Robert Legvold

Mar 15, 2024 | russiamatters.org | Olga Kiyan |Robert Legvold |Conor Cunningham |Karen Donfried

Russia’s presidential election, whose outcome is near certain to grant Vladimir Putin a fifth term, got underway on March 15. Given the inevitability of Putin’s victory in what one Kremlin-connected insider has described as a “well-designed simulation,” one might wonder what impact the Russian election has on the U.S. and its allies. We asked some leading Western experts on Russia whether the election matters to the U.S. and its allies and, if so, how.

Mar 14, 2024 | russiamatters.org | Simon Saradzhyan |Olga Kiyan |Robert Legvold |Conor Cunningham

On March 13, President Vladimir Putin granted an interview, in which he again delved into the conditions under which he says he would initiate the use of nuclear weapons. His remarks were so ambiguous that it caused mainstream Western media organizations—which tend to agree on what to emphasize in news out of the Kremlin—to put divergent headlines on the news stories that they ran about this particular interview. “Putin, in Pre-Election Messaging, Is Less Strident on Nuclear War.

Mar 13, 2024 | russiamatters.org | Olga Kiyan |Robert Legvold |Alex Horton |Conor Cunningham

Can Ukraine hold the line in 2024? That would be the best-case scenario—according to John Mearsheimer, a University of Chicago professor and one of the leading proponents of “restraint” in American foreign policy. Interviewed on a recent episode of the “Daniel Davis Deep Dive” podcast, Mearsheimer has claimed that he considers  “ridiculous” the idea that Ukraine will be able to take the offensive in 2024 or 2025.

Mar 6, 2024 | russiamatters.org | Conor Cunningham |Olga Kiyan |Robert Legvold |Alex Horton

March 07, 2024 Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas was quoted on Jan. 17, 2024, as saying that every member of the so-called Ramstein group should channel the equivalent of 0.25% of their gross domestic product to Kyiv annually, which “would raise at least €120 billion ($131 billion) and swing the conflict in Ukraine’s favor,” according to Bloomberg.

Feb 23, 2024 | russiamatters.org | Robert Legvold |William Alberque |Olga Kiyan |Conor Cunningham

The fundamental questions raised by the war in Ukraine are like the two sides of a coin: on one side, there is the overarching but largely ignored question of how the war is reshaping an international system released from its moorings and lurching in uncertain directions; on the other side, the elusive but no less consequential question of how this untethered international system is affecting the course and prospective outcome of the war.