Putin needs a war with NATO because his power rests on convincing Russians that they are fighting for survival.
His rule depends on permanent escalation, on the constant impression that the state is surrounded, besieged, and therefore united only under his leadership. The rhetoric of existential threat is not a tool among others; it is the foundation of his authority.
This logic is not new. Every dictator who rose to power through aggression was trapped in the same cycle. Napoleon could not stop his campaigns without weakening his legitimacy. Hitler’s Reich collapsed the moment its advance stalled. Even Stalin’s system required permanent mobilization, whether through war, industrial “battles,” or purges. The dictator cannot offer stability, because stability would expose the emptiness of his promises.
For Putin, this means that the end of expansion is the beginning of decline. If Russia is not conquering, it is losing. If it is not escalating, it is being exposed as fragile. The survival of the regime requires external conflict just as much as oxygen is required for breathing. This is why any pause in aggression is temporary, and why peace, for such a ruler, is not an option but a threat.
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