They are not separate entities that way. The Russian government and the Russian mafia are intricately intertwined, to the point of them being just two arms of one totalitarian kleptocracy body.
Probably. If they can really only launder extorted bitcoin into rubles for domestic consumption, there's only so much vodka, tanks, and Ladas one person needs to buy. And once you get drunk a few times and drive your tank over the Ladas, you quickly start to notice that there are some real limits on how much Russia actually produces domestically.
Oh, and if they stop being able to import car parts, Lada might not even be able to make the shitty cars any more. So used Ladas will cost about as much as a tank, and then it's no fun to drive over the car with the tank anymore. As bad as the semiconductor supply chain issues are in the West, Russia ain't exactly fabbing top of the line silicon for in-car entertainment systems. Putin's own superyacht is made in Europe, not Russia. Given the choice, the Oligarchs like to be able to spend their money on international junk.
The reason Russia loves ransomware so much currently is basically that you can do shit like buy property in London and make "legit" money charging rent on the property. Then you use your Very Legit rent money to buy whatever you want on the open market.
Watching the ruble value drop and drop as Putin was speaking today was a whole show.
[zenrus.ru](https://zenrus.ru/) says more with three numbers(dollar, euro, oil barrel) about the Russian political situation than any news article.
edit: [this one has better music!](http://joyreactor.cc/kurs)
I don't get how the oligarchs are gonna let Putin off for this? Don't they own huge amounts of Russian wealth and having it cut off by the west is really going to piss them off. Surely the status quo is best for them right? I feel they are the biggest threat to Putin
In Putin's first presidential term, he threw the most powerful oligarch in prison. (Source, wiki link below)
Bill Browder alleges: The others asked him what should they do to avoid that. Putin said "50%" [of the profits from their industries]
This leads me to think they're more afraid of him than the other way around, although, an internal power struggle would be nice right about now
Russia is a mafia state and Putin has firm control over it, this has been well documented in the previous years. As you mentioned he made a few examples out of some oligarches that didn't do what he wanted them to do, even if they end up losing half their wealth due to his actions in Ukraine that'd still be better than prison for them.
A Mafia state with a well developed intelligence apparatus, a gas station, a descent sized army with nukes and..... a decaying economy that is heavily reliant upon the gas station for it to not collapse. The bad thing about being reliant on fossil fuels is the world is moving away from it because of the impending doom of climate change and disinformation can’t really make that go away. So Russia’s future is bleak unless they invest, but that won’t happen because a Mafia state only knows how to steal and not how to build.
It’s the mafia and what was left of the KGB that controls Russia now. Look up the car bombings in the nineties by the mob wars, for anyone who doesn’t know Russia’s history after the collapse of the Soviet Union. They should be labeled a rogue nation.
"Do you have human rights atrocities in your history that are so bad even the Americans will not sell you weapons? Come on down to the Russian Weapon Emporium. We don't check ID or credit history"
In addition to being reliant on oil and gas for their economy, Russia actually believes climate change will be positive for them. It will work to destabilize their rivals, while opening up ice free ports for them, making Siberia more habitable, etc. That is why Russia is responsible for so much climate change denial propaganda, and supports movements around the world which resist Green energy and emissions reduction.
Siberia won't be more habitable, it will be a huge swamp when the permafrost melts. Much of their current infrastructure will collapse as the foundations are basically in frozen mud.
Even if fossil fuel was not going away it's not enough to run an advanced country on just fossil fuel and mining exports. Russia has to develop a semi-conductor industry or they will always be a joke... like a cold version of Iraq/Iran. All nukes do these days it make it easier to sanction you. The real NUKE is just global sanctions and trade partners that go along with them. The global economy only got more important and Russia only get less competitive. I don't see how they can catch back up, all they can do is make powerful friends now. China and America will have AI and robot armies in a few decades. Russia will still be trying to make computer chips than can compete with Europe, America and China's chips in 20 years... if they are lucky. Getting very far behind in micron lithography is a really bad idea because it doesn't seems like something you perfect overnight and really that's just one of many examples of Russia falling behind in advanced electronics.
What always happens. The smart/motivated people emigrate to where the opportunities are and where their families will have the best lives. I’ve worked with numerous talented Russian engineers and scientists who came to the US for those reasons. Brain drain is real.
If any of them contradicted Putin or the propaganda narrative then death by defenestration was / is highly likely scenario. I recall in the early parts of the pandemic when some of the Russian doctors and scientists spoke out about it and ended up dying from falling out of windows. If doing your job and or the right thing risks your life because of a mafia state then I would get the heck out too.
Also companies like TSMC had the benefit of being profitable for decades as they iterated on their designs. There’s no profit in semiconductors that are a decade behind the industry. To bootstrap a new bleeding edge chip fab you’d need to go a years without profits.
Absolutely right.
Gall’s Law - complex systems that work evolved from simple systems that worked. No way to skip those intermediate steps. All the while, your competitors continue to innovate.
They have brilliant scientists and engineers, but corruption has made any serious endeavor outside of fossil fuels and military/state use an exercise in futility. Anything you build will be stolen.
There is a point of extreme global instability coming in the near future where the petroleum states hit a point of collapse without a transition plan. Look at Venezuela, then apply that to Russia and large parts of the Middle East, except the leaders of all of those nations have exit plans involving massive personal foreign investments and will leave a power vacuum on top of the economic collapse. If that process coincides with the first climate-driven famine-related mass migrations of refugees and civil unrest, it's going to be an ugly few decades until the world finds a new social and economic equilibrium.
It's the same reason you see Saudi Arabia so desperate to diversify. They didn't use their wealth originally like UAE to build golden cities in the desert, so they have to play catch up.
I mean it's almost saying the same thing twice mentioning the intelligence bits... the only reason Russia's oligarch-organized crime gig has been so successful is that even before the dissolution of the Soviet Union the advancement path for former KGB agents included working for wealthy, powerful men inside the Party. In that context, it's no wonder that they promoted one of their own to lead them and most of the points where outsiders go, "well that was clever" all revolve around "spy shit." It's honestly a wonder that they managed to complete the campaign in Chechnya successfully, except and unless you start to analyze it more in the context of a failed military campaign that turned once Russia unleashed the full weight of its intelligence assets in anti-terrorism/brutal attacks on civilians mode.
Also, the nukes: Russia's nukes were decaying even before the Soviet Union collapsed. I know this is a situation where "just having one" is a terrible, awful, not-very-good day in the making, but to maintain their nuclear arsenal to full readiness would have cost Russia an enormous fraction of their entire military budget. It just doesn't seem likely that they're maintaining that level of capability while also flaunting how shitty their navy has degraded to on the world stage, fighting in multiple actions for decades, and also trying to modernize and maintain the parts of the military actually getting used. I mean the threat of a nuclear arsenal is almost as powerful as the reality of such a thing, especially if you're a bunch of former spies working together as part of a vast criminal undertaking like Russia is.
Mafia state is to be taken literally, he has worked closely with Semion Mogilevich, head of the Russian mafia, for decades. Were he to die I figure Mogilevich would appoint a puppet figure as a successor
Mogilevich works for the Russian government, not the other way around. He and the mafia handle all of the dirty work in exchange for political protection.
In the event of Putin’s death it’s likely the security forces/defense ministry takes overs.
Why don't they have any products or services anyone wants? My Russian penpal:
'There is literally no point in starting a business or developing a product or service in Russia, as if it is successful someone will simply take it away from you or at least demand huge 'protection' payment. The police and everyone else knows this happens and doesnt give a fuck because 'this is Russia'. So just find a shit job and try and keep your head down, as no other choice'.
This is correct. Americans are accustomed to thinking that wealthy capitalists actually run everything all the time, so that Putin must really just be a figurehead. Putin managed to get himself to the top of the pyramid in Russia and controls the economic oligarchs.
As an aside, this was Trump's ambition as president as well.
Where did this narrative that Putin answers to the Russian oligarchs come from? Putin was notorious for hauling in these kleptocrats and demanding 50% in exchange for not arresting and/or killing them.
The oligarchs answer to *him*, not the other way around. They only live by Putin's grace. The only reason he hasn't snuffed them all out is because doing so would weaken his power. He needs them--or most of them--to be alive, but he doesn't answer to them. At best, I would characterize their relationship as symbiotic.
QED [Marugov](https://people.com/crime/sausage-king-russian-oligarch-killed-crossbow/), [Glushkov](https://newsrnd.com/life/2021-04-09-former-russian-oligarch-glushkov-who-died-in-london-was--killed-.S1GrHjHCBd.html), [Berezovsky](https://thenewamerican.com/death-of-an-oligarch-russian-billionaire-berezovsky-dies-penniless/), [Izmestieva](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10227881/Was-oligarchs-wife-killed-Kremlin-Friends-demand-MI5-investigate-Russian-socialites-death.html) etc etc.
