In the preface to volume one, “The Gathering Storm,” of his six-volume memoir of World War II, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill recalls a conversation with U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt, in which Roosevelt asked what the war should be called. Churchill responded instantly, “the unnecessary war,” noting that it was the easiest war to stop. The world is now at war in Europe and the Middle East and at risk of escalation that could become a world war. This escalation is unnecessary and could be stopped by relearning some of the lessons that led to the Second World War.

French President Macron called a meeting of French political leaders on Friday to receive briefings on the changing and more aggressive nature of Russian hybrid attacks against European states, citing the attempted explosives-laden drone attack against Leipzig airport. Macron also announced an upcoming G7 meeting to address energy security and joint measures to address Russian airspace violations, surveillance of defense sites, maritime meddling, and sabotage and assassination operations. Macron’s concerns reflect assessments in 2026 by the intelligence services of the Baltic States as well as Sweden and Finland that Russia is planning a provocation against a NATO state in the near term. These assessments, as well as information gathered by U.S. intelligence, may have contributed to the decision by the U.S. to send CIA Director Ratcliffe to Moscow to warn President Putin against such a provocation.

Putin intends to bring the war to the U.S. The September 15 indictments of five operatives linked to a Russian intelligence network in the U.S. for conspiring to finance terrorism and orchestrate a murder-for-hire plot against a Russian dissident in the U.S. may have been a bit of a wake-up call in Washington that the type of hybrid “grey zone” operations Europe has experienced from Russian intelligence in recent years is heading to the U.S. This should come as no surprise. To Putin, the U.S. is the “main enemy,” and anything to weaken the ability or willingness of the main enemy to stay in the fight is certain to be a key part of Putin’s escalation strategy. Messaging to Moscow is important, and President Trump should no longer be under any illusions about the nature of his relationship with the Russian dictator. Putin is his enemy.

President Trump’s choice of negotiators to send to Moscow to try and reach a negotiated solution to the conflict could not have been more poorly chosen. The Kushner-Witkoff team should not have been used to deliver the message Ratcliffe delivered because they do not have the standing or credibility in Moscow’s eyes. Witkoff’s sad gushing about the history of the moment and his memories of Putin are sad and embarrassing. More importantly, though, they deliver exactly the wrong message to Putin. Putin doesn’t respect flattery from characters like Kushner and Witkoff. Putin’s choice of their principal interlocutor from the Russian side, Kirill Dmitriev—the CEO of the Russian Direct Investment Fund—shows that Putin has assessed accurately the real motivation of the Kushner-Witkoff team: business deals and money.

There is a reason for sending the CIA Director to deliver different messages. One might recall the visit of then-CIA Director Burns to Moscow in 2021 to warn Putin against again invading Ukraine. Burns clearly delivered a message based on intelligence information on Russian plans and intentions—which proved correct—and I suspect Ratcliffe delivered the same type of message based on similar intelligence. Using CIA Directors to deliver such messages is important because Putin mirror-images. He trusts information from his intelligence and security services far more than information from his Ministry of Foreign Affairs or other sources. If the information carried to Moscow comes from the CIA Director, it, by definition, has more credibility than information from any other source. This doesn’t mean Putin will heed the message, but it will reach his ear. But the key to the efficacy of messages delivered by CIA Directors is the credibility of consequences. Clearly, Putin correctly assessed that the consequences he would face from President Biden for invading Ukraine in February 2022 would be gradual and, in the end, inconsequential. He may believe the same will be the case with the Trump/Ratcliffe messaging.

If it hasn’t been clear for years, it should be absolutely clear now: Putin is all in on this war. There is no indication from Moscow of any change in Putin’s absolutist terms for ending the war. Putin cannot negotiate a peace short of capitulation by Kyiv. Ending the war short of Putin’s definition of victory risks a disgruntled army returning to Moscow, and history is not kind to Russia’s leaders in such a scenario. Perhaps as important, ending the war short of victory leaves Russia in a much worse strategic situation with Ukraine’s emergence as the preeminent military power in central Europe. Germany and the EU are rearming. NATO membership has increased with the addition of Sweden and Finland. Russia’s economy is in tatters as a result of sanctions and Ukrainian strikes against energy, military, and military support infrastructure deep in the territory of the Russian Federation. The war cannot be hidden from the Russian people any longer. The pressure of his handling of the war may possibly be starting to take a toll on Putin himself. His performance at the Navy Day celebration in St. Petersburg this July, where for the second consecutive year the parade of warships was cancelled and Putin’s appearance was indoors in front of a poster of a Russian submarine, was widely ridiculed. The city was essentially on lockdown for security reasons. Putin followed the widely ridiculed appearance in St. Petersburg with a highly staged visit to Russia’s Far East that was received locally with widespread cynicism but included a first visit to Iturup Island, triggering strong criticism from Japan but serving as a symbol of Putin’s determination to keep and increase the boundaries of the Russian Federation.

