Vladimir Putin is losing his grip on Russia | Hacker News Reader

Vladimir Putin is losing his grip on Russia

economist.com

62 pointsbazzmt57 comments

I've heard this about a hundred times over the years.

I think the same every time I read this, but at one point it has to give, right?

Nothing is going well and economically the population is feeling it. I imagine this can’t go on much longer.

Anecdotally, the people I know who recently visited Moscow and St Petersburg claim they're not seeing significant struggle, and definitely not the 'risk your life for violent revolution' type of issues.

Moscow and St Petersburg will be the absolute last places where you will see people struggle precisely because Putin knows it's important to keep those cities prosperous even if it's at the cost of people living outside of the major cities.

Sure, but that's already 20% of population counting metro area. Add other well off areas, university towns, upper class in small towns, etc. and it doesn't seem to be looking super bad in the short term for them.

The enlistment bonuses tell that story: from St Petersburg, you get 10x the bonus compared to Dagestan.

Because they are rich people who are in the rich parts of the richest cities. I’m sure if you walked the streets of Moscow in 1988 you wouldn’t see any significant struggle among the elite.

I am sure you have not walked the streets of Moscow in 1988. As someone who had, I can assure you, it was not very pretty.

Was the Russian party elite starving or not in 1988?

I am not sure what is "the Russian party elite". Regardless, how is this related to what people would see walking the streets in Moscow? (lines to the stores, people selling their belongings or random shit they have got in lieu of salary at work, delipidated buildings, literal open dirt everywhere etc).

You do not know what the party elite of the communist party was in the Soviet Union?

I do. I am, again, not sure what does this have to do with the topic. I now suspect you are trying to derail in an attempt to hide your ignorance of the state of Moscow in 1988. There is no need to degrade the forum for that. Just be careful to not talk about things you don't know about next time!

The Soviet Union, which was much worse, went on for a very long time. But it fell under similar circumstances, essentially bankrupted by a war in Afghanistan.

It's not so much when the population feels it, rather the elites who prop Putin up.

>I think the same every time I read this, but at one point it has to give, right?

If you repeat this same news every time, then you'll eventually be right, yes.

I don't think so. An oligarchy can hold on for generations, look at North Korea.

Are you talking about Russia or USA?

Oil is up by 100% in recent weeks. It might have to give, but probably not with these prices.

Their oil terminals are getting blown up at a faster pace than oil prices are increasing.

"A man who promises it'll rain will eventually be correct"

The mistake that we seem to see repeatedly is blindness to adaptation. Russia's economy would have collapsed had the Russian government carried on exactly as things were before sanctions. No economy will really truly collapse while the people in it need an economy: they will make changes.

At some point those changes might include stopping the war and getting rid of Putin.

I don't think all commentators fall into this trap, but more thoughtful predictions get overwhelmed by those expousing more impactful ideas.

It does seem that Putin has lost something recently, a grip on the hearts and minds of a subset of Russians that previously backed him come what may. The war has been quite static this year, Russia still losing a lot of men, and hardening domestic policy on Internet use. I doubt it's enough for violent protests.

I agree with you that war can easily become unpopular and turn people against their government. But is there any country, whose economy has been sanctioned by the foreigners and crippled by it, where the people then decided to overthrow their government? As far as I know my history, no. Foreign sanctions easily give every country an easy excuse to blame all economic problems on the foreigners. In every instance, they've actually united nations against their "common" enemy (i.e. the foreign sanctioner). They also provide an excuse to stifle criticism using state powers as any criticism on the government handling of the economy can be conveniently labelled as speaking the language of the "enemy" and / or supporting the "enemy".

While I understand that the true purpose of sanctions is to weaken a country's military, sometimes I do wonder if it is a war crime as it also ends up effectively "punishing the people".

Isn‘t Iran a good counter-example? Heavily sanctioned, huge uprisings.

No. While Iran is heavily sanctioned, the current "uprising" was foreign-instigated, and a poorly executed intelligence operation that tried to hijack what was otherwise a normal political protest (that is actually a usual occurrence in Iran, despite western media claims of "no democracy"). The hope was that just as in Ukraine, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal, peaceful political protests could be transformed into violent ones through planted intelligence operatives in them, which would naturally force the government to use state violence to control it. Amidst a disinformation campaign, this would result in an escalation of violence from both sides, which could then be fanned further through foreign-controlled social media platforms to instigate young idiots to join the "mass" protest and foment a "revolution".

