Staunton, November 29 – Some in Daghestan now think that it is time for each Daghestani nation to have a separate republic rather than continue to live in a single “all-Daghestan ‘collective farm,’” an attitude that may be indicative of what other larger nations think about their status relative to the Russian Federation. In a […]
Window on Eurasia
75 Years On Russia Again Engaged In a Winter War
Staunton, November 30 – Seventy-five years ago, Moscow launched what became known as the Winter War against Finland. It used much the same propaganda and tactics it is using against Ukraine now. It faced far greater resistance than its vast disproportion of forces had led it to believe. And thanks to that resistance, it achieved […]
Oil Price Collapse Should Lead Russians to Recall and Act on Stalin’s 1931 Warning
Staunton, November 29 – The continuing decline in oil prices, a political move by the West against Moscow, should cause Russians to recall Stalin’s warning in 1931 that “we are 50 to 100 years behind the advanced countries and must catch up within ten years. Either we will do that or they will crush us,” […]
Mufti Says Russia’s Muslims Are An ‘Inalienable Part’ Of Russian World
Staunton, November 29 – Stavropol Mufti Muhammad-haji Rakhimov told the Third Stavropol Forum of the World Russian Popular Assembly that “Russian [rossiiskye] Muslims are an inalienable part of the Russian [russky] world,” a statement at odds with some by other speakers who stressed the Orthodox and ethnic nature of that idea. The mufti added that […]
Fate of Post-Soviet Space and of Russia Itself at Issue in Ukraine, Kazakh Scholar Says
Staunton, November 29 – The fate not only of Ukrain,e but also of the entire post-Soviet space, and even the survival of Russia itself as a single unified country is being decided by what is happening in the conflict in southeastern Ukraine, according to Aydos Sarym, a political scientist from Kazakhstan. He told the UNIAN […]
Moscow Ready to Use Internal Troops Against Any Maidan-like Activity in Russia, Interior Minister Says
Staunton, November 29 – In words that are clearly intended to intimidate but that may have just the opposite effect by exposing official nervousness, Russian Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev says that Moscow is ready to use its internal troops against any Maidan-like activity in any part of the Russian Federation. The minister told the military […]
Moscow Coming Up With Ever More Euphemisms To Hide Russian Losses In Ukraine
Staunton, November 28 – Because Vladimir Putin continues to insist that there are no Russian military personnel in Ukraine, the Russian defense ministry has been forced to use ever more euphemisms in order to hide the reality that Russian soldiers are dying there. Now, the Russian dead will be called “those who died in exercises […]
West Split between Those Who Take Freedom For Granted and Those Who Don’t
Staunton, November 28 – Russian aggression in Ukraine has opened a new divide in the West between those who take freedom for granted and those who know that it must be defended or it can be lost, according to Vladimir Vyatrovich, the director of the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory. Many in the West have […]
‘Russia May Lose Belarus’
Staunton, November 28 – Analysts and officials in both Moscow and the West have long operated under the assumption that Russia will always be able to retain Belarus as a reliable satellite. But recent statements by Alyaksandr Lukashenko and actions by Belarusian nationalists are raising questions about that assumption. In an article yesterday on the […]
Putin’s Russia Is a Country Without a Present Or Future, Only a Past, Shtepa Says
Staunton, November 25 – The unwillingness of Russians to make a sharp break with the Soviet past and accept that Russia today is “a new independent state” and the efforts of Vladimir Putin and his regime to present Russia as a country with a single unbroken history has left Russia without a present or a […]