風蕭蕭_Frank
以文會友
YouTube 西方國家因失去烏克蘭項目而集體否認和集體憤怒
https://blog.creaders.net/user_blog_diary_release.php?action=
中立性研究
在悲痛的五個階段中，集體西方的新保守派目前正處於其在烏克蘭病入膏肓的代理人戰爭的第一階段（否認）和第二階段（憤怒）之間。 他們還不能承認失敗，但從集體西方的宣傳來看，整個災難的軌跡很容易讀懂。 今天我們正在閱讀《外交事務》和《紐約時報》上的一篇文章，表明他們仍然不能承認失敗，但他們實際上知道即將發生什麽。 我們越快進入這種精神瘋狂的第三階段，對烏克蘭、俄羅斯和歐洲就越好。
Collective Denial and Collective Anger In The West Over Losing Project Ukraine
Neutrality Studies
On the 5 stages of grief, the Neocons of the Collective West are currently somewhere between stage 1 (denial) and stage 2 (anger) over their terminally ill proxy-war in Ukraine. They can't admit defeat yet, but the trajectory of the whole disaster is pretty simple to read looking at Collective West propaganda. Today we are going through a piece in Foreign Affairs and the New York Times showing that they still can't admit defeat, but that they actually know what's coming. The faster we get to stage 3 of this mental insanity the better for Ukraine, Russia, and Europe.
Europe's Emerging War Fatigue
How to Shore Up Falling Support for Ukraine
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/ukraine/europes-emerging-war-fatigue#:~:text=I
By Susi Dennison and Pawel Zerka
A Ukrainian tank near Bakhmut, Ukraine, December 2023
It has now been almost 700 days since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Although most European leaders remain firm in their staunch support for Kyiv, it is becoming increasingly difficult for them to maintain that same level of support among their publics. Cost-of-living concerns are leading many Europeans to question the sustainability of continued funding for Ukraine, and the outbreak of war in the Gaza Strip has divided Europe’s attention in recent weeks. Meanwhile, although Kyiv’s counteroffensive continues, it has not yet delivered substantial territorial gains. The momentum generated by Ukraine’s success in the first year of the conflict has given way to a sense that, despite ongoing fighting, the frontline is not moving, and the risk of a frozen conflict is growing.
These concerns help explain the shift in attitudes on display in the surveys conducted by the European Council on Foreign Relations. This public opinion polling suggests that Europeans’ support for Ukraine’s continued fight has started to decline. The change, so far, has not been big—but its direction leaves no place for doubt. According to ECFR’s earlier poll, conducted in January 2023 in ten European countries, 38 percent on average wanted Ukraine to regain all its territory. But according to ECFR’s latest survey from September and October, this number has dropped to 34 percent. The percent of people who think that the conflict between Russia and Ukraine needs to end as soon as possible, even if it means Ukraine losing some territory to Russia, has essentially held steady at 28 to 29 percent. As a matter of comparison, the September data for the United States shows 43 percent supporting Ukraine as it continues to fight while just 17 percent prefer the war to end as soon as possible.
European support for Ukraine has not yet gone wobbly, but it might soon—not least because some politicians, in a heated election year, could try to get ahead of the trend. To avoid such an outcome, European leaders must do a better job of giving their constituents a convincing theory of how Ukraine can win the war and why it is essential to Europe’s future that it does. If they fail to do so, Kyiv may find itself losing crucial support in the weeks and months to come.
GROWING IMPATIENCE
Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, European support for Kyiv has remained strong, which has underpinned the willingness of EU governments to agree to 11 rounds of sanctions against Russia. With their publics on board, European leaders have also signed up to provide Ukraine with impressive amounts of aid. EU countries and institutions have given Ukraine a total of $145 billion, according to the Kiel Institute’s Ukraine Support Tracker: almost twice as much as the United States has given. To help Ukrainian refugees, EU governments activated what is known as the Temporary Protection Directive in the first months of the war, allowing Ukrainians to enter the EU and move freely between countries without undergoing usual procedures. Given EU governments’ deep fear of the political consequences of more open border policies, this was a particularly strong indicator of the confidence that the EU political class had in public support for the Ukrainian cause.
