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Close your eyes and imagine a world without Russia.

If youre in the Baltics, Poland, Ukraine or any of the other territories that have suffered through the centuries under Russian repression, the scenario might sound like deliverance.

Russia is going to disintegrate, former Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg, a prominent aristocrat and longtime Vclav Havel confidant, recently predicted. Large parts of it will seek independence as soon as they can.

The prince should be careful what he wishes for.

While most experts say Schwarzenbergs prediction remains unlikely, the risk that Russia explodes under pressure from its failed assault on Ukraine has nonetheless set alarm bells ringing from Berlin to Washington, as military and diplomatic strategists contemplate a postwar scenario in which the country fractures into a patchwork of warlord-controlled fiefdoms, similar to those that dominated Afghanistan in the 1990s or present-day Libya.

When in history have the Russians faced a truly major defeat and their politics remained intact? asked Peter Rough, a former official in the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush who now heads the Center on Europe and Eurasia at the Hudson Institute, a Washington-based think tank. I dont see how a major military defeat could allow Putin to remain and the borders of the Russian Federation to remain what they are today.

Scenarios range from uprisings among Russias more than 20 ethnic territories sprinkled across the countrys 11 time zones to a full-scale descent intothe kind of conflict and lawlessness that has gripped Libya since the fall of its dictator Muammar Gaddafi. Either would pose grave threats to regional stability, with potentially profound consequences for Europe, including further disruption of supply chains, clashes between nuclear-armed factions and new waves of refugees fleeing a destabilized Russia.

The subject is so sensitive that the officials refuse to speak publicly about their deliberations or even acknowledge their contingency planning for fear of giving Russian President Vladimir Putin a welcome talking point and fueling Russian support for the war. (A recent event and report by the Hudson Institute on the issue prompted an angryresponsefrom Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, for example.)

When asked byPOLITICO to discuss such scenarios during the Munich Security Conference last week, Western officials declined to address the subject on the record.

Could it happen? For sure, said Ivan Krastev, a political scientist and chairman of Bulgarias Center for Liberal Strategies who has advised a number of European leaders. Krastev stressed that disintegration isnt likely, but not impossible.

But focusing on this option is totally counterproductive, he added. If you say, were here to dismantle Russia, youre making a strong argument for Putins narrative that the West is the aggressor.

In fact, the Russian president returned to that theme again Tuesday in an address to the countrys political and military establishment on the state of the country ahead of the first anniversary of his full-scale assault on Ukraine.The elites of the West do not hide their purpose, he said, suggesting thatthe U.S. and its allies aim to destroy Russia.

On Wednesday, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedevwent even further,sayingRussia will disappear if it loses the war in Ukraine, which he blamed on the U.S.

If Russia stops the special military operation without achieving victory, Russia will disappear, it will be torn to pieces, Medvedev saidin a Telegram post, using the euphemism for Russias invasion of Ukraine.

That message resonates in a country repeatedly wracked by military conflict and still traumatized by the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Russias travails during World War I helped spark the Russian Revolution and a civil war that pitted Vladimir LeninsBolsheviks against a motley group of royalists, capitalists and other political forces known as the White Army. Thewar, one of the bloodiest in Russian history, included a number of pogroms targeting Jews. It ended in 1923 with the Red Army prevailing but left deep divisions in the society.

The dissolution of the Soviet Union in the 1990s which saw the breaking away of countries like Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan, as well as EU countries like Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania played out more peacefully, but its far from certain similar agitation from the peripheries today wouldnt be met with a more forceful response.

The structure of the Soviet Union made its breakup relatively straightforward from a legal standpoint.In contrast, the Russian Federation is a single country with a very powerful central administration. Unlike the Soviet Union, where half of the citizens were non-Russian, 80 percent of the population of modern-day Russia identifies as Russian.

The most important factor preventing bloodshed in 1991 was that Russia didnt object to dismantling the Soviet Union. Its difficult to imagine that either Putin or a potential successor would idly stand by or that a majority of the population would allow them to if regions likeBashkortostanin the southern Uralsor Siberia, Russias treasure chest, where most if its natural resources lay buried,tried to break off.

