4: Roberto Carmack, PhD, on Russian actions

Welcome to the One CA Podcast. 

Please welcome Roberto Carmack who received his PhD in Central Asian and Russian history. He is a Specialist at the 450th Civil Affairs Batallion (Airborne), U.S. Army Reserve. Roberto discusses Russian actions and the way ahead in the region.

Sponsored by the Civil Affairs Association. Produced and edited by John McElligott.

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Transcript

00:00:29    SPEAKER_01
NATO members in Eastern Europe and even larger countries like Germany and France are very concerned with the potential for Russian aggression because the Russians did, in fact, slice off a piece of a sovereign country, Ukraine, and annex it.

00:01:06    SPEAKER_00
Welcome to the 1CA Podcast. My name is John McElligot. I'll be your host for this episode. We're joined today by a special guest from the 450th Civil Affairs Battalion Airborne. Roberto Carmack is a specialist, but he also has a PhD, so we'll call you Dr. Carmack for this episode if that's okay with you.

00:01:25    SPEAKER_01
That sounds good, sir.

00:01:26    SPEAKER_00
We wanted to talk with you today about your background and the connection between what you'd studied and what you're doing on the civilian side now. and how you think that may tie into civil affairs. So you're really a history buff. You earned a master's degree and a PhD in history. If you could, for everyone, describe your doctoral thesis and what your focus was.

00:01:46    SPEAKER_01
Sure. So I defended my thesis in 2015, and it's about Central Asia during World War II, and in particular about mobilization in Kazakhstan. Basically, what I've done is compare how Soviet authorities, In Russia and in Central Asia, mobilized all these different populations for the war effort, from Muslim Central Asians to Russians to people who were deported to the region during the war. So it's mainly designed to understand how mobilization worked in practice and how all these ethnic policies changed as a result of the war.

00:02:26    SPEAKER_00
To conduct your research, did you have to go to those countries?

00:02:29    SPEAKER_01
Yes, I did. I spent quite a bit of time in Kazakhstan, about a year. I mostly did archival work to locate these government documents that discuss these policies. I also did quite a lot of research in Moscow, something like three months.

00:02:48    SPEAKER_00
Was that speaking Russian and other languages?

00:02:51    SPEAKER_01
Right. So in Kazakhstan, you can get by. using Russian. I do speak Kazakh, but most of the documents for that period were written in Russian because there's a heavy bias towards the Russian language in all Soviet regions.

00:03:07    SPEAKER_00
So everyone else listening to this episode knows Specialist slash Dr. Carmack speaks multiple languages and is actually, you're getting paid by the Army for, what do you have now, Russian and Spanish on the record?

00:03:22    SPEAKER_01
That's right, yeah. Okay.

00:03:24    SPEAKER_00
Well, I would encourage everyone to go ahead and take those language exams and to learn another language. How has the process been for you in taking those exams and getting paid?

00:03:35    SPEAKER_01
You know, these exams are in some ways difficult and others not too bad. I came to Russian pretty late in life. I started studying the language in grad school, so I had to learn it basically from nothing. It took many years to get to a level where I can speak it and read it comfortably. and it requires frequent practice. Spanish was technically my first language, so I was able to reacquire it through review. But yeah, I mean, there are many, many soldiers that have language abilities that they learned in their households or through education. So like you, I definitely encourage them to seek the opportunity to take the exam because it's really great for your record, and the money certainly helps.

00:04:20    SPEAKER_00
Absolutely. Yeah, a little extra cash on top of the Battle Assembly pay is wonderful.

00:04:25    SPEAKER_01
Yeah.

