By Dan Storyev, The Nation, 6/22/26

Dan Storyev is a human rights expert who fled Russia.

“Russia is finished,” cheerfully proclaimed The Atlantic on its May 2001 cover. The headline was wrong, but it proved to be really catchy. It has been echoed for over two decades by a host of experts, academics, and writers, with regular frequency. All the while, Russia, spiteful as ever, does not heed the experts’ opinions and does not seem to be collapsing anytime soon.

Instead, if anything is collapsing today, it is America’s ability to understand Russia, which was never great to begin with. The self-delusion of the foreign-policy “Blob,” coupled with the anti-intellectualism of the second Trump administration, joined by wartime cancel culture, and accompanied by dishonest sources—all created a cocktail of groupthink that posits that Russia is on the brink of collapse.

This cocktail is poison to Washington’s policy vis-à-vis Russia and Russians. It already led to wasteful spending, misguided diplomacy, and even attacks on free speech on US soil.

The sanctions did not manage to permanently reduce “the ruble to rubble,” as then-President Biden prematurely boasted. The combined might of the United States and its allies could not isolate “collapsing” Russia from the rest of the world. In the meantime, voices that could offer a more rational explanation of Russia to the public and policymakers are shunned. Even the most anti-Putin Russian intellectuals are canceled in American forums, while experts who try to argue for more nuance in America’s approach to Russia are branded as Kremlin stooges by the commentariat.

Some of “Russia is finished” fortune-telling is motivated by wishful thinking. There is no doubt that Russia, which has been waging a war of aggression on European soil since 2014, is easily painted as an eternal enemy of the West. Historian Yuri Slezkine even argued that the West still mainly defines itself through othering and fearing Russia. The Kremlin is also all too happy to present itself as a threat to what its propagandists call “the rotting West.”

But there is also no doubt that this wishful thinking is misled at best. Russia is nowhere close to collapsing. The “Russia is finished” articles, books, and video essays often point out genuine faults in the bizarre structure of Russia’s economy, the Kremlin’s politics, rampant corruption, and inexorable population decline. They then make vague predictions about a return to the mayhem of the 1990s, a breakup of Russia along ethnic lines, total economic collapse, or a brewing popular uprising.

The temptation to mock the collapse clairvoyance is strong. One could easily list all the objective reasons why Russia isn’t collapsing any time soon. The country’s economy has proven surprisingly resilient, able to withstand sanctions of historic proportions. While the Russian military is stuck in the blood and mud in Ukraine, it has repeatedly shown an ability to adapt rather than collapse.

Russia’s diplomacy, which is traditionally seen in the West as not much more than incoherent gopnik yelps, is making headway in the Global South where Russian state–affiliated media are important players and student exchange programs are in full swing.

Inside Russia, civilians live relatively normal lives and are likely not thinking of rising up with pitchforks against the Kremlin. Many of them enjoy new Hollywood releases, chic cafés, and exhibitions. Yes, life goes on, even as Russian cities are bombed and the economy is slowing down.

There is a feedback loop here: Russia keeps chugging along and pundits keep churning out doomsayings. It is tempting, when producing propaganda, to paint your elected enemy as on the brink of an abyss, needing only a little push to tip over and disappear. This is what Italian philosopher Umberto Eco described in his essay “Ur-Fascism,” writing that propaganda presents an enemy as both “too strong and too weak.” For the foreign-policy Blob, there is nothing better than an eternal weak-strong enemy, in opposition to which the military-industrial complex and its associated content factories can eternally justify their own existence.

As Russians say ironically, “Whatever we try to engineer, we always end up making a Kalashnikov rifle.” A similar ailment befalls the American field of Russia studies, which is riddled with military and intelligence interest. Owing to a robust Cold War heritage, key Russia studies programs and projects in the US are either linked to the Department of Defense or downright funded by it.

A securitized view of Russia is bound to produce a lopsided analysis that ignores or misunderstands Russian society. It already led to some odd investments under the Biden administration. Consider the “decolonization” boom of 2022–23, when many pages of good repute—including the aforementioned Atlantic—posited that the United States must go abroad to destroy the monster of Russian imperialism by breaking Russia apart along its ethnic lines. It would be easy, argued the newly minted anti-colonial activists, because Russia is already on the brink of collapse.

Decolonization forums were hosted at platforms like the Hudson Institute; foundations and pundits popped up all over the marketplace of ideas. Many were eager to take advantage of the robust grant-making system—like the late USAID—built to advance US power around the world. Unlike the anti-colonial movements of the 1970s, the decolonizers were excited to work with the US security services, openly seeking out funding and support.

The US support, however, did not result in much. Russia did not fall apart. In retrospect, it was probably odd to expect concrete results from groups who were trying to win Western support by promoting Manchurian separatists during an event in Kyoto; or at an event in Washington calling for a formation of an independent Novgorod (currently a city tucked within western Russia), with an economy based on “trade with the Hanseatic League”—which has been defunct since 1669.

Any anthropologist or sociologist focused on Russia could probably explain the patent absurdity of trying to break Russia apart. They could point out that the decolonizers have little to no support inside of the country, and that ethnic Russians make up the majority in most of the supposedly “ethnic minority” regions, while minority elites are tightly dependent on the Kremlin. They could say that, for example, Russia’s defense minister comes from the ethnically Turkic Tuva region, where his family long enjoyed elite status. That many in Russia’s ethnic minorities are profiting off the Kremlin’s war. But who wants to listen to anthropologists?

