If the US oversees the optimization of the EU’s military-industrial complex, military logistics, and other defense-related matters with a view towards “dwarfing” Russia’s associated capabilities, then the challenge that Russia might face along its western frontier could mirror the one in June 1941.
Germany in 1941nwas a super power. Today the EU countries have to face a nuclear armed Russia. Russia has 45% of the worlds nuclear weapons and can & would if it had toi blow te EU countries off the map in a few days. So the EU countries will behave. They are smart enough to do that.
I agree except with the "they are smart enough to do that (behave)" as the current European misleadership has shown to act irrational and counter to European interests. As long as the gynecologist and the daft fashionista stay in their current European (unelected) positions, we should expect the current irrational auto destructive political course to remain steady.
The worst danger of Europe for Russia is less a direct agression that a permanent pression against the country and seduction of "elites" for mining the russian will to stay sovereign.
"If the US oversees the optimization of the EU’s military-industrial complex, military logistics, and other defense-related matters with a view towards “dwarfing” Russia’s associated capabilities, then the challenge that Russia might face along its western frontier could mirror the one in June 1941."
If we compare with 1941, Germany was not prepared for an attritional war but banked on a Blitzkrieg, same as against Poland and Western Europe, forgetting the scale of USSR. Those in the know knew at the end of October 1941 that Germany will loose the war. Right know, Europe as a totality is a midget compare to what Germany was in June 1941. Plus, strategically speaking, Russia dwarfs EU in terms of military arsenal. I do expect that the first Russian salvo against Europe, to bring them to their senses would be horrible. Also, I really want to see Europeans building a war driven population. Yeay, they are going to cut the social safety network to force people to seek refuge in the military, but it won't work and it even has the potential to turn against governments. Maybe 2048 will become a new 1848. But this time, the Conservative Czarist Russia will not be there to save European Monarchies from the revolutions. On the contrary, I t might sell itself as a "refuge" of the ever poorer and increasingly authoritarian EU...
"...darker periods of their shared history with Russia"? I might be misreading this, but it seems Russia is always to be blamed for something regarding Poland. The general population of Poland is also quite ignorant of their own share of quilt towards Russia. What about the Shuysky Tribute on October 29, 1611, where deposed Tsar Vasily IV Shuisky and his brothers were forced to kneel before Polish King Sigismund III Vasa in Warsaw? Or the Polish occupation of Moscow (1610-1612)? Or the Polish Catholic unethical and forceful proselytization of Orthodox population in Poland and Russia?! It has to be said that Polish-Russian rivalry has a religious undertone as well.
Both sides committed injustices against the other's state and people throughout their millennium-long rivalry, which did indeed have an important sectarian dimension for centuries but no longer plays any role therein.
Nevertheless, some "Non-Russian Pro-Russian" and even Russian influencers have claimed that Poland and Poles are to this day still motivated by sectarian interests in opposing Russia, but that's flat-out false.
That narrative was only seeded into the Alt-Media discourse to rally Russians against Poland and further discredit Poland in the eyes of their targeted audience. Their contemporary rivalry is strictly geopolitical, there's no sectarian dimension whatsoever at all.
Sure, there are few fringe Polish voices online that rant against Orthodoxy, but the average Pole doesn't even think about it, in fact, many don't even think about Catholicism anymore according to recent surveys (it's just an inherited cultural trait for many nowadays).
You don't even see any reference to Orthodoxy in publicly financed Polish media and think tank attacks on Russia, it's literally a non-issue and purely the product of the abovementioned information warfare campaign that I believe is also self-discrediting.
That said, circling back to the darker periods of their shared history, as you noted, it goes both ways, but listing every single semi-significant historical grievance and explaining each fairly from both sides' perspective is understandably far beyond the scope of this analysis and can't be reasonably expected.
What I've noted from Alt-Media however, especially its "Non-Russian Pro-Russian" segment, is an outright denial of any Russian injustices ever committed against the Polish state and its people in favor of focusing solely on Polish injustices against the Russian state and its people.
I think that's equally immoral as those Poles who ignore what their own country had done to Orthodox believers (however they self-identified) in the past. It's entirely reactionary and I sincerely believe that it's also self-discrediting. I don't think that Russia's side should ever stoop to such a low and that it's better than that.
I've tried explaining this over the years to folks on X (then Twitter when I first began doing this), but they wanted to hear none of this: just like some Poles have a bloodlust for Russians, strangely enough, some "Non-Russian Pro-Russians" (NRPR) have a bloodlust for Poles because they want to be "more Russian than the Russians".
They imagine that average Russians hate the Polish state and its people as much as average Poles hate the Russian state (far less actually hate the Russian people), but they couldn't be more mistaken since I've lived here for 12.5 years on my Polish passport (I'm a proud dual citizen born and raised in the US) with no problems at all.
