Putin: The ‘uncrowned new tsar’ holding together a fractured empire 

On 6 August, just as international public opinion was extensively reporting on the sudden death of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, Ukrainian armed forces unexpectedly launched a bold offensive into Russia’s western border region of Kursk. 

The outcome was not only a source of humiliation for the arrogant “new tsar”, Russian President Vladimir Putin, but also a shock for media outlets around the world. As a result, the Russia-Ukraine war, which has been ongoing for two and a half years, came under the spotlight again in a new form. 

The core of the issue is neither the “new Russia” long occupied by Moscow nor the “new Ukraine” seized by Kyiv’s counterattacks. Rather, it represents a key geopolitical strategic proposition arising from the new power balance in the heartland of the Eurasian continent. This includes the reconstruction of regional order amid US-China-Russia competition, a reassessment of regional security and the Kremlin’s strategies for managing its influence in Eurasia and the coastal regions of the Indo-Pacific.

Essentially, the escalating Russia-Ukraine war did not begin with the “special military operation” unilaterally announced by Putin on 24 February 2022, but rather with the 2014 Crimean crisis, which has long been regarded as a significant regional historical event.

In other words, the Russia-Ukraine war has lasted for a decade, with its roots traceable to the period surrounding the outbreak of the Crimean crisis, when two major initiatives emerged — China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and Russia’s Eurasian Economic Union. 

At that time, US-Russia-Europe, US-China-Russia and US-Europe-China relations seemed calm on the surface but were actually marked by significant undercurrents, with the four entities creating multiple interconnected triangles of influence.

Ultimately, the reason why Mikhail Gorbachev, the last general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, and Boris Yeltsin, the first president of the Russian Federation, were willing to accept the reality of the Soviet Union’s collapse was not because they believed in historical inevitability. Rather, they were both convinced that getting rid of the uncontrollable geopolitical burden was a necessary path to liberation and rebirth.

The notion of political and economic self-destruction is misguided. The independence of the former Soviet republics caused Russia to lose its former sphere of influence forever. 

On the contrary, political withdrawal and limited military and economic concessions are prerequisites for reintegrating into the US-led global economic and trade system. They are also preconditions for the upgrading of a national political system and the construction of an international multipolar system, as well as the best option to maintain the security and the sphere of influence of Russia’s “Greater Eurasia” strategic framework. 

It is also because of this that Gorbachev decided to break the diplomatic ice before the Soviet Union completely dissolved, shifting the strategic focus from central and eastern Europe and the Far East to the heartland of the Eurasian continent under Russian control.

It consolidated its monopoly as a new power in transport and logistics, food production, and energy exports via the east-west Silk Road-style Eurasian corridor. Working with neighbouring Berlin and Beijing, it also sought to build the core of a traditional land power-based multipolar system to minimise the overall strategic deterrence and influence of the US within Eurasia. 　　

At the same time, partial economic openness and limited political freedom provided Moscow with short-term guarantees in exchange for the foreign capital and technology it needed for its defence industrial system. 

Meanwhile, in determining its future success or failure, it is critical to ensure that Kyiv does not waver in its thinking, hesitate in its approach, question its position, deviate from its course, confront its strategy, resist its identity, deny its history or reconstruct its identity. Even if a passive regime change occurred, it would not undermine the foundation of the state. Who knows, a reverse annexation and a rise against the odds could still be within reach.

Following over two decades of steady economic globalisation, the Kremlin’s power core under Putin has realised that the EU-Russia-China triangle, which has shown itself to be highly beneficial and harmless, is in fact the greatest security risk. 

For both Russia and China, 2001 was a pivotal year for profound changes in Eurasia and international relations. Its geopolitical strategic significance lies in setting aside disputes and pursuing joint development, up until 2013 when the BRI was first unveiled in Kazakhstan and the Revolution of Dignity broke out in Ukraine.

During this process, while the establishment of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation and the signing of the Treaty of Good-Neighborliness and Friendly Cooperation Between the People’s Republic of China and the Russian Federation provided a mechanism and platform for ensuring the permanent resolution of border issues between the three Central Asian countries and China, as well as the opening of new transportation routes, it is still unable to fundamentally resolve the historical land border demarcation issues between China and Russia in the Far East. 