The second coming of Trump and the ensuing collapse of USAID with other grantmaking institutions did not improve the situation. The money might have stopped flowing toward clearly bizarre initiatives—but it stopped flowing toward rigorous study also, owing to the new administration’s apparent anti-intellectual bent.

In the age of unprecedented geopolitical competition, it would be sensible for Washington to invest in serious Russia studies departments at think tanks and universities. Yet American expertise on Russia is in its sundown hour now, as many such departments are shutting down or getting defunded, while think tanks are plagued by financial issues. Some of the leading centers of knowledge on Russia—like the Wilson Center—were shuttered by DOGE. In particular, the administration cut the FLAS funding, prompting even elite Ivies to scale back their Russia research.

Russia itself also became increasingly more isolated from Western researchers, a trend that began in 2014 and only got worse in 2022. Institutions on both sides broke contact: Russian institutions came out in support of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine (whether willingly or not), which Western institutions could not let slide.

This resulted in the status quo where many Western Russianists were de facto (and often officially) banned from the country they study. Russia even banned the Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies, the chief US conference for such research. Very few American experts nowadays can safely travel to Russia. Moscow discourages Russian officials and experts from speaking to Americans. Unless, of course, these Americans are alt-right influencers like Candace Owens or Andrew Tate.

American institutions—such as Yale University or even the Wild Salmon Studies Center (yes)— have been designated as “undesirable.” This means that any interaction with them could lead to criminal prosecution. A knowledge iron curtain is actively being constructed by Moscow.

This is not to say that the Western political atmosphere is conducive to free and open discourse. Those who advocate studying Russia more thoroughly run the risk of being branded as Kremlin mouthpieces for not demonstrating a sufficiently hawkish position. Meanwhile, the exiled Russian academics who manage to make it to the West are often deplatformed and ostracized not necessarily for their political stance as much as for being Russian.

This form of wartime cancel culture is of course more prominent in the EU, and especially the Baltic States. Take Estonia, which wantonly deported a respected Russian-Australian historian—apparently, for giving a Russian-language talk on North Korea. The idea of automatically rejecting even the most anti-war Russians occasionally rears its head in the US too, like at 2023 PEN America, where a panel of exiled Russian writers was canceled due to fears of Ukrainian boycott, prompting American journalist M. Gessen to quit the PEN board in protest.

As a result, the Russianists American public and policymakers might still see are not just underfunded but are feeling politically constrained by a groupthink that excludes anyone Russian, or even anyone with a nuanced position on Russia. The “politically correct” sources of Russia knowledge are thus reduced to an ever-shrinking group of hawkish exiles or even more hawkish Eastern Europeans, who are willing to perfectly toe the party line and espouse maximalist positions on Russia mixed with hopes of near-collapse.

Eastern European experts, like Ukrainians or Balts, often claim to have a unique expertise on Russia due to their having been on the receiving end of the Kremlin’s imperialism for many years. They are not hiding their default (and perhaps understandable) desire to see Russia collapse. The Russia studies approach popular in Eastern Europe nowadays is aimed at “decentering” Russians, and a popular refrain heard there is that to understand Russia one must listen not to Russians but to Ukrainians or other victims of Russia. To what extent this approach is analytically sound is questionable—after all, we don’t expect Vietnamese or Iranians to have the best insights into American domestic affairs.

The actual Russians who are sometimes listened to in this context are a specific brand of exiles. These experts that might have the ear of Western politicians are often outright anti-Kremlin activists. No wonder, since they saw their country being trampled into authoritarianism by Putin and his posse.

But their careers, in many cases, effectively depend on a collapse of Putinism—and perhaps Russia with it—within their lifetimes. They know that they have little to no support inside Russia. As exiled politician Ilya Ponomarev said, they can only return to Russia “through bayonets,” meaning a Western military intervention. As the bayonets are not coming anytime soon, not much is left for the underfunded, disunited, and depressed Russian opposition in exile except hope, which, as Russians say, “dies last.”

This hope leads to assertions about the inevitable collapse of Putin’s regime. In reality, of course, the exiles’ plans for an end to Putin’s regime are limited to finding a window of opportunity. Rational analysis is tainted by political objectives.

The US is thus discouraged from learning about Russia, while Russian intellectuals are discouraged from helping the US learn about Russia. This creates fertile ground for baseless speculations and wishful thinking about a nearing collapse.

Lastly, the cottage industry of predicting Russia’s collapse is also emblematic of a key vulnerability of the Western intellectual scene—a general inability and unwillingness to conceive of a sustainable alternative model to capitalist liberal democracy, what British philosopher Mark Fisher called Capitalist Realism.

That is not to say that Putin’s Russia is somehow anti-capitalist or even that it is philosophically antithetical to the West. Russia’s war is now driven primarily by hyper-capitalist mechanics of huge payouts and debt forgiveness for frontline soldiers, supplemented by an economy that rewards investments into the ever-expanding military-industrial complex. Contemporary Russian intellectuals, even the pro-Kremlin ones like Alexander Dugin, ultimately see themselves as a part of a European intellectual tradition.

To add insult to injury, while the United States maintains the largest economy on the planet, it sure does not feel like this to an average American. Amid decaying infrastructure, skyrocketing prices and overall anxiety, it is easy for Americans to get hypnotized by the shiny façade Moscow can offer. MAGA influencers like Tucker Carlson or Candace Owens are perfectly willing to eat it up when they fawningly visit Russia grocery stores or churches.

