- The Russia-Ukraine war has dealt multiple setbacks to Vladimir Putin, the director of the CIA says.
- William J. Burns said in an op-ed that the war had “proved foolish and illusory” for Putin.
- The invasion, Burns said, had weakened Russia’s military and economy.
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Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has crippled its economy and left it beholden to China, says William J. Burns, the director of the CIA.
“Russia’s economy is suffering long-term setbacks, and the country is sealing its fate as China’s economic vassal,” Burns wrote in an opinion article for Foreign Affairs on Tuesday.
Russia has been struggling under the West’s crippling economic sanctions ever since it invaded Ukraine in February 2022. But the ties between Russia and China have only deepened, with bilateral trade reaching a record $240 billion in 2023, Chinese customs data showed.
“Putin’s war has already been a failure for Russia on many levels,” Burns wrote in his article. “His original goal of seizing Kyiv and subjugating Ukraine proved foolish and illusory.”
China needs this deal as much as Russia does. China lost a major state backed real estate developer named Evergrande to a massive $300B debt and is desperate to make money on exports to fill in the gap. Russia can’t buy anything except for products supplied by China, Iran, and a few other outliers so they are stuck paying whatever prices are asked. China will probably drain Russia of a generations worth of wealth, condemning them to more hardship years in the future. Some resentful, prescient Russians will then sow the seeds of contempt against their biggest neighbor.
The future is dark and there is no good.