A long and fairly depressing interview with the heads and several employees of Estonia's, Latvians and Lithuania's state security agencies ref their views on Russia and its people:
https://ekspress.delfi.ee/artikkel/120083694/human-life-has-no-value-there-baltic-counterintelligence-officers-speak-candidly-about-russian-cruelty
Some 'highlights':
When engaged in a struggle with Russia, one can expect them to be excessively emotional, but also relentless. They are great, ambitious, merciless, and most of all, cruel.
Toots wasn’t surprised by the atrocities committed in Bucha. Nor were any other of the counterintelligence agents I interviewed in Estonia, Latvia, or Lithuania. They’re aware of how Russians conducted themselves in the Baltics during the Second World War. Of how they conducted themselves before that. Of how they’ve always behaved. The West lacks such awareness.
„[The West is] fortunate,“ Toots remarks. „We’re a buffer between them and Russia. They’ve forgotten a lot and think Russia is just like them.“
It isn’t. And Putin isn’t the only issue.
„When the war began, we were worried about people saying it was only Putin’s war,“
Obviously, you can’t abstractly accuse an entire nation,“ says long-time Director General of the Estonian Internal Security Service Arnold Sinisalu. „But a society and a nation constitute a whole. The state may brainwash, but the germ of chauvinism still springs from the people itself.“
That is precisely how Baltic counterintelligence officers refer to Russia – not ‘it’, but ‘they’. The war in Ukraine is not Putin’s war. The cruelty is not Putin’s. The rapes, murders, gouged eyes, hangings, and burned corpses aren’t special tactics employed by Russia’s leader. It is Russia as a whole.
„The majority of Russians are to blame,“ says Sinisalu.
Western colleagues sometimes have a hard time believing this.
„They’re certainly more naïve and optimistic than we are,“ says one Baltic counterintelligence officer.
„When we tried explaining to our partners that Russia can’t be trusted, they denied it,“ another adds, visibly resentful. Georgia, the Crimea – nothing changed. „And here we are in 2022.“ Several interviewees imply that they’ve had to tirelessly remind Western partners of the dangers of such naiveté.
Our assessments of Russia haven’t changed in the last 30 years,“ says Mežviets. The chief analysis is this: Russia wishes to regain its status as an empire by any means.
„To them, there are no states, only zones and territories,“ Peeter explains. Russia sees itself as being surrounded by vassals and ancillaries – there is no third option.
„They’ll never come to terms with the breakup of the USSR,“ Mežviets says. As Russia’s leaders themselves have declared: Russia ends where it is stopped.
„It’s a conqueror’s mindset,“ Jauniškis says. „Everyone around them are enemies.“
The cruel culture pervading Russia’s modern army was entrenched during the era of Stalin’s Gulags. It isn’t random, but systematic. Rigid hierarchies, an inability to account for variation, autocrats locked in information bubbles, and, at the same time, a population yearning for autocracy – perhaps the hardest aspect for Westerners to wrap their heads around – have existed in Russia for centuries and will only persist.
Baltic counterintelligence directors don’t only speak about Putin, but recall the reign of Peter the Great, who ordered all Swede-supporting Russians to be executed. Again, Sinisalu and Toots chime in together with a Russian maxim: „Beat your own to frighten others.“
„Violence is a historical pattern in Russia, and that will not change,“ Sinisalu calmly adds. „Human life has no value there.“
The massacre in Bucha wasn’t unique, but a repetition of Katyn. The detonation of the Olenivka prison was a copy of the explosion in Sambir, which killed 1,200 female prisoners in 1941. Nothing has come as a surprise for anyone familiar with Ukrainian history, as Ukraine isn’t simply Ukraine – it is also Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania in the 1940s.
For Russia, both sides winning equals a loss,“ remarks an Estonian entrepreneur who has organized complex business transactions with Russians for decades. „They need for there to always be winners and losers, even when negotiating.“ And only they may come out on top.
„There, diplomacy is a sign of weakness,“ says Mežviets. „Russia only recognizes force. It’s hard for the West to understand, as Westerners hold different values and believe that others do as well.“
Jauniškis compares contemporary Russian society to the medieval Mongols. Though Lithuania once joined forces with Russian princes to counter the Mongolian hordes, he feels that Russia switched sides given the behavior of its officers and soldiers alike. „They’re animals,“ he frankly states.