Aleksandr Dugin's work is the philosophical/ideological cover for whatever Putin's doing. The gist is to create a conservative Eurasian state/alliance to combat Western liberalism.
Hmmm, I was wondering what RT (German version) [0] meant by Putin wanting to denazify the Ukraine ("Putin launches special military operation to protect Donbass and denazify Ukraine"). Since they (Azov) are headquartered in Donetsk Oblast, is it them who Putin wants to permanently remove right now, and is this his purpose for starting this war?
What I mean is, Putin wasn't even making a propaganda claim about Ukraine being anti-Semites. The Russians he was talking to barely know that was the Nazi ideology, and that's assuming they'd disagree with it. He was just claiming they were going to attack Russians.
He also said he'd "show Ukraine real decommunization" the day before. