Please read Nicolas Tenzer’s essay, “What does Vladimir Putin want?” and the Cosmopolitan Globalists’ introduction to the essay, here. Consider: Does ideology matter? Does Putin have one? Has Nicolas Tenzer correctly identified it? Has he missed any element of it? How much explanatory power do you think his thesis offers? Do you disagree with it? If so, why? Is he correct that our failure to recognize this ideology is the cause of our failure to confront this threat appropriately?
M. Tenzer attempts to argue that the essence of Putinism is irrational metaphysical evil (nihilism). As such, it's a more abstract attack on Putin's Russia than I am familiar with - but perhaps some French readers expect this kind of analysis.
In any case, I think it's nonsense, the geopolitical actions of Russia *do* make perfect sense from a "realist" perspective, e.g. a perspective which asks whether a country will try to prevent an ideologically hostile military bloc (that's NATO) from setting up shop on its border.
The essay reawakens my own hostility towards every part of the western political establishment that wants to reshape the world outside our own borders. Trump or Sanders, Le Pen or Melenchon, let's try anything that will get rid of our liberal imperialists.
Some of the problem is Ukraine is simply more important to Russia that it is to the West. Yes the people in the West like most of the readers here(including myself) very much want to uphold the norm that countries cannot invade other countries but if you look at Ukraine through a pure dollars and cents perspective Ukraine is a far less important of a country to the West than say Finland. Putin knows this and is acting accordingly.
It doesn't matter what motivates a thug or a thuggish system to threaten your life. The solution is always the same. Show your raptor claws. If you don't have any, you will lose your life sooner than later. Those are real animals we are dealing with, make no mistake. Mistakes in this game cost dearly.
Frederick Forsyth says that as far as nations have a character this is what Russians are: moody, oppressed, aggressive. Maybe it can change. Maybe.
Jan 13, 2022·edited Jan 13, 2022Liked by Claire Berlinski
This is an outstanding essay, and the issues raised can be addressed from many directions and for a long time to come. The notion that “might is right” is very, very old… read the Illiad, for example. But it’s more than a notion, it’s an ethic. If you have the physical and mental strength, including guile and cunning, to take it, and to keep it, you deserve it. If you do not have the mental and physical strength to keep it, you are weak, and you deserve to lose it. And of course, it can be anything; your freedom, your country, your wives and husbands, your sons and daughters.
This is a deep and dark seam in human nature, and in the context of a civilised society, it informs the actions and thinking of the criminal mind, from the street punk to organized criminal associations and on down. What our relatively comfortable societies are having difficulty coming to grips with is that this ethic informs the mind of a man who has complete control of the world’s second-largest military. The reasons for our difficulties are myriad, understandable, and may seem insurmountable from inside but not necessarily outside our de facto and imagined walls.
Since Athens, democracies have sometimes – but not always – found the resources to resist and eventually prevail in life and death struggles with the competing ethic of the Sparta of the day, where everything is at risk… although Athens and Sparta might be a bad comparison. More latterly, Ukraine offered a wakeup call eight long years ago, but it seems we weren’t listening, or if we were listening, we didn’t actually, er, respond, apart from token gestures. Time will tell, but it does seem that this time, time is really short.
Very interesting take. I would rather drive 50 miles on back roads and be moving than spend 20 minutes on the freeway at dead stop, even though the freeway trip ultimately gets me home quicker. Very irrational. Maybe it’s a male thing. Being in motion has its allure.
I do believe acquiring and maintaining wealth and power are still the ultimate motivators of the individual Russians involved. The acquisition method is indirect. Destroy the current order blocking opportunities for wealth and power and then be alert for opportunities that will periodically and randomly appear in the chaos. It takes a lot of confidence to believe the order can be disturbed enough for one’s own advantage without the chaos engulfing oneself. That might be why they are pushing and probing to disturb the order here and there without doing anything large, yet. I do believe when they perceive an opportunity, they will attempt to capitalize on it.
They may have this confidence because they have an example in their recent history where this worked. When the USSR collapsed, there was chaos which created opportunities for the oligarchs to create their fortunes and for Putin to acquire power. Maybe those currently at the top in Russia feel they have exhausted the internal opportunities and are seeking to create and exploit similar chaotic situations externally. It is a way to keep moving when the internal situation becomes too stable.