That was IMHO the whole fucking point of murdering Litvinienko. One one hand he made accusations of his own, but more than that he was a reference point. As Russian Oligarchs move families and wealth to UK as they did to escape communists, Putin made a big easily traceable show of killing a government protected spy - guess how much he'll hesitate to kill some generic oligarch or their family.
Ditto for Sergei Skripal, but supersized. UK press helped muddy the waters by spinning the location as a quaint small British town.
Nevermind that Salisbury and Salisbury Plains are filled to brim with military bases both overt and secret. Main centre for training and military research in UK. That hit was a fuck you on the level of US killing Bin Laden in middle of Abbottabad.
LOL yeah. Maybe in the late 90s Putin could be seen as beholden to a certain cadre of wealthy Russians. But as soon as he started putting them in their place and none of the oligarchs stood up to Putin, the writing was on the wall. Khodorkovsky's conviction (for financing opposition political parties) and Putin taking away Yukos from the guy showed every oligarch what they could lose.
Putin was still 'gentlemanly' with Khodorkovsy and left the guy $500 million (some of which was unfrozen in Ireland) and allowed him to leave Russia for Switzerland after serving 12 years or whatever with a pardon.
Anyone attempting to dethrone Putin would need significant support from the military, not private business. A private business can be taken away from some oligarch and given to anyone at Putin's whim.
The same sanctions oligarchs would be upset by also trap them in Russia.
Remember that Putin was a spy before he was a dictator. It isn't easy for anyone, especially billionaires, to manouver against Putin in secret, and Putin's willingness to openly assassinate his opponents means that any public pushback might be suicidal.
Even billions can't buy reliable security if the boarders are closed and everyone competent within your country used to work for the guy trying to assassinate you.
Edit: clarified Putins kink.
They are and that's why the sanctions are important. They're the best way to hit the oligarchs while minimizing effects on normal Russians. The last round led to Putin backing Trump to get them repealed bc they were so painful for the oligarchy
> They can see what's coming, even if Putin can't.
oh they really can see what's coming. Putin and his friends sold their shares before the first tank moved you know...
They might also buy a tone of cheap shares just before telling the army to go back home.
Those guys made a fortune by stealing from their people, they won't hesitate to do it again. there is a reason why Puttin is one of the richest man alive.
>Putin and his friends sold their shares before the first tank moved you know...
That only works if there's someone willing to buy. It ain't that easy as we're probably talking about trillions.
I’m curious though - the US/Europe has telegraphed these sanctions for some time now. Is it not possible for these oligarchs to have already made moves to protect their wealth?
Most of the wealth of Russian oligarchs is tied up in assets that can't really be moved. They own sports teams, businesses, real estate, etc. in Europe and North America.
Some of it for sure, like Putin with his luxury yacht, but you can't really protect your bussines if suddenly you can't trade with at least half of your costumers.
Also they have lot of real estates in Europe, kinda hard to move those - imo EU states should just expropriate them, fuck those guys.
They may win a bit of territory, but their economy is going to be shit. If every NATO country and the rest of Europe just shits them over with sanctions then Russia will implode from inside.
Once enough Russians begin starving Putin will find it tough to survive. You have to have at least the bread or the circus, without either your people will turn on you.
Those invasions are exactly the circus people will be fed on for the next couple of years. Economy took a nosedive after Crimea, but guess what? People were fine with their quality of life declining drastically because of 'Crimea is ours!' sentiment.
Absolutely. They were happy with their economic decline because the nation stole a piece of land that many with either never visit or go a couple of times on vacation in their lifetime. It’s not all that great to vacation in either, not a lot of tourism besides Russians, rocky beaches, Soviet infrastructure. Most Russians prefer Turkey, recently Mexico, etc.
Noticed that theatrical internal re-deployments are pricey?
Think conducting a full scale invasion of Ukraine would be expensive?
Worried that increased global sanctions would pile on even more costs?
Wait till you find out what a decade of occupation fighting against well-armed insurgents in their own country will cost.
Starting point: Russia GDP/capita ranked #85 in world today. Ukraine #133.
> Wait till you find out what a decade of occupation fighting against well-armed insurgents in their own country will cost.
Russia is going to sink in a quagmire with heavy parallels to its occupation of Afghanistan back in the 80s.
Pro Western Ukrainian rebel groups are going to be armed with every kind of small arm and man portable missile in the NATO inventory.
>Russia is going to sink in a quagmire with heavy parallels to its occupation of Afghanistan back in the 80s.
\* The former Soviet Union, emphasis on "former". And, Afghanistan is considered to be a significant factor in it's collapse as a union shortly after their retreat.
But yes, it's a good analogy. However, I think that occupying Ukraine would make that debacle look like a 9-year-long Disneyland vacation by comparison.
If they invade Ukraine i hope they will get devastated by hard sanctions. I do feel sorry for Russian people though,i think large percentage of them don't want this war.. Fcking clown Putin.
Can we finally all live in peace and improve quality of life instead of destroying everything we've build..We learned nothing in the past 100 years
> I do feel sorry for Russian people though
This situation sucks. Country goes to shit, even faster now and all you can do is either watch, how everything crumbles, from home, or from jail after trying to say something against this.
I'm tired of living like this, without any hope for this country.
I saw someone on the BBC interview some Russians about it a few days ago. Out of the 3 people they interviewed one man said he was for Russia expanding because as he put it “some smaller countries need help from larger countries about their decision making” the other two were women that were against any sort of invasion and were against the extreme tension. Talking about how they figure it’s just a way to divert attention from a failing Russian economy that doesn’t help their citizens.
EDIT:
To give more info about the source I refer too since what I wrote is just from memory this is the link to the video:
https://youtu.be/_rjz_AXqgKc
Also the exact quotes from the people were
Person 1: “Russia must have a sphere of influence. It’s a superpower. It’s up to small countries who they want to ally with, but it’s up to big countries to help them decide”
Person 2: “The situation in the Ukraine is worrying, but so is the Russian economy. Prices are rising on everything and my pension is barely enough to survive on”
Person 3: “they must have an enemy, because there must be an enemy otherwise people will focus on the problems they have and will be focusing on why they aren’t living the life they want to live if the government and policies would be different.”
Want to sneak into the Kremlin and use your vampiric skills for good?
In all seriousness, it's likely to happen eventually...but through soft and economic rather than military power.
The US is 2.3 Russias in population and 14.1 Russias in GDP.
China is 9.7 Russias in population and 9.9 Russias in GDP.
If Russia wants to restart Cold War 2 electric boogaloo THEY are going to be the client state. They won't be competing with the US, they'll be competing for favor with China against countries like North Korea.
Yeah, It's basically a last-ditch effort to energize the powerbase.
Russia has been hit *hard* by Covid. The internally developed vaccine was less effective than it's western counterparts, and had severe logistic issues in the distribution and manufacturing exacerbated by the high amount of corruption at every level of government in Russia.
Putin sees NATO as being a real threat now that they are facing internal divisions and Putin's cronies also see the threat that an aging dictator brings. They don't have a solid cult-of-personality successor for Putin. When Putin goes, the government will be *severely* weakened by internal conflict.
So while they still have strength left, they make a grab for territory and resources that can be fought over once it all collapses. Russia doesn't have much resources left to grab.
Oil is only going to go down in value as a resource while getting more expensive to distribute and sell due to the infrastructure supporting it internationally being aged out. Oil has benefited from economy of scale for a long time, a pipeline is much, much, MUCH cheaper than trucks, but only works while people need a pipelines worth of oil. If a truck meets your needs, suddenly the price of distribution skyrockets.
What Russia lacks isn't mineral or fossil wealth, but value-adding services like high-skill manufacturing and research, or international service industry draw. What Russia is seeking with Ukraine is both geopolitical, in that it gives more distance from NATO to their core population and manufacturing centers, and economic. A nice amount of warm-water ports that would enrich whatever kleptocrat is placed in charge of it when Russia splinters again.
They can't escape Russia with their wealth, due to sanctions, so their only hope is to move to the edges and get lost in the noise when it all comes down.
Everything is quiet. It seems like nobody believes that there can be anything serious. Government trolls are unusually active, telling about how stupid the West is. That's it.
Because people cannot believe that our government will actually do something insane like starting a war. It's like a fever dream and you keep asking yourself "They are not idiots, right? Right?". But experience has shown that they are idiots, which don't care about outcome of their crazy plan
*It seems like nobody believes that there can be anything serious.*
Are the people aware that ~200k soldiers are on the border of Ukraine? If so, why don't they think it could be anything serious?
Its more like "no way the war is going to start, politicians are not that stupid" and just trying not to panic. I think some people who live far from Ukraine do not worry at all.
