Thomas Graham and Rajan Menon on Negotiating with Russia

Rajan Menon is the director of the grand strategy program at Defense Priorities. He is also the Anne and Bernard Spitzer Professor of International Relations at City College of New York and a senior research scholar at the Saltzman Institute of War and Peace at Columbia University.

This podcast episode includes references to the Eurasia Group Foundation, now known as the Institute for Global Affairs.

Show notes:

“How to Get What We Want From Putin,” (Politico, January 10, 2020)

Archival audio:

Tensions between NATO and Russia mount over Ukraine (CBS News, January 18, 2022)
Russia will pay heavy price” if it invades Ukraine, warns President Biden - BBC News (BBC News, January 20, 2022)
Ukraine crisis: Will US-Russia talks stop war? (Channel 4 News, January 21, 2022)
US and Russia meet for security talks over Ukraine tensions | DW News (DW News, January 10, 2022)
Are NATO partners fully united in how to deal with Russia? | DW News (DW News, January 12, 2022
Russian Ambassador blames tensions on 'aggressive' NATO actions (Sky News, January 11, 2022)
On Putin's terms? From Ukraine escalation to US-Russia talks (FRANCE 24 English, January 10, 2022)
Europe’s role in tackling the Russia-Ukraine crisis explained (Channel 4 News, January 2022)

Transcript:

January 25, 2022

RAJAN MENON: One of the hallmarks of sound, strategic thinking—and only one—is to ask yourself the question: Given the other side's circumstances, do they see the world the same way, and do they see your profession of innocence and good intentions the same way?

MARK HANNAH: Welcome to None of the Above, a podcast of the Eurasia Group Foundation. My name is Mark Hannah.

Russia has amassed more than 100,000 troops near its border with Ukraine, precipitating a crisis not just with Ukraine but with Western Europe and the United States. The State Department has ordered the families of diplomats to evacuate the American Embassy in Kiev, which underscores the fear an invasion might be imminent. With few other options available, the United States and NATO have threatened Russia with punishing sanctions, and President Biden is considering sending thousands of troops to the Baltics and Eastern Europe. Meanwhile, the US has been engaged in a flurry of diplomatic activity, talking with its allies and with Russia. However, talks between Washington and Moscow, including last week's meeting between Secretary of State Antony Blinken and his Russian counterpart, have done little but highlight the two countries’ seemingly irreconcilable differences, among them the expansion of NATO and Ukraine's fate in the alliance. To break this impasse and lay the foundations for a more stable Europe, commitments may need to be curtailed, and principles might have to be shrewdly weighed against interests. For policymakers, the task will be hard, but according to our guests today, not impossible.

We are joined by Thomas Graham and Rajan Menon, the authors of the recent Politico op-ed “How to Get What We Want from Putin.” We begin our conversation with Thomas Graham, a distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, who served as the senior director for Russia on the National Security Council during the George W. Bush administration.

Thomas, when you worked on this piece, it wasn't long after President Biden's conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin. US.-Russia relations haven't exactly been great recently, but what's at stake in this current crisis?

THOMAS GRAHAM: This goes back to the beginning of the fall, when the US intelligence community began to pick up signs that Russia was once again beginning to beef up its forces along the border with Ukraine. It raised alarms in Washington.

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GRAHAM: They thought this was a different type of buildup, more threatening of an actual military operation against Ukraine than they have seen back in the spring of this year. They began to rally our allies and partners in Europe to agree on actions we could take that would deter the Russians from any type of massive military operation against Ukraine. This led to a reaction in Moscow—of course, denials in Moscow that they had any intention of any military operation. But obviously, the tensions were rising, and we were seeing a sharp deterioration in the quality of the relationship between the United States and Russia, sharpening of the rhetoric on both sides. And this, I think, led to two phone calls between the presidents in December—one at the beginning, one at the end—and an effort on the part of the White House and the Kremlin to defuse the crisis in some way.

