'..late 2016 is going to be a particularly interesting time in Russian politics.'<blockquote>'I spoke about Putin's hold on office with Mark Galeotti, a professor at NYU's Center For Global Affairs who has been studying Russian politics for decades. The real question for Putin, he explained, is the loyalty of a few key groups keeping him in power — and what might cause those groups to abandon him. He also explained why he thinks that 2016 might be the year that Putin's regime finally starts to crumble.
..
..if I had to predict a time when I could see all those things aligning, late 2016 is going to be a particularly interesting time in Russian politics.'
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How Putin could lose power, January 5, 2015</blockquote>
'..Mr. Dobkin recalled, describing [Yanukovych] as “a guy on another planet” who believed the deal brokered by the Europeans could still provide for a graceful exit later in the year.'<blockquote>'Also gone by Friday afternoon was Vladimir P. Lukin, the envoy of the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin, to the truce negotiations. He had put his initials on a text negotiated overnight but then vanished, returning to Moscow..
..
When Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, later complained to him that Mr. Yanukovych had been ousted in an armed coup, Mr. Sikorski told him that “this wasn’t a coup. The government was abandoned.” Mr. Lavrov, according to Mr. Sikorski, responded that “the police were without the power to shoot, so they were afraid of Maidan, so they left.”
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Met at the airport in Kharkiv after midnight by Mr. Dobkin, Mr. Yanukovych did not seem in a panic, or even to understand the gravity of the situation. “He thought this was a temporary difficulty,” Mr. Dobkin recalled, describing the president as “a guy on another planet” who believed the deal brokered by the Europeans could still provide for a graceful exit later in the year.'
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Ukraine Leader Was Defeated Even Before He Was Ousted, January 3, 2015</blockquote>
'..an insipid colonel's panic-stricken fear of losing his power, because of the ambitions of a clique of thieves swarming around the throne..'<blockquote>'The formula for saving any dictatorship is universal: create an enemy, start a war. We are back in Soviet times of total lies..
..an insipid colonel's panic-stricken fear of losing his power, because of the ambitions of a clique of thieves swarming around the throne .. Russians have a proverb: beat your own so the others fear you. It is hard to imagine officials in Berlin or Paris summarily banning food imports. The entire nations would burst in indignation that same day .. Every dictator hopes he is immortal, but since it is impossible, he is ready to drag everyone he despises into the black hole. And he despises everyone – both his own people and everybody else.
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Putin offered Europe his social contract. And with every new person willing to accept it, the black hole will grow and expand. One needs to realise: postwar Europe is already prewar Europe.'
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Russia, Ukraine and Europe have been into Vladimir Putin's black hole of fear, September 18, 2014</blockquote>
Context<blockquote>
'Rule of law emerges from property rights.' - Karen Dawisha ("Putin's Kleptocracy - Who Owns Russia?")To Nikolai Patrushev: '[Gaidar] warns Russia..''..the collapse of the USSR was the luckiest event in the past half-century..''What Russia needs today is to learn how to develop steadily .. avoiding wars..' - Yegor Gaidar'..repression against the opposition .. suicidal strategy. Russia's history..' - Yegor Gaidar</blockquote>