A Dying Russia Likely to Lash Out in Death Throes

“Russia will be experiencing a population decline not seen since the plague of the Middle Ages,” said Jackson. “This is a cause for concern because an extreme misalignment of geopolitical aspirations and demographic fundamentals can lead countries to behave unpredictably.”

Will Russia meekly accept the fate of its demographic decline, or will this trend feed extremism and provoke aggression?

“Russia has window of opportunity that is closing soon,” said Joe Purser, director of the JFCOM Futures Group. “It may face a situation in 20 or 30 years when it will be unable to see to its own security.” _ISN

If Russia's ethnic Slavs are aging without replacement, who will work to pay for the pensions of those who cannot work?

...in January 2010 the Kremlin may be paying nearly 40% more for old-age pensions than it is paying now because of Russia’s runaway consumer price inflation, which runs well above 20% on the tiny basket of staple products that ordinary Russians need to survive.

Where will the Kremlin get the money?

It has already wasted more than half of its FOREX reserves on a futile effort to artificially inflate the value of the ruble and the stock market. It is planning to spend a huge chunk of its budgetary reserves to cover existing expenses in 2009, when it will be entering a full-blown recession and incurring massive debt. It’s planning a gigantic increase in military spending, and now it will face the crushing burden of monumental new, permanent, pension expenses — or the prospect of senior citizens starving and freezing as their existing pensions are whittled down to nothing by the plague of inflation. _LR

The Russian economy -- like the ruble -- is in freefall. Russian doctors earn $1.25 an hour. If the doctor is willing to work overtime, she may earn as much as $2.00 an hour!

"At the state hospital, I earn $200 a month, $400 with overtime," Bogdashov says. _npr

Russian men typically die in their 50s. Drug and alcohol abuse have become a staple of Russian life, beginning in the early teenage years.

"You see 12-, 13-year-olds sitting in the benches, just drinking beer like soda. So young. That's a problem," Kelleher says.

It's even more of a problem in villages outside the city where life has stood still. Abandoned by anyone with ambition, the shabby wooden houses lean to one side, seemingly as drunk as many of the remaining residents. _npr

Putin ignores the internal tragedy of Russia, since it is the outward projection of Russian power that concerns him. Putin will need to move against the Ukraine soon, to solidify his ability to project force into central Europe and the Mediterranean. What will Obama do in response? He will bend over as far as Vlad requires.

Under the Obama administration, American foreign policy's initial focus is on fighting the Afghan war. So the question regarding the Russian resurgence is not what the Americans will give the Russians, but how much and how publicly. This will give the United States greater leverage in dealing with what it has identified as its prime concern, but at the cost of both creating a greater challenge in the future and undermining the strength of the Transatlantic alliance structure. _Source_via_LR

Russia will build a wide fence of disaster around itself in an attempt to create a safety buffer. Given the demographic collapse of ethnic Slavs and the demographic rise in the Islamic ethnic groups of Eastern Europe and Central Asia, such a policy is likely to bring on the downfall of the Russian state even more rapidly.

Chechen warlords and other powerful Muslim fighting groups within and near Russia are biding their time. They will take payoffs from Putin and fight small wars like the one against Georgia for the booty. But eventually they plan to walk the streets of Moscow as owners.