Essay: Russia's failed attempts to be in the first ranks of the great powers through authoritarian rule and Russian imperialism

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During his annual phone-in with the public in 2019, President Vladimir Putin described low productivity as “one of the most acute and important” problems facing Russia.[1]

Please watch the short video at: Russia's predicament, Stephen Kotkin, video, 2024

The historian Stephen Kotkin stated:

“ And so it comes up with this solution to try to handle this geopolitical conundrum, the gulf between its aspirations and its capabilities. It comes up with this idea that you can use the state and use state power to force modernize the country to try to push it into the ranks of the first powers coercive. And it does this and sometimes has a spurt, it has an industrialization spurt, like you referred to under Stalin, or that we saw under Putin. We saw it on the Czars regime. It goes back to Peter the Great, as you know. And so they have this spurt and then they hit a wall, they stagnate, it doesn't continue. And instead of catching up to the first rank powers, instead of catching up which is what is now the western powers, the gulf between Russia and the greatest powers only gets wider instead of shrinking. So they try to use the state to manage this. They try to have this coercive modernization. Different forms, again, the Stalin one is much bloodier, incomparable to either the czars or the post-Soviet. And it turns out that they don't build a strong state. Instead they build a personalist regime. And there's a conflation between the survival of the Russian state and the survival of this regime that is trying to force modernize, to try to catch up, to try to match the capabilities with the aspirations. And you end up with personalist rule, you end up with a stagnating economy, and you end up with this conflation where the survival of the regime is somehow meant to mean the survival of Russia.

And today we have this Putin equals Russia equation, which is false, but very widespread. And so if they gave up the aspiration to be a providential power, a power under God, if they gave up the need to have a special mission in the world, to be in the first ranks of the great powers, then they wouldn't feel this geopolitical urgency to try to catch up somehow or close that gap or manage that gap between capabilities and aspirations. And then they wouldn't have to force modernize with coercion, they wouldn't have to suppress consumption and lower living standards to overinvest in the state and in the secret police. And they wouldn't have these moments of quest for a strong state that devolves into personalist rule potentially. So it's a choice. It's a choice that elites in Russia make again and again and again. It's not cultural DNA, although it does come from a self-identity, self-conception about, you know, Russia's special place in the world. And so I call this the geopolitical conundrum, and I think it can be broken.[2]

”

Why authoritarian countries often do poorly and fail

Aggressive, authoritarian countries and war:



"Give me liberty, or give me death!" - Patrick Henry

Vladimir Putin's foolish decision to launch an invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. The war in Ukraine is making Russia's demographic crisis even worse

The main consequences of Russia's demographic crisis according to the Russian demographer Salavat Abylkalikov

The Russian demographer Salavat Abylkalikov says the main consequences of Russia's demographic crisis will be the following:

“ According to the average version of the UN forecast, Russia's population by 2050 may be about 133.4 million people, which is 14th in the world and below countries such as Egypt, the Philippines, and Mexico. But if Russia goes not according to the average, but according to the low option that is quite likely at the present time, then with a population of 123.2 million people we will drop to 16th place and will already be neighbors with Tanzania and Vietnam. Thus, the price of switching to the low scenario could be -10 million people, as well as a decrease in the place in the top countries in terms of population. Moreover, the low version of the UN forecast did not include too low or even negative migration growth.

A smaller population means a country's lower economic potential, a shrinking domestic market, worsening demographic problems and an aging population, as well as a decrease in the country's geopolitical power. The population size still correlates with the weight in international relations, the ability to promote their interests on the world stage. And the declining population for the largest country in the world may cause some neighbors on the continent, especially the eastern ones, to be tempted to solve their internal growing problems by some external adventures. But will Russia find anyone and how to fight back, will there be allies?[3]

”

Articles and videos related to the war in Ukraine making Russia's demographic crisis even worse

Videos:

Russia brain drain and the war in Ukraine

Is Russia a failed state?

See also: Is Russia a failed state?

Map of Russia.

Approximately 7% of Russia's land is arable and suitable for agricultural production.

Question: Is Russia a failed state?

Consider:

Almost half of global strategists think Russia could become a failed state within the next 10 years, Fortune magazine, January 23, 2023.

The 2023 article Russia has failed as a state published by Modern Diplomacy indicates: "Britannica explained that a failed state is the one that “cannot protect its national boundaries". April 26, 2023 head of the Russian Committee of defense of the Russian State Duma suggested that Russian citizens should be mobilized to protect Russian borders acknowledging that Russia has no resources for that, comparing the current inability of the state to the previous mighty USSR."

