This reply pointed me towards another great thread from @kamilkazani I had missed, and it pointed me towards the right direction when I asked about alternatives to military containment of Russia.
https://twitter.com/bitsunited/status/1504156393565212675
The @kamilkazani thread focuses on ending the war in Ukraine by offering the Russian soldiers an attractive way out, but it does not solve the problem with Russia in the decades to come. However, the "give them salt" is an idea with great potential.
https://twitter.com/kamilkazani/status/1503768312236421120
I laid out the situation how I understand it in this thread, and concluded that the only realistic future seems to be a military containment of Russia for decades, which will be expensive and disastrous for the World and for Russia.
https://twitter.com/pavel23/status/1504138872690810882
The ideal outcome would be a democratic Russia, but democratizing Russia has failed once badly and given democracy a bad reputation with most Russians.
https://twitter.com/pavel23/status/1504138927111823363
Going with the "salt" idea, what might be the salt that could move and change Russia as a whole? Russia once wanted to join the EU and NATO, but is just too big and would have overwhelmed the capacity of the EU to integrate and transform it; it would have been a mess.
We can see that clearly in how the EU still struggles with the much smaller countries from the eastern block, fighting corruption and old habits there and authoritarian tendencies in Hungary and Poland, but overall it became a success.
https://twitter.com/pavel23/status/1504138929188003840
The EU is also the most successful project in removing borders, bringing peoples together and even overcoming decades of totalitarian rule and making democracy work. To me this is the model how we could make the world whole.
So let's entertain the thought Russia and all former Soviet republic would be members of the EU. Wouldn't that be great? No borders any more, the Russians in all those countries could move freely around, and the best of all: Russia would be safe, surrounded by friends.
No more need for a an ever growing buffer of states it feels it must control, and such an "EU" would probably grow even further, and might start to integrate countries like Turkey and many other countries, so "EU" would not be an appropriate name any more.
The countries would keep most of their sovereignty, but also have enough common standards and institutions to create an amount of prosperity which is almost unimaginable, and most importantly, lasting peace. So where is the catch?
First of all, the integration of all the members the EU already took on almost overwhelmed the capacity of the EU to integrate them, and also did show many problems with its structure, and there is a lot to be desired regarding the institutions of the EU, and it even lost..
...the UK as member, also thanks to the meddling of Russia and the United States. The UK is a country that is most experienced in international affairs and businesses, and the loss of the UK and its international connections and expertise is painful, especially in these times.
So the point is, that while it would be great to have Russia and Ukraine and all other former Soviet republics to live happily together in an enlarged EU, the EU alone just could not do it. The power shift in the EU would be too great,...
...and it also could not manage the necessary cultural transformation of Russia the same way like it did with Eastern Europe, where the EU is still struggling. And even if Europe would pull it off, such an EU would be a serious threat to the U.S. empire; it would break it.
So the only solution would be to integrate the USA, Europe and the former Soviet countries into something like the EU. The problem with the USA is that is also culturally very different, has weird laws, the barbaric death penalty, large inequality, political instability, ...
... the largest prison population, and has to extract wealth from all over the world to pay for its ridiculously large military. On the other hand it has the greatest thinkers and the most vibrant, innovative culture in the world. However, if this could be pulled off, ...
...creating a political and economic union of states with at least the level of integration like the EU, containing all NATO-Members plus the former Soviet Union, it would unite over 1.2 billion people in a structure of governance, creating lasting peace, rule of law,...
...and could tackle global problems like nothing the world has seen before. The problems to get there seem insurmountable, but the alternative is a new cold war, decades of increased military spending, threat of nuclear war and the danger of civil war in Russia, so I think ...
...it would be worth some serious thought. There is still a gap between the vision and where we are now, namely at war, and a Russian population that is neither fit for democracy nor desires it, but Russians understand money, and an offer to join a rich and powerful union...
...of a billion people might have some appeal. Btw, any idea how such a union could be called? The best I could come up with would be UDN, Union of Democratic Nations, which sounds boring, but boring might be good, or UFN, Union of Free Nations, which sounds a bit more vigorous.
After I came up with it googled the term "Union of Free Nations", and it exists in a map game: thefutureofeuropes.fandom.com/wiki/Union_of_… Anyway, it is not that important, but having a name can also help to bring things forward.
Another weakness of the Russian political system is that by putting the right person at the top, huge changes are possible, but Putin will make sure that no one gets into that office who might prosecute or jail him and his followers for their crimes, so that's a problem.
I don't know how a strong women at the top would work, but I heard that in Russian families the women often hold the power, and there were nine female Russian rulers, most famous Catherine the Great, so that might be an option as well.
However, you can not put an unknown or inexperienced person in that office, and you want to have someone who has governed at least a federal subject of Russia, and there is a number of women who did that, but I don't know anything about them: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_f…
It is interesting to see what other weaknesses of the Russian political system and society could be exploited to heal Russia, bring its society to the 21st century, make it a peaceful neighbor and a sane, reliable member of the international community. I see some hope now.
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