Russian bombers testing the RAF hark back to cold war for Putin and the west

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/19/russian-bombers-raf-flight-west-putin-cold-war-nato

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The sight of Russian long-range nuclear bombers testing the RAF in the skies off Cornwall has brought home the perils faced daily by the inhabitants of eastern Ukraine and reignited inflammatory talk of a new cold war with Russia.

Against a background of overt and tacit threats to former satellite states, tit-for-tat spy expulsions, high-risk military games of chicken, gas supply cut-offs, and angry diplomatic exchanges, it seems the west is rapidly rewinding to the bad old days of confrontation with Soviet Russia.

And as the Ukraine ceasefire appears to unravel, the question on the lips of every western leader, army general, business analyst and spy chief is: what does Vladimir Putin want?

The Russian president’s apparent bad faith in honouring the Minsk peace accord is seen as part of a pattern of threatening behaviour that has raised tensions across Europe. Russia’s armed forces, both nuclear and conventional, are formidable, and have global reach.

Despite the falling oil price, sharp devaluation of the rouble and western economic sanctions, Putin continues, undeterred, to spend heavily on Russia’s military and its nuclear weapons arsenal. The country’s 2014 military budget was about $70bn, with only the US and China spending more. It is set to rise this year to $84bn.

Related: After separatists' victory in Debaltseve, will Putin stick or twist?

Russia’s navy comprises the Northern Fleet, based at Murmansk, the Baltic Fleet, Black Sea Fleet, Caspian Flotilla, and Pacific Fleet, while the army, partly based on conscription, is believed to number about 300,000 men – Britain’s army totals about 86,000.

American estimates suggest Russia has approximately 1,500 deployed strategic nuclear warheads, plus more than 1,000 in reserve. It can also deploy 2,000 tactical nuclear warheads. Missile system platforms included land-based silos, submarines, and air-launched warheads.

Of particular alarm to analysts is Russia’s development of new nuclear-armed cruise missiles and long-range submarines as 1980s arms control treaties expire. So-called close encounters with Russia’s conventional military have grown exponentially in the past year, from the Arctic Circle to the Mediterranean.

Russia’s air force, of particular concern to Britain, comprises 38 advanced fighter squadrons, including MiG29s, 15 Su-24 bomber squadrons and 14 assault squadrons, plus other assets.

David Cameron, criticised for his silence over Russia’s actions, is now showing increased urgency. He waded in on Wednesday after it became clear the Moscow-armed separatists had Ukraine’s army on the run. “We must not allow people to cause instability and bully their neighbours,” he said.

Defence secretary Michael Fallon went further. He warned that the Baltic republics – Nato members Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – could be next. “Nato has to be ready for any kind of aggression from Russia, whatever form it takes. Nato is getting ready,” Fallon said.

This all seems slightly hysterical. Looked at from Putin’s perspective, Russia is more attacked than aggressor. His narrative of national victimhood begins in 1989 with the fall of the Berlin Wall and the subsequent “tragic” implosion of the Soviet Union.

Related: Ukrainian soldiers share horrors of Debaltseve battle after stinging defeat

Argument still rages over whether the then US secretary of state James Baker promised President Mikhail Gorbachev in 1990 that Nato would not enlarge up to Russia’s borders. Whatever people say now, Putin insists the promise was made – and cynically broken.

In Putin’s mind, Nato’s expansion is matched by EU enlargement into central and eastern Europe, which he views as little more than another American-inspired attempt to deny Russia its traditional spheres of influence in its “near abroad”.

Putin’s grievances, real and imagined, include overbearing US militarism in the Middle East, notably in Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan, and in its crude attempts to dictate the future of Syria and Iran.

Western domination of global political and economic forums such as the UN security council and the G7 have led him to alternative international structures such as the Eurasian Economic Union and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation.

Putin is actively building bilateral ties with China, including big oil and gas export deals, as a way of off-setting US influence and reducing Russia’s dependency on European energy markets.

Yet Putin is not merely reactive and pragmatic. He is, equally, an opportunist and an ideologue – a passionate, patriotic Russian nationalist, fiercely proud of the Motherland (the beloved Rodina) and determined to restore lost greatness. It is this sense of mission that makes him truly dangerous and unpredictable.

But it is Putin’s belief in western, especially American weakness – even moral decadence – that is perhaps most threatening of all.

Peering out from his Kremlin perch, Putin sees a European continent divided between wealthy and poor countries, between north and south, and senses an opportunity. He sees a Nato alliance similarly riven yet, like the EU, united in its wish to avoid an open fight with Russia.

He sees a risk-averse US president who, his many domestic critics say, has abandoned America’s global leadership role. He sees, in the end of the American unipolar moment, a chance to forge a Bush-ian new world order conformable to his authoritarian, paternalistic philosophy.

Putin sees himself, above all, as a muscular champion and guardian of traditional, patriotic and national values and of familial, religious and sexual orthodoxy. The legacy he draws on is neither Soviet nor Marxist-Leninist, but imperial. What Putin wants is power and pre-eminence, personal and national.

In Russia, a tsar is born.