March 1, 2022

Russian op-ed on Putin

Link here
[T]here are far fewer people actually out protesting. You have to understand that ordinary people in Russia are scared out of their minds. On the first day of the conflict, almost 1,000 protesters were jailed across Russia for walking outside with as little as a piece of paper that said: “I don’t want war.” According to the independent media source OVD-info, in the first four days of the war more than 5,200 people were arrested.

My friend spent time in jail for walking down the same street as the protesters. A professor of sociology, Grigory Yudin, was arrested in the centre of Moscow and reportedly beaten up in the back of an autozak (police bus).
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Putin, who is so keen on history, is unknowingly digging his own grave. With Russia cut off from Swift and facing sanctions from the EU, the US, and the UK, it’ll take only a few years before it runs into extremely hard times. And when it does, people will not be afraid any more. If history teaches us anything, it’s that people – even ones as stubborn and patient as the Russians – will not tolerate a lack of food. When the money runs out, so will Putin’s clock.

And we – the new generation of Russians – will be waiting.