00:04:26    SPEAKER_00
Dr. Carmack, I wanted to talk to you about the connection between the U .S. military and what's going on in Russia and to provide some background about the Russian Federation. So if we could try to break down the armed forces of the Russian Federation and how it compares to the U .S. It's my understanding that the service branches include ground forces. aerospace, Navy, strategic missile, airborne, and special operations forces. I'm not sure if they have anything related to civil affairs. And they have conscription, so citizens must join the military if they're age 18 to 27 for 12 months of service, which, based on my experience in the U .S. Army, that would take up a lot of your training anyway. And there was one estimate I found that mentioned approximately 5 .4 % of GDP spent in the military. Does that stack up against what you know, and how would you rank the strengths of the Russian military compared to those of the U .S.? Yeah,

00:05:26    SPEAKER_01
so that 5 .4 % of GDP going to military expenditures, that's actually quite high compared to most countries in Europe. You know, since 2008, the Russian government has initiated a pretty comprehensive program of military reform. Basically, their goal is to emphasize quality over quantity and modernize the military. So, you know, in general, from a technological and even strategic viewpoint, it doesn't seem that the Russians can match the United States or the NATO alliance in terms of sheer capacity. But thanks to these reforms, their military capacity has generally gone up.

00:06:15    SPEAKER_01
Your listeners probably know that Russia and Georgia, the former Soviet Republic, waged a short but pretty intense war. There were a lot of problems there, mainly because the different branches of the Russian military and even individual elements within the Russian army weren't coordinating their efforts. So there's a lot of miscommunications that definitely degraded their battlefield capacity. But now if we fast forward to recent events in Ukraine and Syria, it's very obvious. that the Russian ability to command and control their forces has improved dramatically. So are they a match for the United States and NATO? In the strictest sense, no. But it would be a mistake to underestimate them because they're improving their capacity practically every year. Okay.

00:07:01    SPEAKER_00
Well, you brought up a couple countries there as examples. You talked about Georgia, Syria, Ukraine. And I wanted to talk to you about the idea of a buffer zone. I've read about it very often, and I think it's a plausible argument. I read connected to geopolitics and the importance of geography. So do you agree that the Russian Federation needs a buffer, buffer zones? And what evidence do you have to support that idea?

00:07:28    SPEAKER_01
Absolutely. And that's not only something that I believe, but I think that the Russian government is definitely adhering to the military and geopolitical strategy. Really, the creation of these buffer zones is the only way to prevent offensive action against the Russian Federation, at least from the perspective of the Kremlin and the people making defense policy. The modern history of the Russian state is just filled with examples of foreign powers invading through vulnerable frontiers. The Nazi invasion during World War II is just a major example of that. It's not altogether surprising that Russian leaders are trying to keep their opponents like the United States and NATO away from their borders. For example, that was one of the major reasons why the Russians decided to intervene in Ukraine in the past few years. They need to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO, and that way, by keeping NATO forces out of Ukraine, they have more strategic flexibility to wage an effective defense should there be a war with the alliance.

00:08:35    SPEAKER_00
And what's the connection with Georgia and the Caucasus region?

00:08:40    SPEAKER_01
Yeah, Russian military and diplomatic strategy there is largely similar to what's going on in Ukraine. I referenced the 2008 war with Georgia before. You know, this narrow strip of territory between the Caspian and the Black Seas is of highest strategic importance for the Russians. Not only is it a... oil transfer point. But many of these countries in the past, like Georgia, have tried or at least flirted with the notion of joining NATO and establishing very close relations with the EU. The Russians are trying to prevent that by any means at their disposal through economic pressure and, if necessary, military pressure. So we can see the creation of a buffer zone there as a preeminent Russian concern. Okay.

00:09:30    SPEAKER_00
There's another area I wanted to bring up, and I haven't heard about it since Russia took over the Crimean Peninsula in 2014. What has happened since then?

00:09:40    SPEAKER_01
Yeah, so I think one of the reasons you haven't heard much out of Crimea is because the annexation has become normalized in a sense. Western media outlets have grown accustomed to it, and they see it as something that's an established fact. Although there's not a lot of armed conflict in the region like there is in those two separatist provinces in eastern Ukraine of Donetsk and Luhansk, there's still plenty going on. On the whole, Russian control on the peninsula is quite stable. The Russians have militarily fortified the peninsula, so any sort of armed incursion from the Ukrainian side is not really feasible. The Russians have accused the Ukrainian government of sending in these small special operations type teams to conduct sabotage operations and collect intel. But for the most part, the peninsula is militarily secure. So inside, the Russians are slowly working to consolidate their control over the governing apparatus and even the population. According to several independent polls, mostly conducted by Western research outfits, the majority of Crimeans, something like 80 percent, support Russian control over the Crimean peninsula. And this largely breaks down along ethnic lines. And it's not too surprising that most ethnic Russians there support Russia as opposed to Ukraine. strongly opposed to Russian control. One of them, and perhaps the most important, is the Crimean Tatars. They're a Turkic Muslim group that's native to the peninsula. And the Russians have been treating them extremely poorly by arresting their leaders, shutting down their representative institutions, and silencing their press. So there's a lot of potential there for future conflicts. So we'll have to see what happens within the next few years.