Putin’s determination and perhaps conviction that he is on a path to victory belies objective analysis of the war against Ukraine and Russia’s economic and strategic situation. Putin’s determination is likely reinforced by the approach the Trump Administration has taken, accommodating Moscow and putting pressure on the victim. This may be starting to change, and perhaps President Trump is starting to realize that Putin is his enemy, the enemy of the United States and the West, and a supporter of Iran—currently engaged in active military activity to kill Americans and wreck energy markets (among other markets) to undermine Western economies.

Trump signed the long-delayed sanctions legislation sponsored by the late Senator Lindsey Graham. This legislation allows for primary and secondary sanctions on Russia and other countries by allowing tariffs on the largest importers of Russian crude oil or gas and the top five countries that aid Russia’s energy sanctions evasion. There has been a suggestion that officials in the Trump Administration are trying to create more incentives for members of the Russian elite to seek peace. If true, this is an interesting change in the Administration’s approach, which has thus far been to ingratiate itself to Putin. Putin seems highly resistant to pressure from outside the Russian Federation, and there is no level of economic hardship or war casualties Putin is unwilling to inflict on the docile Russian population. His latitude to resist pressure from disenfranchised or recently relatively impoverished Russian elites may be less so.

There is a path to making the coming war unnecessary. The key to the problem is Putin. He is at the center of the spider’s web of the cabal acting against the free world. Iran, its surrogates, principally the Houthis at the moment, China, and North Korea are key pieces in Putin’s architecture of disruption. To destroy this architecture, you have to destroy its architect. Defeat Putin in Ukraine, and Iran’s position in the Middle East will surely erode, and a powerful message will have been sent to Chinese President Xi to keep his hands off Taiwan.

Unlike Churchill and Roosevelt at the onset of World War II, the free world has a valiant and effective military partner eroding Putin’s power: Ukraine. Therefore, the first step in deterring the coming unnecessary war is to provide Ukraine the military and financial support it needs to win. This starts with air defense to protect against Putin’s increasing use of modified drones and ballistic missiles to target Ukraine’s energy infrastructure and civilians in an attempt to erode Ukrainian willingness to resist—a problem which could become more acute as winter approaches.

Secondly, Ukraine should be encouraged to continue its effective targeting of Russian energy, economic, and military infrastructure, which is helping to erode support within Russia for Putin’s regime and his war of aggression. Ukraine should be encouraged and given the support it needs to continue its current offensive northeast of Lyman in the Donetsk Oblast. Ukraine should be encouraged to engage in operations to liberate Crimea, which is the jewel in the crown of Putin’s territorial “achievements.”

It would be well worth the effort of the U.S. and the West to put pressure on Russia’s periphery, starting with enhancing support for pro-Western elements in the Republic of Georgia—long an outlier of Western support in the Caucasus and itself a victim of Putin’s aggression in August 2008 and currently under pressure from pro-Russian elements supported by Russia’s intelligence services. The U.S. decision to deploy forces to Poland and NATO’s decision to deploy more forces to the Baltic States are another useful way to stretch Putin’s resources and pressure him.

The lessons of history are clear: appeasement of aggression brings more aggression. Strength and resolve are the key to avoiding unnecessary wars. It is time the Trump Administration learned history.

The Cipher Brief is committed to publishing a range of perspectives on national security issues submitted by deeply experienced national security professionals. Opinions expressed are those of the author and do not represent the views or opinions of The Cipher Brief.

Have a perspective to share based on your experience in the national security field? Send it to Editor@thecipherbrief.com for publication consideration.

Read more expert-driven national security insights, perspective and analysis in The Cipher Brief

Excerpt from Spies: The Epic Intelligence War Between East and West

When Spies was first published in 2023, it made front-page news with the chilling revelation that the Russian government had reached an advanced stage in planning an assassination on American soil.

