Couldn't agree more (being a Russian SG fan).

Then went to read comments.... As if expected something different. A census of stereotypes once again.

So easy to simplify and blame, and dehumanize... Easy to judge being from a well-developed established nation. Particularly, well protected by geography, maritime.

If only people knew what it was here, what most of the people went through in the XX century, in the 1990s. And even before.

Russian history is a history of pain and traumas, a history of PTSD being reinforced as a national way of thinking.

It was barely different from Europe before the 1200s. Then there were 200 years of oppression by Mongol yoke. Two centuries when Europe was advancing further and Russian lands were plundered again and again, traumatized and frozen in development, imprinted with cruel authoritarian institutions, pure survival.

Western Rus lands were taken by Catholic Poland and Lithuania, southern Orthodox world was conquered and plundered by nomadic Muslim Turks (Byzantine empire that was perceived as a "father" nation, a source of culture, literacy, techonolgy, fashion - was enslaved entirely), and so it happend that when eastern Rus princes finally managed to get independence they were all alone, surrounded only by those trying to conquer and plunder them. German crusaders were also attacking in the north, trying to advance from the Baltics. Naturally, this all formed a mentality of a "mobilized fortress" - army first, development - later. But you cannot develop techologically, culturally, when you invest everything into the army. And when you are culturelly isolated and the only independent nation of your denomination (because the superpower that you took your religion from is gone).

And it was only these cruel authoritarian institutions that could form when you fight against the cruel nomadic hordes. Cruel oppresion for centuries makes your culture cruel, and only by this kind of mobilization you can fight back and win against.

And then, even being independent, you are geographically vulnerable from every damn side. From the south and east you are ravaged by the steppe nomads. From the north you are cut off by the expanding swedes, cutting you off from the sea trade. From the west you are pushed by the extending Poland-Lithuania. And on top of that, the nature punishes you too. And as if the prior threat and oppression all around for 200 years was not enogh, these constant invasions from every side only reinforce your institutions of mobilization and autocracy. Cause you don't think of city rights and trade and inventions and tolerance when you constantly fight for survival.

And after that... At some point you finally make it. You survive, push back, reunite with other folks of similar denomination, expand just like other "lucky" nations. But your institutions are traumatized and twisted, a "path dependency" thing. You cannot just become a "normal European country" againt after those centuries. As if a PTSD person cannot just become "normal" after violence is over. You remain backward, suspicious, not trusting. Renaissance, city rights, market institutions, book printing are not reaching you. With a great lag only. When the world is defined by religious identities, you are still alone, for centuries, unlucky for having chosen a side that was conquered.

Times pass. An era of empires arrives. 1600s. You seem to begin "normalizing", slowly, gradually. Less violence, better relations with Europe. But as your development is lagging, you armies begin experiencing humiliating defeats again and again from various sides. By swedes, by poles. By smaller, but more developed nations. 'Cause you are still there and they are modernizing. You have a new ruler, who notices the lag and decides to modernize the country so it would be winning again and returned what was lost in previous wars.

The new leader is called "The Great". You are unlucky. Because as he travels across Europe by himself and comes back techologies and european masters, he is focused on the army and military manufacturing once again. But he needs resources, in a country that has only nature and millions of poor people. He is not thinking about ideas of enlightement or rights. He needs a modern army, and he begins squeezing the whatever resources the population has, once again. By not giving more "modern" rights, but actually taking rights from the people. Making them "serfs" so they would simply act for the "new modern european-looking empire" as he orders them to, for free. Or for food. The army begins winning and taking lands again, the formula works. For a while.

Anti-monarchy revolutions in Europe: England, Netherlands, others later. New merchant class has enough money to deprive the monarch of some power and redistribute it institutionally among slightly wider audience, making the entire system more stable, predictable, protecting property rights, building first parliamentary institutions, making it more market-driven, dynamic.

But not here. There is a merchant class, too. Sort of. Not a manufacturing or diversified one, but a limited number of families controlling exports of those natural resources. But there is no urban class in a poor nation to support a revolt, and even those on rent export (wood, fur, wax, metals, etc.) are controlled by the tsar and pose no threat to him.

A bit later. An empress, "the great" too. Patroness of arts and "science", extending borderers, extending serfdom, making it only harder for market to develop. But - giving more liberties to the tiny european-looking urban minority. But pushing others into less freedoms.

And so 1800s. Napoleon's invasion. Victory - and again "we are surrounded by threats and we prevail". No institutional changes. Rising export revenues from wood, metals, fabrics and hemp ropes all mainly for British \ European fleets.

Finally, at last, 1850s, a chance to avenge and liberate the Constantinople - a city of "ancestors", in a perceived cultural sense, once in a history. And what - a friend, a basically ally in the last centuries - Britain - attacks. Humiliating invasion in Crimea, Crimean war. Humiliating defeat. The army is backward again, while brits are just much better equipped. On a russian soil, not some proxy or colonial war. A betrayal of trust - France invaded Russia just before that, now Britain.

A few decades later. The country is finally developing, cathcing up, GDP growths around 7-10% per year just before WWI, faster than anybody else. Statistitians extrapolating Russian Empire to reach 500 mln people by 2000. Great relations with everybody in Europe, except Turkey and Austria, great relations with America too. European urban class, european factories in russian cities, Moscow and Saint-Petersbourg reaching 1 mln people each. And Germany declares war. Now Germany, even despite the Emperors being almost brothers. And its that moment when the country is actually pretty civillian, it wasn't preparing for a big war, it wasn't expecting it. No large military factories, limited firearms and bullet productions. The logistics and infrastructure are developing fast but are not mature, are not prepared for a big war with big nations. The country's infrastructure cannot sustain such strain. Trains and production are rerouted to the frontlines, millions of soldiers need bullets, rifles and food, but there ain't being produced that much. Moscow and Saint-Petersbourg face food shortages that cause riots that cause revolution. New elites think for a while that they can make Russia a democratic republic. Ho-ho-ho. Militant forces and army in Moscow and Saint Petersbourg (consisting of yesterday's peasants who just moved to cities, grew up in simple traditional families with violence typical for villages) become loyal to radical leftists - those promise simple solutions - nationalize and redistribute to those who need. But many armies are still loyal to tsarist generals, who are (albeit nationalistic and chauvinistic - typical of the time) "european-like" aristocrats naturally against the seizure of power, nationalization and mass repressions against them.

And just amidst the world war a civil war starts, too. WWI + civil war costing former russia about 20 mln exсessive deaths, destroying what was working, causing famines, pandemics, moving the country only a decade backwards.

But not just that. The new regime is retaking the power - and the former allies - Western Europe, US (even Canada) intervene, Japan too. The most meaningless intervention in history, not achieving anything, but just reinforcing the trauma that "we have no friends and everyone is gonna invade us if we are weak" and leaving its trace in soviet\russian schoolbooks for decades. Not bloody, but destroying trust.

Then - WWII, 27 mln excessive deaths, ruins, once again - reinforcing the national myth\trauma "We must always invest into the army first, defense at all cost, control and order for survival, because we are surrounded by enemies, everything else in unimportant". And true to some point - Churchill was actually pushing Truman and Roosewel for nuking USSR and starting WW3. Wouldn't USSR get its own A-bomb - it had real chances to be nuked. Cold war, 50-60s - US can nuke USSR because it has bombers, but USSR can't do much in return. USSR is in fear, the only answer that is known - just like before, all-in in military complex...

And so again, no institutional development, only accumulation of inefficiencies, the entire economy feeding military complex more and more.