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Comment by Terr_ | Hacker News Reader

"Former Russian President threatens that Russia may engage in state-sponsored international terrorism, mass-murdering civilians in other countries."

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> Medvedev, who cast himself as a liberal reformer promising modernisation and democratisation upon becoming president in 2008, has reinvented himself as one of Russia’s most vocal pro-war figures.

Some context for younger readers: At that time the Russian constitution limited Putin to two consecutive 4-year terms as President (2000-2008) and Medvedev was put forward as the moderate-looking maybe-successor. However Putin just used him to keep the seat warm for a term while he kept ruling from a Prime Minister position. This was also a period when some held out hope that Putin might decide to gradually retire, allowing Russia to become less autocratic and erratic.

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It is a damn shame. Was Russia predetermined to become an autocratic terror state after the fall of USSR, or did Jeltsin just have a bad day when he appointed Putin?

It wasn't predetermined, but there was a chain of events that helped.

1) 1993 constitution crisis. Role of the president had gained more power compared to the State Duma (lower legislative house).

2) Privatization in Russia was a mess. On one hand, it created the oligarch class, which led to the obvious money → political power transition. On the other, huge slice of society had suffered economically, which explains the mid 2000s social contract of "People get less democracy in exchange for economical stability".

3) KGB archives hadn't been opened when there was an opportunity to do so. It was a huge mistake.

4) Re-election of Yeltsin in 1996 was against the natural way of events. Lots of resources were used in agitation, including, but not limited to professional political consultants from the USA. Putin's cronies were learning from the best ones.

5) As of 1999, Putin's appointment was a collective decision between two oligarch clans. It was a pure feudalistic/mafia-like process, without a hint of democratic principles. By the time of the next president elections, ruling oligarch clan controlled most of the media.

That's a very oversimplified view. First Chechen war is not mentioned. Role of the Second Chechen war in Putin's presidency is important, yet not crucial.

You're leaving out Putin's role and emphasizing minor details. For example, Putin always hated the US, and the fact that Yeltsin's campaign hired American pollsters had nothing to do with that, nor do Russians in general care who Yeltsin hired as consultants.

Former FSB agent Litvinenko accused the FSB of being behind the apartment building bombings before Putin had him assassinated. These bombings were equivalent to 9/11 in the Russian consciousness at that time, and FSB agents were even found to have planted the defused bomb that immediately preceded the Second Chechen War, but after they were arrested, FSB director Patrushev claimed that incident (that was used to justify a war) was an anti-terror drill and had them released the next day. There were no more apartment bombings after that, and the Chechens claimed to have nothing to do with those bombings, which is exactly the opposite of what any other terrorist group would do. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1999_Russian_apartment_bombing...

https://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/38614

>You're leaving out Putin's role

Putin was a figurehead of the oligarch clan from Saint-Petersburg, who happened to have KGB connections as well. Russia had moved from the Western-like democratic path already. They could've chosen another person with the same results.

>Putin always hated the US

It doesn't matter. Professional criminals don't operate out of hate.

>the fact that Yeltsin's campaign hired American pollsters had nothing to do with that, nor do Russians in general care who Yeltsin hired as consultants

He was re-elected with very low initial public support. Had Zyuganov become president in 1996, there could be an opportunity to build the democratic tradition of transition of power. OTOH, communists could've messed up in some other way, of course. I also omitted the financial crisis of 1998, but that's another explanation of why general public wasn't so principled regarding democratic values as opposed to promise of stability, 7-10 years later.

Re: apartment bombings. Correct, that's the casus beli for the Second Chechen war and directly related to Putin's election platform.

> Putin was a figurehead of the oligarch clan from Saint-Petersburg, who happened to have KGB connections as well. Russia had moved from the Western-like democratic path already. They could've chosen another person with the same results.

There were no oligarchs in St. Petersburg when Putin got into politics, and he wasn't a figurehead. Putin had ties to the St. Petersburg underworld, who were experienced with capitalism during communism. His affiliation with them helped him work his way up St. Petersburg politics as a deal fixer.

> It doesn't matter. Professional criminals don't operate out of hate.

Many of Putin's actions are absolutely driven by hatred of the West.

> Had Zyuganov become president in 1996, there could be an opportunity to build the democratic tradition of transition of power.

Only Zyuganov is to blame for losing. Pinning this on Americans is a huge stretch.

>There were no oligarchs in St. Petersburg when Putin got into politics

How do you call people like Gennady Timchenko? There's a nuanced difference between "Successful fossil fuel mogul" and "Member of a crime syndicate".

>Pinning this on Americans is a huge stretch

I didn't. It was a minor detail explaining that these were the second president elections ever happened in modern Russia and there was no local expertise in manipulating public opinion yet. And there was no legal checks and balances preventing abuse of power of the current president. "Administrative resource" had become a common noun after 1996.

> How do you call people like Gennady Timchenko?

You missed the "when Putin got into politics." Timchenko got his first break when Putin gave him an oil export license in 1991 and his fortune making break when Putin arrested one of his enemies and gave that enemy's oil firm to Timchenko. https://www.ft.com/content/c3c5c012-21e9-11dd-a50a-000077b07...

I don't have any data to support this but my thought is Russia was always going to turn into something like an oligarchy but that there would be a leader like Putin I think was not inevitable. I think there could have been an elite class that controlled Russia's natural resources and a mostly weak central government. But this idea is based on other countries and I admit to not knowing nearly enough about Russian history to say this with any degree of authority.

Alternatively, if outside forces had set up Russia's new government instead of Russia doing it itself, similar to what the US did with Japan, then I think there would be a larger chance for a more standard Western government. (To be clear, I'm not saying the US necessarily should have done that, or that doing that is a good thing, just that it would have changed the outcome.)

It's the sound of a regime shitting its pants, basically.

Some pertinent recent context: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Igor_Kirillov_(general)#Assass...

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