Putin has Not Learned that Expansionist Wars No Longer Build Empires but Lead to Their Downfall, Inozemtsev Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Oct. 7 – Until the start of the 20^th century, the use of military force to build empires was a cost-effective strategy, Vladislav Inozemtsev says, because relatively few troops had to be used to gain the bases of wealth, the occupied lacked the ability to resist, and technology flowed from the military to society rather than the other way around.

            Most leaders around the world have recognized this new reality and avoided trying to build empires by military means alone, the Russian economist says; but one who hasn’t is Vladimir Putin and his war in Ukraine is likely to lead to the downfall of precisely what he hopes to build (novayagazeta.ru/articles/2026/10/07/krest-zavoevatelia).

            For most of human history, using armies to conquer land and the natural resources on it, the two key elements of national wealth and power, made sense. Armies were small, losses were restricted in number, and those so occupied were less able to resist because they lacked the resources to do so with confidence, Inozemtsev says.

            But over the course of the last century, each of these elements has changed beyond recognition. Land and the natural resources in it are no longer the most important bases of national wealth and power. Military actions entail far larger losses, and those against whom they are directed can use means others call terrorist to resist, Inozemtsev continues.

            By the end of the 20^th century, it had become clear to most that wars of conquest to build empires represented “a cross of the conqueror,” in which “the willingness of peripheral peoples to resist had increased the price of war … and the decline in the comparable values of resources [like land] relative to production and innovation had reduced” the returns on such actions.

            In short, the Russian economist and commentator says, “by the end of the 20^th century, at least for those who know how to understand history, war had ceased to be an instrument for effective political and economic expansion.” Instead, it put those who launched such military actions at risk of losing the powers their countries had before they started these wars.

            Another change, one seldom attended to, exacerbated the consequences of “the cross of the conqueror” in the 21^st century, Inozemtsev says. ”It concerns the role of war in economic development and technological progress of countries at war or those potentially involved in such conflicts.”

            As war become more technologically advanced in the course of the last century, governments made most of their investments in technology in the military sector and counted on those investments to “spin off” into the civilian sector. But over time, government spending on such investments declined and the private sector increased investments.

            Consequently, in the most recent conflicts, governments have been forced to acquire the technology they need from private sector firms, making the vitality of such firms critical to the success of any military effort. Western countries have such a private sector advantage; Russia quite obviously doesn’t.

            What that means for Russia in its war with Ukraine is this: Putin has launched a war on the basis of an out of date understanding not only of the ability of states to build empires now by military means alone but after having completely failed to understand both Ukraine’s remarkable resilience and Russia’s lack of a vigorous private technological center to support its army.

            Putin’s prospects to achieving his goals are close to zero over the longer term, however many temporary and partial victories he may appear to be winning.

Soviet Myth of Caucasian Longevity Just That and Other Russian Regions are Offended, ‘Svbodnaya Pressa’ Commentator Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Oct. 7 – Near the end of Soviet times, the New Yorker featured a cartoon about longevity in the USSR. The aged figure in it in North Caucasian dress was asked to what he attributed his great age. He responded, while eating a bowl of porridge, “I have never criticized the state.”

            That cartoon was a Cold War echo of a myth the Soviets promoted that the oldest people in the Soviet Union and indeed in the world came from the North Caucasus, a myth that the Putin regime has continued and thus offended other regions in the Russian Federation, the Svobodnaya pressa portal reports (svpressa.ru/health/article/534937/).

            In fact, Russian researchers say, there were then and are now relatively large numbers of people in the Middle Volga and Sakha who have lived more than 100 years; and they and their governments are angry that Moscow writers focus only on the centenarians of the North Caucasus.

            Living so long reflects a variety of factors, including but not limited to genetics, diet, activity levels, and family support. In portions of the North Caucasus, Moscow scholars say, these factors combine in ways that boost the chances people will live to great age. But those factors are present elsewhere, these Russian investigators say.

            Focusing on the North Caucasus alone reenforces the view that living to a great age is the result of genetics alone rather than reflecting as well personal choices and social patterns, something that discourages people living elsewhere from taking the necessary steps or demanding them from their government to ensure that some of them will also live longer.

Creation of Tatarstan Academy of Sciences in 1991 Prevented Mass Emigration of Scholars and Helped Other Turkic and Muslim Countries as Well

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Oct. 7 – When Kazan set up its own Academy of Sciences in 1991, most observers saw that as little more than a component of Tatarstan’s efforts to achieve independence; but today, 35 years later, the real contribution of that act was to prevent the mass emigration of scholars to other countries, Kazan officials and scholars say.

            In 1991, many even in Tatarstan opposed the idea, participants at an anniversary meeting said; but they lost out to those who said that the three Baltic republics, “whose total GDP is less than that of Tatarstan has its own Academy of Sciences and asked why can’t the Tatars have theirs?” (milliard.tatar/news/sozdanie-sobstvennoi-akademii-nauk-v-kazani-spaslo-ot-emigracii-vydayushhixsya-ucenyx-tatarstana-10524).

            Because the academy was established and continues to grow, scholars who might have left for Moscow or other foreign centers largely stopped. They have made contributions to the republic and to its ties with the Turkic and Islamic worlds, and they have helped other Turkic and Muslim peoples in the former Soviet space develop as well.

‘Ice Free Arctic’ Won’t Be Safer for Ships or Require Fewer Icebreakers, Western Experts Say at Oslo Meeting

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Oct. 7 – Most discussions, Russian and otherwise, about the future of the Northern Sea Route begin with assertions that the Arctic will be ice free by 2050, making the use of that sea lane easier and safer, allowing for the expansion of trade and reducing the need for icebreakers.