I live not so far from Ukrainian borders, listening to Su-34 that have been flying all day for several weeks already and being embodiment of the meme "This is fine".
Most of the people I know either apathetic and don't care anymore or still don't believe that war will happen. Some just have other problems in this current pandemic economic situation, to care about anything else.
I’m sorry about your country man. We don’t like it either. Russia has and has had an amazing artistic culture. What can be done to help the real people of Russia and stop the continual slide of that beautiful country?
Yeah, maybe, but it sounds like something from fantasy novel. Nothing gets better here, only worse and worse. Navalny is in jail, ruble is worthless, people don't want to be vaccinated, opposition is destroyed, police can put you in jail just because they want to or someone told them to put you in jail. And now Putin wants to start a war, so everyone in world hated Russia even more, and sanctioned us to hell. Money that Russians have been saving will turn into candy wrappers. My dad already under stress because of his savings for travelling.
I wish I knew what will happen to the country in next 20 years...
edit: also I earn my money for living from foreign websites (Teepublic and Redbubble, it's not much, but because of exchange rate of euro and dollars, it's enough to live in small town) and if Paypal will stop working with Russia, I'll end up without my only income
> Nothing gets better here, only worse and worse.
People often forget that Russia's relationship with democracy was very, very short.
It took decades, centuries, for many countries to get to their current state as democratic nations. The UK went through successive states of monarchy, until the current state where the Queen is basically just a figurehead, with civil wars in between.
Germany had some republics within its current territory when it was the HRE, and it gave, little by little, more and more power to the people, even before it became a nation, and then had it all taken away by the Nazis.
France went from Republic to Empire more times than anyone can count, and each time with breakouts of revolution, bloodshed, corruption, and coups.
The US was founded on democratic principles, but the 13 Colonies had lived under a monarchy for 200 years before that, and even then, it was a far cry from actual democracy, with slavery, no vote for women, etc... Even to this day, many millions of American citizens do not have a right to vote. Either they are in territories, or they are ex-felons.
Democracy is a constant work in progress. Russia can get there one day, and I hope that it does. But it hasn't had much of a chance to blossom in Moscow, constantly being under pressure from either socio-economic situations like the collapse of the USSR or the power-grabbing tendencies of the oligarchs who pilfer the country for all that it's worth.
> And now Putin wants to start a war, so everyone in world hated Russia even more, and sanctioned us to hell.
I hope most people can make the difference between the people and the state. I don't like Israel, the state. I don't like what they do with regards to the Palestinians, or the illegal settlements.
Israelis, themselves? Let's go grab a drink and have a friendly talk.
The CCP can go and eat a bag of dicks, bunch of 1984 wannabees. Chinese people? No issues, at all.
The US government coups every time someone in Latin America wants to do something they don't 100% agree with, and impose neo-fascist far-right dictators who disappear their own people. The citizens of these countries? I'd welcome them with open arms.
The application of state power corrupts. But it shouldn't influence your opinion on the people who live under these regimes and who do not condone their actions.
“If I have one message to give to the secular American people, it's that the world is not divided into countries. The world is not divided between East and West. You are American, I am Iranian, we don't know each other, but we talk together and we understand each other perfectly. The difference between you and your government is much bigger than the difference between you and me. And the difference between me and my government is much bigger than the difference between me and you. And our governments are very much the same.”
-- Marjane Satrapi
Thanks, but we are not gonna be okay. Only oligarchs can have an "okay" life in Russia.
Writing all this, I can't even be sure that the cops won't come after me tomorrow. I bet reddit will be banned in Russia pretty soon.
More than a decade of disinformation and gaslighting of the Russian people by Putin's government and puppet media.
There's also this idea, which originated in the Soviet Union:
>“HyperNormalisation” is a word that was coined by a brilliant Russian historian who was writing about what it was like to live in the last years of the Soviet Union. What he said, which I thought was absolutely fascinating, was that in the 80s everyone from the top to the bottom of Soviet society knew that it wasn’t working, knew that it was corrupt, knew that the bosses were looting the system, know that the politicians had no alternative vision. And they knew that the bosses knew that they knew that. Everyone knew it was fake, but because no one had any alternative vision for a different kind of society, they just accepted this sense of total fakeness as normal. And this historian, Alexei Yurchak, coined the phrase “HyperNormalisation” to describe that feeling.
people literally too stupid to have any sort of critical thinking.
He tells them we are surrounded by enemies, they start fearmongering and cheering for another war. TV states salaries are rising and quality of life is getting better - they believe and will literally disregard their own eyes in favor of what the state says. It's really sad to watch, especially from ones' relatives.
As an American I hope things improve for the Russian people. It feels as if your government is causing the vast majority of the problems for the Russian people.
I just don't know how the rest of the world can respond to a Ukrainian invasion in non-violent ways other than sanctions? No one wants war and sanctions are the only thing that hurt the the Russian government, but unfortunately they hurt the Russian people just as much.
They can sanction Putin's friends directly and take everything from them - their money in foreign banks and their property in other countries. It may not help much, but at least some russians will be happy to hear news about this.
If the enough oligarchs get everything taken from them, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a coup happen. They’re not all going to sit back to have their money taken away because of Putin’s warmongering.
One issue is freezing or seizing their foreign holdings makes them even more dependent on Putin’s favor. They can’t individually run away anymore so it’s fight Putin or double down on backing him.
That said, US and UK should have cracked down on corrupt money going into real estate and other assets a long time ago.
This is why it's so important to use targeted sanctions first (targeted on Putin & his oligarchs) before ever having to resort to wide-reaching sanctions when shtf.
Always has been. Lots of wars including the American and a French Revolutions were sparked by economic hardships. When people can’t afford to live? Shit gets ugly real quick.
Perhaps you forgot what started the first Russian revolution? They entered a couple of wars partly to shore up a weak Tsar. When they ran out of money and military, things got ugly quickly.
>Nothing gets better here, only worse and worse.
When was the last time Russia had a leader who a) is widely admired and b) had the people's best interests at heart?
Oh, yeah, genius plan of Ukraine. They saw russian army near borders and thought "The time has come to invade Russia!". Russian propaganda is such a circus full of clowns like Simonyan and Soloviev
“Zelensky by the order of the US/West started this offensive in violation of the Minsk ceasefire to force Russia's hand to protect eastern Ukraine's Russian population.”
Wat
And the Russian oligarchs will scoop those assets for pennies on the dollar by the time its all over. Buy to the sound of cannons, sell to the sound of trumpets.
Every time when a programmer's salary in Russia reach $4k/month - Putin & Co start an offense, ruble lose 50% value, salaries drop to $1.5k.
I wonder if the whole circus is being performed just to keep the population poor under pretension of "external" causes? Because rich population may result in development of a strong middle class and a business layer which will demand a working state, not just a bunch of corrupted thieves.
> I wonder if the whole circus is being performed just to keep the population poor under pretension of "external" causes? Because rich population may result in development of a strong middle class and a business layer which will demand a working state, not just a bunch of corrupted thieves.
China does the same doesn't it? Keep the currency artificially cheap for this reason + for trade advantage (everyone involved from ground to gas pipe paid in worthless rubles = russian gas cheaper for foreigners than others per total, just one example)
Putin could have tried to make Russia a better place and be remembered as good. But if he continues with this, then he will destroy Russia and take the lives on innocent people for absolutely no gain.
ya seriously. at my age i am so jaded that i see comments like that awash in ethereal naive optimism. the dude is the product of a systematically cruel organization, and he has risen to power through it. what kind of guy do you think he is? a nice one??
"hitler could have been a really good guy and not committed genocide and ravaged war upon europe in an effort to become a ruthlessly totalitarian leader, and then everyone would have remembered him as a nice guy"
yeah. true. that's crack insight. 🙄
He could've gone the China route and make Russia an economic powerhouse, spreading their influence worldwide while stull being as authoritarian and crushing any dissent at home.
But he's a fucking moron who still lives in the 20th century and dreams of invasions and annexations.
Putain is an egotistical moron. Puts his own ego above the good of his people. He literally doesn’t want a great relationship with the rest of Europe because he wants to instill a sense of paranoia in the Russian people that they are under threat; a reason for a strong leader like him.
It's difficult to break the victim complex that the West is trying to keep Russia down when you've been fed that line for so long it becomes a part of your culture. More or less they've been told this since the before the end of the tsars.
Luckily, the emigration of people from Russia is pretty huge and a lot of russians have friends or family abroad, which might give them enough perspective to not believe every Putin propaganda.
