"Somewhere in the balance of all of those identities and neuroses is the answer to what Putin intends to do with Ukraine.
If I were a cynic, I’d just tell him to go ahead and take Kyiv because it would become his Kabul, his Afghanistan — but the human costs would be intolerable. Short of that, I’d be very clear: If he wants to come down from the tree in which he’s lodged himself, he’s going to have to jump or build his own ladder. He has completely contrived this crisis, so there should be no give on our part. China is watching — and Taiwan is sweating — everything we do in reaction to Vlad right now.
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Russians associated Putin’s first two terms — 2000 to 2008 — “with unprecedented wealth accumulation in modern Russian history,” said Aron.
But beginning in 2011 and stretching all the way to 2019, Russia’s economy stagnated because of lower energy prices and, most of all, institutional impediments to growth: Putin’s preference to tap Russia’s natural resources, not its human resources. No Silicon Valleys for him — except cyberhackers. That would require real rule of law, secure property rights and the unleashing of talented people, who ask too many questions like, “Vlad, where did your money come from?”
“Putin’s response to this economic stagnation and the political peril it represented was to shift the basis of his regime’s legitimacy from economic progress, which made Putin so popular in his first two terms in office, to Putin as the defender of a motherland besieged by the West,” Aron told me. “Putin concluded that if he was going to be a president for life, he had to be a wartime president for life.”
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As for the U.S. and NATO vis-a-vis Ukraine right now...we need strength in numbers and commitment so that China and Taiwan don't become "Act II" of this drama. I'm also hoping that while Vlad is so distracted by Ukraine, he neglects to notice other forces around him that would like to see Russia headed in another direction...autocrats have a tendency to make lots of enemies...in their own countries.