The political scientist and political technologist spoke about how Vladimir Putin tried to shift the focus of people's dislike for himself with the help of the war against Ukraine.
Abbas Gallyamov expresses the idea that from the point of view of building a stable democracy in Russia, "the longer Putin sits, the better." He explains this by the fact that the Russian ruler, by his actions, discredits authoritarianism as such and demonstrates the exhaustion of this option for the country's development.
"That is, if he is quickly overthrown," says Gallyamov, "Putin's supporters can say that he turned out to be weak and another strong leader is needed. But no, guys, make sure that all the talk about a strong leader, enemies around, and a course built on confrontation with the outside world is all a dead end in itself."
The political scientist is convinced that the more troubles and ordeals Vladimir Putin brings to Russia, the more obvious it will become that his system does not work.
"Of course, it is blasphemous to say this because people are dying, but war is also good in the long run. She showed all these militarists that everything is a lie.
The Russian army, about which they raved that "Russia has only two allies - the army and the navy", in fact turned out to be a paper tiger. And the vertical of power, to which they prayed and fetishized, is not even capable of organizing mobilization - recruits go to war, equipping and arming themselves at their own expense, as in Europe in the Middle Ages. And this discrediting should become obvious,†sums up Abbas Gallyamov.
The political scientist and former speechwriter for Vladimir Putin also suggest that if the Belarusians succeeded in putting Alexander Lukashenko to rest in 2020, this would further increase the likelihood of full-scale Russian aggression against Ukraine.
"In this case, the war would definitely happen. Because the overthrow of Lukashenko would greatly increase the protest mood in Russia."
The growth of foreign political tension, and the escalation along the outer perimeter, is exactly the way Putin is fighting against the growing protest moods in Russia.
In other words, according to Gallyamov, Vladimir Putin needed war and escalation because his approval rating had been falling since 2018.
“He became less and less legitimate president since the Russians were no longer interested in foreign policy, but began to be interested in domestic,†the expert notes. "They were tired of all this endless talk about the Americans, NATO, and they began to look at the situation inside the country. And nothing good happens there: neither in the economy, nor in politics, nor in the cultural sphere - nowhere. There are stagnation and degradation everywhere.
That is, as a result, the Russians suddenly saw the light, and Putin's ratings went down. Putin needed a nosebleed from rising tensions on the outer perimeter to get them interested in foreign policy again and to turn Putin's criticism into an act of hostility towards the country again."
Thus, one of the reasons for the Russian aggression in Ukraine, Abbas Gallyamov, names the fact that at some point, the criticism of the Russian ruler within the Russian Federation "ceased to look like an act of betrayal, but he needed it to look like that."
"So that the security forces feel that their hands are untied, so that people themselves are afraid, and the captain of the besieged fortress, as they say, is not criticized. He intensely created tension and at some point could not resist, believed in his greatness and broke into a real war."
Gallyamov does not rule out that a real war was not initially included in Vladimir Putin's plans at all - he just needed the escalation process itself.
"By issuing an ultimatum and starting saber-rattling at the borders, he was sure that Zelensky would break down and at least partially accept his ultimatum, and Putin would look like a kind of a winner of NATO.
But Putin suddenly found himself in the situation of a hooligan who terrorizes everyone, and then suddenly someone comes up to him and says, “Get out of here.†Well, how not to hit after that? If you turn around and leave, you will not be respected by your own people. So I had to hit."