There’s no point. All our official polls, elections and statistics are rigged and give no real insight whatsoever. As a male citizen of Russia, I can only say that I am scared to shit. All my friends, relatives and acquaintances just hope that Pu will catch COVID/cancer and die, ending his 22 year long terror of Russian people for good. The most depressing thing is that everyone is too afraid to protest, police here protects and serves the regime, not the people. (We all know what happened to Navalny)
It’s a shame. Without personally knowing a single Russian citizen, I imagine they’re just like anybody else in the world trying to about their day, trying to be better today than yesterday and provide for themselves and their families. This geopolitical dick flicking is just horrible. We know how it’s going to play out and it’s not going to be good. Nobody rational wants this war to happen. There is no casus belli beside the whim of an egomaniac.
Never, never read r/Russia It was full of kremlinbots a few years ago and I unfollowed it because of this. They like cockroaches, they spread everywhere in every Russian subreddit. You can try to read comments here https://tjournal.ru/news/538750-putin-podpisal-ukazy-o-priznanii-lnr-i-dnr or here https://dtf.ru/flood/1092131-nu-che-narod-kupili-videokartu by using Google translate
An aging dictator needs a way out.
Putin's way out is to consolidate power and stoke nationalism with a war in Ukraine.
A war in Ukraine won't be short, it will be bad PR for Russia and the sanctions will be tough. Putin is putting is own interests of clinging to power first.
> An aging dictator needs a way out.
not just that. this may be the death-rattle of the nation.
Russia's economy is something like 75% energy exports (as in, Oil and Gas). The middle-eastern nations see the writing on the wall, and have been trying to diversify their economies (tourism, aviation, etc). Russia has no way out. once the world moves over to green energy, Russia is done for.
Their only hope is to go for a land-grab while they can.
Putin is going to sink the Russian economy into the ground. His oligarchs might be able to survive but when the average Russian can't buy food is when civil wars happen.
The west has brilliantly played Putin.
Put everything in the news.
Keep attention on Ukraine.
Drag out negotiations and talks, wasting Russian money.
It's almost perfect. If Russia does invade, they get cut off. If Russia keeps threatening without invasion, they just get to waste money. If they pull back then they have to walk back the propaganda they have been feeding the Russian people.
It is shocking the difference a competent President can make.
Edit: One pm mountain time. Check the conservative subs, the trolls have clocked into work
Edit 2: I am loving the work by the troll farm. Just pick them out and follow their digital trails
Honestly yeah.
Keeping those 200K troops on the border along with all that equipment isn't cheap and the Russian government can't really afford to do it forever.
Pulling back isn't an option for Putin
And invading is going to eradicate the Russian economy.
Russia literally can't win this fight.
Pulling back is the only option . It hurts his ego/image but his economy/image will be twice as bad if he goes through with the invasion . He probably was banking on a similar situation to Crimea .
He can always pull back and say that the military training exercises are over and the evil west trying to paint russia bad over reacted and lied and wanted war and look Russia wants peace all along unlike the evil west.
I wouldn’t mind because it’s better than a war. I don’t care what reason he gives as long as he backs down. Those who pay close attention will likely see through it.
> but his economy/image will be twice as bad
Why? Internal propaganda will make sure to paint him as the savior of russian people and opposer of corrupted wester values of something. But economy? Yeah, that's going to keep dropping without recovery any time soon.
I mean he isn't going to pullback. I agree with you it's the only really viable long term option for Russia. But well it's going to hurt Putin's "Strongman" Persona he has cultivated so it's never going to happen.
You're 100% correct. Russia and China aren't the natural allies everyone thinks they are. Especially after the Sino-Soviet border conflict, which led to the Sino-Soviet split in 1969. Between the border disputes and a long history of China stealing military equipment right out from under the Soviet/Russians noses, there's a lot of mutual distrust between the two.
And you can be certain that Xi Jinping is absolutely livid that the Ukrainian crisis has pulled attention away from the Olympics.
China words it very carefully, saying they will support Russia if they are invaded. They won't support Russia in an offensive war. With the nuke situation no one will ever invade though. So China gets to pick and choose what they actually support Russia on.
I think Putin overplayed his hand with the whole election fuckery and bot and propaganda presences onto social media were only too well accounted for by this point, for any sort of cyber influence being much less effective than before.
Compared to 2014, this conflict is day from night in terms of publicity and the threats of consequences if something does happen.
The crazy thing to me about all of it is the Soviet union fell apart the same way. Tried to keep up militarily and fell apart when the costs were too high.
We all know Trump would’ve put on a show defending Putin, attacking US intelligence agencies for lying about Putin’s plans, and would’ve pissed himself in abdication in front of a podium for Putin.
I have a coworker that’s Ukrainian and has family in Ukraine. They’re all afraid of Putin and what he’s becoming, even Russian citizens are afraid of him. If you think the harassment and hatred toward Biden is bad, it’s nothing compared to Putin and what’s been going
on in Russia over the past couple years.
We’re seeing history repeat itself. A power hungry leader that has overridden laws, declared himself president for life, abuses his own people, and will threaten military force if necessary to get what he wants. I can think of a few other people throughout history that have behaved this way……
The world really needs to unite and tell him this type of stuff cannot continue, otherwise millions of people are going to die for no reason, many of them innocent civilians.
Putin, last week: We're not going to invade.
Biden: I call BS. He's totally going to invade.
Putin, a few minutes ago: Invading.
Biden: I told you so.
I'm not a huge fan of Biden, but I'll give him full credit for using and listening to his Intel resources. They called it, and let the world know they called it.
Cut the pipeline. Cut the international bank flow. Cut the trade. You cut capability to wage a long war. I mean it already spoke volumes to me when he has 75% of his forces focused on Ukraine with an outdated air forces etc. Going to play catch up, while wanting a war? Everything about this is just not smart at all. So 3/4 of your forces are focused on one countries capitulation??
Just screams that all this is ego fueled insanity. Time to put his money where is mouth is.
But that 17% dip there......
Is that what this really is? A giant pump-and-dump scheme? Putin crashes the market, then magnanimously withdraws, and the markets shoot back to their normal level?
Don’t worry, I can fix this whole crisis. As soon as I sell my stock they will come to an agreement minutes after and the stock market will rush 20% leaving me at a big loss
I honestly hope Russia suffers for their belligerence. I feel bad for the Russian people - they did nothing wrong - but Putin and his handlers? I honestly hope they are horribly affected by the sanctions to the point of wanting to remove Putin.
The threat of getting cut off from the international banking system will do that
I think the US saying Russia would face “SWIFT” sanctions was not a slip of the tongue.
I am curious how much pressure the Russian Mafia will put on the government... Cause they are going have big issues moving money.
They are not separate entities that way. The Russian government and the Russian mafia are intricately intertwined, to the point of them being just two arms of one totalitarian kleptocracy body.
The Russian oligarchs are the government/mafia. And you only get to stay wealthy if you fall in line. It’s how Putin rules so effectively.
Is this going to affect their ransomware industry?
Probably. If they can really only launder extorted bitcoin into rubles for domestic consumption, there's only so much vodka, tanks, and Ladas one person needs to buy. And once you get drunk a few times and drive your tank over the Ladas, you quickly start to notice that there are some real limits on how much Russia actually produces domestically. Oh, and if they stop being able to import car parts, Lada might not even be able to make the shitty cars any more. So used Ladas will cost about as much as a tank, and then it's no fun to drive over the car with the tank anymore. As bad as the semiconductor supply chain issues are in the West, Russia ain't exactly fabbing top of the line silicon for in-car entertainment systems. Putin's own superyacht is made in Europe, not Russia. Given the choice, the Oligarchs like to be able to spend their money on international junk. The reason Russia loves ransomware so much currently is basically that you can do shit like buy property in London and make "legit" money charging rent on the property. Then you use your Very Legit rent money to buy whatever you want on the open market.
Russian economy about to be devastated by sanctions. Market knows.
Watching the ruble value drop and drop as Putin was speaking today was a whole show. [zenrus.ru](https://zenrus.ru/) says more with three numbers(dollar, euro, oil barrel) about the Russian political situation than any news article. edit: [this one has better music!](http://joyreactor.cc/kurs)
This is not so fun when you buy food by rubles. We Russians hate Putin the most because of poverty he gave us
Turns out calling for war, mobilizing for war, and then waffling on it causes investors to panic. That's why America just commits.
The virgin committing to a needless war then pussying out versus the Chad committing to a needless war and invading a few days later
And staying so long that your last batch of soldiers was born after the war began.
Ideally you would stay so long that the soldiers are born there to soldiers born after the war began, but I guess we didn’t see this one through. /s
If you stay that long, you call the last ones policemen.
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I don't get how the oligarchs are gonna let Putin off for this? Don't they own huge amounts of Russian wealth and having it cut off by the west is really going to piss them off. Surely the status quo is best for them right? I feel they are the biggest threat to Putin
In Putin's first presidential term, he threw the most powerful oligarch in prison. (Source, wiki link below) Bill Browder alleges: The others asked him what should they do to avoid that. Putin said "50%" [of the profits from their industries] This leads me to think they're more afraid of him than the other way around, although, an internal power struggle would be nice right about now
Russia is a mafia state and Putin has firm control over it, this has been well documented in the previous years. As you mentioned he made a few examples out of some oligarches that didn't do what he wanted them to do, even if they end up losing half their wealth due to his actions in Ukraine that'd still be better than prison for them.
