Weaker Than Before Summary

 In WELT this morning, if you open up the paper, there is an opinion piece by Clemens Wergin entitled "In the end, Russia will be weaker than before".  

I don't just agree with the summary....I'd double the spiral going on in Russia.

The Chinese will be the 'major' trading partner for years to come, but they've got all the 'aces' in this hand to ensure they get better deals than what the Russians can ever offer.  If you need car-parts as a Russian company....you will get them, and probably pay 110-percent of the going rate.  

Upper-class Russian grinding their teeth daily.....over the lack of western products?  That feeling will reside for the entire next decade.  Don't bring up the latest fashion....the latest electronic gear....the latest in Nike tennis shoes....the latest in French-made E-scooters....in their presence.

The Russian elite who jetted off to London, NY City, or Miami five or six times a year?  Well....they will quietly grumble as their destinations are mostly a Lake Bakal cabin, a luxury Volgograd 3-star hotel, or a Cherepovets wellness hotel with a free bottle of vodka each day.  

At least ten-thousand Russian families will gather each year to remember Yuri....their son who was drafted off in mid-2021, and failed to return from the war.  Other than a letter from the state government about his demise....a medal which came in the mail....and some guy from his unit who did visit to state where Yuri met his end....that was the simple conclusion of his life.  A lot of these people won't accept this ending.

If you'd asked Putin about a lesser-Russia existing, he'd deny such a thing.  But it's a long path for people to just settle upon and accept.  In simple terms, the country has been flipped over over, and become a modern-day North Korea.  Maybe Russia is lucky....at least they have electrical power, plenty of gasoline, and the 22th most powerful military in the world.  

In the end, they aren't a super-power any longer, and they don't sit in the shadow of the twelve-odd countries with a real GDP.  They rest somewhere just marginally above Brazil.