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This series—led by the Futures Lab and featuring scholars across CSIS—explores emerging challenges and opportunities likely to shape peace negotiations to end the war in Ukraine. All contributions in the series can be found by visiting Strategic Headwinds: Understanding the Forces Shaping Ukraine’s Path to Peace.
In modern war, silicon chips are the new gunpowder. Microelectronics pass information allowing weapons to become more accurate. Information is a critical source of military power.
This trend hangs over the war in Ukraine and any effort to broker a peace treaty. Leaders in Kyiv need to know that Russia won’t be able to resupply its war machine and turn any negotiation into a pause to rearm. That requires that the incoming Trump administration increase efforts to stem the flow of electronics to Russia and build in more robust enforcement mechanisms that persist after the conflict.
Russian forces rely on imported technology to support everything from drone attacks along the frontlines to firepower strikes against Ukrainian critical infrastructure. A major failure in the United States and other democracies is that electronics continue to flow into Russia almost three years into a war widely condemned. To date, sanctions designed to limit the flow of systems required to stem the flow of enablers to Moscow have often been late and often ineffective.
This is not for lack of trying. The United States issued its first sanctions in February 2022, targeting Russian banks, including Promsvyazbank and Sberbank. In coordination with the European Union, Japan, Australia, the United Kingdom, Canada, Taiwan, and New Zealand, these efforts were followed by placing export controls on software, equipment, and technology and later expanded to include sanctions targeting key Russian military and political leaders.
Part of the problem was a narrow view of the conflict. Both Washington and Brussels took two years to expand sanctions to cover particularly malign countries like China that have continued to ship electronics required to support Russian weapons. It took over 20 months for the Biden administration to issue an executive order authorizing secondary sanctions on non-U.S. banks linked to transactions supporting Russia’s military-industrial base.
While the United States moved early to target “sanctions evasion networks and Russian technology companies,” it took almost two years to grow the list from 21 entities and 13 individuals to 275 individuals and entities involved with supplying Russia with advanced technology, covering 17 jurisdictions including India, China, Switzerland, Thailand, and Turkey. Now, the U.S. Department of Commerce maintains a Common High Priority List that outlines what technologies are subject to stringent export controls to disrupt Moscow’s military machine. This list is divided into multiple tiers reflecting the complex supply chains that produce key electronic and precursor components used in modern precision-guided weapons.
The challenge also extends to intelligence. Russia finds it easy to bypass sanctions and access global supply chains by paying companies outside of Russia to purchase key electronic components despite secondary sanctions. This evasion mechanism is why multiple countries from Central Asian states to Italy and Austria have seen key exports to Russia rise since the start of the war.
Recent U.S. Department of Treasury actions show how extensive this network was in Turkey, which included GRU-linked companies—GRU being Russia's foreign military intelligence agency—and multiple networks covering business operations across Europe. For example, the Mirex Network included businesses in Bulgaria used to deliver electronic warfare systems to Russia. In another case, NXP—a Dutch company—provided key components to Russian missiles, including the Kh-101. These weapons are a key part of Russia’s ongoing firepower strike campaign used to attack Ukrainian critical infrastructure.
To set conditions for negotiations, Russian leaders need to know they will find it increasingly difficult to evade sanctions on imports of key electronics. That will require bolstering intelligence support to sanctions monitoring and expanding sanctions to address new evasion networks.
First, the incoming Trump administration will need to bolster intelligence support for sanctions. There are signs the December 2023 executive order may be starting to have an effect. Those effects can be amplified if the United States can identify Russian efforts to evade sanctions through willing companies around the world early enough to stem the flow. That means rapidly declassifying and sharing intelligence with key partners and creating entire task forces to break the supply chain.
Second, those efforts could also extend to covert action and cyber operations. Consider the infamous 1982 case of the Trans-Siberian gas pipeline explosion. In the final stages of the Cold War, Soviet spies engaged in technology espionage targeting western electronics and software firms to steal designs. To combat the theft, the United States planted a trojan in pipeline control software stolen by the KGB leading to a massive explosion in Siberia that produced both tangible economic damage and more intangible psychological effects. Finding creative ways to corrupt the Kremlin’s technology imports should be on the table as the new Trump administration enters office.
Third, any negotiation process is likely to be marked by a complicated ceasefire and monitoring regime. Peace processes normally include at least three ceasefire agreements before they stabilize. In extreme cases, this can reach as high as 68 ceasefire agreements, as seen in the Bosnian conflict in the 1990s. As a result, coercive measures like sanctions against Russia’s war machine must extend beyond the initial talks. Washington should signal these punitive measures will continue as long as their clear indications that Russia seeks to use force to settle territorial disputes. Putin needs to know he will face high costs in rearming in the future to change the bargaining calculus in the present.
In modern warfare, control over technology equates to control over power. As the war in Ukraine demonstrates, the ability to disrupt Russia’s access to critical electronics is central to shaping the battlefield and the negotiating table alike. Sanctions, intelligence-driven enforcement, and innovative measures must converge to ensure Moscow cannot sustain its war machine. This requires not only addressing current evasion networks but also establishing long-term mechanisms to monitor and curtail future flows of technology. As the incoming administration crafts its strategy, the goal must be clear: use every tool available to break Russia’s reliance on imported microelectronics, shift the balance of power, and lay the groundwork for a peace that endures.
Benjamin Jensen is a senior fellow in the Futures Lab at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.
