Samuel Charap Profile Banner
Samuel Charap Profile
Samuel Charap

@scharap

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Senior Political Scientist, @RANDCorporation . Co-Author, Everyone Loses

Washington, DC
Joined June 2010
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
We’ve arrived at a stage when avoiding escalation to a Russia-NATO conflict is going to take luck or effort. Existing guardrails are eroding by the day if not the hour.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
so... the implications of an isolated, angry Putin presiding over a grinding, existential conventional war and an economy devastated by sanctions are really terrifying. The chances of his accepting "defeat" are far lower than the chances he escalates dramatically.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
It seems to me that the only well planned part of this entire play has been the military piece. No one beyond the military and the services seems to have even been in the loop. I wouldn’t be surprised if the post-invasion plan is about as good as the US one in Iraq was.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Important that some Western leaders are trying to talk Putin out of this madness, even if the chances of success are vanishingly low.
@EmmanuelMacron
Emmanuel Macron
2 years
I spoke to President Putin this morning. He refuses to stop his attacks on Ukraine at this point. It is vital to maintain dialogue to avoid human tragedy. I will continue my efforts and contacts. We must avoid the worst.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
The longer this goes on, the more brutal it is likely to get. And we haven't seen the most destructive Russian capabilities employed yet: indirect fires, unguided bombs, etc.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
This Putin address to the Security Council is absolutely terrifying. Not showing any hint of compromise. Glorifying the "bravery" of Russian forces and doubling down on the "Nazi" rhetoric re: Ukraine. Extremely emotional. Blood curdling.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Main takeaway from that barnburner of a speech is that Russia now has given itself a pretext to respond to "attacks" on DNR and LNR with no need to conceal its direct military involvement. thread 1/x
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Seems like cruise missiles are flying. This is going to be very big. Nothing limited about Putin's speech or this military operation. This is a big war.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Let's be clear. What is happening now is a large-scale military operation against Ukraine. Forget about the Donbas. It's a sideshow.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Just saw a @WSJ headline that the Dow is up 600 points because Russia "agreed" to talks with the Ukrainian leadership, confirming once again that markets simply cannot accept the reality of how bad this is going to get. It's verging on delusional.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
One gets the sense that folks in this town smell blood in the proverbial water regarding the stability of the (odious) Putin regime. Let's file that under "careful what you wish for". Thread. 1/7
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
for the record, Putin just effectively declared war on Ukraine.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Putin "I have declared a special military operation"
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Having watched the Putin-Scholz presser in its entirety I see no cause for optimism. NATO issue still front and center. Putin demanding an answer immediately. And calling what’s happening in the Donbas “genocide.” Does not bode well.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
It's almost impossible to get one's head around the extent to which Russia is a different country today than it was a week ago.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
There has been a significant though subtle shift in Russian war aims in the last week. Before, it was nothing less than regime change. Now it’s clear they would accept a negotiated settlement. Granted, their current demands are outlandish. And they might still try to oust Ze. 1/2
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Glad to see that the FBI has mastered snark in Russian. Using the Putin dressing down of SVR head Naryshkin in an ad calling for CI tips. “Speak directly, we are ready to listen.”
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@FBIWFO
FBI Washington Field
2 years
Информация, предоставляемая ФБР населением, является наиболее эффективным средством борьбы с угрозами. Если вы располагаете информацией, которая может помочь ФБР, просим вас обратиться к нам.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
10 months
The Putin rant on Poland with set propaganda piece from Naryshkin does not bode well...It's one thing for Soloviev to say things like that, but what's the point of making a big show of this at a televised Security Council meeting unless something is in the works...