00:11:40    SPEAKER_00
Yeah, absolutely. And you brought up... Ethnic Russians. I've read that ethnic Russians are in decline, and that may be one reason why Russia is trying to expand again to include non -ethnic Russians within the Federation. What's the history, and where do you think we're headed?

00:12:00    SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it's a good point. I mean, there's no question that Russia is facing a demographic crisis. You know, the birth rate is extremely low. for a European country. And really, within the next few decades, it's not going to be likely that they'll be even able to support their military force at current levels. It's something that the leadership is well aware of and is worried about. Hence, they're instituting these pro -birth policies in an attempt to kind of boost the birth rate. And part of the consequence of this is that we have to remember, you know, The technical name for the country is the Russian Federation because it's a federation of many ethnic groups led by the Russians, including many groups that are non -Slavic and even Muslim. I'm talking about groups like the Chechens and the Tatars, and there are many others. These Muslim national or ethnic groups tend to have a higher birth rate than the native Russian population. So what we're going to see in the next 50 years or so is that these Muslim groups are going to gradually outstrip the Russian population. And it's obviously going to have a tremendous impact on Russian national identity and even their military policies.

00:13:18    SPEAKER_00
Have you seen pushback recently? Are ethnic Russians pushing back against non -ethnic Russians, or are they more inclusive?

00:13:29    SPEAKER_01
Well, on the one hand, no. When we're talking about groups like the Tatars, Russians consider them to be citizens of the Russian Federation and not too different from them. Most sattars speak Russian. They're aware of Russian cultural values, et cetera, et cetera. Where the pushback is coming in is with migrants from Central Asia. We're talking about ex -Soviet countries that aren't part of the Russian Federation anymore, countries like Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan. These countries sent huge numbers of labor migrants to work in places like Moscow and St. Petersburg. And yes, there's tremendous pushback against these populations. This has been going on for more than 10 years. There's been a huge upswing in racist sentiment that breaks down along racial lines and anti -immigrant sentiment. And you're right, as the Russian population experiences this demographic crisis, it seems likely that these kind of extremist sentiments... are going to increase.

00:14:31    SPEAKER_02
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor.

00:14:54    SPEAKER_00
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00:15:35    SPEAKER_03
Welcome back to the 1CA podcast.

00:15:38    SPEAKER_00
I want to ask you about, as the Russian bear flexes its muscles in Eastern Europe, how much flexibility, how much give do you think there is within NATO circles and those Eastern European countries? And where do you think, if we call it a red line or... Where do you think Europe would feel Russia is going too far if they started to annex more territories like Latvia, for example? What's your take on that?

00:16:06    SPEAKER_01
your take on that? Yeah, so if we're talking about the Russian sphere of influence or their perceived sphere of influence, I think we can divide these countries into three broad categories. The first includes one of the countries that you mentioned. Latvia, and also Estonia, Lithuania, the Baltic countries. Here, the United States and NATO needs to draw a very firm and unambiguous red line because, you know, these are members of the NATO alliance. So if the Russians were to outrightly annex these countries or even subvert them by fanning ethnic conflict, that would really undermine the foundation of the NATO alliance. designed to repel Russian aggression, after all. So there can be no ambiguity that we will respond very aggressively to aggression in that sphere. But when we're talking about other countries, there's a second category. And here I have in mind countries like Ukraine and Georgia that, of course, are important to U .S. and even European interests, but our ability to shape events in these countries is rather limited. Here, I think we should push back whenever it's feasible, but probably not at the expense of sparking a wider military or diplomatic confrontation. And finally, there are certain countries where Russian influence is really predominant. Here I'm talking about Armenia. The Armenians are in some ways completely beholden to Moscow, Tajikistan, and Central Asia along the Afghan border, where the Russians have a great deal of military and even economic influence. Or a country like Belarus, Russia's strongest ally in Europe, and a country that's quite dictatorial like Russia itself. Here, the United States doesn't have much to offer these countries because its economic and diplomatic power is very far away. These governments aren't used to dealing with the United States. And here, we might have to refrain from pushing back in any substantial way because it just wouldn't be a good use of our limited resources.