Due to my sincere love of both countries (my surname is distinctly "Old Rus", aka "Ukrainian", which I consider derived from the same proto-ethnos from which contemporary Russians emerged and this view is shared by Putin in his 2021 magnum opus on Russians and "Ukrainians"), I want to bridge their divides.
I at first assumed that the greatest problem would be Poles since some whose ancestors had horrible experiences with Russians and passed them down through generations (including as recently as the communist era) obviously most likely won't change their views towards Russians. That's still true.
It's also still true that average Russians harbor nor hatred for Poles, they just dislike the Polish state, and with good reason that's perfectly understandable given the darker periods of their shared history that I touched upon with respect to their millennium-long rivalry (the longest-ever in Russian history).
But what came as a total surprise to me was the irreconcilable hatred that many NRPRs have for Poland and Poles for the reason that I mentioned, virtue signaling support of Russian foreign policy by trying to be "more Russian than the Russians", albeit on the false premise of assuming that Russians hate Poland and Poles.
What this has done is further toxify Polish perceptions of Russia and Russians since many Poles assume that these NRPRs -- especially top state-adjacent influencers indisputably tied to the state through public media appearances, meetings with top officials, tours of Donbass, etc. -- represent Russians and the Russian state.
They don't in this regard, at all, but these NRPRs' "soft power supervisors" don't ever discreetly nudge them to recalibrate their takes in order to align them more closely with state policy due to them practicing "Potemkinism", or the creation of alternative realities for strategic purposes, in this case "making Russia look good":
I'm a principled opponent of "Potemkinism" since I do not believe in sharing false portrayals of Russian policy and everyday reality, especially that which can easily be debunked through official sources or personal experiences, but these "soft power supervisors" don't see it that way (I've tried so hard for so long to get them to).
The end result of relevance to this subject is that NRPRs continue to be some of the most toxic and genuinely Polonophobic voices on X apart from some Ukrainians and Germans, and by Polonophobic, I don't mean criticizing the Polish government (which I do quite often), but actually hating Poles just because they're Poles.
This reinforces the notion in average Poles' minds that the Russian state whose interests they self-assumed responsibility for representing hates them too, ergo the alleged need to contain Russia for the safety of all Poles and their next generations, which therefore fuels the arms race, tensions, and political Russophobia in Poland.
Even though this particular form of "Potemkinism" indisputably harms Russian interests, not to mention discrediting pragmatic Poles (including among the two populist-nationalist opposition parties that collectively have 20% of the electorate's support) by association, nobody here wants to change this approach.
It truly and very deeply saddens me, but nevertheless, I'll continue trying to bridge the divide between these two people as much as I realistically can, including by sharing the reality of how "Potemkinism" greatly subverts Russian national interests in this respect by counterproductively fueling Russophobia and associated threats.
There is a great deal of deliberate, enforced immaturity in these discussions. We are memorising events hundreds of years back, putting a new coat of paint on these events as if it was yesterday. All of this is politicized nitpicking - useful for history books, harmful for developing realistic, cordial relationships. Take a page on how the Dutch are memorising the German occupation during WWII - only during a football match between The Netherlands and Germany, where the Dutch supporters shout en masse 'I want my bike back' - a reference to the fleeing German soldiers in WWII who stole Dutch bikes to bike back to Germany. For god sake - grow up and provide wealth and security to your people.
This is very interesting and much appreciated.My perspective is shaped by a different provenance. As one born and educated in Romania, the Russian "hatred" is not that deep and as much as the "communism" was imposed from Moscow, everyone, with some introspection knows that the biggest culprit was Germany, who in Romania's case, agreed to let USSR take a bite, only to bank on Romania joining the war alongside. And Russians left in 1956 and never came back. Everything done was done by Romanians themselves. But with respect to Poland, I do see one paralel between Romania and Poland and their countries demise, especially after 1600s. In both cases, a totally uncontrolable and irresponsible nobility has undermined the central authority andcompleately weakend the state, all for their own personal gain and benefit. The Poles did manage to loose their state completely to Germans, Austrians and Russians. Romanians managed to cling to a certain autonomy within the Ottoman Empire - a high level of vassalization, but never actual part of the Ottoman Empire, as 1/3 of Hungary managed to be between 1526and the end of 1600s. I think the what I call "Panism" is still eating at the Polish polity and that again be the problem. Same way for Romanians, the greedines and lazyness and self-interest of its elites will be the fall of the country again, with the national unity dream in shackles and a population embittered, split, and in some ways apathetic. All very good reasons from both Romanian and Polish side to blame Russia for...
You're right, I also agree that the szlachta and especially magnates unwittingly killed the Commonwealth by clinging to their privileges in an era when it was becoming obvious that some degree of centralization was required to more effectively manage state resources and thus preserve at least some of these same privileges instead of lose them entirely.