It merely set aside the issue in the form of “laying solid foundations for a new type of great power relations” based on the treaty’s terms until the eve of the full escalation of the Russia-Ukraine war in 2021. Under the joint statement between both heads of state, the treaty would be automatically extended for another five years, which is the completely unpredictable 2027.      　　

In order to achieve Russia’s capitalist-style rise as a great power, the Kremlin’s power core abandoned its bipolar confrontation with the US and pinned its hopes on a horizontal alliance between the land powers of Eurasia. 

Furthermore, by cooperating with Germany, the old post-reunification industrial powerhouse, and China, which had joined the World Trade Organization, Russia hoped to implement a tripartite “technology–resource–production” strategic partnership to exclude the US as much as possible. It had also wanted to prevent the erosion of its sphere of influence, which encompasses the three Eastern European countries, the three South Caucasus states, the five Central Asian nations and Mongolia. 

By leveraging this strategic window, Russia in turn aimed to restore its greatness, hoping that the former Soviet republics would “autonomously return” and no longer continue to weaken.　

But the Kremlin did not expect that things would turn out contrary to its intentions. The Eurasian horizontal axis strategy (EU-Russia-China), which had been implemented for 30 years, neither enabled Russia to rise against the tide within its traditional spheres of influence nor allowed the Kremlin to naturally become a pole in a multipolar world.

On the contrary, Russia became trapped in self-destruction, and the so-called tripartite Eurasian strategic integration involving Germany, Russia and China only triggered a Western European “expulsion of Eurasia” and an East Asian “restoration of Asia-Europe”. 

The US-China-EU triangle, where geoeconomic interests are highly aligned, was grossly underestimated; and rather than being at the core, Moscow’s longstanding geopolitical role was confined to the auxiliary roles of an “oil and gas carrier” and “railway transport worker”.

As the successor of Yeltsin, Putin is not the creator of the Eurasian horizontal alliance strategy, but rather an insider and bystander who witnessed the decline of both the old Soviet Union and new Russia. 

More accurately, as one familiar with both sides, Putin was a key figure marginalised during the Soviet era. Amid the Cold War, he experienced the intense fighting between the conservative Gennady Yanayev and reformist Gorbachev, and also between Gorbachev and the radical Yeltsin, which in turn led to successive failures of the Red Army’s and the White Army’s attempts at revitalisation and rebirth. 

Meanwhile, amid cheers and laughter brewing for a long time, as a decision-making elite within the power core during the new Russia period, Putin instead witnessed a battered and tottering traditional landlocked steppe empire, remnants of an empire that does not wish to accept reality, and an increasingly distant border region.   　　

Because of this, Putin, who was handed Gorbachev’s “broken legacy” and Yeltsin’s “unfinished project”, is not a strongman of the calibre of Peter the Great who can make Russia great again. Instead, he is the remnant of two former regimes and an “uncrowned new tsar” striving to delay the decline of Russia and prevent the second dissolution of the empire. 

To ensure that nothing goes wrong, Putin promptly materialised the Eurasian Economic Union in response to China’s BRI, which is based on its Western Region Development Strategy. 

In contrast, when faced with Ukraine’s determination to enter the EU and the continued export of Soviet military technology, Putin unhesitatingly initiated the Crimean crisis and escalated military strikes against Ukraine, thereby declaring the end of the 30-year Eurasian horizontal axis strategy, and replacing it with the Eurasian vertical axis strategy (Russia-Muslim world-India) oriented towards the Indo-Pacific. 

But facts have proven that the success of the new axis strategy entirely depends on the military outcomes in “new Russia” of eastern Ukraine and “new Ukraine” of western Russia — the battles of Donbas and Kursk respectively. It is a showdown that could alter the overall balance of power on the Eurasian steppe.

This article was first published in Lianhe Zaobao as “乌克兰反击战再改全球陆海平衡”.

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