It is a cliche that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely and we have seen that play out repeatedly in the political sphere where leaders who arrogate to themselves increasing amounts of power at the expense of counterbalancing democratic institutions become more and more reckless and abusive.
We see this in the case of Russian leader Vladimir Putin who over the years has increasingly undermined Russian democracy and consolidated power in his own hands. Whatever historical reasons he might have given for thinking that Ukraine was actually part of Russia, his invasion of that country was reckless and has not gone well, resulting in a large number of deaths and injuries and destruction, with no end in sight. Although reliable numbers are hard to obtain, it is quite possible that there are a substantial number of Russians who support the invasion, since the move symbolizes the creation of a greater Russia and nationalists tend to favor actions that seem to enhance the power and reach of their country.
The repeated sudden deaths of people who oppose Putin have also become so common that official denials of lack of complicity are highly disingenuous. But the death in captivity on February 16th of dissident Alexei Navalny could well be a bridge too far. Here was a young and healthy man, a vocal critic of Putin, who dies suddenly with no official word on the cause of death or even an autopsy, as far as I know. While the authorities initially refused to hand over the body to his mother, they finally conceded and a funeral was held. I do not know why the family did not arrange for an independent autopsy before the burial.
The recklessness of Putin can be seen by comparing the Navalny case with that of Nelson Mandela. Mandela was a prisoner of the apartheid regime on South Africa for decades. I read that the South African government was fearful that if Mandela died in captivity, that would create a major uproar locally and internationally and so they made every effort to make sure that he was not in danger even as they refused to release him. But Navalny seemed to have received no similar consideration. Whether his death will galvanize opposition to Putin’s stranglehold on power remains to be seen.
… Vladimir Putin who over the years has increasingly undermined Russian democracy …
It only took a little scraping with a trowel, having such a thin foundation.
… a young and healthy man, a vocal critic of Putin, who dies suddenly with no official word on the cause of death …
“Sudden Death Syndrome” has a long history under various names, and a 100% mortality rate.
Whether his death will galvanize opposition to Putin’s stranglehold on power remains to be seen.
It will take more than a light coating of zinc to pry Vladimir Vladimirovich’s fingers loose. But these may be the good ol’ days, from the Russian perspective: once VVP goes to that big judo dojo in the sky, the brawl over his throne may leave Moscow looking like Mariupol.
Is that what the attempted invasion of Ukraine has done?
What it seems to this outside observer to have done is demonstrate handily how shit the Russian military is. They had one job -- invade and occupy a country one twenty-eighth the size of their own… and two years on, they’re struggling. It’s like the rest of England tried to invade Cornwall, and didn’t manage it. Or if you’re in the US, the whole rest of the USA tried to invade Montana, and after two years were still struggling. It’s NOT a good look -- it makes Russia, for so long painted during the Cold War as this peerless badass bogeyman, seem weak. I mean, OK, they had a quagmire in Afghanistan, but NOBODY does well in Afghanistan. They should have been able to just roll over Ukraine… and they haven’t. It’s embarrassing.
@1: that is the main worry for the future. When Vladdo croaks it’s going to be dagger time, big time. And the Russian citizenry will look at the present time as a veritable Golden Age for their asses. Worse still, such troubles tend to spread outward…
@2: yes, right now everyone in Europe is in a tizzy “Oh gawd we’ve got to rearm”. Fine, more money down the crapper, but who knows what the Vladingbat is cooking in his alleged brain.
On the other hand, he unwittingly gave a powerful impulse to green energy in EU, as people are slooooooowly waking up to the fact that burning hydrocarbs is not a good idea, and being dependent for them from demented tyrants an even stupider one. Should have done so fifty years ago, but mas vale tarde que nunca.
https://www.zeit.de/wirtschaft/energiemonitor-strompreis-gaspreis-erneuerbare-energien-ausbau
The problem is it creates a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martyr_(politics)
@ sonofrojblake
Your surprise is because you think this is Russia vs. Ukraine (i.e. you’ve been suckered by the propaganda).
This is the US/NATO vs Russia. Ukraine is just the stage.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-62002218
@ Morales
Yes that was the whole point of the bit about Mandela. Well done for trying to keep up.
