笨狼發牢騷
發發牢騷，解解悶，消消愁
中國12月社融增量2.37萬億 新增人民幣貸款1.13萬億 - 華爾街見聞
Ukraine also has access to NATO procurement system. In selected aspects, it is already a member of NATO. https://t.co/UvfZXLgmTn
— Leonid Ragozin (@leonidragozin) January 15, 2022
劉海影：麵對內需不足局麵，應堅定不移地走市場化改革開放路線，以是否改善民企處境、是否有利於建立民間對政策規則的穩定預期為改革標準。
2021年年底的中央經濟工作會議指出，“我國經濟發展麵臨需求收縮、供給衝擊、預期轉弱三重壓力”。三重壓力中，需求收縮無疑是最嚴重的挑戰，供給衝擊不過是一次性事件，預期轉弱本就是對需求收縮的認知映射。曾幾何時，中國經濟引擎的轟鳴馬達響起的是“錢太多”的回音，世界第一大消費市場的頭銜也是吸引跨過公司熱情湧入的頭號理由，當前中國卻需要直麵需求不足的挑戰，原因幾何？
疫情不是充分的理由。對比一下，疫情肆虐的美國，消費迭創新高，帶動美國通貨膨脹創出近40年新高；很多其他國家同樣如此，以至於2021年全球貨物貿易量將增長10.8%，全球通貨膨脹率也創出10年新高。
從宏觀經濟學角度看，需求不僅是消費，也包括投資與淨出口；需求不足也不是絕對概念，而是相對於中國經濟龐大的供應能力而言，需求有所不足。從某個角度講，需求不足反證了中國經濟的成功，表明中國經濟體供給能力維持了持續多年的高速擴張。在理想情況下，持續擴張的供給能力產生持續增長的收入，並帶動持續增長的需求，達成一個完美平衡（所謂的“黃金律”）。在這樣一個完美狀態中，不存在需求不足。事實上，在中國經濟騰飛的前35年，這一完美狀態幾乎就是現實——雖然欠缺的那一點，正好如滾雪球般導致了今日需求不足的事實。
那麽，中國經濟的需求不足問題，成因何在？
房地產結構性問題
一個可能的答案是房地產行業的結構問題。在批評者眼中，中國超高的房價收入比水平在擠出了居民消費之餘，抬高了實體經濟運行成本，抑製了實體投資。在去年房地產形勢急轉直下之後，經濟學家也立即指出，房地產行業的直接與間接貢獻，占據了中國GDP的25%~30%左右份額，房地產行業衰退迅速導致實體經濟的不景氣，構成需求不足的最直接原因。
從數據上看，中國房地產行業的問題可以以“四高”來概括：
房地產行業在建規模巨大，按照商品房平均售價計算其建成價值達到100萬億元，占GDP比例從20年前的15.5%上升到現在的88%；
這一巨大的在建規模由房地產企業巨大的總負債來融資建設，其數額按照全行業總資產減去淨權益來計算，達到95萬億元（含預付款等無息負債與貸款、債券等有息負債），占GDP比例從20年前的19%上升到現在的85%；
而房企之所以願意並有能力進行如此大規模的負債建設，是受到居民同等力度的購買行為的支持，而後者以快速增長的居民負債為支撐，其規模近年來快速上升，到2021年占GDP比例達到60%，占居民可支配收入比例超過100%。
上述三高推動中國房價多年來快速上漲，以上海為例，按照numbeo提供的數據，上海的房價收入比高達43倍，對比之下同樣作為全球金融中心的美國紐約市該值僅為10倍，上海房價在這個意義上是紐約房價的4.3倍。
