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By John Helmer, Moscow
@bears_with [2]
In warfighting against Russia’s enemies, President Vladimir Putin makes mistakes. He admits as much. Unequalled among the current leaders of the enemy states, he has the capability to correct his mistakes quickly. That’s one of the reasons for his unequalled domestic voter support.
Also, Putin is an attentive listener; he brooks criticism on condition it is not intended in a plan for regime change. Every ten years or so, Putin knows that Russia’s main enemies – the US, Germany, the UK – have come up with, will always come up with regime-changing schemes employing Trojan horses, Fifth Columns and quislings inside Russia.
These started for Putin with the Chechen secession. After he had defeated that, they were followed by the plotting of the oligarchs around Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Boris Berezovsky and ended with Alexei Navalny. Putin is well enough educated in the methods of analysis of Marxism-Leninism to understand that for Russia, regime change and warfighting, also class struggle, race war and imperialism, are constant and inevitable.
Because of what the Germans did to the Russian people at the time of his father, mother, brother, and uncles, Putin knows there is only the deterrence of superior force to stop the Germans repeating themselves; killing Germans is a generational necessity for Russia’s survival. Putin wishes better but knows – especially now – that the good Germans are outnumbered and outgunned, and the bad Germans are planning for worse with US encouragement and armament, as before.
With the British and the Americans, Putin has tried a combination of traditional economic inducements, regular espionage, and manipulation in the manner of Felix Dzerzhinsky’s Trust [3].* In the calculus of the force required for divide-and-rule and warfighting against the Anglo-American empires, Putin has also understood that time is needed to rebuild Russia’s capacities, economic and military, from the level of destruction which Washington inflicted through the time of the Gorbachev and Yeltsin capitulations. In correcting his predecessors’ mistakes and their misjudgements of the Americans, Putin has been a quick study but a slow learner.
Then there is Putin’s philosemitism in dealing with the Jewish state. Joseph Stalin believed Israel to be an anti-imperial ally, but it has turned into a battleship for the empire in destroying all of Russia’s traditional Arab allies, and now Iran — the last holdout before Putin must fight a war on the southern front.
There, Putin’s policy towards Iran combines [4] two hundred years of Russian trial-and-error, some of the errors fatal ones.
In the tradition of male loyalties in the Russian tusovka – mishpocha is the Jewish concept – Putin is both comfortable with and dutiful towards the Jewish men he shared his Leningrad boyhood with. Such loyalty is lifelong. No Russian can forget – even if Americans, Germans and British make a point and policy of forgetting – that they survived the war but not their grandparents, fathers, brothers and womenfolk. Putin has been persuaded that the 15% of Israel’s population who are Russian by language, history, and habit are an extension of the tusovka to which he should show the loyalty which survivors must show each other.
There has been nothing comparable towards the Iranian side; towards the Arab world, genuine Russian sympathy and cultural orientalism died with Yevgeny Primakov (1929-2015). Ties of trade, investment, and military cooperation are a poor substitute, as unpredictable and as fraudulent as the spot and future markets in commodities, including money itself.
In this podcast recorded yesterday, Dimitri Lascaris discusses the lessons Putin and the Russian General Staff are learning from the Iran war, both to guide their next steps for the security of the southern front, and also for negotiating and fighting the war in the Ukrainian sector of the western front.
Click for the hour-long discussion on Reason2Resist [5].
[6]The Reason2Resist podcast can viewed here [7].
[8]References in the podcast for readers to follow up:
President Donald Trump’s press conference at the NATO Summit on June 25; click to read [9]. “Question: He [Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Dan Cain] has said that Mr. Putin has territorial ambitions beyond Ukraine. Do you view that in the same way? Donald Trump: That’s possible. I mean, it’s possible. I know one thing he’d like to settle. He’d like to get out of this thing. It’s a mess for him. He called the other day. He said, can I help you with Iran? I said, no, you can help me with Russia. Because you know, in the last few weeks, we took care of India and Pakistan, Kosovo, Serbia. I think on Friday [June 26] we have coming in — the Congo is coming in and Rwanda is coming. And that was a vicious war that went on — a machete war, heads chopped off all over Africa. They’re coming in. We did uh, two others in addition to that. Nobody’s ever done anything like this. Uh, no. I consider him [Putin] a person that’s uh, I think, been misguided. I’m very surprised actually. I thought we would have had that settled easy. I’ve settled four of them in the meantime. But he did call up and he said uh, you know, he’s close to Iran. He’d like to help us get a settlement. I said no, no, you help me get a settlement with you, with Russia. And I think we’re going to be doing that too… I think it’s a great time to end it. I’m going to speak to Vladimir Putin and see if we can get it ended.”
