Putin is crazy... WAPO: Russia is harassing U.S. diplomats all over Europe

[DetlefK]

11. This is not "anything to win". Russia has not overcome its old-fashioned soviet imperialism.

According to recent polls, ~50% of Russians adore Stalin (he of terror-regime fame), because he saved Russia from Hitler. This outweighs his atrocities.

Doping athletes was considered completely normal in communist countries because sports was propaganda-warfare.
There was an actual byword that was used by politicians to justify doping: "A victory for the German Democratic Republic is a victory for Communism!"

And IMO that same old soviet imperialism can be blamed for the Ukraine-crisis:
Russia sees Eastern Europe as its sphere of influence, like in the good old days of the Soviet-Union.
The West does not recognize Eastern Europe as Russia's sphere of influence because the Soviet-Union no longer exists.
So, whenever something happens in Eastern Europe, Russia thinks that this was an attack-by-proxy on Russia itself.

Ukraine was historically, culturally and politcally always split into a western and an eastern half. The western half was oriented towards Europe and voted accordingly, the eastern half was oriented towards Russia and voted accordingly. Some sort of political crisis was only a question of time.
And when Ukraine split along the seams, Russia immediately thought it was all about them.




The West has one kind of social vision and Russia has another kind of social vision. And each tries to gather followers. When countries rather pick the West's vision than Russia's vision, maybe this is not geopolitical warfare. Maybe the West has simply made a better offer.