Kremlin’s Turn to China May Spark Violent Protests by the Russian People Once They See the Consequences, Pastukhov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Dec. 4 – Vladimir Putin and the Russian elite have turned to China as the best way to keep themselves in power, but that turn is likely to lead to Russia becoming a satellite or even colony of China, something many Russians won’t like and may respond to with violent protests once they recognize those dangers, Vladimir Pastukhov says.

            The London-based Russian analyst adds that while there is no doubt that the turn to China is the choice of the Russian elites, there are good reasons to think that it is hardly the choice of the Russian people, something that may have political consequences within Russia in the future (t.me/v_pastukhov/876 reposted at echofm.online/opinions/ne-start-programmy-russkogo-mira-a-ee-zavershenie).

            According to Pastukhov, “Putin’s elites are currently pursuing narrow and purely corporate interests. Relying on China seems to them to be the only way to prolong their stay in power; and if they are lucky, to make that stay permanent. For that end, they are turning back the wheel of Russian history” even beyond Alexander Nevsky.

            As a result, the elite in Moscow is “essentially a comprador one.” And because that is so, what the Kremlin is doing is “not the start of the ‘Russian world’ program but its completion. That this is happening under the guise of protecting sovereignty only makes it especially amusing” and dangerous.

            But it is an open question as to whether Russians as a society will agree to this. At first, of course, they are likely to be indifferent as it doesn’t matter who is dominant as long as it isn’t the United States, Pastukho says. But that is likely to be the case only “until the practical aspects of Chinese influence began to be felt.”

            “Is Russian business ready to be second in its own home? Are local brothers ready to fall under Chinese ‘triads’? Are local communities ready to coexist with giant Chinese ghettos on their territories? The response to these and similar lifestyle changes is unpredictable” and one very real possibility that can’t be ruled out is violent protest.