I have often read in the past 6 months that, for historical reasons, mobilization would break the social contract Putin has with the masses and cause an uprising, but as we’ve seen, he is doing it anyways. Until now, it was all carrot, nobody’s forced to join but they’ll be paid a lot to fight. Now, it’s the stick.
Putin’s solution has been, unsurprisingly, to rely on lies and deceit. He talks about “partial mobilization of reservists” in his speech so that most people think “this doesn’t apply to me”. The actual text of the law is vague and open ended and there are tons of reports that the laws are not being respected and many people who in theory shouldn’t be eligible, have been conscripted anyways. Most likely so the Csar’s boyars could look good by fulfilling gubernatorial cannon fodder quotas.
It is also very likely the victims of mobilization will continue to disproportionately be poor, rural, low-information, politically disenfranchised minorities. This is usually always the case, but more-so here as a result of less political representation for those demographics.
Putin thinks he found a way to thread that needle and survive (politically and otherwise) and I wonder: Is he right? Has he found the right way to boil the frog, or will he be brought down sometime in the next year?
It’s hard to predict what will happen over the next 12 months. Many draftees are fleeing Russia, which isn’t good for Putin, and laws will be enacted to stop that. Still, I don’t think the overall situation is bad enough to threaten Putin’s power significantly.
Keep in mind he has done a very good job of killing or imprisoning most of his opposition, and the average Russian citizen isn’t willing to die for a cause likely to fail.
As long as Putin has the military behind him, he will be safe, at least for a while. As you said, most of the conscripts have been from poor rural regions. If that were to change, I think the populace might be more inclined to consider regime change, but it’s still a long shot. Only time will tell.
Unlike the U.S. where an opposition can build up until it is effective, Putin tends to forcefully put a stop to opposition as soon as it rises up. Unless it happens en masse, what you have is a “who will bell the cat?” situation.
I guess one question is, what is the actual percentage of the pool of potential draftees. Let’s just say that 10,000 have fled (and I genuinely have no idea of the numbers btw) and there are 10 million potential males of fighting age and useable physiology, will that be sufficient to not be “good for Putin”?
the Army demonstrated stellar incompetence and corruption, leading to a costly advance followed by panic retreat as the Ukrainians counterattacked.
in consequence they needed reinforcements.
but those reinforcements are directed towards low level units ( battalions of “volunteers”, criminals out of prison, out of shape civilians, drafted by force) that lacks morale and training, and weapons, and ammunition, and clothes…
the situation will likely continues to deteriorate for the Russians, and Putin will be subject to attacks from his right ( trigger happy ultra nationalists that are ready to go nuclear) and his left ( more level headed military that see the war can’t be wined and prefer a Putin-less Russia to a nuclear-obliterated Russia)
That’s not a bright future for him and may explain his lasts speeches were recorded.
Fair point, but the fact that the Russian people are now seeing able-bodied Russian men flee the country sends a message that at least they don’t want to be cannon fodder for the Ukrainian Army.
Your first paragraph answers your second paragraph. I think Putin probably expected to win in Ukraine, and win decisively. But he will have well calculated that if it doesn’t go well, Ukraine is a great place to dispose of your malcontents who may cause problems for him.
Indeed, the Russian military has always been mistreated and under-funded specifically so they can never threaten the security-state faction that protects Putin. The further degradation of the military serves to entrench Putin, not to dislodge him.
We will see Putin overthrown only when the FSB and allied security organs decide it’s in their interests to do so, and there is little to no visibility as to what’s happening behind the scenes.
If Putin does get overthrown, nobody should feel relieved, because his successor will definitely not be a Boris Yeltsin type. The brief period of liberalization and detent in the 1990’s is now seen universally as a mistake by Russian power brokers and will not be repeated.
Probably very true, and damn sad. This current invasion fiasco, and whatever follows, is going to leave Russia brooding paranoiacally in the corner, viewing the rest of the world with fear and suspicion, all the while possessing a massive nuclear arsenal.
…and nobody knows how well it works. Not even Putin himself.
The USA does not know how well their nukes really work, and I am sure the are way better than the Russian’s!
To the OP question: not likely. As the partial mobilization is, as already recognized in OP, almost certain to hit mostly at already marginalized segments of the Russian Federation’s population, it will not create the needed back pressure.
And for all I can ever see, the internal culture of the Russian military, when faced with a large pile of rusty, unmotivated, unwilling, unhappy individuals pressganged into service, will, alas, just be delight to have additional people they can abuse and brutalize. “I’ll give you something to be unhappy about!”
One could twist the 18th century aphorism that “Prussia is not a state with an army, it’s an army with a state”, into one to the effect that “Russia is a Secret Police with a state”.
Repressive states sustain themselves in that there is always someone who is perfectly willing to follow the orders to inflict cruelty on their own people, if not out of eagerness then out of “Well, what else can I do? Die? Jeopardize my family because they’re the relatives of the guy who defected? Why can’t everyone just submit and obey so I don’t need to endanger myself?”
I have seen statements that mobilization over Ukraine will probably break the social contract between the Russian population and Putin. I’m pretty certain it is correct, but I’m pretty sure Putin doesn’t care, and I’m not certain how large of a segment of the Russian population was aware they were part of a contract.
On top of that, yeah, 12 months can be a lifetime in a war. If you’d told me that Russia was going to invade and try to take all of Ukraine 12 months ago, I would have told you they didn’t have the manpower to do it. Coups move even faster than wars. If Putin thought he was going to be removed in 12 months, he’d be eliminating the people who could do it right now. If it happens, it will be quick.
I read a tweet speaking of 260.000 men leaving or having left russia over the past couple of days … seemed “way off” at first … but then again - say you have 50 border crossings with 5,000 people leaving each you have this number
concerning if putin will be overthrown - my gut feeling is YES … but it will be more of a grassroots (street) approach rather than a Machiavellian palace-revolt …
Even in very suppressed societies, sometimes a minor fact will have a huge and completely unpredictable impact or outcome (butterfly effect) - with its very own dynamics that are quite often irreversable.
Just like what seems to be going on in Iran right now … with the girl killed by the religious police … or a 30 cent fare increase in Santiago’s metro system 3 years ago that had mayor parts of Chile in flames, or Ceausescous final days.
I don’t see how that would work in practical terms, short of a protracted general strike or something of that sort. Even then, such a thing could be no more than a re-run of 1905 (tactical retreat followed by renewed crackdown on all those putting their heads above the parapet) or Feb-Oct 1917 (instability/irresolvable division over the war) - leading to some sort of coup d’état.
A convenient heart attack near an open window seems more likely, though it’s hard to imagine what alternative candidate the securocrats would be willing/forced to accept.
Putin will not be overthrown in a popular uprising. If/when he goes, it will be in a coup led by someone already in a position of power who is calculating that he will immediately be able to win popular support by rescinding the mobilisation plans.
my understanding is that putin went to great lengths to avoid people getting into positions of aggregated power (e.g. through lots of “divide and conquer” breakup of structures …)
Also - and along the same line - name a couple of russian politicians (I sure could not come up with a list of 5-10 runner-ups except the kremlin speaker (the guy that looks like a 1980ies footballer), Lavrov and the Chechen-Gucci guy …)