Putin’s End Game: Restoring Russian Glory

MOSCOW, RUSSIA – MAY 4, 2020: A sculpture depicting St Basil’s Cathedral and Kremlin towers is seen in Manezhnaya Square in central Moscow. Seen behind is a Russian nationwide flag flying on prime of the Russian State Duma constructing. Vladimir Gerdo/TASS (Photo by Vladimir GerdoTASS by way of Getty Images)

It was clear from the second he consolidated energy and have become president of Russia on the daybreak of the twenty first century, and on so many events since, what Vladimir Putin in the end has in thoughts, what he goals of attaining. But now, as he reaches 70 years of age, a weak, divided and confused western alliance has supplied him with the chance he looked for lo these a few years. He is in a stronger place than ever to satisfy his far-flung ambition and cement an expansionist legacy, which nearly actually is not going to cease at his conquest of the previous Soviet republic of Ukraine.

The document is evident, and more and more so is Putin’s clear aim of restoring the Soviet empire that dissolved in 1991 following seven many years of totalitarian tyranny. After Boris Yeltsin rose to grow to be the primary president of the successor Russian Federation and spent the remaining years of the twentieth century choosing up the items of the fallen superpower, he hand-picked Putin as his successor, undoubtedly due to Putin’s KGB bona fides.

Animated by his perception that the world-altering dissolution of the Soviet Union represented the “greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the [20th] century,” Putin went to work restoring Russian rule within the 14 susceptible post-Soviet breakaway republics by any means crucial. And little question he would additionally dearly like to reinstall pro-Russian governments in jap European nations previously enslaved by the Soviets – together with Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic.

One of the brand new Russian president’s preliminary acts was to annex the constituent republic of Chechnya in 2000, and brutally tamp down an ongoing riot there. He adopted in 2008 with assaults that introduced the previous Soviet republic of Georgia to its knees in lower than a fortnight. In 2014, following the displacement of the pro-Soviet president of Ukraine, Putin lined up his heavy artillery once more and added Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula to his checklist of conquests. And now he has pulled the identical web page from the playbook for the rest of Ukraine. Add to that the puppet authorities put in in Belarus, which served as a staging space for Putin’s assaults on the capital metropolis of Kyiv, and Putin is slowly however absolutely rebuilding the previous Soviet empire – one brick at a time.

Vladimir Putin (Photo by Alexei NikolskyTASS by way of Getty Images)

But someway, regardless of his background within the spy sport, President George W. Bush, coming into workplace similtaneously Putin, famously claimed, “I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straightforward and trustworthy. We had a very good dialogue. I was able to get a sense of his soul; a man deeply committed to his country and the best interests of his country.” Those glowing phrases hardly prevented Putin from transferring on Georgia within the waning days of the Bush administration.

Even a cursory examination of Putin’s background ought to by no means have left any doubt about what animates the Russian strongman. He had labored as a KGB international intelligence officer for 16 years earlier than becoming a member of Yeltsin’s group, then rising to prime minister in August 1999, and president months later. And Putin is now daring Joe Biden, simply as he did Bush in his invasion of Georgia and Barack Obama throughout his annexation of Crimea, to discard the precept that Ukraine has the precise to exist as an impartial republic. But then once more, Biden had already inexplicably and gratuitously introduced that he’s each keen to barter, with nearly 200,000 Russian troops lining the Ukrainian border, and has taken navy choices off the desk. Exactly what sort of sign does that ship to a frontrunner skilled in intelligence, who’s professional at studying the relative power and vulnerability of his adversaries?

His invasion of a sovereign neighbor has eliminated all doubt that restoration of nationwide glory was, is, and can all the time be the top sport for the Russian president. Thus, relaxation assured Ukraine is hardly the final word prize. It is merely a big piece of the puzzle referred to as the Soviet empire Vladimir Putin totally intends to assemble as soon as extra.

~ Read extra from Tim Donner.