@2 sonofrojblake: There is a big difference between the way the Russian military was portrayed during the cold war and now. During the cold war the Russian military figures were inflated by US military and intelligence analysts to justify big military and intelligence budgets.
In the years prior up to the invasion of Ukraine it was Russia inflating it’s own military power. This was both to make the country look more dangerous and because Russia sold it’s weapons on the international market. Everybody knew that Russia was overstating it’s military and that corruption was a problem in the Russian military. Everybody, inside and outside Russia, was caught off guard by the raw scale of the corruption problem.
@5 Silentbob: It’s more complex then just US/NATO vs Russia or Ukraine vs Russia. If it was really US/NATO forces then the Russian air force would have been blown out of the sky a long time ago and Ukraine wouldn’t be depending on simple artillery. At the same time, the US and NATO have provided Ukraine with more drones and artillery then they could begin to buy/build on their own. Ukraine has also been given top grade anti-missile and anti-air systems that have weakened Russian missile attacks and forced them to use air attacks carefully.
It isn’t really a proxy war but Ukraine couldn’t have held up without support either.
<snicker>
Other than that the whole point about Mandela was that Mandela was not actually martyred, sure.
Just unlike Mandela, was the whole point. As you see it.
(Heh)
Vlad Vexler:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gNMTx_Es_s
Why Putin Killed Navalny
Feb 17, 2024
@JM, 6:
What baffles me is that NOT everybody was caught off guard. Someone knew the scale of the problem, likely someone(s) not far below Putin, maybe Vlad himself. And those people must surely have had an inkling that the invasion wouldn’t be the cakewalk it should have been, AND that the resulting humiliation would look bad for Russia and expose their weakness. It just seems astonishing to me that they’d wade in like that -- I just would have thought that Putin would have known it would be a shitshow -- is he really that out of touch? And how angry must he be with the people who didn’t tell him that the army wasn’t up to it?
sonofrojblake @ # 9: … Putin would have known it would be a shitshow — is he really that out of touch?
Please recall that prior to 2/24/22, just about all the news out of Ukraine centered on corruption. Whatever Putin knew about the shoddy state of his own military, he surely figured that the Ukrainian forces had it even worse.
@9 sonofrojblake: It’s likely that somebody should have known but didn’t. High level power mongers are not known for their self reflection. Everybody was skimming their share and nobody realized just how much was being lost overall.
The low level officers skimming off some of the training money are not telling the higher level officers that the troops are really untrained. And the mid level officers directing contracts based on bribes probably don’t even realize that that a lot of what they are buying that way doesn’t meet standards and would fail in combat. The high level officers allocating budget for fictional units are not about to tell anybody what they are doing. The system looked like it was working because the front line combat units got their gear and well trained soldiers, the second tier units had enough they could roll out for training and parades and the reserve units that did a few weekends a year lost the most.
There is also a big problem that was known but turned out far worse then expected. People knew that Russia would have trouble meeting production demands from Russian companies but it was expected that any sanctions imposed would falter. People thought that the EU simply needed Russian oil too much and that other countries would evade the sanctions too much. The sanctions have been hard and have held up much better then expected. Even China is paying some lip service to the sanctions. Russia has had to turn to Iran and North Korea for ammunition and parts. Russia simply can’t resupply drones, missiles, airplane parts and other advanced gear at the rate it wants to.
Never underestimate people’s ability to believe their own bullshit. It’s entirely possible that Putin really did believe that Russian troops would be welcomed as liberators.
With regards to ‘somebody should have known’…
This was a problem for the German WWII Eastern Front.
This was a problem for the Soviet ‘Five Year Plans’.
This was part of why the Soviet Union had massive famines.
This was part of why China during the Cultural Revolution had massive famines.
Heck, this was a good chunk of the reason why CoViD-19 wasn’t taken seriously in China until after it escaped.
One of the great flaws of any authoritarian regime is that, if you can live or die by the word of the Great Leader… few people want to be the bearer of bad news in case that bad news gets them killed or otherwise punished. This is especially true in corruption cases like this, where nobody wants to report anybody else’s corruption because any investigation could show their own corruption as well. It effectively turns into a society-wide case of mutual blackmail, and the person on top who is the only one allowed to make the big decisions often is the last to know because nobody wanted to be the head sticking up that gets chopped off ‘pour encourager les autres’.