The Russians are developing their paranoia nicely:
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin warned Russia's foes on Friday against trying to destabilize a country facing broadening economic crisis, Russian news agencies reported.
Putin did not specify who might pose a threat to Russia's stability. But in the past, he has often blamed Western security services of trying to destabilize the country using opposition groups and non-governmental organizations as their instruments.
"Any attempts to weaken or destabilize Russia, harm the interests of the country will be toughly suppressed," they quoted ex-KGB spy Putin as telling an annual meeting of top spies and security officers ahead of their professional holiday.
Putin and his fellow nutballs truly believe we are out to destabilize them? Good grief, at this point the best hope we have is that they don't actually believe this but are using this line to consolidate dictatorial power inside Russia.
This attitude is unfortunate since as much as we must contain Russia from threatening the West, from Georgia to Norway, we need Russia as a bulwark against a more powerful China that could rise in the future:
The Western response to the rise of Imperial Russia that is nuclear armed, pining for past glory, paranoid, militarily fragile yet with residual power sufficient to overpower isolated neighbors, demographically declining, and reliant on energy exports, is still in its infancy.
All we know for sure right now is that Russia has declared they are not our strategic partner. Yet they may one day be a critical partner for containing China. Russia is the Angry Sick Man of Europe. We must prop them up even as we contain them. This is a delicate mission, to say the least.
So Russia's oft-repeated claim that we are out to "get" them is ludicrous. We just want to hold them off from doing something stupidly destructive--as their Georgian adventure almost was--until they realize that they need the West, too.
I fear that Russia is immune even to hope and change. We're going to need a lot of luck on our Russia Project.
