WASHINGTON (AP) — After more than a two-week war that he expected to dominate in two days, Vladimir Putin is showing anger, frustration at the failures of his military, and a willingness to cause more violence and destruction in Ukraine, according to US intelligence. officials.
Officials have publicly said in recent days that they are concerned that the Russian president will escalate the conflict to try to break Ukraine’s resistance. Russia still has an overwhelming military advantage and could bombard the country for weeks to come. And while the rest of the world reacts to the horrific images of the war he has launched, Putin remains insulated from internal pressures by what CIA director William Burns has called a “propaganda bubble.”
Putin’s attitude – difficult as it may be to determine from a distance – is crucial for the West to understand, as it provides more military assistance to Ukraine, and also prevents Putin from directly attacking NATO countries or possibly reaching for the nuclear button. Intelligence officials testified before Congress for two days last week, openly expressing concern about what Putin might do. And these fears are increasingly shaping discussions about what U.S. policymakers are willing to do for Ukraine.
In two decades, Putin has achieved complete dominance of the Russian government and security services, running a tiny inner circle, marginalizing dissent and imprisoning or killing his opposition. He has long criticized the collapse of the Soviet Union, dismissed Ukraine’s claim to sovereignty, and speculated that the nuclear war would end and the Russians would become “martyrs.” Burns told lawmakers that he believes Putin “was stewed for years in a combustible mixture of discontent and ambition.”
According to Burns, Putin expected to capture Kyiv in two days. Instead, his army was unable to take control of the major cities and had already lost several thousand soldiers. The West has imposed sanctions and other measures that have hurt the Russian economy and lowered the standard of living of both oligarchs and ordinary citizens. Much of the foreign exchange that Russia has hoarded as a defense against sanctions is now frozen in foreign banks.
Burns is a former US ambassador to Moscow who has met Putin many times. In response to a question about the Russian president’s mental state, he told lawmakers he didn’t think Putin was crazy.
“I think Putin is angry and upset right now,” he said. “He will probably redouble his efforts and try to crush the Ukrainian army, regardless of civilian casualties.”
According to Burns, Russia’s recent unsubstantiated allegations that the US is helping Ukraine develop chemical or biological weapons suggest that Putin himself may be willing to deploy those weapons as part of a “false flag” operation.
There is no obvious way to end the war. It is almost unbelievable that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has won worldwide admiration for leading his country’s resistance, would suddenly recognize Russia’s annexation of Crimea or support granting new autonomy to Russian-friendly parts of eastern Ukraine. And even if he takes Kyiv and topples Zelensky, Putin will have to answer for a Western-backed insurgency in a country of more than 40 million people.
“He doesn’t have a sustainable political endgame in the face of fierce resistance from Ukrainians,” Burns said.
Avril Haynes, director of national intelligence under President Joe Biden, said that Putin “sees this war as a war he cannot afford to lose. But what he might take for a win may change over time, given the significant expense he incurs.”
Intelligence analysts believe that Putin’s recent increase in Russia’s nuclear alert “was probably intended to deter the West from providing additional support to Ukraine,” she said.
The White House’s concern about the escalation of the conflict has upset both Democrats and Republicans at times. While initially voicing support, the Biden administration has in recent days refused to support Poland’s plan to transfer Soviet-era military aircraft to Ukraine, which would have required U.S. involvement in the transfer. The administration has previously delayed imposing sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline and will not send Stinger air defense missiles to Ukraine until it changes course.
Answering a question on Thursday, Haynes said Putin could view the transfer of the aircraft as a bigger deal than the anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons already being sent to Ukraine. Haynes did not say whether the US had intelligence to support this conclusion.
US Representative Mike Quigley, an Illinois Democrat who sits on the House Intelligence Committee, said the Biden administration was “always a step or two late” for fear of provoking Putin. He urged the White House to quickly agree to the transfer of aircraft.
“I think it’s like nitpicking,” Quigley said. “If anyone thinks that Putin is going to differentiate and differentiate — ‘Oh, well, they’re taking off from Poland’ — they see this as an escalation.”
Meanwhile, as violence escalates and more Russians die, the West is also watching for any signs of holes in Putin’s “propaganda bubble.” One independent Russian political scientist, Kirill Rogov, wrote on his Telegram account that the war was “lost” and an “epic failure.”
“The mistake was the idea that the West does not want to resist aggression, that it is sluggish, greedy and disunited,” Rogov wrote. “The idea that the Russian economy is self-sufficient and secure was a mistake. The mistake was the idea of the quality of the Russian army. And the main mistake was the idea that Ukraine is a failed state, and Ukrainians are not a nation.
“Four mistakes in making one decision is a lot,” he said.
Prior to the invasion, a poll by the Levada Center, Russia’s leading independent research firm, showed that 60% of respondents considered the US and NATO to be the “initiators” of the conflict in eastern Ukraine. Only 3% answered Russia. The poll was in January-February, and the Levada Center has not published new polls since the beginning of the war.
Outsiders are hoping that ordinary Russians will respond to the drastic decline in living standards and find honest images of the war through relatives and online, including using VPN software to bypass the Kremlin’s social media blockages. Russian state television continues to broadcast false or unconfirmed claims about the US and Ukrainian governments and promote the idea that Russia cannot afford to lose the war.
“Otherwise, it will lead to the death of Russia itself,” Vladimir Solovyov, a prime-time talk show host on the state-run Rossiya 1 TV channel, said on his daily radio show last week.
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Associated Press contributor Lynn Berry contributed to this report.