But support for Kyiv is now under pressure. Since the beginning of 2022, ECFR has been monitoring people’s attitudes about the war in Ukraine. Among other things, we have been asking whom they consider as the biggest obstacle to peace between Ukraine and Russia, and whether they would prefer for Ukraine to regain all of its territory (“even if it meant a longer war”) or for the war to end as soon as possible (“even if it meant Ukraine had to lose parts of its territory”). We conducted our most recent poll this fall—before the Hamas attack on Israel—in Denmark, Estonia, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom, with an overall sample of 15,000 respondents. We previously surveyed the same countries (except for Switzerland) in January 2023, and most of these countries (except for Denmark, Estonia, and Switzerland) in April and May 2022.
Support for Kyiv is now under pressure.
According to the latest survey, there has been, over the past months, a modest but consistent drop among Europeans in their preference for Ukraine to continue fighting. There are still countries where the preference for Ukraine to regain all its territory, rather than for the war to end as soon as possible, prevails: by 63 to 13 percent in Estonia, by 46 to 24 percent in Denmark, by 43 to 22 percent in Poland, and by 41 to 19 percent in the United Kingdom. These four differ from more dovish countries, where the opposite view (for the war to end as soon as possible, even if it means Ukraine loses parts of its territory) is dominant: by 46 to 14 percent in Italy, 40 to 28 percent in Germany, and 38 to 16 percent in Romania. The French are currently divided equally, 28 to 28 percent, between the two options. But in all these countries, numbers for the more hawkish option have gone down since January: most notably, from 52 to 43 percent in Poland, from 35 to 28 percent in France, and from 26 to 14 percent in Italy. (Respondents could also say “none of these,” “don’t know,” or a third substantive option: “Western dominance of the world needs to be pushed back, even if it means accepting Russian territorial aggression against Ukraine.” On average, these three responses were chosen, respectively, by 16, 16, and 6 percent of European respondents.)
The most consequential change appears to be taking place in Germany, where a dovish option now leads with a clearer margin (40 to 28 percent) than at the beginning of the year (39 to 33 percent). But the direction of change is evident in every other country, except Portugal, leaving no room for doubt: public belief that Ukraine should keep fighting to regain all its territory, no matter how long it takes, is waning.
The view that Russia is the chief obstacle to peace has also decreased in every European country since the time ECFR asked about it in April 2022. The drop is slight: on average, it is a decrease of only eight percentage points. A majority of Europeans (52 percent) still consider Russia as the main obstacle to peace, while less than a quarter (23 percent) blame the United States, Ukraine, or the EU. But 20 months ago, the proportion was 60 to 19 percent. And there are currently countries, such as Romania, where the West started to be seen as a bigger problem than Russia (a huge shift from 24–42 percent earlier to 38–30 percent today); or Italy, where the two sides are currently blamed equally. Here, again, the direction of change is hard to dispute: Europeans are starting to question whether Russia is the only impediment to peace.
WAR FATIGUE
In European countries closer to the conflict zone, support for Ukraine usually remains strong. But even in eastern European countries, there is evidence that people are getting increasingly tired of the war and its consequences.
In Poland, support for accepting Ukrainian refugees has steadily decreased, from 83 percent in March 2022 to 65 percent in September 2023, according to eupinions, an independent public opinion platform. Ahead of the country’s parliamentary election, in October, Konfederacja, a far-right party, was warning against the threat of “Ukrainization of Poland,” and it got over 1.5 million (or over seven percent) of votes. But Poland’s new prime minister, Donald Tusk, is vowing to win “the full mobilization of the free world, the Western world, to help Ukraine in this war.”