Russia's target was Alexander Poteyev, a former officer in the SVR, Russia's foreign intelligence service, whom the FBI and CIA had recruited as a spy. Poteyev betrayed one of Moscow's most closely guarded secrets: its network of deep-cover "illegals" living in the United States. His intelligence allowed the FBI to arrest ten Russian operatives in 2010, including the glamorous Anna Chapman.

The United States exchanged the illegals for Western agents imprisoned in Russia. Among those released was Sergei Skripal, the former Russian military intelligence officer whom the Kremlin later attempted to murder in Salisbury, England, with the nerve agent Novichok.

The CIA extracted Poteyev from Russia and resettled him under a new identity in the United States. Putin did not hide the fact that he wanted him dead. A Kremlin spokesman warned that Russia knew the traitor's identity and that an assassin would be sent after him.

That was precisely what happened.

Russian intelligence recruited Hector Fuentes, a Mexican microbiologist with a Russian wife and another family in Mexico. His handlers exploited his private life to blackmail him into identifying and surveilling Poteyev in Miami. They gave Fuentes $20,000 to rent an apartment there, but the operation foundered on poor tradecraft. Fuentes photographed the license plate of Poteyev's car and attracted the attention of security guards at Poteyev's apartment complex. When he attempted to leave for Mexico, American border officials discovered the photograph. Fuentes was arrested and disclosed the operation to US investigators.

By authorizing the plot, Putin had crossed an important red line. Europe had already witnessed Russian assassinations and attempted assassinations, including the attack on Skripal. But the Kremlin had previously stopped short of authorising a killing inside the United States. Putin was now demonstrating his willingness to tear up the remaining restraints governing relations with Washington.

Yet the American response was remarkably weak.

The New York Times subsequently reported that Washington retaliated harshly, imposing sanctions and expelling ten Russian intelligence officers operating under diplomatic cover in April 2021. But according to someone intimately involved in the events, when the United States informed the Kremlin about the expulsions, its message did not even mention the planned murder. Instead, Washington concentrated on Russia's SolarWinds cyberattack.

The penalties imposed were hardly sufficient to alter Putin's behaviour. Russian intelligence officers sometimes regard expulsion as a badge of honour. Putin had also insulated much of the Russian economy from American sanctions. A more serious response might have publicly exposed his immense wealth and corruption - subjects about which the Kremlin leader is notoriously sensitive.

The assassination plot was only the first of four events that, viewed from Moscow, advertised American weakness.

The second emerged in 2020, when reports alleged that Russian military intelligence was paying bounties to the Taliban to kill American service personnel in Afghanistan. The story appeared during the presidential election campaign but then largely disappeared, supposedly because the US intelligence community could not reach a consensus about the underlying evidence.

There should have been little doubt. John J. Sullivan, the former American ambassador in Moscow, has written that he examined the intelligence and found the proof persuasive. According to a source with knowledge of the events, American authorities possessed intelligence about a Russian officer travelling to Dubai to meet an Afghan contractor who facilitated payments to the Taliban. At the centre of the scheme was an Afghan-Russian gem smuggler, Rahmatullah Azizi, who acted as an intermediary.

The intelligence reached the President's Daily Brief in February 2020. Donald Trump nevertheless denied having been briefed and dismissed the story as "fake news." As with the assassination plot, the Russian bounty program provoked no meaningful American response.

The third demonstration of weakness was Washington's withdrawal from Afghanistan, negotiated by Trump and executed by Joe Biden in August 2021. The operation was handled disastrously. The world watched desperate Afghans cling to an American C-17 as it taxied along the runway at Kabul airport. Some fell to their deaths after the aircraft took off. A suicide bombing killed thirteen American service personnel and approximately 170 Afghan civilians. Soon the Taliban controlled the country once more.

From the Kremlin's perspective, the images suggested that the United States no longer possessed the will or competence of a superpower.

The fourth episode concerned Havana Syndrome - the mysterious neurological symptoms suffered by American officials since 2016. The US government repeatedly denied that a foreign power was responsible. A 2023 intelligence assessment judged it "very unlikely" that an adversary lay behind the incidents.

Investigative reporting later revealed compelling evidence of Russian involvement. Members of Unit 29155, a Russian military intelligence black-operations squad, were present near several incidents involving American personnel. The operatives appear to have used some form of electronic weapon.