這種情況下，房地產行業持續多年的超級繁榮事實上建立在巨大的供需不平衡基礎上。我們可以從每年新結婚人數、新市民人數所對應的剛需以及市民改善型需求三個角度，來粗略匡算中國家庭的住宅需求，按照行業人士譚奎提供的數據，在一定假設下，中國居民住宅需求變化軌跡如圖。可以看出，2013年之前，基本格局是供不應求，從2013年開始，住宅供給超過了住宅需求，2015年開始的棚改新政進一步放大了供需缺口，到2021年這一缺口達到驚人的4.4億方，也構成了房地產形勢轉折的最大背景。按照這一估算，住宅需求將在10年左右時間跌至9億方左右，相比較於2021年15.5億方米的供給缺口41%。
多年繁榮之下，中國房地產行業、建築行業中住宅建築部分對中國經濟直接與間接貢獻占據GDP比例高達27.9%，超過美國、歐洲等國水平的2倍有餘。
換言之，與大家的認知相反，事實上中國經濟本可能在更早的時間就展現出需求不足問題，而房地產行業與居民的加杠杆運動創生了超前的需求，從而延後了這一問題的暴露。
現在，房地產行業在2021年下半年的下滑，隻是對過去多年額外需求的修複。考慮到中國居民債務占中國居民可支配收入（按照國民經濟資金流量表計算，而不是統計局抽樣調查數據，後者低估了中國居民可支配收入水平）之比超過100%，在居民下調其未來收入增速的條件下，可以預期中國居民進一步加杠杆的能力與意願都將大幅下滑，進一步暴露出房地產行業供需缺口的巨大。這一缺口的調整壓力保守估計將會持續10年以上，以每年約5%的速度壓低房地產行業經濟產出，並透過其直接與間接的拉動作用，對GDP增速形成大約-1.2%的拖累，迥異於之前10年平均1.5%的正貢獻。這種拖累，既體現為消費需求，也體現為投資需求。
中國經濟目前以及未來遭遇需求不足的困擾，房地產行業的透支及其後遺症是重要原因。也正因此，政府出台“房住不炒”和“三條紅線”的政策基調，來促進行業艱難的去杠杆和出清再平衡。
資源配置問題
然而，在我們的分析中，房地產行業的結構問題雖然重要，卻並非中國經濟需求不足問題最大的根源。實際上，中國經濟需求不足問題最大的根源，在於近年來中國資源配置效率的降低。
中國經濟具備巨大的後發優勢，在理想狀態下，通過學習、創新並固化於投資之中，新技術有機會源源不斷地滲入經濟運行，提高生產能力、生產效率與勞動生產率。這將保證收入與需求持續上升，形成與產能相匹配的消化能力。這裏麵的關鍵在於，中國的經濟體製必須正確地配置資源，令盡可能多的投資屬於有效投資。
按照定義，有效投資是指有能力支付所有上遊行業成本、尤其是人力成本之後，仍舊能夠掙取合格利潤率的投資。對成本的支付是收入創造與需求衍生的同一過程，而合格利潤率保證了可能的增長機會將被窮盡利用。這樣，假設一個經濟體的所有投資都是有效投資，那麽，投資既擴張產能，也增加收入，兩者並行不悖，古老的薩伊定律將在動態中維持生效。
然而，現實中很多情況將會阻礙這一理想情況的出現。近年來，中國資源配置效率有所降低，投資創造收入的能力下滑。2008年美國金融危機之後，中國政府強調國有經濟的控製力，從4萬億、供應側改革、棚改房新政到2021年的監管風暴，幾乎每年均有重大措施出台。從數據上看，中國的投資回報率從2007年最高點16%持續下滑，到2016年跌至4.5%附近，隨後繼續小幅走低。