In Slovakia, the party led by Robert Fico, a populist former prime minister, won parliamentary elections in September, allowing Fico to return to power. Just one day after taking office, he pledged to halt military support for Ukraine, one of the main promises he made during his campaign. According to Eurobarometer, Slovakia was, in August, among a handful of EU countries (along with Bulgaria, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, and Greece), where more than 40 percent of the population disagreed that the EU should continue to show solidarity with Ukraine.
In Germany, the far-right AfD party—which opposes support for Ukraine—is currently polling second, with the support of 22 percent of German voters. This is a historic high, up from ten percent at the beginning of 2022. Several factors may be contributing to the party’s sudden ascent—but these could include rising energy prices and the growth of the migrant population. Although Germany does not share a border with Ukraine, it currently hosts over a million Ukrainian refugees (the largest number in the EU, alongside Poland).
In France, the national debate is now absorbed by the war in Gaza.
The farther away from the war zone, the more interest appears to be flagging. In France, the national debate is now absorbed by the war in Gaza, which has domestic implications, given the country’s large Muslim community which supports the Palestinian people. According to Google Trends, people in France have been searching more for “Israel” than “Ukraine” over the past two months.
Or take the Netherlands, where the far-right Freedom Party, led by Geert Wilders, unexpectedly won the parliamentary election in November. This has thrown the previous government’s promise of providing Ukraine with F-16 fighter jets into question, given Wilders’s long opposition to military support for Kyiv. Other issues (such as the economy and migration) appear to explain Wilders’s strong result, whereas people’s opposition to supporting Ukraine remains low, according to most polls. If Wilders enters the government and chooses to change the country’s approach to Ukraine, however, the strength of the public’s support for Ukraine will be challenged.
After almost two years of fighting, the war in Ukraine is no longer viewed as an emergency by a large part of the European public, especially by those who are not close to the conflict zone. Immediately after the invasion, many Europeans were afraid that their countries could be next, or that Russia might use nuclear weapons, or that the war could escalate in other ways. But none of these outcomes have materialized, and so many Europeans currently see Ukraine as one of the various wars happening far from home, for some perhaps as distant and as abstract as conflicts in Armenia or Gaza.
FOREVER WAR?
Our data also show weak confidence among Europeans that Ukraine can win this war. In September, only in a handful of countries surveyed—Denmark (46 percent), Estonia (67 percent), Poland (49 percent), and Portugal (48 percent)—was there a prevailing view that Ukraine was likely, rather than unlikely, to win the war within the next five years. Considerably fewer people shared that belief in France (28 percent), Germany (32 percent), Romania (35 percent), Spain (26 percent), Switzerland (35 percent), and even the United Kingdom (34 percent). In Italy, only 20 percent saw Ukraine’s victory as likely—whereas almost twice as many (38 percent) considered Russia as the likely winner.
Weak confidence in Ukraine’s chance for victory does not necessarily mean people expecting Russia to win. In fact, 38 percent, on average (going from 23 percent in Estonia to 46 percent in France and 47 percent in the United Kingdom), do not consider either Ukraine or Russia as likely to win this war within the next five years. Therefore, it appears that many Europeans are bracing for a forever war—expecting instability in Ukraine to become the new normal.
And from this, there is a short path to disengagement. To keep publics on board, some European leaders present Ukraine as fighting not just for its own independence but also for Europe’s future. During a visit to Kyiv in November, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told the Ukrainian parliament, “You are fighting not only for your freedom, your democracy and your future, but for ours too. You are fighting for Europe.” Earlier this year, French President Emmanuel Macron said that Ukraine today is “protecting Europe.”
But for the most part, European citizens do not perceive their own countries to be implicated in this war. People rarely see their own country as being at war with Russia: only 11 percent in Romania and Switzerland believe so, and the highest result is Estonia, with 31 percent. Meanwhile, at least a quarter of the respondents in every European country polled think that the United States is at war with Russia—with the highest result in Italy, where this belief is held by 51 percent.
Thus, Europeans appear to be seeing less at stake in this war for their own countries than what they perceived at the beginning of 2022—when, according to our polling from just before the war started, majorities in Germany, Poland, and Romania, and at least 45 percent in Finland, France, Italy, and Sweden, thought that Russia’s stance on Ukraine posed a large military threat to their countries. Currently, European governments could begin to see less urgency and less domestic political gain from supporting Ukraine.