One worry among Western planners is that if the war in Ukraine ends with the Kremlins defeat as most hope Russian soldiers will return home and carry on the fight there, helping to fuel the countrys disintegration.

Vladimir Putins attempt to reassemble the Kremlins lost empire could end up costing Russia at least some of its territory | Anatolii Stepanov/AFP via Getty Images

Many of the men fighting for Russia in Ukraine come from underprivileged Russian territories including the mountains of eastern Siberia, where much of the population has ethnic and cultural ties to Mongolia, and the NorthCaucasus,an area of diverse ethnicity that includes Chechnya and Dagestan.

The Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, who played a central role in crushing the Islamist uprising in Chechnya in the early 2000s, recently said he intends to set up a private army modeled on the Wagner Group, a brutal mercenary force controlled by Putin allyYevgeny Prigozhin.

Speaking in 2011 in the North Caucasus, Putin made little secret of his distaste for the percolating independence movements there.

If this happens, then, at the same moment,not even an hour, but a second,there will be those who want to do the same with other territorial entities of Russia and it will be a tragedy that will affect every citizen of Russia without exception, hesaid.

That suggests any move by regions to free themselves of Moscows control would be bloody, both between the central government and would-be secessionists and among the regions themselves.

New statelets would fight with one anotherover bordersand economic assets, Marlene Laruelle, who directsthe Institute for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies at George Washington University, wrote in a recent essay.Moscow elites, who control a huge nuclear arsenal, would react with violence to any secessionism.

What makes the possibility of a Russian collapse so alarming is, of course, the countrys nuclear arsenal a strategic ace-in-the-sleeve Putin has repeatedly made mention of over the past 12 months. On Tuesday, the Russian president announced he was suspending Russias participation in the New START Treaty, the last remaining nuclear arms control pact between Moscow and Washington.

In the run-up to the collapse of the Soviet Union, the U.S. and its allies were far from sanguine about the nuclear threat. U.S. intelligence warned at the time that tactical nuclear weapons, possibly including so-called suitcase bombs, could end up on the terrorist black market if steps werent taken to secure them.

While Washington welcomed the independence of the Baltic states, there was deep concern that parts of the Soviet nuclear arsenal could fall into the wrong hands in other corners of the empire, including Kazakhstan and Ukraine, with disastrous consequences.

Thats less of a threat in Russia today for the simple reason that there arent nuclear weapons in the potential breakaway regions, according to Western analysts.

The more worrying prospect is the outbreak of conflict between members of the Russian establishment, and a struggle for control of the armed forces. Political infighting has already broken out between the Wagner Group chief, Prigozhin, and the Russian defense minister, Sergei Shoigu, and the chief of the general staff of the armed forces, Valery Gerasimov.

On Tuesday, Prigozhin a Putin ally whose soldiers have been fighting near the Ukrainian town of Bakhmut accused his rivalsof withholding ammunition and air transport, adding that their actions could amount to treason.

A big question in any scenario of Russian disintegration is what role China would play. While instability in its resource-rich neighbor would present Beijing with a host of opportunities to fuel its voracious appetite for raw materials, from natural gas to potash, most observers believe it will not seek to redraw Russias borders.

China is going to be very careful, Krastev said.

Nor is there likely to be much demand by local Russian populations in Siberia or elsewhere to seek out Chinese domination. Russias outer regions are generally poor and rely heavily on the central administration in Moscow for money, one more reason for them to stick with the devil they know.

Whats clear is that while the crack-up of Russia might still be a low-probability event, its not one that Western planners can afford to ignore. AsRussia watchers debate the prospects for the countrys decolonization, they shouldnt dismiss the possibilitythat Putins attempt to reassemble the Kremlins lost empire could end up costing it at least some of its territory.

The tragedy of Russia is that it doesnt know where its borders are, Schwarzenberg, whose family fled Soviet-controlled Czechoslovakia in 1948, said.

The danger is that this could quickly become tragic not just for Russia, but for the rest of the world too.