這個過程中，中小型民企經營挑戰加劇。從PMI指標看，從有數據的2011年以來，大企業PMI指數在95%的時間高於50榮枯線，而小企業PMI隻有12%的時間高於榮枯線，兩者差距在2016年底達到最大值，直到最近仍舊高達3個點左右。由於國企一般都是大企業，中小企業困境也就是民企困境，對於民企而言，要麽在”內卷”的行業格局中紅海競爭，要麽進軍國際市場，要麽在政府監管尚來不及發力的新經濟領域冒險一搏。在金融資源、政策監管、行業準入、資源傾斜等方麵它們與得到政府支持的大型國企相比，遭遇很多現實困難與體製性壓力，在投資回報率、技術進步與擴張等方麵，近年來迭次減速。民企固定投資增速從2007年47%的高位，下行到疫情衝擊前（2019年底）的-2.6%。
而得到更多資源支持與政府培植的大型國企，占用70%的金融資源，與近年來負債高速擴張的地方政府一道，彌補了民企投資需求的不足，成為支撐投資增長的逆周期力量。但國企與地方政府的投資擴張，其投資中有大量項目屬於無效投資，並且由於退出機製的無效，即使是已被證明無效的產能，也可以得到源源不斷的融資支持而維持，或者依靠壟斷地位而維持（壓低下遊中小型民企的利潤），因而推升中國經濟的債務比率、壓低下遊及中小型民企投資回報率。同時，國企與地方政府投資的就業密度遠低於民企投資，創造就業崗位與收入增長的能力不足。
無效投資多、無效產能退出緩滯、投資回報率低，基本上是一體三麵，其經濟後果是無法創造足夠的高新勞動崗位及其所決定的收入與需求增長，反過來，疲弱的終端需求進一步惡化了產能過剩與僵屍企業問題。換言之，國企與地方政府規模巨大的無效投資，在當期創造需求，長期內則抑製需求。
2021年，上述問題得到充分暴露。之前數年，資源品行業出現了成規模的產能向國企集中，隨後經曆了投資不足與創新減速，行業壟斷與產能缺口隨之湧現，疊加碳中和政策等其他因素，PPI在2021年大幅上漲了10%。出廠價格的大幅上漲有力地推動了上遊行業、占據資源優勢的大型國企盈利上升，2021年因此成為利潤大年。問題是，PPI上行並未驅動CPI同步上行，PPI-CPI剪刀差持續擴張，上遊成本上升沒有伴隨以終端需求提升，中下遊行業、民企以及中小型企業成為遊戲輸家。
從數據上看，從2009年開始，PPI-CPI剪刀差與國企-民企利潤增速剪刀差高度同步，揭示這一現象已經重複多年，反映出利潤與資源配置對上遊行業與國企傾斜，PPI上升驅動的加庫存運動中，中小型企業對ROE持續改善信心不足，企業並未同步提升其擴張欲望，投資增幅遠低於利潤增幅。
由於民企創造了80%的就業，民企的不景氣直接影響到居民收入增速，到2021年年末個人可支配實際收入2年平均增速下滑到4.1%，個人實際消費開支2年平均增速跌至2.2%，社會消費零售總額2021年年末按照環比聯乘值計算實際當年同比增速跌至1.5%。內需不足的挑戰由此浮出水麵。
麵對內需不足，政策應該做什麽？
從上麵的分析可以看出，麵對內需不足局麵，切忌頭痛醫頭腳痛醫腳。
一個容易的藥方是加大政府主導的投資，依靠政府投資來填充內需，例如加大地方政府主導的基建投資或者新基建投資。如前所述，這些投資許多不具備合格的投資回報率，大部分項目投產之日，也就是產生負現金流之日，事實上，地方政府投資項目的整體現金回報率無法覆蓋投資利息，不僅產生了地方政府巨額負債問題，也錯配了經濟資源，惡化了資源配置效率，對改善中下遊、中小型民企處境收效甚微。今日內需不足窘況，正是往日不斷刺激投資的結果。同時，地方政府在多年透支之後陷入財務窘況之時，可能浮現的加大稅費征收衝動，對地方中小企業發展絕非福音。從這個角度出發，合理的基建項目應該上馬，但不應該為投資而投資。