Our concern was when you began to see the initial positions that were being taken by both sides, there seemed to be very little common ground. There didn't appear to be a way that you could negotiate yourself out of this crisis, and therefore the risk of a military confrontation would grow. We're not only talking about a military confrontation between Ukraine and Russia, but one that might eventually involve the United States and Russia, the two largest nuclear armed powers in the world. What that would mean if it rose to the nuclear level is basically the destruction of the United States and Russia within 30 minutes, with fallout that would probably put an end to human civilization. So, the stakes are pretty high. And the idea that you could limit a military confrontation between our two countries beneath the nuclear threshold is something that is debatable. So, the stakes are very, very high. The stakes for the United States and Russia, for Ukraine, for Europe, for European security.

HANNAH: Our other guest is Rajan Menon, the director of the Grand Strategy Program at Defense Priorities and the Anne and Bernard Spitzer Professor of International Relations at City College of New York.

Raj, do you agree with Thomas that if neither side budgets in their talks, the US could somehow be drawn into a confrontation or even a nuclear war with Russia? Despite the deterrent influence of mutually assured destruction, it's not hard to imagine the possibility of miscalculation and these kinds of things escalating or spiraling out of control.

MENON: We have had no experience in an out-and-out confrontation with Russian forces, let alone negotiating our way and navigating our way in a world of nuclear escalation. Now, my own view is that while the focus has been on whether the Russians will invade Ukraine or not, I'm rather skeptical that they will launch a full-out invasion of Ukraine. I see something much more limited. But they have said in the event that there can be no agreement, there will be––and this soundsa little less awkward in Russian—military technical measures that they will adopt toward the West. They've deliberately said these are not limited. They've not mentioned Ukraine in this context. So, I could see them doing things such as forward positioning strike weapons in a place like Belarus for example, that changes the security environment in Europe as a whole. Everyone is sitting and thinking about what they will do in Ukraine. Will they invade or not invade? I'm not prepared to say they won't. I don't know. Maybe they don't know at this point, but one can see other ways in which they could make their point clear that there is a cost to be paid in simply believing Russia will swallow whatever one puts before it.

GRAHAM: It doesn't have to be the European theater. The Russians are thinking in a broader context. And one of the points they've made is that the United States has positioned military equipment,infrastructure, thousands of miles away from the US border. And this military equipment is capable of attacking Russia. They see that as a threat. One of the things they could do in response if diplomacy were to break down, is to try to create a similar equivalent threat to the United States, placing Russian military equipment in Cuba, for example, or Venezuela. For those of us who are old enough to remember, the Cuban Missile Crisis erupted because of the Soviet Union doing something like that. But this would be, in Moscow's mind, a way of—in a sense—equalizing the threat and saying, “We are prepared to negotiate a way out of this. But if we're going to withdraw our military equipment from Latin America, then the United States should be prepared to do the similar thing in Europe. So, we'll equalize the level of security between our two countries.”

HANNAH: Earlier this month, the NATO-Russia Council convened in Brussels. Top US officials traveled to Geneva to meet with their Russian counterparts. But beyond simply agreeing to keep talks alive between Washington and Moscow, little progress has been made in quelling the tensions at the Ukrainian border.

Just so we can establish things for our listeners here, what are America's core interests in Ukraine, and why are they so irreconcilable with Russia's interests?

GRAHAM: The United States’ national interest is maintaining peace and security in the European continent at large. Europe is our largest trading partner. We have historical ties to Europe that are extremely important to us. Europe has been a region in which United States—twice in the twentieth century—fought major wars in order to prevent that region from being dominated by a hostile power. Those things still obtain today in the twenty-first century. Ukraine is part of that. Our interests in Ukraine are really questions of European order, maintaining stability on the continent, peace on the continent, and integrating Ukraine slowly into European or Euro-Atlantic institutions, as we like to say.

Russia has a different set of interests. Russia has always, throughout history, sought to build strategic depth as a way of protecting Russia from invasion by outside powers. And if you look at where Russia is located geographically, it is on a plane in Eurasia. There are no formidable physical barriers. Russia has been the victim of invasions from the East and the West throughout history, and two very important ones in the past 200 or so years—the Napoleonic invasion in 1812 and Hitler's invasion in 1941. And the way Russians have tried to create or build their security is by pushing that border out to give themselves as much time as possible to react to an external invasion. Ukraine is an important element of that buffer zone between a potentially hostile power in Europe and the Russian heartland. So, there is a combination of psychological, historical, economic, and security factors that make Ukraine a key piece of territory and a key country in the Russian political imagination.

