Kremlin Ramps Up Rhetoric on ‘Russia’s Compatriots Abroad’ to Justify Actions in Ukraine, Warns ISW

The Kremlin is increasingly promoting rhetoric about “Russia’s compatriots abroad”, including ethnic Russians and Russian-speakers, to justify its war in Ukraine and possibly create informational conditions for provocations in countries where Russian “compatriots” live.

This is what the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) warns.

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The Kremlin has also used the idea of ​​protecting “compatriots abroad” to justify the fact that Russian troops have occupied Transnistria since 1992, and Transnistrian officials may have made appeals regarding Transnistrians with Russian citizenship to create additional information conditions for the Kremlin to escalate Russian actions in Transnistria and Moldova.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on February 14 that Russia is “concerned” about Russian citizens in Transnistria and “will not allow them to become victims of another Western adventure.”

On February 28, the Seventh Transnistrian Congress of Deputies was held, where a number of decisions were adopted that are likely intended to provide the Kremlin with justifications for a wide range of possible escalating actions against Moldova – actions that the Kremlin could take both immediately and and in the long term.

The Congress of Transnistrian Deputies passed seven resolutions, including a request to the Russian State Duma and the Federation Council for Russian “protection” of Transnistria in response to alleged increasing pressure from Moldova. Transnistrian officials specifically used the word “defense” (zashchita), which means both “protection” and “defense,” in their request, presumably to set the stage for the Kremlin to interpret “defense” in a military sense if it so chooses.

In their request for Russian “protection,” Transnistrian officials cite the duties of Russia’s “peacekeeping mission” in Transnistria and the estimated 220,000 Russian citizens they say reside in Transnistria.

Transnistrian officials likely seek these calls to serve as a basis for possible Russian intervention in Transnistria and Moldova in the near or long term, as they match Russian justifications for previous interventions, most notably the incursions into Ukraine.

Kremlin officials and mouthpieces continue to set information conditions for using Transnistria and the pro-Russian Moldovan autonomous region of Gagauzia to destabilize Moldova, but have not yet indicated how and for what specific purpose they intend to use these information conditions.

These calls for Transnistria in particular do not call for specific actions by Russian forces and are likely broad in scope to provide the Kremlin with the widest range of possible courses of action (COA) for escalation and intervention aimed at destabilizing Moldova.

These appeals for Transnistria are also not time-bound and allow the Kremlin to make different appeals as it deems necessary or appropriate. The Transnistrian appeals create a long-term justification for the Kremlin to continue its escalation and interventions against Moldova, regardless of the outcome of the war in Ukraine.

After the congress of Transnistrian deputies, the Kremlin has not yet indicated an immediate path for escalation, although Russian President Vladimir Putin may address Transnistrian demands during his speech to Russia’s Federal Assembly on February 29.

Several developments of the scenario for Moldova are possible:

1. The Kremlin may decide to take no action immediately after the February 28 congress and allow the status quo between Transnistria and Moldova to remain.

2. The Kremlin may put increased diplomatic pressure on Moldova to repeal its recent Customs Code, which took effect on January 1, 2024. It has been described by pro-Russian separatists as economic warfare.

3. The Kremlin may also seek to send additional military aid to the Transnistrian forces in the future, although it is currently unclear how the Kremlin would hope to transport military equipment or personnel to Transnistria.

4. The Kremlin may step up hybrid operations aimed at destabilizing and further polarizing Moldovan politics and society ahead of Moldova’s accession negotiations to the European Union (EU) in June 2024 and Moldovan presidential elections in November 2024. to undermine and delay Moldova’s future accession to the EU.

5. The Kremlin may decide to formally annex Transnistria in the future to justify military intervention against Moldova in the long term. The Kremlin has previously used similar justifications, particularly the protection of Russian citizens and “compatriots” abroad, to justify military intervention against Georgia and Ukraine. No such signals are visible at this stage.

Ukrainian forces have reportedly carried out another strike on a Russian military unit in the occupied Donetsk region, again drawing the ire of Russian military bloggers and raising renewed concerns about Ukraine’s use of HIMARS systems. A Russian Telegram user claiming to be an employee of an unspecified branch of Russian special services reports that a Ukrainian HIMARS strike struck an assembly of personnel of the Navy’s 155th Infantry Brigade (Pacific Fleet) during a ceremony at the presentation of military awards in Olenovka, Donetsk region, on the night of February 27.

The Russian source claimed that the strike killed 19 people, including the brigade’s deputy commander, a major and a captain, and wounded 12 people, including the brigade commander, Colonel Mikhail Gudkov.

Ukraine launched a similar strike on February 20 in the Kherson region.

Russia continues to pursue actors it considers “foreign agents” to consolidate its control over the Russian information space ahead of the March 2024 presidential election.

On February 28, Russia’s State Duma passed a law banning Russians from promoting the content of individuals and organizations legally designated as “foreign agents,” as well as from promoting their own content on platforms that those “foreign agents” own.

ISW has already assessed that if this law is passed, it will affect the ability of Russian opposition media to operate and accurately report on events in Russia, and at least one Russian opposition journalist has already suspended his work due to the new advertising ban.

Russian publication RBC reported that major Russian advertising agencies now include unilateral termination clauses in their advertising contracts in case the Kremlin designates the client as a foreign agent during the term of the contract.

Russian opposition publication Verstka reported on February 28 that the Kremlin had more than doubled prosecutions of certain foreign agents for violating Russian censorship laws from 2022 to 2023, most often for allegedly spreading “fake ” information about the Russian military or promoting extremism.

Some Russian regional authorities are also stepping up efforts to crack down on violations of Russian censorship laws.

A Financial Times (FT) investigation published on February 27, based on leaked classified Russian military documents from 2008-2014, outlined Russia’s alleged criteria for using tactical nuclear weapons.

The FT reported that the documents showed Russia had developed war games to use tactical weapons and claimed the files showed Russia had a lower threshold for using nuclear weapons “if the desired outcome cannot be achieved by conventional means ” than Russian officials have ever publicly acknowledged.

The FT said the criteria for a nuclear response ranged from “enemy incursion into Russian territory” to more specific parameters such as “destroying 20% ​​of Russia’s strategic ballistic missile submarines”. The FT noted that unspecified experts confirmed the documents remained relevant to Russian nuclear doctrine despite being more than ten years old.

ISW cannot independently verify the legitimacy of the documents, but it has often noted that Russian actors have invoked nuclear rhetoric and threats to use nuclear weapons to target the Western information space and create anxiety aimed at undermining Western support for Ukraine.

Russia’s nuclear doctrine has long been established to include the possibility of using nuclear weapons in conventional warfare at thresholds much lower than those of Western nations.

Turkey and China appear to be aiming for their own negotiating platforms to settle the conflict in Ukraine, which the Kremlin is likely to use to advance its long-standing narratives of talks and war.

China’s Special Representative for Eurasian Affairs Li Xiu will visit EU countries, Ukraine and Russia from March 2 to conduct a round of shuttle diplomacy regarding a political solution to the Ukraine war.

Russia has previously taken advantage of China’s approach to a vaguely defined political peace plan for Ukraine to claim that China supports Russia’s military efforts in Ukraine, as ISW has already reported.

Similarly, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced on February 28 that Ankara is ready to provide another platform for talks to Russia and Ukraine.

The Kremlin is likely to use these proposed platforms as a weapon to advance the argument that Ukraine is the country that refuses to negotiate. ISW continues to assess that the Kremlin is not interested in good faith negotiations with Ukraine and has no interest in ending the war on terms other than those formulated by Russia.

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2024-02-29 13:37:00
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