另一個藥方是設法加大房地產投資，過去這似乎是一抓就靈的妙方。然而，房地產過度發展無助於緩解居民收入增長乏力問題。整個房地產行業，過去10年總經營收入90.6萬億，其中一部分轉化為企業盈利，合計為11萬億；一部分支付了土地之外的成本，約27.2萬元；最大一筆去向是支付地方政府土地拍賣成本，合計約52.4萬億元。很明顯，不是房地產發展了居民收入就增加了，而是居民收入增加了（並預期將會持續增加）才能夠負擔高昂土地成本。鑒於居民負債之高已經影響到居民當期開支，在當前局麵下，重新刺激房地產市場發展對需求的擴張與收縮效應很可能將互相抵消，總體而言，刺激房地產進一步過度發展不僅將是危險的，對於解決需求不足問題也將是無效的。
還有一個藥方是在共同富裕口號下執行強監管政策、通過強化征稅提升實際稅率。背後的一個理由是，由於貧富不均，消費傾向高的低收入階層無錢可花，而消費傾向低的高收入階層為富須為仁。如果實現了更為均等的財富分配，中國居民的消費傾向將有所提升，緩解需求不足問題。
對此，需要問的問題是，挫傷大型民企信心的舉動是否有利於提升居民收入。成功民企的股東（及其創始人）在絕對財富數量上的優勢令人心生不平，但事實上，他們的開支在其個人財富中的占比相當低（這是所謂低消費傾向的含義），在更大的意義上，他們是財富的管理者而不是使用者。財富是資產的另一個名字，唯有能夠帶來未來合理利潤的資產，才能夠被記為財富，而能帶來未來合理利潤的投資，就是我們前述的有效投資，也就是涉及崗位創造、收入增長的經濟活動。
從這個意義上講，民企的成功——無論其規模大小，隻要合法合規——都應該受到鼓勵，它是居民收入增長的朋友而不是敵人。企業家用自己的財富承擔創新失敗的風險，如果他們的投資失敗，經濟擴張與收入改善的可能性就會落空，但這是探索發展機會必要的試錯嚐試，並且他們身上體現出來的貧富不均數據自然得以改善（富人變窮了）。換言之，民企與企業家進行的投資探索，我們應該樂見其成功。
實際上，近年來中國企業在新經濟領域的成功，不僅極大地提升了中國的國力，也是中國居民收入增長、消費增加的重要推動力量，更可能是中國不錯失未來技術革命（例如習近平主席最近強調的數字經濟）的關鍵，其積極意義怎麽估計都不為過。
同理，應該在降低稅率、規範化收稅的前提下，盡可能降低實際稅負，而不是相反。與全球其他國家相比，中國的宏觀稅負處於一流水平，中國政府掌握的資源也遠高於其他各國政府，這種情況下，需求不足並非由於實際稅負不夠高。
2022年開年情況看，消費增速已經跌至低水平，外需增速將大幅低於去年，房地產投資將會負增長，製造業投資增速將前高後低，增速難超去年，表明2022年將是困難巨大的一年。按照我們量化模型預測，2022年經濟實際增速下滑幅度可能超出市場一致預期。困境不是一日煉成，脫離困境也不會是一日之功。此時此刻，必須首先認識到問題的嚴重性，其次對成因進行客觀、準確剖析，並在堅強決心之下，采取正確舉措。
那麽，什麽才是正確舉措？一言以蔽之，就是堅定不移地走市場化改革開放路線，以是否改善了民企處境、是否有利於建立民間對政策規則的穩定預期為改革標準。
（作者為獨立經濟學家，維世資產管理（香港）有限公司宏觀顧問。本文僅代表作者觀點。責任編輯郵箱：tao.feng@ftchinese.com）
Why Is Russia Threatening to Invade Ukraine?(2021.12.16)
For Putin, the current standoff is a chance to overturn what he sees as an unjust post-Cold War order—and create a new one in its wake.
