Henry Kissinger: Putin’s survival unlikely if Ukraine wins

The president may Vladimir Putin find it difficult to stay in power if the war in Ukraine forces to Russia to abandon the military offensive and accept a peace agreement with Europesaid former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.

“I would like a Russia that recognizes that its relations with Europe must be based on agreement and a kind of consensus, and I think that this war, if it ends properly, could make that possible.”Kissinger said in an interview with John Micklethwait, editor-in-chief of Bloomberg. When asked if Putin could survive in power if the war ended on those terms, Kissinger replied: “It’s unlikely”.

The diplomat said that it is important that, after the war is over, Ukraine emerges as a solid democracy, and that it is preferable to avoid “the dissolution of Russia or the reduction of Russia to resentful impotence” that threatens to stoke new tensions.

He described Putin as a “Dostoyevsky-like figure beset by ambivalence and unrealizable aspirations”who was very capable of wielding power as a leader and used it “in excess” in relation to Ukraine.

The June 7 interview in New York was a retrospective of Kissinger’s life and career after his recent 100th birthday.

Putin has frequently hosted Kissinger in Russia during his nearly quarter-century tenure in the Kremlin and, in a 2012 meeting, said their relationship dated back to the mid-1990s, when he was prime vice-president of the government. from Saint Petersburg.

Kissinger said in his interview with Bloomberg that Putin was both the heir to a traditional Russian outlook and someone who grew up on the streets of Leningrad—now Saint Petersburg—where more than half the population starved to death during World War II and He faced a constant threat.

putin “He translated that into not wanting European military power to be within arm’s reach of Saint Petersburg and major cities like Moscow,” and reacted “on the verge of irrationality” before its expansion, Kissinger said.

While the US and its allies did well to resist Russia’s attack on Ukraine, it is “Increasingly important” for the parties to the conflict to assess how they want to end it through diplomacy, Kissinger said.

There is a risk that military relations between the powers will dominate geopolitical thinking and turn the war into a global conflict by attracting countries like China, he added.

“Europe will become more stable, the world will become more stable, when Russia accepts the fact that it cannot conquer Europe, but it has to remain part of Europe by some kind of consensus like other states do.”indicated.