Russia is the same USSR with different names; same KGB, Putin, etc., same power elites. Which do have different factions, to be sure, some more warlike than others. But nevertheless, the leadership thinks they are a bunch of cool tough guys.
They simply realized USSR was broke and could not keep up with the military spending, it was a joke. So they “collapsed” the government and told the West they were abanding communism. Which is really just a bunch of power elites anyway !
Now the power elites in Russia are free to acquire wealth without fear of being labeled a “corrupt communist” because there is no more “communism” there. Now it can freely just be corrupt. Which it is, top to bottom. Like how much the real price is of a Moscow apartment and what people declare it is for tax purposes.
The real “war” is going on to bring down the U.S. from the inside, because it will eliminate our military from policing anything. IMHO, you have a much differnent situation if the U.S. is militarily out of the picture.
Once that happens, the big rich guys in Russia - and anywhere - running business and government have no threat from anyone or anything to impede them from going back and picking up the satellite countries that they let go when they “collapsed”. Politicians historically have always seen satellite nations or colonies as cheap raw materials and labor.
IMHO, Europe is mistaken in thinking that Russia poses no threat. If you have two hungry dogs and one plate of food, you get a fight. I think many agree that the future holds the distinct possiblity of resource-related wars.
Well since the end of the USSR russia “only” has a population of 138,739,892 (July 2011 est.) people anymore.
and a GDP of $1.465 trillion (2010 est.) (official exchange rate)
The EU on the other side has a population of
492,387,344 (July 2010 est.)
and a Gdp of $16.07 trillion (2010 est.) (official exchange rate)
So do the math.
If the EU really only would spend 1% of gdp which really would be nothing! russia would still have to spend 11% (which would ruin any country) of their gdp to get to the same numbers.