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Wonder what it's going to take for the skeptics to believe that Russia is preparing for a major military operation. There is absolutely no need to be doing what Moscow is doing unless they're creating the option for something qualitatively bigger than anything we've seen 1/2
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Putin: "demilitarization and de-nazification of Ukraine"
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
11 months
The real loser here is of course Putin. He let his own Frankenstein get out of hand. He will pay the price in prestige and authority. Prigozhin will be gone soon enough but the damage will be permanent.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
this actually makes much more sense than MiG-29s, but I wish I weren’t reading about it in the @WSJ . Not sure why publicity is useful here.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Regime change in Russia might seem like the only way out of this tragedy. But on closer examination it poses huge risks and is no more likely to make things better, than it is to make them worse. 7/7
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
The scenario of a liberal reformist successor coming to power who begs forgiveness for Putin's sins would be great, but it would also be great to win the lottery. Equally if not more plausible are regime change scenarios that work out badly for everyone, Ukraine included.2/7
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
one comment from a source of theirs: "we don't have enough sobyanins [Moscow mayor -- known as a competent manager]" to manage Ukraine. "We don't even have enough Beglovs [St. Petersburg mayor, known as a completely incompetent manager]." END
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Looks like a lot of Russian government web sites are down, including the Kremlin, MFA, MOD, Government...
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
1 month
Happy to announce that I've been named Inaugural Distinguished Chair in Russia and Eurasia Policy @RANDCorporation . I appreciate the vote of confidence and look forward to continuing RAND's long tradition of important work on the region.
Senior political scientist @scharap has been selected to serve as our inaugural Distinguished Chair in Russia and Eurasia Policy.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Re: peace talks: Lots of skepticism out there about @ZelenskyyUa 's efforts to find a negotiated solution. Or rather skepticism about Russia's sincerity. Skepticism is more than warranted. But let's be clear. There will be a deal to end the war. 1/5
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
no one (among the "civilians") had any idea this was coming until the invasion had already started. not in the Government, prez admin, etc. Suggests the political planning is nonexistent. (consistent with what we're seeing) 3/x
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Putin's address starting. Thread.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Putin: "Russia cannot feel secure with [the threat from Ukraine" "we have no other choice but to use the means we are about to announce"
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
The extent of the catastrophe that is unfolding before our eyes is hard to overstate.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
But I don’t think they were open to something short of decapitation/total surrender 7-10 days ago. A testament to the utter failure of their initial war plan and the resilience of the Ukrainians. 2/2
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Putin asking the Ukrainian military to drop their weapons and go home. holy cr2p
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
I believe this is the first joint Russian-Belarusian snap exercise. Ever.
@TadeuszGiczan
Tadeusz Giczan
2 years
Belarus announced joint drills with Russia to be held in February aimed against Polish, Lithuanian and Ukrainian military build-up. Lukashenko: "Ukraine keeps concentrating its radical nationalists from the National Guard next to our border. They are even worse than NATO troops".
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Given the intensity of fighting in the Donbas, it seems like there's a push ongoing to extend Russian control to the oblast borders before possible signing of a ceasefire. That's going to be tough given how dug in the Ukrainian JFO is. 1/3
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
9 months
‘ “If we acknowledge we’re not going to do this forever, then what are we going to do?” asks an SAO according to ⁦ @alexbward ⁩. Good question.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Now threatening any country that considers intervening. "I hope that I have been heard"
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Putin not only recognized the DNR/LNR, he also signed "friendship and cooperation" treaties with them, essentially security guarantees. 2/x
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Wow, China is going all in on the bio labs conspiracy theorizing. Next Beijing will reveal the original “Dulles Plan” and the long lost video of Madeline Albright claiming that Siberia is the 51st state.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
If this starts, avoiding escalation to a Russia-NATO conflict will be very difficult. But essential.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
So I think #Putin has now set a record for most demands for legal guarantees of #NATO non-enlargement made in a single day. Apparently UK, Finnish and French leaders got the same ultimatum today.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
This regime is unlikely to go down without a fight against enemies domestic and foreign, real and imagined. Regime security = national security in the leaders' minds, and they'll treat threats to the former as threats to the latter. 3/7
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
The horror of what is unfolding is beyond comprehension.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
One real possibility is that an even-more-hardliner than Putin comes to power. Gorbachev 2.0 is far from inevitable. 6/7
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
well, this is an interesting plot twist: "US officials told the Financial Times that Russia had requested military equipment and other assistance since the start of the invasion. ... some indications that China may be preparing to help Russia."
