Most of the major points are agreed to.”

In the interview, Lavrov reiterated Russia’s position on Crimea, stating, “Russia does not negotiate [over] its own territory,” and praised President Trump for acknowledging the peninsula’s status.

Crimea “will stay with Russia” in any peace deal, Trump told Time Magazine in an article published on Friday. He said that even Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky understands this. “It’s been with them [Russia] for a long time,” the US president stated, noting that Russia had its submarines there “long before any period that we’re talking about” and that the majority of Crimeans speak Russian.

Russian officials have repeatedly said that Moscow is open to a negotiated solution, but have emphasized that any agreement must reflect the territorial realities on the ground and address the root causes of the conflict.

Zelensky insisted on Wednesday that Kiev would never officially recognize Crimea as Russian. Trump sharply rebuked that statement as “very harmful to the Peace Negotiations with Russia in that Crimea was lost years ago.”

By Stephen Bryen, Asia Times, 4/15/25

Is a partition plan a realistic outcome for ending the Ukraine war. General Keith Kellogg’s proposal appears to have already encountered difficulties. However, that does not mean that some type of partition is out of the question.

Kellogg’s “plan” would carve up Ukraine into four zones

-British, French, and Ukrainian troops, with the potential for others to join, would make up the first zone, western Ukraine. That zone would stretch from the Polish border to the Dnieper river.

-The second zone. East of the Dnieper would be under Ukrainian control, defended by Ukraine’s army.

-A third zone would be a buffer area with a depth of 18 miles.

-A fourth zone would include the Russian “occupied areas” including Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaphorize, Kherson and Crimea. The Kellogg plan does not address the actual boundaries.

The Russians have already said, referring to Kellogg’s plan, that putting NATO or NATO-state soldiers in Ukraine is unacceptable.

The Kellogg plan leaves the juridical status of the areas with Russian troops unclear and it leaves Ukraine’s army at full strength. One implication of the plan is that the war could re-start at any time.

Taking a step back, it is worth asking what the Russians’ end game may be and the likelihood they will achieve it.

The first and clearly the most important point is that the Russians are attempting to restore their relationship with Washington and want to persuade President Trump to support the immediate Russian goal of legitimizing those territories Kellogg puts into the fourth zone.

Were Trump to accede to Russia’s territorial objectives, essentially granting de jure legitimacy status to the Russian territorial gains in the war, it would be highly controversial in Congress. Trump would face censure for acquiescing in an illegal invasion of Ukraine.

This is more problematic than Biden’s withdrawal from Afghanistan, where the US simply left by pulling out its forces. While the Taliban took over as the pro-US Afghan government disintegrated, the US did not recognize the new government or offer any overt concessions to it. Today, the US maintains an Afghan affairs office in Doha, Qatar, but has no diplomatic relations with Afghanistan.

The Kellogg plan is not, despite his statements, like the Berlin agreement. People remember that at the end of World War II, the Allies divided Germany into four zones – the US, UK, France and Russia. Similarly, the Allies split Berlin, Germany’s capital within the Soviet zone, into four sectors (though the US, British, and French sectors later merged).

The background of the German partitioning came about because of serious disagreements among the allies over Germany’s future and a shift in the outlook of the US and UK, who saw Germany as a geopolitical asset and the USSR as a threat.

For Ukraine, officially the conflict is between Ukraine and Russia, with third parties (especially NATO) supporting Ukraine with arms, advisers, technical support, training, supplies, financial aid and intelligence. Unlike Ukraine, the Russians have been mostly on their own, although China has helped them under the table – as has North Korea, even supplying a few thousand soldiers.

Russia’s major advantage is a significant military-industrial base and a large recruitment pool for soldiers. Ukraine, on its own, would have long since disappeared: It is entirely a creature of NATO from a support and resources point of view.

Those differences aside, some kind of partitioning of Ukrainian territory is not out of the question in the future. It could be an outcome under some circumstances that are by no means far-fetched.

Looked at along a timeline where the negotiations either fail or drag out without resolution – which may be convenient for the United States and for the Russians, especially if Trump and Putin can’t find a mutually acceptable formula and the Zelensky government continues to act in the mode of enfant terrible – the Russians may be successful in defeating Ukraine’s army on the battlefield.

Short of that dramatic result, they may destroy a significant part of the Ukrainian army in the field – precipitating a real crisis in Kyiv. Zelensky, who cannot really negotiate with Russia (assuming he actually wanted to do so), would face an enormous risk keeping his government in Kyiv.

Facing the prospect of either being captured by the Russians or being replaced by extreme nationalists in the army and intelligence services, Zelensky may find it convenient to retreat to the west, potentially establishing a Ukrainian government in Lvov, which is far enough away from Russia to be considered more or less secure.

With a new government in Kyiv, likely pro-Russian, Ukraine would be practically partitioned. Essentially, Kellogg’s Zone 1 would become the Zelensky-led Ukraine headquartered in Lvov, and Russia would control everything east of the Dnieper, even possibly Odesa, a city founded by Catherine the Great and which Russia considers Russian.

If this scenario plays out, then some sort of European rescue army could plant itself in Zone 1, avoiding a total defeat for Europe, the EU and NATO.

There are many downsides and upsides to this scenario. NATO will probably remain in a part of Ukraine, and Russia will not get international recognition for its military conquests. This would reduce the US and NATO burden of militarily, economically and politically supporting Ukraine.

The US would be free to focus its attention elsewhere, mainly Asia and China, and rebuild stockpiles of weapons depleted during the Ukraine war. Europe could boast it stood by Ukraine, but without the consequence of the war spreading outside Ukraine’s borders. NATO would not lose face, nor would Washington.

There is already talk in Europe about reopening Europe (especially Germany and France) to “cheap” Russian energy. That’s a signal that the endgame is in sight. Europe cannot afford an economic collapse that would create upheaval on the continent, stimulate social revolution and purge the ruling elites responsible for the mess.

Even Europe, despite all the war talk, will have to face the necessity of adjusting its vision or face chaos.