The Next 100 Years

rus s i a n dy n a m i c s
If we are going to understand Russia’s behavior and intentions, we have to
begin with Russia’s fundamental weakness—its borders, particularly in the
northwest. Even when Ukraine is controlled by Russia, as it has been for

---

103
r u s s i a 2 0 2 0
centuries, and Belarus and Moldavia are part of the Russian empire as well, 
there are still no natural borders in the north. The center and south are an­
chored on the Carpathian Mountains, as far north as the Slovakian- Polish 
border, and to the east of them are the Pripet marshes, boggy and impassa­
ble. But in the north and south (east of the Carpathians), there are no 
strong barriers to protect Russia—or to protect Russia’s neighbors. 
On the northern European plain, no matter where Russia’s borders are 
drawn, it is open to attack. There are few significant natural barriers any­
where on this plain. Pushing its western border all the way into Germany, as 
it did in 1945, still leaves Russia’s frontiers without a physical anchor. The 
only physical advantage Russia can have is depth. The farther west into Eu­
rope its borders extend, the farther conquerors have to travel to reach 
Moscow. Therefore, Russia is always pressing westward on the northern Eu­
ropean plain and Europe is always pressing eastward. 
That is not the case with other borders of Russia—by which we mean to 
include the former Soviet Union, which has been the rough shape of Russia 
since the end of the nineteenth century. In the south, there was a natural se­
cure boundary. The Black Sea leads to the Caucasus, separating Russia from 
Turkey and Iran. Iran is further buffered by the Caspian Sea, and by the 
Kara Kum Desert in southern Turkmenistan, which runs along the Afghan 
border, terminating in the Himalayas. The Russians are concerned with the 
Iranian–Afghan segment, and might push south as they have done several 
times. But they are not going to be invaded on that border. Their frontier 
with China is long and vulnerable, but only on a map. Invading Siberia is 
not a practical possibility. It is a vast wilderness. There is a potential weak­
ness along China’s western border, but not a significant one. Therefore, the 
Russian empire, in any of its incarnations, is fairly secure except in northern 
Europe, where it faces its worst dangers—geography and powerful Euro­
pean nations. 
Russia had its guts carved out after the collapse of communism. St. Pe­
tersburg, its jewel, was about a thousand miles away from NATO troops in 
1989. Now it is less than one hundred miles away. In 1989, Moscow was 
twelve hundred miles from the limits of Russian power. Now it is about two 
hundred miles. In the south, with Ukraine independent, the Russian hold 
on the Black Sea is tenuous, and it has been forced to the northern extreme 

---

104
t h e n e x t 1 0 0 y e a r s
of the Caucasus. Afghanistan is occupied, however tentatively, by the Amer­
icans, and Russia’s anchor on the Himalayas is gone. If there were an army 
interested in invading, the Russian Federation is virtually indefensible. 
Russia’s strategic problem is that it is a vast country with relatively poor 
transportation. If Russia were simultaneously attacked along its entire pe­
riphery, in spite of the size of its forces, it would be unable to easily protect 
itself. It would have difficulty mobilizing forces and deploying them to mul­
tiple fronts, so it would have to maintain an extremely large standing army 
that could be predeployed. This pressure imposes a huge economic burden 
on Russia, undermines the economy, and causes it to buckle from within. 
That is what happened to the Soviet state. Of course, this is not the first 
time Russia has been in peril. 
Protecting its frontiers is not Russia’s only problem today. The Russians 
are extremely well aware that they are facing a massive demographic crisis. 
Russia’s current population is about 145 million people, and projections for 
2050 are for between 90 million and 125 million. Time is working against 
it. Russia’s problem will soon be its ability to field an army sufficient for its 
strategic needs. Internally, the number of Russians compared to other eth­
nic groups is declining, placing intense pressure on Russia to make a move 
sooner rather than later. In its current geographical position, it is an acci­
dent waiting to happen. Given Russia’s demographic trajectory, in twenty 
years it may be too late to act, and its leaders know this. It does not have to 
conquer the world, but Russia must regain and hold its buffers—essentially 
the boundaries of the old Soviet Union. 
Between their geopolitical, economic, and demographic problems, the 
Russians have to make a fundamental shift. For a hundred years the Rus­
sians sought to modernize their country through industrialization, trying to 
catch up to the rest of Europe. They never managed to pull it off. Around 
2000 Russia shifted its strategy. Instead of focusing on industrial develop­
ment as they had in the past century, the Russians reinvented themselves as 
exporters of natural resources, particularly energy, but also minerals, agri­
cultural products, lumber, and precious metals. 
By de-emphasizing industrial development, and emphasizing raw mate­
rials, the Russians took a very different path, one more common to coun­
tries in the developing world. But given the unexpected rise of energy and 

