Mark Galeotti heads the consultancy Mayak Intelligence and is honorary professor at the UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies and the author of some 30 books on Russia. His latest, Forged in War: a military history of Russia from its beginnings to today, is out now.
Happy birthday, Mr President? With Vladimir Putin turning 72 on Monday, this has become an opportunity for the Kremlin’s spin doctors to present their ideal notion of the septuagenarian sovereign. Ambitious courtiers have been competitively performing their sycophancy, as if in an over-the-top production of King Lear. Posters were anonymously pasted up in Kyiv, vowing
When is slower internet better than none at all? When are travel delays more serious a political challenge than threats of nuclear war? These questions acquired particular significance with the news that Stockholm’s Arlanda airport was temporarily closed this week when several drones intruded into its airspace. Investigations are still in progress, but the police
Another six bite the dust. The British Embassy in Moscow, already pared to the bone, is being reduced by another six diplomats. Their accreditation has been withdrawn because they were ‘threatening the security of the Russian Federation’ by ‘conducting intelligence and subversive work.’ It is bad news for international stability as diplomatic links become more
Is the sinking of the super-yacht Bayesian and likely death of Mike Lynch a bigger story than Ukraine’s Kursk incursion? The Russian mid-market tabloid Moskovsky Komsomolets certainly thinks so, reflecting a clear unwillingness on the part of the Kremlin and the state-controlled or state-dominated media to get to grips with the current crisis in Kursk. Likewise, the stodgy government
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This week: Power play. The Spectator’s Svitlana Morenets writes the cover article in this week’s magazine exploring Zelensky’s plan for his Russian conquests. What’s his aim? And how could Putin respond? Svitlana joins the podcast alongside historian and author Mark Galeotti (02:10). Next: Will and Gus discuss their favourite pieces from the magazine, including Richard Madeley’s diary
For the first time since the Second World War, foreign forces have invaded Russia. As Ukrainian troops push over the border into the Kursk region, Vladimir Putin, with breathtaking lack of irony, denounces this as ‘terrorism’ and a ‘provocation’. But what is Kyiv’s goal? Previous incursions, largely into the Belgorod region, have been carried out
One waspish – but not entirely inaccurate – Russian media assessment of the first US presidential debate was that it was ‘a reality show about the lives of pensioners.’ They ought to know, as Russia’s own history has highlighted the dangers of gerontocracy. When the Bolshevik revolutionaries who had just seized power formed their ruling
Are we witnessing a new and more dangerous stage in the indirect war between Russia and the West? The news that Moscow’s agents may have been planning to assassinate European defence industrialists suggests they are escalating their covert operations abroad, which demands a quick and serious response. German and US intelligence sources are claiming that
Is the assassination of Vladimir Putin the answer to ending the war in Ukraine? A collection of émigré Russians who have declared themselves the ‘Congress of People’s Deputies’ and a Russian parliament in opposition have called for the West not only to support them in a campaign to overthrow Vladimir Putin, but actively to play
Yesterday was the one-year anniversary of Yevgeny Prigozhin’s mutiny, when his Wagner mercenaries seized the city of Rostov-on-Don and sent a flying column of several men towards Moscow. You would scarcely know it, though, because while Russian social media is full of discussion, eulogies and conspiracy theories, the state-controlled press is largely pretending this never
What do you do if you’re a modern state and need extra capacity in a hurry? You outsource. And if you’re also a kleptocracy, to whom can you turn for this? Criminals. It’s not clear whether Qilin, the Russian hacker group behind the recent attack on NHS suppliers is run, encouraged, or simply given a
Everyone loves Russia, or at least echoes its talking points – if you believe the country’s state media. Why should it be so important for Vladimir Putin, who tries to appear impervious to foreign criticism, to magnify any seemingly supporting words? It underlines a centuries-old insecurity at the heart of Russia There was a distinct
Five down – how many more to go? As more and more senior Russian officers and defence officials are arrested on corruption charges, the rumour mill is in full spin as it cranks out claims that this is everything from a purge of potential coup plotters to a Federal Security Service (FSB) takeover of the
There was an expectation that the appointment of Vladimir Putin’s new government would see some change in the Russian security apparatus, but few predicted that Russia’s defence minister Sergei Shoigu would be replaced by an economist, Andrey Belousov, with Shoigu becoming secretary of the Security Council. With an economist taking over the defence ministry, and the
The universal corruption of the Russian elite suits Vladimir Putin. When everyone has a skeleton in their closet, power rests with whoever decides which closets get searched. The arrest on corruption charges of Timur Ivanov, deputy minister of defence, is noteworthy not because he was infamously corrupt, but because it raises the question: why him,
The ‘Baltic Beast’ is at it again. Mysterious – or not so mysterious – GPS signal disruption has become a growing problem for civilian air traffic, not just in the Baltic but also the Black Sea and the Eastern Mediterranean. It is clear that Russia is behind it, but why? Airplanes have, while in flight,
One thing the French seem to be learning (or, given their history, re-learning) is that the Russians are always up for a scrap. A ministerial phone call between the two countries has led to a diplomatic spat such that a stung Emmanuel Macron is now claiming that Moscow plans to target this summer’s Paris Olympics
Pity the poor political technologists, as Russia’s professionals in the dark arts of spin, propaganda, gerrymandering and outright ballot box stuffing are known. They are not only expected to produce the exact expected election result – that’s the easy bit, when you control the count – but they are meant to make it look as
Vladimir Putin’s annual address to the Federation Council (the upper chamber of the legislature) is rarely an exciting event, but it does provide an opportunity to gauge his mood and assess his priorities. This year’s – the longest yet, at over two hours – was in many ways his stump speech for March’s presidential elections,
Secret documents have been leaked that reveal Russian scenarios for war games involving simulated nuclear strikes. They shed light on Moscow’s military thinking and its nuclear planning in particular, but ultimately only reinforce one key factor: if nuclear weapons are ever used, it will be a wholly political move by Putin. The impressive 29 documents