Interlude featuring archival audio

HANNAH: Russia considers Ukraine to be within its sphere of influence still and the prospect of Ukraine's accession to NATO a threat to its security. Western leaders like Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin continue to insist that NATO's door remain open and repeatedly dismiss Moscow's concerns as anachronistic. How does that argument track for you, Raj?

MENON: One of the hallmarks of sound, strategic thinking—and only one—is to ask yourself the question: Given the other side's circumstances, do they see the world the same way, and do they see your profession of innocence and good intentions the same way? Sometimes I ask my students in class to think about a thought experiment where the Cold War ended and we had, quote, “lost the Cold War.” And the Russians said, “We are going to move the Warsaw Pact into the Western Hemisphere, and you don't really have to worry about anything. You lost the Cold War. But we regard the Cold War is over, and we are peaceful partners. And by the way, occasionally, we might join with some of our allies and stage military exercises in the Gulf of Mexico.” I submit to you that there is no way this would have been viewed benignly. Now, when you say that, people are saying, well, you are equating the United States with Putin's Russia. We're a democracy. This kind of morality talk is really meant to put people on the defensive and say they are not apologists for Putin. I don't feel any compulsion to do that. It seems to me we have a long history—going back to the Monroe Doctrine, the Roosevelt corollary, and then multiple interventions in our hemisphere—of maintaining a sphere of influence. And to say this is some sort of pathological Russian behavior strikes me on the face of it as absurd.

HANNAH: Many commentators are attributing Russia's aggression to the fact that Putin is this illiberal strongman. But Raj, are you saying the United States would essentially do the same thing were it in Russia's position, despite the fact that it's a democracy?

MENON: If not the same thing, then it would be deeply unhappy. What they are doing is not some aberration. If you think of the circumstances Tom described—historical, cultural, and so on—that doesn't mean we have to endorse it. But we're obliged to understand if we do certain things, they will at some point react in ways that could create a significant escalation. And most of the burden of dealing with that will not be on Europe because few have militaries that can make any difference. It will be on the United States. So, while it is Ukraine's right to decide where its future lies, Ukraine's choice has some direct and self-evident implications for us.

HANNAH: Despite the major risk of war, there seems to be this notion that merely giving consideration to Russian security concerns is an act of appeasement. But Washington taking Russia's concerns seriously and demonstrating that it is committed to cooperation is not the same thing as giving in to Moscow's every demand. And as Thomas and Raj argue, doing so will be essential for keeping Russia constructively engaged with the West.

So, Thomas, what are the concerns the United States should be taking more seriously?

GRAHAM: Well, the concern Washington is not taking seriously is the one Putin has said is his top priority—it’s the eastward expansion of NATO into the former Soviet space, which from Moscow’s standpoint impinges on what it sees as its security zone. And so, really the crux of the problem we face—the crux of the crisis—is about the Russian security buffer zones in Europe. And to what extent we can recognize that or deal with it or accommodate it in some way while still not sacrificing what we see as core American interests or core American principles—I think that is the fundamental question. And to some extent, it appears irreconcilable on the surface, given the way we think about security and the way the Russians think about security, but that's where the role for creative diplomacy comes in.

HANNAH: Now, it's unclear whether Russia will conduct a major invasion of Ukraine. It's probably unclear even to those working in the Kremlin. But Russia's demands are hardly opaque. In December, Russia made public two draft treaties, which outlined the security guarantees it wants the US and NATO to make. Thomas, what are those concessions?

GRAHAM: The Russians have said quite explicitly that their three priority demands: That is, an agreement that there would be no further expansion of NATO's eastward. Second, that certain types of offensive military equipment capable of striking Russian territory will not be deployed in former Soviet states. And a third demand, in fact, is that NATO withdraws its infrastructure, military equipment, from those countries that joined NATO after 1997. 1997 being the year in which the Russia-NATO Founding Act on Cooperation was signed and before the first post-Cold War wave NATO expansion occurred. So, basically, returning the situation to the status quo of 1997. These are the three primary demands. And what their negotiators have said quite publicly in the past couple of days is that while the things the United States has put on the table in terms of arms control measures are interesting and probably worth some consideration, they don't see any reason to continue the talks unless the United States is prepared to address these three primary concerns.

