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Let me comment on an article written by Owen Matthews in the UK edition of The Spectator – Putin may seem confident – but Russia's future is bleak. The madness reflected in this piece helps explain why the British people are so lost as they struggle to grasp the fact that Putin is kicking their arrogant ass.
Mr. Matthews starts with this nonsense:
And yet, as he prepares for his fifth term, the truth is that Putin is a hollow king. He invaded Ukraine to assert Russia's greatness in its own backyard as well as on the international stage. Instead, the war showed that Putin's much-vaunted army is unable to defeat the much smaller Ukrainian army. Rather than halt NATO expansion, he has expanded it largely to formerly neutral Sweden and Finland. The invasion has decimated key sectors of the Russian economy (particularly gas exports and automotive), abruptly halting foreign investment and turning Russia into an economic vassal of China.
The war has forced one million of the country's best educated and brightest people into exile and broken the Kremlin's implicit contract with Russia's elite that they would be able to enrich themselves and others in exchange for political subservience. You will be able to enjoy your earnings uninterrupted. Most unfortunately, the war has allowed Putin and the elderly monarchists around him to fulfill a dream that many old people want, but very few are able to achieve – to build a future that which represents an idealized version of their country's past.
Take your pick of Matthew's most absurd claim. My favorite is, “The invasion has decimated key sectors of the Russian economy (especially gas exports and automotive), abruptly halted foreign investment and turned Russia into China's economic vassal.” Is Matthew really so misinformed or is he just a corrupt propagandist who will type whatever he is told by the MI-6 propaganda team.
Special military operations have not only activated and dramatically expanded Russia's military industrial sector, but also kept the rest of the economy in good stead. The war has not “erased” Russia's gas exports, it has redirected and expanded them. And then there's the fact that many Europeans continue to buy Russian gas, paying premiums only through third-party brokers and ravaging their economies with inflation. Yes, Western foreign investment has stalled and Russia has grown by more than 4% in the last quarter without missing a step. Poor, poor Russia.
Unlike the United States and the United Kingdom, Russia has not sent its industrial capabilities to other countries such as China. And Russia's ample supplies of oil, gas, aluminium, coal, uranium, bauxite, nickel and rare earth minerals mean it does not have to depend on any foreign country or entity to continue producing its civilian and military industries. .
The most important consequence of Russia's invasion of Ukraine is that it has exposed NATO as a hollow shell. NATO's supposedly superior tanks and artillery have been destroyed on Ukrainian plains and exposed as expensive prima donnas that require expensive maintenance and are unreliable in combat conditions. I guess Mr. Matthews might not have seen the video of the British Challenger tank getting stuck in the mud. This video symbolizes the pathetic condition of the British Army.
The depth of Matthew's ignorance and hypocrisy is revealed within the following two paragraphs:
However a very powerful a part of Putin's speech was not what he stated in regards to the struggle in Ukraine, however how little time he dedicated to it – simply quarter-hour out of two hours. The remaining targeted on his home program, which included the whole lot from fixing the deepening demographic disaster to changing crumbling infrastructure, bettering well being and schooling, and funding science and analysis. In brief, the nuts and bolts of on a regular basis administration. And his major message was not aimed toward Russia's wealth creators or elites, however solely at bujetniki – Hundreds of thousands of state staff, navy and safety personnel, pensioners and bureaucrats who depend upon the Kremlin for his or her revenue and who type the spine of Putin's assist.
The essential query for his political survival is how lengthy he’ll be capable of pay to maintain these folks in workplace. Among the bullish financial forecasts Putin made in his speech are price nearer examination. Sure, Russian GDP grew extra in nominal phrases final yr than every other G7 nation. The common Russian family ended 2023 with about 18 p.c extra money within the financial institution than a yr earlier. Russia's largest state-controlled financial institution, Sberbank, reported a 5.5-fold enhance in internet revenue year-on-year, reaching a file excessive of 1.5 trillion rubles ($16.3 billion). The protection trade employs 3.5 million folks and lots of factories have doubled their workforce because the starting of the struggle. However this obvious financial increase is definitely due to an enormous enhance in state spending on struggle – a type of navy Keynesianism that’s swallowing up 40 p.c of the state finances and about 10 p.c of Russia's GDP.
It's a hoot. In keeping with Matthews, Russia is experiencing financial prosperity solely due to protection spending and is starting to run a “deficit”. Russia is a number one nation, which is in a $35 trillion gap (and climbing), in comparison with america, which has a protection finances of a trillion {dollars} (properly, $900 billion to be actual), now. Doesn’t produce tanks, has failed to supply useful hypersonic missiles, is unable to match Russia's manufacturing of artillery shells and has turn out to be largely a service economic system. The latter implies that America is now not an industrial superpower.
I think about Owen Matthews going by way of Kubler-Ross's 5 levels of grief as he struggles to recover from the Ukraine debacle. He’s within the “denial” stage. Subsequent – anger then bargaining. He has some ways to get “acceptance”.