Letter From the Editors

Drama fans, take note: This year’s St. Petersburg International Economic Forum is serving more twists than your average summer blockbuster. With a sparse guest list and a sluggish economy, the Kremlin dispatched a carefully worded memo to domestic media, urging them to celebrate Russia’s homegrown successes. Meduza, which got hold of said memo, lists the main talking points: from the unveiling of a thrilling new crossover SUV, produced by AvtoVAZ, to the launching of gas service in small towns you never heard of (hey, voters live there, too). And just like last year’s SPIEF, this year’s forum features the usual array of nepotistic talking heads – including Putin’s daughters.

Yet the real show unfolded off-script: The Iron Maiden of Russia’s tight fiscal policy, Central Bank chief Elvira Nabiullina, faced off with Finance Minister Anton Siluanov and Economic Development Minister Maksim Reshetnikov over whether the Russian economy was headed for a recession. Hey, wait, that wasn’t in the memo! NG’s Mikhail Sergeyev also picked up on this unusual airing of dirty laundry in public. Russians “are suffering today from high food inflation, wage cuts, falling production and the inability to obtain a mortgage.” But instead of putting their collective heads together to solve these issues, officials instead opt to report on metrics far removed from the situation on the ground. However, if these trends continue, that creates the “likelihood of a recession as early as the second quarter of 2025.” Sergeyev concludes, “In this regard, another feature of SPIEF may be the expansion of the list of undesirable topics or undesirable questions.”

Across the Atlantic, a famous political bromance imploded in spectacular fashion. Donald Trump’s on-again, off-again friendship with Elon Musk finally fractured. Their “big, beautiful fight” over Trump’s budget bill was the nail in the coffin of mounting problems, which started as soon as Musk took the reins with DOGE. Republic picks up on a Freudian undertow: “The relationship between the president and the billionaire was indeed reminiscent of the relationship between a father and his somewhat wayward but still beloved son.” But in an even more eerie comparison, Republic compares the Trump-Musk spat to that between oligarch Boris Berezovsky and Boris Yeltsin from nigh 30 years ago. The problem, writes Republic, is that millionaires are always looking for “their” tsar. But they end up paying dearly, since any autocratic politician they back ultimately drops them. That’s because a tsar “cannot have equals, only subordinates.” Russian politicians couldn’t help but get their own jabs in. While Dmitry Rogozin suggested that Musk enlist in the Russian Army to go fight in Ukraine as his penance, ex-president Dmitry Medvedev made an even more enticing offer: “We are prepared to assist with a peace agreement between D and E for a reasonable fee and accept Starlink shares as payment.” Sounds like a solid starting offer.

But memes aside, the perpetual instability of the Trump administration is a factor in another blowup – the war between Israel and Iran. Whether the surprise attacks by Israel managed to derail Iran’s nuclear program remains to be seen. Yet according to expert Nikolai Kozhanov, the US remains a “key security provider for Israel.” Even that relationship has soured during Trump’s second term, and no one in Washington wants to get stuck in another Middle East quagmire. Because of that, it’s hard to tell “whether Israel’s goal was to provoke Iran” and derail ongoing nuclear talks with the US, or whether “this was the US using Israel to put additional pressure on Tehran.” Military scholar Ruslan Pukhov cuts to the chase: The war shows that acting “like a great power without the necessary resources leads only to the imitation of greatness.” Perhaps Pukhov should be the headliner at the next SPIEF.