Seen from Washington, Russia’s very existence outside of a US-led liberal world order is tantamount to resistance to this order. To those who still like to think that they live at the End of History, the continuing existence of Moscow is anathema because it threatens the very core of their worldview.

And if Russia can manage to not just exist but present a thriving image in comparison to the United States or the broader West—that is offense of the highest order. To accept that Russia can exist and even occasionally punch above its weight in challenging the West, whether through black ops in Africa or political meddling in Europe, is to contend with the idea that the liberal democratic model is not the only logical conclusion for every regime in the world.

And at the non-happening end of history, the US is thus left with a pool of Russia experts and policymakers who are given in to wishful thinking about Russia collapsing on its own, who don’t understand Russia and don’t want to in the first place. They are, as the Russians say, “dividing a hide of an uncaptured bear.” Whether they are doing so because of their lack of imagination or curiosity or they are impelled by some ulterior motives, the result is the same: misguided policies and intellectual decline.

By Uriel Araujo, InfoBrics, 7/2/26

An influential Ukrainian military officer has delivered a warning that risks pushing already strained relations with Poland into dangerous territory. Chief Sergeant Yury Syrotyuk (of the Unmanned Systems Battalion of the 5th Separate Assault Kyiv Brigade) recently delivered an interview on the topic of “Poland and Ukraine”: he accused Warsaw (in a segment from roughly 36:00 to 36:50 in the video) of waging a historical war over narratives involving the Volhynia massacres. He then bluntly suggested that the dispute could escalate into a military confrontation – in which case Kyiv would deploy drones against Polish cities, killing civilians. And he advised Warsaw not to cross that line.

This violent rhetoric came days after Syrotyuk shared a video on Facebook in which he described himself as the grandson and nephew of UPA (Ukrainian Insurgent Army) veterans “who defended their homes from all the occupiers in Volhynia,” a clear reference to the mass killings of Poles there. He also accused the Polish authorities in Warsaw of seeking regional hegemony and conspiring with Moscow to partition Ukraine (a claim that has no factual basis).

This episode in fact fits into a broader pattern of rising Ukrainian-Polish friction. As I recently wrote, Polish President Karol Nawrocki even revoked the Order of the White Eagle (the country’s highest honor) from Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky, This was after Kyiv’s decision to rebury Nazi collaborator Andriy Melnyk with state honors – and to grant an elite unit the title “Heroes of the UPA.”

Zelensky and Ukrainian officials responded with coordinated information campaigns on social media that in turn inflamed anti-Polish sentiment. One Polish PiS party MP, Kazimierz Smoliński, noted that comments under Zelensky’s posts revealed staggering hatred toward Poles, sometimes appearing stronger than toward Russians.

In any case, the aforementioned Yury Syrotyuk is no fringe voice. A 2014 Master Thesis by Nika Palaguta’s (on the Svoboda far-right ultra-nationalist party) mentions him as the party’s press secretary. His grandfather was a UPA member killed by the NKVD in 1944. The thesis also quotes him defending Svoboda’s commemorations of OUN/UPA leader Stepan Bandera, the controversial Nazi collaborator. Today’s chief sergeant Syrotyuk has actually been giving talks about “what to do with Poland” since at least 2018. If Bandera’s views on the matter are to be the model, then the answer to that question could be troublesome.

Moreover, a 2023 Russian Foreign Ministry report on human rights in Ukraine mentioned Syrotyuk presiding over the 9th Bandera Readings in Kyiv, dedicated to the 80th anniversary of the UPA’s creation. The event featured ultra-right figures, including neo-Fascist Yevgeniy Karas of the S14 group, who spoke openly about nationalists “having fun fighting and killing” and warned of potential strikes against European countries.

In November 2023, Syrotyuk, then described as a politician, journalist, public figure, and junior sergeant, wrote that the current conflict represents only the first phase of a longer struggle. For Moscow, he argued, the end of the war means the destruction of Ukraine (another unfounded claim); for Kyiv, it requires the collapse of Russia. He also criticized Kyiv for missing opportunities to support “national liberation movements” in the Caucasus. One could say his worldview has remained quite consistent, and he has a large platform to convey it.

One may recall that Polish concerns predate the current war. The President of the Roman Dmowski National Foundation, Przemysław Piasta, has warned that post-conflict Ukraine could pose a serious threat to Poland, historical memory remaining the Achilles’ heel of bilateral ties. Ukrainian glorification of OUN-UPA figures (responsible for the deaths of approximately 100,000 Polish civilians in Volhynia between 1943 and 1945) continues to poison relations, after all.

As I wrote earlier, the reburial of Andriy Melnyk and related decisions have exposed fragile foundations pertaining to the Polish-Ukrainian partnership, with Poland and Israel condemning these moves. Geopolitical necessity has thus far kept Warsaw supportive of Kyiv, but nationalism remains on the rise on both sides.

No wonder tensions extend beyond Poland. In February 2025, drawing on warnings from Ukrainian politician Spiridon Kilinkarov, I addressed how a post-war scenario where Hungary and Poland may claim territories of Ukraine is not absurd at all.

