Wily Putin pushes Russia to the brink
VLADIMIR Putin shares more than a first name with Vladimir Lenin, who assumed absolute power on December 30 1922 of what was to become the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
Under Mikhail Gorbachev, the USSR disintegrated into 15 separate countries on December 26 1991. To match the billions that Ronald Reagan was prepared to spend on projects such as the strategic defence initiative, Gorbachev was forced to commit far more than the USSR could afford — depriving his people of the essentials, never mind the luxuries, of everyday life. Gorbachev knew the game was up, as did Nikita Khrushchev in 1962 when John F Kennedy faced him down over the Cuban missile crisis.
The age of nuclear arms gave birth to the doctrine of mutually assured destruction, with its menacing acronym MAD. This is related to the equilibrium theories of John Nash, the Nobel mathematics laureate who is the subject of the hit film A Beautiful Mind. If there are at least two competitors and each has a fixed position, diverting from which will provide no advantage, then you have equilibrium.
One has a feeling of society beaten into utter submission
Nobody moves or everyone moves. And in a nuclear world, if everyone moves, everyone dies.
Putin is clearly one of those politicians childishly and deeply in love with himself. He preens halfnaked for the cameras, flexing his muscles like some amateur body builder and bragging about his judo skills. He is also a gambler with no regard for rules or the perceptions of him by others. He will get away with whatever he can.
John McCain, the former Republican presidential contender, believes that Putin is no better than Adolf Hitler and that Crimea is his first move in extending Russian influence. However, the increasing energy independence of the US as it exploits its vast reserves of natural gas means that by 2020 it will be the world’s largest producer of hydrocarbons, thus diluting the influence of actors such as Saudi Arabia and Putin’s Russia.
In his biography of Reagan, titled Dutch after the late president’s nickname, Edmund Morris — winner of the Pulitzer prize for The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt— describes Moscow as it was in 1988.
He had accompanied Reagan for his summit with Gorbachev, whose real reason for inviting the US president, Morris suspected, was to show him the “human” face of communism.
“Some face!” writes Morris. “Walking across the bridge . . . I peer through the windows of ill-lit apartment buildings . . . and am reminded of Tolstoy’s plaint about the misery of Russian features: ‘Few . . . are not disfigured by alcohol, nicotine or syphilis.’
“Bodies,” adds Morris, “even the bodies of young girls — are goitered, bent, bunioned: I’ve not seen so many cripples outside of Africa. This is the Moscow Dutch should be seeing, not the gilt and bees waxed-splendours of the Kremlin: this Third World city of dirt streets and weevilled garbage heaps.
“[The president] should be breathing this universal reek of kerosene and boiled artichokes, and noting the extraordinary languor with which people just sit and stare and drink and sew, or doze alone under the dusty trees. Gnats moan; dogs howl. One has a feeling of society beaten into utter submission.”
Today, freed from the economic disasters always visited upon communist societies, Russia enjoys relative prosperity. However, as the rouble tumbles, investment slows and growth stagnates, there was capital flight of $70-billion (about R750-billion) in the first quarter compared with $63-billion in 2013.
Better tread carefully, Mr Putin. Your muscles won’t hold up your economy. However, the personal tax rate is a flat 13%, so, given that it pays to buy in a slump, Russia might be an attractive emigration choice.
Do they take pensioners?