THEORY OF VICTORY
Arguably the most significant support Europe can offer Ukraine is membership in the EU, as the only way to lock in its future as a European, prosperous, and democratic country—with all the guarantees of financial and security support that EU membership entails. The EU Council decision last week to open negotiations with Ukraine and Moldova was important in this respect, but only the first step in a long road to entry to the club, given the heavy lifting needed on reform requirements for Ukraine and for the EU itself.
Here, it becomes clear why European public opinion on the war matters so much. Internal EU Council estimates forecast that around $200 billion in EU funds would flow to Ukraine over seven years after accession. Ukraine joining the EU would also significantly shift the dynamics around European funds (which are the EU’s main tool of reducing developing gaps within the bloc), turning current large recipient states, such as Poland, into net contributors. Many Europeans might also fear the effects that Ukraine’s membership in the EU’s single market could have on their businesses and jobs—as Poland’s ban on Ukraine’s grain exports last summer and the latest blockage of border crossings with Ukraine by Hungarian, Polish, and Slovak truck drivers have demonstrated.
Paying more to Ukraine is not a development that existing EU citizens would accept lightly, especially amid the ongoing cost-of-living crisis. It is very possible that leaders’ positions on Ukraine’s potential membership in the EU, and on continued financial and military support for Kyiv, could feature prominently in the upcoming elections to the European Parliament, which will be organized simultaneously in all 27 EU member states in June 2024. For these reasons, Europe’s growing war fatigue should be taken seriously now. Otherwise, it could begin to constrain the policy choices in front of EU leaders in the coming months and years.
To guard against this, Europe’s leaders need to show deeper understanding for the cost-of-living crisis and why some Europeans link their economic difficulties to the war in Ukraine. Subsidies to households and businesses to help them bear these costs can help, but they will not be enough. European leaders also need to urgently preempt what looks like a gathering sea change in attitudes toward Ukraine. They should frame the conflict as a Russian war against Europe, not just against Ukraine. They should remind voters that a war-mired Ukraine and a victorious Russia would be even more costly for the EU, perpetuating the threat in its direct neighborhood. European leaders need to develop a stronger case for EU enlargement, making clear that Ukraine joining the union will also benefit ordinary Europeans, by broadening the area of stability, prosperity, and freedom.
For any of this to be credible, however, European leaders need to develop a more convincing case for how Ukraine can win. A Ukrainian victory requires Europe to invest in its defense industrial capacity, so that it can sustain Ukraine, even if Washington stops. Russia is banking on its ability to outlast Western support for Ukraine, and that bet needs to be proved wrong.
How Putin Turned a Western Boycott Into a Bonanza
If companies want to leave Russia, the president is setting the terms — in ways that benefit his government, his elites and his war.
By Paul Sonne and Rebecca R. Ruiz. Produced by Nico Chilla.
Soon after Russian troops invaded his country, the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, made a plea to Western companies: “Leave Russia,” he said. “Make sure that the Russians do not receive a single penny.”
President Volodymyr Zelensky addressing a joint session of Congress on March 16, 2022. Reuters
Hundreds of companies answered the call. Politicians and activists predicted that it would help strangle the Russian economy and undermine the Kremlin’s war effort.
President Vladimir V. Putin had other plans.
Mr. Putin has turned the exits of major Western companies into a windfall for Russia’s loyal elite and the state itself. He has forced companies wishing to sell to do so at fire-sale prices. He has limited sales to buyers anointed by Moscow. Sometimes he has seized firms outright.
A New York Times investigation traced how Mr. Putin has turned an expected misfortune into an enrichment scheme. Western companies that have announced departures have declared more than $103 billion in losses since the start of the war, according to a Times analysis of financial reports. Mr. Putin has squeezed companies for as much of that wealth as possible by dictating the terms of their departure.
