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SETH HALPERN's avatar

Every time I compose a lengthy comment I inadvertently delete it. Eh.

Anyway, I was going to comment that Putin sees Russia as the new champion of Slavophilism, and thus of both Russian nationalism proper and of the Russian ethnic and linguistic diaspora. That's a dream - arguably not unlike like Islamism or Han Chinese Red Imperialism - that has lately lured nations and peoples away from the messy and disillusioning chores of liberal democracy. It also both exploits and compromises the diversity of peripheral countries while undermining their internal stability.

As such, it can't be beaten with such brute force or sanctions as the West is likely to deploy, but needs somehow to be turned back dialectically against Russia itself.

To wit: Imagine if the Austrians and Sudeten Germans had been vociferously anti-Nazi instead of fanatically pro-Nazi in 1938.

I believe this is known as jujitsu. https://youtube.com/shorts/_HupHLmvDKQ?feature=share

https://youtube.com/shorts/i6Qd5dep7Eg?feature=share

Unfortunately I lack the martial arts training to demonstrafe how to apply this technique to Russia in general or Putin in particular.

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