When radical reforms were finally implemented in 1791, it was already too late, and that was one of the reasons why Russia soon thereafter went to war yet again after it was done with the Ottomans because its own state system didn't want a competing one which could have hypothetically been pretty effective right on its border and leaving its sphere of influence.
I agree that anti-Polish sentiment in Russia is a much more rare phenomenon than anti-Russian sentiment in Poland. It's nothing out of the ordinary, though - it's almost always the smaller and weaker party that feels threatened by the big neighbor. For example, while there's some anti-Polish sentiment in Lithuania, anti-Lithuanian sentiment in Poland is unheard of.
It's not only the non-Russian pro-Russians that fuel Polish negative sentiment towards Russia, it's also Russian state media. Since at least 2014, they are openly anti-Polish, and it's not always mere constructive criticism of a geopolitical rival's actions: it's petty hit pieces, belittlement, historical revisionism (blaming WWII and Holocaust on Poland, for instance), it's Medvedev's rants about nuking Warsaw, Putin finding some obscure WWII Polish politician's quote to call him an anti-Semitic pig during a press conference, and so on. These get shown on Polish TV and reinforce the negative sentiment.
Regarding Putin, while I have some different historical interpretations than he does, I think that he's not Polonophobic, he just dislikes the Polish State.
Even so, his innuendo that Poland was responsible for WWII was twisted by many NRPRs to imply that all Poles deserved to be genocided.
It's pretty disgusting and I recommend that folks who want to retain the illusion of civility in the NRPR community eschew bringing up Poland.
There's one Russian account in particular that's especially obsessed with Poland and posts some of the grossest historical distortions I've ever read.
They hate me for pointing out how they whitewashed OUN terrorism in interwar Poland and then later made a very rude remark about my ethnicity.
It was one of just several times that I ever experienced Polonophobia from a Russian, albeit an anonymous but semi-popular influencer (30k+ followers).
Thank you Andrew for your thorough reply. Although I am a Serb/Croatian, which makes me perhaps in your view a NRPR, I can also say that I am trying to bridge the divide between Poles and Russians. I am married to a Polish woman and we both live in Russia. I would also have to add that the EU, Canadian and American Polish diaspora, on average, with some notable exceptions, is much more Russophobic than an average Pole from Poland. Their numbers are huge and they have the resources to fuel their hatered towards Russia and influence the Polish politics. At least that is my experience living in the USA and Canada for 20 years. Regarding my experience living in Russia, I have met quite a few Russians whose parents or grandparents are Polish. I see no haterated towards the Poles, maybe for the current Polish government. On the contrary, people are courious about life in Poland or EU, as you probably know yourself.
I'm a NRPR and there's nothing to be ashamed of in principle, it's just that our movement has been hijacked in my honest assessment by very toxic people who are less genuinely pro-Russian than they are activists for other causes (Leftism, Islamism, and/or "Third Worldism" in my experience -- and I'm not judging since I see some merits in all three, but they're not identical to being pro-Russian).
I also noticed a lot of very intense Russophobia among the relatively few members of the Polish diaspora that I encountered back when I lived in the US. I think that in general, some diaspora (maybe most actually) tend to be more nationalistic (for better or for worse) than their co-nationals in "the old country".
I too experienced the same in my conversations with Russians here over the last 12.5 years of living in Moscow. Some, upon discovering that I'm Polish (I'm here on my Polish passport), would tell me about their partial Polish roots, say a few basic words, and/or reminisce about visiting Poland during the communist and/or post-communist periods.
There's absolutely zero Polonophobia among average Russians, only among some fringe figures on state TV and certain online circles, it's just many NRPRs that are very vicious towards Poles. I've been attacked online by them on the basis of my ethno-national identity so, soooooo many times.
It's so discrediting to Russia's anti-bigotry cause in Ukraine too since these same people (rightly!) condemn Ukrainian bigots' belief that Russians' ethno-national identity at birth makes them "evil" or whatever and at minimum predetermines their political views, yet they believe this to be the case for Poles!!!
I can easily intuit it through their rude remarks about how "he's (meaning me) Polish, of course he doesn't support Russia" or the sensational yet unfortunately semi-popular one of how "he's a spy in Russia, no Pole could ever like it!" All this ignores my years of indisputable support for and solidarity with Russia.
Prior to falling very ill from exhaustion on 24 August 2025, I worked 1,278 consecutive days (coincidentally exactly 3.5 years) publishing unique multipolar analyses influenced by my sincere understanding of the Russian school of geopolitics. Whenever they're informed of this, Polonophobic NRPR trolls only attack me harder.
I can't in good conscience publicly associate with people like that, which is one of the reasons why I publicly disavowed the organized NRPR movement last year multiple times on social media last year, though I importantly will NEVER disavow support for Russia or being a proud NRPR myself, only the organized NRPR movement online.