00:18:20    SPEAKER_00
I think in the last few years, the United States has returned to pre -positioning assets and returning some equipment that was taken out of Europe. Is that what you've been tracking the last few years? Do you think that we are now increasing our footprint permanently or through exercises in Europe to push back against Russia?

00:18:40    SPEAKER_01
After 1991, the United States certainly started withdrawing substantial military forces from Europe. The view was that Russia was not weak and didn't pose a substantial geopolitical threat. But this has begun to change. It really started to change in 2008 when Vladimir Putin initiated a foreign policy that was quite aggressive, at least compared to Russian policy in the past. The situation changed radically in 2014. Now, all of these small NATO members in Eastern Europe and even larger countries like Germany and France are very concerned with the potential for Russian aggression because the Russians did, in fact, slice off a piece of a sovereign country, Ukraine, and annex it. This is almost unprecedented in Europe in the sense, you know, since World War II, that is.

00:19:26    SPEAKER_00
know, since

00:19:29    SPEAKER_01
So now there's been a lot of pressure for the United States to redeploy forces into Eastern Europe in order to create a ready force that could deter Russian aggression and, if necessary, repulse it. So, yeah, the United States has been more or less serious about reinforcing NATO's eastern border. Now there's a battalion -sized element in Estonia, Lapia, Lithuania, and Poland that's manned partially by the United States. The United States is also prepositioning heavy equipment to have it ready in case of a conflict. So in the future, it's very likely that these countries are going to continue requesting U .S. support and the reinforcement of U .S. forces, and that the United States is going to go along with it in order to send a clear message to the Russians that we're ready, that Eastern Europe is not a place where you can meddle with impunity. Right.

00:20:26    SPEAKER_00
And civil affairs units, active duty are certainly there, but also reserve units rotate through the exercises as a part of supporting the special and conventional forces in there. Roberto, I wanted to ask you about influence operations. So the United States saw that big time in the 2016 U .S. presidential election. So we've learned, most Americans learned how extensive the influence operations have become. Could you describe? how Russia has been meddling in European elections in recent years, and what other countries are doing to combat those efforts.

00:21:01    SPEAKER_01
Right. So as you intimated in your question, Russian meddling in the U .S. election is really just the tip of the iceberg. Within the past two years or so, the Russians have interfered with elections across Europe, from the United Kingdom to Germany and others. The goal here is to try to support candidates that are perceived to be sympathetic towards Russian interests and also to support groups that are on the political fringes of society in an effort to destabilize these political systems and, in mind, democratic values in these countries. And, you know, these efforts are wide ranging. And even countries as far away as Mexico and others in the Western Hemisphere have complained that the Russian government is meddling in their electoral processes. So this is really part and parcel of a comprehensive Russian cyber strategy to shape the international environment to suit Russian interests. And the election meddling is just one component of that.

00:22:05    SPEAKER_00
Okay.

00:22:06    SPEAKER_01
So, yes. NATO and the United States have obviously begun to recognize the danger that these kind of intrusive cyber efforts pose. About a month ago, NATO finally established a brand new cyber command, and the goal here is to better coordinate the Alliance's defensive and offensive capabilities in the cybersphere. So in the near future, we're probably going to see a situation where cyber warfare becomes a very important and in many senses the primary proxy. for geopolitical conflict between the United States and Russia, and between Russia and our European allies. So there's going to be something of an arms race that develops, I predict, between Russia and the West to develop cyber weapons, to develop countermeasures, and to outlink each other in the cybersphere. So most likely these kind of efforts to undermine our electoral process, to influence our electoral process, they're going to continue because the Russians see this as a cheap way. and relatively harmless from their perspective way of influencing us to their benefit.

