Putin Can’t Afford to Lose in Ukrainebut He Can’t Afford to Win, Either – The New Republic

My homily for the Journal is heartfelt, but I probably wouldnt bother with it were it not for the fact that one of the Journals best reporters, Evan Gershkovich, is sitting right now in a Russian jail on trumped-up espionage charges. Gershkovichs true offense may be that his last published Journal piece before his arrest, co-authored with Berlin-based Journal reporter Georgi Kantchev, was headlined, Russias Economy Is Starting to Come Undone. Economic growth has diminished, likely for the long term, Kantchev and Gershkovich reported. State revenue shortfalls are putting guns in conflict with butter. Perhaps worst of all, long-simmering fears in Moscow that Russia will become an economic colony of China are starting to be realized as Western sanctions make Moscow more dependent on Beijing to supply microchips and semiconductors.

On Friday, the Journals Zumbrun furnished additional evidence of Russias economic decline. The source was a surprising one: air pollution detected by the European Space Agencys Sentinel-5P satellite, which was launched into outer space in 2017. The satellites purpose is to monitor the emission of specific pollutants harmful to the atmosphere. But incidental to this mission, the satellite can tell when countries that arent knocking themselves out to go green, like Russia, are reducing energy output and factory production.

The findings are fascinating. Rosstat says that industrial production rose 1.2 percent in March over the previous year. But Sentinel-5P recorded that industrial regions produced 6.2 percent less pollution over the previous year. Its possible that the Urals were blanketed with solar panels while nobody was looking, but is it likely? After Western car companies pulled out after the Ukraine invasion, Russia said it would reopen these factories under Russian ownership. But Sentinel-5P recorded a 16 percent drop in emissions from these sites, suggesting Russias efforts to continue car production faltered.

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Putin Can't Afford to Lose in Ukrainebut He Can't Afford to Win, Either - The New Republic