Basically, Russia is a third world country really bummed out about not being the Soviet Union. It has some capacity to be a little westernized in the methods of capitalism. That capitalism started with earlier administrations that attempted to bring countries like China and Russia to the world stage so they could have better quality of life for their people. That was always the hopes of the USA and NATO. None of the free world is interested in war, they are mostlyinterested in a peaceful and prosperous life as defined by freedom and democracy.
Trying to get Russia and China to address human rights abuses is futile, ie: Navalny. Everytime Vladimir Putin appears to be threatened by westernized ideas such as free and fair elections the opponents are ostracized and made to serve Putin's paradyme of jail and/or death of his opponents.
There is no way Russia is going to break out of this cycle of inhumane treatment of it's citizens as the Russian people want free and fair elections. It isn't going to happen, although with all those young Russian men in graves now or left behind on the battlefields in Ukriane, there might be something that gets shaken up. This time the Russian people, having been deceived and their young men dead, there might be something they can do about Putin.
The oligarchs, like the one that Moscow Mitch enjoys so much, are not independent of Russia. They all answer to Putin. They are "in place" to give The West the idea that the elite of Russia is wildly successful and wealthy. Basically, the oligarchs are state assets serving at the pleasure of Putin. So much for Wall Street successes.
Ukraine is a magnificent country with a young leader that was elected to protect democracy and clean up corruption. As President Zelensky was successfully ending corruption, which also means Russian influence, Putin decides that is not in the best interset of the motherland and invades without any clear understanding by the peopel of Russia. He expected the invasion into Ukraine a cakewalk, however, the Chernobyl thing puzzles me. If he believed this would an easy defeat of the Ukrainian government and miltiary, what is with Chernobyl on the first day of the invasion. This was not a month into the invasion, but, the first day.
I think the world needs to take a realistic look at Russia and it's satellite Belarus and decide they are not the countries we thought they were, but, more countries hanging on to the past with little interest in human rights.
So, what does the future hold. I think there will be a lot of surprises from this invasion that the world did not expect as if it isn't bad enough already. I still believe after President Biden successfully took the presidency and Trump was no longer a Putin puppet, that caused Putin to move more quickly into Ukraine. I still believe Russia and China believe they have the international warring upper hand because of all the cooperation from Trump. Basically, it is now or never and they would love to end The West's democracies.
