What the hell is Putin doing?

[USAcommitteeX]

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russians voted on Sunday in parliamentary polls expected to tighten President Vladimir Putin (news - web sites)'s grip on power and open the way for economic reform.

Security was stepped up around the railway network and at some polling stations following a suicide bombing on a train near the rebel Chechnya (news - web sites) region on Friday.

At polling stations in Russia's far eastern Arctic regions, people fought through thick snow and powerful winds to kick off the vote. Voting stations then opened one after another as the sun rose across the sprawling country's 11 time zones.

In Yekaterinburg, the border between Europe and Asia, many said they saw little choice but to vote for Putin's party in the election to the State Duma (lower house) after a colorless campaign marked by media curbs offered almost no alternative.

"I am voting for those who support authority. Only they have the power to do something," Alexei Belousov, a businessman, said in cold but bright Yekaterinburg. "They do not suit everyone, but there really is no alternative."

The pro-Putin United Russia bloc has campaigned on a law-and-order, anti-corruption platform. Pollsters predict an increase in its lead over the still-strong communists, who draw on support from largely older people disillusioned by post-Soviet poverty.

Putin's supporters were expected to win a large majority but not the two-thirds necessary for constitutional reforms. The liberal opposition could fail completely to cross a five percent barrier to qualify for Duma seats.

This would place the 51-year-old KGB spy-turned-president, criticized by his opponents for an increasingly autocratic style, in an unstoppable position if he runs for a second term in the Kremlin next March.

Putin and his wife Lyudmila cast their votes at a newly painted polling station in southwest Moscow, saying they had arrived early because their dog had given birth to puppies.

Consolidating power among former military and secret service officers. Eliminating the free press and certainly hampering any progress towards a market economy - scaring off foreign investors by arresting the countries wealthiest industrialiast (who incidentially was a large supporter of several opposition political groups as well as independent press organizations.)

[USAcommitteeX]

Soviet way of life coming back?

Originally posted by USAcommitteeX
Soviet way of life coming back?

nope -

Putin's the leader of a group known as siloviki which means "power boys" who copme from the military and security upper echelons.

Putin had Mikhail Khodorkovsky (He's the richest guy in Russian and knee deep in the Russian oil industry) arrested for fraud and tax evasion and seized big chunks of his stock in his oil companies.

The arrest and stock seizure of course scared investors from the west - the Russian stock market dropped 15% after news of Khodorkovsky's arrest got out.

Putin also raided the Yabloko Party (a liberal political group supported by Khodorkovsky) headquarters a few weeks ago.

More Putin...... He declared Tuzla, a Ukrainian island to be "dispurted territory." Since the Unkraine became independent both sides had agreed that Tuzla belonged to the Ukraine. Anyway, Tuzla is near the location of a new Russian dam. The Russians went further and declared that Sevastopol was a Russian city. Its located on the Crimean peninsula - which belongs to the Unkraine. The Ukrainians deployed border gaurds and conducted military exercises with a bunch of bombers.

Oct. 9, Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov announced a new foreign policy - get this - Russia reserves the right to intervene militarily in former republics to settle disputes that cannot be settled by negotiation - in order to maintain the inegrity of oil and gas pipeleine built by the Soviets.

the crap goes on and on.....

I think there is one main theme going on with benefits.

Putin is not a reformer.

In general Russian rulers can be classified as a reformer or (and here you'll have to excuse my inelegant language) a 'russifier.' In a nut shell - reformers in general look to the west hoping to imitate their successes while russifiers say, "screw the west we're our own culture and quite successful following our own path."

By way of specific examples - Peter the Great was a reformer as was Gorbachev. Stalin was anything but a reformer and although Putin may not share Stalin's faith in communist ideals they do share a fondness for the Russian empire.

I think Putin is trying to reassert direct russian control over territory lost after the break-up of the Soviet Union for the greater glory of Mother Russia and for him personally - 'Czar Vladimir I' (there was a Vladimir of Novgorod and perhaps a couple others but of quite distant memory.)

The benefit is the tremendous oil wealth in central asia and the over land pipeline routes to western markets. The oil wealth will be necessary to help support such a huge empire. Although Russian is blessed with amazing natural resources it has never been able to efficiently tap the wealth they represent.

In addition - China has gotten very active in pursuing central asian oil and I'd be surprised if Putin was not quite suspicious of their activity in places like Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tadjikistan. Kazakhastan has its own issues - lots of oil and stuck bewteen China and Russia who they think are both eager to gobble up the new country (and they are probably right to worry).

but....most of this is pure speculation.

[Dionysos]

So forgive my ignorance of Russian nuance, but how is this different from the Soviet Union's old tactics? Is it simply that they aren't preaching the communist rhetoric of old?

[USAcommitteeX]

So Russia will always bully their former republics? What are they doing in Chechnya? Its like their war on terrorism is going nowhere quicker then ours in Afghanistan and Iraq, Grozny is looking like Beirut in the early 80's. Chechin terrorist have attempted to use wmd on Russian civilians in Russia with dirty bombs, conventional explosives and uranium, the Russian military is falling apart.

