A problem that I have with Andre's perspective is that he never expresses that Russia has anything to atone for regarding deeds done in the past, or that the past sheds possible light on the present. The country can do no harm, past or present. He will say it was just some thugs...lots of thugs. Causing famines on purpose or simply outright murdering and displacing millions, sometimes whole villages wiped out, it all gets a free ride. I wonder if such details are in the history books over there? It took Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn to tell what went on in the gulags, and his writing was banned. It's like Andre regularly wants to go put flowers on the graves of some very cruel Russian leaders, never acknowledges the horrors of their periods of rule. Rated one of the most corrupt countries in the world, yet reading Andre, Putin and his cronies walk around bathed in a celestial light.
Pointing out the evil deeds of someone else, be the accusations true or not, to take the heat off your own culpability in problematic affairs, is something very common in certain parts of the world, and still goes on today. Putin seems very skilled at that, when times are not good for the Russian people, the west is to blame in one capacity or another. Russian people hearing that just go, "Yeah, the evil ones again". Feed the people's resentments, it's an old trick that still works. Pawns in a game is what we are....