I suspect that’s who this new VPN restriction is aimed at affecting most: activist Russians inside the country, and also those Russians evading mobilization by leaving, but continuing to work their Russian jobs via VPN. Putin has been trying to get his hands around that for many months now.
To me, every Russian who left the country is one less Russian on the battlefield, one less Russian to be cannon fodder, one less Russian to harass Ukraine. So I don’t much care why they left, only that it’s a net good for Ukraine that they did. And of course those brave souls who are still protesting and acting against the system from the inside. Слава Україні!
I suspect that if things continue in the trajectory that they seem to be heading, that people from Russia who exit may likely be better-off too, as much as moving countries is a significant barrier.
That’s actually a good question. The basic answer is that there’s not a superfluity of available young men, and what I call “The Two Russias.”
To start with, using a vast overgeneralization, politically there are two Russias: one comprised of St. Petersburg and Moscow and their surrounding areas, and one made of everywhere else. St. Petersburg and Moscow are where the money is, where the power is, where the seat of the church is (very powerful in Russia) and where any public opinion that matters rests. For example, Putin was mayor of St. Petersburg when he was selected by Yeltsin to groom for prime minister. This is the rich part of Russia, the one the world sees and hears, and where Putin’s authority as a leader lives or dies.
But Russia is VAST, and much of it unsettled. Where there are cities, they are much smaller, and much more spread out as you head further north and east. The people who live in the other Russia, the poorer one, don’t have even a fraction of the same power or voice, and are very easy to shut up as Putin also controls the media. Putin puts out the propaganda everywhere, but he keep in mind that he really needs it most in the first Russia, because they have the public voice and the power, and if they revolt it will draw the world’s attention, as opposed to some grieving babushkas in Kamchatka.
So what that has created is a situation where Putin has to pull his conscripts from poorer areas in order to keep the reality of his losing war from Moscow and St. Petersburg. But there just weren’t that many to start with, especially after covid, and many others have hidden or left. Meanwhile Putin’s battlefield losses have been HUGE. So late last year he started pulling conscripts from the two cities, and that’s when the real tech drain began, because many young men left there then who could still leave, did.
The ones who have left (or are leaving) can’t be counted because in terms of data (online activity, pay deposit, tax payments) they appear to be in Russia. They just can’t be found by the mobilization cops anywhere, and it’s because in reality they’re sitting in a café in Tbilisi or Bangkok doing their work remotely and enjoying the weather.
Russia doesn’t know where they are, because they’re very careful not to reveal that their remote work is via VPN from another country. Putin literally has no power beyond his own borders to retrieve them even if he could find them (unless they stayed in Belarus, which is stupid). And again, his battlefield losses have been MASSIVE. His generals have always used the lower classes of soldier as cannon fodder to clear the way for more valuable soldiers (like Speznaz) and lowly conscripts are seen as expendable, even now.
But he’s running out of conscripts, beggars can’t be choosers, he desperately needs the richer Russia to support him and his war, his domestic propaganda isn’t nearly as compelling as he’d like it to be, and while he could easily silence the poor grieving babushkas from somewhere like Yakutsk whose grandsons he threw into the woodchipper of war, he cannot easily do so with the rich, connected and worldly Muscovites and Petersburgians, and now the war is coming directly to them with Prighozin’s march and Ukraine’s drones, and they don’t like that at all. On top of that Putin has been rumored to be sick for several years, and all of this together means his time is running out.
So at this point, I don’t think Putin gives a shit who can code a payment processor or run a wastewater plant or design medical imaging equipment, he just wants bodies to throw at the landmines so he can finally win his cursed war.
Good read. So it sounds like your analysis of the situation is that it is short sighted and Putin is simply a Megalomaniac attempting to hold onto power, would you say that is an accurate summary? Or is he just crazy and super optimistic that things will change all the sudden one day?
Because even if you kept all the people physically producing bombs and shells, eventually you will run out of the educated people that run the other industries that support the military industrial system in Russia if this goes on for long enough.
So it sounds like your analysis of the situation is that it is short sighted and Putin is simply a Megalomaniac attempting to hold onto power, would you say that is an accurate summary?