I’m no expert on Russia, but people everywhere are more alike than different when the layers are peeled away. The article has a lot of ideas that make sense on first reading. I’m going to come back in a few days and read it again after giving my brain some time to digest.
For the best take on Putin, Ukraine and the collapse of the West, take a look at Walter Russell Mead’s opinion piece in today’s Wall Street Journal. He says,
“Neville Chamberlain learned more from failure at Munich than the current generation of Western leaders learned from failure in Crimea. Convinced that the old rules of power politics don’t apply in our enlightened posthistorical century, Europeans nattered on about soft power only to find themselves locked out of key U.S.-Russia talks over Ukraine. As China and Russia grew more powerful and assertive, Americans enthusiastically embraced the politics of mean-spirited polarization and domestic culture wars. Now the Biden administration is simultaneously proclaiming overseas that America is back, in all its order-building awesomeness, and maintaining at home that democracy is one voting-rights bill away from collapse.”
I think it is clear that Putin is operating on the basis on an ideology. It's no nihilism. It's Eurasianism. Read Dugin. It's all there. Note: I am not claiming that Putin is taking orders from Dugin. That would be absurd. Dictators don't take orders from professors. But they do get their ideas from them. https://www.nationalreview.com/2014/03/eurasianist-threat-robert-zubrin/
What struck me in Tenzer's argument was the emphasis on movement. Consider the stifling feeling of immobility. Of stasis. The issue that seems to be plaguing the West is that in the post Cold-war era, we've become atomized and self-absorbed. We navel gaze and accomplish nothing of great import. We developed vaccines in a weekend...then take 9 months of ridiculous caution to release to the public...then have been bowing to conspiracy theorists and avoiding vaccine mandates as if they are not crucial to the survival of the species.
What's frustrating about the West, and freeing about an ideology such as Putinism, is that Putinism offers change. I mean change in the sense that dynamiting a building is a change. But change nonetheless. The West is like a brokerage account, that slowly generates interest if you wisely invest your money after doing your research. Putinism is like gambling, where you go all-in and hit the jackpot or go home with nothing. It's exciting, dynamic. Chaotic and destructive, yes. But easier to manage than intersectional feminism, more "masculine" (uncompromising) than polite capitalism, more rewarding than radical religion.
I think we are wise to take this kind of thing seriously. Putinism will appeal to anyone who is downtrodden, who feels that they can't win with the current system. It's the force behind Trump, behind Brexit, behind all the ways in which our society is unraveling because the rules feel too confining. In the West, we need to find more of a justification for these rules we impose on ourselves. Why is it worth not going to war? It can't just be so that we can travel. And it can't be so that we can get more cheap garbage at Walmart. It has to make us better as a society. We have to really believe that the West is a better way of life.
Tenzer doesn’t get Putin at all. Putin may have nihilistic tendencies but ultimately, Putin is a nationalist through and through. He sees the West as debauched and hypocritical (he’s not totally wrong about that). Given the absurd preoccupations dominating debate in the United States and Europe, he sees the West as ripe for the picking. He might be right about that too.
Tenzer missed the mark when he claims that one of Putin’s main objectives is to eviscerate international law. It’s not law that he despises, it’s the sheriff.
Without a sheriff, international law has no meaning. Both Xi in China and Putin in Russia see the West as judge, jury and executioner. The liberal international order (which is the culmination of Enlightenment philosophy born in the West) was imposed on the world in the aftermath of the Second World War over the heads of the Russians and Chinese. Enlightenment values were never ascendant in either of those nations and they have resented that World Order ever since.
The Russians and Chinese are nationalists while the West has spent the better part of the past 80 years pursuing globalism.
But globalism is dying and nationalism is ascendant. Putin and Xi are surely repulsive but sadly, they are on the right side of history.
Either the United States will adapt or it’s greatest days will be in the past. Donald Trump and his foreign policy team understood this viscerally if not intellectually. Joe Biden, Antony Blinken, Jake Sullivan and the rest are living in the past. They’re desperately trying to revive a system that is flatlining. That’s why Putin is winning and the West is losing.
