Aha: the article explains further down. It’s all very well being able to dig up thousands of tonnes of oil and iron but that’s no use when your citizens want TVs and jeans.
So I wondered this as well... Given the vast resources within Russia there's no reason why they can't build their own TVs or make their own Jeans. Obviously that's currently not the case, but a society that has a space programme can surely achieve this?
That's up to Putin. I think the Oligarchs have perhaps lost there power and leverage within the last 10 days.
> Also capitalism and startups are a culture. People who don't grow up around others that think like that don't ever learn how to think in that way.
This is where China steps in. They offer to build factories / infrastructure in exchange for oil & gas. This is what they have been doing in Africa.