Ukraine, which has a much smaller population of Russia, invaded Russia in 2024. It did so in the southern Kursk region of Russia (See: Russia-Ukraine War: Ukraine's Surprise Attack in Russia's Kursk Region, video and Ukraine invades Russia: Russian civilians seek shelter as fighting rages, video). Russia was caught completely by surprise and was unprepared for the attack. In addition, Ukraine used innovative drone tactics to blind Russian S-400 air defenses and take out Russia's Khalino Air Base which is located in Kursk Oblast, Russia (See: How Ukraine Took Out Russia’s Khalino Air Base with Advanced Tactics, Kyiv Post, December 23, 2024 and Ukraines Masterstroke - Russian Khalino Air Base TOTALLY OBLITERATED, Military Show YouTube channel, 2025).

On August 22, 2024, The Hill published the article Another Russian mercenary leader has turned against Putin which stated:

“ A little over a year ago, Yevgeny Prigozhin, Putin’s former cook and the founder of the notorious Wagner private military company, launched a coup attempt that fizzled quickly. But, significantly, the Russian military and security services did nothing to stop it. They just watched — hardly a sign of their loyalty to Putin.

A few days ago, Georgy Zakrevsky, another head of a private military company, effectively called on Russians to get rid of the “Great” Putin (his modifier, not mine). When the guys with the guns start making fun of your greatness, it may be time to read the writing on the wall...

Here’s Zakrevsky’s diatribe against Putin, in my translation:

“Our country is not just on the brink of disaster or already right next to it; our country is already in trouble. In big trouble. Drones are flying all over central Russia, right up to Moscow and St. Petersburg. They even attacked the Kremlin. Our Black Sea fleet is being pushed out. It’s being pushed out as if we were not a great power with a great fleet, but some third-rate country.

“Our air force is practically not working because it is also being pushed out. We are standing in the same positions that we took more than two years ago, and partly in those to which we retreated. The population is dying out, becoming impoverished, drinking itself to death: no one cares. All they have time to do is bring in migrants.”

Zakrevsky minces no words in assigning blame for this sad state of affairs: “And all this was done by the so-called ‘president.’ The ‘Great’ Putin.”[4]

”

"Russia is a declining power, and it will only get weaker with time." - International relations scholar John Mearsheimer[5]

Russian imperialism

John Joseph Mearsheimer and U.S. relations with Russia

John Mearsheimer

John Mearsheimer, is an American political scientist and international relations scholar, who belongs to the realist school of international relations and teaches at the University of Chicago.

In his March 2022 interview with The New Yorker, Mearsheimer indicated:

“ I’m talking about the raw-power potential of Russia—the amount of economic might it has. Military might is built on economic might. You need an economic foundation to build a really powerful military. To go out and conquer countries like Ukraine and the Baltic states and to re-create the former Soviet Union or re-create the former Soviet Empire in Eastern Europe would require a massive army, and that would require an economic foundation that contemporary Russia does not come close to having. There is no reason to fear that Russia is going to be a regional hegemony in Europe. Russia is not a serious threat to the United States. We do face a serious threat in the international system. We face a peer competitor. And that’s China. Our policy in Eastern Europe is undermining our ability to deal with the most dangerous threat that we face today.[6] ”

In 2014, Mearsheimer said: "Russia is a declining power, and it will only get weaker with time."[7]

Russian military weaknesses. Russia getting pummeled in wars in Russian history that hyper Russophiles will not tell you about

Russians overestimate their role in world history

See also: We Made History: Citizens of 35 Countries Overestimate Their Role in World History

"Russians, for example, estimated that their country was responsible for 61% of world history." - Source: We Made History: Citizens of 35 Countries Overestimate Their We Made History: Citizens of 35 Countries Overestimate Their Nation’s Role in World History, Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, Volume 7, Issue 4, December 2018, Pages 521-528

Map data derived from: We Made History: Citizens of 35 Countries Overestimate Their We Made History: Citizens of 35 Countries Overestimate Their Nation’s Role in World History, Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, Volume 7, Issue 4, December 2018, Pages 521-528

References

  1. ↑ Why Is Russia So Unproductive?, Moscow Times, 2019
  2. ↑ Transcript: Stephen Kotkin: Back to the USSR or Back to the Tsarist Empire?, Stephen Kotkin, Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies; Havard University
  3. ↑ "Until the end of the century, we will be enough." Demographer Salavat Abylkalikov - about whether Russia is dying and what to do about it, Russian demographer Salavat Abylkalikov
  4. ↑ Another Russian mercenary leader has turned against Putin, The Hill, August 22, 2024
  5. ↑ Why the Ukraine Crisis Is the West’s Fault by John Mearsheimer, Foreign Affairs, September/October 2014, Published on August 18, 2014
  6. ↑ Why John Mearsheimer Blames the U.S. for the Crisis in Ukraine, The New Yorker, March 2022
  7. ↑ Why the Ukraine Crisis Is the West’s Fault, Foreign Affairs, Published August 18, 2014
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