As for Europe, it’s already too late. Europe is toast.
M. Tenzer attempts to argue that the essence of Putinism is irrational metaphysical evil (nihilism). As such, it's a more abstract attack on Putin's Russia than I am familiar with - but perhaps some French readers expect this kind of analysis.
In any case, I think it's nonsense, the geopolitical actions of Russia *do* make perfect sense from a "realist" perspective, e.g. a perspective which asks whether a country will try to prevent an ideologically hostile military bloc (that's NATO) from setting up shop on its border.
The essay reawakens my own hostility towards every part of the western political establishment that wants to reshape the world outside our own borders. Trump or Sanders, Le Pen or Melenchon, let's try anything that will get rid of our liberal imperialists.
Some of the problem is Ukraine is simply more important to Russia that it is to the West. Yes the people in the West like most of the readers here(including myself) very much want to uphold the norm that countries cannot invade other countries but if you look at Ukraine through a pure dollars and cents perspective Ukraine is a far less important of a country to the West than say Finland. Putin knows this and is acting accordingly.
It doesn't matter what motivates a thug or a thuggish system to threaten your life. The solution is always the same. Show your raptor claws. If you don't have any, you will lose your life sooner than later. Those are real animals we are dealing with, make no mistake. Mistakes in this game cost dearly.
Frederick Forsyth says that as far as nations have a character this is what Russians are: moody, oppressed, aggressive. Maybe it can change. Maybe.
This is an outstanding essay, and the issues raised can be addressed from many directions and for a long time to come. The notion that “might is right” is very, very old… read the Illiad, for example. But it’s more than a notion, it’s an ethic. If you have the physical and mental strength, including guile and cunning, to take it, and to keep it, you deserve it. If you do not have the mental and physical strength to keep it, you are weak, and you deserve to lose it. And of course, it can be anything; your freedom, your country, your wives and husbands, your sons and daughters.
This is a deep and dark seam in human nature, and in the context of a civilised society, it informs the actions and thinking of the criminal mind, from the street punk to organized criminal associations and on down. What our relatively comfortable societies are having difficulty coming to grips with is that this ethic informs the mind of a man who has complete control of the world’s second-largest military. The reasons for our difficulties are myriad, understandable, and may seem insurmountable from inside but not necessarily outside our de facto and imagined walls.
Since Athens, democracies have sometimes – but not always – found the resources to resist and eventually prevail in life and death struggles with the competing ethic of the Sparta of the day, where everything is at risk… although Athens and Sparta might be a bad comparison. More latterly, Ukraine offered a wakeup call eight long years ago, but it seems we weren’t listening, or if we were listening, we didn’t actually, er, respond, apart from token gestures. Time will tell, but it does seem that this time, time is really short.
Very interesting take. I would rather drive 50 miles on back roads and be moving than spend 20 minutes on the freeway at dead stop, even though the freeway trip ultimately gets me home quicker. Very irrational. Maybe it’s a male thing. Being in motion has its allure.
I do believe acquiring and maintaining wealth and power are still the ultimate motivators of the individual Russians involved. The acquisition method is indirect. Destroy the current order blocking opportunities for wealth and power and then be alert for opportunities that will periodically and randomly appear in the chaos. It takes a lot of confidence to believe the order can be disturbed enough for one’s own advantage without the chaos engulfing oneself. That might be why they are pushing and probing to disturb the order here and there without doing anything large, yet. I do believe when they perceive an opportunity, they will attempt to capitalize on it.
They may have this confidence because they have an example in their recent history where this worked. When the USSR collapsed, there was chaos which created opportunities for the oligarchs to create their fortunes and for Putin to acquire power. Maybe those currently at the top in Russia feel they have exhausted the internal opportunities and are seeking to create and exploit similar chaotic situations externally. It is a way to keep moving when the internal situation becomes too stable.
I’m no expert on Russia, but people everywhere are more alike than different when the layers are peeled away. The article has a lot of ideas that make sense on first reading. I’m going to come back in a few days and read it again after giving my brain some time to digest.
