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The Western debate on the Russian Federation’s geopolitical stance often tends to oscillate between two equally misleading extremes: underestimating its capacity for influence or, conversely, portraying the Kremlin as an all-powerful puppeteer capable of pulling the strings of every global crisis. Reality, as is often the case, paints a more complex and, in some respects, more alarming picture. Vladimir Putin’s strategy is not the product of infallible imperial planning, but rather a systematic elaboration of the doctrine of asymmetric warfare. Where Moscow cannot compete with the West on an economic level or in terms of conventional military technology, it exports and weaponises the only commodity of which it currently has an abundance: chaos.
As recently highlighted by analyses in The Times, the Kremlin has realised that to ease the pressure on the Ukrainian front and erode the cohesion of liberal democracies, it is not necessary to win a symmetrical war; it is sufficient to make the world a more insecure, fragmented and costly place to manage for Washington and European capitals.
Sabotage as a doctrine: ‘Phase Zero’ at the heart of Europe
This strategy manifests itself in a fluid and asymmetric form at the very heart of Western Europe, defined by security analysts as a full-blown ‘Phase Zero’ campaign. The fundamental objective is not conventional military aggression, but the constant internal destabilisation of Western countries through attrition operations that deliberately skirt the threshold for triggering NATO’s Article 5. Compared with the early digital disinformation campaigns, the techniques employed on the ground have undergone an impressive logistical and technological leap forward, focusing on three main areas:
- The shadow fleet as an attack platform: The movements of the Russian shadow fleet in the Baltic Sea and the North Sea have taken on a clear strategic and military significance. These commercial vessels, originally used to circumvent oil sanctions, operate constantly with their transponders switched off, serving as covert platforms for electronic warfare managed by the GRU. The aerial incursions and repeated GPS blackouts recorded in the skies over the Baltic and on the borders of Poland, Romania and Estonia are not mere provocations, but systematic tests to map the vulnerabilities of Western defence and tracking systems.
- Underwater warfare and infrastructural blindness: The targeted damage to critical infrastructure is no longer a matter of chance. Co-ordinated acts of sabotage against the undersea fibre-optic cables between Finland and Germany and between Sweden and Lithuania, combined with the disruption of the Estlink 2 power cable, demonstrate Moscow’s ability to strike at the vital nerve centres of European connectivity and energy supply. Digitally or energetically isolating certain areas of the continent serves to trigger panic, demonstrating the extreme vulnerability of Western civilian life.
- ‘On-demand’ sabotage and disposable operatives: Polish, German and Lithuanian intelligence agencies have traced a significant evolution in infiltration networks. Instead of deploying professional spies who are easily intercepted, Russian services recruit petty criminals, saboteurs and vulnerable individuals directly online via Telegram and social media channels. This ‘disposable’ foot soldiers, paid in cryptocurrencies, are deployed to carry out low-cost acts of sabotage with a high psychological impact, such as the spate of arson attacks that struck shopping centres and logistics hubs across Central Europe. Added to this is the escalation towards physical threats against the top executives of strategic Western companies, as confirmed by the foiled plot against the CEO of Rheinmetall.
The ‘tactical spoiler’ in global theatres
The second pillar of this ‘grammar of disorder’ is the role of tactical spoiler in crisis theatres outside Europe, with particular reference to the Middle East. Moscow lacks the resources to stabilise the region, nor does it have any political interest in doing so. On the contrary, the prolongation of conflict and instability represents a clear geopolitical dividend.
Through asymmetric intelligence support and the sharing of satellite data with state and parastatal actors hostile to the West (starting with its alliance with Tehran), Russia pursues a twofold objective: on the one hand, to force the United States to divert financial, diplomatic and military resources to the Middle East, drawing attention away from the Eastern European front; on the other, to fuel inflationary spikes linked to maritime trade routes and energy costs, directly undermining the political stability and public support for Western governments.
Moscow’s paradox: the war economy and Chinese vassalage
However, a genuinely conservative and realist analysis cannot stop at the surface of the threat; it must lay bare its intrinsic contradictions. This architecture of global disorder conceals a profound structural vulnerability. Russia is squandering its future to sustain the present.
The most recent macroeconomic data reveal the clear limitations of the Russian war economy. The collapse in hydrocarbon revenues and the drastic reduction in the sovereign wealth fund’s liquid assets demonstrate that the total militarisation of domestic industry is cannibalising civilian productive sectors, fuelling domestic inflation. But the most politically significant fact is another: the illusion of ‘absolute sovereignty’ trumpeted by Kremlin propaganda has resulted in accelerated geopolitical and economic vassalage to Beijing.
With China now handling over 35 per cent of Russia’s foreign trade and supplying almost all the dual-use technological components that circumvent sanctions, Moscow has relinquished its strategic autonomy. The price Putin is paying for destabilising the West is Russia’s transformation into a subordinate and dependent trading partner of the People’s Republic of China.
Beyond bureaucracy: the need for sovereign resilience
Faced with this asymmetric threat, the response of Western nations cannot be purely bureaucratic or limited to mere declarations of principle. The defence of open societies hinges on the ability to counter asymmetry with the resolve of realism and infrastructural sovereignty.
This means, first and foremost, investing heavily in the security, surveillance and redundancy of critical national infrastructure, by enhancing maritime, cyber and land-based patrol systems for borders and energy and digital backbone networks. Secondly, it is necessary to understand that deterrence is not an abstract concept, but is based on the credibility of force, the timeliness of response and economic resilience. Publicly exposing Russia’s structural weaknesses and its total dependence on Beijing must become an integral part of our strategic posture.
Global chaos is the weapon of those who know they cannot win an open contest in terms of development, technology and freedom. Recognising this does not mean lowering our guard, but rejecting doomsday scenarios and resuming strategic policy-making with the firmness, clarity and realism that the times demand.