Russian trolls

[Smitty-48]

Ended the influence of Oligarchs over the Kremlin? He is an Oligarch, the richest of them all in fact.

Ended the political chaos of the Yeltsin era? I would say he simply enabled one form of chaos over another.

[Okeefenokee]

He single handedly decided an American election.

Give the man some props.

[Smitty-48]

Moreover, the assertion that the Russian base in Crimea was actually inperiled and so Putin came to the rescue, that's balderdash, and Russia's position has not been strengthened by Crimea it has been made more precarious, furthermore, by letting the genie out of the bottle in the Ukraine, he let the Soviet war machine dig him into one quagmire in the Donbass, to which they have no exit strategy, and then to distract from that, he let them dig him into another quagmire in Syria at the same time.

[Smitty-48]

Also, I would submit, it was neither Putin nor the Soviet war machine who actually pacified Chechnya, the Soviet war machine actually got its asses handed to it in there, rather it was one group of Chechens who pacified another, and while it is not officially separate from Russia, it is none the less ruled by that group of Chechens, not by Putin, nor the Soviet war machine.

As I say, this is all just one form of chaos over another, permanent war chaos is chaos too, Chechnya is pacified, Ukraine and Syria are new quagmires to replace it, out of one frying pan into the next frying pan and the next frying pan after that.

But again, what are the real motivations behind all this expeditionary chaos? I would assert; Putin is clinging to his cushy gig by distraction, and the Soviet war machine is getting to go a war machining for its own sake, mission accomplished, but actually two separate missions for two separate power centers which don't actually add up to any sort of cohesive strategy.

Is NATO actually menacing Russia? No. Is Assad actually essential to Russia? No. Was it worth it to blow up the relationship with Ukraine? No. Was it worth it to get stuck into the Middle East just to get stuck into the Middle East? No.

It's all nonsense, other than the narrow entrenched interests of the cushy gig and the war machine, for them and them alone.

[Smitty-48]

Now, with wholly separate missions by wholly separate power centers in mind, as per the nerve agent attack in the UK; how would that benefit Putin? Putin needs this headache added to all his other headaches, why again? Doesn't make sense, cui bono? Putin? I don't think so.

Hence why I suspect, that if it was Novichok from Mr. Ivan, it wasn't necessarily from the Kremlin, Mr. Ivan is not Putin, Putin is not Mr. Ivan, Mr. Ivan is a power unto himself, Putin is just his little sidekick.

Does Putin want you to think that he is in charge? Of course, that's all part of the cushy gig. But I would suspect that Mr Ivan wants you to think that Putin is in charge as well, so much better for Mr. Ivan, to operate with a free hand from the shadows. Even better if you think that Putin is Mr. Ivan himself, that way, Mr. Ivan doesn't even exist from your point of view, which would be sublime maskirovka.

Once you go down the Soviet rabbit hole with Mr. Ivan, it's all maskirovka, the name of the game was to operate with total impunity, and no accountability whatsoever, that was the holy grail of the Soviet war machine, and I don't see why it wouldn't be now.

Although a Soviet, meaning "Council", is ostensibly a central authority, nobody in the Soviet Union ever really knew who was running things when where why and how, and that was the whole point, because they ruled by paranoia.

The only ones who were creepier than the Soviets, were the East Germans, because they were a hybrid fusion of the Nazis and the Bolsheviks all in one, but I can say with some certainty that they're not around anymore, there's no wilderness in Germany for them to operate from, but in Russia, such a wilderness exists, and in it, Mr. Ivan very plausibly persists.

[Hastur]

Putin has been dead for years. I don't know who controls the double that replaced him but I believe Russian military intelligence was involved in the takeover.

[Smitty-48]

Is looking a little mummified these days, he's got the same skin as Lenin in his tomb right now.

[Hastur]

I liked the podcast episode former DCF member Curonian made about the rumors. Well made.

http://theeasternborder.lv/podcast/epis ... n-is-dead/

[Smitty-48]

Well, as I say, they rule by paranoia, not just the Bolsheviks, the Czars before them, this is why I say the Moscovy Russians are as Western as apple pie and baseball, they're Slavic, but they're Holy Roman Slavs, under the Double Headed Eagle, the two heads originally representing Rome and Constantinople, the Russian intrigues are the closest thing we have to the Roman world now.

The Czarist empire may have extended into the East, but St. Petersburg is in the West.

[DrYouth]

Well, as I say, they rule by paranoia, not just the Bolsheviks, the Czars before them, this is why I say the Moscovy Russians are as Western as apple pie and baseball, they're Slavic, but they're Holy Roman Slavs, under the Double Headed Eagle, the two heads originally representing Rome and Constantinople, the Russian intrigues are the closest thing we have to the Roman world now.

The Czarist empire may have extended into the East, but St. Petersburg is in the West.

The question is whether Russians will follow the modern western model of a sovereign accountable to the rule of law, return to the model of sovereign as deity...
The jury is still out... it could roll either way.
Investors are betting on property rights and stable markets... and for that rule of law is needed... to some degree anyways.
If the oligarch in chief gets too greedy... the goose will stop laying... but the other oligarchs will likely stop him from doing so...

If business continues to grow the middle class will become more empowered and the potential for increased accountability is there... that is the western secret sauce... but there are many hurdles to cross and the possibility of military coup and oligarch power grabs loom in the interim.