Take a look at the unfolding chaos in Europe through the sharp eyes of Vladimir Putin: You don't have to imagine the wolfish grin on his face to see that the Russian tyrant is having a surprisingly good spring.
The two fulcrums of European power, France and Germany, are in the final stages of political collapse and, in the case of Germany, deep economic decline.
In France, the pro-Russian far-right just won a shock victory in the European Parliament elections, and in Germany, an even more pro-Russian far-right party won more votes than Chancellor Olaf Scholz's party.
European elections are primarily a referendum on national governments. Seen in that light, Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron are political victims.
Neither party received even 15 percent of the vote in Sunday's election, and in the fight for political survival, neither can convincingly lead the way in rearming the continent to confront the Russian threat, despite their respective raison d'être.
The Kremlin man's smirk turned into a broad smile.
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Last week, Macron tried to assemble a coalition of European allies to send military trainers to Ukraine, the first time NATO troops were on the ground since Putin's all-out invasion. This week, Macron has tried, so far unsuccessfully, to assemble a coalition of moderates to protect his own political position.
Macron dissolved the National Assembly and called elections next month in a move that put his government, his legacy and France's role in Europe and the world at risk, but only quelled rumors this week that he was planning to resign.
Meanwhile, French stocks and bonds have plummeted as investors worry that Marine Le Pen's far-right ethnocentric party, which easily won France's European elections, could actually take control of France's government this summer — something that seemed unthinkable until Sunday.
Putin's joy was uncontainable.
Scholz is an incompetent politician who failed in government and in managing a dysfunctional three-party coalition government, and he has as much authority in Berlin as a sausage.
This week the Financial Times reported that Germany's stock market chief said foreign investors were deriding Berlin's government as “foolish” and warned that Mr Scholz's bickering coalition government risked dragging the world's third-largest economy down to “developing country” status.
The warning reflects a broader failure of European economies to remain competitive: High energy prices caused by the war in Ukraine and European countries' own eagerness to overregulate have prevented them from keeping up with the growth rates of the United States and China.
Putin is determined above all to be a main player on the world stage, and he is not one to sit idly by: His army of cyber trolls is carpet bombing Europeans with disinformation, deep fakes and deception.
But Moscow's attacks are now much more than that: In Pentagon parlance, attacks against Washington's European allies have become increasingly kinetic, which Western officials say means bombings and sabotage planned by Russia's military intelligence service, known as the GRU.
In the latest incident, a 26-year-old man, allegedly serving in the Russian military, was arrested near Paris after injuring himself with an explosive device in a hotel room. French authorities, who say the device was intended to be used in a violent attack, have detained the man in French intelligence custody rather than police. The incident occurred the day before President Biden arrives in Paris to attend the 80th anniversary of the Normandy landings.
The GRU's goal is to intimidate, confuse and distract a Western alliance already struggling with internal divisions and the breakdown of cross-border political consensus. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has warned of the Kremlin's operations, which include “setting fires and destroying supply depots” and “disregarding the maritime borders and boundaries of the Baltic states” as well as cyber attacks.
About a third of the 27 member states of the European Union are currently controlled or co-ruled by far-right parties. Not all are friendly to the Kremlin, but some are. No one would necessarily be happy with Ukraine being abandoned by the West and carved up by Russia, but some would.
Meanwhile, the battlefield momentum Moscow briefly enjoyed in Ukraine is faltering, thanks in large part to the Republican-led House of Representatives delaying approval of a new arms package for Kiev. But that's secondary to Putin: what he cares about is sustaining the violence, fueling Russia's overheated economy that is increasingly dependent on military spending, and biding his time until Trump gets a second term as president. And, oops, that ends any prospect of further US aid and, sooner or later, Kiev's ability to repel Moscow's meat grinder offensive.
The sound you hear is President Putin laughing.