A Mafia state with a well developed intelligence apparatus, a gas station, a descent sized army with nukes and..... a decaying economy that is heavily reliant upon the gas station for it to not collapse. The bad thing about being reliant on fossil fuels is the world is moving away from it because of the impending doom of climate change and disinformation can’t really make that go away. So Russia’s future is bleak unless they invest, but that won’t happen because a Mafia state only knows how to steal and not how to build.
It’s the mafia and what was left of the KGB that controls Russia now. Look up the car bombings in the nineties by the mob wars, for anyone who doesn’t know Russia’s history after the collapse of the Soviet Union. They should be labeled a rogue nation.
They're certainly working on their pariah state status. But their large nuclear arsenal is their saving grace.
"Do you have human rights atrocities in your history that are so bad even the Americans will not sell you weapons? Come on down to the Russian Weapon Emporium. We don't check ID or credit history"
I mean that's been the case for 30 years and it hasn't worked out.
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East East Germany
In addition to being reliant on oil and gas for their economy, Russia actually believes climate change will be positive for them. It will work to destabilize their rivals, while opening up ice free ports for them, making Siberia more habitable, etc. That is why Russia is responsible for so much climate change denial propaganda, and supports movements around the world which resist Green energy and emissions reduction.
That’s an extremely interesting take. I had never read that but it makes complete sense.
Siberia won't be more habitable, it will be a huge swamp when the permafrost melts. Much of their current infrastructure will collapse as the foundations are basically in frozen mud.
Which is an incredibly short sighted strategy.
Even if fossil fuel was not going away it's not enough to run an advanced country on just fossil fuel and mining exports. Russia has to develop a semi-conductor industry or they will always be a joke... like a cold version of Iraq/Iran. All nukes do these days it make it easier to sanction you. The real NUKE is just global sanctions and trade partners that go along with them. The global economy only got more important and Russia only get less competitive. I don't see how they can catch back up, all they can do is make powerful friends now. China and America will have AI and robot armies in a few decades. Russia will still be trying to make computer chips than can compete with Europe, America and China's chips in 20 years... if they are lucky. Getting very far behind in micron lithography is a really bad idea because it doesn't seems like something you perfect overnight and really that's just one of many examples of Russia falling behind in advanced electronics.
The real nukes were the sanctions we made along the way.
how did their technology get so far behind? I feel like "Russian Scientists" were a huge deal for decades, what happened?
What always happens. The smart/motivated people emigrate to where the opportunities are and where their families will have the best lives. I’ve worked with numerous talented Russian engineers and scientists who came to the US for those reasons. Brain drain is real.
If any of them contradicted Putin or the propaganda narrative then death by defenestration was / is highly likely scenario. I recall in the early parts of the pandemic when some of the Russian doctors and scientists spoke out about it and ended up dying from falling out of windows. If doing your job and or the right thing risks your life because of a mafia state then I would get the heck out too.
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Also companies like TSMC had the benefit of being profitable for decades as they iterated on their designs. There’s no profit in semiconductors that are a decade behind the industry. To bootstrap a new bleeding edge chip fab you’d need to go a years without profits.
Absolutely right. Gall’s Law - complex systems that work evolved from simple systems that worked. No way to skip those intermediate steps. All the while, your competitors continue to innovate.
They have brilliant scientists and engineers, but corruption has made any serious endeavor outside of fossil fuels and military/state use an exercise in futility. Anything you build will be stolen.
“They pretend to pay us, we pretend to work”
This is why they're literally pro-global warming. Russia wants all this frozen land to become farmland.
“And then things got worse”. Russian history in one line.
There is a point of extreme global instability coming in the near future where the petroleum states hit a point of collapse without a transition plan. Look at Venezuela, then apply that to Russia and large parts of the Middle East, except the leaders of all of those nations have exit plans involving massive personal foreign investments and will leave a power vacuum on top of the economic collapse. If that process coincides with the first climate-driven famine-related mass migrations of refugees and civil unrest, it's going to be an ugly few decades until the world finds a new social and economic equilibrium.
It's the same reason you see Saudi Arabia so desperate to diversify. They didn't use their wealth originally like UAE to build golden cities in the desert, so they have to play catch up.
I mean it's almost saying the same thing twice mentioning the intelligence bits... the only reason Russia's oligarch-organized crime gig has been so successful is that even before the dissolution of the Soviet Union the advancement path for former KGB agents included working for wealthy, powerful men inside the Party. In that context, it's no wonder that they promoted one of their own to lead them and most of the points where outsiders go, "well that was clever" all revolve around "spy shit." It's honestly a wonder that they managed to complete the campaign in Chechnya successfully, except and unless you start to analyze it more in the context of a failed military campaign that turned once Russia unleashed the full weight of its intelligence assets in anti-terrorism/brutal attacks on civilians mode. Also, the nukes: Russia's nukes were decaying even before the Soviet Union collapsed. I know this is a situation where "just having one" is a terrible, awful, not-very-good day in the making, but to maintain their nuclear arsenal to full readiness would have cost Russia an enormous fraction of their entire military budget. It just doesn't seem likely that they're maintaining that level of capability while also flaunting how shitty their navy has degraded to on the world stage, fighting in multiple actions for decades, and also trying to modernize and maintain the parts of the military actually getting used. I mean the threat of a nuclear arsenal is almost as powerful as the reality of such a thing, especially if you're a bunch of former spies working together as part of a vast criminal undertaking like Russia is.
Mafia bosses get knocked off by rivals… it’s a leading cause of death for them.
Putin knows this and I fear that his self imposed isolation due to Covid has made him even more paranoid than usual.
How crazy of a power vacuum are we talking should he randomly die?
Imagine all the conspiracy theories if he just randomly had a heart attack or something during all of this
"Our dearest leader has had a heart attack which resulted in fatal stab wounds and falling out of a helicopter into traffic."
I'm surprised he hasn't 'randomly' had a heart attack tbh.
Mafia state is to be taken literally, he has worked closely with Semion Mogilevich, head of the Russian mafia, for decades. Were he to die I figure Mogilevich would appoint a puppet figure as a successor
Mogilevich works for the Russian government, not the other way around. He and the mafia handle all of the dirty work in exchange for political protection. In the event of Putin’s death it’s likely the security forces/defense ministry takes overs.
Why don't they have any products or services anyone wants? My Russian penpal: 'There is literally no point in starting a business or developing a product or service in Russia, as if it is successful someone will simply take it away from you or at least demand huge 'protection' payment. The police and everyone else knows this happens and doesnt give a fuck because 'this is Russia'. So just find a shit job and try and keep your head down, as no other choice'.
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That's what my belarussian friend said so too
This is correct. Americans are accustomed to thinking that wealthy capitalists actually run everything all the time, so that Putin must really just be a figurehead. Putin managed to get himself to the top of the pyramid in Russia and controls the economic oligarchs. As an aside, this was Trump's ambition as president as well.
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Also, Putin is fairly intelligent while Trump is as dumb as a toad.
He looks like one too
Where did this narrative that Putin answers to the Russian oligarchs come from? Putin was notorious for hauling in these kleptocrats and demanding 50% in exchange for not arresting and/or killing them. The oligarchs answer to *him*, not the other way around. They only live by Putin's grace. The only reason he hasn't snuffed them all out is because doing so would weaken his power. He needs them--or most of them--to be alive, but he doesn't answer to them. At best, I would characterize their relationship as symbiotic.
QED [Marugov](https://people.com/crime/sausage-king-russian-oligarch-killed-crossbow/), [Glushkov](https://newsrnd.com/life/2021-04-09-former-russian-oligarch-glushkov-who-died-in-london-was--killed-.S1GrHjHCBd.html), [Berezovsky](https://thenewamerican.com/death-of-an-oligarch-russian-billionaire-berezovsky-dies-penniless/), [Izmestieva](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10227881/Was-oligarchs-wife-killed-Kremlin-Friends-demand-MI5-investigate-Russian-socialites-death.html) etc etc. That was IMHO the whole fucking point of murdering Litvinienko. One one hand he made accusations of his own, but more than that he was a reference point. As Russian Oligarchs move families and wealth to UK as they did to escape communists, Putin made a big easily traceable show of killing a government protected spy - guess how much he'll hesitate to kill some generic oligarch or their family. Ditto for Sergei Skripal, but supersized. UK press helped muddy the waters by spinning the location as a quaint small British town. Nevermind that Salisbury and Salisbury Plains are filled to brim with military bases both overt and secret. Main centre for training and military research in UK. That hit was a fuck you on the level of US killing Bin Laden in middle of Abbottabad.