Two reliable sources familiar with the matter told me that Russian involvement was regarded as almost certain, but that elements of the American intelligence community - particularly the CIA - had suppressed evidence pointing towards Moscow. Their apparent calculation was that doing nothing was preferable to revealing an attack that might constitute an act of war.

In December 2024, the House Intelligence Committee concluded that a foreign adversary was increasingly likely to have caused at least some of the incidents. It criticised the previous intelligence assessment for lacking analytic integrity and being highly irregular in its formulation.

If Russia was responsible, the lesson for the Kremlin was unmistakable: it had attacked American government personnel and escaped without punishment.

Taken together, the assassination plot, the bounties on American soldiers, the humiliating withdrawal from Afghanistan and Washington's refusal to confront the evidence surrounding Havana Syndrome all made the United States appear emasculated in the Kremlin's eyes.

It was in this context that Putin decided to launch his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. America appeared weak. The opportunity for military action had arrived.

The analogy with Munich in 1938 has become an overused cliché. In this instance, however, it is unfortunately appropriate. Through their repeated failure to counter Russian aggression before February 2022, the Trump and Biden administrations effectively appeased Putin's worst ambitions.

Putin's actions must be understood through his background as a KGB officer. He remains an unreformed Chekist, steeped in the mentality of the Soviet security services. He has never abandoned the KGB's view of the United States as Russia's "main adversary," nor his conviction that Washington and the CIA are engaged in a conspiracy to weaken Russia.

His strategy has consistently been revanchist: to regain the territory, influence and prestige lost when the Soviet Union collapsed. His invasions of Ukraine in 2014 and 2022 follow logically from that worldview. According to Putin's distorted version of history, Ukraine is an artificial country created by hostile Western powers. He regards its conquest and reincorporation into Russia as an almost sacred duty.

This is a gross misreading of history. But it is nevertheless what Putin believes - and Western governments must take it seriously.

Putin and the hardliners surrounding him believe themselves to be at war with NATO and, above all, with the United States. That conviction will not disappear with a ceasefire in Ukraine. Nor will the danger necessarily vanish when Putin leaves power. The nationalist resentments he has exploited are larger than the man himself, while his regime has systematically eliminated alternative leaders.

The West therefore faces a Russia problem, not merely a Putin problem. The events preceding the invasion of Ukraine offer an enduring warning: deterrence fails when threats carry no consequences. Dictators interpret silence not as prudence, but as permission.

The Cipher Brief is committed to publishing a range of perspectives on national security issues submitted by deeply experienced national security professionals. Opinions expressed are those of the author and do not represent the views or opinions of The Cipher Brief.

Have a perspective to share based on your experience in the national security field? Send it to Editor@thecipherbrief.com for publication consideration.

Read more expert-driven national security insights, perspective and analysis in The Cipher Brief

KREMLIN FILES/COLUMN: Three years ago, in June 2023, the Kremlin confronted one of the most dramatic internal crises of Vladimir Putin's quarter-century in power. Yevgeny Prigozhin, the former convict turned oligarch, Wagner founder, and longtime Kremlin insider known as Putin's "chef," launched an armed mutiny that stunned Russia and captivated the world. Wagner fighters seized the headquarters of Russia's Southern Military District in Rostov before beginning an astonishing march toward Moscow, encountering remarkably little organized resistance along the way.

For nearly twenty-four hours, the aura of Kremlin control appeared to evaporate. The episode immediately fueled predictions that Putin's regime was beginning to unravel. Some declared the mutiny the beginning of the end. Others saw it as the first crack that would inevitably bring down the Russian dictator. Three years later, those predictions have not aged well. But similar predictions now are all over U.S. and European news sources about another imminent collapse. The anniversary, therefore, offers an opportunity not to revisit sensational headlines but to remember three enduring lessons—especially at a time when rumor, hopeful thinking, and unfounded speculation once again dominate discussion over Russia and the Ukraine war.

Rumor and Reality

Prigozhin survived a negotiated settlement and the initial aftermath of his short-lived rebellion only to have his plane fall out of the sky months later. Wagner was dismantled and its elements incorporated into the Russian armed forces and intelligence agencies. Putin remains firmly in power, and the past three years have only seen a strengthening of his security and intelligence services.

