Russia Policy Monitor No. 2650

FORMER PRISONER: PUTIN'S REGIME WILL INVARIABLY COLLAPSE
When political activist Vladimir Kara-Murza was arrested by Russian authorities over his criticism of the Ukraine war in April 2022, he became one of the most high profile casualties of modern Russian repression. This spring, a Moscow court sentenced him to 25 years in prison, and he was incarcerated for months in a Siberian penal colony before being released alongside other political prisoners this summer as part of an international exchange deal with Moscow. Since then, Kara-Murza has resumed his activism against the Kremlin, and in favor of change in Moscow.

In a late-September interview with London's Guardian newspaper, Kara-Murza related his experiences in the Russian penal system - and his prediction for the country's future. Russia, he believes, will experience an abrupt collapse of the current regime. "That’s how things happen in Russia," he noted. "Both the Romanov empire in the early 20th century, and the Soviet regime at the end of the 20th century collapsed in three days. That's not a metaphor, it was literally three days in both cases."

This, he contends, will happen with the government of Vladimir Putin as well - and Ukraine will be the likely cause. Putin's military misadventure against Kyiv amounts to "a lost war of aggression," Kara-Murza says - one that has led to a fundamental change in the way the international community, and now the Russian people, see the Kremlin strongman. (The Guardian, September 22, 2024)

MOSCOW AND BEIJING COLLUDE ON EUROPEAN ESPIONAGE...
The "no limits" partnership between Moscow and Beijing is broadening into another domain: espionage. Politico reports European officials as warning that the two countries are running "overlapping" intelligence operations on the continent, with China "recruiting agents among EU politicians who have demonstrated fealty to Moscow." "It is not a coincidence that the same entities might serve the interests of both the Russian Federation and the People's Republic of China," says Michal Koudelka, who heads up the BIS, the Czech Republic's domestic intelligence agency. (Politico, September 13, 2024)

...AS RUSSIA STIRS UP TROUBLE IN BRITAIN
M15, the UK's domestic security service, has warned that Russia is attempting to create "sustained mayhem on British and European streets." Ken McCallum, the head of M15, stated that agents of the GRU, Russia's military intelligence agency, have carried out "arson, sabotage, and more dangerous actions conducted with increasing recklessness" in Britain after London made the decision to support Ukraine in its fight against Russia. As a result, McCallum notes, the nature of the threat facing the UK has substantially expanded. ​​"The first 20 years of my career here were crammed full of terrorist threats," he told journalists in his annual speech outlining threats to national security. "We now face those alongside state-backed assassination and sabotage plots, against the backdrop of a major European land war."

Those threats are part of a larger pattern. Since the start of the Ukraine war in February 2022, more than 750 Russian diplomats - the majority of them spies - have been expelled from across Europe. Russia, meanwhile, has increasingly turned to proxies like private intelligence operatives and criminals to continue its subversive operations on the continent. (BBC, October 8, 2024)

THE TRUE COST OF THE UKRAINE WAR, CONTINUED
Russia's nearly-three year war of aggression against Ukraine has come at an exorbitantly high cost, in terms of both national treasure and the blood of its citizens. Just how much was outlined recently by the Pentagon, which now estimates Russia to have lost approximately 600,000 servicemen in its efforts to subjugate Kyiv. That, U.S. officials say, is greater than the casualties of every conflict Russia has been involved with since the Second World War. That pattern, moreover, is liable to continue. "It's kind of the Russian way of war where they continue to throw mass into the problem, and I think we'll continue to see high losses," notes one Pentagon official. (Fox News, October 10, 2024)