Michael McFaul Profile picture
Feb 18 16 tweets 3 min read
In testimony for the US Congress this week, I outlined what I thought were Putin's aims in threatening war against Ukraine. fsi-live.s3.us-west-1.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/mc… Let me summarize in a thread. 1/ THREAD
"Some political leaders, elected officials, and analysts have argued that we could end this conflict overnight by just ending NATO’s open-door policy. That analysis is wrong." 2/
"First, this argument assumes that Putin would credibly commit to a new agreement and stop threatening Ukraine’s sovereignty. Why? He already has violated numerous European treaties and agreements that Moscow signed in the past..." 3/
"..., including most germane to this current crisis, the 1994 Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances for Ukraine. Why should anyone in Kyiv, Brussels, or Washington believe Putin will be more sincere this time around? " 4/
"Second, Putin understands perfectly well that he has invented from scratch this alleged threat of Ukrainian membership in NATO. Give Putin credit; he has framed this crisis as one about NATO expansion, and unfortunately, many ... have accepted Putin’s narrative." 5/
"Putin of course knows fully well that NATO will not accept new members that have Russian soldiers occupying parts of their territory. That’s why Putin invaded Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine in 2014 and now occupies parts of both countries. It’s a tragic fact." 6/
"Third, while Putin has distracted the West with the shiny object of NATO expansion, he has continued to march forward on a much larger, destabilizing agenda of undermining democracy in his neighborhood." 7/
"Democratic expansion, not NATO expansion, threaten Putin and his autocratic regime. He has said so very explicitly many times, including most recently in his joint statement with Chinese leader Xi Jinping..." 8/
"Since so-called color revolutions in Georgia in 2003 and Ukraine in 2004, Putin has deployed multiple instruments of power to undermine democracy and sovereignty in these countries." 9/
"Putin’s massive military buildup on Ukraine’s borders is just the latest tactic in this long-term campaign. Already, the threat of invasion has profoundly stressed the Ukrainian economy." 10/
Fourth...Putin seeks to unite a single Slavic nation of Russia, Ukraine & Belarus which he thinks was unjustly divided after the collapse of the Soviet Union. In a recent long historical article, Putin explained why Ukrainians and Russians are from one nation or one people." 11/
"Fifth, more broadly, Putin aspires to first weaken and ideally destroy European multilateral institutions and continental norms about democracy and human rights." 12/
"Putin personally, as well as Russian state-controlled media, Russian money, and Russian non-governmental and religious actors, have cultivated ties with European and American leaders, groups, and media who share Putin’s populist, orthodox, nationalist ideology." 13/
"Putin understands well that the fight today between autocracy and democracy is not only between countries but within countries, including our own." 14/
"Of course, Putin wants to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO and interrupt current military cooperation between Ukraine and NATO countries. But his revisionist agenda is much larger than that." 15/
"For as long as he rules Russia, Putin will continue to normalize annexation, deny sovereignty to neighbors, undermine democratic regimes, ideas, and societies, and undo the liberal international order." 16/ END THREAD.

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More from @McFaul

Feb 18
Lots of people in my feed recently keep referencing Professor Mearsheimer as the great explainer of the current Russia-Ukraine conflict. I have some thoughts. THREAD 1/
I respect John as one of the clearest, most logical realist theorists out here. Unlike some, he also admits/understands that realism is both an explanatory theory and a normative perspective, or what Id call an ideology. (Liberalism also is a theory & an ideology.) 2/
Whenever I teach IR courses, I assign big chunks of Mearsheimer all the time (Walt too). 3/
Read 13 tweets
Feb 15
We are all looking for signs of Putin pivoting towards negotiations, not war, because we all want to avoid war. But we should be careful about cherry-picking the tea leaves. 1/ THREAD
He told Lavrov to pursue negotiations, yes. That's good news. 2/
But Putin also called Donbas a genocide. How can Putin stand by and watch a genocide of ethnic Russians (his frame not mine)? That quip from Putin scared me. 3/
Read 5 tweets
Feb 9
"Not without reason, Putin believes that U.S. support for democracy abroad threatens his autocratic rule." 1/ THREAD.
"During Putin’s reign, most crises in relations with the United States have been triggered not by NATO expansion, but by democratic mobilizations — Putin calls them “color revolutions” — within countries, be it Georgia in 2003, Ukraine in 2004, the Arab Spring in 2011,..." 2/
"Russia in 2011 and Ukraine in 2014. On this contentious issue, there is no deal to be had between the United States and Russia as long as Putin is in power. U.S. leaders cannot command other societies to stop wanting democracy." 3/
Read 4 tweets
Feb 5
According to Wikipedia, 2 decades ago, "On 15 February 2003, a coordinated day of protests was held across the world in which people in more than 600 cities expressed opposition to the imminent Iraq War." 1/
"It was part of a series of protests and political events that had begun in 2002 and continued as the invasion, war, and occupation took place. The day was described by social movement researchers as "the largest protest event in human history"2/
"According to BBC News, between six and ten million people took part in protests in up to sixty countries over the weekend of 15 and 16 February." 3/
Read 6 tweets
Feb 3
During our negotiations with Russians on New START Treaty, Moscow said they would never, never, never sign the treaty without limitations on missile defense. We said we couldn't agree to that maximalist demand. 1/
The Russians did not take that demand off the table until the very END of negotiations. But they finally did. 2/
What is strange about some of the commentary on the current crisis is that people like Hawley want to capitulate to Russia's most maximalist demands at the very beginning of negotiations. So odd to me. 2/
Read 5 tweets
Jan 29
Cyberattacks against Estonia 2007, interventions in Georgia 2008 & Ukraine in 2014, recognition of Abkhazia & S. Ossetia as countries, annexation of Crimea, war in Donbas, hit squads in London, Salisbury, Berlin & Tomsk killed Europeans & undermined European security.1/
Compared to this list, please explain to me how NATO expansion -- the last major wave which took place 20 years ago-- "threatens" Russian/European security? (& yes, I take note that NATO did attack a Serbian dictator conducting ethnic cleansing.) 2/
And now today, Putin has deployed 130,000 heavily-armed soldiers to invade Ukraine. Isn't that a threat to European security too? Before this crisis, what had Ukraine, Biden, or Brussels done to threaten Russia? Nothing. (The false equivalency in policy debate needs to end.) 3/
Read 4 tweets

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