Russia continues its war against Ukraine. And there are more rumors in recent months, from experts around the world, claiming Putin is “more vulnerable than ever.” This assumption is mostly grounded in Ukraine’s tremendous progress in escalating the drone war, its long-range strikes making a real impact on Russia’s energy sector, and heavy Russian casualties at the front continuing to mount throughout the year. There has also been more public criticism among Russia’s ruling elite than at any time during the war. But speculating from those facts that Putin is now substantially weaker as a dictator, or even, as some have suggested, “ripe for a coup,” is mostly wishful thinking.

Such rumors from alleged intelligence agency leaks, and experts cited by media outlets, offer a tempting, albeit false, notion that the Ukraine war might come to an end without the West having to do more; that Putin will just be overthrown and a more democratic alternative might come to power. Or that resolve and strong support for our Ukrainian allies, who are still fighting and dying every day, are not really needed, and that the “war is surely coming to an end…” That was the response given this week when Germany was pressed on providing long-range weapons:
“well, Ukraine is doing better than ever!” But none of that is based on reality, and Ukraine needs NATO and the U.S.’s support to see this war through to a just settlement, one where Ukraine does not sacrifice long-term security for peace.

Looking back at the war and to Prigozhin’s mutiny, the first lesson to remember is that the Prigozhin’s move exposed important vulnerabilities within the Russian state, ones that have existed for decades. Wagner's convoy advanced hundreds of miles while much of the security apparatus appeared confused, hesitant, or absent altogether. The episode reinforced what many who study Russia have argued for years: corruption, patronage, bureaucratic dysfunction, and institutional rivalries remain defining characteristics of Putin's system. Loyalty often trumps competence, and political reliability frequently matters more than military effectiveness.

Those weaknesses are real. They were discounted by far too many Western military experts before the 2022 invasion, who predicted a quick Russian victory. I have documented numerous examples of such failures across the Russian intelligence, military, and security establishment in my own book: Tradecraft, Tactics, and Dirty Tricks: Russian Intelligence and Putin’s Secret War (Naval Institute Press 2026).

Yet acknowledging these shortcomings should never lead us to underestimating the adversary. The war has damaged the Russian economy, and the energy sector is in crisis due to Ukraine’s strike campaign. Still, as The Economist recently noted, the economy is not in shambles, unfortunately, and won’t crash anytime soon.

Russia’s intelligence services (RIS) remain capable, adaptive, and ruthless. They have repeatedly demonstrated an ability to recover from mistakes, suppress internal threats, and preserve the regime. They get the very best in terms of resources and reconstitution from any losses, and they are expanding their hybrid war against Europe and the U.S.

Weakness and Resilience in Putin’s Russia at War

Weakness and resilience are not mutually exclusive. Prigozhin’s mutiny revealed both. This is the second lesson from three years ago. War has strengthened the RIS and, especially, the FSB’s chokehold on the Russian people. Their economy has largely weathered sanctions and repeated hits, and their population, unfortunately, remains hypnotized by heavy propaganda. Sadly, most Russians support Putin as strongly as the Nazi Germans did Hitler, even to their bitter end. Unfortunately, Russian propaganda today has many more tools than Dr. Goebbels did, and they use them very well.

Prigozhin knew it. He was not marching on Moscow to overthrow Vladimir Putin. This has been widely misunderstood. Throughout the crisis, Prigozhin directed his fury overwhelmingly at Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov. His extraordinary public denunciations in the weeks prior to the mutiny, shouting at both on Russian TV, stunned all of Russia but received little attention in the West. Prigozhin accused the military leadership of corruption, deception, and catastrophic mismanagement of the war in Ukraine. His objective was to humiliate them, force their removal, and compel Putin to intervene—not to replace Putin himself. He was screaming into Russian cameras, “Shoigu! Gerasimov!!” But not once did he shout Putin’s name. He knew where to stop with his ire.

Western observers too often interpreted the mutiny through their own hopes for regime change. It was an elite struggle within the existing system, not a revolutionary movement against it. Understanding that distinction is essential. Elite infighting should not automatically be mistaken for the imminent collapse of the regime.

Putin is a master, just like Stalin was 80 years ago, at playing his lieutenants and loyalist Siloviki against one another. While they jostle for power, he remains firmly in control, and they are constantly trying to curry his favor. Prigozhin sat at his table—and prepared that table—for decades. He knew it.

