Why Did John Ratcliffe Go to Moscow?
The Atlantic · LC · trust 52/100
Despite Trump’s claims, the CIA director’s visit was anything but routine. It might be a sign that Putin is getting more dangerous.
Will Oliver / EPA / Bloomberg / Getty August 26, 2026, 6:06 PM ET Share Save CIA Director John Ratcliffe’s brief trip to Moscow yesterday was unannounced but hard to miss: He flew in a C-17A, a large heavy-transport plane, that open-source analysts quickly identified and tracked. Within hours, he was already on his way home.
The purpose of Ratcliffe’s visit remains unknown. In an interview with Glenn Beck this morning, President Trump described it as “sort of semi-routine,” but such trips are rare. The previous time a director of the CIA went to Russia was in November 2021, when William J. Burns told Moscow that the United States knew of Vladimir Putin’s plans to invade Ukraine. A likelier explanation for this latest trip is that Russia is getting more dangerous and the Trump administration wanted to warn it against escalating.
Ratcliffe’s visit comes at one of the most difficult periods in the war for the Kremlin. Thanks to its drone systems, Ukraine has been able to strike military targets and oil infrastructure deep inside Russia while also hindering Moscow’s advance on the battlefield, turning the front into a kill box in which anything that moves is struck within minutes. Despite making little progress, Russia has continued to take heavy losses. In May, the Russian death toll reached nearly half a million, according to Anne Keast-Butler, the head of GCHQ, the U.K. intelligence agency.
Russia’s weakness could be making Putin more reckless. The Wall Street Journal reported a few weeks ago that the U.S. intelligence community is concerned that Russia could carry out a limited attack on a NATO state, possibly even launching a small land incursion. Such an assault might thwart Russia’s own interests, prompting Europe to accelerate its military buildup and target Moscow’s sovereign assets. But Putin may see attacking a NATO country as an unprecedented opportunity to break the alliance, by manufacturing a crisis in which the United States fails to act.
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If Washington did not respond to such an act of aggression, Russia could expose NATO’s mutual-protection clause as hollow. Putin has some reason to think that the United States may stay out of a conflict if he initiates one soon. Trump has repeatedly expressed disdain for Europe and shown little interest in challenging Putin. In addition, America’s weapons stockpile is depleted from the Iran war. Perhaps in response to fears of increased Russian aggression, NATO mounted a large U.S.-led air exercise last week over Poland and the Baltic region, which included flights near the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad.
Other possible signs of Putin’s growing belligerence have emerged. In recent weeks, a series of low-level attacks have swept Europe. Drones laden with explosives were found at the Leipzig airport this month, and there were explosions or fires at weapons factories and other sensitive sites in Estonia, Italy, Bulgaria, and the Netherlands, all of which have provided assistance to Ukraine. Authorities have attributed some but not all of the attacks to Moscow, and Russian officials have denied responsibility. But they follow an established pattern of Russian provocations in Europe.
Regardless of Putin’s ambitions elsewhere in Europe, he appears committed to fight the war in Ukraine indefinitely. Russia has increased its ballistic-missile attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure, taking advantage of Kyiv’s shortages in air defense. Reporting from the Journal suggests that Putin could be preparing a large-scale mobilization to replenish Russia’s army for a renewed offensive. The Russian leader might try to overwhelm Ukraine this winter with a massive bombardment campaign aimed at destroying its energy grid. But Kyiv is unlikely to capitulate, because it knows that Putin would impose punitive terms.
If Ukraine does survive the winter and retains the ability to strike deep inside of Russia, then Putin might choose to end the war in mid-2027. Facing the prospect of a U.S. president in 2029 who is more pro-Ukraine than Trump is, Putin may opt to take a favorable deal from this administration. That could include most elements of Trump’s 28-point plan without Ukraine’s withdrawal from the territory it currently controls. This would allow Putin to build a relationship with the United States in the time Trump has left as president—removing sanctions, rejoining the G7, and trying to undermine the NATO alliance indirectly through a partnership with Trump.
For all of Trump’s bluster on Europe, he has real incentives to push back now to prevent a crisis that could spiral out of control. His administration has options to deter Putin, if it wants to use them. For instance, Washington could warn Moscow that if it continues its deniable attacks in Europe, the United States would support Ukrainian access to Starlink inside Russia, which would improve the effectiveness of Kyiv’s long-range strike campaign.
On his way to Moscow, Ratcliffe stopped in Latvia. Today, the Latvian prime minister called the trip a “very good signal,” which seemed to imply that Ratcliffe had been there seeking to bolster European security. If the CIA director carried a warning with him, it should have been an unambiguous one: Any attack on NATO territory would bring in the United States. Trump might not want to make that type of commitment, but it may be necessary to ensure that Putin never concludes that he has an opportunity to start a war that breaks NATO.
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