For the people unfortunate to have to live under the Kremlin, every day things get worse and they are now much worse now than ever before. And we don’t mean than last year. Russia’s reputation amongst the family of nations has fallen off a cliff but is still a long way from reaching the bottom
During the time of the USSR, and even the Czars, the world saw Russia as a place of people like us but controlled by an odious system
Now the world, sadly, is beginning to see Russia itself as fundamental flawed. A place to pull back from. To bypass
The lunatics, psychopaths and criminals whom the KGB allowed to take over Russia have peddled the lie for years that “The West wants to Conquer Russia”
This is so obviously rubbish that they never even bother to explain why and how. They ramble on vaguely about plots and blame everything they dislike on outsiders – “Foreign Agents” as the cretinous slogan they pin on everyone who speaks the truth, Russian or foreign, goes. The modern version of “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion”. But its double purpose is to build the “New Pale” a “Ghetto for the Russians”
Oddly, the US Government has gone along with this. Not because there is some conspiracy. In fact, the opposite. The US Government – and by that we mean the professionals in The State Department, gave up on Russia many years ago. Presidents come in and say they want to engage, the professionals let them have a go. After a while The President realises that the professionals had a point and abandons Russia for more important things – which means anything else. Russia is simply going to slowly decline and there is nothing the US, Europe, or even Beijing or the Kremlin can do about it.
The world is starting to feel that Russia is a failed empire drinking itself to death on oil wealth, most of which is stored safely in London, France or Switzerland anyway.
What is the likely future ? A Ukrainian renaissance – which will bleed Russia dry of its youth, its skills, its wealth and even its very existence. Ukraine will become South Korea to Russia’s North Korea.
If that sounds awful, in fact, it could be even worse!
Putin – on the back of Bush’s Iraq obscenity – has helped define a world where “might is right”. Where simply having military power justifies its use. As long as Putinism exists in Russia, then Russia will have to support this barbarian world view. It is the fundamental of Putinism – Legality is defined by Violence. How appropriate for a Judo Champion with a higher University degree in Law.
But Russia is getting weaker, mainly thanks to him. Its arms industry cannot survive, let alone make a profit, without foreign sales. What idiot is going to recommend buying Russian weapons now ? Worse for Russia, the cheapskate Europeans who have been living off US Defence promises are going to spend unimaginable amounts of money on weapons in the future. And that means they will have the budgets to develop their own weapons – and compete with what is left of Russia’s arms industry. Incidentally that is a double problem for the US too – NATO just buys off the shelf from the US now (think the F-35). That will change. Fewer deals, more competition
But the core point for Russia is that Vast amounts of money are to be spent on the military by every rich advanced country, from Finland to Japan, focused on one enemy – Russia
Putin has created a world where borders – the recognised frontiers between nations regardless of what we think of them – don’t matter. This might seem bad for humanity, but it is catastrophic for Russia. No need to explain this – just look at a map. No country in the world has more hostile neighbours. Many actively so, thanks to Putinism. If The Kremlin says all borders are what power defines them to be them Russia is in for a hellish future. All its wealth drained to the edges defending its borders. It will be as if the USSR’s nightmare of “Stealth” had come true – except it is The Kremlin which caused it
Russia’s reputation as a place to trust at any level on any matter is in tatters too. As somebody said “Nobody knows something is really true until The Kremlin denies it”. Russia denies…. Russia denies….. becomes “Russia denied”. Denied any attention or being taken seriously. Just left to fall away and die in the snow, like Napoleon’s Grand Armee
Kremlin Vermin 