by ROBERT BECKHUSEN

How paranoid is the Kremlin getting?

Its new military doctrine—which Russian president Vladimir Putin approved on Dec. 26—presents a world in which Russia is besieged by NATO, and where young people are a threat to national security. Especially if they’re not religious or patriotic.

To be sure, much of what’s stated in the doctrine is not new—as a matter of practice—except that it’s now in the written record and has Putin’s signature on it. This is because military strategy tends to evolve at a faster pace than official doctrine, which is an overarching set of guidelines that armies use to inform strategy.

The most consequential part of the doctrine refers to Russia’s aim to protect its citizens abroad.

This is through the “lawful use of the armed forces … to ensure the protection of its citizens, outside the Russian Federation in accordance with the generally recognized principles and norms of international law and international treaties of the Russian Federation.”

This is not controversial on its own, but it gives sufficient wiggle room for Russian troops to intervene in other countries on behalf of Russian passport holders.

Several border states have substantial Russian-speaking minorities. That has the Baltic states worried, as protecting Russian citizens was the Kremlin’s principle justification for invading Crimea—and backing the breakaway statelets of South Ossetia and Abkhazia during the 2008 war with Georgia.

Russia’s military doctrine goes through revisions every few years. This is the fourth time the Kremlin rewrote its doctrine since the collapse of the Soviet Union—once when Boris Yeltsin was president, in 2000 under Vladimir Putin and again in 2010 under Dmitry Medvedev.

Other revealing passages reflect the Kremlin’s fears of NATO encroachment and the alliance’s anti-ballistic missile systems. It considers NATO to be Russia’s main external threat, including expansion of “members of NATO to the borders of the Russian Federation,” the doctrine states.

On a reassuring note, the doctrine states that a conventional war between states is becoming less likely. It views nuclear weapons as a legitimate threat against conventional attack—but this is similar to existing United States nuclear doctrine.