According to US officials, a frustrated Putin may order an escalation of violence in Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin at a news conference at the Kremlin in Moscow on Feb. 18.Sergei Guneyev / Sputnik/AFP via Getty Images file

Officials said the US has solid intelligence that Putin is directing unusual bursts of rage at people in his inner circle over the state of the military campaign.

US intelligence agencies have determined that Russian President Vladimir Putin is becoming increasingly frustrated by his military struggles in Ukraine and may see doubling down on violence as his only option, according to current and former US officials briefed on the matter.

As the Russian economy teeters on the brink of collapse due to unprecedented global sanctions, and his ostensibly superior military force appears bogged down, Putin has lashed out in anger at subordinates, even as he remains largely isolated from the Kremlin due to concerns about Covid, according to sources.

"This is someone who has clearly been caught off guard by the size of the Ukrainian resistance," said Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, on MSNBC. "He's shut himself away. He hasn't spent much time in the Kremlin. You're getting fewer and fewer inputs, and these are coming from sycophants."

He continued, saying: "I'm concerned that he's been forced into a corner. I'm concerned that there isn't an obvious exit ramp."

Several current and former officials said that Western intelligence agencies have good visibility into Putin right now and are closely monitoring his movements for any significant behavioral changes. Four US officials said there is no intelligence indicating he is mentally ill, but he has shown a different pattern of behavior than in the past.

According to one former and two current U.S. officials briefed on the intelligence, Putin is frustrated and directing unusual bursts of anger at people in his inner circle over the state of the military campaign and the worldwide condemnation of his actions.

That is unusual, they say, because Putin, a former intelligence officer, is known for keeping his emotions under control.

"He is not the same cold-blooded, clear-eyed dictator he was in 2008," said former CIA Director John Brennan.

According to a Western diplomat, Putin appears to be increasingly insulated and misinformed.

"The main concern is the information he's receiving and his isolation." "Isolation is a major concern," the diplomat said. "We don't think he has a realistic grasp on what's going on."

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., the ranking member of the Intelligence Committee, tweeted that "the old Putin was a cold blooded but calculating killer." This new Putin is even more lethal."

Warner, who, like Rubio, receives special CIA briefings, expressed concern about a massive cyberattack on Ukraine, which the Russians have not yet been willing or able to carry out.

Rubio expressed his concern on Twitter, using strong language.

"DANGER," Rubio wrote on Twitter. "#Putin's legitimacy is based on his image as the strong leader who restored #Russia to superpower status following the disasters of the 1990s." Now that his economy is in shambles and his military is humiliated, his only tools for reestablishing power balance with the West are cyber and nukes."

Brennan stated that he, too, was concerned. Brennan believes U.S. and Western intelligence agencies have good insights into Putin's decision-making processes based on the release of accurate intelligence predicting Putin's pre-invasion moves.

"This was such a terrible, terrible miscalculation on Putin's part," Brennan said. "He's never had to deal with anything like this before. I'm sure he's yelling at advisers, ministers, and others — there could be an emotional breakdown here. He's had two black eyes, a bloody nose, and a barrage of punches. He's being crippled on both the battlefield and the financial front, and he's out of options."

The National Security Council's spokesperson declined to comment.

Apart from heavy shelling around the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, Russian forces have not yet launched the kind of concentrated artillery and bombing campaign seen in previous military operations, according to Michael Kofman, an analyst at the think tank CNA. The Russian military is "first and foremost an artillery army, and it has used only a fraction of its available fires in this war thus far," according to Kofman.

"Unfortunately, I believe the worst is yet to come, and this war could become much more ugly," he said.

Condoleezza Rice, who met with Putin several times as Secretary of State during President George W. Bush's administration, said on Fox News on Sunday that she, too, sees a different Putin.

He was always a "calculating and cold" former KGB operative, she said, but "he appears erratic" now.

"There is an ever-deepening, delusory rendering of history," she explained. "It was always a kind of victimology of what had happened to them, but now it's back to blaming Lenin for the establishment of Kyiv in Ukraine." So he's devolving into something that I've never seen before."

Senator Jeanne Shaheen, D-New Hampshire, a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, stated that "Putin's severe miscalculations will cost him a grave price," adding that he "has become a political pariah to those he foolishly believed would support his unprovoked, premeditated invasion of Ukraine."

According to a US defense official, the Russian military has not yet achieved air superiority over the country on the fifth day of its invasion, and the Ukrainian military still has significant air and missile defense systems that are viable and available to them. Most analysts predicted that the Russians would quickly overwhelm Ukraine's aging air defense systems.

Officials say Ukraine's stockpile of portable air defense missiles, including shoulder-fired Stinger missiles transferred from Baltic countries, has complicated Russian efforts.

According to multiple reports on Monday, Ukraine has been using its complement of Turkish drones to destroy Russian ground vehicles. Azerbaijan used the small drones, which can hover over targets and launch missiles at them, to devastating effect in its conflict with Armenia in 2020.

According to the defense official, the Russian invaders are struggling to maintain fuel and other supplies, which is one of the reasons their main advance on Kyiv has stalled. According to the official, the Russians advanced only about 3 miles in 24 hours and were still about 15.5 miles outside of central Kyiv.

Putin grossly underestimated Ukraine's resolve and failed to anticipate a united, tough response from the West, according to Alexander Vershbow, a former ambassador to Russia who served as NATO's deputy secretary general from 2012 to 2016.

"It's not a failed invasion, but it's definitely faltering," Vershbow said.

With Russian forces struggling to push deeper into Ukraine against determined opposition and Russia's economy facing unprecedented international pressure, experts and former US officials say Putin's remaining options are all unappealing and risky.

Putin could direct his military to use brute force to seize Kyiv and other cities by bombing and shelling civilian areas indiscriminately. That was Russia's strategy in the Syrian air war, where it backed Iranian-backed fighters and Syrian regime troops, as well as in the Second Chechen War in 1999 and 2000.

Several thousand civilians were killed in Chechnya when Russian troops besieged the capital, Grozny. Human rights organizations have accused Russia of war crimes and targeting civilians in both Syria and Chechnya.

Putin championed the Chechen war when he ran for president in 2000 and won, portraying himself as a leader who could restore order and crush unrest.

"The next stage could be the scorched-earth tactics seen in Chechnya and Syria, which would mean much more death and destruction," Vershbow, who is now a distinguished fellow at the Atlantic Council, said. "I don't think they have too many scruples about this."

Rubio said on Monday that there are "growing signs that #Putin has ordered a medieval siege of #Kyiv," which would include cutting off food, fuel, and power.

"We must begin to consider what we can and are willing to do to prevent such a heinous crime," he added.