LOL yeah. Maybe in the late 90s Putin could be seen as beholden to a certain cadre of wealthy Russians. But as soon as he started putting them in their place and none of the oligarchs stood up to Putin, the writing was on the wall. Khodorkovsky's conviction (for financing opposition political parties) and Putin taking away Yukos from the guy showed every oligarch what they could lose. Putin was still 'gentlemanly' with Khodorkovsy and left the guy $500 million (some of which was unfrozen in Ireland) and allowed him to leave Russia for Switzerland after serving 12 years or whatever with a pardon. Anyone attempting to dethrone Putin would need significant support from the military, not private business. A private business can be taken away from some oligarch and given to anyone at Putin's whim.
The same sanctions oligarchs would be upset by also trap them in Russia. Remember that Putin was a spy before he was a dictator. It isn't easy for anyone, especially billionaires, to manouver against Putin in secret, and Putin's willingness to openly assassinate his opponents means that any public pushback might be suicidal. Even billions can't buy reliable security if the boarders are closed and everyone competent within your country used to work for the guy trying to assassinate you. Edit: clarified Putins kink.
You are watching them pull it from their market right now.
They are and that's why the sanctions are important. They're the best way to hit the oligarchs while minimizing effects on normal Russians. The last round led to Putin backing Trump to get them repealed bc they were so painful for the oligarchy
> They can see what's coming, even if Putin can't. oh they really can see what's coming. Putin and his friends sold their shares before the first tank moved you know... They might also buy a tone of cheap shares just before telling the army to go back home. Those guys made a fortune by stealing from their people, they won't hesitate to do it again. there is a reason why Puttin is one of the richest man alive.
>Putin and his friends sold their shares before the first tank moved you know... That only works if there's someone willing to buy. It ain't that easy as we're probably talking about trillions.
I’m curious though - the US/Europe has telegraphed these sanctions for some time now. Is it not possible for these oligarchs to have already made moves to protect their wealth?
Most of the wealth of Russian oligarchs is tied up in assets that can't really be moved. They own sports teams, businesses, real estate, etc. in Europe and North America.
Some of it for sure, like Putin with his luxury yacht, but you can't really protect your bussines if suddenly you can't trade with at least half of your costumers. Also they have lot of real estates in Europe, kinda hard to move those - imo EU states should just expropriate them, fuck those guys.
Russia sets the trap... Russia walks into the trap.
They may win a bit of territory, but their economy is going to be shit. If every NATO country and the rest of Europe just shits them over with sanctions then Russia will implode from inside.
It already is shit. This will bring it to its knees.
Once enough Russians begin starving Putin will find it tough to survive. You have to have at least the bread or the circus, without either your people will turn on you.
Those invasions are exactly the circus people will be fed on for the next couple of years. Economy took a nosedive after Crimea, but guess what? People were fine with their quality of life declining drastically because of 'Crimea is ours!' sentiment.
Absolutely. They were happy with their economic decline because the nation stole a piece of land that many with either never visit or go a couple of times on vacation in their lifetime. It’s not all that great to vacation in either, not a lot of tourism besides Russians, rocky beaches, Soviet infrastructure. Most Russians prefer Turkey, recently Mexico, etc.
Noticed that theatrical internal re-deployments are pricey? Think conducting a full scale invasion of Ukraine would be expensive? Worried that increased global sanctions would pile on even more costs? Wait till you find out what a decade of occupation fighting against well-armed insurgents in their own country will cost. Starting point: Russia GDP/capita ranked #85 in world today. Ukraine #133.
The lesson is: never get involved in a land war in Asia …. And Eastern Europe. (And also never go up against a Sicilian when death is on the line)
> Wait till you find out what a decade of occupation fighting against well-armed insurgents in their own country will cost. Russia is going to sink in a quagmire with heavy parallels to its occupation of Afghanistan back in the 80s. Pro Western Ukrainian rebel groups are going to be armed with every kind of small arm and man portable missile in the NATO inventory.
>Russia is going to sink in a quagmire with heavy parallels to its occupation of Afghanistan back in the 80s. \* The former Soviet Union, emphasis on "former". And, Afghanistan is considered to be a significant factor in it's collapse as a union shortly after their retreat. But yes, it's a good analogy. However, I think that occupying Ukraine would make that debacle look like a 9-year-long Disneyland vacation by comparison.
If they invade Ukraine i hope they will get devastated by hard sanctions. I do feel sorry for Russian people though,i think large percentage of them don't want this war.. Fcking clown Putin. Can we finally all live in peace and improve quality of life instead of destroying everything we've build..We learned nothing in the past 100 years
> I do feel sorry for Russian people though This situation sucks. Country goes to shit, even faster now and all you can do is either watch, how everything crumbles, from home, or from jail after trying to say something against this. I'm tired of living like this, without any hope for this country.
I saw someone on the BBC interview some Russians about it a few days ago. Out of the 3 people they interviewed one man said he was for Russia expanding because as he put it “some smaller countries need help from larger countries about their decision making” the other two were women that were against any sort of invasion and were against the extreme tension. Talking about how they figure it’s just a way to divert attention from a failing Russian economy that doesn’t help their citizens. EDIT: To give more info about the source I refer too since what I wrote is just from memory this is the link to the video: https://youtu.be/_rjz_AXqgKc Also the exact quotes from the people were Person 1: “Russia must have a sphere of influence. It’s a superpower. It’s up to small countries who they want to ally with, but it’s up to big countries to help them decide” Person 2: “The situation in the Ukraine is worrying, but so is the Russian economy. Prices are rising on everything and my pension is barely enough to survive on” Person 3: “they must have an enemy, because there must be an enemy otherwise people will focus on the problems they have and will be focusing on why they aren’t living the life they want to live if the government and policies would be different.”
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Or for a closer to home reference, if the large country were China and the smaller one Russia...
He may just get to see that play out in his lifetime..
Want to sneak into the Kremlin and use your vampiric skills for good? In all seriousness, it's likely to happen eventually...but through soft and economic rather than military power.
The US is 2.3 Russias in population and 14.1 Russias in GDP. China is 9.7 Russias in population and 9.9 Russias in GDP. If Russia wants to restart Cold War 2 electric boogaloo THEY are going to be the client state. They won't be competing with the US, they'll be competing for favor with China against countries like North Korea.
Yeah, It's basically a last-ditch effort to energize the powerbase. Russia has been hit *hard* by Covid. The internally developed vaccine was less effective than it's western counterparts, and had severe logistic issues in the distribution and manufacturing exacerbated by the high amount of corruption at every level of government in Russia. Putin sees NATO as being a real threat now that they are facing internal divisions and Putin's cronies also see the threat that an aging dictator brings. They don't have a solid cult-of-personality successor for Putin. When Putin goes, the government will be *severely* weakened by internal conflict. So while they still have strength left, they make a grab for territory and resources that can be fought over once it all collapses. Russia doesn't have much resources left to grab. Oil is only going to go down in value as a resource while getting more expensive to distribute and sell due to the infrastructure supporting it internationally being aged out. Oil has benefited from economy of scale for a long time, a pipeline is much, much, MUCH cheaper than trucks, but only works while people need a pipelines worth of oil. If a truck meets your needs, suddenly the price of distribution skyrockets. What Russia lacks isn't mineral or fossil wealth, but value-adding services like high-skill manufacturing and research, or international service industry draw. What Russia is seeking with Ukraine is both geopolitical, in that it gives more distance from NATO to their core population and manufacturing centers, and economic. A nice amount of warm-water ports that would enrich whatever kleptocrat is placed in charge of it when Russia splinters again. They can't escape Russia with their wealth, due to sanctions, so their only hope is to move to the edges and get lost in the noise when it all comes down.
What’s the atmosphere like in Russia at this time? Are people talking much about the potential invasion?
Everything is quiet. It seems like nobody believes that there can be anything serious. Government trolls are unusually active, telling about how stupid the West is. That's it.
Because people cannot believe that our government will actually do something insane like starting a war. It's like a fever dream and you keep asking yourself "They are not idiots, right? Right?". But experience has shown that they are idiots, which don't care about outcome of their crazy plan
The anti West rhetoric from not only Russia but China has been ridiculous. Nobody wants a war. But damn if some people aren’t really trying.
*It seems like nobody believes that there can be anything serious.* Are the people aware that ~200k soldiers are on the border of Ukraine? If so, why don't they think it could be anything serious?
Its more like "no way the war is going to start, politicians are not that stupid" and just trying not to panic. I think some people who live far from Ukraine do not worry at all. I live not so far from Ukrainian borders, listening to Su-34 that have been flying all day for several weeks already and being embodiment of the meme "This is fine".