The third lesson is perhaps the most consequential. Putin's system was never designed to depend solely on the regular armed forces. It rests on multiple overlapping centers of coercive power, principally at the hands of the intelligence services. The Federal Security Service (FSB) remains the dominant institution protecting the regime. Alongside it stands the National Guard (Rosgvardia), with its vast manpower and domestic security mission, and the Federal Protective Service (FSO), whose responsibilities include safeguarding the country's leadership (first and foremost in the personage of Putin). These organizations were deliberately structured to counterbalance one another, prevent any single institution from becoming too powerful, and ensure that threats to the regime can be contained from multiple directions. Putin is a master at it.

The Wagner mutiny did not invalidate that architecture. If anything, the aftermath demonstrated its durability. While the regular military was embarrassed, the broader security state remained intact. Rosgvardia was strengthened immediately after the mutiny, receiving more heavy equipment, tanks, and APCs designed to put down even the most serious uprising by disloyal units, should they ever get past the wary watch of the FSB. It is headed by General Viktor Zolotov, a loyal former KGB colleague of Putin’s. That layered system and those allegiances help explain why authoritarian regimes like Putin’s can absorb dramatic shocks without collapsing (Iran provides parallels, and no doubt Russia and Iran continue to learn from one another).

None of this means Putin's regime is invulnerable. History offers countless reminders that authoritarian systems often appear stable until they suddenly are not. Internal rivalries matter. Economic pressure matters. Military setbacks matter.

But careful analysis requires distinguishing between long-term structural vulnerabilities and near-term political collapse. Those are not the same thing. Russia under Putin has shown a remarkable ability to overcome its structural and corrupt vulnerabilities to launch out repeatedly with aggression.

Three years after the Wagner mutiny, the greatest analytical mistake would be the same one made in June 2023: allowing hope to substitute for honest assessment. We cannot simply hold our breath, wait for the next rumor of elite discord, and convince ourselves that the dictator—and the security state he has painstakingly constructed over twenty-six years—will collapse under its own weight.

It will not be that easy. If Russia's aggression is ultimately to be defeated, it will require sustained Western resolve, continued support for Ukraine, and a clear-eyed understanding of both the strengths and the weaknesses of the adversary we face. Strategy demands as much patience as the current optimism calls for. But our strategy also demands more resolve, as well as something else missing in 2022—and for much of Putin’s reign—a more credible deterrent from the West.

All statements of fact, opinion, or analysis expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the official positions or views of the US Government. Nothing in the contents should be construed as asserting or implying US Government authentication of information or endorsement of the author's views.

The late-June 2026 death of Sergei B. Ivanov - the man once thought the most likely successor to Vladimir Putin - as well as the Russian President’s age, his rumored health problems, and the discontent over the economic impact of his disastrous invasion of Ukraine; have renewed speculation over when, under what circumstances and to whom he might cede power. The constitutional changes Putin orchestrated in 2020 potentially allow him to remain in office until 2036. Further, he has refused to answer questions about whether he will stay until then saying it is too early to discuss such matters and citing his focus on running the nation. However, given that Putin would be 83 in 2036, it is highly likely a leadership change will occur before then. How might Putin – assuming he is in a position to do so - handle such a transition? Ivanov’s history with him is instructive in this regard.

Like Putin, Ivanov hailed from St. Petersburg. They both served in the KGB’s foreign intelligence arm, the First Chief Directorate. But there was a difference between them that likely nettled the prideful Putin. While he served in Dresden, working with the allied East German State Security Service (a posting that earned him the not wholly complimentary sobriquet “Stasi” among his KGB colleagues), the polished, English-speaking Ivanov battled the ‘Main Enemy’ on the hostile side of the East-West divide. The two maintained a close relationship while Putin came to power and into the early years of his rule. Ivanov was the most-trusted of the coterie of St. Petersburg intelligence and security service veterans who formed the core of Putin’s governing elite as he founded what would become a de facto ‘Chekist” state in Russia.

When Putin was appointed Director of the Federal Security Service (FSB) by then-President Boris Yeltsin, he named Ivanov as his deputy. As he moved on from the FSB to become prime minister and then president of Russia, Putin kept Ivanov at the center of his security apparatus, appointing him successively as Secretary of the Security Council from 1999 until 2001; as Defense Minister from 2001 until 2007; and then as First Deputy Prime Minister. Apparently seen by Putin as too ambitious and difficult to control, Ivanov’s influence began to gradually wane in 2008 as the Russian president named the more pliable Dmitry Medvedev as a placeholder president while he himself actually ran the country from his perch as Prime Minister pending a return to the presidency. Although Ivanov remained a trusted player in Putin’s orbit for years thereafter - subsequently serving as Deputy Prime Minster and Chief of Staff of the Presidential Administration – the window for him to succeed his boss had long since closed. In 2016, he was relegated to a ceremonial position overseeing environmental and transport matters.