Many of them are behave in ways (even apart from their self-discrediting ethno-bigotry) that are antithetical to my morals, ethics, and principles, and worse still, silent NRPRs observing this on social media don't intervene to denounce them for what they're doing, they just passively go along with it.
It's the same with top NRPR influencers: three times already, a huge one defamed me on X as an "Israeli spy in Russia" in three posts the first time that were seen by a total of 1 million people. They also shared their defamation in a private X chat with around 100 other influencers, including a top Russian diplomat.
That diplomat doesn't ever involve themselves in the chat, but they still get notifications (they're also active on their own page) and could easily leave if they weren't interested. That top NRPR influencer knew that and hoped, unsuccessfully, to manipulate that diplomat into turning the security services against me.
I'm a proud alumni of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, which is under the umbrella of the Russian Foreign Ministry and has many VIP students (e.g. children of the political and military elite) along with its own security office. I promptly informed them just to ensure that there'd be no "overreaction".
There wasn't, neither then nor the other two times that this person spread such dangerous defamation about me, but not once did anyone in that huge private influencer X stick up for me. Not on a single person. One privately messaged support for me but indicated that they don't want that person attacking them next.
I understood and appreciated that at least one person reached out to tell me how unacceptable that other one's behavior was, but nobody else did, and not one of them did so in view of that person. That was a reality check which taught me how vile this community had become at the highest levels. I want no part of it anymore.
None of them respected my 12.5-year-long contribution to the cause, 1/3 of my life (I'm 37), including my MA and PhD from MGIMO, half a decade at Sputnik, cooperation with leading think tanks here, being falsely implicated by the US in summer 2020 in a totally fake "meddling" scandal, etc.
It was so disgusting to me that this sort of scum is promoting Russia, people who truly hate me for whatever reason, that I don't want to be associated with its organized manifestation. Unlike them, I have stakes in Russia's success: my wife and two kids are citizens, I own my apartment, and all my savings are in rubles.
None of this is appreciated, not even at the basic level of defending my dignity as "one of their own" supporting "the same cause", it's beyond unacceptable on a personal, principled, and political level. I was privileged to be able to peek behind the curtain, but what I saw and experienced horrified me. It's still hard to believe.
Thank you kindly Andrew for your honesty and hard work and also for your resolute support of Russia. I've been following you for a long time, I believe from the very first newsletter you published online. I find your analysis to be informative and thorough. Fortunately, for every political fringe figure there are many more normal people willing to live in harmony with others. Also, I believe the current Russian leadership, most of them, is willing to normalize relations with Poland and Polish people. Relations between different Slavic nations should definetely be cordial or at least respectful. Keep up the good work! I wish we can meet in person at some point.
Brussels, Paris, Amsterdam, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Berlin, Bonn, Dresden, Hiedelberg, Zurich, Geneva et al are simply nodes in a neural network poised for destruction, decimation and enslavement of Russia. So, if say a Russian oil tanker is harassed in the Bay of Biscay, it is stupid to imagine that the response from a sensible power would be in form of sending a puny corvette as escorts the next time when it would in all probability have already been tracked and be liable for ambush. The response ideally would be in the form of a newcake shower, known as the bridal embellishment in the west, upon any or all of the "nodes" of this demoniac system.
As for the dilemma of having to deal with hostile populations in "occupied" territories, there is no need to confer citizenship rights upon them unlike the provisions of the defective post 1947 Indian Constitution drafted by British conquerors. The defeated populace could be treated on par with how the United States treats the Cuban populace of American-held territory of Guantanamo Bay in occupied Cuba. Alternatively, it can be entirely supplanted with more congenial ones such as North Korean, and itself be displaced to more favourable locales such as the Rub Al Khali in Arabian Peninsula, where the more enterprising ones amongst its composition will be free to cast this population in prurient Reality sops based on Game of Thrones or on Love/cannibal island theme. The Liberia precedent established by the United States, God's own country on earth.
Germany in 1941nwas a super power. Today the EU countries have to face a nuclear armed Russia. Russia has 45% of the worlds nuclear weapons and can & would if it had toi blow te EU countries off the map in a few days. So the EU countries will behave. They are smart enough to do that.
Having seen Analena, Kajas, Ursula, Borell, Starmer, BoJo, Macron, the new German guy running their mouths I do not believe they are smart at all.
The Belgium PM is getting smarter. Meloni is a mystery to me.
Only Orban and Fico are clearly motivated by rational self interest.
Update: the Belgium PM is not getting smart, he is smart. Of course he's getting yelled at by the usual suspects.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/mar/16/belgian-pm-bart-de-wever-call-repair-relations-russia-energy-costs-condemned
I agree except with the "they are smart enough to do that (behave)" as the current European misleadership has shown to act irrational and counter to European interests. As long as the gynecologist and the daft fashionista stay in their current European (unelected) positions, we should expect the current irrational auto destructive political course to remain steady.
