Vasily Kashin is the Director of the Centre for Comprehensive European and International Studies at the Higher School of Economics (HSE) in Moscow. Kashin, born in Moscow in 1973, previously worked at leading think tanks such as the Valdai Discussion Club and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He is both an academic who knows the West very well and one of Russia\u2019s foremost experts on China. One final point to gauge the weight of his words: in recent times, Kashin has taken part in \u201ctrack two\u201d diplomacy talks with American counterparts.<\/p>\n
Kashin states that Russia\u2019s relations with the West have undergone an irreversible rupture and that the pre-2014 model of relations has completely ended. Describing the old order as a \u201cneo-colonial\u201d structure in which Russia supplied cheap resources and invested the proceeds in the European economy, yet in return had no political say and faced discrimination in areas such as access to technology, Kashin stresses that this system is no longer possible.<\/p>\n
Kashin argues that the most important outcome of the war in Ukraine is not territorial gains but the purge of the \u201cglobalist and pro-European\u201d elites inside Russia, which he says freed the country from a relationship of dependence. He sees no hope for the future of Russia\u2019s relations with the European Union and says they should not be restored, while he leaves a conditional door open to dialogue with the United States.Kashin spoke to Harici Media in an interview.<\/p>\n
Vasily Kashin, who welcomed<\/strong> Harici Medya<\/em> at the university where he works in Moscow, answered questions from Tun\u00e7 Akko\u00e7 and Mehmet K\u0131van\u00e7.<\/p>\n Let\u2019s start with relations with the West in general. Do you view the West as a single bloc, or do you assess the United States differently from Europe? How do you see the future of relations between the West and Russia? Is it possible for these relations to return to their former state in the future?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Well, first of all, I think that after this very deep internal political change which happened in the United States, we cannot see the west as a single entity. There are a lot of processes happening simultaneously in the European Union as well, because a number of major European countries are now in state of very deep internal political crisis, notably France, where you have constant changes of cabinets of ministers, very unpopular president, etc. The same in Germany. So they’re all in simultaneous internal political crisis and the outcomes might be different in different countries.<\/p>\n I think that there is certainly no return to the relations which we had with the Western countries before 2022 and even before 2014, the Crimea, because the old model of relations was very closely connected to a specific political economic model which existed in Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union and which is seen by majority of population as extremely bad for countries development and in general illegitimate under that model. Under that political economic model, Russia was a major exporter of primarily energy resources and other natural resources as well, constantly running huge foreign trade and current account surpluses and investing these surpluses huge money, dozens of billions of dollars every year into the economy, primarily into the economy of European Union. So we supplied them with cheap resources, invested much of our profit into their economy, and got nothing in return. Absolutely no, no say in European politics. At the same time, we were heavily discriminated against. There was heavy discrimination against us in terms of access to technology, markets and investment.<\/p>\n If we compare Russia in 2000s with China, which was a communist country with very strong protectionism, China was allowed to buy pretty much anything they wanted in terms of European assets. They could easily buy high tech assets, for example. Even now they control major automakers such as Volvo and Saab. When Russia tried to do something like that, and there was specific case, for example, when Russia tried to buy German automaker Opel in 2000s because Russia wanted to use that to get better access to technology, develop the automotive sector in the country, etc. It was denied on political reasons and there were a number of other cases like that.<\/p>\n The globalist and pro European part of Russian elite was destructed<\/strong><\/p>\n So it was always a very bad deal in Russia for Russia. And it was based on the influence of very destructive and corrupt part of the Russian elite which was advocating these relations with Europe. I believe the major outcome of the war in Ukraine, in general terms, the one which started in 2014 and escalated in 22, is the destruction of this more globalist and pro European part of Russian political and business elite. Because especially the war of 2022 led to huge redistribution of power and wealth in Russia. Assets worth hundreds of billions of dollars which belong to the global part of the Russian business elite or to the European companies have been either confiscated or the owners were forced to sell them at much depreciated prices. Now different people control them. And no one wants to go back to this semi-colonial old model of Russian European relations. We simply don’t need our relations with Europe to be restored.<\/p>\n You mentioned that certain Russian elites managed or led relations in past years. Do these people still hold important positions in Russia?