The truth is that Ukrainian refusal to adequately protect minority rights angers its neighbors, amplifying ethnopolitical friction. For one thing, Romanian and Hungarian communities in Ukraine have reported harassment, while similar issues affect relations with Romania and even with Greece. Ukrainian ultra-nationalism, often of a far-right and occasionally neo-Fascist or neo-Nazi persuasion (as seen with groups like Azov) has after all been a source of regional tensions since the 2014 Maidan Revolution.

This strand of nationalism alienates minorities and neighbors alike as Kyiv’s chauvinistic policies and glorification of controversial WWII-era figures create perceptions of threat. Underreported in much Western coverage as they are, these dynamics show that Ukrainian ultra-nationalism generates instability beyond the issue of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict.

Rhetoric aside, a Poland-Ukraine conflict, again, is not so far-fetched in a post-war scenario. Syrotyuk’s drone threats are therefore credible given Kyiv’s demonstrated strike capabilities against Russia.

Historical grievances and ultra-nationalist influence could thus undermine the Polish-Ukrainian partnership. Geopolitics can delay confrontation, but it cannot erase deep ethnopolitical fissures, especially when influential actors fuel them with inflammatory speech. Kyiv’s post-Maidan project has created multiple fronts of tension, well beyond Russia.

By Matthew Blackburn, Responsible Statecraft, 6/25/26

As Western leaders departed the G7 summit in Évian talking of a “strategic awakening in support of Ukraine,” the night sky over Moscow was illuminated by the fires of a burning oil refinery just nine miles from the Kremlin. This unprecedented Ukrainian drone strike on Russian territory was met in Western capitals with quiet endorsement rather than anxiety.

During the tensest moments of the Cold War, Western statecraft was anchored by a healthy fear of the unknown. Today, that prudence has been replaced by confidence that conflict can be precisely managed. When Franklin D. Roosevelt famously declared that “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself,” he was addressing panic during an economic collapse. In contemporary Europe, however, this maxim has been carelessly transposed onto the realm of nuclear redlines.

The prevailing consensus in Europe treats deep strikes into the Russian heartland as a low-cost method of pressuring Moscow into a ceasefire. Assuming Russia is under unsustainable strain, experts continue to argue that Europe can safely coordinate the war, so long as taxpayers accept the costs.

Such a view ignores the risks inherent to a broader unravelling of the global security architecture. Unlike during the Cold War, in which superpowers respected defined chains of command and established redlines, today’s historical guardrails have eroded. The European coalition lacks both coherent leadership and escalation control mechanisms. This makes the conflict far more prone to spiraling into a broader war than commonly acknowledged.

This is keeping with the conflict’s trajectory since 2022 of creeping escalation dressed up as controlled policy. As European states take the primary responsibility for supporting Ukraine, this conflict is reaching a new, more dangerous stage.

Europe’s strategy in Ukraine during Trump 2.0

The Western coalition behind Ukraine fragmented after President Donald Trump’s return to the White House. Throughout 2025, European leaders proposed a “coalition of the willing” to deploy forces and integrate Ukraine into an emergent European Union security space following a ceasefire. They essentially demanded that Russia agree to an unconditional ceasefire while holding the upper hand on the battlefield.

When Trump’s Alaska summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin made it clear Washington would not enforce these demands, Europe switched gears. Its leaders agreed to cover the costs of U.S.-made weapons, ramp up domestic military production, tighten sanctions, and keep the pressure on Moscow to agree to a ceasefire.

Lacking the capacity for large-scale ground offensives, Ukraine’s strategy shifted to defending its frontlines while increasing costs on Russia through deep strikes. These attacks grew in scale and scope even after Trump’s inauguration signaled a U.S. pivot to a negotiated settlement. The most dramatic case was Operation Spiderweb, during which Ukrainian drones struck Russian airbases, damaging strategic bombers tied to Russia’s nuclear deterrence triad. While Kyiv denied targeting Putin’s Valdai residence in December 2025, President Zelensky’s recent open letter defiantly warned the Russian leadership it could not be “comfortable” given Ukraine’s ability to strike state parades and executive residences.

A war without clear guardrails

Striking a nuclear power’s strategic assets and leadership lacks any Cold War precedent. From the British seizure of the Russian shadow-fleet tanker Smyrtos to Zelensky’s recent warning that “Moscow will burn,” the erosion of guardrails continues in real-time. To make matters worse, Western decision-making is now fragmented across a variety of actors; it is reported Kyiv requests approvals for deep strikes from the Pentagon and individual European defense ministries on a case-by-case basis.

Current European strategy assumes an overextended and weak Moscow fears a wider conflict and will keep the war within current parameters. This supports the view that gradual, qualitative shifts in military support can compel Moscow into a ceasefire. Key to this is relocating Ukrainian drone production into Europe, where it is shielded from Russian air strikes. More sophisticated European-made drones are already available to Kyiv; NATO long-range missiles are also now being licensed for production directly in European and Ukrainian manufacturing sites. Kyiv has brilliantly exploited this framework, operating under the assumption that Russia’s hands are tied.

But deep strikes put the Kremlin in a tough spot. Thus far, Moscow has been visibly reluctant to execute wider drone and missile deep strikes with the aim of devastating Ukraine’s critical infrastructure. This restraint is born not of military incapacity but of a calculated political logic: If Russia intensifies deep strikes on Ukraine’s energy grid and water supply, it could trigger a humanitarian catastrophe and an irreversible public relations disaster that is fundamentally in conflict with the Kremlin’s claim it is liberating a “brotherly people.” It would also likely rally Western public opinion behind the war. Thus, unlike Israel’s unrestricted, high-intensity air campaign in Gaza, Russia has operated with restraint to preserve its political narrative.

