In the 1980s, Western governments and experts overrated both the strength and likely longevity of the Soviet Union, with many assuming it would survive and perhaps even prosper over at least several decades. Now, Peter Zashev says, their successors are making a similar mistake about Putin’s Russia.

In fact, the Russian scholar now at the Stockholm School of Economics in Riga says, “Putin’s Russia is weak, even very weak,” despite the bluffing Moscow has once again used with such success to convince the West otherwise (moscowtimes.ru/2024/11/12/sploshnoi-blef-i-bravada-rossiya-putina-slaba-ochen-slaba-a147419).

Now just as at the end of Soviet times,........

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