Yes, and worse than it appears in what I wrote. What is driving Putin right now is a demented vision of something called Russkiy Mir, or Russian World, wherein Russia reclaims its world glory, not least by reclaiming every square inch of land that was ever Russian. A lot of this comes from his close advisor Aleksandr Dugin’s neo-fascist book Foundations of Geopolitics, and it puts every country surrounding Russia at risk, especially Poland and the Baltic states, because Putin’s publicly acknowledged end goal is to sit as king over all of them in a new, reunified Russian kingdom.
Also, he’s not just running out of educated people, he’s running out of people, period. There are roughly 14 million in Moscow, 4 million in St. Petersburg, and 145 million in Russia total, leaving out Crimea. Again, outside the cities, they are spread out across a vast land mass. By contrast, in the US right now there are over double that, 333 million spread out over the lesser land mass of the southern portion of North America. Not only does he have very few men, he has a huge area for people to hide in, and a significant portion of his own populace that grew up under Soviet rule who are willing to hide anyone they love. Russians run the best black markets in the world, IMO, and now men of conscription age are a part of that. It’s a battle Putin will not win.
It’s also one of the reasons Putin grabbed Crimea, and is now trying to get Ukraine: to literally steal the children. This is not hyperbole, it is fact. Russia is now a failing country. Even if the war were to stop today, Putin’s misuse of his populace to chase his dreams of a pimped up new Russia has ensured that there simply won’t be the population needed to support a thriving economy.
And I won’t go into how poor Russia is because Putin’s entire goal the whole time he has been in ANY public office, including mayor, has been to fleece the people. He stole millions in food aid from hungry Petersburgians in the 1990s and hasn’t stopped since. He and his oligarch cronies are richer than most living people can imagine, and it’s all on the backs of poor Russians. If you’re interested, Alexei Navalny and the Bellingcat folks have done an amazing series of videos about Putin’s theft (turn on English subs) of Russia’s natural resources, to sell them for profit and divert the income through his close circle of cronies.
So yeah. He is a madman. In So. Many. Ways. Like, lay-off-the-crack-pipe-already crazy. I could write about it for hours, lol. Thank you for asking, because it was actually good to think about it as a whole picture for once. I am pleased when anyone wants to learn more about this conflict, because I believe it is going to shape not just the east, but the west for decades to come, no matter how it turns out.
I suspect that’s who this new VPN restriction is aimed at affecting most: activist Russians inside the country, and also those Russians evading mobilization by leaving, but continuing to work their Russian jobs via VPN. Putin has been trying to get his hands around that for many months now.
To me, every Russian who left the country is one less Russian on the battlefield, one less Russian to be cannon fodder, one less Russian to harass Ukraine. So I don’t much care why they left, only that it’s a net good for Ukraine that they did. And of course those brave souls who are still protesting and acting against the system from the inside. Слава Україні!
I suspect that if things continue in the trajectory that they seem to be heading, that people from Russia who exit may likely be better-off too, as much as moving countries is a significant barrier.
Wouldn’t those be jobs that typically require advanced education? Why would they want to throw that subset of the population into the meat grinder?
That’s actually a good question. The basic answer is that there’s not a superfluity of available young men, and what I call “The Two Russias.”
To start with, using a vast overgeneralization, politically there are two Russias: one comprised of St. Petersburg and Moscow and their surrounding areas, and one made of everywhere else. St. Petersburg and Moscow are where the money is, where the power is, where the seat of the church is (very powerful in Russia) and where any public opinion that matters rests. For example, Putin was mayor of St. Petersburg when he was selected by Yeltsin to groom for prime minister. This is the rich part of Russia, the one the world sees and hears, and where Putin’s authority as a leader lives or dies.
But Russia is VAST, and much of it unsettled. Where there are cities, they are much smaller, and much more spread out as you head further north and east. The people who live in the other Russia, the poorer one, don’t have even a fraction of the same power or voice, and are very easy to shut up as Putin also controls the media. Putin puts out the propaganda everywhere, but he keep in mind that he really needs it most in the first Russia, because they have the public voice and the power, and if they revolt it will draw the world’s attention, as opposed to some grieving babushkas in Kamchatka.
So what that has created is a situation where Putin has to pull his conscripts from poorer areas in order to keep the reality of his losing war from Moscow and St. Petersburg. But there just weren’t that many to start with, especially after covid, and many others have hidden or left. Meanwhile Putin’s battlefield losses have been HUGE. So late last year he started pulling conscripts from the two cities, and that’s when the real tech drain began, because many young men left there then who could still leave, did.