For the moment, a video call on December 7th between Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin seems to have avoided, or at least delayed, war in Ukraine. In the weeks prior, Russia had amassed an alarming number of ground forces and support personnel at the border, raising concerns of a looming invasion. As was the case before the first in-person meeting of the two Presidents in Geneva, in June, a cycle of escalation has seemingly given way to an opportunity for dialogue. Putin called the latest talks “open, substantive, and constructive.” But rather urgent questions remain: Why was a new round of conflict a possibility in the first place, and has the danger really gone away?
For Putin, Ukraine seems to be key not because he dreams of resurrecting the Soviet Union or enlarging the territory of modern-day Russia by force; rather, Ukraine presents an opportunity for Russia, once and for all, to reassert its geopolitical relevance. As Putin sees it, only the threat of war can reopen a conversation that, to many in the West, has long felt like settled history: the expansion of NATO eastward, the denial of a Russian veto on questions of regional security, and the underlying sense that Russia lost the Cold War. If Ukraine joins NATO, or is drawn into a de-facto military alliance with it, then Putin’s project has failed; if Ukraine is kept from doing so, Putin has fulfilled his historical role.
“After so many years in power, Putin sees himself, not Gorbachev or Yeltsin, as responsible for formulating the ultimate post-Soviet order,” Alexander Baunov, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Moscow Center, said. “In this sense, many events or facts that may seem to be historically irreversible are, from his perspective, mistakes that remain to be corrected.” For Putin, the United States is the counterparty with whom he can seek to fulfill this promise; Ukraine, as it were, is the host venue.
The current cycle of tensions with the West regarding Ukraine dates to 2014, when, in the wake of street protests that toppled Ukraine’s venal President Viktor Yanukovych, whom Putin backed, Russia annexed Crimea and sparked a would-be war in the Donbass, in eastern Ukraine. Although the conflict continues today, albeit at a low simmer, its most deadly phase, following an outright Russian incursion, was brought to a temporary end by the Minsk agreements, a set of peace accords reached in 2014 and 2015. Those agreements, signed at a moment of acute weakness for Ukraine, call for measures that, if fully implemented, would allow a large degree of autonomy for the Russian-backed enclaves in the Donbass. As a result, Kyiv would be hamstrung in pursuing an independent foreign policy—which is exactly what Russia wanted.
For this same reason, the Minsk agreements were destined to be a tough sell for Ukraine itself. Relations between Russia and Yanukovych’s postrevolutionary successor, Petro Poroshenko, quickly soured, especially as Poroshenko staked his legitimacy on an uncompromising and militaristic position in the Donbass. In 2019, Volodymyr Zelensky assumed the Presidency, promising peace. His earliest moves were aimed at easing tensions with Russia and withdrawing forces from frontline positions. The Kremlin viewed him favorably, at least compared to Poroshenko. Since then, as Zelensky was forced to deal with Russian intransigence, the fundamental impossibility of enacting the Minsk agreements, and pressure from nationalist factions and paramilitary battalions in Ukraine, he has adopted a more bellicose posture.
“If, for a while, the Kremlin saw in Zelensky the possibility of reaching an agreement, over the last year, it has become convinced this is not the case and that he’s no different than Poroshenko,” Andrey Kortunov, the director general of the Russian International Affairs Council, said. Having grown disappointed in two successive Ukrainian Presidents, the Kremlin became convinced that the only interlocutor with whom it can speak is in Washington, not Kyiv.
In February, Zelensky moved against Viktor Medvedchuk, an oligarch widely seen as the Kremlin’s point person in Ukraine. (Medvedchuk, who has a long-standing personal relationship with Putin, was appointed one of Ukraine’s chief negotiators for the peace talks in Minsk.) Zelensky’s administration ordered three television channels linked to Medvedchuk taken off the air and sanctioned Medvedchuk and his wife. A few months later, Ukrainian prosecutors charged Medvedchuk with treason and a court ordered him held under house arrest. The U.S. Embassy in Kyiv spoke favorably of Zelensky’s decision to shut down Medvedchuk’s networks. It’s possible to see Medvedchuk’s role as entirely pernicious and his removal from civic life as a long overdue turn of events for Ukraine. But, if you’re Putin, it might seem like a clear violation of the delicate status quo governing relations between the two countries, and a sign of the West’s hypocrisy on questions of rule of law.
