Comments by "John Walsh" (@johnwalsh4857) on "James Bruno - 1st hand Insights from Georgia, where Russians are Increasingly Unpopular and Resented" video.

well in Afghanistan a disproportionate number of Soviet fighters came from the Central Asian Caucasus and Baltic states. that brought out a lot of resentment later, leading to unrest in those areas and later break up from the Soviet union, in Chechnya many of the rebels were ex Soviet Afghan war veterans who used their experience that they learned in Afghanistan to fight the Russian army defeating them in the 1st war,
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there was also a massive spike in violent crime in Russia post Soviet Afghan war and the 1st Chechen war, this war will probably spark a worst crime wave than the previous one in the 90s. in fact possibly unrest and rebellioin in the poorer ethnic parts of Russia.
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Also another possibility is Russia becoming a decentralized semi anarchic state, while still semi stable with the technical Rule coming from Moscow from the Russians states esp. in the caucasus , far east central asia have a lot more leeway of independence, most of the centralization from Putin's time is gone, Like Russian states acting liek almost seperate countries but still defer to Moscow as the captiral of a Russian federation or more like a Russian confederation. After this war is over, the Moscow gov. will be focused on economic survival and maintaining stability. and not military and territorial expansion. I think the Russian confederation will be much influenced by its neighbours esp. USA/NATO, China and Turkey who influence their favorite puppet Russian state. While Russia certeinly will lose a a lot of central planning it will still maintain cohesion and stability more or less.
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well the FSB does not control the entire show, its rivalled by the Russian army and the powerful GRU which has been there a lot longer than the FSB. Its said teh GRU actually has more influence than the FSB.
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the way the Russo Ukraine war is going , with the rise of Russian PMCs, succession of power in Russia might well be decided by the power of the gun , the military might of the PMCs, that is a civil war.
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Well the Russian war in Ukraine is a bit worse in in terms of casualties nd intensity than even the Soviet Afghan war of the 80s and the two Chechen wars. In Ukraine the Russians lost around 100K casualties, in ten months, in Afghanistan the Russians lost probalby around 50K casualties in ten years and the Soviets never mobilized their population for that war. nor did they mobilize for the two chechen wars, Russia has not mobilized its population for war since WW2. and with mobilizations the Russian population is definitelyi feeling it albeit not the ones who are politically important since the Russians are mobilizing in the poorer less politically significant areas of Russia but once the Russians start mobilizing significantlyi from Moscow, St. Petersburg etc. then you will have a major even critical political problem in Russia regarding the war.
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@ned900 yep that is true but the GRU still has some clout its not been destroyed or absorbed by the FSB, Putin may be a dictator but he does not have full power, he has to still please certain factions to remain in power.
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@concernedrabbit9075 Yep true, and as said, the casualties in this war was not seen by Russia since WW2. and I dont think Russian society is ready to absorb WW2 like casualties, for Ukraine. the Russian motivation to fight and win this war and conquer Ukraine is not there. Unlike the WW2 generation.
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@uzstiklo7141 from what Soviet vetrs of the Afghan war told me, many of the soldiers sent were from the Baltics, the Central Asian Caucasus and Far East states. The Baltics were considered by the Soviet leadership having questionable loyalty hence many were sent to Afghanistan. THe Russians , Ukrainians , Belorussians , the three main political states of the USSR got the nice quiet jobs of being sent to East Germany and other warsaw pact states facing NATO.
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@ned900 yep I was old enough to remember the KGB I remember I was in the Cosmos hotel Moscow in 81, saw all these suppoed Russian civilians in the lobby suddenly jump up and confront a local Russian who went thru the front lobby door. Cosmos hotel moscow as I recall the only 5 star hotel in moscow in the late 70s early 80s and the only hotel where foreigners were allowed gto stay iin with KGB minders and probably bugged hotel room. HOwever as I said, the GRU is a seperate intel dept and at times rivalled with the KGB and the NKVD. GRU is not so well known and they control or are controlled by the Russian army chief of staff and the GRU controls the Russian army's spetsnaz units.
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I think the oligarchs getting bumped off in large numbers in Russia can also mean Russian is cleaning house, getting rid of people who gave information to Foreign intel agencies, the Russian gov and military is so corrupt to the point anything has a price, I think intelligence on Russian gov and militarhy is so leaky that the US gov. knew the invasion date when many Russian generals did not. Also I think many oligarchs gave the info freely since they were really opposed to the war.
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