---

105
r u s s i a 2 0 2 0
commodity prices, this move not only saved the Russian economy but also 
strengthened it to the point where Russia could afford to drive its own se­
lective reindustrialization. Most important, since natural resource produc­
tion is less manpower-intensive than industrial production, it gave Russia an 
economic base that could be sustained with a declining population. 
It also gave Russia leverage in the international system. Europe is hungry 
for energy. Russia, constructing pipelines to feed natural gas to Europe, 
takes care of Europe’s energy needs and its own economic problems, and 
puts Europe in a position of dependency on Russia. In an energy- hungry 
world, Russia’s energy exports are like heroin. It addicts countries once they 
start using it. Russia has already used its natural gas resources to force neigh­
boring countries to bend to its will. That power reaches into the heart of 
Europe, where the Germans and the former Soviet satellites of Eastern Eu­
rope all depend on Russian natural gas. Add to this its other resources, and 
Russia can apply significant pressure on Europe. 
Dependency can be a double- edged sword. A militarily weak Russia can­
not pressure its neighbors, because its neighbors might decide to make a 
grab for its wealth. So Russia must recover its military strength. Rich and 
weak is a bad position for nations to be in. If Russia is to be rich in natural 
resources and export them to Europe, it must be in a position to protect 
what it has and to shape the international environment in which it lives. 
In the next decade Russia will become increasingly wealthy (relative to 
its past, at least) but geographically insecure. It will therefore use some of its 
wealth to create a military force appropriate to protect its interests, buffer 
zones to protect it from the rest of the world—and then buffer zones for the 
buffer zones. Russia’s grand strategy involves the creation of deep buffers 
along the northern European plain, while it divides and manipulates its 
neighbors, creating a new regional balance of power in Europe. What Rus­
sia cannot tolerate are tight borders without buffer zones, and its neighbors 
united against it. This is why Russia’s future actions will appear to be ag­
gressive but will actually be defensive. 
Russia’s actions will unfold in three phases. In the first phase, Russia will 
be concerned with recovering influence and effective control in the former 
Soviet Union, re- creating the system of buffers that the Soviet Union pro­
vided it. In the second phase, Russia will seek to create a second tier of 

---

106
t h e n e x t 1 0 0 y e a r s
buffers beyond the boundaries of the former Soviet Union. It will try to do 
this without creating a solid wall of opposition, of the kind that choked it 
during the Cold War. In the third phase—really something that will have 
been going on from the beginning—Russia will try to prevent anti- Russian 
coalitions from forming. 
It is important to step back here and look at the reasons why the former So­
viet Union stayed intact in the latter half of the twentieth century. The 
Soviet Union was held together not simply by force but by a system of eco­
nomic relationships that sustained it in the same way that the Russian em­
pire before it was sustained. The former Soviet Union shares a common 
geography—that is, vast and mostly landlocked, in the heart of Eurasia. It 
has extremely poor internal transport systems, as is common in landlocked 
areas where the river systems don’t match with agricultural systems. It is 
therefore difficult to transport food—and after industrialization, difficult to 
move manufactured goods. 
Think of the old Soviet Union as that part of the Eurasian landmass that 
stretched westward from the Pacific Ocean along the wastelands north of 
populated China, northwest of the Himalayas, and continued along the 
border with South Central Asia to the Caspian, and then on to the Cauca­
sus. It was buffered by the Black Sea and then by the Carpathian Moun­
tains. Along the north, there was only the Arctic. Within this space, there 
was a vast landmass, marked by republics with weak economies. 
If we think of the Soviet Union as a natural grouping of geographically 
isolated and economically handicapped countries, we can see what held 
it together. The countries that made up the Soviet Union were bound to­
gether of necessity. They could not compete with the rest of the world 
economically—but isolated from global competition, they could comple­
ment and support each other. This was a natural grouping readily domi­
nated by the Russians. The countries beyond the Carpathians (the ones 
Russia occupied after World War II and turned into satellites) were not in­
cluded in this natural grouping. If it weren’t for Soviet military force, they 
would have been oriented toward the rest of Europe, not Russia. 
The former Soviet Union consisted of members who really had nowhere 

---

107
r u s s i a 2 0 2 0
else to go. These old economic ties still dominate the region, except that 
Russia’s new model, exporting energy, has made these countries even more 
dependent than they were previously. Attracted as Ukraine was to the rest of 
Europe, it could not compete or participate with Europe. Its natural eco­
nomic relationship is with Russia; it relies on Russia for energy, and ulti­
mately it tends to be militarily dominated by Russia as well. 
These are the dynamics that Russia will take advantage of in order to re­
assert its sphere of influence. It will not necessarily re-create a formal politi­
cal structure run from Moscow—although that is not inconceivable. Far 
more important will be Russian influence in the region over the next five to 
ten years, which will surge. In order to think about this, let’s break it down 
into three theaters of operation: the Caucasus, Central Asia, and the Euro­
pean theater, which includes the Baltics.