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Not any longer. Basically, if you watch the news here, every month you see a downfall of one or another person who controlled significant assets and probably played an important role in life of several regions of Russia for decades. Like typically that would be a guy who controlled assets here in Russia and then lived permanently somewhere in Europe and invested the profits he gained here in Russia, there in Europe. Now we don’t need this kind of people here. And usually there are perfectly legal reasons to relieve them of their Russian assets and charge them with some criminal misdeeds which they could probably commit quite long time ago and keep them away from our country. The removal of these people is in fact the main outcome of the current conflict, which is much more important than things which are happening, like in terms of territorial changes in Ukraine or something like that.<\/p>\n About U.S.\u2013Russia relations\u2026 After the Alaska meeting, I think there was some general hope, but so far nothing concrete has happened. Now, the discussion seems to focus on sanctions and other issues. How do you foresee the future of relations between the U.S. and Russia?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n I think there is still hope for Russian American relations. There’s absolutely no hope for Russian European relations. They will remain bad and they should never improve in the foreseeable future. For the Russian American relations, there is hope, but at the same time we should understand the American logic. They have several goals. First of all, they need to maintain their control over Europe, which is essential for them if they want to continue to fight for global supremacy. They need to navigate their politics among the European elites. They need to improve the credibility of Donald Trump inside of the United States. And there is also issue of specific approach of Donald Trump to deal making. He’s constantly keeping anyone he’s dealing with under pressure. Frequently changes the conditions, the approach seeking to psychologically destabilize the other side.<\/p>\n Russia needs certain conditions met, until then the war continues<\/strong><\/p>\n So clearly the Americans are interested in ending the Ukrainian war and partly stabilizing their relations with Russia. They’re interested in that for several reasons. One of the reasons is that Ukraine is consuming a lot of resources. Now, in money terms, Europeans are paying the most of it. But there are also other elements of the equation, including the very limited production capacity of the American defense industry, very limited American military resources. And they’re deepening arms race with China, which the United States are currently losing because China is in today’s world, China is industrial superpower number one, which surpasses the United States and Japan taken together by far, probably even United States, Japan and Germany taken together. And that means that he needs to concentrate on Pacific. He also is interested in weakening the political link between Russia and China. He understands that Russia will never oppose China, but he is interested in decreasing the intensity of the security cooperation.<\/p>\n And of course, there is another side of it. Ukraine is actually gradually losing this war. And there is an understanding that as time goes, the conditions for negotiating with Russia would become worse. So what he is trying now is trying to pressure us to make a deal as soon as possible and to make a deal which will not be very good for Russia. What he did now he’s going back to conditions of immediate ceasefire along the current frontline, something which Russia will never accept. Russia needs in order to stop the war… Russia needs a number of very important military political conditions to be met, and that includes Ukraine neutrality, certain limits on the future Ukrainian armed forces, and certain conditions related to the Ukrainian internal politics. For example, the current bans and prohibitions on Russian language and Russian Orthodox Church should be lifted. Until these conditions are met, war continues.<\/p>\n They don\u2019t want bargaining, they want to impose their own onditions<\/strong><\/p>\n The biggest problem now is because of the American pressure approach, we don’t actually have specific substantial talks, because to start discussing all these issues, we need to create negotiation teams on several baskets because all of them are very complex with Ukraine and with the United States, because even if we talk ceasefire, it’s ceasefire along front line, which is about 2000km long. It’s very complicated technical issue. You need to have teams of military experts who will have highly technical discussions, and that’s not happening. We need people who will discuss future security, what weapons can be deployed, where you also need teams of military experts doing that. You need teams of legal and political experts discussing the political issues. This is not happening. What we have now are just discussions at the very top level because between presidential representatives who are talking about specific, like some very general things. So they are avoiding discussions with us because they don’t want bargaining. They want to impose certain conditions on us. That’s not going to happen. They can increase sanctions. We are ready. They cannot destabilize us with sanctions. Everything basically, which could work was tried by Biden administration. If there is military escalation, then we are ready to any kind of escalation up to nuclear conflict. So we will not back down. So, at some point, I believe Trump understands that and we have some realistic discussion.<\/p>\n One scenario is this, does it seem realistic to you? If, at the end of the day, Trump says the U.S. will no longer support Ukraine but the conflict continues, do you think European involvement in Ukraine can be sustained without the U.S.?