January 22, 2025
What are Putin’s red lines? Are they tantamount to nuclear threats? Or, given the lack of overt follow through, should they be discounted altogether? How do we evaluate them? This talk seeks to address these questions by deciphering the content, context, and coherence of Putin’s red line discourse. Specifically, it leverages data analytical techniques to compare and contrast expectations from the Western canon with the idiosyncrasies of the construction and timing of Putin’s explicit references to red lines. The disconnect between this overt discourse and potential trigger events is situated within the strategic logic of Russia’s “way of warfare” that places a premium on “reflexive control,” as opposed to the demonstration of resolve and credibility. This explication of the explicit discourse is augmented by ongoing data and visual analyses of the application of Putin’s “real” red line threats to identify benchmarks for assessing the most recent threats and the risks of inadvertent escalation.
Chapters:
00:00 Introduction by the moderator, Dr. William Potter, Director, James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies and Sam Nunn and Richard Lugar Professor of Nonproliferation Studies Middlebury Institute of International Studies
02:45 Presentation by Dr. Adam Stulberg, Sam Nunn Professor & Chair Sam Nunn School of International Affairs; Associate Director, Strategic Energy Institute Georgia Institute of Technology
49:14 Q&A