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Libya with nukes: Is the West ready for Putin to lose?

Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh was selected as Prime Minister by the Libyan Political Dialogue Forum (LPDF), together with Mohamed al-Menfi as Chairman of the Presidential Council, Musa al-Koni and Abdullah al-Lafi as Presidential Council members.[1] Dbeibeh was required under the agreements made by the LPDF to nominate a cabinet of ministers to the House of Representatives (HoR) by 26 February 2021.[13]

On 15 February, Dbeibeh stated his intention to contact people in all 13 electoral areas of Libya for discussing proposed nominations as ministers, and for the cabinet to represent a cross-section of Libyans. The LPDF rules state that if Dbeibeh fails to present his proposed cabinet to the HoR by 26 February, or the HoR does not approve the proposed cabinet, then decision-making returns to the LPDF.[13][14] Dbeibeh said the following day that he would consult with the High Council of State, the HoR and the 5+5 Libyan Joint Military Commission.[15]

On 15 February, about 20 HoR members were present at an HoR session held in Tobruk, chaired by Aguila Saleh Issa in the "eastern" component of the HoR; 70 HoR members were present at Sabratha, the HoR session of the "western" component. The Tobruk bloc called for GNU offices to be located in Sirte and for the HoR to hold a special session for approving the proposed GNU cabinet. According to the Libya Herald, the two branches of the HoR remained in competition with one another.[16]

On 10 March 2021, the House of Representatives met in the central city of Sirte and approved with a 12111 vote the formation of the Government of National Unity led by Mohamed al-Menfi as chairman of the Presidential Council and Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh as Prime Minister.[17]

The House of Representatives, which rules eastern Libya, passed a no-confidence motion against the unity government on 21 September 2021.[18] On 3 March 2022 a rival Government of National Stability was installed in Sirte, under the leadership of Prime Minister Fathi Bashagha.[19] The decision was denounced as illegitimate by the High Council of State and condemned by the United Nations.[20][21]

Both governments have been functioning simultaneously, which has led to dual power in Libya. The Libyan Political Dialogue Forum keeps corresponding with ceasefire agreement.[22] Since May, there have been clashes between supporters of the two governments in Libya,[23] which escalated on August 27.[24]

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Government of National Unity (Libya) - Wikipedia

TUNIS, Feb 8 (Reuters) - Libya's "5+5" military committee of officers from both main sides of the civil war has agreed on a coordination mechanism for the withdrawal of foreign forces in liaison with neighbouring Sudan and Niger, the United Nations said on Wednesday.

The procedural step would allow for joint coordination and data exchange to facilitate the full withdrawal of mercenaries and foreign fighters from Libya, the U.N. Libya envoy Abdoulaye Bathily announced after a meeting in Egypt.

However, any more concrete moves to pull out the hundreds of foreign fighters believed to be present in Libya after joining different sides in the conflict still face major political obstacles.

Although there has been little open warfare in Libya for nearly three years, the political standoff over control of government and access to state resources persists, with many Libyans fearing a return to conflict.

View 2 more stories

The main eastern and western factions fighting from 2014-20 deployed fighters from African countries, Syria, and from the private Russian company Wagner, according to U.N. experts' reports. Turkey also deployed forces in Syria at the invitation of the then internationally recognised government.

According to the terms of the 2020 ceasefire agreement that led to the formation of the 5+5 committee, all foreign forces were meant to be withdrawn within months, but very few are believed to have left.

Reporting by Angus McDowall; Editing by Jon Boyle and Alex Richardson

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Libyan military committee agrees coordination on foreign forces ...

The US has stepped up pressure on its Middle East allies to expel the Wagner Group a military contractor owned by an oligarch with close ties to Russias President from chaos-stricken Libya and Sudan, where it has expanded in recent years, regional officials told The Associated Press.

The US effort described by officials comes as President Joe Biden's administration is making a broad push against the mercenaries. The US has slapped new sanctions on the Wagner Group in recent months over its expanding role in Russia's war in Ukraine.

The group does not announce its operations, but its presence is known from reports on the ground and other evidence.