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
whereas before this, Russia didn't have a justification for overt military intervention even under its own laws, now it will. This is an important element of the narrative that was missing. 3/x
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
The Ukrainian resistance has clearly exceeded Moscow’s expectations — consistent with the Russian elite’s chauvinistic dismissiveness of Ukrainians’ ability to succeed at anything. Recall expectations of a “failed state” etc in 2014-2015. 1/2
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
If anyone has an idea of what a stable endgame is, I'd love to hear it. Not clear that any government involved in this conflict has one — at least a plausibly sustainable one.
@SokovNikolai
Nikolai Sokov
2 years
@scharap @ZelenskyyUa One problem with this invasion that severely complicates planning is that it's impossible to imagine Putin's idea of the end state. I increasingly feel he's replaying Gulf II with all mistakes (such as remove Saddam and it'll be a democracy) with only a fraction of resources.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Very happy to announce that the @RANDCorporation study I led on Russian coercive signaling is out! a thread 1/x
Tweet media one
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
In other words, the strategic rationale for launching a major offensive is greater than it was before today. The Kremlin just swallowed its other bargaining chip. END.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Ugh, Putin speaking now @ 5:40am Moscow time.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Putin has made Ukraine into the “anti-Russia” of his pre-war paranoid fantasies.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Short take on Geneva today: it could have been worse.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Buckle up, in other words. bad things ahead. END
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Given the nature of the Russian demands, it's hard to see how talks can stop this war.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
It's hard to take pleasure in a permanent member of the UN Security Council, the world's largest country with the most nuclear warheads, rapidly sliding to rogue-state status. While Russia certainly deserves it, the consequences will be felt globally, for decades to come.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Keep in mind that Russian strategists have long posited that the (US) attempt to take them down will combine threats on the periphery, domestic unrest, and external military aggression. see ch 4 of the report @MassDara and I co-led: 4/7
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
clearly the legal niceties wouldn't have stopped Russia, but they always need some way of portraying their actions as something other than aggression. As Peskov put it yesterday, Russia has never attacked anyone ever, or something like that. 4/x
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
26 days
New piece out today with @DrRadchenko @ForeignAffairs on the history of the 2022 Istanbul talks and why they failed. We attempted to do justice to a complicated story 1/3
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Anti war protest (clearly a channel 1 staffer) interrupted Vremya, the main prime-time Russian state tv news show today.
Tweet media one
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
This is some dark, dark stuff
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
To be fair, this might be impossible, as Macron's readout today suggests. But we have to try.
@RALee85
Rob Lee
2 years
The best thing the US can do to help Ukraine is to convince Putin that de-escalation is a less costly and risky option for him than continuing the war. Calling for regime change or assassination does the opposite.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Very interesting. Indicates where Russian war optimism came from.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Among the more striking aspects of the intl reaction to the war has been the breadth and depth of the (well-deserved) global outrage and the resulting acceleration of economic and political consequences for Russia not led by govts. 1/2
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Effective propaganda relies on a kernel of truth. The narrative here has been invented out of thin air. Unsurprising that this has failed spectacularly. US disclosures of their planning helped too.
@DAlperovitch
Dmitri Alperovitch
2 years
For all the fears over the last nearly 10 years about the Russian hybrid/information warfare capabilities and troll armies, they have completely lost the information war over this invasion of Ukraine
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
And if they are convinced that our policy is aimed at regime change, they will hit back, hard. 5/7
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
I see there's a lot of renewed interest on twitter in pre-war predictions about how Russia would fight. The bottom line is that no one I'm aware of predicted how (badly) Moscow would mess up the initial invasion. THREAD 1/
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
It is interesting that we haven’t seen any sign of Russian networks within Ukrainian state structures being used in this operation. At least not yet. Possibly an indication they weren’t in the loop. Or they didn’t exist. Too early to say for sure.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Russian MOD activating CBRN defense procedures. This is bad.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Many during this crisis have assumed that continued diplomacy with #Russia indicates war is less likely. I'm not sure. A thread.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
This argument basically amounts to an assertion that the west should be prepared to sacrifice thousands of Ukrainians in the name of weakening Russia. Besides its immorality, this argument significantly understates the damage the war will do to the west.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Extremely important point.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
"today's ukraine was totally and completely formed by Russia"
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
BREAKING: that whole exchange of letters thing didn’t fix the problem.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
One thought about what Russia's exit from the Minsk agreements — aka recognition of DNR/LNR — tells us about what is to come. Thread 1/x
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Well, we avoided one escalation pathway. But this is a symptom of a broader problem: well-intentioned efforts to help with lots of cooks in the kitchen accompanied by a lot of (well-deserved) anger and things could get out of hand, fast. Efforts need coordination.
