Karlin is worth reading because, though born in the Soviet Union, he spent most of his early years in England before repatriating himself back to Russia. As such, he is fluent in English and gives us a clear window into Russian populist/nationalistl ideology, an ideology that sees little room for reluctant recruits to their proposed Russian world to decide for themselves about joining.

This article was published a week before the invasion, and makes some surprisingly prescient predictions about how events would unfold, rejecting the idea held by most in the West that some kind of limited annexation of predominantly Russian areas was the goal. He got it right, and he thought it correct, and furthermore that there was a distinct window to execute this project that would likely not persist.

One fascinating aspect of his analysis is that he frankly acknowedges, and supports, the patently cynical negotiation stance of the Russian administration. Consider this: "Even as the military buildup proceeded apace, Russia forwarded demands to NATO to disavow further expansion (including Ukraine), and to withdraw foreign military forces from the ex-Warsaw Pact states. Regardless of one’s stance on NATO expansion, this is an objectively and patently impossible ultimatum, and the Kremlin clearly designed it to be so (even leaving aside the minor matter of their intended recipient being a country it has labeled as “agreement-incapable”

He was dead wrong on one aspect however: the level of Ukrainian resistance, and the manifest incompetence of the Russian forces. He thought it would all be over in short order.

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