[Tailgunner Joe]

Russian President Vladimir Putin was Boris Yeltsin's chosen successor. Putin was appointed as President by Yeltsin before there was ever any election. Russia's enthusiastic embrace of Yeltsin's chosen successor was hardly a repudiation of Yeltsin's policies. Yeltsin's Russia was every bit as much friends with Saddam, Assad and the Ayatollahs as Putin's. Yeltsin's Russia amassed enormous wealth doing business with Saddam through the crooked UN "Oil for Food" scam, just like Putin's Russia. Yeltsin condemned NATO and stood with Red China against the US just like Putin does.

[silverleaf]

Yeah, the Russians just LOVED Eisenhower, Truman, Nixon, Kennedy, and Reagan ... that's why we had a little "cold war" thing going on for over 50 years....

damn George Bush for screwing up a mutually trustworthy friendship

SARC

(notice I left out President Peanut ... the reds probably really DID love him as a useful idiot) )

[A. Pole]

Russian President Vladimir Putin was Boris Yeltsin's chosen successor. Putin was appointed as President by Yeltsin before there was ever any election. Russia's enthusiastic embrace of Yeltsin's chosen successor was hardly a repudiation of Yeltsin's policies.

Actually it is. Yeltsin at the end implicitly admitted the failure of his policies and the nomination of Putin was part of that.

The straw that broke the camel's back was the 1999 NATO attack on Serbia (followed by not abiding by the Kosovo compromise) and Western political support for Islamists in Chechnya.

[The Sons of Liberty]

Russian President Vladimir Putin was Boris Yeltsin's chosen successor

Putin is ex KGB - there's no way he should be trusted, even if Dubya looked "looked into his heart, soul or eyes" or whatever part of his anatomy.

[omega4412]

The US and Russia both need to consider the history of the last 1500 years, not just of the last 15 or the last 100. The Moslems have long exploited divisions in Christendom -- the Greek vs Latin churches, divisions among the Eastern churches.

[thoughtomator]

The driving of Russia into the anti-American camp is surely attributable to one Mr. Bill Clinton.


Clinton Legacy ping

[GSlob]

"...Is Rooted in 1990s"
They are off by about 1000 years. It's not 1990s, but more like 988. Compare the historical fate of the lands [in the same area] which got christianized from Rome [even if indirectly] and ended up as Western civ - and those who ended in Byzantium orbit. Say, the Baltics, Poland, Czech Republic, Croatia versus their Orthodox civ [Huntington's terminology] neighbors. And the civilizational hostility dates from about the same times.

[ozzymandus]

So what. They're still in mourning for Stalin.

[JerseyHighlander]

The average Russian is 100% correct in posting the blame on American WTO and IMF advisers, mostly from the faculty at Harvard and related consultancy groups. And Clinton's parade of thieves he sent to Russia to help destroy the economy of Russia doesn't help America's lasting image in the eyes of Russians either.

[Trailerpark Badass]

You mean Russians look anywhere, everywhere, for a scapegoat, before looking at themselves?

Kind of like the russian guy who used to tell me that 75 years of Communist misery was forced on the poor Russian people by foreign ethnics. Oh, yeah, he told me that here on FR.