[Adam D]

As far as Putin's moves into Ukraine and Ivanov's policy legitimizing intervention in former republics is not a new idea. In fact, it's virtually the same policies the US has established either in the past or currently with most of Latin America. It's all the same policies we held, particularly those that started in the late 19th century and came out full force in the 1910s and 1920s.

As I stated over 2 years ago, the changes the US has brought under Bush are going to have serious consequences for the world, and one of those would be modelling of US action. The US justified unilateral military action to end conflicts (real or otherwise) and that's going to proliferate the legitimization of that idea.

Specifically about Putin, Russia is a very, very unique situation in the world. They're militarily too powerful for their own capacity, their economy is broken and corrupt, the government is almost bankrupt, their ability to collect taxes are practically nonexistant, they have serious drug, prostitution, legal corruption, and large mafia problems, and perhaps worst of all, Russia is the second largest center of AIDS outbreak in the world. They don't have the means to deal with all of their problems, they suffered under 8 years of Yeltsin who let the problems mount, and their capitalist structures were never legitimate from the start. It's hard to imagine how a nation that large with that many problems and a number of competing political parties can possibly come to a lasting solution for any of those problems. Generally in political systems, when things go that far wrong, people look for a radical change from the leaders who brought them those problems, or dragged their feet about fixing problems.

So, before Putin, there was Yeltsin who was seemingly unconcerned with the existing problems, constantly appeared drunk and incoherent, and generally looked soft on everything. The answer to the people when Yeltsin stepped down (that's really the most accurate way to explain that) was somebody who was tough and would be tough on problems. That person was Putin, even if he isn't the most democratic of individuals, his promises of change were what the people wanted to hear.

[Adam D]

Originally posted by Dionysos
So forgive my ignorance of Russian nuance, but how is this different from the Soviet Union's old tactics? Is it simply that they aren't preaching the communist rhetoric of old?

Not much at all, which is why it is so appealling to much of the population.

[USAcommitteeX]

if anyone ever visits Russia my advice try not to fly Russian airlines, a couple years ago I went from Alaska over to Yakutsk, went with friends todo mission work and its not very pretty, it went from bad to worse I should have went to cancun.

[Keith P]

yep
goin to Moscow for vacation
heard the chicks have nice tans

Originally posted by Dionysos
So forgive my ignorance of Russian nuance, but how is this different from the Soviet Union's old tactics? Is it simply that they aren't preaching the communist rhetoric of old?

The tactics may be similar - but tactics do not define the economic or political system.

Originally posted by USAcommitteeX
So Russia will always bully their former republics? What are they doing in Chechnya? Its like their war on terrorism is going nowhere quicker then ours in Afghanistan and Iraq, Grozny is looking like Beirut in the early 80's. Chechin terrorist have attempted to use wmd on Russian civilians in Russia with dirty bombs, conventional explosives and uranium, the Russian military is falling apart.

See the comments regarding control of teritory oiver which oil/gas pipelines travel. That's' what they're doing in Chechnya.

Originally posted by Adam D
As far as Putin's moves into Ukraine and Ivanov's policy legitimizing intervention in former republics is not a new idea. In fact, it's virtually the same policies the US has established either in the past or currently with most of Latin America. It's all the same policies we held, particularly those that started in the late 19th century and came out full force in the 1910s and 1920s.

As I stated over 2 years ago, the changes the US has brought under Bush are going to have serious consequences for the world, and one of those would be modelling of US action. The US justified unilateral military action to end conflicts (real or otherwise) and that's going to proliferate the legitimization of that idea.

Specifically about Putin, Russia is a very, very unique situation in the world. They're militarily too powerful for their own capacity, their economy is broken and corrupt, the government is almost bankrupt, their ability to collect taxes are practically nonexistant, they have serious drug, prostitution, legal corruption, and large mafia problems, and perhaps worst of all, Russia is the second largest center of AIDS outbreak in the world. They don't have the means to deal with all of their problems, they suffered under 8 years of Yeltsin who let the problems mount, and their capitalist structures were never legitimate from the start. It's hard to imagine how a nation that large with that many problems and a number of competing political parties can possibly come to a lasting solution for any of those problems. Generally in political systems, when things go that far wrong, people look for a radical change from the leaders who brought them those problems, or dragged their feet about fixing problems.

So, before Putin, there was Yeltsin who was seemingly unconcerned with the existing problems, constantly appeared drunk and incoherent, and generally looked soft on everything. The answer to the people when Yeltsin stepped down (that's really the most accurate way to explain that) was somebody who was tough and would be tough on problems. That person was Putin, even if he isn't the most democratic of individuals, his promises of change were what the people wanted to hear.

The US didn't invent policies like the ones you refer to. They are common among aggressive and expanding nations. A difference though, we are not looking to add any new territory to our country - Putin is.

[johnny861]

They are definitely tactics typical of Russia.

When Yeltsin was president, I made a comment that it wouldn't be too long before the country sinks back into communism... what I had meant to suggest was not necessarily sinking back into the old regime, but rather the similar actions that one could personify as the old school methods of Russian leadership...

Originally posted by johnny861
They are definitely tactics typical of Russia.

When Yeltsin was president, I made a comment that it wouldn't be too long before the country sinks back into communism... what I had meant to suggest was not necessarily sinking back into the old regime, but rather the similar actions that one could personify as the old school methods of Russian leadership...

which are?