Before 1945, there were no superpower. Just great powers among others.
Rome was a superpower, Ottomans were a superpower, ancient China.
And USA and USSR.
All others in our history were great but not super: France, Holly Empire, Spain, UK , Germany, Japon, modern China, Russia.
Technically the various colonialist were superpowers, especially the British.
The european plan always was to get the Americans to ride to the rescue.
The worst danger of Europe for Russia is less a direct agression that a permanent pression against the country and seduction of "elites" for mining the russian will to stay sovereign.
in the futur NATO end EU member countries will be attack Russia , is about natural reserve .
They never stopped during 1500 years. They will never stop . Till they are too weak to try
If the nukes ever fly, I pray the first ones take out the meddlesome Brits.
10 downing street would be enough.
They would probably fly to other parts of the West as for Great Britain response will likely come from the sea https://www.youtube.com/shorts/sPjKliqeSC0 .
Lavrov did not threaten with nuclear retaliation to a conventional attack.
"If the US oversees the optimization of the EU’s military-industrial complex, military logistics, and other defense-related matters with a view towards “dwarfing” Russia’s associated capabilities, then the challenge that Russia might face along its western frontier could mirror the one in June 1941."
If we compare with 1941, Germany was not prepared for an attritional war but banked on a Blitzkrieg, same as against Poland and Western Europe, forgetting the scale of USSR. Those in the know knew at the end of October 1941 that Germany will loose the war. Right know, Europe as a totality is a midget compare to what Germany was in June 1941. Plus, strategically speaking, Russia dwarfs EU in terms of military arsenal. I do expect that the first Russian salvo against Europe, to bring them to their senses would be horrible. Also, I really want to see Europeans building a war driven population. Yeay, they are going to cut the social safety network to force people to seek refuge in the military, but it won't work and it even has the potential to turn against governments. Maybe 2048 will become a new 1848. But this time, the Conservative Czarist Russia will not be there to save European Monarchies from the revolutions. On the contrary, I t might sell itself as a "refuge" of the ever poorer and increasingly authoritarian EU...
"...darker periods of their shared history with Russia"? I might be misreading this, but it seems Russia is always to be blamed for something regarding Poland. The general population of Poland is also quite ignorant of their own share of quilt towards Russia. What about the Shuysky Tribute on October 29, 1611, where deposed Tsar Vasily IV Shuisky and his brothers were forced to kneel before Polish King Sigismund III Vasa in Warsaw? Or the Polish occupation of Moscow (1610-1612)? Or the Polish Catholic unethical and forceful proselytization of Orthodox population in Poland and Russia?! It has to be said that Polish-Russian rivalry has a religious undertone as well.
Both sides committed injustices against the other's state and people throughout their millennium-long rivalry, which did indeed have an important sectarian dimension for centuries but no longer plays any role therein.
Nevertheless, some "Non-Russian Pro-Russian" and even Russian influencers have claimed that Poland and Poles are to this day still motivated by sectarian interests in opposing Russia, but that's flat-out false.
That narrative was only seeded into the Alt-Media discourse to rally Russians against Poland and further discredit Poland in the eyes of their targeted audience. Their contemporary rivalry is strictly geopolitical, there's no sectarian dimension whatsoever at all.
Sure, there are few fringe Polish voices online that rant against Orthodoxy, but the average Pole doesn't even think about it, in fact, many don't even think about Catholicism anymore according to recent surveys (it's just an inherited cultural trait for many nowadays).
You don't even see any reference to Orthodoxy in publicly financed Polish media and think tank attacks on Russia, it's literally a non-issue and purely the product of the abovementioned information warfare campaign that I believe is also self-discrediting.
That said, circling back to the darker periods of their shared history, as you noted, it goes both ways, but listing every single semi-significant historical grievance and explaining each fairly from both sides' perspective is understandably far beyond the scope of this analysis and can't be reasonably expected.
What I've noted from Alt-Media however, especially its "Non-Russian Pro-Russian" segment, is an outright denial of any Russian injustices ever committed against the Polish state and its people in favor of focusing solely on Polish injustices against the Russian state and its people.
I think that's equally immoral as those Poles who ignore what their own country had done to Orthodox believers (however they self-identified) in the past. It's entirely reactionary and I sincerely believe that it's also self-discrediting. I don't think that Russia's side should ever stoop to such a low and that it's better than that.
I've tried explaining this over the years to folks on X (then Twitter when I first began doing this), but they wanted to hear none of this: just like some Poles have a bloodlust for Russians, strangely enough, some "Non-Russian Pro-Russians" (NRPR) have a bloodlust for Poles because they want to be "more Russian than the Russians".