The reason it succeeded in Ukraine and Bangladesh was because of a clear polity divide amongst the population, and huge local support from one of the political sides (including, very importantly, the army), which meant the double goal of (1) getting rid of an "unfriendly" government and (2) installing a "friendly" government could easily succeed. In Sri Lanka and Nepal, it has meant a regime change, but it isn't clear if whoever fomented the "revolution" - the west or the Chinese - have managed to get the desired "friendly" government. However, in all 4 cases, the so-called "revolution" has replaced experienced democratically elected leaders with inexperienced politicians at the helm (which is the second-best option you could hope for, if you can't install a puppet, as inexperienced leaders are more susceptible to political manipulations).

In Iran, what went wrong with this "revolution" is that, first, there is no real local support for pro-west or pro-Israel polity. All those who remember the Shah's regime (when Iran was an ally of the west) and had fond perceptions of the west are now either old or dead. Most of Shah's political supporters were either purged or left with the Shah to the US (or elsewhere). The later, and current, generation has only grown up experiencing American and Israeli hostilities. Irrational western Islamophobia and Israeli-right's hostility to Islam also doesn't help. Along with an understanding of imperialistic history, they despise repeated western attempts of interference in their politics and thus, overall, have have no goodwill to either regimes. Thus, those hoping for a regime change and the installation of the Shah were always delusional that any hostility for the Ayatollah could be translated to support for the west and the Shah. (Moreover, the current "Shah" - the son of deposed Shah - who the west hope to install in power, chooses to stay in US or Europe and thus has no support or understanding of the domestic politics of Iran, and he largely perceived as a puppet of America and Israel amongst the local Iranians).

Second, Trump and Netanyahu's regime underestimated the Ayatollah regime. They figured that just as in Ukraine, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka, the government would somehow cave-in under the violent protests rather than opt to suppress the political violence because of the high death toll. Perhaps they might have partially caved-in, if not, for Trump's and Netanyahu's very public "appeal" to the Iranians to "seize the moment" and overthrow the government. This immediately made the Ayatollah regime resolute that the revolution was foreign-instigated, and gave it a public excuse to unleash State violence as an emergency measure (that any State would normally do when faced with a foreign backed insurgency) against protestors. And as Trump's regime claims, the "revolution really failed because the guns that were supposed to be distributed amongst disgruntled Iranians never reached them. Moreover, Iran, that has been surrounded by west and western allies, that has repeatedly sought to undermine it, has been studying western imperialism and destabilisation strategies for decades now. After seeing what happened in Ukraine, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka (who were genuinely unprepared for an unexpected violent political protests, in their political planning), it probably already had a contingency in place for a similar situation that the west never anticipated.

Also, if the Americans and Israelis had been more patient, and not immediately attacked Iran, the high death toll (around 3000 or so) of the Iranian protestors could have been used against the Ayotallah regime. The deaths (and arrests) had resulted in a rise of anger and hostility against the regime, which could have been tapped in by the local opposition (who have been demanding further reforms in Iran's pseudo-democracy). All that political potential has been forever lost now because of the rash decision to kill the Ayatollah (who is now considered a martyr, and even more revered) and invade Iran.

Everything that could go wrong, has gone wrong, with the current political strategy against Iran ...

> But is there any country, whose economy has been sanctioned by the foreigners and crippled by it, where the people then decided to overthrow their government?

Arguably the Soviet Union. There's also a fairly strong argument, I think, that apartheid South Africa jumped before it was pushed, here.

There was also an attempt in Belarus, but Belarus is imperfectly sanctioned; it has Russia propping it up. There is no super-Russia propping Russia up, however (China's support is fairly conditional and Putin would be foolish to depend on it.)

Can you share some sources for the claim on Soviet union disintegrating because of sanctions? As far as I am aware, the USSR collapsed because its economy was mismanaged and extended, and the planned US move to depress oil prices finally pushed it over the edge. Moreover, Gorbachev was also an important factor to this.

I admit I don't know a huge amount about the history of sanctions. I would think it's a relatively modern phenomenon. In any case, yes I'd agree that people aren't going to cite them as a direct cause. Retrospectively they won't say that sanctions directly led to a political change. They add additional pressure.