Yet herein lies the danger. If Moscow concludes that its restraint inside Ukraine is being weaponized by Kyiv to inflict deep, humiliating costs on the Russian heartland, its calculus will shift. Instead of going for Ukrainian infrastructure, Moscow may seek to redress the asymmetry in deep strikes and restore deterrence by targeting the true source of Ukraine’s new capacities: European logistical hubs and the manufacturing facilities.

Even a limited Russian reprisal strike on European soil would severely test its collective political will. European air defence and missile stockpiles would come under severe strain in a rapid tit-for-tat strike exchange scenario. Striking European states would be Putin’s ultimate gamble to turn the tables. Instead of a weak Russia making hollow threats, Europe would be gripped by panic as its leaders scrambled to respond without crossing the nuclear threshold.

This scenario is not imminent. Deep strikes would have to intensify further. In the meantime, we should not expect Putin to sue for peace under the pressure of increasingly disruptive but localized deep strikes. The Kremlin will praise the work of its air defenses and play down the scale of the damage. Yet the more strikes that hit Moscow, the more likely a Russian reprisal strike on Europe becomes. To avoid this harrowing scenario, European leaders must return to the basics of conflict management, investing in diplomacy aimed at the urgent rebuilding of strategic guardrails.

Restoring the balance

The paralysis of the diplomatic track leaves Europe exposed. The E3’s five-point plan, agreed in London last week, illustrates the problem: by demanding an unconditional ceasefire alongside foreign troop deployments for security guarantees, it effectively foreclosed near-term negotiations. Diplomatic inertia means the war may progress to the point an exhausted or exasperated Russia is forced to choose between abandoning its war aims or taking a drastic kinetic step to curb European enthusiasm for continuing the war.

Breaking this policy inertia requires rejecting the myth that Europe can safely manage an unprecedented standoff without statecraft. A fundamental reset is needed: European leaders must agree on explicit escalation controls, communicate them to Moscow, and open a viable diplomatic track. While basing negotiations on the current frontline offers a positive foundation for talks, the core challenge remains striking a compromise between Moscow’s demand for Ukrainian neutrality and Europe’s integration plans for Ukraine.

Developing a diplomatic off-ramp and building a new security architecture are not capitulation, nor do they mean reducing support for Ukraine’s defense. Deterrence and diplomacy are partners. A defined diplomatic track is the only mechanism capable of anchoring Europe’s security to a stable, predictable outcome, rather than gambling on fluid redlines.

Nonetheless, engineering this kind of pivot requires a level of strategic vision and political courage not observable in Europe’s current leadership. Without a fundamental reset, Europe risks learning the hard way that running a war without guardrails is not statecraft – it is brinkmanship without a safety net.

By Sylvia Demarest, Substack, 7/1/26

Introduction

The risk that current wars will expand into a nuclear war continues to grow. While the war on Iran currently consists of sporadic exchanges, it has expanded to more countries. Israel has invaded Southern Lebanon. Iraq, apparently under US pressure, has moved to disarm militias said to be aligned with Iran, perhaps to open a path to a future ground invasion of Iran. Pakistan has moved weapons and military personnel into Saudi Arabia. Israeli leaders have pointed to Türkiye as a potential threat to Israel and former leaders have proclaimed that “Türkiye is the new Iran”. Syria is struggling to avoid being drawn into war in Lebanon.

Meanwhile, the proxy war on Russia continues to intensify. Ukraine, with the help of NATO, the UK, and several EU countries, is both manufacturing weapons for Ukraine, and helping send drone swarms into Russia–oblivious of the risk of Russian retaliation. Meanwhile, President Trump seems supportive as he “escalates to deescalate” the Ukraine war. The “Spirit of Anchorage” is dead since the US refuses to acknowledge or to follow through on the agreements that were reached with Russia back in August of 2025. Diplomacy is now virtually non-existent between Russia the US and NATO. The US does not even have an Ambassador to Russia!

One risk is that Ukraine will turn to terrorism. A recent terror attack on a Ukrainian oligarch in Monaco via a package bomb in a hotel is cited as an example. Two people were injured including a woman who had her legs blown off. This is the first terror attack in Monaco. It may not be the last.

These wars and other events could well signal that the current era of globalization, characterized by the free flow of goods and money, is ending. Asset seizures, tariffs, and increasing nationalism are also incompatible with globalization. The Covid lockdown was one blow, resulting in severe supply chain disruptions, the loss of small businesses, and increased inflation. The closing of the Strait of Hormuz is another with increased pressure on supply chains. Companies whose inputs cross three jurisdictions and transpire in several different currencies, could represent a business model for a world that is slowly coming to an end.

Although the focus of the current crisis has been on oil prices, the supply of other critical products has also been affected from fertilizers to lubricants, to pharmaceuticals to helium. The impact of these shortages have yet to fully hit the global economy.

China and Tank Bottom

Critical to the management of this crisis is the fact that China stopped importing oil. Chinese imports fell by 4.7 million barrels a day helping to prevent shortages across the world. Countries around the world also tapped reserves helping to keep oil prices low. Trump visited China from May 13-15. Was a deal cut at that time?