He has also subjected those exits to ever-increasing taxes, generating at least $1.25 billion in the past year for Russia's war chest.
No private deal is safe. The Dutch beer company Heineken, for example, found a buyer this spring and set a price. But the Russian government unilaterally rejected the deal, people close to the negotiations said, and put the company’s Russian holdings in the hands of an aerosol-packaging titan married to a former Russian senator.
In all, Mr. Putin has overseen one of the biggest transfers of wealth within Russia since the fall of the Soviet Union. Huge swaths of industries — elevators, tires, industrial coatings and more — are now in the hands of increasingly dominant Russian players.
In some cases, that player is the state. Government-owned enterprises have acquired the assets of corporate giants like Ikea and Toyota. In many cases, Mr. Putin personally signs off on sales.
“These are good deals for us, for sure,” said Anton Pinsky, a prominent restaurateur who joined with a pro-Putin rapper and associates of a powerful senator to take over Starbucks. In an interview in Moscow, he downplayed the significance of his own deal but was clear about the effect of the Western departures.
“You screwed up, left it,” he said. “We picked it up inexpensively. Thank you.”
Today in Russia, a robust consumer world carries on, helping Mr. Putin maintain a sense of normalcy despite a war that has proved longer, deadlier and costlier than he predicted. Most foreign companies remain in Russia, unwilling to lose the billions they’ve invested there over decades.
Other businesses have been sold and now have a through-the-looking-glass feel. Krispy Kreme is now Krunchy Dream; its doughnuts come in a similar flat box with familiar flavors. Starbucks has been reborn as Stars Coffee. Its mermaid is now a Russian swan princess.
These companies can buy raw materials domestically or import them from friendly countries. And customers can still easily buy products that have supposedly been pulled from shelves. On a recent day, a Moscow supermarket offered Pepsi from Uzbekistan and Coca-Cola from Poland.
Mr. Putin’s economic counterstrikes have helped to fortify support among the elites profiting from the war and to blunt the effects of Western isolation. While Ukraine is preoccupied with short-term imperatives like shoring up international support, the relative resilience of the Russian economy has enabled Mr. Putin to play a long game.
Previously undisclosed documents, financial statements and interviews with dozens of deal makers in Russia and across Europe — many of whom spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution — show that Moscow now micromanages practically every exit. Companies must navigate an opaque system to win approval to sell. In some cases, Mr. Putin’s friends have appealed directly to him to intervene.
“Those who are leaving are losing their position,” Dmitri S. Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, told The Times. “And of course, their property is being bought at a serious discount and taken over by our companies, which are doing it with pleasure.”
Still, the wave of departing companies has stung. It has sent a global signal that Russia is a business pariah. The economy is strained and at risk of overheating. Mr. Putin’s handling of Western departures has only reinforced Russia’s image as a dangerous place to do business. Even some top Russian officials admit that decreased competition and foreign investment will hurt everyday Russians and the economy in the long term.
The Kremlin says it prefers that companies remain in Russia. But Mr. Putin scoffs at the notion that leaving will hurt. “Did they think everything would collapse here? Well, nothing of the kind happened,” he said this month. “Russian companies took over and moved on.”
Not every deal is a windfall. Some buyers will face steep obstacles to make their new businesses profitable.
Hanging over the exit process for Western firms is the threat of intimidation and force. The Russian authorities have investigated departing companies, interrogated workers and arrested local executives.
Last summer, Mr. Putin seized the Russian arm of the Danish brewer Carlsberg, along with roughly half a billion dollars in cash, and put them under the temporary control of one of his friends.
At least four other companies have similarly lost control of their operations this year to effective state seizures.
Today, Mr. Putin is at the helm of a fraught exit process that works to Russia’s advantage. But it began in the early days of the war with the urgent goal of simply keeping the Russian economy alive.
Blocking the Exits
Speaking from the White House two weeks after the invasion, President Biden boasted that the West was crushing the Russian economy. “The list of businesses and international corporations leaving Russia is growing by the day,” he said.
