Putin Earlier won Support by Promising Stability and Predictability, but His War in Ukraine has Destroyed Both, Gallyamov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Feb. 24 – With his war in Ukraine that is now entering its fifth year, Vladimir Putin has undermined the stability and predictability that for the first two decades of his rule had been the basis of his popular support among Russians, Abbas Gallyamov argues (t.me/abbasgallyamovpolitics/9775 reposted at echofm.online/opinions/proshhaj-stabilnost-2).

            “People used to know what a waited the country tomorrow and the day after,” the former Putin speechwriter turned anti-Putin commentator. “Now all that remains is a memory; and if there is no stability, then there is no reason for people to cling to Putin” as they have in the past.

            According to Gallyamov, Russia “has suddenly become so unsettled that it seems things can’t get any worse;” and it is that sense which is “the main domestic political outcome” of his war in Ukraine, a situation which in the final analysis is of Putin’s own making. Had he not started the war,  he could have continued in unquestioned power for far longer.