Many of the risks that have their roots in 2022 are derived from the war in Ukraine and remain relevant for 2023. The financial and military allocations promised at the beginning of the year by the USA, France and Germany will increase the Ukrainian army’s ability to defend itself (from the ground and from the air), as well as to organize effective counterattacks against Russian aggression.

The inevitable continuation of the war is accompanied by the strengthening of the consequences of Western sanctions and, accordingly, Russian countermeasures in the energy and agro-food spheres. Although it will affect both the North and the South, the costs of geopolitical confrontations will be much higher for those living in the South and may include inflationary risks, food shortages, and more. (EconomistIntelligence, January 2023). With the projected risk profile for 2023 clear, the West must ensure that it avoids the mistakes of 2022, when it misinterpreted Russia’s intentions, allowing it to permanently destroy regional security without putting up any effective resistance.

Although he demonstrated increased efficiency at the stage of crisis management (Russian aggression against Ukraine), radical and urgent decisions that turned Russia into the most sanctioned country in the world (13,072 sanctions by December 2022), the West failed to foresee the real crisis. Both American and European decision-makers relied on the wrong strategy to reduce the risks associated with the materialization of a new Russian war in Europe. In this sense, elementary mistakes were made in assessing the strategic threat, neglecting negative scenarios.

The most serious mistake was the repeated ignoring of the unfortunate experience with the manifestation of Russian militarism in Eastern Europe. Old lessons that the West has not learned include the first war against Ukraine in 2014-2022, which was preceded by the war against Georgia in 2008. The West acted with diplomatic tools completely unsuitable for the direction in which the Russian threat escalated, before the end of 2021, to a crisis of scale. The Russian case can serve as a “cold shower” for repairing the mechanisms of interception, reduction and prevention of risks operated by the West in general and the EU in particular.

Origin of risks for the EU and their expectations

In addition to the management of current crises (security, energy, humanitarian), which involves reducing the negative consequences and restoring the pre-crisis order, the EU should review and strengthen its mechanisms for preventing risks caused by geopolitical (f) factors. This category includes three sets of (f)actors. In the Eastern European dimension, we are talking about the erosion of traditional and energy security in Eastern Europe due to Russian militaristic revisionism. On the African side, chronic instability persists in the Sahel region (Mali, Burundi, including the Central African Republic), which is facilitated by Russia’s intervention through the Wagner Group’s private army. Finally, with regard to the Asian dimension, I will focus on technological vulnerabilities that could be exacerbated by a potential “chip war” between the US and China. In addition, the EU may face problems if there are disruptions in technology supplies from Taiwan (about 60% of global chip contract manufacturing in 2022) following Chinese military aggression, which is inevitable in the long term.

The wide variety of geopolitical risks, as well as the lack of unity in terms of foreign policy, make the EU remain the most vulnerable actor in the West. For these reasons, the EU together with the member states (EU – 27) should closely cooperate in the process of monitoring and assessing trends in the development of threats in three dimensions: Eastern European, African and Asian. South America should not be overlooked, although it is not an actual priority from the point of view of threats of Russian origin.

Anticipating the new risks that the EU needs requires the integration of a “security culture” into the planning and decision-making process. Early warning tools must be used before national vulnerabilities explode and have cross-border and, by extension, European or continental consequences. Diversification of the voices that influence decision-making in the EU is another pressing need. Thus, members of the business environment from critical sectors and academia should be involved in the development and updating of risk management documents within permanent platforms (“groups of sages”). Thus, narrow and/or biased thinking will be countered, including interference in national political agendas. In addition, the EU needs the effective cooperation of the security services of the member states to ensure access to accurate, verified and comparable information. Proper contextualization of the threat helps to take effective measures to reduce or even prevent the risks faced by Member States.

In a volatile and uncertain international context, the EU must emerge from three realities – the urgency of the risk, the severity of the impact and the factor that exploits the vulnerability. They should be included in a comprehensive risk register to reduce the number of geopolitical surprises. With a comprehensive picture, interventions can be completed and initiated at the stage of risk incubation, rather than after the fact.

Reducing risks of Russian origin – three priority areas

Russia is now the source of the risks facing the EU. The initial event was military aggression against Ukraine. Freezing the conflict preserves the source of the risk, as well as the uncertainty associated with the possibility of uncontrolled (but frozen) risk escalation. To reduce the likelihood that the risks associated with the current crisis will multiply, the EU has at least three solutions: 1) deployment of proactive diplomacy in regions where Russia seeks refuge from Western sanctions; 2) termination of the process of energy decoupling in relation to Russia; 3) equipping Ukraine with political-diplomatic (strengthening Ukraine’s global voice), economic-financial (confiscation of Russian assets and their transfer to Ukraine) and military (promotion of arms procurement) tools.

