This book revisits the concept of strategic culture by examining the relationships between Russia and its neighbors in the east and west. The book explains how the competing Russian and western influences create innovative strategies, that display common regional characteristics of the different countries' cultures.

This book revisits the concept of strategic culture by examining the relationships between Russia and its neighbors in the east and west. The book explains how the competing Russian and western influences create innovative strategies, that display common regional characteristics of the different countries’ cultures.

From a globally renowned expert on Russian military strategy and national security, The Russian Way of Deterrence investigates Russia's approach to coercion (both deterrence and compellence), comparing and contrasting it with the Western conceptualization of this strategy. Strategic deterrence, or what Dmitry (Dima) Adamsky calls deterrence à la Russe, is one of the main tools of Russian statecraft. Adamsky deftly describes the genealogy of the Russian approach to coercion and highlights the cultural, ideational, and historical factors that have shaped it in the nuclear, conventional, and informational domains. Drawing on extensive research on Russian strategic culture, Adamsky highlights several empirical and theoretical peculiarities of the Russian coercion strategy, including how this strategy relates to the war in Ukraine. Exploring the evolution of strategic deterrence, along with its sources and prospective avenues of development, Adamsky provides a comprehensive intellectual history that makes it possible to understand the deep mechanics of this Russian stratagem, the current and prospective patterns of the Kremlin's coercive conduct, and the implications for policymakers on both sides of the Atlantic.

The concept of Strategic Culture was developed during the Cold War years as a tool to analyse the nuclear policies of the Soviet Union and the United States, in an effort to assess the likelihood of their utilising their nuclear capabilities. Strategic Culture provides a useful lens through which we may understand the context, outlook and behaviour of states, shedding light on the way they perceive the international community and their role within it. As the Cold War came to an end, the focus of Strategic Culture literature shifted from the nuclear bipolarity that characterised U.S.-Soviet relations, to focus on other states and issue areas that dominated the international agenda within the New World Order. This thesis seeks to return to the original tenets of Strategic Culture, bringing attention back to the initial remits of this area of study, that is, the nuclear strategic cultures of the U.S.A. and Russia. Further to identifying the strategic cultures of the United States and Russia, this research questions whether these have been impacted by the change in international order brought on by the end of the Cold War. This work will also question whether nuclear weapons contorted their respective strategic cultures, or whether their strategic cultures were insulated from the impact of nuclear weapons. It will also assess whether the differences in strategic cultures have brought about differences in nuclear policy.

This book discusses the diverse practices and discourses of memory politics in Russia and Eastern Europe. It argues that currently prevailing conservativism has a long tradition, which continued even in Communist times, and is different to conservatism in the West, which can accommodate other viewpoints within liberal democratic systems. It considers how important history is for conservatism, and how history is reconstituted according to changing circumstances. It goes on to examine in detail values which are key to conservatism, such as patriotism, Christianity and religious life, and the traditional model of the family, the importance of the sovereign national state within globalization, and the emphasis on a strong paternal state, featuring hierarchy, authority and political continuity. The book concludes by analysing how far states in the region are experiencing a common trend and whether different countries’ conservative narratives are reinforcing each other or are colliding.

This book analyses the categories of thought underpinning Russia’s strategic decision-making and military operations, unpacking their nature, development, and interaction. The work argues that mainstream Western analysis of Russian military and strategic behaviour is affected by two limitations: first, by forcing Russian choices into pre-packaged logics of action, it fails to grasp the peculiar assumptions and intellectual nuances underpinning Moscow’s strategies; second, an overreliance on buzzwords such as ‘hybridity’ has mystified understanding of the Russian military modus operandi, its true character and strong consistencies. The book addresses such limitations by stressing the influence of strategic culture on Russia’s approach to strategy and war-fighting. After proposing an original model of strategic culture, it employs this conceptual framework to interrogate Russian primary sources and military practices between 2008 and 2018. This allows general hypotheses to be formulated about the ultimate principles underpinning the Russian way of war, which are then tested against three case studies: Russia’s interventions in Georgia (2008), Ukraine (2014–2015), and Syria (2015–2018), respectively. While steering clear of making forecasts, this book provides a solid basis on which to build expectations about and to chart strategies for counter-acting Moscow’s actions— including in the context of the current war in Ukraine. This book will be of much interest to students of Russian security, military and strategic studies, foreign policy, and International Relations in general.

" Over the last decade, Russia's increased aggression towards its neighbors has raised concerns over the stability of the European continent. Cyber denial attacks on Estonia, war against Georgia, annexation of the Crimean peninsula, and the support to rebels in Ukraine's Donbass region have all come during Vladimir Putin's watch. With Putin firmly in control of Russia after having eliminated much of his political opposition, the world asks, what are his motivations and what comes next? Contemporary reactions to Russian aggression advance the notion that the U.S. and its NATO allies should diplomatically and economically isolate Russia while increasing the alliances' hard power projection to contain and deter further aggression. This strategic approach represents an extreme pendulum swing that is a polar opposite of the U.S.'s 2009 approach to 'Reset' relations with Russia by engaging diplomatically while reducing military strength. By applying an analysis of Russian strategic culture and national interests, this thesis offers that instead of replacing engagement and disarmament with isolation and containment, a blended solution of both deterrent strength and engagement would achieve better results in line with U.S. national interests."--Abstract.