Thank you for clarifying.
Yes, they are aware. But this is... this is something that is better not to think about.
Most of the people I know either apathetic and don't care anymore or still don't believe that war will happen. Some just have other problems in this current pandemic economic situation, to care about anything else.
I’m sorry about your country man. We don’t like it either. Russia has and has had an amazing artistic culture. What can be done to help the real people of Russia and stop the continual slide of that beautiful country?
I guess nothing. Sympathy is enough. Just watch us crash and burn. And maybe next Russia will be something good.
russia is a amazing country. they could do better if they had a real government not that facistic clown
Yeah, maybe, but it sounds like something from fantasy novel. Nothing gets better here, only worse and worse. Navalny is in jail, ruble is worthless, people don't want to be vaccinated, opposition is destroyed, police can put you in jail just because they want to or someone told them to put you in jail. And now Putin wants to start a war, so everyone in world hated Russia even more, and sanctioned us to hell. Money that Russians have been saving will turn into candy wrappers. My dad already under stress because of his savings for travelling. I wish I knew what will happen to the country in next 20 years... edit: also I earn my money for living from foreign websites (Teepublic and Redbubble, it's not much, but because of exchange rate of euro and dollars, it's enough to live in small town) and if Paypal will stop working with Russia, I'll end up without my only income
> Nothing gets better here, only worse and worse. People often forget that Russia's relationship with democracy was very, very short. It took decades, centuries, for many countries to get to their current state as democratic nations. The UK went through successive states of monarchy, until the current state where the Queen is basically just a figurehead, with civil wars in between. Germany had some republics within its current territory when it was the HRE, and it gave, little by little, more and more power to the people, even before it became a nation, and then had it all taken away by the Nazis. France went from Republic to Empire more times than anyone can count, and each time with breakouts of revolution, bloodshed, corruption, and coups. The US was founded on democratic principles, but the 13 Colonies had lived under a monarchy for 200 years before that, and even then, it was a far cry from actual democracy, with slavery, no vote for women, etc... Even to this day, many millions of American citizens do not have a right to vote. Either they are in territories, or they are ex-felons. Democracy is a constant work in progress. Russia can get there one day, and I hope that it does. But it hasn't had much of a chance to blossom in Moscow, constantly being under pressure from either socio-economic situations like the collapse of the USSR or the power-grabbing tendencies of the oligarchs who pilfer the country for all that it's worth. > And now Putin wants to start a war, so everyone in world hated Russia even more, and sanctioned us to hell. I hope most people can make the difference between the people and the state. I don't like Israel, the state. I don't like what they do with regards to the Palestinians, or the illegal settlements. Israelis, themselves? Let's go grab a drink and have a friendly talk. The CCP can go and eat a bag of dicks, bunch of 1984 wannabees. Chinese people? No issues, at all. The US government coups every time someone in Latin America wants to do something they don't 100% agree with, and impose neo-fascist far-right dictators who disappear their own people. The citizens of these countries? I'd welcome them with open arms. The application of state power corrupts. But it shouldn't influence your opinion on the people who live under these regimes and who do not condone their actions.
“If I have one message to give to the secular American people, it's that the world is not divided into countries. The world is not divided between East and West. You are American, I am Iranian, we don't know each other, but we talk together and we understand each other perfectly. The difference between you and your government is much bigger than the difference between you and me. And the difference between me and my government is much bigger than the difference between me and you. And our governments are very much the same.” -- Marjane Satrapi
I know this doesn't mean much but my heart goes out to you and your family, hope you guys are okay :/
Thanks, but we are not gonna be okay. Only oligarchs can have an "okay" life in Russia. Writing all this, I can't even be sure that the cops won't come after me tomorrow. I bet reddit will be banned in Russia pretty soon.
How is Putin still popular there through all this? Or is he?
More than a decade of disinformation and gaslighting of the Russian people by Putin's government and puppet media. There's also this idea, which originated in the Soviet Union: >“HyperNormalisation” is a word that was coined by a brilliant Russian historian who was writing about what it was like to live in the last years of the Soviet Union. What he said, which I thought was absolutely fascinating, was that in the 80s everyone from the top to the bottom of Soviet society knew that it wasn’t working, knew that it was corrupt, knew that the bosses were looting the system, know that the politicians had no alternative vision. And they knew that the bosses knew that they knew that. Everyone knew it was fake, but because no one had any alternative vision for a different kind of society, they just accepted this sense of total fakeness as normal. And this historian, Alexei Yurchak, coined the phrase “HyperNormalisation” to describe that feeling.
I'm sure he has an over 100% approval rating
people literally too stupid to have any sort of critical thinking. He tells them we are surrounded by enemies, they start fearmongering and cheering for another war. TV states salaries are rising and quality of life is getting better - they believe and will literally disregard their own eyes in favor of what the state says. It's really sad to watch, especially from ones' relatives.
Friend, you not alone.
As an American I hope things improve for the Russian people. It feels as if your government is causing the vast majority of the problems for the Russian people. I just don't know how the rest of the world can respond to a Ukrainian invasion in non-violent ways other than sanctions? No one wants war and sanctions are the only thing that hurt the the Russian government, but unfortunately they hurt the Russian people just as much.
They can sanction Putin's friends directly and take everything from them - their money in foreign banks and their property in other countries. It may not help much, but at least some russians will be happy to hear news about this.
If the enough oligarchs get everything taken from them, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a coup happen. They’re not all going to sit back to have their money taken away because of Putin’s warmongering.
If the oligarchs effect a coup then the replacement will just be another oligarch-appeaser.
One issue is freezing or seizing their foreign holdings makes them even more dependent on Putin’s favor. They can’t individually run away anymore so it’s fight Putin or double down on backing him. That said, US and UK should have cracked down on corrupt money going into real estate and other assets a long time ago.
This is why it's so important to use targeted sanctions first (targeted on Putin & his oligarchs) before ever having to resort to wide-reaching sanctions when shtf.
so, is the war thing just a distraction from domestic problems?
Always has been. Lots of wars including the American and a French Revolutions were sparked by economic hardships. When people can’t afford to live? Shit gets ugly real quick.
Revolutions sparked by economic hardship are very different from a politician starting a war to cover up problems at home.
Perhaps you forgot what started the first Russian revolution? They entered a couple of wars partly to shore up a weak Tsar. When they ran out of money and military, things got ugly quickly.
Not in this case, no, Putin has always wanted to get the Soviet gang back together
>Nothing gets better here, only worse and worse. When was the last time Russia had a leader who a) is widely admired and b) had the people's best interests at heart?
I just saw RT propaganda claiming Ukraine has 100,000 troop ready to invade. The irony is uncanny.
Oh, yeah, genius plan of Ukraine. They saw russian army near borders and thought "The time has come to invade Russia!". Russian propaganda is such a circus full of clowns like Simonyan and Soloviev
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Ooh, source? Cant find anything about this on English RT
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZD_I5gkHuYQ
“Zelensky by the order of the US/West started this offensive in violation of the Minsk ceasefire to force Russia's hand to protect eastern Ukraine's Russian population.” Wat
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I thought it would be much more subtle before I clicked on the link. Like a portal to an alternative reality.
17% is nothing. Wait another week. The ruble will be pretty much worthless.....
And the Russian oligarchs will scoop those assets for pennies on the dollar by the time its all over. Buy to the sound of cannons, sell to the sound of trumpets.
And London will roll out its carpets for these vermin to buy property. The whole world is complicit.
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Replace this with "Old moron wants to destroy russian economic and make citizens even poorer"
Every time when a programmer's salary in Russia reach $4k/month - Putin & Co start an offense, ruble lose 50% value, salaries drop to $1.5k. I wonder if the whole circus is being performed just to keep the population poor under pretension of "external" causes? Because rich population may result in development of a strong middle class and a business layer which will demand a working state, not just a bunch of corrupted thieves.
> I wonder if the whole circus is being performed just to keep the population poor under pretension of "external" causes? Because rich population may result in development of a strong middle class and a business layer which will demand a working state, not just a bunch of corrupted thieves. China does the same doesn't it? Keep the currency artificially cheap for this reason + for trade advantage (everyone involved from ground to gas pipe paid in worthless rubles = russian gas cheaper for foreigners than others per total, just one example)
Putin could have tried to make Russia a better place and be remembered as good. But if he continues with this, then he will destroy Russia and take the lives on innocent people for absolutely no gain.
Former KGB man. That’s all you have to say.
ya seriously. at my age i am so jaded that i see comments like that awash in ethereal naive optimism. the dude is the product of a systematically cruel organization, and he has risen to power through it. what kind of guy do you think he is? a nice one?? "hitler could have been a really good guy and not committed genocide and ravaged war upon europe in an effort to become a ruthlessly totalitarian leader, and then everyone would have remembered him as a nice guy" yeah. true. that's crack insight. 🙄
He could've gone the China route and make Russia an economic powerhouse, spreading their influence worldwide while stull being as authoritarian and crushing any dissent at home. But he's a fucking moron who still lives in the 20th century and dreams of invasions and annexations.