            But speakers at a conference on Arctic security held in Oslo last month say that all such assertions are at a minimum problematic and may lead those concerned about Arctic transit to reach the wrong conclusions (arctictoday.com/an-ice-free-arctic-ocean-in-2050-doesnt-actually-mean-ice-free/).

            Tony Russell, executive director of the Center for Arctic Study and Policy at the US Coast Guard Academy, was among those insisting that there is a compelling need for a more nuanced understanding of what is going on in the Arctic and how those who hope to expand use of it must act.

            That “the Arctic will be ice-free in 2050 … is a great headline,” he said. “It’s truthful but it isn’t the full story.” First of all, there will still be nearly a million square km of sea ice, an enormous amount; and because it will be less thick and therefore more mobile, this remaining ice may make shipping ever more hazardous. Others echoed his words.

            Consequently, he and others said, how much use the Arctic sea lanes will allow will depend on the development of infrastructure, including more ice breakers not fewer to cope with the  mobile ice. Building them and other infrastructure for the route will be enormously expensive, especially since the prime season for transit won’t expand.

            And that in turn means that many governments and businesses will conclude that such investments are not cost effective and that they are better off to use alternative routes which do not require the same amount of money to maintain their current volumes or even support greater ones. 

Astrakhan ‘Port’ Now a Bottleneck as Far as Trade with Iran is Concerned, Moscow Experts Say

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Oct. 5 – Russia’s trade with Iran via the Caspian faces many obstacles including the silting up of the sea and the reduction in the size of ships and the weight of the cargo they carry that has led to, but none of these problems rivals the bottleneck that Astrakhan now represents, Moscow experts say.

            In newly published research, they argue that it is not appropriate to call Astrakhan a port as such. Instead, that term is used to describe wharves spread along more than 100 km of the Volga river and its delta, transshipment points that in many cases are not directly served by railroads (ng.ru/economics/2026-10-05/1_9596_port.html).

            That has multiplied the difficulties in intermodal transfers, a problem that has affected all Russian ports on the Caspian, including Astrakhan if one can call it that, Olya and Makachkala but has been obscured in recent months by increases in trade via all three as the result of the use of ever more workers to shift even bulk cargo, let alone finished goods.

            Moscow needs to develop a real port in Astrakhan, something that will be enormously expensive given that it will require not only the construction of new rail lines to the existing wharves but also concentrating wharves and building ships that have shallower drafts so that they can use them.

            Moscow’s ability to build such ships quickly is limited by problems with its yards and the absence of funds for such efforts and by the Russian government’s proclivity to build bigger ships at a time when the declining water levels in the lower Volga and the Caspian mean that smaller ships are the only ones that will be able to function.

            As a result, trade between Russia and Iran via the Caspian is likely to slow and then even stop in the relatively near future, and both countries, although saddled by Western sanctions have few choices, are likely to look again at rail transit through countries to the east and west of the sea if they are to achieve the trade volumes officials in both have been talking about.   

Relative Size of Different Rising Generations Varies Widely across Russian Federation

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Oct. 6 – Many discussions about the future of the Russian Federation focus on the impact of the rising generation which will replace older people whose lives and ways of thinking were formed in Soviet times and who often continue to act accordingly, but the rising generation varies in many ways.

            One of the most important involves variations among those groups identified as boomers, millennials, and zoomers in the West not only in the Russian Federation as a whole but in terms of the relationship of the size of these groups in various regions, another product of the demographic differences among them.

            The To Be Precise portal now provides data on these differences, variations that are likely to play a growing role in the way in which people living in them will behave and how leaders who seek to appeal to them will act (tochno.st/materials/karta-pokolenii-gde-v-rossii-bolse-bumerov-millenialov-i-zumerov).

              Millenials, those born between 1946 and 1964, now account for 21 percent of the Russian population overall and are the largest generation in 28 of Russia’s more than 80 federal subjects. They dominate in predominantly ethnic Russian regions where birthrates have been lower and outflow of migrants greater.

              Generation X, those born between 1965 and 1980, form almost 21 percent of the population.  According to the portal, they are “the only generation that does not prevail in any region of Russia.” Instead, boomers, millennials or zoomers form larger shares of the rising generations there.

              Millenials, those born between 1981 and 1996, form 24 percent of the population, some 35 million people in all and the largest generation in Russia and also the one who experienced the radical changes during their personality forming years. It dominates areas around the two capitals and in oil and gas producing regions.

              Finally, the zoomers, born between 1997 and 2012, now account for 17 percent of the population of Russia. In four republics where birthrates have remained highest – Ingushetia, Chechnya, Tyva and the Altai Republic—they form a larger share, between 23 and 29 percent of the total population.

Astana and Moscow Agree to Joint Monitoring of Irtysh and Ural Rivers

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Oct. 5 – Despite any progress towards an agreement on the diversion of Siberian river water to Central Asia and Russian anger about Kazakhstan’s demand for a voice on the way in which Moscow handles the flow of the Volga into the Caspian, the two countries have agreed to joint monitoring of the Irtysh and Ural, two transborder rivers.

            In fact, the two countries have been negotiating on this possibility for some time, even as conflicts over the much larger issues have continued. (On earlier talks, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2026/07/moscow-and-astana-inch-toward.html; and on public clashes on such issues, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/08/russians-outraged-kazakhstan-wants.html.)

            The Kazakhstan Altyn-Orda portal says that at a recent meeting in Yekaterinburg, the two sides did agree to continue to monitor flows of the transborder rivers, study the impact of those on water resources, and work to prevent flooding (altyn-orda.kz/kazahstan-i-rossiya-dogovorilis-sovmestno-upravlyat-irtyshem-i-uralom/).

            Such meetings and the accords they often produce are a reminder that even when countries in the former Soviet space may very publicly disagree on headline issues, they often continue diplomatic contacts that may open the way for progress on bigger questions later.