They imagine that average Russians hate the Polish state and its people as much as average Poles hate the Russian state (far less actually hate the Russian people), but they couldn't be more mistaken since I've lived here for 12.5 years on my Polish passport (I'm a proud dual citizen born and raised in the US) with no problems at all.
Due to my sincere love of both countries (my surname is distinctly "Old Rus", aka "Ukrainian", which I consider derived from the same proto-ethnos from which contemporary Russians emerged and this view is shared by Putin in his 2021 magnum opus on Russians and "Ukrainians"), I want to bridge their divides.
I at first assumed that the greatest problem would be Poles since some whose ancestors had horrible experiences with Russians and passed them down through generations (including as recently as the communist era) obviously most likely won't change their views towards Russians. That's still true.
It's also still true that average Russians harbor nor hatred for Poles, they just dislike the Polish state, and with good reason that's perfectly understandable given the darker periods of their shared history that I touched upon with respect to their millennium-long rivalry (the longest-ever in Russian history).
But what came as a total surprise to me was the irreconcilable hatred that many NRPRs have for Poland and Poles for the reason that I mentioned, virtue signaling support of Russian foreign policy by trying to be "more Russian than the Russians", albeit on the false premise of assuming that Russians hate Poland and Poles.
What this has done is further toxify Polish perceptions of Russia and Russians since many Poles assume that these NRPRs -- especially top state-adjacent influencers indisputably tied to the state through public media appearances, meetings with top officials, tours of Donbass, etc. -- represent Russians and the Russian state.
They don't in this regard, at all, but these NRPRs' "soft power supervisors" don't ever discreetly nudge them to recalibrate their takes in order to align them more closely with state policy due to them practicing "Potemkinism", or the creation of alternative realities for strategic purposes, in this case "making Russia look good":
https://korybko.substack.com/p/potemkinism-is-responsible-for-false
I'm a principled opponent of "Potemkinism" since I do not believe in sharing false portrayals of Russian policy and everyday reality, especially that which can easily be debunked through official sources or personal experiences, but these "soft power supervisors" don't see it that way (I've tried so hard for so long to get them to).
The end result of relevance to this subject is that NRPRs continue to be some of the most toxic and genuinely Polonophobic voices on X apart from some Ukrainians and Germans, and by Polonophobic, I don't mean criticizing the Polish government (which I do quite often), but actually hating Poles just because they're Poles.
This reinforces the notion in average Poles' minds that the Russian state whose interests they self-assumed responsibility for representing hates them too, ergo the alleged need to contain Russia for the safety of all Poles and their next generations, which therefore fuels the arms race, tensions, and political Russophobia in Poland.
Even though this particular form of "Potemkinism" indisputably harms Russian interests, not to mention discrediting pragmatic Poles (including among the two populist-nationalist opposition parties that collectively have 20% of the electorate's support) by association, nobody here wants to change this approach.
It truly and very deeply saddens me, but nevertheless, I'll continue trying to bridge the divide between these two people as much as I realistically can, including by sharing the reality of how "Potemkinism" greatly subverts Russian national interests in this respect by counterproductively fueling Russophobia and associated threats.
There is a great deal of deliberate, enforced immaturity in these discussions. We are memorising events hundreds of years back, putting a new coat of paint on these events as if it was yesterday. All of this is politicized nitpicking - useful for history books, harmful for developing realistic, cordial relationships. Take a page on how the Dutch are memorising the German occupation during WWII - only during a football match between The Netherlands and Germany, where the Dutch supporters shout en masse 'I want my bike back' - a reference to the fleeing German soldiers in WWII who stole Dutch bikes to bike back to Germany. For god sake - grow up and provide wealth and security to your people.
This is very interesting and much appreciated.My perspective is shaped by a different provenance. As one born and educated in Romania, the Russian "hatred" is not that deep and as much as the "communism" was imposed from Moscow, everyone, with some introspection knows that the biggest culprit was Germany, who in Romania's case, agreed to let USSR take a bite, only to bank on Romania joining the war alongside. And Russians left in 1956 and never came back. Everything done was done by Romanians themselves. But with respect to Poland, I do see one paralel between Romania and Poland and their countries demise, especially after 1600s. In both cases, a totally uncontrolable and irresponsible nobility has undermined the central authority andcompleately weakend the state, all for their own personal gain and benefit. The Poles did manage to loose their state completely to Germans, Austrians and Russians. Romanians managed to cling to a certain autonomy within the Ottoman Empire - a high level of vassalization, but never actual part of the Ottoman Empire, as 1/3 of Hungary managed to be between 1526and the end of 1600s. I think the what I call "Panism" is still eating at the Polish polity and that again be the problem. Same way for Romanians, the greedines and lazyness and self-interest of its elites will be the fall of the country again, with the national unity dream in shackles and a population embittered, split, and in some ways apathetic. All very good reasons from both Romanian and Polish side to blame Russia for...
