Has Russia Become a Pariah State?

 

I’ll be upfront and honest, I’ve never been a great lover of the ex-communist state of Russia even though my wife was born and brought up in that country before moving to Estonia in her teens. So, today we have Vladimir Putin's war in Ukraine that has basically upended his country’s international and domestic affairs. In recent days we’ve heard of concerns about the invasion that are growing within the Kremlin. One Kremlin insider this week stated, "It's suicidal what Putin is doing to his country and our standing in the world."

The tyrant, Putin, is facing increasing animosity both abroad and at home as his war in Ukraine, which he reckoned would be over in a matter of days, approaches two full months. Experts cite strategy failures, mounting military losses, and the dire economic consequences of Western sanctions blamed almost entirely on Putin as evidence of painting a bleak picture of Russia's future. The ex-KGB’s decisions on the Ukraine invasion face rising scrutiny as a small but growing number of Kremlin insiders have started to express doubts about the war.

Ten Kremlin sources (who wished to remain nameless - for obvious reasons) who have direct knowledge of the conflict, conveyed their concerns to the American finance company, Bloomberg last week, saying they regarded the invasion as a catastrophic mistake that had set the country back decades. The report described the critics as spread across senior positions in government and state-run businesses.

As far as I am concerned, Putin's crazy foray into Ukraine had already proved more costly for Russia than the Soviet Union's nearly 10-year war in Afghanistan in the 1980s. Back then the USSR lost around 15,000-plus soldiers in Afghanistan in a decade of fighting." Now, 40 years later, Putin has lost close to that amount in one month! Putin’s regime acknowledged in late March that 1,351 of its troops had been killed and 3,825 others wounded in the invasion. NATO estimates put the likely death toll closer to 15,000, while Ukraine says it has killed nearly 20,000 Russian troops.

So, we now know that ordinary Russians are beginning to feel the economic pinch of tough Western sanctions. Putin has conceded that sanctions have started to upset the country's energy industry but has publicly maintained that Russia's economy has not been undermined as a result. What a liar! This dictator just doesn’t give a damn about his people, the economy or the future financial status of his country. The head of Russia's central bank, however, warned that the full impact of sanctions had not yet been felt, and that Moscow's mayor said this week that around 200,000 residents could lose their jobs with Western companies pulling out of the country en masse. By the end of this week, I would suggest that Russia has lost closer to one million jobs since the beginning of Putin’s genocidal invasion of Ukraine.

I would end this piece by simply stating that Russia will be a pariah state in the eyes of many countries and people possibly for the next 50 years. Until Putin goes, Russia will continue to be a pariah state. When he eventually goes six feet under this will be the legacy he takes to Hell!!