So far, the Trump Administration and the international energy market have managed this crisis remarkably well. Meanwhile, the oil market is still in a race against the clock as global oil inventories continue to fall. Onshore storage now at its seasonally lowest point in recorded history. Strait inbounds remain far below necessary levels. This means Iran still has leverage with little reason to relinquish control. Once the barrels that remain stuck in the Strait are absorbed the calculus shifts to outbound tankers vs. curtailed production vs. the number of inbound tankers. Meanwhile, price manipulation has worked. Massive shorting of oil, and consistent production in the US, has managed prices which are now under $70 a barrel. Market apathy persists with traders believing every tweet that declares imminent peace. Yet, the clock continues to count down to operational lows and tank bottoms.

The extent of market manipulation is also being revealed–namely, by massive shorting oil on the exchange and through various ETFs. In one ETF it is estimated that a huge percentage of the shares have been borrowed to sell short. At some point these trades will have to be reversed. This could lead to a rapid increase in the price of oil.

The War on Iran

On June 17, 2026, the US and Iran entered the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) which also extended the cease fire agreement entered on April 8, 2026. The terms of the MOU so heavily favored Iran that many commentators spoke openly of a US defeat. The MOU promised to end the US blockade, lift sanctions on Iran, return to Iran billions of seized funds, create a reconstruction fund of $300 billion to rebuild Iran, end the Israeli invasion of Southern Lebanon, and perhaps even allow Iran to control the Strait of Hormuz. So far, other than lifting the blockade and allowing Iran to export oil, the US has avoided complying with the MOU.

Regarding the MOU cease fire, in the words of former Ambassador Chas Freeman, it is “a ceasefire with Israeli characteristics, you cease, we fire.”

Controversies over the terms of the MOU quickly developed. These included: the US stating that Iran had agreed to open her enrichment programs to full international inspection by IAEA; that instead of returning Iran’s funds to Iran, the funds would be placed in an account controlled by the US and would only be used to purchase US agricultural products and pharmaceuticals; and pressuring Oman to allow non-fee transit along Oman’s part of the Strait under US control. Oman has signed the UN Convention of the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) Iran has not. But Oman and Iran are still negotiating, see: After U.S.-Iran War, Oman Said to Propose Hormuz Fee Plan (NY Times).

Iran was to immediately receive some $12 billions of her funds held by Qatar–funds that go all the way back to the Biden Administration. So far, none of these funds have been released to Iran.

The MOU also required the parties to “refrain from the threat or use of force against each other” yet Trump persists in threating to “kill the Iranian peace negotiators in Switzerland”, that he may have to “complete the job” — (if he doesn’t get a very good deal) — which, he says, would take “ about a week”

The terms of the MOU also required the permanent termination of all military operations, on all fronts, including Lebanon. Yet, on March 16, 2026, Israel invaded Southern Lebanon. Instead of complying with the MOU and pressuring Israel to withdraw from Lebanon, Secretary of State Marco Rubio negotiated a “Trilateral Framework Between the United States of America, the State of Israel, and the Republic of Lebanon” with the Lebanese president that allows Israel to remain in Lebanon. This agreement is very controversial within Lebanon and its full implementation is in question. This “Trilateral Framework” should be seen as a direct attack on the MOU with Iran. What is going on?

Some are speculating that these two conflicting agreements are reflective of an ongoing conflict in the Trump Administration between Vice President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Vance was involved in negotiating the MOU, some claim Vance was not aware of Rubio’s parallel negotiation of the Trilateral Framework.

Here’s Moon of Alabama: “Via The Cradle we find some interesting speculation how this is an expression of a power struggle within Trump’s White House coterie:”

“The agreement between Lebanon and Israel cannot be understood through bilateral negotiations alone. It also reflects shifting power dynamics in Washington, where US policy toward Lebanon is shaped not only by official institutions, but by competition within the administration and the Republican Party, alongside pressure from pro-Israel lobbying groups, particularly the Zionist lobby and the hardline Lebanese Christian lobby.”

…

“[This] is reflected in the quiet contest within the American right, particularly between US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who represents the traditional pro-Israel Republican establishment, and Vice President JD Vance, whose camp has been more cautious about US involvement in West Asia.”

…

“According to sources familiar with the matter, these tensions have extended beyond policy differences. Vance was reportedly angered after learning that Rubio had been planning a tour of the Gulf without consulting him beforehand. He also suspected Rubio of working behind the scenes with US envoys Jared Kushner, and possibly Steve Witkoff, in ways that could undermine Vance’s diplomatic achievements. Those close to Vance increasingly believe that Rubio, Kushner, and Senator Lindsey Graham have formed an informal alliance aimed at sidelining him ahead of the next presidential race.”

“Rubio has long been captured by the Zionist lobby while Vance is creature of tech billionaires. Which side has more firepower if there is a competition?”

US Israeli policy is a complete and inhuman disaster which has allowed Israel to commit genocide in Gaza, appropriate Palestinian land in the West Bank, and invade, displace people, and destroy Southern Lebanon. The fact that this level of depravity persists, with US support, reflects the degree of money and power supporting the State of Israel.

Iran Ships Oil to China

Since the lifting of the blockade much of the oil that has exited the strait has been Iranian oil shipped to China. Iran had millions of barrels of oil in storage and on crude carriers. Part of the strategy behind the US blockade was to use the blockade to force a shutdown of Iranian energy production. This strategy did not succeed, Iranian oil is now exiting the Gulf in bulk. Iran has exported 50 million barrels of oil, mostly to China. This is a rate of around 3.5 million barrels per day versus Iran’s “normal” rate of export of around 1.7 million barrels a day. This means Iran is exporting roughly double the normal amount.