I don't see the people in Russia overthrowing their government either. It seems more likely that internal public pressure would embolden a political change. It only takes the second layer collectively deciding it's politically expedient.

That doesn't necessarily mean the war stops though. Russia has been reshaping itself into a war economy to keep going, that might be hard to unwind.

Me too. What I haven't heard until very recently is normal people either unafraid to say it, or afraid of the consequences of saying it less than the consequences of what is happening.

They lost the plot, it's a little too late, but it's new.

Yes it's pretty clear the world gives the Russian people far more credit than it deserves.

But there have been some clear cases of Putin's omniscience leaking - the "3-day war" failure, the milbloggers he's has to imprison, the rebellion and loss of Wagner, the inability to protect Syria and Iran, every oligarch he has to execute, 20% interest rates. These aren't the indicators of a firm grasp of power.

I don't remember hearing he's losing his grip in the past. He always seemed pretty secure as dictator for life with any serious opponents like Navaly or Boris Nemtsov being killed in various ways. There seems more criticism now. Like from "Ilya Remeslo, a longtime Kremlin attack lawyer and propagandist":

>I have the impression that part of the system is already starting to work against Putin … It’s essentially … similar to what happened at the end of the Soviet Union, when people hated the [Communist] Party and did everything for it to end. Putin’s Russia will follow the same path as the Soviet Union. Everything is being repeated.

And if you were old enough, you'd have heard it about the Soviet Union, too. And nothing happened... until, abruptly, it did.

You have a good point but the thing is its hard to separate speculation, educated guesses and actual facts. There is so much propaganda mixed with fake news these days. You can't believe anything you read.

The USSR collapsed mid-reformation. Putin has no such misgivings about his politics, and will be harder to tear down.

The faster the world can go green, the faster Russia can collapse economically. It is the West that is holding this back by delaying global greenification. Imagine a world where the West was an exporter of green energy.

The only other way I know to weaken Russia, if only temporarily, is by funding Ukrainian drones targeting its fuel infra.

As a westerner i'm constantly bombarded with

> China is failing

> Russia is done for

> X is over

There are entire youtube channels dedicated to these circlejerks and they are forced into my recommendations all while we loose freedoms to 'fight foreign propoganda'.

This reminds of the EU's 29472th sanction package, that this time will 100% put Russia to its knees.

And the competing narratives that Russia is going to invade us all, but at the same time, is being defeated.

https://archive.ph/OraDr

not working for me. Just see the first three lines.

The article is paywalled

https://archive.ph/OraDr

Also paywalled unless I am bad at internet.

Doesn't work. Only shows a few lines.

Sorry. Maybe this and option 4 https://www.removepaywall.com/search?url=https://www.economi...

Yes, but now the archive.ph link you posted is working. It looks like they may have two paywalls, one when first posted and one for x hours later. Just a theory. Seems odd.

The more Russians are desperate the more coarse their propaganda is. Basically most nationalistic and even patriotic movements in Europe are fuelled by Russia, the closer to their borders the more it is true.

It's ironic that Economist keeps pushing this propaganda year after year, but it's UK that has worse and worse performing PM's, but every single one of them keep dreaming not about their own country and economy, but how to topple Putin.

This article was written by a guest author, and The Economist has plenty negative to say about the current state of UK affairs.

Writing an article is not an attempt to depose someone.

There are many, many articles on the front page of this publication that are not about Russia, so clearly "every single one of them" isn't even hyperbolically true.

Writing an article about the problems of a foreign nation when your own nation has problems isn't - and has never been - ironic.

I mean, the Economist has been... pretty sceptical of the UK's behaviour for a long time. It was extremely critical of Brexit, for instance. In 2017 and 2019 it endorsed the _Liberal Democrats_, for goodness sake.

Age and health issues can erode someone's power. But news like this are a dime a dozen. They might be right but this is propaganda 101. Eventually the prediction comes true and the news outlet can pin a medal to their chest.

Every once in a while they get to throw one about the enemy or any world leader out into the world and see if it sticks. Here's the Economist being super worried about Xi's grip on power [1].

[1] https://www.economist.com/china/2025/07/20/xi-jinping-is-gro...

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