You're right, I also agree that the szlachta and especially magnates unwittingly killed the Commonwealth by clinging to their privileges in an era when it was becoming obvious that some degree of centralization was required to more effectively manage state resources and thus preserve at least some of these same privileges instead of lose them entirely.
When radical reforms were finally implemented in 1791, it was already too late, and that was one of the reasons why Russia soon thereafter went to war yet again after it was done with the Ottomans because its own state system didn't want a competing one which could have hypothetically been pretty effective right on its border and leaving its sphere of influence.
I agree that anti-Polish sentiment in Russia is a much more rare phenomenon than anti-Russian sentiment in Poland. It's nothing out of the ordinary, though - it's almost always the smaller and weaker party that feels threatened by the big neighbor. For example, while there's some anti-Polish sentiment in Lithuania, anti-Lithuanian sentiment in Poland is unheard of.
It's not only the non-Russian pro-Russians that fuel Polish negative sentiment towards Russia, it's also Russian state media. Since at least 2014, they are openly anti-Polish, and it's not always mere constructive criticism of a geopolitical rival's actions: it's petty hit pieces, belittlement, historical revisionism (blaming WWII and Holocaust on Poland, for instance), it's Medvedev's rants about nuking Warsaw, Putin finding some obscure WWII Polish politician's quote to call him an anti-Semitic pig during a press conference, and so on. These get shown on Polish TV and reinforce the negative sentiment.
I agree, especially about domestic Russian pundits, who I wrote about here two years ago:
https://korybko.substack.com/p/dont-take-domestic-russian-pundits
As for Medvedev, I was appalled at his casual use of the "Polack" slur twice on X, and even more appalled by all those who defended him:
https://x.com/AKorybko/status/1794700511108800535
https://x.com/AKorybko/status/1849412240027353214
Regarding Putin, while I have some different historical interpretations than he does, I think that he's not Polonophobic, he just dislikes the Polish State.
Even so, his innuendo that Poland was responsible for WWII was twisted by many NRPRs to imply that all Poles deserved to be genocided.
It's pretty disgusting and I recommend that folks who want to retain the illusion of civility in the NRPR community eschew bringing up Poland.
There's one Russian account in particular that's especially obsessed with Poland and posts some of the grossest historical distortions I've ever read.
They hate me for pointing out how they whitewashed OUN terrorism in interwar Poland and then later made a very rude remark about my ethnicity.
It was one of just several times that I ever experienced Polonophobia from a Russian, albeit an anonymous but semi-popular influencer (30k+ followers).
Thank you Andrew for your thorough reply. Although I am a Serb/Croatian, which makes me perhaps in your view a NRPR, I can also say that I am trying to bridge the divide between Poles and Russians. I am married to a Polish woman and we both live in Russia. I would also have to add that the EU, Canadian and American Polish diaspora, on average, with some notable exceptions, is much more Russophobic than an average Pole from Poland. Their numbers are huge and they have the resources to fuel their hatered towards Russia and influence the Polish politics. At least that is my experience living in the USA and Canada for 20 years. Regarding my experience living in Russia, I have met quite a few Russians whose parents or grandparents are Polish. I see no haterated towards the Poles, maybe for the current Polish government. On the contrary, people are courious about life in Poland or EU, as you probably know yourself.
I'm a NRPR and there's nothing to be ashamed of in principle, it's just that our movement has been hijacked in my honest assessment by very toxic people who are less genuinely pro-Russian than they are activists for other causes (Leftism, Islamism, and/or "Third Worldism" in my experience -- and I'm not judging since I see some merits in all three, but they're not identical to being pro-Russian).
I also noticed a lot of very intense Russophobia among the relatively few members of the Polish diaspora that I encountered back when I lived in the US. I think that in general, some diaspora (maybe most actually) tend to be more nationalistic (for better or for worse) than their co-nationals in "the old country".
I too experienced the same in my conversations with Russians here over the last 12.5 years of living in Moscow. Some, upon discovering that I'm Polish (I'm here on my Polish passport), would tell me about their partial Polish roots, say a few basic words, and/or reminisce about visiting Poland during the communist and/or post-communist periods.
There's absolutely zero Polonophobia among average Russians, only among some fringe figures on state TV and certain online circles, it's just many NRPRs that are very vicious towards Poles. I've been attacked online by them on the basis of my ethno-national identity so, soooooo many times.
It's so discrediting to Russia's anti-bigotry cause in Ukraine too since these same people (rightly!) condemn Ukrainian bigots' belief that Russians' ethno-national identity at birth makes them "evil" or whatever and at minimum predetermines their political views, yet they believe this to be the case for Poles!!!
