Russia in global affairs

My previous article discussed the unprecedentedly dangerous situation in which we now find ourselves (Karaganov, 2024). In this article, I outline the new policies and priorities that Russia, as I believe, should adopt, building upon Russia’s National Security Strategy (2021) and especially its Foreign Policy Concept (2023).

I have long been watching the world inexorably moving towards a wave of military conflicts threatening to develop into a third world thermonuclear war that can in all likelihood destroy human civilization. This prognosis was one of the main reasons why I published a series of articles about why it is necessary to restore the credibility of nuclear deterrence, which kept the world safe for more than fifty years.

In mid-June, I published an article titled “Nuclear weapons use can save humanity from global catastrophe” in Profil magazine. It was posted in Russian and in English almost simultaneously on the Russia in Global Affairs journal’s website. [1] It was widely reprinted around the world, sparking a tsunami of responses, objections, and debates, tens of thousands of reactions. There was also no shortage of words of support, either.

Constructive destruction is not aggressive. Russia maintains it isn’t going to attack anyone or blow them up. It simply doesn’t need to. The outside world provides Russia with more and more geopolitical opportunities for medium-term development as it is.

Millions of pages have been written about the history and theory of the Cold War. I will give you one more interpretation. The Cold War is one of the types of international competition for resources (territory, population, and economic potential per se) that has accompanied humanity throughout its history.

The crisis will by all means exacerbate dramatically the growing inequality and the sense of injustice ingrained in the modern capitalism, and further reduce the already shrunk middle class in developed countries. Most will become poorer, but especially in poorer countries.