@paulmcleary
Paul McLeary
2 years
It's official - Europe won't transfer fighter planes to Ukraine. Poland decided not to, and Slovakian defense ministry spokesperson confirms to me just now: “Slovakia will not provide fighter jets to Ukraine."
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Since everyone is looking for military and informational signs of Russia’s seriousness (or not) about launching an invasion, it might make sense to also think about signs that the diplomatic track might actually be more than Kabuki theater/time-buying tactic/ point-scoring/ 1/9
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
When you can't win an argument, impugn the motives of your opponent. It's sad how far one of the former giants of the field has fallen.
@anders_aslund
Anders Åslund
2 years
@EmmaMAshford @scharap @scharap is persistently taking a pro-Putin line, just like you, ignoring the freedom and human rights of smaller countries in its neighborhood. Is that smart?
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
So since I've garnered a number of new followers this weekend, I thought I'd follow up on the substance of the discussion around my @POLITICOMag article. A thread.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Since there has been a lot of interest in a pre-war argument my colleague Scott Boston and I made about military assistance to Ukraine, I'm happy to admit that we were (partially) wrong. But it's important to understand why we were wrong, rather than engage in point scoring 1/8
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
New piece in @ForeignAffairs today. A thread
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
11 months
New ⁦ @ForeignAffairs ⁩ piece out today on #Russia - #ukraine war and how it’s likely to end. And what the US can do about it. An Unwinnable War | Foreign Affairs
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
And it would be a humiliating climbdown for Moscow to un-recognize the republics. Squaring that circle is likely a core challenge in the talks. 3/3
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
The DNR/LNR "recognition" decision has left Putin with little choice but to seek full control of the regions. It has also seriously complicated any political settlement. No Ukrainian govt would agree to give up Donetsk and Luhansk. 2/3
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
With all due respect for @IvoHDaalder , I find this line particularly unconvincing: "Putin worries that if any of these states becomes a successful and prosperous democracy, let alone fully integrates with the west, the Russian people will demand the same." Thread
@DrRadchenko
Sergey Radchenko
2 years
An interesting op-ed by @IvoHDaalder : . Argues that the US must go all in to aid Ukraine in order to stop the "revival of Russian expansionism." I tend to side with @scharap in that it's unlikely that any such a build-up will alter the odds for Ukraine.
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
1 year
Feels like we have schizophrenia on Russia-China these days. One day Beijing is on the verge of arming Russia, and now "China rolls back unconditional support for Russia".
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
That said, we should not lose sight of the tactical implications. Rather than retreat, the Russian military is likely to double down and resort to far more brutality. 2/2
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
The bottom line is that (from Moscow's perspective) half-measures have failed for 8 years. And it doesn't take this kind of force to continue with them... 2/2
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
Will be interesting to see if moscow retaliates directly. Boeing depends on Russian titanium for its planes and has a research center in moscow.
@AFP
AFP News Agency
2 years
#BREAKING Boeing announces suspension of support for Russian airlines
Tweet media one
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
One gets the sense another major Russian miscalculation is coming. if this is meant to scare Ukraine and the West into capitulating, it's not going to work. 1/2
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@scharap
Samuel Charap
2 years
New @ForeignAffairs piece out today. A case for why working with Ukraine for a negotiated end to the war is in U.S. interests.
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