Repeating a Medvedev-like managed transition arrangement – that is Putin “retiring” while orchestrating events like a puppet master behind the curtain - is one likely scenario should he decide to depart the presidency. Another possibility is the constitutionally sanctioned model like that which played out in 1999 wherein the man Yeltsin named prime minister – in that case Putin himself - became his heir apparent. Putin went on to become acting Russian president and then president in 2000 following Yeltsin’s resignation. Another possibility is that Putin could precipitously decide to extra-constitutionally designate a successor.

The problem with these scenarios is that Putin to date has given no indication he might be willing to cede power. Nor, even if so inclined, is he likely to do so at least until he has secured something he can, however speciously, call ‘victory’ in Ukraine, a result that – at minimum - hinges on his ability to secure either through negotiations or force of arms the four oblasts Russia claims to have annexed in 2022. For Putin, successful resolution of the war is both a strategic imperative and central to his personal legacy. Given the grinding nature of the Russian Army’s advance in Donbas and the ferocious resistance being mounted by the Ukrainians, such an outcome appears unlikely in the foreseeable future if ever.

It is conceivable that the military or security services could mount a coup to topple Putin. Yet, despite the massive human and economic costs his war has imposed on the Russian people, there are to date no discernible indications such a putsch is in the offing. Additionally, the security measures taken following the abortive 2023 Wagner mutiny – to include the 2024 restoration granting of the Soviet-era Dzerzhinskiy title/honorific to a division of the Putin-created National Guard (‘Rosgvardiya’) protecting the country’s leadership and the ‘no man, no problem’ retaliation meted out to Yevgeny Prigozhin in its wake – mitigate against the success of any such attempt to overthrow the regime.

Given Putin’s age, and the fact that he rules a country wherein the male life expectancy is roughly the mid-to-high 60s, another likely scenario for an end to his regime involves his sudden death or incapacitation in office. Such an eventuality would unleash a period of leadership tumult in Moscow akin to that which followed the 1953 death of Stalin. With the demise of the Soviet dictator, it was widely assumed he would be succeeded by one of his closest lieutenants, Georgy M. Malenkov. Malenkov indeed became Chairman of the Council of Ministers. He successfully conspired with Red Army Marshal Georgy Zhukov, Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov and Nikita Khrushchev to dispose of the odious Lavrentiy Beria. Nonetheless, even though he was effectively the Soviet premier and the head of government, Malenkov was unable to consolidate power because he controlled neither the security apparatus nor the Soviet Communist Party. And it was Khrushchev - by then First Secretary of the Party – who ultimately won the fight between Stalin’s lieutenants to succeed him.

During a 1959 discussion with Khrushchev, former U.S. Ambassador W. Averill Harriman addressed Stalin’s lack of a succession plan, asking the Soviet leader who Stalin thought would succeed him. Khrushchev’s reply that: “Stalin didn’t think; he thought he would live forever” was, as was the case with much of what he said, calculatingly apocryphal. Stalin, notoriously conspiratorial by nature, clearly feared that if he acknowledged his rule would someday come to an end, his power would rapidly erode as plotting to hasten that indefinite date commenced. As the fight to succeed him would attest, he was surely correct in that judgement. After all, as Golda Meir would famously observe to Henry Kissinger in 1973: ‘Even paranoids have enemies’.

Reference in Ecclesiastes 7:15 to “the righteous perishing in their righteousness, and the wicked living long in their wickedness” certainly applies not only to Stalin but also to Putin. Nevertheless, absent some highly unlikely actualization of the scheme he discussed with Xi Jinping in 2025 of indefinitely extending his mortality by replacing organs in a manner akin to that of a Bond villain, Putin knows that his death is an actuarial certainty. But, like Stalin, he surely (and rightly) understands that any designation of a successor would inevitably and immediately lead to an erosion of his own power as others vied for his throne.

