The sad thing is, it really does not need to be this way. They have all the resources and all the engineering and scientific background to be great. Their acceptance of generational kleptocratic tendencies just keep sucking everything dry and perpetuating the us vs. them national ethos. It’s really quite sad.
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There’s part of me that blames this all on Putin. Similar to your point, it’s like he was given a team that should compete for a playoff spot, yet they continue to finish dead last.
However, the Russian people have to also shoulder some blame. I don’t know enough about Russia to opine on just what the flaw is, but they appear to have some fatal flaw that hinders their success.
I am no expert on Russia, but I have read more than a little history. The people have not had much experience with freedom. Autocracy has been their norm.
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Read, or lived through?
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You and Peter the Great share the same lament.
I have read all of Massie’s books. That one was especially good.
Ole PtG wanted to modernize Russia, but I don’t think he wanted to give up autocracy.
Yes. Democracy has always been the deal breaker for their quest for modernity.
Not really – there is a deep unwillingness to accept the responsibilities of democracy coupled with no understanding of how it really works. Of course, the autocrats have always wanted it that way, but you can’t simply “free the serfs” and send them to the polls and get anything reasonable as an outcome. And then economically, the typical outlook is a three-way combination of the entitlement mentality of communism, the get-rich-quick schemes of the late-night infomercial, and marxist utilitarian ethics: if it works, by definition it is right; ending up in jail means it did not work, so that in and of itself makes it “wrong”.
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“Their” referred to the autocrats that have long been in charge of the country, whether monarchy, empire, communist, or Putin.
The Russian mindset more closely follows other eastern cultural norms (where a strong leader is preferred) way moreso than any western ideal based on greco-roman egalitarianism. It’s been that way since the formation of the original “Russian” (Rus Khaganate) people in the 9th Century with heavy military and militaristic forcing influences from the Norse to the north and the Turkic “Khagan” to the east and practically no influence from the democratic thinkers of the south.
A gross oversimplification: Kyivian Rus leaders told the Mongols to GFY and reaped centuries of resistance to foreign rule along with the birth of the Cossack Nation. Novgorod Rus told the Mongols that they were the coolest and would LOVE to pay tribute. Mongols took from the nobility, the nobility took from the people and that was that.
Then, a whole bunch of other shit happened and here we are.
“Lord Palmerston!”
“Pitt the Elder!”
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Shit that happens in Russia.
Nice! It’s amazing how many people don’t understand the basic history of one our current and former adversaries. And, if you don’t understand these basics, will never effectively work with or strategize against said adversary.
Probably correct. I stay close by my phone, but the State Department never calls.
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You had me at “gross oversimplification”.
To be fair, the Mongols always gave an out and they really, really didn’t like it when you executed their emissaries. Like wipe whole cultures from history upset. It was one of the most disrespectful things in their culture. They would host enemies in their own house and provide food and alcohol. Executing them meant the hammer of Tengri, God, Allah, and Buddha (they were a poly religious nation) coming down on you. To this day you can get fed in a stranger’s ger in the middle of nowhere.
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But seriously the next five to ten years in the Russian Federation are going to be very interesting. It’s rife with ethnic people from former independent republics that haven’t exactly been treated well as members of the Soviet Union and now Russia. There could be attempts at breakaway republics and reclaiming lost land. Many of the former Soviet satellite countries are already turning away from Russia on this.
That’s an interesting point. There could very well end up being a splintering of Russia, which would be pretty hilarious in an irony is ironic sort of way.
I wonder how much the tens of millions lost in WW2 in addition to the untold millions of intellectuals Stalin did away with diluted the gene pool over there.