cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/45454904
Mounting economic hardship and growing public discontent could push Russia toward internal conflict, a senior Kremlin official has warned.
The stark message comes as inflation, war fatigue, and social divisions deepen across the country.
Alexander Kharichev, head of the Presidential Directorate for Monitoring and Analysing Social Processes, issued the warning in a state-run journal.
[…]
Military over social spending
Rising prices have hit ordinary Russians hard, with food costs climbing well above the national inflation rate. Businesses are struggling to stay afloat, and layoffs and bankruptcies loom large.
Despite the pressure, the Kremlin continues to prioritize military spending over social welfare.
At the same time, Russia’s workforce has been decimated by more than a million war casualties, mostly men of working age, worsening the long-term demographic decline and ageing population.
[…]
Kharichev warned of “fragmentation of society” and the “loss of Russia’s ability to fight for its survival.”
His analysis cited the growing erosion of public trust in government and widening rifts within Russian society.
[…]
You must log in or # to comment.
What’s incredible is this wouldn’t be the first time Russia has spent such an insane amount of money on a futile war they absolutely collapse.
Collapsing is a proud Russian tradition. And now the US gets to do it with them!
We couldn’t afford the Vietnam war. The Nixon Shock sealed our fate - it’s just been very gradual.
As soon as it became clear how much russia botched the invasion initially, I’ve thought of vovka as Tsar Nicolas III
Be careful what you wish for. We might end up with Soviet Union Two: Electric Boogaloo.
Maybe this time they won’t dismantle the worker’s councils after the revolution, that’d be nice.
We’ll get Stalin 2.0.
As in, an improvement on the original (fewer famines) model? Or an upgraded, more effective (bigger famines) model?
2040: A group of Neo-Bolsheviks seize control of Russia, fully intending to literally make fully automated luxury gay space communism real. Imagine a publicly owned vast automated supply chain that produced goods at scale with little human effort. Go full tilt on automation of all kinds, but direct all profits to the general welfare. Maybe do away with money entirely. It would start with a genuine utopian dream.
2060: Neo-Stalin rules over what was once Russia. Its human population, long since more trouble than they were worth, were largely done away with. The population of the country is approximately 2300. Yet the combined industrial output of the automated leviathan that sprawls over what was once the Moscow-St. Petersburg corridor now exceeds that of the PRC. And a frightening fraction of that is directed towards military purposes. Their population reduced to a handful of oligarchs still controls the first, second, or third most powerful military in the world, depending on form of measure.
Maybe they’ll get it right this time and will be more resilient to capitalist interference.
Yeah… That was the problem…
Can we get the Czechoslovak legion involved? They sounded so cool.
Waiting for international women’s day any day now.
So it’s a race, is it? USA! USA! USA!
Wouldn’t it be great if all the empires collapsed and everybody just like, learned their lesson?
hahaha
I’m sorry, I think they have a lead. You (?) can come up from behind and get ahead afterwards, though, like in the space race!
I do enjoying coming from behind.
Sources: Reuters, BBC, AP, Express
This article is made and published by Jens Asbjørn Bogen, who may have used AI in the preparation
haha okayyyyy
That guy better stay on the ground floor for the rest of his life. Anything higher up than oh say about 30 feet gets so darn slippery this time of year in Moscow that you just wouldn’t believe it.
And stay away from tea too. And silenced handguns aimed at the back of the head. Just so many accidental ways people are dying nowadays
I hear the Polonium is lovely this time of year…
I recently heard Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Russian political dissident, give a talk. He survived two attempted poisonings among other things. He described how the current method of poisoning is for Putin’s henchmen to sneak into your home and put polonium into your underwear. So this guy might want to consider walking around naked for a while as well…
Russian technology is so advance that high rise balconies exist everywhere, including basements and submarines.
Why are you, Mr Kharichev, so interested in windows?
I’ll believe it even I see it, just like any Trump news.
Seriously. Russia was supposed to collapse in 2023. Then in 2024. Then in 2025. Putin was sick and he was about to die. Endless supply of hopium. At this point I consider it all fake news until proven otherwise. Also there was the recent Money & Macro economic analysis that contradicts a lot of the hopium theories. And there’s the whole contradiction between impending economic collapse and lauching war on NATO countries. The two are mutually exclusive.
Yeah, with Putin’s approval at 80% it’s hard to see a civil war happening any time soon.
Sometimes things go out with a bang. There’s a good chance that Putin’s regime also survives it with only some regions falling out with it first.
Yep. History curves to justice my ass.
We didn’t start the fire, we didn’t light it but we tried to fight it. And fucking failed the open book test each time.
According to Vlad Vexler, in Russian political/bureaucratic culture this is not to be understood as real analysis and more to be understood as functionaries pitching themselves as useful to Putin: https://youtu.be/ZJryUKULZ_E
Love Vlad Vexler, he nailed almost everything since the war started. Russia is actually not that complex, it’s just a very big gang really.
Well, that took long enough. The Russian people should be in revolt.
“Ivan, pull the lever to lower the price of vodka a leetle bit more, the peasants need to be pacified.”
“But, Gregor, we are the peasants!”
Rethinking my EU5-related life choices right now
It’s crazy how much it start to seem like Russia and the US are like 2 sides to the same coin. It’s almost like a small minority of persons with highly lethal weapons give them some sort of complex that leads them to believe they can make decision for everybody else at the cost of other people’s livelihood.
Putin and Trump, and their respective countries, have lots in common. It’s almost like they’re marching in lock-step.
Yes. But trump isn’t sending thousands of soldiers every week to die in the meat grinder… yet.
He’s working hard on catching up, no worries.
And he doesn’t even have to invade. He will kill his own people using his minions.
Just wait
I think Mr. Kharichev is about to get window’d.
Every once in a while a story like this gets published and it occupies the news cycle for a little bit. They always end up being nothing.
A few years ago Putin was reportedly on his death bed. Prior to that he had aggressive Parkinson’s and would resign in 6 months.
I suspect this is just a smoke screen for something else.
Indeed. If this happened it seems unwise - even if it was part of an essay suggesting doubling down on Putinist “family values”. I don’t recognise the source, though, and not much else comes up that I trust more on a search.
Edit: I found this. Maybe it’s time to get my Russian practice in. The title does indeed read as described, at least.
Update, it was a journal article/paper, I don’t have access, and I didn’t find a copy anywhere.
“Russia risks new Lenin”
Hooray!
Anyone hoping this means they stop funding scammers to trick Americans into voting against their best interests, too bad, that’s one of their best revenue streams.
Yeeaaaahhh, no, that won’t stop unless indeed a civil war breaks out in Russia.
