The headlines, “Putin faces fury in Russia over military mobilization and prisoner swap,” in WaPo, or “Long lines of traffic seen at some of Russia’s land borders,” in CNN, tell an important story.
And, perhaps, signals an imminent, metaphorical Earth-shaking event.
Ever since Russia began what I, and many others, call Putin’s War, or the invasion and attempted annexation of Ukraine, Russia has been involuntarily exposing its military, government, and society’s weaknesses.
Militarily, rather than running at least eastern Ukraine over in a couple of weeks, as expected, it took some of the far east Ukraine, deliberately ravaged and depopulated it, if reports are to be believed, but Ukraine halted the advances quite quickly, and negotiated for advanced weapons to be delivered in quantity by the West. Ukrainians have, briefly, fought bravely, fought effectively, and have fought to win. Reports on Russian tactics, command structures, military morale, weapons of all sorts, indeed nearly everything, excepting perhaps their artillery, is that it’s inferior to Ukrainian and Western counterparts. The worm of corruption has devastated the Russian military.
In the government, we have learned that it’s basically a strongman government, and when the strongman arrogantly believes they can step outside of their personal expertise and do more than high level direction, it’s a disaster. Putin’s implicitly condemning fellow strongmen China’s Xi, Turkey’s Erdogan, Hungary’s Orbán, Saudi Arabia’s Muhammed bin Salman, Brazil’s Bolsonaro, and several others through his failures, and encouraged liberal democracies menaced by these countries to defend themselves.
Societally, the inability of the Russian society to remove an obviously dangerous man reveals a lack of backbone that is not so much a failing as an inherited condition. From centuries of living under the God-sanctioned Tsars to the self-righteous Soviets, Russians aren’t really equipped to remove a leader quickly.
Morning Glory.
It takes a fucking disaster. Think of the starving Russian masses who finally went against God, forced out the Tsar, and along with that doomed family the institutionalized corruption of a Russian monarchy. Or the Soviets, when the common Soviet citizen, who did not see a future for themselves that gave them the right to decide how to approach that future, who faced empty shelves and, again, corruption, and found that drinking themselves into a stupor didn’t resolve the problem, finally took it upon themselves to replace Gorbachev with Yeltsin, and to pull back from the Soviet model.
A night or two ago, Putin gave a speech that sounded like a threat to me. A threat to use nuclear weapons if he’s denied his victory. As much as Western countries have to worry about that, if Russians heard that speech then they have to worry, too.
Because many of them know American, British, and French nuclear weapons are pointed at strategic targets throughout Russia.
So when you read
Social media video from Russia’s land borders with several countries shows long lines of traffic trying to leave the country on the day after President Vladimir Putin announced a “partial mobilization.”
There were queues at border crossings into Kazakhstan, Georgia and Mongolia. One video showed dozens of vehicles lining up at the Zemo Larsi/Verkhny Lars checkpoint on the Georgia-Russia border overnight Wednesday. That line appears to have grown longer Thursday. One video showed a long queue stretching into the mountains behind the crossing, with a man commenting that it was five to six kilometers long. [CNN]
These Russians aren’t just trying to avoid military service. They’re trying to get out of the line of fire.
Fear leads to anger, to rage. It can lead to violence.
As women hugged their husbands and young men boarded buses to leave for 15 days of training before potentially being deployed to Russia’s stumbling war effort in Ukraine, there were signs of mounting public anger. [WaPo]
Here we see Russians are about to be sacrificed, as if sheer numbers will do them any good in Ukraine. Just toss them in the hopper. There must families that are positively frantic. Just about all of those affected have become violently anti-Putin.
From the beginning, I’ve speculated that Putin’s War wasn’t ending until Putin is ended. The question is whether the Russian public is desperate enough to do it, and if his personal defenses are strong enough to withstand an attack. On those two matters, I think it’ll take a breakdown in the military or his personal guard to get to him.
As is usual with such situations. There are exceptions, such as Archduke Ferdinand’s incendiary assassination. But quite often the dictator is killed by someone he thought he could trust.
And what is the impact on American politics, if & when Putin goes down?
Tucker Carlson
Anyone positively associated with Putin will become damaged goods. This includes Senator Rand (R-KY), currently running for reelection, who has sought to delay several legislative bills concerning relief and arms to Ukraine. Senator Johnson (R) thought Russian election interference was no big deal, and is also running for reelection. Tucker Carlson of Fox News has reportedly said positive things about Russia, but I don’t watch Fox News and have to rely on second hand news. Senator Cruz (R-TX) once had the poor taste to suggest the American military could not keep up with the Russian military. He’s not up for reelection this cycle. That’s fortunate for him, not so much his fellow Texans.
Those Senatorial and House candidates, incumbent or not, who’ve allied themselves, even informally, with the strongman model of government, or Putin’s government in particular, may face additional headwinds over the next few weeks. Especially if Putin’s removed or killed.
In tight races like we often see, those headwinds could be decisive. If Putin goes down, he’ll not only drag down his cronies in Russia, but his American allies as well. Even Trump may be affected, although honestly I’m not sure what happens in Trump’s case.
And all of these collapses and reversals may result in the strongman model of government being discredited, and returning to the age old question of how to perform governance that the people will accept.
A problem of critical importance to both Republicans and Democrats.
