The Russian government is constantly fighting corruption. At least, officially. Officials are arrested. Criminal cases make the news. Putin regularly demands that state money be protected from theft. Every few years, another anti-corruption campaign begins. And yet corruption remains everywhere. The reason is not that the Kremlin has been trying to defeat it and somehow…
Russia’s war in Ukraine is damaging the country in almost every possible way. It is burning through men, money, equipment, infrastructure, labor, markets, and the last remains of normal life. It has made Russia more dependent on China, more isolated from Europe, more militarized, more corrupt, and more afraid of its own future. So the…
Nicholás Maduro was one of Putin’s “friends” outside Russia. Now that he’s arrested, who the Kremlin still has to rely on? What heads of state openly support Moscow? And how far are they ready to go? Russia doesn’t just lose an ally when a dictator falls. It loses a hiding place. A trade route. A…
Today, we’re going to talk about what 2026 is likely to bring in geopolitics. We’re going to zoom out and focus on the deeper shifts — the forces that move slowly, reshape everything around them, and determine what the headlines will look like years from now. Here’s our roadmap for today: The Instinct Trap Here’s…
What do Putin and his circle actually want Russia to become?Not the slogan version. The real one. If you strip away all the talk about “sovereignty,” “traditional values,” and “multipolar world,” you don’t see a modern state taking shape. You see a clan kingdom. A feudal system where power, money, and safety pass by blood…
Russia is a country at war. And yet, in a nation that claims endless “heroism,” you will not find a single living general whom the public is allowed to admire. That absence is not an accident. Look at Ukraine. In Kyiv, a mural of General Valerii Zaluzhnyi towers over a Soviet apartment block — a…
Our lives are set by people in tailored suits—those who write laws, spend our taxes, and quietly redraw the rules we live by. We call them elites: the few who control resources, force, and stories. From that control flows status; from status, power. To understand the chaos around us, we have to understand them—who they…
What happens after Putin is not a parlor game. It is the logic of a dying empire. Dynasties need heirs. But modern autocracies breed only rivals and debts. Today, we’re going inside Russia’s real Game of Thrones to see why Putin’s dynasty ends with him. Here’s our roadmap: 1. The USSR as a Modernist Project…