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n I believe Trump likes to tell us that he has an option of walking out of this conflict. He’s doing this to pressure us. In reality, there is no such option. United States are major participants of this war even if they don’t provide funds to Ukraine. For example, the variability of the Ukrainian armed forces to fight is based on their access to the American satellite reconnaissance data and to American communication satellite infrastructure. The whole command and control system is based on their access to Starlink. And all they have in terms of targeting is based on their access to satellite reconnaissance provided real time and their teams of Americans located in Eastern Europe working on processing all these data flows which are going to the Ukrainian military. There are American Avax planes patrolling, providing Ukrainians with real time radar data which is a major factor for resilience of the Ukrainian air defense system. There are huge amount of American signal intelligence assets deployed in Eastern Europe. Providing Ukrainians with data flows that all costs a lot of money. And he needs all of that somewhere in Asia. He will not be able to move anything to Asia as long as war continues. Because in this case the war effort collapses.<\/p>\n In the longer term, they cannot finance this war<\/strong><\/p>\n The Europeans have major problems with financial resources. That is why they are discussing the option of stealing frozen Russian assets now. The problem is that if they do so, if they confiscate Russian sovereign assets, that will have impact on behavior of all other countries which are keeping their assets in Europe, including Middle Eastern countries, China and others first. Second, there was huge redistribution of assets inside of Russia, but it’s far from being complete. The Europeans have been accumulating their assets in Russia for three decades. Huge amount. And of course, it’s much more than they can take from us. We will simply confiscate all of this and they will lose it forever. We can think also about some creative ways to increase impact on Europe, maybe doing something with intellectual property rights and other stuff. So they will lose a lot. And their credibility in the eyes of international investors, primarily Middle Eastern countries and East Asian countries, will be damaged and will do everything we can to exacerbate this damage. So they’re still reluctant to do so.<\/p>\n But even if they do so, Ukrainian defense effort alone requires $120 billion for the next year. And apart from that, there will be need in a lot of resources to sustain everyday work of the Ukrainian government. And we are working hard to increase the price because we are conducting bombardment of infrastructure. Almost every major European economy is in debt crisis. And most notably this is France, which has budget disaster. They have huge increase of public debt every month. But all others, including for example, Italy, Spain, even Germany, they’re all in pretty bad shape. They will have to spend huge amount of money. Even if they seize our resources, that will not solve the problem. In the longer term, they cannot finance this war. And they know that perfectly well. And this is why they are trying to escalate pressure and force us to accept this immediate ceasefire.<\/p>\n Trump\u2019s pressure on T\u00fcrkiye <\/strong>will not bring any results<\/strong><\/p>\n The next question is about T\u00fcrkiye. How do you foresee Russia\u2013T\u00fcrkiye relations, especially over the past year, given Ankara\u2019s improved ties with the West, particularly the Trump administration and the United States, as well as the European Union? President Erdo\u011fan recently visited the White House and signed an important energy deal. In this context, how do you see the future of Russia\u2013T\u00fcrkiye relations, given that Trump is pressuring T\u00fcrkiye to reduce or halt energy purchases from Russia?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Well, T\u00fcrkiye has been focused on increasing its independent role in regional and global politics and in increasing its strategic autonomy. And I believe that T\u00fcrkiye understands that it can gain much more from keeping the strategic autonomy than from siding with one or another country, especially with Trump, because no one actually knows where Trump will be in three years. And he will try to pressure T\u00fcrkiye. I don’t think it will bring any results in the long term. T\u00fcrkiye will be the main channel for the remaining Russian economic relations with Europe, which will still exist in some form, because we cannot fully separate, even in spite of the fact that our political relations are absolutely hostile. At the same time, T\u00fcrkiye will also need greater industrial and resource cooperation with Russia because T\u00fcrkiye will be developing its own economy which will require resources, not just energy resources, but many kind of resources. And there will be additional venues for industrial cooperation. We already have nuclear energy cooperation and some forms of defense industrial cooperation that could be increased. So in longer term, as long as T\u00fcrkiye remains an independent player which is pursuing its own national interest and not controlled by any external force, relations will be developing in generally positive way. We can have different views on some specific issues of Middle Eastern policies or policy on former Soviet space, but it doesn’t change the general picture. The two countries need each other and will make every effort from both sides, I believe, to have these differences contained.<\/p>\n Last questions about China. How do you evaluate the rivalry between the United States and China? Do you expect an escalation, trade war or hot war?