Comments by "The Zero Line" (@The_ZeroLine) on "'Putin has become a caricature of himself’: Understanding Russia with Mark Galeotti | Podcast" video.

  1. 10:55 one of those combat mosquitoes the Kremlin’s been on about almost got Galeotti.
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  2. Galeotti gets everything right except his assertion that Prigozhin couldn’t have taken Moscow. It shows a fundamental misunderstanding of why the “mutiny” was succeeding let alone the conceit that police garrisons could have easily dealt with Prigozhin’s air and land forces. Oddly, one of the very reasons it was no means a forgone conclusion that Prigozhin would be stopped is the very thing he says himself, which is that if no one wants to commit to getting involved then it doesn’t matter what military assets Moscow had at its disposal or how superior he believed them to be.
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  3. Galeotti is great, but simply because he’s so much better than most of the faux “slavperts,” they trust him without question. I’ve heard a number of inaccurate and contradictory analyses from him re:how internal Russian politics work, the views of the general public, etc. When it comes to broad assessments, he vacillates between by 20% +/- on what % of Russians hold x view as the most minor of examples. Then again, half the Western media still take Russian MOD wires at face value. So, I guess, this is a massive improvement. Anyway, this was a generally excellent interview.
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