I do have some concern Putin lashes out.
This will be the second time within a generation that a sitting Russian government has fallen due to economic pressures.
IMHO the first time occurred in the mid to late 1980’s when the economic impact of Reagan’s SDI (aka “Star Wars”) program hit. There the Soviet government was faced with either continuing the old ways and becoming economically and politically irreverent or drastically changing. They attempted both and failed at both.
Now, 2014, Russia is facing a second economic crises because the US becoming, again, an economic power house through oil production (aka fracking). The current Russian leadership is facing almost the same economic and political choices as an earlier generation did in the 1980’s. With the egos involved and the Russian basic socio-political mindset there is no easy alternative. In the near-term future Russia will have to accept, again, second hand status when it comes to world economic-political-military power.
I have only two questions.
1. When will the third such crises hit Russia?
2. When will the Russian society really change? After three economic collapses in 100 years with two leading to drastic changes in types of central governments something has got to give.