Posted on 03/05/2022 5:22:25 AM PST by CondoleezzaProtege
For almost three decades, Putin has been saying and many in Russia and the West have followed him in this that the Soviet Union came apart because the Bolsheviks set up union republics and gave them the right to leave, a right Moscow never expected them to claim but added in the hopes of eventually expanding the USSR to include other peoples as well.
There is no doubt that that Leninist approach contributed to the way in which the USSR fell apart, but it does not explain fully why it did. That explanation lies in two other spheres, demography and popular participation.
When the Soviet Union was created, the ethnic Russian core was overwhelmingly dominant in terms of numbers; but by 1991, the non-Russian nations within that country formed almost exactly half. And because of development, the peoples of that empire were no longer prepared to accept the dominance of one nation, especially one headed to minority status.
In discussions about Putin’s aggression in Ukraine, he, most Russians and many in the West have forgotten that and therefore do not see that whatever territorial gains Putin makes by force of arms, he is bringing within the borders of “the Russian Federation” – and that absurdly now misnamed entity must be put in quotes – ever more non-Russians.
Were Putin to be foolish enough or lucky enough to occupy all of Ukraine, he would change the demographic balance inside “the Russian Federation” in fundamental ways. And if he brings in Belarus as well, he would create a country that he would celebrate as Russia rising from its knees but one that would more or less instantaneously begin to fall apart.
More than half of the people of that new empire would be non-Russians….
(Excerpt) Read more at windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com ...
Hold DJT's beer...
The Soviet Union fell apart because it failed economically and socially.
The Russian State will not cease to exist; rather the current government is likely to cease to exist.
Hillary and the Democrats will miss Putin.
I disagree. The current government will become more oppressive and closed much like what has happened here in the USA. The Russian g9vernment have their propaganda network just like we do. Only difference between them and us, we the people are just sitting on the couch happily allowing our government to for AL I tents enslave us all in legislation and reulation.
United forever in friendship and labor
Our glorious republics will ever endure!
The great Soviet Union will live through the ages
The joy of her people, their fortress secure!
Remember China is watching. China is learning. And China will buy from Russia when all else won’t.
It sounds like pretensions to know what Putin wants or is doing.
Barring WWIII, I expect Ukraine to still exist at the conclusion of this. Its borders may be different and its government certainly will be. It will be a government deferential to Moscow with a commitment to eschew NATO, or other foreign entanglements, in its constitution. Russian troops may remain in Ukraine to “rebuild” and “secure the peace”.
That doesn’t sound like Moscow, or even Putin, losing, to me.
I think this, because the President of the United States is on Putin’s side. Both Putin and Biden intend to make hay out of this while it plays out.
It’s an interesting take. But even if your prediction is correct, it will take years and there are other bad actors in the world that will benefit while the world becomes more dangerous. A nuclear armed dictator with nothing to lose is always dangerous. In the 80s, it was spending that ultimately was the catalyst that broke the Soviet Union. Today, the weapon is going to be Revenue. If China is the only Russian customer in the world, Russia (and their federation) should fall once again. But there has to be commodity supply to fill the gap. America can provide most of that commodity gap to starve Russian revenue.
Russia will be China's buffer state to the West.
Russia's 1990s attempt to join Europe was repudiated. Russia has been a Mongol vassal before. It will be again, since it has no other choice.
Yes, glossed over in poetic utopian words, i.e. lies; and then sold emphatically, musically, via one of the more majestic anthems ever written.
Oh, and the first lines of which were “Unbreakable union of freeborn republics”. The irony of lies is remarkable.
Well I largely agree with the author of the article I disagree about the Russians intentions and their ethnic future. Ukrainians Bella Russians and Russians largely got along okay in the Soviet Union with a simmering level of bitterness underneath. When Hitler and his invasions of Poland Czechoslovakia etc. attacked plans had already been drawn up to methodically erase these people viewed as scum to make more room for Germans who needed living space. Well they may view fellow Russians as rubes and ukrainians as bad cousins it would take a maniacal killer like Goebbels and his kind to genocide the citizens of those republics. They didn’t even do that with the Muslim republics.
Only question now is has Putin’s brain decayed sufficiently and his soul reach the level of disease that he adopts the mantle of Lebensraum.
Russia is now 81% Russian. If Putin just wants the Russian speaking areas of the Ukraine digesting it won’t be a serious problem for Russia in the immediate future. If he aims at more than that it might.
The propaganda is getting deep.
>Remember China is watching. China is learning. And China will buy from Russia when all else won’t.
China may buy from Russia however Russia it too poor to buy much from China. Not a good trading partner. If China pisses of their good customers such as the US and Europe then it will be bad for business.
Not too much.
Plenty of totalitarian dictators left [pun intended] to play ball with.
The French Marceillaise (sp?) totally rocks too, with better lyrics... :)
They grow on trees...lol
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