HANNAH: Russia uses the threat of aggression to revise the security order that has long dominated Europe. And while the immediate priority is to cool tensions, Thomas and Raj argue that the current crisis offers an opportunity to revise this order to improve stability on the continent. However, the challenge is to do this without war. They've drawn a blueprint which, combined with skilled diplomacy, could provide a successful path forward.

MENON: In conceptual terms, if you think of the measures that could be taken as a series of concentric circles and posit that the innermost circle is the easiest and the outermost circle is the hardest, I would start with the innermost circle. So, one thing that would be easy to do is to simply make sure we have more contact with the Russians about European security issues and other security issues. Now, people will say there's no point in talking without reaching agreements and so on. But I think it's very important to have a sense that each side takes the other side's view seriously and understands these issues on an ongoing basis.

The second concentric circle might be something so minimal as more regular military to military talks. It could build out further—and I think Thomas touched on this. How do you have measures that prevent accidental events from rising to a level that gets out of control?

The outermost circle might be NATO expansion. I think it'll be very tough to reach an agreement on that in any near-term that satisfies both sides if what President Putin wants is a signed declaration that NATO will not expand any further and include Ukraine. But short of that, other things can be done. What I'm waiting to see is whether the Russians will conclude that the lack of an agreement on the outermost circle—that is NATO expansion in Ukraine, in particular—means all the rest of these things have to be let go, or whether the two sides will say, “Let us continue negotiations in other areas where we can make progress.” I just don't know, and I don't know that anybody really knows for sure what they're thinking.

HANNAH: Thomas, the durability of the security order will depend largely on the buy-in from both the United States and Russia. So, what are the practical steps that can be taken which would satisfy Russia but not sacrifice core principles and interests of the United States and of Western Europe?

GRAHAM: Well, let me just start by saying that there are three components to this. One is restrictions on military operations in Europe. The second is dealing with the issue of NATO expansion. And the third component is dealing with the ongoing and frozen conflicts in Europe. All three of these are necessary steps towards the creation of a more durable, stable security order in Europe. Now, some of the things we proposed in terms of restrictions on military activities are not new and we believe ought to be the basis for early agreement—at least in principle—between Russia and the United States or European allies. Although it may take some time to work out the details. So, all sides have an interest in reducing the risk of incidents in the in the sea and in the air that could lead to unwanted military confrontation between the two sides. We had treaties that dealt with that during the Cold War beginning in the 1970s. There are things we ought to do in terms of limiting military exercises along the NATO-Russia frontier, agreements that ban certain types of weaponry within certain distances of the border, transparency measures—all types of steps that give countries the sense that the element of threat has been reduced over time. And the third element of this—and something we did have until 2019—is a ban on the deployment of intermediate range nuclear ballistic missiles in the European theater. We had a global ban we had negotiated with the Soviet Union in 1987. We walked away from it in 2019, in part because of what we saw as continuing Russian violations of that treaty. But certainly in the current context, given the fact that there's no overriding strategic or military reason for having these types of weapons systems in Europe, we ought to be able to agree to a ban on that type of deployment.

HANNAH: Thomas and Raj also have a potential solution for what might be the most contentious issue—NATO expansion. Without closing the door on NATO forever but recognizing what many Western officials are saying privately, that Ukraine is not ready for membership anytime soon, they propose a moratorium.

GRAHAM: With the United States and NATO ought to be prepared to do is declare some type of moratorium on eastward expansion. And I think in many ways, the solution to the problem at this point, the way you defuse the crisis, is working out that sort of agreement—what a moratorium would look like, what the conditions would be, and how long a moratorium would last. And sort of the sweet spot is the length of time that allows the Russians to say, “This meets our minimal security requirement as far as Ukraine being outside of NATO is concerned.” We've proposed 20 to 25 years. The important thing is that you get beyond the lifetime of individuals who have some concern about this. Much of the Russian leadership is 70 now, so 20 to 25 years ought to cover that. But the period also has to be short enough so that the United States and NATO allies can say, “Well, we haven't violated our principle at the open door.”

