Analysis-Trump’s Iran attack rattles Russian hardliners who call for Putin to double down on war in Ukraine
By Andrew Osborn
MOSCOW, March 3 (Reuters) – When President Donald Trump returned to the White House last year, some Russian hardliners were cautiously optimistic, hoping that Trump’s unpredictability and businesslike nature would benefit Moscow on Ukraine.
But his attack on Iran means many now see him as a growing threat to Russia and question whether Trump is, as they think, a pragmatic, potentially pro-Moscow dictator ready to engage in realpolitik.
Some hawks openly demand that Moscow abandon U.S.-brokered peace talks with Ukraine and instead double down on fighting there, arguing that U.S.-Iran nuclear talks that preceded the U.S.-Israeli air war were a cynical ploy to show that Washington cannot be trusted.
“A USA without principles is a threat to the whole world,” said nationalist businessman Konstantin Malofeyev, who is married to a senior Kremlin official. “The United States with whom we are trying to negotiate on Ukraine is the United States. Yes, it wants a weak Europe. But it also wants a weak Russia.”
Boris Rozhin, an influential war blogger who goes by the moniker “Colonel Cassad” and has nearly 800,000 followers on the Telegram app, said Trump is a monster running amok with impunity.
“To seriously rely on any agreement or agreement with him (the monster) is either stupidity or treason,” Rozhin remarked.
Andrei Sidorov, a leading academic, went further, telling state television that Trump was a “dangerous man” and that he regretted that the US president survived an assassination attempt in July 2024 and was re-elected the same year.
“We now understand who is responsible for the world,” Sidorov said. “If you look at what Trump is doing step by step right now, almost no one can stop him. Let’s be honest, Russia is stuck in a stalemate in Ukraine. Practically all we are doing now is dealing with the Ukraine issue. (And) our arch-enemy (the US) is mediating in these negotiations.”
The Kremlin, still hoping that Trump can help end the war in Ukraine on his own terms and oversee a broader lucrative US-Russia rapprochement, has condemned US actions as “unprovoked aggression”. But he refrained from criticizing Trump personally and did not offer any concrete material assistance to Iran beyond diplomatic support.
He also said he believed it was in his interest to continue peace talks on Ukraine, even if events in Iran meant there was uncertainty about the timing and location of the next round of talks.
The Kremlin’s statement on Ukraine was a signal that it would seek to maintain a delicate balancing act, at least for now; While he remained on good enough terms with Trump to keep him engaged on Ukraine, he was also vocal about policies with which he disagreed.
Russian and Western analysts do not believe there is much Moscow, which has imported, refined and then begun producing its own Iranian-designed drones, can do to help Tehran at this stage.
Some also see a potential silver lining for Russia from events in Iran. Putin’s special envoy Kirill Dmitriev raised the possibility that rising oil prices, which have not risen as much as Moscow needs to balance its budget, could help the struggling state budget and reduce discounts on Russian oil sold to countries such as China and India.
Some Russian analysts have suggested that if the conflict in the Middle East continues for a while longer, Ukraine may receive less arms and ammunition supplies from the United States, air defense missiles may be sent to the Gulf countries instead, and general interest and support from the United States may decrease if the conflict in the Middle East continues for a while longer.
But the hawks’ harsh rhetoric reflects real unease among Russia’s security and political establishment. They see an increasingly aggressive U.S. president weakening Moscow’s influence on the world stage, with Russia stuck in Ukraine and unable to protect its own interests the way the Soviet Union once did.
Hawks say Trump is systematically eliminating Russia’s allies. These point to the fate of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, who was overthrown by opposition forces in December 2024 and whose leader was later welcomed to the White House by Trump; Venezuelan Nicolas Maduro, who was captured at gunpoint by US forces in January; and to Iranian Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was assassinated in joint US-Israeli attacks over the weekend.
The fate of Cuba, a long-time ally, is also in Washington’s interest and worries them, too.
Trump’s critics accuse him of being too soft on Moscow and inadvertently leaving Putin out in the cold with a summit in Alaska last year; But some hard-line Russians are so afraid of Trump alienating key allies in Moscow that they even fear he might one day turn his attention to Russia; This is something Trump has never stated is on his agenda.
Alexander Dugin, the ultranationalist philosopher and hardline ideologue who once saw Trump as a great hope for Russia, told his followers: “If Iran resists, everything can go wrong. If it collapses, we are next.”
Dugin said, “We had common ground with Trump when he remained true to his original MAGA ideology. As Trump rapidly moved away from MAGA and closer to neocons, those points of contact quickly disappeared. It is better to have nothing to do with Trump as we do today.” he said.
(Reporting by Andrew Osborn, editing by Jon Boyle)
