I’ve been noticing Russia since Putin took power. I was deployed to Uzbekistan 2003-04 and noticed lots of fondness for Soviet times among young Uzbeks and Russians with no personal memory of the CCCP.
Of course Russians want to restore their national pride, to include being feared once again. The 2001 Kursk disaster was an enormous embarassment to this end as well as a tragedy.
It’s just that lately Russia Resurgent under Putin is engaging in some unexpectedly bizarre behavior. Laying claim to the North Pole seabed and depositing a Russian flag plaque on the ocean floor, as an example.
And don’t forget suppression of opposition media, outlawing of non-Orthodox proselytizing, saber-rattling at Eastern Europe, and all but getting in economic bed with the Chinese, even as the latter are slowly colonizing Siberia. And tightening the Gazprom energy noose around Europe’s neck.
The Nashi youth movement grows with Putin’s blessing. Looking at pix of its members, I’d say its name is slightly misspelled.
Let’s just say that the `spookiness’ of Novaya Rossiya is now bubbling to the surface.
Well, I don’t think it is bubbling now. It has been, and it was there before Putin. Worse now, certainly.
We’ve been keeping a close eye on them, and to be honest, for all our huff and puff in the states about “allies”, I don’t foresee them as allies, and I personally don’t trust them at all.
The Russians are, pretty much like anyone else, in it for themselves and their own power base, which is most of Europe.
With the Europeans consistently leaning to the side of Socialism (just LOOK at the EU) Karl Marx has a strong hold from the grave, and all of the Communist followers of Marxism would be happily pushing their agendas if they were alive today.
Oh, wait, I forgot the Democratic party is almost nothing BUT socialists these days.
We, the US have been working with Russia for years on strategic defense of our respective regions for missile defense. We’ve had visitors from there, and we’ve visited them over the years — all in an attempt to convince the rest of the world that missile defense is good for everyone.
And yet, the Russians who KNOW this to be true are dead set on causing missile defense to become an “offensive issue”.
So, don’t trust them. Don’t trust the Chinese either. Eventually, the two will understand they together are stronger than us and Europe and will do something about it.
Communism, through Socialism is on a very strong rise in the world, in all hemispheres, and when the time is right, Communism will once again rear it’s ugly head, and the United States will again be their target.
We’ve got an added problem that we have people in the US BLIND to this, who believe that “social” behavior is more important than even patriotism for our own country.