Question: Why have you not been able to end the Ukraine war? Donald Trump: Because it’s more difficult than people would have any idea. Vladimir Putin has been more difficult. Frankly, I had some problems with Zelensky. You may have read about them. And it’s been more difficult than other wars. I mean, look, we just ended a war in 12 days that was simmering for 30 years, frankly.”
NATO’s 2025 communiqué, released on June 25 [10], is unusually brief at 427 words; there are 3 Ukraine mentions, 3 Russia mentions. “United in the face of profound security threats and challenges,” the communiqué reads, “in particular the long- term threat posed by Russia to Euro-Atlantic security and the persistent threat of terrorism, Allies commit to invest 5% of GDP annually on core defence requirements as well as defence-and security-related spending by 2035 to ensure our individual and collective obligations.”
[11]The corresponding NATO communiqué [12] drafted by the Biden Administration and issued in Washington on July 10, 2024, is almost thirteen times longer at 5340 words with 61 mentions of Ukraine, 45 mentions of Russia; That is defined as NATO’s main enemy: “Russia remains the most significant and direct threat to Allies’ security. “
Assessment of the lessons of the US-Israel-Iran war to date by Moscow military blogger, Boris Rozhin [13]: “The Middle East War. 1. It is worth noting that the Middle East war has not stopped; for instance, the genocide in the Gaza Strip which is Israel’s war against Hamas. The Houthi war against Israel is also ongoing. Today, the Houthis have promised to continue to hit Israel while the genocide in the Gaza Strip continues. So the talk about peace in the Middle East is far from the eality. The main problem for the world in the region is the Nazi regime in Israel.
- The withdrawal to the negotiations was carried out through demonstrative strikes of dubious efficiency. The United States struck with anti-bunker bombs and cruise missiles at Iran’s nuclear facilities but there is no credible evidence of their disablement. The Iranians explicitly insist that they have not been critically damaged and will continue to develop their nuclear program. Iran, in turn, attacked the Al-Udeid base in Qatar with ballistic missiles. At the same time, there is also no reliable evidence of critical damage at the base. Both sides knew in advance about the attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities and Iran’s strikes on al-Udeid. Both sides took valuable assets from the attacked facilities in advance. Both sides announced the success of their strikes and the failure of the strikes of their opponents.
- Nevertheless, such a scheme has allowed both sides to announce victory and agree to a truce. This was evidence that all participants in the war are not ready to go to the end and wage a total war of destruction, which would be the consequence of the heavy damage that Iran and Israel have caused to each other, with full understanding that there will only be many more impacts on both sides due to the weakening of the air defence. Therefore, as in 2020, Qatar was used as an intermediary – except that on this occasion it has had to accept the shelling of its territory, which [Iran’s attack on al-Udeid] demonstratively was, though the Qataris are falsely offended… Iran has run this war out of its missile arsenals while preserving the internal stability of the society. Without nuclear weapons. And without a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. The role of Russia, China and Pakistan, as well as the hypothetical assistance that could be provided to Iran, has remained behind the scenes. It is still unknown what Chinese military transport aircraft have been transporting to Iran and what agreements there may have been between the Iranians with Pakistan. Russia has traditionally and publicly held the position of a peacemaker, providing active diplomatic support to Iran.
- If we consider the situation from the point of view of the outcomes, it is obvious that Iran has resisted effectively, particularly against the hysterical calls at the beginning of the war for the imminent collapse of Iran. It was able to restore the chain of command, to establish some working air defence (which had just began to swing into action at the truce), and ensure the possibility of turning Israel painfully over up to the last minutes of the war. At the same time, the plans of the United States and Israel to overthrow the ayatollahs collapsed. Instead of overthrowing the regime, Iran’s opponents got instead a rallying of the Iranians around their flag, which in the end rather strengthened the Iranian authorities, at least for the near future. The son of the Shah in a kippe, the Iranians clearly do not need.
