Category Archives: Russian Decline

Is China’s Goose Cooked? And Other Bedtime Stories

Posted on 7 March, 2017 by

Economically, China needs a powerful recession to get rid of businesses being kept alive by loans. Politically, China can’t afford the cost of unemployment. The re-emergence of a dictatorship in China under President Xi Jinping should be understood in this … Continue reading →

Posted in China, Demographics, Donald Trump, Economics, Empire, geopolitics, Peter Zeihan, Politics, Russian Decline | Tagged , ,

Putin Smiles for All of Russia

Posted on 30 January, 2017 by

Overall, Russia is far from economic collapse and losing governability, but it is slowly moving in that direction. If the authorities avoid dire errors, the country can survive at the margin of safety for at least six to ten years, … Continue reading →

Posted in Russian Decline | Tagged

Russia is Reshaping Itself

Posted on 17 November, 2016 by

Update: Russian Economy Now So Bad That Russians are Losing Faith in the Future. Every day brings fresh indications that the Russian economy under Vladimir Putin is disastrous now and will become more disastrous in the future. The World Bank … Continue reading →

Posted in Russia, Russian Decline | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Coming for Your Women

Posted on 21 October, 2016 by

Some claim that World War III is about capturing brains rather than territory, and there is some merit to the claim. But there are many ways to capture another nation’s brains. One way is to provide better working and living … Continue reading →

Posted in Brain Drain, China, Russia, Russian Decline, Russian slavery, Russian Womb Drain, Siberia | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

It’s All Part of the Plan Part II

Posted on 12 October, 2016 by

In part I of this series, we took a quick look at ways in which Russia is being actively dismantled by its historical victims. The Separatist Spirit is Strong in the Urals, Siberia, the North Caucasus, Russian Manchuria, Russian Occupied … Continue reading →

Posted in Russia, Russian Collapse, Russian Decline | Tagged

Imbalance Leads to Instability Leads to War

Posted on 5 October, 2016 by

Weakness Feeds into Imbalance in Positive Feedback Loop Warning: For reasons mentioned in passing below — and for other reasons not mentioned — everything the would-be superpower tries to do to project strength, is simply making it weaker in every … Continue reading →

Posted in Brain Drain, Demographics, Russian Decline | Tagged | 2 Comments

Multiple Paths to Russia’s Decline

Posted on 29 September, 2016 by

Russia’s decline extends through most of its infrastructure, from its demography to its schools, health system, roads, housing, electrical power grid, to its economy and financial infrastructure. Conditions have declined so far that Russian officials fear that something as small … Continue reading →

Posted in China, Economics, Russian Decline | Tagged , | 8 Comments

Grand Triumphalism Against a Darker Background of Decline and Decay

Posted on 5 September, 2016 by

High Speed Silk Road Routes to All of Asia and Europe Xi Jinping, 63, the president of China and general secretary of the Communist Party, wants to revive the myth and build a New Silk Road, in large parts along … Continue reading →

Posted in China, Russia, Russian Decline | Tagged , | 15 Comments

A Bridge Too Far

Posted on 2 September, 2016 by

A Bridge to Who Knows Where? The prospects for Russia’s new bridge from the mainland to Crimea are unclear. In order to pay for the grand connecting link, Russia will have to forego much-needed bridge construction and repair elsewhere in … Continue reading →

Posted in Putin, Russian Decline | Tagged

Forget the Bread: Circuses and Wars are What Putin Offers

Posted on 19 August, 2016 by

“Two things only the people anxiously desire — bread and circuses.” The government kept the Roman populace happy by distributing free food and staging huge spectacles. __ Dictionary.com Putin has taken a similar approach to placating the Russian people, with … Continue reading →

Posted in Russia, Russian Decline | Tagged

Once a Purveyor of Hope . . . Now a Bringer of Pain and Fear

Posted on 13 August, 2016 by

We could be talking about “President Hope and Change Obama,” who has single-handedly set back US national and international relations and opportunities decades. But there is another former “president of hope” on the world stage who has transformed his country … Continue reading →

Posted in Russian Decline | Tagged | 3 Comments

Russian Schoolteachers Face Difficult Challenges

Posted on 6 August, 2016 by

[The] Kremlin is convinced that professionals who are paid more than $1,500 a month are a potential threat… Moscow Times To economize on teachers’ salaries is to condemn the country to serious problems in the future. That is obvious. It … Continue reading →

Posted in Russia, Russian Decline, Russian Womb Drain | Tagged | 1 Comment

To Make Russia Better One Must First See it As it Really Is

Posted on 29 July, 2016 by

41% of Russians say they do not have enough money to buy food and clothing, only 50% of water is potable and large parts of the food chain are tainted — and there is no accountability to be found anywhere. … Continue reading →

