Russian diplomacy is no longer about co-operation but "putting Westerners in their place", say ex-Kremlin insiders.

Russia’s diplomats were once a key part of President Putin’s foreign policy strategy. But that has all changed.

In the years leading up to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, diplomats lost their authority, their role reduced to echoing the Kremlin’s aggressive rhetoric.

BBC Russian asks former diplomats, as well as ex-Kremlin and White House insiders, how Russian diplomacy broke down.

  • socsa@lemmy.ml
    131·
    2 years ago

    It’s actually hilarious how millennials are refusing to shit themselves in fear over hollow threats of nuclear apocalypse like the boomers did for decades.

    Like, I’m going to die a slow death from microplastic poisoning. My kids will slowly cook to death as the earth warms. Instant death by fireball sounds pretty nice.

    • ArthurParkerhouse@lemm.ee
      62·
      2 years ago

      The young scions of our age find themselves in a curious juxtaposition to their forbearers, who once trembled at the thought of world-ending calamities unleashed by the fiery engines of the Autarch’s weaponry. These newer souls scoff at such fears, deeming them hollow echoes of a past era, perhaps because they have been raised in the shadow of subtler, yet equally inexorable, dooms. To them, the threat of slow ruin wrought by the invisible maladies that pollute our waters and air, or the gradual inferno that the Sun’s ever-increasing wrath promises to our world, hold more tangible dread. For these youths, the prospect of instantaneous annihilation in a blaze of cosmic fire seems almost a reprieve, a quick severance of life’s Gordian knot, sparing them the prolonged suffering promised by the ills that plague our slowly deteriorating Urth.

  • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.ml
    1011·
    2 years ago

    Ah yes, Russian diplomacy is so weak that pretty much all of the world outside the west is aligned with Russia

  • PolandIsAStateOfMind@lemmy.ml
    725·
    2 years ago

    Russian diplomacy is actually pretty good with many successes, but to notice that you should look at something other than USA and EU.

      • PolandIsAStateOfMind@lemmy.ml
        48·
        2 years ago

        For example continuing cooperation and expansion of BRICS, recent Africa summit, increasing relations with countries in LatAm, many trade relations which were in large part able to replace everything lost on NATO embargoes, etc. etc.

        • El Barto@lemmy.world
          42·
          2 years ago

          But that’s just being nice to those who are automatically nice to them. Why don’t they do the same with those who oppose them? They just keep doing “no u, no u, no u.” In that respect, other countries such as Saudi Arabia and China have better diplomacy.

          • PolandIsAStateOfMind@lemmy.ml
            36·
            2 years ago

            But that’s just being nice to those who are automatically nice to them.

            That’s part of a diplomacy. Also ask yourself, why are they being nice to them, especially places being plundered by wester colonialism for centuries. For example something like the current situation in Niger where French diplomat get his credentials and visa revoked over not even pretending to be doing his job + ignoring the government he was ambassador to + inflammatory speech of Macron worsening the situation. Which leads to the curious problem of westerners, including a lot of people in this thread, having weird definition of diplomacy as dictating ultimatums to kneeling nonwhite people. USA and EU are now doing exactly this: dictating ultimatums, and are bewildered when other people don’t want to hear this.

            Also, it’s not olny being nice: there are a lot of treaties being signed, a lot of gound prepared for further ones - this is how you gauge diplomacy.

            Why don’t they do the same with those who oppose them?

            You mean Russia? West is only speaking to Russia with ultimatums and loaded “propositions”. I guess the revelation of how France and Germany treated the Minsk agreement was a big bucket of cold water for Russia, they stopped believing what NATO says.

            They just keep doing “no u, no u, no u.”

            Again, what does west expect when they aren’t even engaging in a good faith? Non hostile countries hear something vastly different, as proven by the examples i cited earlier.

            In that respect, other countries such as Saudi Arabia and China have better diplomacy.

            Idk about Saudis, but China recently vrokered a deal between Iran and Saudis, two of the most traditionally mutually hostile countries on Earth, i would call this stellar diplomacy.