[14]Reza Pahlavi kowtowing to Israel at the Wailing Wall in April 2023 [15], and quoting Cyrus, the ancient Persian king, for precedent. Pahlavi announces his regime-change message to restore himself wrapped in the US flag on June 13, 2025 [16].
- At the same time, Iran has suffered tangible losses in air defence and radar systems, in the personnel of the army and the IRGC;, lost a number of important heads of law enforcement agencies, a number of important scientists, a number of industrial facilities, including nuclear ones. Material damage to Iran is significant and it will take more than one year to eliminate all the consequences. The main failure of Iran in this war is the complete failure of the Iranian special services; there have been problems there with ensuring the protection of the leadership and vital personnel, as well as of the performance of the unified air defence system. Too, it is worth noting the naivety of Iranian diplomats who were responsible in going along with Trump’s manipulation, which led to a misunderstanding of the timing of the outbreak of war.
- On the other hand, Israel has also suffered serious material damage, which is clearly visible even from the footage which has leaked through censorship. By the end of the war, Israel’s air defence was operating with effect and Iran was launching fewer missiles to achieve more hits. Modern ballistics and hypersonics have proved to be no less formidable weapons than the high-cost American models. Israel has also lost several expensive air defence systems, several important scientific facilities, and suffered serious damage in military, industrial, and civilian infrastructure. The total economic damage is also very significant. At the same time, it was impossible to achieve regime change in Iran. It was not assured that Iran would not have nuclear weapons. It was not possible to start a ‘new stage in the development of the Middle East’ with the redrawing of borders. An Israeli lion has jumped on the victim and tried to gnaw her neck, but the victim has broken free, and begun to poke the lion with a missile knife in its back. As a result, the situation began to turn from a blitzkrieg into a war of attrition, which threatened Israel with uncontrollable scenarios, so the owner of the Western zoo simulated a ‘crushing blow’ after which it turned the aggression against Iran.
[17]- 6. That’s certainly not the end. It’s a pause. None of the fundamental contradictions in the Middle East has been eliminated in this war. The existential nature of the conflict has not gone away. Within the wheels of this war, they will immediately begin to prepare for the next one. Israel will draw conclusions from the failures of its air defence, as well as restore its thinned-out agent network inside the country for future operations for regime change in Tehran, followed by its break-up. Iran, in turn, in addition to general restoration, will restore its air defence system (there will be attempts to buy air defence systems and radar from China and Russia), reform the special services and approaches to security, prepare even more drones and missiles. And so, in the future the topic of Iran’s nuclear program will not disappear anywhere. The Iranians have also drawn the appropriate conclusions from this attack for the role of the IAEA…
- 8. The questions that remain up in the air: How much did Iran have left of launchers and missiles to strike Israel at the end of the war? How much has Israel left of anti-air missiles and air defence systems? What and where did the Iranians take from their nuclear facilities? What is the real situation at the sites in Natanz, Isfahan and Fordow? What losses did Israel suffer during the strikes which did not get into the photo/video media? What are the real losses of Iran and Israel among the military? In general, there are more questions than answers. So a more detailed analysis will follow later, when the fog of war and military propaganda will subside.”
[*] To interpret the war from Iran’s perspective, listen to the Iranians directly [18]. There are MI6 agents and pensioners proposing to interpret the Iranians, also the Arabs and the Russians, with seeming sympathy and expertise. Some of them are also engaged on the Kremlin tab [19]. Russians understand that MI6 has a long and uninterrupted history of deception operations in the war against Russia, and they never stop trying new ones. Their most recent one has been the fabrication of Novichok [20] in the 2018 attacks on Sergei and Yulia Skripal. Their most successful operation was John Le Carré’s books [21] about fighting the KGB. They were fiction; MI6 is the codename for English fiction. Dzerzhinsky made no mistake about that. [*] To interpret the war from Iran’s perspective, listen to the