I don’t think anyone, especially from the US or Russian banking or political sector understood the understated Russian situation that has gone on for two decades.
Go and review the whole Cyprus banking failure and ask why so many Russian billionaires came into Cyprus and did their investing into Europe via this ‘gimmick’. They simply didn’t trust the Russian banks, or the economy. They took their profits and moved them into Euro or dollars. The guys who stayed around and played with the Russian economy....keeping their cash there....they’ve lost big-time.
Russia is unable to sustain itself. I seriously doubt that Putin is still around in a year...considering the lack of a recovery phase.
-——Russia is unable to sustain itself———
That is the essence of the problem, succinctly stated truth.
Russia never made it to the 21st century and possibly never will.