21–30 of 149 posts
I’m often wondering if Putin is, in fact, the most powerful person in the world by a very large margin. He might not have a billion people or a space force, but he plays everyone like a fiddle.
shut down the oil and gas out of russia and you shut down putin.
I’m often wondering if Putin is, in fact, the most powerful person in the world by a very large margin. He might not have a billion people or a space force, but he plays everyone like a fiddle.
That's utter bullshit and i'll tell you why: Russia has been severly weakened by democratic Europe. They have lost an insane amount of area since the fall of USSR and Europe has never been "closer" to Moscow, their capital. They are now getting punished for actions of last resort. Eg. Invading Ukraine, because otherwise their entire naval fleed would be rendered useless, since it couln't even go out. Russia is weak,…
I’m often wondering if Putin is, in fact, the most powerful person in the world by a very large margin. He might not have a billion people or a space force, but he plays everyone like a fiddle.
He might be the most powerful in current soviet union that is CIS. However I fail to see how he can be the most powerful in the world given that USA surpasses russia in both military and economic might (which are pretty much the same thing if you think about it). Russia has no answer to sanctions and those counter-sanctions are just a delusion. USA can make many other countries respect the sanctions due to dollar bei…
Compare with Russia: they have some involvement in Syria (and other places, I'm sure), but if they'd pull back from Syria, I'm not sure who else besides Assad would complain. From this point of view, their hands might not be as tied as the US'
I agree that Russia counter-sanctions can be just a delusion, but I think that another interesting point is that sanctions aren't biting as hard as they could've in Russia, due to their massive reduction in public debt:
https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2019/09/11/russias-net-public...
They had slow (or absent) growth, otoh.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's utter bullshit and i'll tell you why: Russia has been severly weakened by democratic Europe. They have lost an insane amount of area since the fall of USSR and Europe has never been "closer" to Moscow, their capital. They are now getting punished for actions of last resort. Eg. Invading Ukraine, because otherwise their entire naval fleed would be rendered useless, since it couln't even go out. Russia is weak,…
I don't think he's saying that Russia is the most powerful country in the world, I think he's saying that as an individual person, Putin is more powerful than any other individual person. I guess the main question would be "is Putin with total control of a less powerful country more powerful than the US president with carefully defined control of a more powerful country?"
The sanctions against Russia are still in place and it seems to be working. It will only get worse when Trump will ( probably) lose. Their ally is China and they are the weak partner on that end and China knows it.
Additionally, Russia is probably getting an extra "big reward" in the coming year for their meldding in the western world.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The bit that you miss is that the people who had the misfortune to live in the Russian "sphere of influence" did not want, and will never want to be in it. The former Russian "spheres of influence" are very happy to be out of it, and terrified by the prospect of finding themselves drawn into it.
I am the first person to criticise the Russian sphere of influence. They did a terrible job from the rise of the proletariat through to today. Even I could do a better job if left to administer the country. However to call them aggressors is a total perversion of the word aggression. Their posture is backs-to-the-wall defensive in relation to Western powers.
Just because they're afraid of having their "backs-to-the-wall" doesn't mean their doctrine is legitimate.
> The revolutions in Georgia and Ukraine of 2004-5 fed Putin’s “dark paranoia” that the Kremlin was threatened by a western plot to topple his regime. The Kremlin has subsequently revelled in escalating conflicts with the western powers as a marker of Russia’s newly regained stature on the world stage. The US has spent a generation pushing first the Soviets, then Russia, back into a very tightly confined sphere of in…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think he's saying that Russia is the most powerful country in the world, I think he's saying that as an individual person, Putin is more powerful than any other individual person. I guess the main question would be "is Putin with total control of a less powerful country more powerful than the US president with carefully defined control of a more powerful country?"
I'm implying on the : "he plays everyone like a fiddle". The sanctions against Russia are still in place and it seems to be working. It will only get worse when Trump will ( probably) lose. Their ally is China and they are the weak partner on that end and China knows it. Additionally, Russia is probably getting an extra "big reward" in the coming year for their meldding in the western world.
I’m often wondering if Putin is, in fact, the most powerful person in the world by a very large margin. He might not have a billion people or a space force, but he plays everyone like a fiddle.
He might be the most powerful in current soviet union that is CIS. However I fail to see how he can be the most powerful in the world given that USA surpasses russia in both military and economic might (which are pretty much the same thing if you think about it). Russia has no answer to sanctions and those counter-sanctions are just a delusion. USA can make many other countries respect the sanctions due to dollar bei…
The US has been using the media like this for decades, but it's always been considered a side game. Russia has made it a primary mode of attack - partly because it's vastly cheaper and more effective than spending extreme sums of money on super-weapons.
So we know that Putin has been financing the subversion of social democracy and the promotion of far-right nationalist narratives in the US and the EU through a combination of direct funding, social media troll farming, and straightforward financially advantageous diplomacy - and possibly also direct election hacking, although so far that's been harder to prove.
The UK has been almost destroyed by this. It's a shell of the country it was when the century started, and the poison of Brexit hasn't even worked its way fully through the system yet. I expect I'll get the usual downvotes for posting this out, but the downvoters might want to address the points made here before they waste their time on that:
https://www.newlawjournal.co.uk/content/is-brexit-a-russia-b...
There's much more detail about this in a book which is being released soon.
I’m often wondering if Putin is, in fact, the most powerful person in the world by a very large margin. He might not have a billion people or a space force, but he plays everyone like a fiddle.
That's utter bullshit and i'll tell you why: Russia has been severly weakened by democratic Europe. They have lost an insane amount of area since the fall of USSR and Europe has never been "closer" to Moscow, their capital. They are now getting punished for actions of last resort. Eg. Invading Ukraine, because otherwise their entire naval fleed would be rendered useless, since it couln't even go out. Russia is weak,…
Ukraine is currently having a civil war, they ousted their president before their legal election, and a huge chunk of the population highly disagreed with doing that, so much so to take up arms and begin a civil war.
The Crimean populi voted to get out of that mess. They were lucky that there were Russian forces there strategically and historically stationed.
Perhaps if Ukraine straightens out it's crap, there will be opportunity for that same island to vote again, and rejoin Ukraine.
Look at the economy in Ukraine now. It's worse than most African countries, which is pathetic for a country with so many educated people, and so much infrastructure.
Say what you will, but Crimea caught a lucky break and I wouldn't blame a single one of those people for voting that day to join Russia and keep the peace and day to day life.