Perhaps the most worrying development of all for the Kremlin was the slow creep of military equipment and weaponry from NATO states into the Ukrainian arsenal. Since 2018, the U.S. has sold hundreds of anti-tank Javelin missiles to Ukraine. Last March, the Pentagon announced a hundred-and-twenty-five-million-dollar military-aid package, which included armored patrol boats. Turkey has supplied the Ukrainian army with the same type of armed drones that proved decisive in Azerbaijan’s victory over Armenia in Nagorno-Karabakh last fall; this October, Ukrainian forces used such a drone to destroy rebel artillery in the Donbass. In November, Ukraine signed a treaty with the United Kingdom that would allow it to buy British warships and missiles—an announcement that followed a tense moment last June, when the Royal Navy sailed a destroyer in the Black Sea, close to Russian-held Crimea, angering the Kremlin.
At a certain point, Russia came to fear that Ukraine, in its accumulation of NATO weapons systems, was becoming the equivalent of an unofficial member state. Given all that weaponry, what would keep NATO armies from establishing bases? And, with bases in place, why couldn’t they host NATO missiles, even nuclear ones that would directly threaten Russia and undermine its deterrence capabilities?
“The Kremlin has long ago accepted that Kyiv’s political line is going to differ from its own,” Fyodor Lukyanov, the editor-in-chief of Russia in Global Affairs and a respected voice in Moscow foreign-policy circles, said. Even if they don’t admit their own responsibility, officials in Moscow are not blind to the fact that, in the wake of Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its role in propping up the war in the Donbass, Ukraine’s political culture will surely retain a strong anti-Russian element for some time to come. “But that doesn’t mean they don’t take very seriously the importance of insuring Ukraine’s neutral status, which, as they see it, means it cannot host any NATO military infrastructure,” Lukyanov said.
From Putin’s point of view, the real nightmare scenario is formal NATO membership for Ukraine. (As with so much of what Putin finds discomfiting in Ukraine, he has only himself to blame—in 2014, a poll showed that the idea of joining NATO had around fifteen to twenty per cent support among the Ukrainian public; today, that number is more than sixty per cent.) Since Biden became President, Zelensky and other Ukrainian politicians have been more vocal in pushing the matter. In January, Zelensky told Axios on HBO that he had one question for Biden: “Mr. President, why are we not in NATO yet?” Even if Ukrainian membership is not on the immediate agenda, the official position of NATO member states, the U.S. included, on the question of future expansion is unchanged: if potential new members meet the requirements and are interested in joining the bloc, no outside powers have the right to tell them they can’t.
“From the perspective of the West, the end of the Cold War gave way to the rise of a certain geopolitical order, with which everyone more or less agrees—except Russia, which every now and then gets upset for seemingly no reason,” Lukyanov told me. Only that’s not the view in Moscow, he explained. “The issue is not so much Ukraine but the underlying principle: if a military alliance seeks to expand, it has to consider the interests of those who are opposed.” Russia, in other words, can’t be expected to remain a passive observer of actions that it believes violate its core security concerns. “That’s the red line, and, if crossed, Russia will respond,” Lukyanov said.
For the first two decades of his rule, Putin saw his own geopolitical maneuvering as essentially reactive, a response to what he and the Russian policy élite viewed as long-standing Western efforts to weaken Russia. “In Putin’s reality, Russia was encircled and under threat, and was required to defend itself,” Tatiana Stanovaya, head of the analysis firm R.Politik, told me. But, throughout the past year, that dynamic has undergone a fundamental transformation. In mid-November, Putin gave a speech at the Russian Foreign Ministry in which he said that Western states do not respect Russian interests or ultimatums, and the only way to get them to do so is by keeping tensions high and threatening force. “He made clear that Russia will no longer stand around whining and complaining about the injustices of the world,” Stanovaya said. “It is ready to act, to use force to stand up for its position. This is a principally different Putin, and a different Russia.”
