alt Hacker NewsThat's misunderstanding the model of actors. "Russia" isn't "Putin". "Countries" act in the best interests of their power structure, not their leaders.
Basically: the way this ends is when the collective will of the power centers (generally the armed forces, though not always) decide that they'll be wealthier and happier with Putin gone than by following more orders.
And obviously that's an unstable/unpredictable equilibrium, because groups don't decide collectively like that and exactly how a coup works is never known until it does. But it's the way literally every other government of every other failed state has fallen[1], and there's no reason to think this one will fare any differently.
[1] Well, there's "unexpected death of the leader" thing too.
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>> "Russia" isn't "Putin"
However putin is a good representative of russian people who easily travel to other country 5000+ km to die for cash and imperial narratives. If putin dies tomorrow war wouldn't stop.
> That's misunderstanding the model of actors. "Russia" isn't "Putin". "Countries" act in the best interests of their power structure, not their leaders.
No, I am not misunderstanding. For all intents and purposes, at the moment Putin’s will is Russia’s will. And it looks like he knows his weaknesses within the country and is willing to let marginal populations bear the weight of his ambitions while keeping his power base comfortable enough. Of course he might end up like Stalin, at which point who knows? But it might not be much better for Ukraine, and in the meantime Putin keeps giving the orders.
> Basically: the way this ends is when the collective will of the power centers (generally the armed forces, though not always) decide that they'll be wealthier and happier with Putin gone than by following more orders.
He can get most soldiers rich enough for this to drag on for quite a long time. They probably would be happier elsewhere, but they don’t have a say. The generals is another problem, but so far Putin is quite effective at finding loyal ones.