In Sudan, it was originally associated with former strongman Omar Al Bashir and now works with the military leaders who replaced him. In Libya, it is associated with eastern Libya-based military commander Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar.

Wagner has sent thousands of operatives to African and Middle East countries including Mali, Libya, Sudan, the Central African Republic and Syria.

Wagner tends to target countries with natural resources that can be used for Moscows objectives - gold mines in Sudan, for example, where the resulting gold can be sold in ways that circumvent Western sanctions, said Catrina Doxsee, an expert on Wagner at the Washington-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies.

The groups role in Libya and Sudan was central to talks between CIA Director William Burns and officials in Egypt and Libya in January. Secretary of State Antony Blinken also discussed the group with President Abdel Fattah El Sisi in a late-January trip to Cairo, Egyptian officials said.

The group and Russian oligarch Yevgeny Prigozhin have been under US sanctions since 2017, and the Biden administration in December announced new export restrictions on its access to technology and supplies, designating it as a significant transnational criminal organisation.

Wagner started operating in Sudan in 2017, providing military training to intelligence and special forces, and to the paramilitary group known as the Rapid Support Forces, according to Sudanese officials and documents shared with the AP.

Wagner mercenaries are not operating in a combat role in Sudan, officials said. The group, which has dozens of operatives in the country, provides military and intelligence training, as well as surveillance and protection of sites and top officials.

The US is making efforts to convince power brokers in Libya and Sudan to expel the Russian private military company Wagner, regional officials tell The Associated Press. AP

Sudanese military leaders appear to have given Wagner control of gold mines in return. The documents show the group has received mining rights through front companies with ties to Sudans powerful military and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

Two companies have been sanctioned by the US Treasury Department for acting as fronts for Wagners mining activities.

The main camp of Wagner mercenaries is in the contested village of Am Dafok on the border between the Central African Republic and Sudan, according to the Darfur Bar Association, a legal group that focuses on human rights.

In Libya, Mr Burns held talks in Tripoli with Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh, head of one of Libya's two rival governments.

The CIA director also met with Mr Haftar in eastern Libya, according to Libyan officials.

UN experts said Wagner mercenaries have been present Libya since 2018, helping Mr Haftar's forces in their fight against Islamist militants in the east. The group was also involved in his failed offensive on Tripoli in April 2019.

CIA Director Bill Burns held talks in Tripoli as the US is pressuring allies in the region to expel the Wagner Group from Sudan and Libya. Reuters

Since the 2020 ceasefire, Wagner's activities have centred around oil facilities in central Libya, and they have continued providing military training to Mr Haftar's forces, Libyan officials said. It is not clear how many Wagner mercenaries are still in Libya.

US officials have demanded that mercenaries be pulled out of oil facilities, another Libyan official said.

Mr Haftar did not offer any commitments, but asked for assurances that Turkey and the militias it backed in western Libya would not attack his forces in the coastal city of Sirte and other areas in the central part of the country.

Egypt, which has close ties with Mr Haftar, has demanded that Wagner not be stationed close to its borders.

There is no evidence yet that the Biden administrations pressure has yielded results in either Sudan or Libya, observers said.

Updated: February 03, 2023, 7:06 PM

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US seeks to expel Wagner Group from Sudan and Libya

CAIRO -- Italys prime minister held talks in Libya on Saturday with officials from the countrys west-based government focusing on energy and migration, top issues for Italy and the European Union. During the visit, the two countries' oil companies signed a gas deal worth $8 billion the largest single investment in Libyas energy sector in more than two decades.

Libya is the second North African country that Premier Giorgia Meloni, three months in office, visited this week. She is seeking to secure new supplies of natural gas to replace Russian energy amid Moscow's war on Ukraine. She previously visited Algeria, Italys main supplier of natural gas, where she signed several memorandums.

Meloni landed at the Mitiga airport, the only functioning airport in Libyas capital, Tripoli, amid tight security, accompanied by Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani and Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi, her office said. She met with Abdel Hamid Dbeibah, who heads one of Libyas rival administrations, and held talks with Mohamed Younis Menfi, who chairs Libyas ceremonial presidential council.