It is estimated that Iran may have another 55 million barrels in onshore oil storage to be exported. If Iran can continue to export at this rate, and this is uncertain since it is unknown if there are buyers other than China, Iranian storage will be emptied in around 2 weeks. After that, it will no longer be advantageous for Iran to keep the blockades lifted–especially in the face of the lack of implementation of the MOU. What happens then? What happens if, by July 15th, the United States still hasn’t released any of Iran’s frozen assets? What is Iran’s incentive to continue with the joint lifting of blockades? At that point could it be advantageous for Iran to reclose the Strait and return to the pre-MOU status but with 105 to 150 million barrels of Iranian oil sold with the proceeds outside the reach of the US?

No recent Assassinations of Iranian Leaders. Why?

Leah Gunn Barret on a You Tube channel called “Transition Protocol” has claimed that a Pakistani Chinese technological breakthrough helped Iran halt the assassination campaign against its leadership after the March 17 killing of Ali Larijani–“Pakistan led Iran to finally find a way to counteract the artificial intelligence-generated killing of their top leadership.” The allegation is that with China’s help, Pakistan cracked the kill chain code and offered the technology to Iran.

In a “division of responsibility” the US allowed Israel to hunt and kill Iranian leaders “using an intelligence apparatus built to assassinate with lethal proficiency.” “Israel has pursued this assignment with ruthless efficiency, killing Iran’s supreme leader in the opening salvo of the war and more than 250 other “senior Iranian officials” since, according to a count maintained by the Israeli military. The latest blow came when Israel said it had killed the naval commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. “

It was revealed that Pakistani intelligence discovered Israel was planning to assassinate a leading Iranian figure at the signing of the MOU, possibly Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf. It has been alleged that Pakistan informed Israel that if it tried anything, it would hear directly from Pakistan and “it won’t be pleasant.” The MOU was subsequently signed electronically.

It is further alleged that Pakistani military intelligence intercepted another threat from Israel to assassinate Pakistani peace mediator Field Marshal Asim Munir at recent US/Iran talks in Switzerland. Pakistan responded by threatening retaliation if it touched the Pakistani delegation.

As this Substack has discussed, the technology behind Israel’s assassination spree belongs to none other than tech giant Palantir. Here’s a chilling description of how Palantir’s Maven program surveils and kills people.

Who’s Pushing These Wars?

Looking objectively at the world, on wonders why some accommodation short of war could not be found to resolve global tensions–yet these wars persist. Why? There are many theories regarding the forces that, throughout human history, have pushed for and profited from war, including the saying “all wars are bankers wars”. One theory offered by Alex Krainer and the people at Promethean is that “Perfidious Albion” i.e. the UK and the remnants of the British Empire and the City of London are to blame. Below is from Alex Krainer’s Substack.

Here’s Alex Krainer’s Take: “Over the past few years, I came to the conclusion that Great Britain was world’s chief arsonist of peace and suggested that if, the City of London, with its supporting structures in British government, banking, intelligence, secret diplomacy, along with a vast network of think tanks, media organizations, NGOs, charitable organizations and gambling casinos around the world could somehow be quarantined, probably 95% of all the world’s wars and other problems would vanish overnight.”

As proof Krainer points to the heavy British influence in the Russiagate scandal, Britian being instrumental in the creation of Israel, and the continuing British hostility to both Iran and Russia.

Krainer goes on to note: “Chatham House published an article by Sir John Jenkins titled, Lasting Israel–Palestine peace will not be possible without a new policy to neutralize the Iranian threat.”

“Sir John’s article was based on a more extensive policy paper published by The Policy Exchange on 17 July 2023 (thus, before “October 7”), titled “The Iran Question and British Strategy.” Both documents spell out much of what we are observing in the region today and the 2023 document even explains the broader framework behind the need to take down Iran: it is an obstacle for Britain’s “Indo-Pacific Tilt.” In its foreword, the paper says that “Iran’s increasingly appalling human rights record, accelerating nuclear program, sponsorship of proxies throughout the Middle East, extensive assistance to Russia in its brutal war on Ukraine, and sponsorship of terrorism and kidnapping makes it an obvious threat to international stability.””

Finally noting: “The authors shed some light on Britain’s disproportionate power, given its minuscule military and disintegrating economy: “The UK’s diplomatic and military toolkit allow it to make a difference in the Middle East. For historic and strategic regions, the UK has deep and longstanding relationships with almost every country in the Middle East. This fact, alongside its UN Security Council membership and military capacity, give it the ability to have an outsized influence on the course of Middle East affairs.””

What do you think?

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By Brian McDonald, Substack, 6/28/26

Brian McDonald is an Irish journalist who has lived in Russia for many years.

Sergei Ivanov’s death last week closes one of the more fascinating unfinished chapters in the story of Putin’s Russia. Just as his formal retirement earlier this year marked the start of what will be the gradual exit of the political leadership that came to power in Russia in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Ivanov was a silovik who might have been president, who for a time seemed to stand nearer than anyone else to Vladimir Putin’s confidence, and his career rose so high that even its ultimate failure had the proportions of triumph.

At 73, his passing came months after he had left his final post, the ornate but diminished title of special presidential envoy for ecology and transport. It might have seemed a strange last office for someone who had sat at the centre of the state as defence minister, secretary of the Security Council, first deputy prime minister and head of the presidential administration, but he embraced it with gusto and was very obviously an animal lover.

