The unrest in Belarus poses a direct threat to Putin himself

Two events this week have signalled the likely outcome in the ongoing standoff triggered by the disputed Belarusian presidential election. On Wednesday Belarus’s foreign minister Vladamir Makei appeared alongside his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov in Moscow. Makei’s statement was blunt: “We prevented an attempt at a colour revolution in our country.” The message and the show of unity with the Kremlin mark a significant change in how Russia is preparing to engage with the situation.

Makei’s appearance in Moscow was swiftly followed by the confirmation that Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny had been poisoned with Novichok. This is the same nerve agent that was used against the former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in Salisbury in 2018. Novichok is part of a class of nerve agents developed by the Soviet Union — the use of Novichok is unmistakably Russian and has become a defining feature of Russian assassination attempts. Russia’s denials, simultaneously angry and mocking, are described by the Russian word vranyo, a lie that you do not really expect anyone to believe.

In the face of such acts, the courage of the opposition in Belarus cannot be understated. Alexander Lukashenko’s fearsome enforcer Dmitry Pavlichenko, accused by the EU of running a hit squad, has been bought back into service.

The question that most commentators have been asking is how Putin might choose to intervene or indeed whether he would do so at all. The question was settled in an interview last week in which Putin broke his silence on Belarus. Putin chose that moment to give an indication of how Russia will respond to continuing protests and how he views Russian interests in the countries bordering Nato. With Ukraine, apart from Crimea and the Donbas, now largely in the Western orbit, the loss of another liminal border state would be unthinkable.

The Kremlin has remained silent for two weeks watching the determination of the Lukashenko regime to stay in power. Putin will also have assessed how united the elite decision makers were, whether Lukashenko commanded the support of the security services and whether another viable, pro-Russian candidate would appear.

There is famously little affection between Belarus’s President Lukashenko and Putin, and it was only a matter of weeks ago that Belarus expelled a team of Russian mercenaries, threatening to deliver them to Ukraine. Yet Putin used Sunday’s interview to dispel any doubts about Russia’s willingness to intervene in the Belarus crisis.

The use of the term “colour revolution” by Makei was significant, because it shows a significant shift in narrative, one that is also evident in Russian-backed media. Russian state media had previously pursued a relatively neutral position, pointing out that “Belarus is not Ukraine”. The message has now changed to “in Belarus, just like in Ukraine”. As witnessed during the Colour revolutions, Russian media now suggests that Western powers are fomenting unrest, that the protests are violent and the police response is, in Putin’s words, “restrained”.

Although Putin acknowledged that the protests were a sign of internal problems, from his perspective the solution must not diminish Russian power. So for Putin, the relationship between Lukashenko and the people is an internal matter, as long as it does not upset the geopolitical status quo. If it changes the status quo in a way that does not benefit Moscow, it will stop being an internal matter and most likely lead to intervention.

For Moscow, the legitimacy of a regime is not linked to the normal indicators of democracy but whether the relative relationships with the West and Russia are preserved. One Russian political commentator, Alexander Baunov, observed this week: “The internal political agency of the Belarusian people is important, but less so than the external political agency of the Belarusian state as a player in the global power balance. Demands for freedom can be accommodated as long as they don’t conflict with the tasks of maintaining the geopolitical equilibrium.” In other words all internal politics in the countries surrounding Russia are now seen through a geopolitical prism by the Kremlin.

Putin described Belarus as “perhaps the country closest to us: ethnically the closest, and linguistically, culturally, spiritually.” This gives some sense of the stakes for Putin and why the divide between domestic and foreign politics has collapsed. If Lukashenko were to go, it would set an unwelcome precedent for Putin when he likely seeks re-election in 2024 — and so he wants to avoid the easy removal of an authoritarian leader who faces economic stagnation after a rigged election. If peaceful revolution is allowed in a country as similar to Russia as Belarus, then why not mother Russia herself?

Thus Belarus’s governance is a domestic security issue, not for Russia but for Putin personally. This matters because it means that no level of assurance about pro-Russian sympathy by rivals to Lukashenko could assuage Putin’s fears. Indeed Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, the most likely actual winner of the Presidential elections, remains sympathetic to Moscow and the newly-formed Coordinating Council of the Belarus opposition issued a statement making clear its commitment to the country’s “constitutional order and foreign policy course.”

Moscow’s intervention is already taking place. Representatives of the Russian state-backed broadcaster RT, are being sent to Belarus, as local journalists walk out of Belarus’s state media. It seems likely that, for the moment at least, Putin will use the tools of propaganda and economic coercion to achieve his desired outcome. If further evidence of ongoing Russian involvement were needed, the aircraft used by the head of the FSB has been spotted making round trips to Belarus as recently as August 18. Putin does not want to risk alienating the Belarusian people or incurring further US and European sanctions if he can avoid either. The tipping point for the overt use of Russian force remains unknown, but it is being used as a potent threat.

A move to aggressive and semi-open intervention in the form of “little green men” appearing in Belarus would suggest that Putin fears the situation is spiralling out of Moscow’s hands. Putin used his interview to draw a red line: “We also agreed that [Russian forces] will not be used until the situation gets out of control and until extremist elements, under the guise of political slogans, cross certain borders — start looting, start setting cars, houses and banks on fire, seize administrative buildings and so on… I hope there will be no such need.” The protests so far have been peaceful so Putin’s stated fears seem remote. However, the possibility remains for Russian agent provocateurs to conduct “false flag” operations to justify subsequent intervention.

Russia’s position makes cooperation with the West unlikely. This is not simply a question of “spheres of influence”. If this were the case then a deal could be struck in which the Belarusian people might accept a commitment not to join Nato, something for which there seems little popular support anyway, as the price for democracy. For Russia the real threat is democracy itself and so Putin will not tolerate change in Belarus. In other words this is not a battle of Western and Russian interests that can simply be managed. This is a far more intractable clash of values.