Putin's Plan: Understanding the Russian National Security Strategy 2021 With Clausewitz's Theory

This thesis extracts the main directions of the Russian National Security Strategy 2021 and assesses how the key features influence the escalation risk of the relations between Russia and the West. The thesis uses Carl von Clausewitz's theory in a two-step analytic approach. The first step uses the basic structure that, Clausewitz suggests, characterizes strategies. The basic structure of strategies consists of the political standpoint in the strategic environment, the political purpose or end state, the strategic objective or aim, the ways, and the means. The arguments in the Russian NSS 2021 are analyzed and put into the hierarchical relation with Clausewitz's causal chain of strategies. The research finds four key features guiding Russian strategic action: 1) perception of an existential threat from the West, 2) great power ambitions, 3) establishment of total control of the state over society, and 4) disruptive transformation of the Russian economy. The second step uses the three tendencies of Clausewitz's trinity of war, verified by Max Weber's theory of social action, and evaluates how emotionality, rationality, and identity influence the risk that the relations between Russia and the West escalate. The results suggest that the Russian NSS 2021 prepares Russian society and economy for war. The NSS 2021 also creates a strategic context that increases the risk of escalation and does not limit the level of intensity of a possible conflict.