New Report! Escalation by Design: Russian Objectives in Ukraine — Proxy Warfare to Invasion (2014–22)
Dear Colleagues,
The Saratoga Foundation is pleased to announce a major new report: Escalation by Design: Russian Objectives in Ukraine — Proxy Warfare to Invasion (2014–22), authored by Senior Fellow Roger N. McDermott, as part of our ongoing Kremlin Strategic Failure project.
In this incisive study, McDermott argues that Russia’s February 2022 full-scale invasion was not a rupture from earlier policy but the culmination of a coercive strategy that had begun to fail. From 2014 to 2021, Moscow relied on proxy warfare, political subversion, economic leverage, and calibrated military pressure to constrain Ukrainian sovereignty. As these tools yielded diminishing returns—amid consolidating Ukrainian identity and expanding Western security cooperation—Russia shifted from coercion to compellence, seeking to impose a new political reality through speed, shock, and nuclear-shadowed escalation.
The report analyzes the deep, intermediate, and proximate drivers of war, highlighting the urgency created by shrinking pro-Russian influence inside Ukraine, the failure of Minsk II, and a “now-or-never” decision frame. It also examines the Zapad 2021 military exercise as a preview of Moscow’s intended operational grammar, and assesses how battlefield realities exposed its limits. McDermott concludes that durable war termination will hinge not merely on ceasefire lines, but on sequencing, verification, and enforceable political architecture.
We invite you to read this timely and deeply researched analysis, which sheds light not only on Russia’s failures but also on the evolving nature of modern war.
Please download the full report 👉 here.
Enjoy!
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