The current Russian military buildup along the border with Ukraine far exceeds the scale of what worried Western governments over the spring, in advance of the Putin-Biden summit in Geneva. U.S. intelligence officials told the Washington Post they believe Russia will, by early 2022, have in place a hundred battalion-tactical groups, equalling a hundred and seventy-five thousand troops. Citing a Western intelligence official, the Financial Times reported that Russia’s military deployment is “still missing some critical equipment and capabilities typically required for a sustained offensive” but that “these elements could be brought to the border rapidly if needed.”
Whatever the ultimate composition of Russia’s forces, their ability to overwhelm the Ukrainian military is not in doubt. “It’s hard to overstate the significance of how much military power they are putting together,” Michael Kofman, an expert on the Russian military and research director of the Russia Studies Program at CNA, a think tank, said.
Once such a sizable military force is in place, it comes to exert its own influence on events. “If you draw down such a public and heavy-handed deployment, people say you were bluffing or you were deterred—and both are losses for Putin,” Kofman said. He estimates that the Russian military has the logistical wherewithal and resources to maintain its current force along the border until the early spring, by which time Putin will have to decide whether to invade or back off.
That gives the Biden Administration a narrow window. In the days since Biden’s call with Putin, Russia has put forward a set of expansive, and unlikely, demands. The Foreign Ministry published a long list, calling on NATO states to formally retract a 2008 pledge that the alliance would one day admit Ukraine and Georgia, promise not to deploy certain weapons systems to states near Russia, and refrain from military drills and maneuvers near Russia’s borders.
Sergei Ryabkov, a Russian Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, said that, if NATO continues to expand, the country’s “response will be military.” He also said Russia will deploy intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Europe if NATO does not agree to return to treaty talks over banning such weapons. “This path must be traversed quickly,” Ryabkov said. One element of the U.S. position that somewhat buoyed hopes in Moscow is Biden’s promise to Putin that he would assemble a meeting of major NATO allies to address Russia’s concerns.
Even if the U.S. and other NATO members were ready to negotiate on these strategic questions, there is no realistic scenario in which significant progress, much less a formal agreement, could be made in the compressed timeline that Russia seems to be demanding. That may suggest that Putin is wagering, as Russian officials often boast, that Russia cares more about Ukraine than the West does—which means that, in the end, the West will cave so as to stave off a war it doesn’t want. After all, a Russian-Ukrainian war is a lose-lose for Western states: either they look feckless if they do nothing and Ukraine is defeated, or they feel compelled to intervene, risking a wider war with Russia that no one has the stomach for.
Or, more ominously, Russia is putting forward demands it knows can’t be met, in order to justify the invasion to come. In a wide-ranging essay on Russia’s new, more assertive foreign policy, the analyst and columnist Vladimir Frolov wrote, “The threat of the use of force against Ukraine cannot be infinitely convincing (and effective for achieving political goals) without actually using force.” Frolov wryly quoted a line attributed to Secretary of State Antony Blinken: “Superpowers don’t bluff.”
In any scenario, the current standoff is Putin’s chance to overturn what he sees as the unjust post-Cold War order and create a new one in its wake. But anyone who claims to know for sure whether he’s set on achieving that through war is engaged in a bluff of their own. In Chekhovian fashion, Putin has hung the proverbial gun on the wall—whether it, in fact, goes off or not in Act II is a climax yet to be written. “I have the sense that Putin sees a new grand agreement with Biden as the most preferable form of victory,” Stanovaya said. “War with Ukraine would be a desperate measure he would see as forced on him by circumstance—which doesn’t mean he won’t do it.”
