Putinism, ‘an Unstable Isotope,’ Now Decaying into Its Component Parts, Pastukhov Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Feb. 3 – Putin by fighting in Ukraine “reconciled” two hitherto unreconcilable camps, that National Bolsheviks who wanted a Soviet Union and the Black Hundreds who wanted no Ukraine at all, Vladimir Pastukhov says; but as the war continues, this division is undermining both Putinism as an ideology and political stability in Moscow.
    Putin was able to unite these two groups precisely because he did not announce or at a minimum was never clear about exactly what he wanted from the war, the London-based Russian analyst says; but now that there is talk about ending the conflict, the question of what he wants is central (t.me/v_pastukhov/1378 reposted at kasparov.ru/material.php?id=67A0EA8C3FAB9).
    And because that is happening, both the unity of Putinism as ideology and the unity of his political system in general is increasingly at risk given that Putinism has always been “an unstable isotope” ready at the first opportunity to “decay” into it component and in many cases competing component parts.