The ones who have left (or are leaving) can’t be counted because in terms of data (online activity, pay deposit, tax payments) they appear to be in Russia. They just can’t be found by the mobilization cops anywhere, and it’s because in reality they’re sitting in a café in Tbilisi or Bangkok doing their work remotely and enjoying the weather.
Russia doesn’t know where they are, because they’re very careful not to reveal that their remote work is via VPN from another country. Putin literally has no power beyond his own borders to retrieve them even if he could find them (unless they stayed in Belarus, which is stupid). And again, his battlefield losses have been MASSIVE. His generals have always used the lower classes of soldier as cannon fodder to clear the way for more valuable soldiers (like Speznaz) and lowly conscripts are seen as expendable, even now.
But he’s running out of conscripts, beggars can’t be choosers, he desperately needs the richer Russia to support him and his war, his domestic propaganda isn’t nearly as compelling as he’d like it to be, and while he could easily silence the poor grieving babushkas from somewhere like Yakutsk whose grandsons he threw into the woodchipper of war, he cannot easily do so with the rich, connected and worldly Muscovites and Petersburgians, and now the war is coming directly to them with Prighozin’s march and Ukraine’s drones, and they don’t like that at all. On top of that Putin has been rumored to be sick for several years, and all of this together means his time is running out.
So at this point, I don’t think Putin gives a shit who can code a payment processor or run a wastewater plant or design medical imaging equipment, he just wants bodies to throw at the landmines so he can finally win his cursed war.
Good read. So it sounds like your analysis of the situation is that it is short sighted and Putin is simply a Megalomaniac attempting to hold onto power, would you say that is an accurate summary? Or is he just crazy and super optimistic that things will change all the sudden one day?
Because even if you kept all the people physically producing bombs and shells, eventually you will run out of the educated people that run the other industries that support the military industrial system in Russia if this goes on for long enough.
Yes, and worse than it appears in what I wrote. What is driving Putin right now is a demented vision of something called Russkiy Mir, or Russian World, wherein Russia reclaims its world glory, not least by reclaiming every square inch of land that was ever Russian. A lot of this comes from his close advisor Aleksandr Dugin’s neo-fascist book Foundations of Geopolitics, and it puts every country surrounding Russia at risk, especially Poland and the Baltic states, because Putin’s publicly acknowledged end goal is to sit as king over all of them in a new, reunified Russian kingdom.
Also, he’s not just running out of educated people, he’s running out of people, period. There are roughly 14 million in Moscow, 4 million in St. Petersburg, and 145 million in Russia total, leaving out Crimea. Again, outside the cities, they are spread out across a vast land mass. By contrast, in the US right now there are over double that, 333 million spread out over the lesser land mass of the southern portion of North America. Not only does he have very few men, he has a huge area for people to hide in, and a significant portion of his own populace that grew up under Soviet rule who are willing to hide anyone they love. Russians run the best black markets in the world, IMO, and now men of conscription age are a part of that. It’s a battle Putin will not win.
It’s also one of the reasons Putin grabbed Crimea, and is now trying to get Ukraine: to literally steal the children. This is not hyperbole, it is fact. Russia is now a failing country. Even if the war were to stop today, Putin’s misuse of his populace to chase his dreams of a pimped up new Russia has ensured that there simply won’t be the population needed to support a thriving economy.
And I won’t go into how poor Russia is because Putin’s entire goal the whole time he has been in ANY public office, including mayor, has been to fleece the people. He stole millions in food aid from hungry Petersburgians in the 1990s and hasn’t stopped since. He and his oligarch cronies are richer than most living people can imagine, and it’s all on the backs of poor Russians. If you’re interested, Alexei Navalny and the Bellingcat folks have done an amazing series of videos about Putin’s theft (turn on English subs) of Russia’s natural resources, to sell them for profit and divert the income through his close circle of cronies.
So yeah. He is a madman. In So. Many. Ways. Like, lay-off-the-crack-pipe-already crazy. I could write about it for hours, lol. Thank you for asking, because it was actually good to think about it as a whole picture for once. I am pleased when anyone wants to learn more about this conflict, because I believe it is going to shape not just the east, but the west for decades to come, no matter how it turns out.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/watch?v=T_tFSWZXKN0
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