Posted in Russian Decline | Tagged ,

Mexico and Russia in Virtual Dead Heat in IMF GDP Rankings

Posted on 23 July, 2016 by

Russia and Mexico: Not Usually Considered as Geopolitical Equals Rank Country/Economy GDP Nominal (billions of $) 2016 share 2017 2018 1 United States 18,558.130 25.081 19,285 20,145 2 China 11,383.030 15.384 12,263 13,338 3 Japan 4,412.600 5.963 4,514 4,562 4 … Continue reading →

Posted in China, Economics, innovation, Russian Decline | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

A New Wave of HIV Emerges From an Unexpected Quarter

Posted on 19 July, 2016 by

While Sub-Saharan Africa still has the highest number of people living with HIV – more than 24 million – it is Eastern Europe and central Asia that registered the greatest increase in the number of new cases. __ http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/russia-lack-hiv-prevention-fuels-rise-new-infections-1571155 A … Continue reading →

Posted in Russia, Russian Decline | Tagged ,

China’s Massive Economic Bubble Receives a Gigantic Bolus of Hot Gas

Posted on 16 July, 2016 by

China Reports No Drop in GDP Growth So Far in 2016 China’s government has chosen to continue pumping credit into an already near-bursting financial bubble of mismanagement. This amounts to “kicking the can” down to road in order to present … Continue reading →

Posted in Russia, Russian Decline | Tagged

Hague International Court: No Justification for China’s Land Grab

Posted on 13 July, 2016 by

China Out On a Limb China has a limited amount of time in which to assert its dominance over Asia. It must begin with East Asia, since that is its pathway to the blue Pacific and a larger projection of … Continue reading →

Posted in China, Russian Decline | Tagged | 3 Comments

Russia Running Out of Time

Posted on 6 July, 2016 by

In a few short years, Russia will degrade from having a very small and expensive skilled labor pool to not having one at all, forcing the Russians to choose which bits of their system to not maintain. __ Zeihan on … Continue reading →

Posted in China, Economics, Russian Decline | Tagged | 6 Comments

Trying to Finance a First Class Military with a Third Class Economy

Posted on 28 June, 2016 by

In USD terms, Russia’s economy is smaller than Italy’s, smaller than Canada’s, smaller than Australia’s, smaller than California’s. None of those nations (or states in the case of California) attempts to build and maintain a world-bullying sized military, but it … Continue reading →

Posted in Russian Decline | Tagged

Moscow Can’t Maintain Economic Dominance in Central Asia

Posted on 23 June, 2016 by

Russia Losing the “Great Game” to China The world is supposed to believe that Russia and China are chumming it up, signing mutual commitments left and right. But the underlying reality is that Russia is being pushed back from large … Continue reading →

Posted in Central Asia, China, Russian Decline | Tagged , ,

ISIS Cyber Caliphate Operates Out of the Kremlin

Posted on 21 June, 2016 by

According to German experts, the so-called Islamic State is unable to carry out complex hack attacks. According to Der Spiegel, the truth is that Kremlin’s hackers are behind the cyber-caliphate. __ Der Spiegel Claims Russia Responsible FSB, GRU, and SVR … Continue reading →

Posted in China, Russian Decline, Siberia | Tagged ,

Why Can’t China and Russia Innovate?

Posted on 19 June, 2016 by

These days, China and Russia are more famous for stealing, pirating, and copying foreign technology than for meaningful homegrown innovation. Europe Can Innovate Over the past 6 centuries, Europe and its diaspora have been the global centre of innovation. European … Continue reading →

Posted in China, Creativity, Economics, innovation, Russian Decline | Tagged , | 3 Comments

China and Russia on the Same Page: Geopolitical Risk

Posted on 4 June, 2016 by

Revanchism in Russia and China Drives Out Investment and Threatens Economic Futures To understand the nature of such geopolitical risk, look no further than the debacle of revanchist Russia’s taking of the Crimea and large chunks of Eastern Ukraine at … Continue reading →

Posted in China, Russian Decline | Tagged | 2 Comments

Russian Pharmaceutical Production and Sales Drop Amid Economic Crisis

Posted on 2 June, 2016 by

Drug Production and Sales are Down; Abortions and Mortality are Up The manufacture and purchase of medicinal drugs are down sharply over the past two years, as spending priorities are shifted away from health care, over to more crucial issues … Continue reading →

Posted in Russia, Russian Decline, Russian slavery | Tagged , | 2 Comments

The Hollowing Giant: Autophagy in the former USSR

Posted on 24 May, 2016 by

autophagy: self-digestion; eating oneself Corrupt institutions and governments divert resources away from productive projects and enterprises, toward powerful insiders in government, and well-connected family, business, and criminal interests. This results in a “hollowing out” of the competence and productivity of … Continue reading →

Posted in Russian Decline | Tagged | 2 Comments