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The face of Russia’s new leader
Although Russia’s presidential election won’t take place until Sunday, “barring something extraordinary and unforeseen,” Dmitri Medvedev will win by a landslide to succeed Vladimir Putin as the Kremlin’s new leader. Handpicked by Putin, the 42-year-old Medvedev has never held an elected office. While some have cast him as merely a Putin puppet, Medvedev has also made some surprisingly un-Putinesque moves:
In a speech Feb. 15, he publicly embraced personal freedom, saying that liberty is necessary for the state to have legitimacy among its citizens. He has laid out domestic policy goals that seem to speak to Russia’s expanding consumer class.
Medvedev has also struck a campy pose – hamming it up with Deep Purple, the British band whose music was popular in Soviet times – that suggested a dormitory-life playfulness decidedly un-Putinesque.
His words and behavior have raised unexpected but pervasive questions: Does Medvedev mean what he seems to say? Can he relax the Kremlin’s grip on Russian political life that has been a central characteristic of Putin’s rule? And if he does, will he clash with Putin, his principal source of power?
Continue reading here to see what some analysts have to say.
back to top12 Comments to “The face of Russia’s new leader”
Russia is still an enemy. While we’re all rightly focused on Islamic terrorism, we have to keep our eyes on the Bear.
They can’t be trusted. As long as they have nuclear weapons and hardline leaders, they are a threat.
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I agree with SteveG! My mother always said “never trust a Russian.” My best friend’s mother (who grew up in Spain — or Andulusia as Mr. bin Laden calls it) always said “never trust an Arab.” Both were right.
The Russians are a real power, and they have a history of being willing to plow down opposition. Their hardliners will sacrifice their own people to get what they want — first slot for Mother Russian.
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Wow … this may be a history-making day. NJLawyer agrees with me!
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Russia is like every other country with global political and economic ambitions. They want power and want to project it. In a unipolar, zero-sum world, that means it comes as the expense of the U.S.
While we should rightly be wary of a rebound in Russian geo-political power, we should also be wary of China and India, two other countries with global ambitions.
It should be noted that Russia is still a one-trick pony when it comes to their military. They have nuclear weapons and that’s about it. Their conventional forces are in a state of disarray. Russia’s economic power is one-dimensional as well. Russia’s coffers grow because of oil. Any downturn in oil prices and/or revenues and Russia’s economy will tank.
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Hey, it’s leap year, SteveG!
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I will submit that the US and Russia both lost power when the superpower status of the Soviet Union dissolved with the Berlin Wall leaving the US the only superpower if weakened.
Russia realizes that if China and US team up as the next Superpower Duo (two is always better than one for all concerned) and China certainly wants to, we will no longer compete with each other but retreat to our own spheres of influence – cutting Russia out once and for all.
This is behind Russia’s play in selling energy to the EU hoping they can align with them instead as a more equal partner.
Fear, pride and ego is behind much of Putin’s and Russian bluster.
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I will agree with Llama’s first paragraph. I can see a sort of detente between the US and China where we agree to stay on our side of the line and they on theirs. The thing about the Russians is that they have always believed they should control Europe, and I think the rest of Europe is a tad worried about that attitude, though I suspect that the “western” part of Europe would link up with Russia to defeat the now Islamic controlled countries Russia once ruled who I think will join in with the jihadists. I can even see a land war (WWIII), and sadly, I can see the US sending troops. But Mother Russia is still Mother Russia, so I wouldn’t trust them in the long run.
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Problem with China is that they have openly said they believe the U.S. is the hurdle to Chinese power, in their sphere of influence (Far East) and elsewhere. They consider any U.S. interference in Taiwan as an act of war. A Chinese general was even quoted as saying America’s West Coast cities would be target if America backed a Taiwanese independence movement. When pressed, the Chinese government didn’t rebuke the general or state he was out of line.
China has acquired and developed weaponry (nuclear and conventional) specfically aimed at U.S. forces: advanced over-the-horizon warplanes, destroyers with AEGIS-like systems, quiet conventional and nuclear subs, as well as conventional and cruise missiles. All these weapons are tailored towards a confrontation with the United States.
China is sitting quiet right now, allowing the U.S. to wage the war on terror. By sitting on the sidelines, China can gain strength without attracting too much attention. It seems like a generation ago that China downed one of our reconaissance airplanes.
I would trust the Chinese even less than the Russians. The Chinese are on the way up, geopolitically speaking and the Russians are on the way down.
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I wouldn’t trust either Russia or China. Both have horrible human rights records and are hungry for power. The U.S. government and intelligence community have spent years trying to understand how Russians think. Have they spent as much time deciphering the Asian culture and mindset?
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I’m not dismissing China, Lester, just saying that provided the “lines” are observed, they aren’t the immediate problem. We will ultimately have to deal with China, and just as we have to get over our dependence on oil, we have to get over our dependence on Chinese products. We had better find a way to return to being more self-sufficient.
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#8 I agree with Lester’s analysis. It is odd our “relationship” with this totalitarian monstrosity which only a few decades ago (before the spilled blood was even mopped up from Tiananmen Square) we were calling it our Most Favored Nation for trading.
The lead paint in the toys might be just another Sun Tzu “war by other means” strategy.
I foresee eventual dukeout with the ChiComms over the world’s dwindling easily attained oil reserves. I’m truly surprised they didnt come p with some lofty reason to go into Iraq for the big WMD hunt.
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The face of Russia’s new leader
Which one are we talking about?
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