Thread by @ABarbashin

1/13 Thread on Russian reaction to #war with Ukraine
For years Russian legal and political system has been repressing the most active civic society leaders, those capable of gathering support for street activity. State adapted multitude of laws that penalize protests of any kind

Despite all that (details below) we are seeing massive protests all across the country for the second day in the row. That is both inspiring and astonishing. I would like this to be known and reported. That Russians showed their disagreement with what Putin does to Ukraine. 2/13

Here is a good explainer to what was done in 2021 alone in terms of adapting political system to a more war-like authoritarian rail
ridl.io/en/one-year-in…
With first and by most elimination of the main opposition force - Navalny and his organization 3/13

Russian independent media been under fire from Putin since 2001, he always knew that independent media is his enemy. Again look at what was done in 2021 alone to make it even harder for Russian media to survive without gigantic fines and imprisonment 4/13
ridl.io/en/media-in-20…

Civil society organizations have been bothering Kremlin since at least 2004 and last decade it has been a non-stop slowly execute assault. 2021 so far proved to be the worst year for NGOs in Russia 4/13
ridl.io/en/the-worst-y…

Those who were too stubborn the state penalized; others, who agreed to fully play by the rules, were basically bought with state funding 6/13 ridl.io/en/not-only-th…

None of that means that Kremlin did not have a growing problem with legitimacy with how Russians view it. Repressions alone do not grant mass support, there is not enough $ to satisfy all. So 2022 was a struggle from afar. 7/13
ridl.io/en/authoritari…

But the bigger problem here is that Russians did not want war - as indicated by all latest polls, Moreover, they feared it with over 65% naming it as one of key fear 8/13
ridl.io/en/we-are-bein…

But the Kremlin mindset was departing from Russian reality for years. Their goals and aspirations had nothing to do with what society needed. It was all about history, might and glory 9/13
ridl.io/en/troubleshoo…

When this crisis began, I was among many who argued for more or less rational explanations. Leaving a full on war option as a possible but not likely version of event. Assessing deal on Ukraine and compromise with NATO will prevent a horrible outcome 10/13
ridl.io/en/will-russia…

I even dared to be optimistic for a while believe that diplomacy would solve this arguing "they can't be suicidal, right?" 11/13
ridl.io/en/the-drumrol…

I have been monitoring closely what Russian IR and foreign policy specialist were writing this past few months with one camp arguing for full on "tearing apart" the existing order. Turns out they were right - they represented what Putin believes. 12/13
ridl.io/en/too-proud-t…

On February 21st, right after Putin's speech I wrote this finally accepting the fact that war is the only way forward in the mindset of Russia's leader.
There is no rational component to this mindset. That scares me the most now. 13/13
ridl.io/en/putin-in-th…