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Comment by mikkom | Hacker News Reader

Evaluation of Russia by Finnish Intelligence Colonel (subtitles)

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kF9KretXqJw

I think this is something you should watch if you are interested in how russia works. It's very straight talk and clarified russian mindset a lot for me at least.

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Also a long and great Twitter thread: https://nitter.net/kamilkazani/status/1501360272442896388

He has a number of good threads.

He mixes evidence with unsupported opinions and just-so stories though.

Yeah I noticed that too. Glosses over things and doesn't explain them. Leaves you asking for sources and more proof.

Enjoying the notion of cartels as protostates. Makes a lot of sense!

Interesting bits:

* “the Russians have the ability to expect and endure a tremendous amount of suffering”.. “they have made suffering a virtue”

* “global recession is not really a problem to Russia since they are in a recession all the time anyway”

Kind of suggestive that what's happening won't be over anytime soon.

What do you expect, really? Russians live in feudalism, only with modern technology. They haven't known anything other than totalitarian regimes, and when they had a little democracy after '91, it all fell apart for most of them. Maybe all of the interested parties should read a bit of Russian literature? If you want shortcuts, just read Vladimir Sorokin, but it's really more nuanced. The thing about suffering is also very enshrined in the Eastern Orthodox mindset.

Watching this, I felt it all was a bit reductionist. But then again, if it does seem to explain how things work there...

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