Foreign Affairs: Putin's Paranoia Has Begun To Paralyze Russia

The Kremlin is losing its ability to grasp the true state of affairs.

Against the backdrop of no end in sight to the war in Ukraine, the Kremlin is tightening its grip on its own people, writes Foreign Affairs.

The publication notes that since the start of the full-scale invasion, restrictions on the population in Russia have been regularly tightened. Less obvious, but no less important, is sharp shift in the internal security doctrine in Russia, the publication notes.

Against the backdrop of the war, the Kremlin needs a more aggressive strategy to keep potential dissidents and ordinary Russians under control. In particular, the FSB, which in recent decades has focused on counterterrorism, is now hunting for spies. And all of this is leading to widespread paranoia.

“A regime based on spy hunts and paranoia has serious consequences. Because government agencies and private companies fear reprisals from the FSB, they have begun to conceal accurate data, avoid making decisions, and generally switch to survival mode. Among ordinary Russians and government employees, the spread of social control and prosecutions for treason has created a pervasive climate of mistrust and intensified a sense of paralysis,” the publication notes.

The journalists add that in Russia, people who do not support government policy are often arrested under the pretext of “fighting spies.” In particular, this includes those who oppose acute confrontation with the West. It is noted that while 10–15 cases of treason were initiated annually prior to the full-scale invasion of Russia, by 2024 that number had risen to 361, and 143 such cases were registered in the first quarter of 2026.

And although this approach allows the Kremlin to strengthen its political control, it simultaneously undermines the state’s ability to govern, the publication notes. Since attempts to turn any perceived political threat into a potential act of treason result in the state relying not on legal norms but on “secret FSB assessments.” Against this backdrop, Russian elites are withholding more and more information from the country’s leadership that the Kremlin might not like. All of this leads to officials failing to report problems until they escalate into crises.

“For the Kremlin today, the risk of elite paralysis is very real: it now extends not only to the research and expert community but also to top officials and industry leaders in Moscow and the regions. By disrupting the feedback loop necessary for any stable government—even the most authoritarian—to remain in power, Putin’s regime is becoming less capable of understanding the true state of affairs in Russia. And in the long term, this could make Putin far more vulnerable in the face of a real political crisis,” the publication concludes.

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