Putin’s success was largely based on the very high cost of oil. Anyone could have been successful with that price, as we see all over the world. But let’s see how much success he has now as the price drops lower and lower, especially when he’s trying to modernize his military to overtake the West’s technical advantages. The military issue matters because Putin has taken Russia back to its Imperial ambitions. It’s also matters because it’s a big waste of money, like so much of what Putin does it benefits his cronies and his constituents but not most Russians. Facing no threats from the West beyond peaceful differences, Russia has no reason to spend so much on defense. Yet having started the process, defense spending will come before social spending. If Russians were close to parity with the West for standard of living and under threat, spending so much on the military might make some sense. Putin is turning Russia into a poor country again in much the same way that Venezuela turned from easily achieved success to failure.
You say that as it's something bad. Social spending isn't a conservative thing, while the defense one is. Check the topics on the U.S. government spending on this forum.
Yea, no duh Putin’s success was based on a very high price of oil. Even Ronald Reagan would not have been able to diversify an economy that was that booming based on the high price of oil because the incentive to change was not there - especially just out of the disastrous post commie Yeltsin era.
If anything, the low price of oil and commodities will incentivize Russia to diversify.
The rest of what you wrote was just filler - I never brought up military issues or geopolitics. All I write was that Putin has been the best leader of Russia ever. Less deaths and more prosperity than under the Czars and under the Commies. I know that is kind of shocking to read but the Czars had Serfs and bloody rule (that dwarfs any sort of blood letting people can accuse Putin of carrying out) and we all know how bloody commie rule was and how poverty stricken it was. Even on any sort of freedom index Putin’s rule surpasses the freedom available to people under the czars and commies.
So, yes, from the Russian perspective - Putin is the greatest leader Russia has ever known.