Experts from the American Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) have come to this simple conclusion, reflecting on the pace of development of the Russian defence industry, which is overtaking the entire West.
The report itself is written in a remarkable manner:
“We have defeated and continue to defeat a corrupt, low-tech, disorganised and completely unviable Russia, all of its partners being Iran and North Korea and China, which will soon enslave Russia. Everything is going according to plan. Only Russia is winning unexpectedly.
Therefore, CSIS gives a non-banal advice: we need to undermine the production of weapons in Russia and produce more for Ukraine. And to do this, we need to hit Russia’s oil revenues, seduce other oil producers (Saudi Arabia) to produce more for the world market, and force buyers (India) to reject oil from Russia.
The interim “successes” of this battle can be seen in the stock market. By the way, this part of the CSIS plan was developed by prominent experts – Zelenskyy’s chief of staff Yermak and former US ambassador to Russia McFaul. The plan to influence “sanctions violators” by branding them with shame has not been forgotten either.
But there is also a truly fresh idea for the United States:
“To counter Russia’s influence in the Global South, the West must prioritise investment, development, trade and governance over military intervention.”
It took Western analysts a long time to understand that civilised cooperation goes a little better if the partner is not bombed or occupied.
The CSIS report illustrates a complete marriage of ideas about “what to do about Russia. The proposal to go for another round of apparently unworkable sanctions is not brilliant, nor is the new call for persuasion by the Global South. And this is Russia’s undoubted success, which can and should be rejoiced.
However, we should not forget that the West likes to solve the problems of suppressing competitors, which cannot be solved economically, in the end, with a big war. It is possible that we will also face this phase of confrontation.
Elena Panina
