[goldstategop]

Putin is an autocrat. That doesn't make him a friend of the West. Russia has more or less reverted to the Soviet period except now nationalism rather than Communism is the source of its aggressive designs on Europe and elsewhere. Solzhenitsyn doesn't see this since he has a blind worship of Russia's government. A democracy isn't built by repressing internal dissent and murdering your own enemies abroad. The Slavophiles imagine they're bringing about freedom. In fact, they're helping to bring into being its exact opposite.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Russians were dominated by authoritarians for centuries before the Bolsheviks came along. Paranoia is in their DNA.

[RusIvan]

Putin is an autocrat. That doesn’t make him a friend of the West. Russia has more or less reverted to the Soviet period except now nationalism rather than Communism is the source of its aggressive designs on Europe and elsewhere. ==

Almost true. But you forgetting it was West who provoke Russian into this anti-westernism. Bombing Serbia started the path. Until that Russian approvement of USA was about as the Putin rate -70%. Now it is near 7 maybe.