[Skybird]

I have reduced my pragmatic support for Putin. Initially I saw him as the guy wanting to bring Russia closer to Europe, in this he was compared by not few people to Alexander the Great, and like Alexander, he failed, in Putins case due to too many betrayals by the West and according disappointment by Putin. His reactions by isolating Russia from Europe, I saw as a consequence from these bad experiences. But in his late years of the recent past, he seems to have turned into a truly oligarchiy old man who guards his powers with eager eyes and who now uses openly crminal and tyrannical tools of intimidation and suppression that go beyond what I pragmatically would have tolerated in order to guarantee stability of Russia, namely in its military. In other words I now list him as an angry and selfish old man who promises to be another of those many old men who just miss the appropriate time to step back and understand that by age their time is over.

But we will need to live with Putin's shadow for years to come, I think that is clear.

One wonders what would have become if NATO and the EU would have played fairly and honestly with Russia from the 90s on. But Washington did not want that. And so we and the Russians got the state of things we have now, and now head for an age of new confrontation, as I see it. The state becomes more corrupt and supressive again. Right the things that Putin >initially< fought back. But now he has become himself part of the gang he initially pushed back.

Unneeded. Completely unneeded.

Initially there was a big chance for a Russian-European merging, at least a closer bridging of differences than ever before. This opportunity is wasted by having wanted too much in the West. A big chance wasted. I see this as a historical tragedy.

Of course the hawks on both sides now say they always knew it. But them and their criminal friends in big business made sure that the failure would become reality. What a rotten breed.