Arnaud de Borchgrave, in the Washington Times, offers an interesting alternative reading of Putin's Russia.
The disoriented Russian leadership eagerly accepted the advice of well-meaning American economists who advocated cold-turkey market economics and democratic politics. Enormous chaos ensued, as well as revolving door politics.
Boris Yeltsin followed a path well trodden by France's Fourth Republic after World War II: a new government every six months. Until Mr. Putin came along, that is. His model was France's Fifth Republic, which Charles de Gaulle began crafting when the army brought him back to power. This could only be done by throttling back on the excesses of democracy, which had followed four years of Nazi occupation. A democratic free-for-all in Russia followed 70 years of communist repression. A strong presidential system at the center, structured by Putin, put an end to chaos in Russia, just as de Gaulle had done in France.
Mr. Putin rescinded elections for governors in Russia's 89 regions in favor of Kremlin appointments, again emulating France's system of some 90 prefects appointed by the president and reporting to the interior minister.
Remember the furor over that?
When this reporter wrote Mr. Putin's two geopolitical mentors were de Gaulle and Gen. Pinochet in a forward to a 2000 study on Russian Organized Crime for the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the new Russian president messaged back: "Thank you for the homework -- and for understanding what we are attempting to do."
So what we have now is preferable to the Soviet Union. Fine. I wonder how stable Putin's regime is and can it survive him?
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