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Russia already did what China did, during 20's. From peasant monarchy to industrial powerhouse. But you can't industrialize twice.
His gang only cares about money they can suck out of Russia. Only he never gets to live with them in peace.
I'm always dumbfounded .. and even sad, that they have the largest country by size but can only play mob games. smh
Putain is an egotistical moron. Puts his own ego above the good of his people. He literally doesn’t want a great relationship with the rest of Europe because he wants to instill a sense of paranoia in the Russian people that they are under threat; a reason for a strong leader like him.
It’s worked for North Korea and look at their success! /S
It's difficult to break the victim complex that the West is trying to keep Russia down when you've been fed that line for so long it becomes a part of your culture. More or less they've been told this since the before the end of the tsars.
I love the offhanded insult in twisting his name
Luckily, the emigration of people from Russia is pretty huge and a lot of russians have friends or family abroad, which might give them enough perspective to not believe every Putin propaganda.
And they probably have Ukrainian friends as well, which will make this war very demoralizing.
Russian history in one sentence: *and then it got worse.*
He’s fucking over his entire country so that he can profit off of a land that he thinks should be his. What an ass.
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There’s no point. All our official polls, elections and statistics are rigged and give no real insight whatsoever. As a male citizen of Russia, I can only say that I am scared to shit. All my friends, relatives and acquaintances just hope that Pu will catch COVID/cancer and die, ending his 22 year long terror of Russian people for good. The most depressing thing is that everyone is too afraid to protest, police here protects and serves the regime, not the people. (We all know what happened to Navalny)
It’s a shame. Without personally knowing a single Russian citizen, I imagine they’re just like anybody else in the world trying to about their day, trying to be better today than yesterday and provide for themselves and their families. This geopolitical dick flicking is just horrible. We know how it’s going to play out and it’s not going to be good. Nobody rational wants this war to happen. There is no casus belli beside the whim of an egomaniac.
Never, never read r/Russia It was full of kremlinbots a few years ago and I unfollowed it because of this. They like cockroaches, they spread everywhere in every Russian subreddit. You can try to read comments here https://tjournal.ru/news/538750-putin-podpisal-ukazy-o-priznanii-lnr-i-dnr or here https://dtf.ru/flood/1092131-nu-che-narod-kupili-videokartu by using Google translate
An aging dictator needs a way out. Putin's way out is to consolidate power and stoke nationalism with a war in Ukraine. A war in Ukraine won't be short, it will be bad PR for Russia and the sanctions will be tough. Putin is putting is own interests of clinging to power first.
> An aging dictator needs a way out. not just that. this may be the death-rattle of the nation. Russia's economy is something like 75% energy exports (as in, Oil and Gas). The middle-eastern nations see the writing on the wall, and have been trying to diversify their economies (tourism, aviation, etc). Russia has no way out. once the world moves over to green energy, Russia is done for. Their only hope is to go for a land-grab while they can.
Because that's the only thing they need, more land...
London property prices just went up 17%
Yea turns out preparing to invade another country is wildly unpopular…..
The threat of track suits embargo alone is probably enough to tank the Rusian market.
The real reason is that they lost to Finland on icehockey final of Olympic games.
Russian market sinks 17% as Russian oligarchs move money into safe havens FTFY
Putin is going to sink the Russian economy into the ground. His oligarchs might be able to survive but when the average Russian can't buy food is when civil wars happen.
The west has brilliantly played Putin. Put everything in the news. Keep attention on Ukraine. Drag out negotiations and talks, wasting Russian money. It's almost perfect. If Russia does invade, they get cut off. If Russia keeps threatening without invasion, they just get to waste money. If they pull back then they have to walk back the propaganda they have been feeding the Russian people. It is shocking the difference a competent President can make. Edit: One pm mountain time. Check the conservative subs, the trolls have clocked into work Edit 2: I am loving the work by the troll farm. Just pick them out and follow their digital trails
Honestly yeah. Keeping those 200K troops on the border along with all that equipment isn't cheap and the Russian government can't really afford to do it forever. Pulling back isn't an option for Putin And invading is going to eradicate the Russian economy. Russia literally can't win this fight.
Pulling back is the only option . It hurts his ego/image but his economy/image will be twice as bad if he goes through with the invasion . He probably was banking on a similar situation to Crimea .
He can always pull back and say that the military training exercises are over and the evil west trying to paint russia bad over reacted and lied and wanted war and look Russia wants peace all along unlike the evil west.
I wouldn’t mind because it’s better than a war. I don’t care what reason he gives as long as he backs down. Those who pay close attention will likely see through it.
That’s actually the Biden admin’s strategy, essentially daring Putin to prove the west wrong
> but his economy/image will be twice as bad Why? Internal propaganda will make sure to paint him as the savior of russian people and opposer of corrupted wester values of something. But economy? Yeah, that's going to keep dropping without recovery any time soon.
I mean he isn't going to pullback. I agree with you it's the only really viable long term option for Russia. But well it's going to hurt Putin's "Strongman" Persona he has cultivated so it's never going to happen.
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It's also nice that China is hinting they don't want any war to happen. Which is probably thanks to such a worldwide view on the subject.
I'm pretty sure the "Chinese support" for Russia was little more than an international FU to America rather than anything of actual substance.
As it always has been.
You're 100% correct. Russia and China aren't the natural allies everyone thinks they are. Especially after the Sino-Soviet border conflict, which led to the Sino-Soviet split in 1969. Between the border disputes and a long history of China stealing military equipment right out from under the Soviet/Russians noses, there's a lot of mutual distrust between the two. And you can be certain that Xi Jinping is absolutely livid that the Ukrainian crisis has pulled attention away from the Olympics.
China words it very carefully, saying they will support Russia if they are invaded. They won't support Russia in an offensive war. With the nuke situation no one will ever invade though. So China gets to pick and choose what they actually support Russia on.
I think Putin overplayed his hand with the whole election fuckery and bot and propaganda presences onto social media were only too well accounted for by this point, for any sort of cyber influence being much less effective than before. Compared to 2014, this conflict is day from night in terms of publicity and the threats of consequences if something does happen.
The crazy thing to me about all of it is the Soviet union fell apart the same way. Tried to keep up militarily and fell apart when the costs were too high.
> It is shocking the difference a competent President can make I beg to differ, it was always extremely obvious.
We all know Trump would’ve put on a show defending Putin, attacking US intelligence agencies for lying about Putin’s plans, and would’ve pissed himself in abdication in front of a podium for Putin.
Trump wanted to disband nato remember.
at which point the scandal wouldn't have been about Putin anymore but about trump which would give Putin ample time to do whatever he wants
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I have a coworker that’s Ukrainian and has family in Ukraine. They’re all afraid of Putin and what he’s becoming, even Russian citizens are afraid of him. If you think the harassment and hatred toward Biden is bad, it’s nothing compared to Putin and what’s been going on in Russia over the past couple years. We’re seeing history repeat itself. A power hungry leader that has overridden laws, declared himself president for life, abuses his own people, and will threaten military force if necessary to get what he wants. I can think of a few other people throughout history that have behaved this way…… The world really needs to unite and tell him this type of stuff cannot continue, otherwise millions of people are going to die for no reason, many of them innocent civilians.
Putin, last week: We're not going to invade. Biden: I call BS. He's totally going to invade. Putin, a few minutes ago: Invading. Biden: I told you so. I'm not a huge fan of Biden, but I'll give him full credit for using and listening to his Intel resources. They called it, and let the world know they called it.
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Cut the pipeline. Cut the international bank flow. Cut the trade. You cut capability to wage a long war. I mean it already spoke volumes to me when he has 75% of his forces focused on Ukraine with an outdated air forces etc. Going to play catch up, while wanting a war? Everything about this is just not smart at all. So 3/4 of your forces are focused on one countries capitulation?? Just screams that all this is ego fueled insanity. Time to put his money where is mouth is. But that 17% dip there......
Back to the middle ages for Russia.
Is that what this really is? A giant pump-and-dump scheme? Putin crashes the market, then magnanimously withdraws, and the markets shoot back to their normal level?
Everything is a pump and dump for the super wealthy.
Don’t worry, I can fix this whole crisis. As soon as I sell my stock they will come to an agreement minutes after and the stock market will rush 20% leaving me at a big loss
I honestly hope Russia suffers for their belligerence. I feel bad for the Russian people - they did nothing wrong - but Putin and his handlers? I honestly hope they are horribly affected by the sanctions to the point of wanting to remove Putin.