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n There are very clear signs that both United States and China are expecting this escalation in the coming years. In case of China, it’s translated into very specific political decisions, including increases in stockpiling food and energy resources, which is dramatic during the last several years, changes in legislation which are allowing for additional mobilization of people and resources, holding economic mobilization exercises every year, increasing purely military activities, strengthening energy cooperation with Russia and Central Asia to ensure energy flows and many other moves besides. We should always remember that right now China is turning into third nuclear superpower in the world. They’re adding possibly hundreds of nuclear warheads every year. They’re already much more significant in terms of their nuclear capabilities than France and UK Taken together and they will probably be absolutely comparable to basically on the same level with US and Russia in early 2030s. That means that the whole logic of this rivalry changes.<\/p>\n China has very high probability of winning a regional war<\/strong><\/p>\n At some point there will be a resembling situation in Europe. Now United States and other NATO members want to oppose Russia in Ukraine, but they don’t dare to do anything directly. They can only work by the hands of Ukrainians. They can provide them with information, weapons guidance, etc. But they are not capable to fight Russia directly because they are afraid of nuclear escalation. Sooner or later we’ll see the similar picture in Asia. The difference is that in terms of resources, in terms of production capacity of defense industry, for example, in terms of size of economy, Russia is smaller than United States and of course smaller than European Union. China is having much more industrial capacity than the United States. And in some key areas which are the most important for today’s defense, China is having more resources than the rest of the world combined. For for example, in 2021, China controlled 80% of global production of small UAVs. And even now, almost all of the UAVs which are being used by both Russia and Ukraine in war are produced with major use of Chinese components, which includes microchips, small electric motors, controllers, accumulators, etc. In today’s war, as we know from the war in Ukraine, small attack UAVs, primarily FPV drones, are accounted for 80% of casualties, they are single most important instrument of war. And China is controlling the global production chains. It’s like situation like if we in early 20th century, prior to World War I, one country controlled like 80% of production of, you know, artillery shells. That would be a pretty predictable war in this case. Yes. So now we are having this situation.<\/p>\n Now it’s hard to judge the combat capabilities of the PLA because they have not been engaged in combat since late 80s. But in terms of defense industrial capacity, they have made it. They’re much stronger actually than the United States. And they have very high probability of winning regional war. Especially if the United States cannot fight directly and will try to supply someone there. Nothing compared to China in terms of production of certain types of weapons. So yeah, there will be a major conflict and they will carefully choose the timing and they will strike and probably they will win.<\/p>\n What does the alliance between Russia and China means for the world, not only for Russia, but for the future of the world and for the international community?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n It’s still not an alliance in Western terms. We are not closely aligned on all of the issues. Most importantly, we don’t have aligned policies in issues of the Asian politics. Russia has very close relations with India, for example, and Vietnam. Both India and Vietnam have territorial disputes with China and they consider China as a possible threat. Yet they are sourcing most of their weapons from Russia. Russia is main partner of India in terms of defense industry and supplying a lot of weapons to Vietnam. And this is one example how Russia is working completely independently from China.<\/p>\n There are scenarios under which we will fight together with China against USA<\/strong><\/p>\n Russia and China have common positions on issues of global governance because we both want to have the role of US and EU greatly reduced. This is first thing. Second, we are jointly opposing United States claims for global dominance. These are our common goals in global politics. And of course there is common border, common interest in security in neighboring areas and very good convergence of economies because we produce resources and Chinese having the greatest manufacturing base in the world. These are the pillars of our relations. We will never go against each other. It doesn’t mean that we will always align because, for example, Chinese are still interested in having good relations with European Union. The Europeans are rejecting them because they’re told by the Americans to do so. And they started confiscating Chinese assets in Europe, like what happened in Netherlands with Nexperia. But the Chinese are still trying to engage them. Russia is not trying to engage European Union. So there are differences, but there’s very close partnership and there are scenarios under which we will fight together against the United States.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Vasily Kashin is the Director of the Centre for Comprehensive European and International Studies at the Higher School of Economics (HSE) in Moscow. Kashin, born in Moscow in 1973, previously worked at leading think tanks such as the Valdai Discussion Club and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He is both an academic who knows […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":12114,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[174],"tags":[1211,529,805,503,87,207,2702,683,800,1812,822,1192],"class_list":["post-12113","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interview","tag-ceasefire","tag-china","tag-european-union","tag-headline","tag-investment","tag-nato","tag-peace-deal","tag-russia","tag-russia-ukraine-war","tag-russian-economy","tag-ukraine","tag-united-states"],"yoast_head":"\n