Things looked bleak for Mr. Putin. The stock exchange in Moscow was closed and the ruble had crashed. If Russia lost all the jobs, production and cash of Western companies, the effects would be devastating.
But Mr. Putin was preparing his financial rejoinder. He restricted the movement of money abroad and required that companies from “unfriendly nations” win approval before selling their businesses.
Mr. Putin was putting the brakes on just as Western executives faced pressure to accelerate. In the United States, there was perhaps no more vocal figure than the Yale University management professor Jeffrey Sonnenfeld. He appeared on cable news programs, criticizing companies that remained in Russia.
Professor Sonnenfeld recalled that it was corporate boycotts — more than sanctions — that helped abolish apartheid in South Africa. He transformed his office into a sort of war room, with a Yale team grading companies on their efforts to sever Russian ties.
The question of who would end up with those companies was of little concern.
“If Putin thinks he can do better at the deep fryer, let him have at it,” he said in an interview. “We really don’t care. The important thing is to not have the endorsement of a renowned global brand.”
Professor Sonnenfeld’s list and others like it added to pressure from shareholders, Ukrainian activists and everyday consumers.
Some executives worried what would happen to their Russian employees, factories and technology if they walked away. Others were reluctant to abandon their investments over a war that might prove short-lived.
But some quickly announced intentions to go. Heineken and Carlsberg said that they would leave once they found buyers. The Canadian gold mining company Kinross did the same, and within days announced a deal for $680 million to sell its Russian operation to a local buyer.
OBI, a German hardware store chain, went a step further, saying that it would close all 27 stores in Russia until it found a buyer.
Mr. Putin’s government, though, was already erecting hurdles.
On March 17, 2022, the Russian Trade Ministry sent a letter to local OBI managers. The letter, reviewed by The Times, urged managers to defy the company and keep the stores open, citing consumer-protection laws. There was no “economic reason” for closing, the ministry wrote.
OBI, the ministry warned, needed to fulfill “obligations to its consumers, workers and counterparties, including suppliers.” That prompted a days-long cat-and-mouse game as local employees tried to reopen stores and executives in Germany tried to stop them.
The Russian authorities also demanded that OBI officials testify about their plans. Prosecutors visited a store and inspected its computer system, the company told The Times.
OBI struck a deal that spring, ultimately selling for the symbolic price of a few dollars.
The buyer, a businessman named Josef Liokumovich, passed the company’s background checks and was not on any financial blacklists. But as OBI soon learned, Western companies have no control over who ultimately takes over their operations.
In less than a year, OBI’s Russia operation changed owners four times, ultimately landing with associates of the Russian senator Arsen B. Kanokov, who is under U.S. Treasury sanctions. At one point, an ally of the Chechen strongman Ramzan Kadyrov appeared in the ownership register.
Such redirection is why diplomats and experts say it is too early to understand the changing landscape. The true new owners of some businesses might not be known for years, if ever.
“These guys,” Urszula Nartowska, OBI’s top lawyer, said, “they have the power of what they want to take. And you have to accept that.”
In June, the Kremlin demonstrated what companies could expect: Moscow approved the Kinross gold mine sale, but with a stunning alteration. The sale price had been cut in half, to $340 million.
The buyer, Highland Gold, would later be blacklisted by British officials who said that gold provided a “significant income stream for Russia’s war effort.”
“The government realized they could dictate who buys, and maybe use that power to reward connected buyers,” said Alan Kartashkin, a lawyer for Debevoise & Plimpton who spent decades in Moscow and has negotiated the exits of Western companies.
“I remember thinking,” Mr. Kartashkin added, “once they feel they have the power to control entirely private transactions, where the government has no equity interest, they’re not going to stop.”
‘This Business Is Already Russian’
The mood was celebratory in July when the Russian minister of industry and trade, Denis V. Manturov, appeared at a St. Petersburg elevator factory.
The plant had recently belonged to the world’s largest elevator company, the Connecticut-based Otis Worldwide. Now it belonged to a firm controlled by Armen M. Sarkisyan, who had made a fortune running the Russian lottery in part thanks to government connections.
