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Inside Putin's Circle

ft.com

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Re: Inside Putin's Circle

#41

Post by Animats »

That's a very useful and important article. So that's who Putin talks to. A very small group who share his worldview: It is the manifest destiny of Mother Russia to have an empire in Eastern Europe.

A key point that has emerged from a number of sources is that Putin's crowd has no plan B. This isn't considered by Russia's leadership to be just a military adventure - if it works, great, if it doesn't work, pull back and try something else. It's a must-win operation.

Historically, this sort of thing ends only when the leader is killed.

Re: Inside Putin's Circle

#42

Post by Koshkin »

ordu wrote: post #10
twelve40 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yes, definitely not "hard men", more like what you described, except various intelligence agencies who don't always wear a gun, are also included.

Well, FSB is an intelligence agency, and they wear guns or at least have a license to wear gun. Though I cannot argue. I rely on my intuitive knowledge of Russian which is hard to use as a rational argument. This knowledge tells me that "силовые структуры"/"structures of force" are organizations that use force to solve problems. And I think that all of them wear guns. But I may be wrong with that last statement, and…

> FSB is an intelligence agency

It is a security agency, a.k.a. the “secret police.” (It does, of course, spy on the populace.)

Re: Inside Putin's Circle

#43

Post by shoo »

user249 wrote: post #18

Quoted post unavailable.

I reckon the population of hacker news has drifted tremendously over the last decade. More content about the general grind of corporate tech industry, less focus on entrepreneurship. Many people in the tech industry who read and comment on HN are focused on exploiting the status quo and enjoying salaries offered by roles in large corporations

Perhaps one consequence of this drift is that people with more radical activist leanings, who are more likely to actually do something, are going to be more likely to hang out and discuss somewhere else rather than here

(i am not pointing any fingers, i haven't engaged in any kind of activism for years and grind away at the IT day job in exchange for salary.)

edit: the above argument lazily conflates people interested in tech industry entrepreneurship with people interested in activism. that doesn't make much sense, both groups will have quite different goals and often be in conflict. but i think there is definitely a drift where much of the people following tech industry news here on HN will be increasingly mainstream & functionally conservative.

Re: Inside Putin's Circle

#44

Post by agumonkey »

mekkkkkk wrote: post #28

I read an incredibly thorough book about Putin a year or so ago, and what stuck with me is how political his career in the KGB was. In those final years of the USSR, everything was in shambles, and any position of power became so through-and-through political. That makes his rise so interesting and frightening. He has been forged in a dark web of covert slush funds, power projection and kompramat. He was obviously ve…

there's also long interviews from 2017~ on PBS Frontline IIRC, a series called "Putin files"

Julia Ioffe, Masha Gessen

It's partial but has a lot of detail

On the other side there are the Russian friendly views such as Mearsheimer or even Stone.

It's difficult to weigh what is true (even though I'm biased anti aggressor in this case)

Re: Inside Putin's Circle

#45

Post by user249 »

01100011 wrote: post #22
user249 wrote: post #18

Quoted post unavailable.

HN is a tech news aggregator website. Some of us are more active in the appropriate forums. Do you leave comments on cooking websites suggesting they need to take action?

People who cook could help in their own way. Hacker News is has people who could tell you about how to run a botnet hack, mount an effective DDOS or the appropriate type of crypto to donate and how to get it.

Nevermind, though. I'm just feeling helpless and want to do something. I need to think a little deeper about it.

Re: Inside Putin's Circle

#46

Post by galaxyLogic »

SirYandi wrote: post #39
user249 wrote: post #18

Quoted post unavailable.

I know this is a selfish perspective but the Ukraine/Russia news cycle has been hitting my mental health pretty hard. Its nice to come here and see the usual interesting techy stuff and get a break from the horror. Not that I disagree with your point. This is a place of intelligent discussion which could perhaps benefit Ukrainians better.

Yes HN is supposed to be about intellectually interesting ideas. And the fight against war and fascism needs those because otherwise we are in deep sh*t. So why not combine the two?

The situation with Russia is much about information. HN is about information and IT, no? HN could be the primary forum to discuss ways to counter MIS-information.

There seems to be a deep problem in Russia, its citizens are mostly duped by misinformation pushed by their government. What kind of intelligent solutions exist or could be developed to counter that?

Re: Inside Putin's Circle

#47

Post by jfk13 »

notyourwork wrote: post #38
mmaunder wrote: post #31

I’ve been a paid subscriber of FT for years. It’s horrifically expensive and worth every penny.

I had to check pricing after reading your comment. $375/year! That sounds crazy.

Does a dollar a day sound more affordable? Just read the news over a cup of home-brewed coffee instead of getting a take-out, and you should easily break even. :)

Re: Inside Putin's Circle

#48

Post by beebmam »

DamnYuppie wrote: post #30
user249 wrote: post #18

Quoted post unavailable.

Business, despite all its press and media to the contrary, isn't war. People are not dying and suffering and you don't really face any repercussions from your actions. War is a totally different thing so asking people to "move fast and break things" doesn't really make sense in that context especially when there are actual physical repercussions. Also why should the people on this site really care? Honestly I get it…

>Also why should the people on this site really care?

Would you care if gangsters showed up at your house and told you that everything you owned now belongs to his gang? Would you care if that happened to your neighbor?

If you think this will never happen to you, think again. This world is a brutal place filled with people that would take from you every single thing you hold dear without a blink of an eye.

Re: Inside Putin's Circle

#49

Post by tatrajim »

mmaunder wrote: post #31

I’ve been a paid subscriber of FT for years. It’s horrifically expensive and worth every penny.

I was a subscriber for ten years, but gave up on them over mediocre coverage of important issues in the US and East Asia, about which I had some knowledge. Relying on their reporting risked costing me money in my investment decisions.

Re: Inside Putin's Circle

#50

Post by dangrossman »

jfk13 wrote: post #47
notyourwork wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had to check pricing after reading your comment. $375/year! That sounds crazy.

Does a dollar a day sound more affordable? Just read the news over a cup of home-brewed coffee instead of getting a take-out, and you should easily break even. :)

If I'm going out to get my avocado toast anyway, it only makes sense to get the coffee with it since I'm right there. Maybe they should let me round up my change to get the day's FT news with my coffee at Starbucks instead.
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