g5000
Diamond Member
- Nov 26, 2011
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Are we seeing the beginning of the end of Putinism?
Wartime leaders change generals when they’re losing, not winning. On Jan. 11, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that Valery Gerasimov, chief of the general staff, was to replace Sergei Surovikin, who was appointed just a few months earlier in October, as his new overall commander of Russian military forces in Ukraine. The only reasonable conclusion: Putin understands that Russia is losing in Ukraine.
[snip]
Third, Putin’s societal support is soft and declining. Public opinion polls show he still enjoys popular support. But these polls in Russia have high refusal rates, which should not be surprising in a country where you can go to jail for 15 years for “public dissemination of deliberate false information about the use of Russian Armed Forces.” The minority responding to these polls supports the regime, but the majority who choose not to respond likely do not.
[snip]
Likewise, a paranoid Putin felt compelled to shut down many independent media channels — including TV Rain and Echo of Moscow radio — and ban Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Yet viewership of Russian state-controlled media outlets is declining while audiences increasingly consume independent media operating from exile. Viewership of Navalny’s YouTube channels, operated by his team in exile, jumped dramatically in 2022, especially after Putin announced a new draft in September. (Only a week after the order was issued, as many men or more fled Russia than enlisted.)
Even Putin's propagandists know the cause is lost:
"The USA was the main winner of 2022. Especially Biden."