HANNAH: What strikes me as interesting is that in these negotiations in Geneva, European security is being negotiated between Russia and the United States, but neither Ukraine nor Western Europe are present.

Interlude featuring archival audio

HANNAH: Now, you and Raj argue in your article that these measures should be discussed in bilateral talks between Russia and the United States. Why is that? Why shouldn't the Europeans, who have the most at stake in European security, play a role in these talks?

GRAHAM: Well, what we're saying is you can't negotiate something serious in a large multilateral format, and that's what we're talking about when we talk about the NATO-Russia Council, which includes 30 NATO members, plus Russia, let alone the OSCE in Vienna, which is an organization of 57 member states. What you get in formats like that are exchange of opinions, but you don't get serious negotiation where people sit down and begin to think through what the possible tradeoffs are, the possible compromises, that will help defuse the situation or accommodate the concerns of all the parties to a conflict.

I believe the bilateral channel has to be the primary channel of negotiation, and there are good reasons for that, given the roles the United States and Russia play in the European continent, the size of our militaries. We're the only two countries that really have the capability to affect the balance of power in Europe, and there isn't going to be a solution to this crisis unless the United States and Russia, in fact, agree to the various arrangements. But that doesn't mean Washington should not consult and be in very close consultation with our allies and partners in Europe. At the end of the day, whatever we work out with the Russians, we're going to have to sell to our European allies and partners. So, close consultations with our allies, close consultations with the Ukrainian government, but the real negotiating has to be done in a bilateral channel between the United States and Russia.

HANNAH: President Biden has made statements saying, in effect, that everything is on the table. Is that actually how you think his administration is approaching this crisis in practice?

MENON: Well, he has said that. But he's also said—as has Jen Stoltenberg, as has Wendy Sherman recently—that there will be no move to shut the door in Ukraine's face for all time.

On the size of Russia, my thinking has evolved on this. It is true that Russia, compared to the United States or China or Germany or Japan, is not a front ranking economic power, but that's kind of beside the point, because we've seen in Georgia and Kazakhstan and Ukraine that in certain areas, they have the capacity to make a difference. And the proof of the pudding is we are now there talking to them. In other words, by massing forces near Ukraine's border, they have gotten the attention of the West. And I think President Biden and his colleagues are fully aware that in some sense you legitimize Russia by doing that. But they've also decided it was just too dangerous to let this play out without any speed governor, as it were, on the crisis. So I think, yes, it is not a global power. It has many serious problems. But in certain areas where it has determined that its interests are very, very important and paramount it can do a great deal. The idea, for example, that we would project forces and fight a war to defend Ukraine on Russia's border is just completely absurd. That would be a catastrophic thing to do. Nobody believes we would do that. We don't believe we would do that. I don’t think the Russians believe we would do that. I don't think anybody in Europe believes we would do that. And so, that is, in a sense, the part of this negotiation that has led the United States to say, “This is a dangerous situation. We don't want this to spin out of control. We don't like President Putin, but let's begin a discussion to see what can be worked out, because everyone recognizes the gravity of the situation.”

HANNAH: While it's still unclear how the crisis on the Ukrainian border will pan out, tough choices, compromise, and a shrewd recognition of interests will certainly be necessary to prevent the conflict’s escalation and to create a more stable European order.

Thanks to both of our guests, Thomas Graham and Rajan Menon. If you haven't, make sure to read their Politico article, “How to Get What We Want from Putin.”

I’m Mark Hannah, and this has been another episode of None of the Above, a podcast from the Eurasia Group Foundation. I want to give a special thanks to our None of the Above team who make all of this possible. Thanks to our producer Caroline Gray, our associate producer and editor Luke Taylor, and Lucas Robinson for his research support. If you enjoyed what you've heard, do subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or anywhere else you find podcasts. Do rate and review us, and if there's a topic you want us to cover, send us an email at info@noneoftheabovepodcast.org. Thanks for joining us. Stay safe out there. Catch you next time.

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