Why Perpetual War is Essential for Putin’s Survival

The Structural Trap: Why ‘Fortress Russia’ Requires Perpetual Conflict

For years, the prevailing wisdom in Western capitals was that a negotiated peace in Ukraine would be a victory for Vladimir Putin, granting him consolidated control and reduced military expenditures. However, a deeper analysis of the Kremlin’s internal logic suggests the opposite: the Russian regime has evolved into a system where perpetual war is no longer a choice, but a structural requirement for survival.

This “Fortress Russia” model, as analyzed by William Dixon and Maxim Beznosyuk for TNI, suggests that a ceasefire—even on terms favorable to Moscow—could destabilize the regime more acutely than the war itself. The external aggression is not a byproduct of instability; It’s the primary tool used to maintain it.

Fragmenting the Elites: The Price of Loyalty

Autocratic stability relies on a delicate balance of power distribution among elites. Historically, Putin managed this through prosperity and arbitrage. The current conflict has ended that era, replacing it with a system of systemic fragmentation and high-cost dissent.

We are seeing a shift where political rank no longer guarantees safety. The seizure of assets from figures like gold tycoon Konstantin Strukov and the quiet removal of veteran allies like Dmitry Kozak signal a recent reality: the elite are now effectively hostages of a system that views resignation as desertion.

The war provides the necessary justification for this repression. Travel bans for those with state secrets and the forced liquidation of foreign assets are framed as national security measures. Without a constant external enemy, the justification for these extraordinary measures collapses, potentially opening the door for elite coordination against the center.

The Great Divide: Rural Prosperity vs. Urban Austerity

To prevent mass uprisings, the Kremlin has implemented a sophisticated “carrot and stick” economic strategy that splits the Russian population along geographic and economic lines.

The Periphery’s War Boom

In impoverished rural regions, the war has become a primary engine of economic growth. By recruiting heavily from the periphery and linking these areas to the military-industrial complex, the regime has created a new class of “war shareholders.”

• Localized Wealth: In some Siberian regions, a soldier’s salary can exceed the local average by 15 times.
• Recruitment Incentives: In Tatarstan, signing bonuses have reached 2.9 million rubles (approximately $38,000), representing decades of typical local savings.
• Industrial Dependence: Regions like Sverdlovsk, Tula and Rostov have integrated their civilian production into military supply chains, making their local economies structurally dependent on the continuation of the conflict.

The Urban Squeeze

Conversely, the urban middle class is funding this survival. The regime has pivoted toward austerity, evidenced by the increase of the VAT to 22% and a sharp reduction in social spending—dropping from 38% to 25% of the budget.

To prevent this resentment from turning into organized resistance, the state has deployed a digital panopticon. The criminalization of VPNs, the banning of WhatsApp, and the mandatory implementation of surveillance apps like MAX have effectively erased the boundary between security services and the penal system.

Rethinking NATO: From Crisis Management to Permanent Presence

If the Russian regime structurally requires war, the West must stop treating the current aggression as a temporary crisis to be “managed” until Putin tires. Instead, NATO must treat perpetual conflict as a constant condition.

The Shift to Permanent Combat Formations

The era of rotational “Enhanced Forward Presence” (eFP) is reaching its limit. To counter a Kremlin that plans in decades, NATO needs permanent, based combat formations with deep logistics, including division-sized ammunition stocks and integrated air and missile defense (IAMD) centers.

Establishing a “strategic wall” in the Suwalki Gap and northeast Estonia would force the Kremlin to internalize security costs. This creates a fiscal dilemma: Putin must either spend ruinous amounts to match NATO symmetrically—weakening his internal repression—or accept strategic inferiority, thereby losing the “external threat” used to justify domestic control.

European Strategic Autonomy

The alliance must evolve toward a two-pillar architecture, reducing total dependence on the U.S. And establishing Europe as a coherent strategic pole. This involves:

• Defense Spending: Moving toward a 5% GDP threshold for defense.
• Industrial Integration: Developing a local defense-industrial base for long-range strike systems and drones independent of U.S. Supply chains.
• Financial Innovation: The potential issuance of integrated “euro-defense bonds” to consolidate fragmented national procurement.

Ukraine as a Structural Deterrent

The most critical shift in Western policy is moving from viewing Ukraine as a “crisis” to viewing it as a structural deterrent. This requires a transition from periodic aid tranches to long-term security contracts.

By ensuring a sovereign, heavily armed Ukraine remains on Russia’s border, the West forces the Russian state to maintain its military economy at the “red line.” According to the framework proposed by Yale professor Milan Svolik, this state of extreme tension eventually leads to either elite exhaustion or systemic fiscal catastrophe.

In this light, supporting Ukrainian resilience is not a burden on European security, but a high-return investment—a 21st-century Marshall Plan that keeps the Russian regime trapped in its own structural contradictions.