His life was tied to Putin’s in myriad ways as both came out of Leningrad and both passed through the world of Soviet intelligence at the same time. Ivanov was rather dry, brusque, controlled, albeit courteous in private by many accounts, but, in contrast to his old friend, almost entirely without warmth in public where he spoke as if speech were a procedure requiring clearance. Although ironically, he sounded more engaging when speaking English than his native Russian.

In the middle years of Putin’s first presidency, Ivanov thrived in the system being built around him, security-minded, European enough to understand the West, suspicious enough not to trust it, patriotic without the circus element of a Zhirinovsky or Rogozin, bureaucratic without being merely grey. He knew languages and the intelligence world, he understood the global system better than most men around Putin and once belonged to the camp that believed Russia could still deal with the old West, or at least with its serious parts.

But he also carried the hard instincts of the security collective and he could be blunt to the point of brutality. As defence minister he presided over an army still crippled by corruption, hazing, bureaucratic rot and the miserable inheritance of the 1990s. The Andrey Sychyov case, in which a conscript was so savagely abused that he lost his legs and genitals, became one of the darkest symbols of that era and Ivanov’s handling of it did him no credit. At the same time, his ministry fumbled the transformation of the Russian armed forces, leaving that task to fall to others.

Yet Ivanov’s defining contest was with Dmitry Medvedev rather than NATO, Washington, Brussels, Ukraine or Chechen militants.

By 2007, the choice of Putin’s successor had become the great court drama of Moscow and Ivanov and Medvedev were elevated together, compared endlessly, and watched for clues in seating arrangements, television coverage, Red Square pageants and presidential body language. Ivanov had the harder profile and where he suggested some form of continuity, the more youthful Medvedev offered a form of progress through legality and modernisation. For a Russia newly rich on oil, with a booming consumer market, but still resentful of humiliation and not yet fully tired of liberal vocabulary, both versions had their uses.

Then Putin went and chose Medvedev, surprising many Russia watchers, and that was the hinge on which Ivanov’s career turned. He didn’t vanish, however, and remained fairly powerful, then became stronger again in 2011 when he was appointed head of the presidential administration, just as Moscow was facing the Bolotnaya protests and Putin was returning to the presidency. In that role he managed the hardening of the system after 2012, the conservative turn, the suspicion of street politics, the tightening attitude to NGOs, media, sexuality, education and the whole world of dissent.

This period was the revenge of officials who regarded the Medvedev interval, with its talk of modernisation, Skolkovo, photo ops with Steve Jobs, burgers with Obama, and cautious media thaw, as frivolous or merely unserious and Ivanov saw liberal gestures as weakness and Western praise as a trap. Although he did show up on a BBC documentary called “Putin, Russia and the West” where he fondly spoke of his relationship with former US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

Fundamentally, he was never really master of the machine and his relations with parts of the FSB establishment were complicated because he’d come from foreign intelligence, which meant he was never fully absorbed into the internal-security clan. In Russia, where power is tribal as well as personal, closeness to Putin isn’t always enough as Alexey Kudrin, and a few others, could testify.

His departure from the presidential administration in 2016 was carried out smoothly as he was moved sideways into ecology and transport, as left-field an exit ramp as could be imagined in Moscow. There were rumours of ill health, and a fondness for good whiskey, amid a deeper private grief that engulfed his final decade. In 2005, his eldest son Alexander was involved in a traffic incident in Moscow in which a 68-year-old woman, Svetlana Beridze, was struck and killed on a pedestrian crossing. The case was later closed, but the episode became another Russian parable about rank, influence, elitism, immunity and the excesses of the children of power.

Then, in 2014, Alexander drowned in the United Arab Emirates and his death was said to have struck Ivanov with exceptional force. For years, Kremlin insiders would say he hadn’t gotten over it, and was no longer “the old Sergey.”

Whatever was really going on at home, Ivanov was now more often seen with tigers, leopards, birds and bears than with his old government colleagues. There were meetings with international celebrities, including an almost hard to comprehend set piece with Pamela Anderson, to promote the causes that had become his official brief.

Putinism was made by a generation of Saint Petersburg lawyers, intelligence officers, state managers, security men, technocrats, oil people, court ideologues and opportunists. Some were loud and performative but Ivanov belonged to the less voluble inner species, where he was the confidant who knew where the bodies were buried and was too disciplined to mention the cemetery.



The fact that he could have been president adorns all his media obituaries, but most of them miss the nuance that the presidency in Putin’s Russia wasn’t a prize waiting for the most qualified candidate, and was instead a function inside Putin’s own design. Medvedev received it because Putin needed that version of the future in 2008 and Ivanov didn’t because he represented another one. He also had more potential to form an independent power base and would have been less certain to hand back the keys to the Kremlin after a single term, which likely played a role.



Ivanov was also known to take a dim view of those who stole and would most likely have launched a major anti-graft crackdown if he’d found himself calling the shots, which earned him enemies in advance.

In the end, Sergei Ivanov showed what one possible Putin succession might have looked like, harder, colder, more openly security-driven, less theatrical than today’s ideological circus, but no less committed to the supremacy of the state. Like so many players in Russian history, he became something more melancholy than a failure, a man with the knowledge that the warm breeze of the future had once passed close enough for him to feel its heat.