A precipitous end to the Putin regime would almost certainly trigger a period – perhaps an extended period – of crisis and uncertainty in Russia. Even in the best-case scenario – such as a decision by Putin to name a successor or wield power from behind-the-scenes as he did with Medvedev - it is likely that a contest among aspirants to his purple would follow. In addition to the character, worldview and policy goals of any new man in the Kremlin, the key determinants in any transition will be how it comes about and strength of support for that new leader. Putin has not allowed any subordinate to become an alternative center of power and the Russian political system is deliberately opaque with respect to any political matter, much less an issue as sensitive as leadership transition.

According to the Russian constitution, in the event of a president’s death, resignation, incapacity, or impeachment, the prime minister - currently Mikhail V. Mishustin - would serve as acting president pending a presidential election within three months. In practice, however, succession would likely be less about constitutional procedure than about who can best ensure elite status, security, property and de facto immunity from any legal accountability. The presidential administration, security services, state corporations, courts, political parties, media, and regional governors all look to the Kremlin for direction and sustenance.

Consequently, a decision on who would succeed Putin would involve bargaining among elites with roots in those sectors. While Mishustin would temporarily fill in as president in a sudden constitutional transition, he lacks the charisma, nationalist credentials, independent public backing, and security-service connections to become a permanent successor to Putin. That said, because the prime minister is the formal acting president in extremis, replacing Mishustin with another figure would be a clear signal that the person named is being positioned to succeed Putin.

Any change in leadership in the Kremlin, however it comes about, will - if only because Russia is a major nuclear power – engender worries about the nature of any regime following that of Putin. This was also the case after Stalin’s death when then-Vice President Richard Nixon voiced concern that his successor “might very well prove more difficult to deal with than Stalin himself.” As the recklessness Khrushchev displayed in deploying missiles to Cuba attested, Nixon was right to be worried. The Russian leadership itself probably understands such concerns and wants to avoid fueling them. That is one reason that the next Russian president is less likely to be an advocate of change than a continuity figure. Domestically, any successor would likely concentrate on consolidating his rule and avoiding anything that looks like defeat in Ukraine. Even if the next leader is less personally ideological than Putin, the governing structure he inherits will inevitably push him toward continuity. This would mean repression of any opposition, or perceived opposition, at home; deep suspicion of the West; protection of elite wealth; and management of the Ukraine war and its consequences.

In any transition scenario, but particularly in the case of an unexpected transition, the security services - the best organized and most powerful internal organizations supporting and enforcing Putin’s rule - will play a key role in determining who will follow him. Not surprisingly, then, several of those thought best positioned to succeed Putin have deep security service roots. Most prominent among them is ex-Putin bodyguard and former governor of Tula oblast Alexei Dyumin. He was given a position in the Kremlin and subsequently made secretary of the State Council, actions seen by many as signs he is seen by Putin as a possible successor. Another leading candidate, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Patrushev, is the son of the hard-line former Director of the FSB and Secretary of the Russian Security Council Nikolai Patrushev. Even potential candidates seen as technocrats or managers, such as First Deputy Chief of the Presidential Administration Sergei Kiriyenko and Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, will have to account for the pervasive influence of the security services should they aspire to succeed Putin.

As Mark Galeotti, an expert on organized crime and the security state in Russia has noted, that country “is effectively a state with a nationalized mafia.” Officers and contacts of those services have leveraged their authorities and connections not only to the benefit of the Putin regime but also to line their own pockets. And there is no reason to suppose that the end of Putin’s rule - however it comes about - and the inevitable departure from the scene of Ivanov and other aging KGB veterans such as Nikolai Patrushev and FSB Director Alexander V. Bortnikov will herald an end to the Chekist State. Moreover, any idea that the new generation of security-state linked ‘siloviki’(strongmen) will willingly cede their sway on the most senior levels of Russian leadership is, to put it mildly, improbable.

On the contrary, for as long as the Ukraine war goes on the security services’ sway over the Russian state will almost certainly grow. Indeed, anyone succeeding Putin is likely to rely heavily on those same services to monitor and suppress any extant opposition to the war and his establishment of control over the levers of power. The impact of the security services on the Russian state after Putin will be much like their central role under him only more so. On becoming Prime Minster in 1999, Putin quipped that “a group of FSB colleagues dispatched to work undercover in the government has successfully completed its first mission.” Sadly for Russia, its people and the people of Ukraine in particular, that mission continues with no end in sight.

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