For the best take on Putin, Ukraine and the collapse of the West, take a look at Walter Russell Mead’s opinion piece in today’s Wall Street Journal. He says,
“Neville Chamberlain learned more from failure at Munich than the current generation of Western leaders learned from failure in Crimea. Convinced that the old rules of power politics don’t apply in our enlightened posthistorical century, Europeans nattered on about soft power only to find themselves locked out of key U.S.-Russia talks over Ukraine. As China and Russia grew more powerful and assertive, Americans enthusiastically embraced the politics of mean-spirited polarization and domestic culture wars. Now the Biden administration is simultaneously proclaiming overseas that America is back, in all its order-building awesomeness, and maintaining at home that democracy is one voting-rights bill away from collapse.”
Take a look at the whole essay,
https://www.wsj.com/articles/putin-is-running-rings-around-the-west-ukraine-kazakhstan-troops-border-invasion-russia-11642008206?mod=mhp
I think it is clear that Putin is operating on the basis on an ideology. It's no nihilism. It's Eurasianism. Read Dugin. It's all there. Note: I am not claiming that Putin is taking orders from Dugin. That would be absurd. Dictators don't take orders from professors. But they do get their ideas from them. https://www.nationalreview.com/2014/03/eurasianist-threat-robert-zubrin/
What struck me in Tenzer's argument was the emphasis on movement. Consider the stifling feeling of immobility. Of stasis. The issue that seems to be plaguing the West is that in the post Cold-war era, we've become atomized and self-absorbed. We navel gaze and accomplish nothing of great import. We developed vaccines in a weekend...then take 9 months of ridiculous caution to release to the public...then have been bowing to conspiracy theorists and avoiding vaccine mandates as if they are not crucial to the survival of the species.
What's frustrating about the West, and freeing about an ideology such as Putinism, is that Putinism offers change. I mean change in the sense that dynamiting a building is a change. But change nonetheless. The West is like a brokerage account, that slowly generates interest if you wisely invest your money after doing your research. Putinism is like gambling, where you go all-in and hit the jackpot or go home with nothing. It's exciting, dynamic. Chaotic and destructive, yes. But easier to manage than intersectional feminism, more "masculine" (uncompromising) than polite capitalism, more rewarding than radical religion.
I think we are wise to take this kind of thing seriously. Putinism will appeal to anyone who is downtrodden, who feels that they can't win with the current system. It's the force behind Trump, behind Brexit, behind all the ways in which our society is unraveling because the rules feel too confining. In the West, we need to find more of a justification for these rules we impose on ourselves. Why is it worth not going to war? It can't just be so that we can travel. And it can't be so that we can get more cheap garbage at Walmart. It has to make us better as a society. We have to really believe that the West is a better way of life.
But right now, we insist on hating ourselves.
Tenzer doesn’t get Putin at all. Putin may have nihilistic tendencies but ultimately, Putin is a nationalist through and through. He sees the West as debauched and hypocritical (he’s not totally wrong about that). Given the absurd preoccupations dominating debate in the United States and Europe, he sees the West as ripe for the picking. He might be right about that too.
Tenzer missed the mark when he claims that one of Putin’s main objectives is to eviscerate international law. It’s not law that he despises, it’s the sheriff.
Without a sheriff, international law has no meaning. Both Xi in China and Putin in Russia see the West as judge, jury and executioner. The liberal international order (which is the culmination of Enlightenment philosophy born in the West) was imposed on the world in the aftermath of the Second World War over the heads of the Russians and Chinese. Enlightenment values were never ascendant in either of those nations and they have resented that World Order ever since.
The Russians and Chinese are nationalists while the West has spent the better part of the past 80 years pursuing globalism.
But globalism is dying and nationalism is ascendant. Putin and Xi are surely repulsive but sadly, they are on the right side of history.
Either the United States will adapt or it’s greatest days will be in the past. Donald Trump and his foreign policy team understood this viscerally if not intellectually. Joe Biden, Antony Blinken, Jake Sullivan and the rest are living in the past. They’re desperately trying to revive a system that is flatlining. That’s why Putin is winning and the West is losing.
As for Europe, it’s already too late. Europe is toast.
I would support the proposition.
It makes me wonder if this is the question we should ask of any political movement that fell under the influence of a personality cult?
Stalinism stemming from Communism? Trumpism born of the Republican party?