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Comment by blamarvt | Hacker News Reader

The people holding the guns are still just people though right? I think the point of these economic pressures is to eventually have those people with the guns turn around and point them on Putin.

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That's a much bigger ask than you seem to realize. Overthrowing a dictator is an incredibly bloody undertaking. Even if you win, there's no guarantee that whoever takes control of the country will be any better.

I am well aware of how big the ask is and it will be bloody either way. Acquiescing to a manipulative tyrant is the more painful option in the long run not only for Russians but also the world.

> Overthrowing a dictator is an incredibly bloody undertaking.

Doesn’t have to be. We did it in Portugal some 50 years ago [1]! I think just four people died.. We have been living in democracy since then, joined the European Union, etc.. So, it is possible..

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnation_Revolution

Portugal is only 10.000 square kilometres bigger than one of the Russian's "oblast" (region) I grew up in, and has twice less people living in it than Moscow city residents.

This is why only four people have died. Death toll in Russia in case of a mass revolution would be tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands.

Portugal has 10M people, Russia has 146M, so 4x14,6=58,4.. A similar coup would result only in 58 deaths.. ;)

Mate, this is not something that can be quantified just like that. I have been to the Portugal once, and your people are very peaceful and friendly. I'm afraid this is not the case with rural Russia -- which means that any confrontation would be deadly and very, very bloody.

This is exactly why I'm doing what I can, but avoiding any violence. This is not the way we win this.

You are right, I was only playing with the numbers, hence my smiley on the end of the sentence. Every case is different, violence should be avoided if possible!

I think that Carnation Revolution also benefitted from the fact that dictator Salazar, who ruled the country for 37 years, had already been dead for 3 years when it happened.

The people who hold the guns do not use Namecheap they use official Russian registrators. Sberbank(which is under the sacntions) for example payed tens of thousand of dollars (https://habr.com/ru/news/t/591929/) for prolonging its domains(seems like corruption right?). Namecheap was used by simple developers, but I see that it was mistake to trust them.

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