I can easily intuit it through their rude remarks about how "he's (meaning me) Polish, of course he doesn't support Russia" or the sensational yet unfortunately semi-popular one of how "he's a spy in Russia, no Pole could ever like it!" All this ignores my years of indisputable support for and solidarity with Russia.
Prior to falling very ill from exhaustion on 24 August 2025, I worked 1,278 consecutive days (coincidentally exactly 3.5 years) publishing unique multipolar analyses influenced by my sincere understanding of the Russian school of geopolitics. Whenever they're informed of this, Polonophobic NRPR trolls only attack me harder.
I can't in good conscience publicly associate with people like that, which is one of the reasons why I publicly disavowed the organized NRPR movement last year multiple times on social media last year, though I importantly will NEVER disavow support for Russia or being a proud NRPR myself, only the organized NRPR movement online.
Many of them are behave in ways (even apart from their self-discrediting ethno-bigotry) that are antithetical to my morals, ethics, and principles, and worse still, silent NRPRs observing this on social media don't intervene to denounce them for what they're doing, they just passively go along with it.
It's the same with top NRPR influencers: three times already, a huge one defamed me on X as an "Israeli spy in Russia" in three posts the first time that were seen by a total of 1 million people. They also shared their defamation in a private X chat with around 100 other influencers, including a top Russian diplomat.
That diplomat doesn't ever involve themselves in the chat, but they still get notifications (they're also active on their own page) and could easily leave if they weren't interested. That top NRPR influencer knew that and hoped, unsuccessfully, to manipulate that diplomat into turning the security services against me.
I'm a proud alumni of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, which is under the umbrella of the Russian Foreign Ministry and has many VIP students (e.g. children of the political and military elite) along with its own security office. I promptly informed them just to ensure that there'd be no "overreaction".
There wasn't, neither then nor the other two times that this person spread such dangerous defamation about me, but not once did anyone in that huge private influencer X stick up for me. Not on a single person. One privately messaged support for me but indicated that they don't want that person attacking them next.
I understood and appreciated that at least one person reached out to tell me how unacceptable that other one's behavior was, but nobody else did, and not one of them did so in view of that person. That was a reality check which taught me how vile this community had become at the highest levels. I want no part of it anymore.
None of them respected my 12.5-year-long contribution to the cause, 1/3 of my life (I'm 37), including my MA and PhD from MGIMO, half a decade at Sputnik, cooperation with leading think tanks here, being falsely implicated by the US in summer 2020 in a totally fake "meddling" scandal, etc.
It was so disgusting to me that this sort of scum is promoting Russia, people who truly hate me for whatever reason, that I don't want to be associated with its organized manifestation. Unlike them, I have stakes in Russia's success: my wife and two kids are citizens, I own my apartment, and all my savings are in rubles.
None of this is appreciated, not even at the basic level of defending my dignity as "one of their own" supporting "the same cause", it's beyond unacceptable on a personal, principled, and political level. I was privileged to be able to peek behind the curtain, but what I saw and experienced horrified me. It's still hard to believe.
Very cogent exposition.
Thank you kindly Andrew for your honesty and hard work and also for your resolute support of Russia. I've been following you for a long time, I believe from the very first newsletter you published online. I find your analysis to be informative and thorough. Fortunately, for every political fringe figure there are many more normal people willing to live in harmony with others. Also, I believe the current Russian leadership, most of them, is willing to normalize relations with Poland and Polish people. Relations between different Slavic nations should definetely be cordial or at least respectful. Keep up the good work! I wish we can meet in person at some point.
Brussels, Paris, Amsterdam, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Berlin, Bonn, Dresden, Hiedelberg, Zurich, Geneva et al are simply nodes in a neural network poised for destruction, decimation and enslavement of Russia. So, if say a Russian oil tanker is harassed in the Bay of Biscay, it is stupid to imagine that the response from a sensible power would be in form of sending a puny corvette as escorts the next time when it would in all probability have already been tracked and be liable for ambush. The response ideally would be in the form of a newcake shower, known as the bridal embellishment in the west, upon any or all of the "nodes" of this demoniac system.
As for the dilemma of having to deal with hostile populations in "occupied" territories, there is no need to confer citizenship rights upon them unlike the provisions of the defective post 1947 Indian Constitution drafted by British conquerors. The defeated populace could be treated on par with how the United States treats the Cuban populace of American-held territory of Guantanamo Bay in occupied Cuba. Alternatively, it can be entirely supplanted with more congenial ones such as North Korean, and itself be displaced to more favourable locales such as the Rub Al Khali in Arabian Peninsula, where the more enterprising ones amongst its composition will be free to cast this population in prurient Reality sops based on Game of Thrones or on Love/cannibal island theme. The Liberia precedent established by the United States, God's own country on earth.