This will be my last boring Russia Putin entry until the war takes a dramatic turn.
I can't help but return to how Putin's stupidity has guaranteed his own failure in achieving his goal of returning Russia to the glory of the old Soviet empire. First, it was never glorious. It was isolated, gloomy, and not a pleasant place in which to live.
I'll start by revisiting the origins of the Soviet empire and how it was built. With the exception of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, which the USSR invaded at the outset of World War II, the USSR received its so called empire from Europe's division by the Allies after the war. Granted, the USSR was an integral part of the Allied victory in Europe (and Japan to a lesser degree, depending on who you believe), but there was no grand conquering or popular outcry. It's a lot easier to repress than to conquer, and repress they did.
The USSR was classic communism in that the state owned everything and decided who got what; houses, vacation dachas, factories, companies, your refrigerator, etc. What was made, how many, and its selling price of everything was determined by Central Planning. The open market meant nothing to supply and demand. There weren't multiple companies competing for orders, because it was all the State. So the quality of everything sucked. There was no incentive for a plant manager to build an excellent product, because the penalty for sucking didn't exist. Likewise, there was no incentive for anyone to "work their ass off to build a business" because it wasn't theirs in the first place. Everything was built based upon quotas, which are never a good thing. There's an example from my undergrad days that's stuck with me all these years, which illustrates why quotas are bad. If you're in charge of making men's suits, you'll be allocated a certain amount of fabric, given a number of suits you're required to make, and the date you'll be required to complete production. Of course, you'll do what guarantees success, not the right thing. You'll make everyone one of those suits a small because larger ones take more time and material to make. And those suits will be of horrible quality, because that's not part of your directive and you have no competition to beat you. As a result, your fellow countrymen suffer because they can't buy a usable suit, but the whole country suffers because no one on the free market wants your crap. Most importantly, as a citizen of USSR, there was always a lack of basic necessities. This is why communism always fails, always.
Communism did have the benefit of keeping corruption to a minimum. Revenue, profits, and taxes were closely monitored, because the government was everyone's accountant. Sure, there were opportunities to fudge the books, but to what end? It's not as though there were many options to spend your ill gotten gains if you were corrupt. Everything was state owned, so you couldn't buy vacation home in USSR and you couldn't leave the country to buy one in the South of France. And everyone was a government informant; turning someone in may mean more potatoes for the family. Also, let's not forget the penalty for defrauding the government, which was a visit from KGB, some fun and games in the basement of Lubyanka, followed by an all expenses paid trip to Siberia. Quite the deterrent.
What all of this meant for the government was there was some, not a lot, but some money in the central coffers and it largely went where Central Planning said, even if that wasn't always the right place. Jet fighters received proper maintenance, tanks were built, soldiers were trained, and so on. Not so much went toward basic necessities for the populace, but hey, life's tough in the USSR.
Today, Russia relies on tax dollars to fund defense and other government activities. All well and good until you realize that the entire oligarchy and their companies are Olympic level tax evaders, so there's not much in the coffers.
And it doesn't stop there. Another reason the Russian army is sucking ass right now is because a big chunk of the money that was available was syphoned off on the way back down. Funds allocated for equipment upgrades, training, and maintenance have been pocketed by generals and others. It's not as though they needed to be prepared for a war or anything. Oops.
On the commercial side, profits also get funneled back to Vlad, with several stops along the way for others to dip in. As I've said, innovation can't occur when industry's profits are diverted into someone's pockets instead of having those fund available for things like R&D, process improvements, and system optimization. What most don't realize is that Russia will never be a world leader in anything or lead innovation in any area. The Russian people have been repressed for centuries and the general populace doesn't see the value of hard work and excellence, because it's been a waste of time (and has become again). They just don't give a shit and their work shows it. Apparently, half of the palace in St. Petersburg was falling down before the czar stayed there the first time. If this offends, go read up on Russian history and prove me wrong.
The numbers don't lie. I'll use GDP per capita, because it accounts for difference in population size. In 2020, Russia's GDP per capita was $10k versus the $63.5k for the US. In other words, our GDP per capita was over six times that of Russia. Over the past decade, Russia's has decreased by 50%, whereas the US has increased 25% in the same period.*
Wrapping things up in a tidy package, what this all means is that Vlad's own greed will prevent him from achieving his goals. The kleptocracy he cultivated has left him with a fighting force that couldn't beat the Salvation Army. I've read that he wants to isolate Russia further, but I don't buy it. His ego won't allow that. He wants to be on the world stage and to be seen as the conquering leader of a powerful empire, a statesman commanding respect and fear from other world leaders. But even he knows this will never happen, because he's isolated himself from even his closest advisors. The dude's become paranoid. He's terrified of being overthrown, lest he be imprisoned, killed, or given an extended vacation in Lubyanka to participate in all the fun activities there. Until then, he'll continue to be a despot and common thief with a few personality disorders.
* Russia's economy spiked dramatically after the fall of the Soviet Union. This was driven by the free market suddenly producing all of the basic necessities that Central Planning had gotten wrong. Think toothbrushes, not state of the art electronics. Once those goods were in the pipeline and the populace got what they needed, the economy plummeted again.
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