Russia Archives - ICDS

The Stolen Children: How Russia Attempts to Kidnap Ukraine’s Future

In the first weeks into the full-scale invasion, Ukraine alerted the international community that the Moscow authorities were deporting children from the occupied territories under the plan to put them up for adoption in Russia. Since then, the U.N., the OSCE, the European Parliament, and the U.S. State Department have thrown their weight behind the accusations. The number of confirmed victims is growing by the day, whereas hundreds of thousands of children are suspected to have already been deported. Yet little has been – and can be – done to stop this crime.

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Commentary

How Moscow Turned Its Far East into Beijing’s Raw Material Colony

Today, all analytical attention seems to be focused on the full-scale war that Russia has unleashed against Ukraine. However, thousands of kilometres away, some events are taking place that can have no less impact on the prospects of world geopolitics.

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Commentary

Let Us Not Deceive Ourselves: Western Unity Is Fragile

A common Western policy on Russia requires a herculean effort. Yet European unity will be short-lived unless—once the war ends—Ukraine receives the only security guarantee that has proven effective—that is, membership in NATO.

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Publications

Why Russia Went to War: A Three-Dimensional Perspective

Since Ukraine’s independence became a recognised fact in 1991, the spectre of war with Russia has arisen on several occasions, only to subside. To many outsiders, the war of 2014 was a ‘hybrid war’ launched by ‘separatists backed by Russia’, rather than a fully-fledged war, and the ‘Minsk process’ was defusing it. Until the United States presented details of Russian war plans at the end of 2021, very few observers expected Russia to transgress the bounds of coercive intimidation in its dealings with Ukraine. Once war broke out in February 2022, the pervasive question was ‘why?’

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Publications

Iran’s Defence Industry: What’s in Stock for Russia?

Albeit heavily sanctioned and exhausted by the Islamic revolution and the war with Iraq, Iran has managed to upbuild a self-sufficient defence industry from the ashes and demonstrate a robust weapon system manufacturing capacity over the last decades. It started with low-tech reverse-engineering of 3rd generation fighters and tanks and ended with indigenously producing high-accuracy and long-range ballistic missiles.

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Publications

Europe’s Indo-Pacific Tilt: Estonian and Japanese Interests

Reshaped by the new great power competition, the international order has been undergoing revolutionary transformations. Revanchist Russia has unleashed a barbarian war against a sovereign European nation, while increasingly militarised and contentious China looms as a not-so-insidious threat in the Indo-Pacific. In response to these shifting dynamics and mounting geopolitical tensions, Europe is now awakening to the new reality and paying greater attention to the far-away region.

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Publications

Children of War: The Ukrainian Case

The war in Ukraine has imposed considerable physical, mental, and emotional damage on children. It is critical to provide mental health and psychosocial support (MPHSS), as well as to reinforce psychological and social infrastructure—in Ukraine and countries hosting refugees—to help them cope with the immediate trauma of war and promote resilience for future reconstruction efforts.

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Publications

Putin’s Counterintelligence State

It is far from inevitable that the looming historical defeat of the Russian armed forces in their full-blown invasion of Ukraine will shutter the core of the counterintelligence state. On the contrary, the growing militarisation and securitisation of Russian society will most likely bring the Federal Security Service (FSB), the regime’s ‘sword and shield,’ to the forefront as a primary instrument of maintaining subservience and order.

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Commentary

Bits versus Bombs: Observations on Russian Offensive Cyber Operations in Ukraine

When Russian tanks rolled across the Ukrainian border on 24 February and reports surfaced of a parallel attack against the satellite provider Viasat, an ominous signal was given that the war had also escalated in cyberspace.

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Publications

Between Ostpolitik and Zeitenwende—Germany’s Dual Dependence on China and Russia

In the spirit of Chancellor Willy Brandt’s Ostpolitik, Germany prioritised commercial ties with Russia and China over the geopolitical risks they carried. Eventually—it hoped—the autocratic economic partners would liberalise and ‘change through trade.’ Now, winds of change have been blowing in Berlin for almost a year.

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