larry johnson explores current russian realities with historical details as a comparison;

I miss Professor Stephen Cohen desperately. He knew and understood Russia as it is today. The same cannot be said for the current professor emeritus of Princeton, Stephen Kotkin. There is no denying his scholarship and his academic credentials, but based on his comments to Tunku Varadarajan, who is the author of a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed, he exhibits an ignorance and prejudice that tells me that he knows nothing of military affairs nor of the current conditions in Russia. While I do not claim to be a Russian scholar, I spent enough time on farms in Missouri (my home state) to recognize horse manure when I see it.

Varadarajan’s article — With Putin, ‘Ultimately, Trump Holds the Cards’ — is not even a clever piece of journalism and, in my opinion, is another indicator of the panic gripping the anti-Russian crowd. Varadarajan opens with this:

“Nobody can do more damage to Putin than President Trump,” Stephen Kotkin says. “Putin is actually afraid of Trump. Trump is the only one who could hurt Putin in a big way.”

Few in the West have a deeper understanding of Mr. Putin than Mr. Kotkin, 66, a historian whose monumental biography of Joseph Stalin—one of Mr. Putin’s heroes—awaits its third and final volume. Mr. Kotkin is a fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution and a professor emeritus at Princeton...........more.........