The Role of Russian Intelligence in the Invasion of Ukraine
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is touted as an intelligence failure, but examining the role of intelligence agencies in Russian foreign policy reveals a more systematic reality. This talk will discuss the role of Russian intelligence services in Russia’s decision to invade Ukraine in 2022 and draw parallels between this decision and the Soviet Union’s decisions to use military force. Soviet-era military interventions heavily shaped the KGB’s foreign policy views. In her talk, Suzanne Freeman will go beyond the simple designation of the invasion of Ukraine as an intelligence failure and instead highlight how the policy decision represents the Soviet Committee for State Security’s (KGB) enduring policy preferences. These preferences enter the Russian policy process through President Vladimir Putin, a former KGB officer, and retired KGB officers who serve in key national security positions across the presidential administration and ministries and from the KGB’s successor intelligence agencies. The talk will explain why Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine is more than an intelligence failure but rather a systematic decision.
Suzanne Freeman is a Ph.D. candidate in the MIT Political Science Department and a predoctoral research fellow at George Washington University’s Institute for Security and Conflict Studies. She researches civil-intelligence relations, civil-military relations, nuclear issues, and grand strategy and utilizes archival research, structured interviews, and wargaming. Her research lies at the intersection of international security and comparative politics, studying authoritarian intelligence agencies and military institutions and their role in domestic and foreign policy. Her research agenda examines the policy role of coercive institutions from different perspectives by examining the reform of post-Communist intelligence agencies, intelligence agencies as a tool of authoritarian control, Soviet nuclear counterproliferation policy, and the Russian military’s power projection capability. Before her PhD studies, she worked at the U.S. Naval War College’s Russia Maritime Studies Institute. She received a bachelor’s degree in Slavic Studies and a master’s degree in International Affairs from Columbia University.