max seddon

As their yacht bobbed on the Mediterranean, the microchip executive snapped a picture of his Russian partner asleep on the deck. He only knew the Russian by his first name, Maxim. But he knew Maxim was using a shadowy network to get the chips for the Russian defense industry.

🎧NEW EPISODE of the Carnegie Politika podcast: @AlexGabuev, @NicoleGrajewski, and @SergeyVakulenk0 discuss what the war in Iran means for Moscow. How does it affect Russian influence in the region, and its position on global energy markets? carnegieendowment.org/podcasts/carne…

The Iran war coverage focuses on oil. The slower, more consequential story is fertilizers. A near-shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz is triggering a supply shock that will show up in food prices 6-9 months from now. Putin's gains here may be more long-term than simply lining his pockets with petrodollars

Trump’s spy chief Tulsi Gabbard offered contradicting assessments about the status of Iran’s nuclear program in a Senate hearing, undercutting one of the administration’s principal justifications for the war. With @ahauslohner as.ft.com/r/8697339d-324…

One of my fav photo albums ever is this collection by Andrew Miksys of post-soviet dance clubs in provincial Lithuania

The PowerPoint says “Become part of the technological future of the Russian armed forces”

The US intelligence community assesses that Russia has maintained the upper hand in the war against Ukraine, DNI Tulsi Gabbard tells Senators in the Worldwide Threats Hearing.

"Even with wartime attrition, Russia’s ground forces have grown, and its air and naval forces are intact and arguably more capable than before the full-scale invasion [...] "Russia is likely to remain resilient against Western sanctions and export controls"

Patrushev also said that Moscow was considering sending armed naval patrols to protect its ships. This could include "mobile firing groups" to protect Russian-flagged tankers as well as "special means of defense" on board the ships themselves.

In some of Russia's harshest criticism of the US war in Iran, which Putin has tried not to say much on, top aide Nikolai Patrushev calls it a "tragedy" that will "set global trade and economics back years" and "has no justification or objective reasons." kommersant.ru/doc/8514927

The strange case of Ilya Remeslo, a staunch pro-Kremlin activist who abruptly turned on Putin overnight, now calling for his resignation and prosecution "This man has destroyed everything he could lay his hands on,”Remeslo told me this morning theguardian.com/world/2026/mar…

My latest piece in @FT about how Iran's Hormuz blockade and Chinese rare earths controls show that the US has lost the dominance it once enjoyed in economic coercion, and what this means for sanctions as tools between war and peace: ft.com/content/ae4585…

Friday was my last day at Meduza. I'm still figuring out what's next, but I fully intend to keep my focus on Russia’s war against Ukraine. If you need a writer or editor for a project, don’t hesitate to reach out here or on LinkedIn! linkedin.com/posts/eilish-h…

RIP to Len Deighton, one of the absolute very best to ever do it ft.com/content/af80c4…

How it started: Kyiv in 3 days How it's going, 4 years later: Shoigu says "...the pace of development of [Ukrainian] ​unmanned drone systems and the sophistication of the methods used ​to deploy them are such that no region of Russia can feel safe" reuters.com/world/europe/r…

✂️ Oil Boom Won’t Shield Russia From Billion-Dollar Spending Cuts Despite the unexpected windfall of a Middle East conflict pushing oil prices higher, the Russian government has begun pressing ahead with sweeping spending cuts worth billions of dollars. “Spending cuts will kill the last bit of economic growth,” a senior official at the Ministry of Economic Development told The Bell. According to Vedomosti, at the start of the year Russia’s Finance Ministry notified all ministries of a 10% across-the-board reduction in spending. Bloomberg estimates the largest possible cut would amount to around 2 trillion rubles ($25 billion), or 0.8% of GDP — though The Bell’s own calculations suggest a more likely range of 0.5–1 trillion rubles ($6–12 billion). So-called “unprotected” budget lines will be first in line for cuts: national projects, infrastructure investment and road construction. Although the Finance Ministry wields considerable authority, sequestration is far from inevitable and is already facing pushback. “The plan is not to cut what is inflated, but what is left — and that’s just crumbs,” said one official at the Ministry of Economic Development. “This year, there is not much room. A transition period could be considered going forward,” a government official agreed. The cuts stem from structural long-term shortfalls. The budget rests on implausibly optimistic assumptions — oil at $59 a barrel, a rate of 92.2 rubles to the dollar — and authorities are banking on $15 billion from a VAT hike that looks increasingly unlikely to materialise amid slowing growth. ➡️ For the first three years of the war, the budget ran fat. Now, with belts tightening and the war still ongoing, civilian spending is the only lever left to pull — even as it has already been squeezed to the bone.

"Russia may be unable to protect its partners, but it is still skillful in adapting to failures and reaping gains from them." With my @CarnegieEndow colleagues @SergeyVakulenk0 & @NicoleGrajewski in @ForeignAffairs on Moscow's reaction to Iran war. foreignaffairs.com/russia/why-rus…

The Kremlin says there may be a new round of peace talks with Ukraine "in the foreseeable future," which sounds like a step down from the usual "soon"...

Belgium’s PM Bart de Wever: “We must normalise relations with Russia and regain access to cheap energy. That is common sense. [...] We must end the conflict in the interest of Europe, without being naïve towards Putin.” ft.com/content/4ce019…

Asked if Russia was helping Iran, Trump said: “It’s hard to say: ‘you’re targeting us, but we’ve been helping Ukraine’.” Biden had given Ukraine $350bn, the president claimed. “So it’s hard to say: “Gee what are you doing?” when we’ve been doing the same thing.”

Trump has sent a blunt message to European nations to join his war effort in Iran and help open up the Strait of Hormuz. “If there’s no response or if it’s a negative response I think it will be very bad for the future of Nato,” he tells @EdwardGLuce. ft.com/content/1ca6d1…