Mr. Manturov bragged that Moscow had brokered special arrangements for the sale. He gushed about a new production line and robust demand for elevators in Russian high-rises. “This business is already Russian,” he said. It was now known as Meteor.
Mr. Sarkisyan is an example of a unique creation of the war: a businessman who was politically connected enough to win such a prize and rich enough to close the deal — but not so closely linked to the Kremlin that he was subject to international sanctions.
Mr. Sarkisyan and others, almost overnight, absorbed huge corners of their markets.
When the Finnish elevator giant Kone tried to sell to its employees, the authorities rejected the deal. Once again, Mr. Sarkisyan’s holding company, S8 Capital, became the buyer.
S8 Capital also moved into the tire business, snapping up the Russian operation of the German company Continental, before buying the top Russian tire maker, Cordiant, and entering talks to purchase the Russian factory of the Japanese tire maker Bridgestone.
S8 Capital did not respond to requests for comment.
By the summer of 2022, Russia’s economy had stabilized, the ruble had rebounded and Mr. Putin’s strategy shifted.
While early in the war, companies like McDonald’s had sold to local managers or local business associates, with an option to return to Russia later, such deals soon became more difficult.
Having climbed out of crisis, the government wanted to do more than just keep the doors open. It increasingly wanted to dictate the terms of every deal.
In August of that year, Mr. Putin issued a decree requiring that companies in key industries obtain his signature before selling their Russian assets. Scores of businesses, including divisions of Siemens and Caterpillar, were suddenly subject to the whims of Mr. Putin himself.
“The government was beginning to tighten up the process, and it was becoming a lot more challenging,” said Laura Brank, a lawyer at Dechert helping Western companies to exit. “I was telling clients we’d better get moving quickly.”
The Subcommission
For most companies trying to leave Russia, the gatekeepers operate out of a gray government building near Red Square. Eleven days after the war began, Mr. Putin empaneled a special “subcommission” there to review requests to sell.
Mr. Putin’s longtime finance minister, Anton G. Siluanov, leads the subcommission, which includes officials from the Kremlin, the central bank and key ministries.
They decide whether companies can leave and under what terms.
Once a company has struck a deal with a buyer, the negotiations often begin again — this time in secret, between the buyer and one of the Russian government ministries. The seller is largely excluded. That process, lawyers say, often ends with a lower sale price and at times a new buyer. The deal then goes to the subcommission. Sometimes, deals fall through after months of silence.
Internal minutes, reviewed by The Times, show that the subcommission scrutinizes even the smallest details. In one meeting last year, the panel approved the $59,000 sale of a tiny apartment owned by the Finnish tire company Nokian.
The subcommission wields enormous power. Minutes show that it rejected a proposal by the American electronics company Honeywell to sell its factories until an assessment proved that the Russian buyer was getting a 50 percent discount.
Despite the bureaucracy, businesspeople have jockeyed behind the scenes for the most lucrative assets, often appealing directly to Mr. Putin.
Some of the Beneficiaries
Vladimir Pontanin
President of Interros, which purchased Société Générale’s assets in Russia.
Leonid Mikhelson
Chairman of Novatek, which purchased Shell and TotalEnergies energy shareholdings.
Timati and Anton Pinsky
A rapper and a restaurateur who are among the new owners of local operations of Starbucks and Domino’s Pizza.
Ivan Tavrin
Russian investor behind Kismet Capital, which has invested in Henkel, Avito and Melon Fashion Group.
Armen Sarkisyan
Businessman behind S8 Capital, which bought the operations of Otis, Kone, Continental and Bosch.
Such was the case in the summer of 2022, when Mondi, a British-Austrian paper company, found a buyer for one of Russia’s largest mills and sought government approval to sell.
As the deal came together, one of Mr. Putin’s old K.G.B. buddies, Sergei V. Chemezov, appeared. He wrote a letter asking that the president steer the mill toward a group of investors, including the state-owned firm he runs. He even suggested a way to structure the deal to get around Western sanctions. The Times reviewed a copy of the letter.