00:23:15    SPEAKER_00
Well, you know, our job for the Army is civil affairs, military government. How do you think this folds into the work that we do for Army Reserve and civil affairs? Or how do you think the active duty forces in civil affairs, you know, what can you actually make it broader than that? So Army or Marine Corps? How do you think we should fold in what's happening in cyber with civil affairs?

00:23:41    SPEAKER_01
That's a good question. You know, civil affairs is a branch of the Army that doesn't really have a clear cyber function offensively or defensively.

00:23:49    SPEAKER_00
really have

00:23:52    SPEAKER_01
or defensively. Obviously, we're impacted by it. You know, cyber attacks against the military will obviously degrade civil affairs operations. But really, one thing we can do... is to try to ensure that, for example, civilian areas in contested zones like Ukraine and the Baltic states have a cyber capability. What that means in practice, they need computers, they need internet access, they need networks, and that's something civil affairs can plug into, and it's something that we can help ensure the survival of on the cheap. It's something that doesn't have a clear military component. but we need to make sure that these countries have the potential to develop the weapons to fight in the cybersphere.

00:24:42    SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I would think it would be helpful for ensuring that if people are getting messages through the Internet and if they have a connection to the Internet, they would see messages from U .S. or Allied forces regarding movements or to avoid tripping up any maneuver commanders' operations. essentially stay out of our way or to then find out what the impact of operations is on the local population through the internet, through chat rooms, through message boards, or through news stories that are posted online.

00:25:15    SPEAKER_01
Absolutely. And we have to keep in mind that some of these Eastern European countries are highly plugged in. Estonia is a good example. Many, many of their government functions depend almost completely on the internet. About 10 years ago, Moscow orchestrated a pretty comprehensive attack on Estonia's cyber infrastructure. It was devastating. It only lasted a few days, but the Russians showed that if they wanted to, they could absolutely cripple that country.

00:25:35    SPEAKER_00
was devastating.

00:25:42    SPEAKER_01
that country. So I think the U .S. would need to fortify these networks to... resist that because it could be so devastating for the countries involved. And it would have all sorts of civil affairs implications as critical government infrastructure, things like hospitals shut down.

00:26:06    SPEAKER_00
Yeah, you're absolutely right. Roberto, I wanted to ask you about what brought you over to civil affairs. So why join the Army and then why join the civil affairs branch?

00:26:16    SPEAKER_01
Well, I joined the Army because I'm obviously interested in military history. I wanted to get out of the library. I wanted to do something a little bit more hands -on, and I figured the Army was the most logical place to do that and also contribute to my country as best as I could. Civil affairs was a more or less natural choice for me because it's one of the professions in the Army where People put a premium on knowing about the cultures of foreign peoples and how to interact with them. That's key to civil affairs operations. And since I'm naturally inclined to study foreign cultures and foreign peoples, it seemed like a very logical choice for me.

00:27:05    SPEAKER_00
Well, we value you being a part of the unit. We think that you're a fantastic addition to civil affairs and clearly know a lot about what's happening in the region with the Russian Federation and its neighbors. And I wanted to ask you to close this episode by asking you about some references, where you would recommend other members of the civil affairs community or United Action Partners. Where should they go for information about what's happening within the Russian Federation in the region?

00:27:36    SPEAKER_01
One of the best websites that reports on the broader Eurasian region with an emphasis on the former Soviet Union is Eurasianet .org. They have good reporting that's hard to find in other more mainstream outlets. New York Times, when they do report on Russia, it tends to be of pretty high quality. They have good reporters that are well -versed in Russian politics and current affairs. For the Russian speakers, there's Kommersant .ru. Kommersant is a pretty good independent Russian newspaper that doesn't adhere to the government line, which is hard to find in Russia today. Those are the main sources that I use to stay abreast of these contemporary issues.

00:28:23    SPEAKER_00
Thank you very much. Well, Roberto Carmack, thank you very much for joining us in the 1CA podcast.

00:28:28    SPEAKER_01
My pleasure, sir. Thank you.

00:28:33    SPEAKER_00
Thank you for spending some time with us. Please subscribe and come back for another installment of 1CA. Until then, be safe and secure the victory.