{"id":4359,"date":"2016-09-28T19:18:45","date_gmt":"2016-09-28T16:18:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/?p=4359"},"modified":"2017-11-14T21:27:37","modified_gmt":"2017-11-14T19:27:37","slug":"how-does-putin-do-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/how-does-putin-do-it\/","title":{"rendered":"How does PUTIN do it?"},"content":{"rendered":"

An expected 100 million Americans and probably an equal or greater number of overseas viewers will be watching the first presidential debate tonight<\/span><\/span> between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Expected at the least are fireworks and the likely shedding of a great deal of rhetorical blood, bile and vitriol.\u00a0 But no matter how the debate turns out, either candidate could only imagine achieving after the vote on November 8th<\/sup> what Vladimir Putin accomplished in Russia\u2019s election of the Duma last week.\u00a0 With a personal favorability rating of over 80% and 343 of 450 Duma, Putin exceeded the most stunning electoral victories of any American president.<\/p>\n

Of course, Russia is not America.\u00a0 Only 47% of the Russian electorate voted, lower than the American average suggesting a long term problem if it means Russians are less enthused with Putin. \u00a0 Reports of voter fraud numbered in the thousands.\u00a0 Nor has Putin reacted kindly to opposition in any form whether politicians, oligarchs or the media.\u00a0 Yet, despite these negatives, Putin has cemented power more or less through the ballot box and personal popularity to which I can attest from my last trip to Moscow.<\/span><\/p>\n

From an American perspective, the only way this was possible was through the heavy-handed and occasionally brutal tactics of an autocrat.\u00a0 After all, the Russian economy is still fragile.\u00a0 The war in Syria is proving excessively costly and seemingly without end.<\/p>\n

Economic sanctions remain in place. Russian aircraft continue to harass NATO ships and patrol planes in international air space and waters. One Russian fighter closed to within ten feet of a U.S. surveillance aircraft—a dangerously provocatively maneuver.\u00a0 And NATO is beefing up its defenses on its eastern most borders in response.<\/p>\n

Of course, opinion polls and Duma votes could have been rigged—as one of the candidates for U.S. president warned would be the only reason for his defeat.\u00a0 Putin has surely advanced the cult of the personality as Stalin did. But cult status was later used as one of the reasons to topple Stalin\u2019s successor Nikita Khrushchev.\u00a0 However, public support for Putin does appear strong and far, far stronger than that in America for either Mrs. Clinton or Mr. Trump.<\/p>\n

The reasons are clear.\u00a0 First, universally, Russians want a leader who is seen as strong, clever if not smart and acting in the state\u2019s best interests.\u00a0 Putin fills each of these criteria, at least\u00a0so the moment. <\/span><\/p>\n

Second, different states have different idiosyncratic motivations for evaluating leaders.\u00a0 Russians have a sense of insecurity baked into the national DNA over centuries dating back to invasions by the Tatars and Mongols.\u00a0 Russians believe that their country should be respected internationally.\u00a0 And Russians believe in the uniqueness of their culture. Putin understands this.<\/p>\n

Third, Russians have a long and tragic history of enduring great hardships whether under tsars, the Communist Party or invaders.\u00a0 The same endurance applies today with a flagging economy.\u00a0 The question is how long this capacity for suffering will last in age of instant, global communications in which Russians compare their standard of living with other countries.<\/p>\n

Putin knows his constituents. Perhaps his KGB training and education have enabled him to master both wholesale and national politics by exploiting that knowledge to influence, convince and even coerce his citizens to support his leadership. Some of the answers to Putin\u2019s success and longevity may emerge at the end of this year.\u00a0 Two years ago, Putin promised that the economy would improve by early 2017.<\/p>\n

If Putin can have some of the EU sanctions lifted or if energy prices soar, then the Russian economy will indeed improve.\u00a0 The latter seems very remote.\u00a0 The EU will decide on the continuation of its sanctions.\u00a0 But if Putin is prepared to negotiate over Ukraine, there could be a softening. If not, that is a problem.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Putin is attempting to strengthen ties with China.\u00a0 Energy deals and a recent joint naval exercise in the Pacific between China and Russia could be harbingers of Putin engineering a reverse Nixon using China as a lever against the United States.\u00a0 Putin views the Shanghai Cooperative Organization (SCO) as a geostrategic and conceivably economic counterweight against the EU and even NATO.<\/p>\n

In many ways, Putin knows how to play a weak hand.\u00a0 Whatever his strengths, President Barack Obama has not been able to outplay, outthink or outmaneuver Putin. Neither has Mrs. Clinton.\u00a0 Mr. Trump thinks he can.\u00a0 Should he be elected, Trump will get the surprise of his life.\u00a0 This is not New York real estate where gaming the system works.\u00a0 This is the big time.\u00a0 And, if polls count, Putin ain\u2019t bad at this game.<\/p>\n

______________________________ ______________________________ ____<\/p>\n

Harlan Ullman is UPI\u2019s Arnaud de Borchgrave Distinguished Columnist and serves as Senior Advisor for Supreme Allied Commander Europe and at the Atlantic Council and at Business Executives for National Security (BENS) and chairs two private companies. \u00a0<\/i>His last book is A Handful of Bullets:\u00a0 How the Murder of Archduke Franz Ferdinand Still Menaces the Peace. <\/i>His next book due out next year is Anatomy of Failure:\u00a0 Why America Loses Wars It Starts.<\/i><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An expected 100 million Americans and probably an equal or greater number of overseas viewers will be watching the first presidential debate tonight between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Expected at the least are fireworks and the likely shedding of a great deal of rhetorical blood, bile and vitriol.\u00a0 But no matter how the debate turns out, either candidate could only imagine achieving after the vote on November 8th what Vladimir Putin accomplished in Russia\u2019s election of the Duma last week.\u00a0 With a personal favorability rating of over 80% and 343 of 450 Duma, Putin exceeded the most stunning electoral victories of any American president. Of course, Russia is not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":4358,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65,76],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog-en","category-harlan-ullman-en"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4359"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4359"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4359\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4360,"href":"https:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4359\/revisions\/4360"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4358"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cass-ro.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}