Neither Mr. Chemezov nor the state-owned company responded to requests for comment.
Mr. Chemezov’s deal never happened, but neither did Mondi’s original agreement. The subcommission put the mill in the hands of a Moscow property developer for significantly less than the original price.
Abroad, Professor Sonnenfeld and others kept up the pressure. More than 200 companies had earned “F” grades on his list. Professor Sonnenfeld testified before Congress in November 2022. Remaining in Russia, he said, was tantamount to supporting the government.
But under Mr. Putin’s rules, leaving also directly benefited the government and, in turn, the war.
This year, the parent company of Ikea sold its Russian malls to a state-controlled bank. Nokian sold its operation to an oil company owned by a Russian regional government. The Russian operations of Nissan, Renault and Toyota were taken over by a state company.
The Russian government has looked to use former Western auto factories to produce vehicles for the state-owned luxury brand Aurus, according to an internal Trade Ministry document obtained by The Times.
Neither the Trade nor Finance Ministries responded to requests for comment.
Mr. Putin also found a way to bring money straight into state coffers.
Early on, foreign deals were subjected to what the government called a “voluntary tax” — required for the privilege of taking money out of Russia in a lump sum. Companies that opted not to pay the tax would receive their payouts in installments.
But by early this year, Mr. Putin had stopped giving them the choice. Companies had to pay the tax, and they still might get their money in installments.
The Kremlin also made explicit what had been implied since the Kinross deal: Companies were required to sell for at least a 50 percent markdown.
Heineken, for About a Dollar
By 2023, the landscape had become unknowable. The Kremlin constantly changed the rules and seemed to be always demanding more. Companies including Unilever announced that they would rather remain in Russia than have their assets end up in the government’s hands.
Against that backdrop, executives at Heineken and Carlsberg were still negotiating with prospective buyers this year when Mr. Putin awarded himself even greater powers.
The Russian government, he decreed in April, could seize foreign assets and put them under the temporary oversight of whomever it liked. Companies now risked being seized outright.
Heineken reached a deal that month and the buyer, a Kazakh businessman, requested government approval. Carlsberg executives followed suit, planning to sell to Arnest, the Russian aerosol maker that had recently snapped up the highly profitable drinks-packaging business of the U.S.-based Ball Corporation.
Both brewers felt confident that, more than a year after announcing plans to leave Russia, they would finally do so.
In July, Mr. Putin blindsided Carlsberg executives by seizing the company and placing it in the hands of his longtime associate and judo friend, Taimuraz Bolloev.
Carlsberg was an attractive target. The company controlled the iconic Russian beer brand Baltika and had recently valued its Russian operation at about $3 billion. Its sales application had revealed that it was sitting on a half-billion dollars in cash.
In another twist, Russian officials also rejected Heineken’s deal. According to the people close to the negotiations, the authorities steered the business toward Arnest — a consolation, perhaps, for having lost the far more lucrative Carlsberg.
The deal went through for a single euro and the promise to repay $100 million in debt.
For Carlsberg executives, the saga was far from over. Mr. Bolloev, they said, has pressured them to sign over the company permanently.
“It would require that we literally did a deal with Putin and his administration, creating a legitimate transaction where they could take over our business for basically close to nothing,” Jacob Aarup-Andersen, the Carlsberg chief executive, said in an interview last month. “We just couldn’t do that.”
Within weeks, the Russian authorities had arrested two company employees and raided their homes. This month, Russian news outlets reported, Mr. Bolloev asked the authorities to nationalize the company.
Dmitri A. Medvedev, the former president who is the deputy chairman of Russia’s security council, expressed no sympathy for companies trying to move money out of the country and take it back to the very countries arming Ukraine.
He taunted Carlsberg, thanking them for padding the Russian budget.
“A strong budget means help for the front,” he wrote last month. “In this regard, the senseless Danes also contribute to modern Russian weapons.”