At a round-table with Dbeibah, Meloni repeated her remarks from Algeria, saying that while Italy wants to increase its profile in the region, it doesnt seek a predatory role but wants to help African nations grow and become richer.

During the visit, Claudio Descalzi, the CEO of Italys state-run energy company, ENI, signed an $8 billion deal with Libyas National Oil Corporation to develop two Libyan offshore gas fields. NOC's chairman Farhat Bengdara also signed.

The agreement involves developing two offshore fields in Block NC-41, north of Libya and ENI said they would start pumping gas in 2026, and estimated to reach 750 million cubic feet per day, the Italian firm said in a statement.

Meloni, who attended the signing ceremony, called the deal significant and historic and said it will help Europe securing energy sources.

Libya is clearly for us a strategic economic partner, Meloni said.

Saturday's deal is likely to deepen the rift between the rival Libyan administrations in the east and west, similar to previous oil and military deals between Tripoli and Ankara. It has already exposed fractions within the Dbeibahs government.

Oil Minister Mohamed Aoun, who did not attend the signing, criticized the deal on a local TV, saying it was illegal" and claiming that NOC did not consult with his ministry.

Bengdara did not address Aouns criticism during his conference but said those who reject the deal could challenge it in court.

ENI has continued to operate in Libya despite ongoing security issues, producing gas mostly for the domestic market. Last year, Libya delivered just 2.63 billion cubic meters to Italy through the Greenstream pipeline well below the annual levels of 8 billion cubic meters before Libya's decline in 2011.

Instability, increased domestic demand and underinvestment has hampered Libyas gas deliveries abroad, according to Matteo Villa of the Milan-based ISPI think tank. New deals are important in terms of image, Villa said.

Also, because of Moscow's war on Ukraine, Italy has moved to reduce dependence on Russian natural gas. Last year, Italy reduced imports by two-thirds, to 11 billion cubic meters.

Meloni is the top European official to visit oil-rich Libya since the country failed to hold presidential and parliamentary elections in December 2021. That prompted Libya's east-based parliament to appoint a rival government after Dbeibah refused to step down.

Libya has for most of the past decade been ruled by rival governments one based in the country's east, and the other in Tripoli, in the west. The country descended into chaos following the 2011 NATO-backed uprising turned civil war that toppled and later killed longtime autocratic ruler Moammar Gadhafi.

Piantedosis presence during the visit signaled that migration is a top concern in Meloni's trip. The interior minister has been spearheading the governments crackdown on charity rescue boats operating off Libya, initially denying access to ports and more recently, assigning ports in northern Italy, requiring days of navigation.

At a joint news conference with Meloni later Saturday, Dbeibah said that Italy would provide five fully equipped boats to Libyas coast guard to help stem the flow of migrants to the European shores.

Alarm Phone, an activist network that helps bring rescuers to distressed migrants at sea, criticized Italys move to provide the patrol boats.

While this is nothing new, it is worrying, the group said in an email to The Associated Press. This will inevitably lead to more people being abducted at sea and forced to return to places they had sought to escape from.

Jalel Harchaoui, a Libya expert and an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, said that Meloni needs to show some kind of a step-up, compared to her predecessor in terms of migration and energy policy in Libya.

But it will be difficult to improve upon Romes existing western Libya tactics, which have been chugging along, he said.

The North African nation has also become a hub for African and Middle Eastern migrants seeking to travel to Europe, with Italy receiving tens of thousands every year.

Successive Italian governments and the European Union have supported the Libyan coast guard and militias loyal to Tripoli in hopes of curbing such perilous sea crossings.

The United Nations and rights groups, however, say those European policies leave migrants at the mercy of armed groups or confined in squalid detention centers rife with abuse.

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Associated Press writer Colleen Barry in Milan, Italy, contributed to this report.

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This story has been corrected to show that Libya is the second North African country that Meloni visited in January, not third; she did not travel to Tunisia.

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Italy, Libya sign $8B gas deal as PM Meloni visits Tripoli