1. Reliable public diplomacy in the “Global South”. Despite the fact that Russia appears to be occupied in Ukraine and isolated due to sanctions, it is simultaneously trying to influence other parts of the world. In addition to deepening political and trade relations with China, India and Turkey, which allows Russia to soften the blow of sanctions, it is active in Africa, South America and Southeast Asia, which make up the “Global South”. The effect of the Russian presence can be judged by counting the countries that take a neutral position or lean towards Russia regarding the war in Ukraine. Although many countries of the Global South vote against Russia in the UN General Assembly, they oppose the sanctions regime. According to some estimates, by 2022, the Russian-tolerant Global South will make up about 63% of the world’s population. Another 37% support Ukraine, mainly represented by the West, which accounts for 70% of world GDP (EconomistIntelligence, January 2023).

The destabilization or dedemocratization of the Global South is a better scenario for Russia, as interstate relations are easier to adapt to Russia’s commercial and geopolitical interests. This category of actions includes the trip of the President of the Federation Council of the Russian Federation Valentina Matvienko to Latin America for meetings with the leaders of Brazil and Bolivia. In addition to trying to deepen its presence in countries that are not subject to sanctions, Russia’s interest lies in promoting a multipolar vision of the international order (zones of influence around individual poles). At the same time, Russia uses its disinformation sources blocked in the West (Sputnik, RT, etc.) to spread a distorted version of the events in Ukraine in Spanish, French, English, etc.

Excluding the embassies of EU member states, the EU has 140 diplomatic missions around the world. However, Russian disinformation appears to dominate the Global South, ultimately leading to opportunities for sanctions evasion. The diplomatic potential of the EU, combined with the potential of its member states, exceeds the potential of Russia tenfold. But for this to bring results, the EU must conduct an integrated communication campaign in the languages ​​spoken in the Global South, using the information potential of Spain, France and Portugal. The interaction of the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, with the academic environment in Morocco is an example of successful public diplomacy, which should have been applied by all EU delegations immediately after the outbreak of aggression in 2022. European diplomacy can serve as a platform to intensify Ukrainian efforts in the field of public diplomacy.

2. “Energy sovereignty.” Reducing energy dependence on Russia is a top priority to prevent further episodes of energy blackmail in the future. At the same time, as a side effect, the elimination of energy vulnerability in relation to Russia and the introduction of other restrictions in the energy sector (oil embargo, etc.) increase the costs of the Russian budget, which increased by 27% in 2022, amounting to 389 billion euros (Bloomberg, January 2023 ). This threatens the legitimacy of Vladimir Putin’s regime and the morale of the Russian military. Thus, the energy separation from Russia indirectly contributes to Ukraine’s efforts to return the territories occupied by Russia.

At the same time, although the replacement of Russian energy resources has a high short-term cost, their complete or partial elimination is a significant investment in European security. In Germany’s case, the prioritization of security in exchange for privileged gas contracts with Gazprom was driven by restrictions imposed by sanctions and Russian energy sabotage, both driven by external factors. As a result, German imports of natural gas, coal and Russian oil plummeted from 55%, 50% and 30% respectively to zero in the last 10 months of 2022. The German trend is also observed in other former dependent European states excessively due to Russian energy carriers – Italy, France, Poland, Bulgaria, etc. Italy proposes to create a “North-South energy axis” with Africa, and Bulgaria plans to import liquefied gas (1.5 bcm annually) from Turkey until at least 2036 (FT, January 2023). While these solutions seem sufficient in the short term, creating new dependencies on Africa or Turkey and Central Asia involves strategic risks until these regions and countries are democratized and/or stabilized to provide a range of reliable partners. .

Contrary to the intention to lay the foundations for new areas of energy vulnerability, the EU and its member states should strengthen energy sovereignty in relations with all regional or global energy states, regardless of the type of political regime. This requires prioritizing the “green transition” based on renewable energy sources and the hydrogen produced from them. If Germany cannot build 1,500 wind turbines a year to meet its 2030 renewable energy targets (from 47% to 80%), other European countries with more modest resources will have no incentive to do so. the European level may be compromised. In addition, a serious plan to expand, upgrade and secure critical infrastructure is a must – read the full article and comment on Contributors.ro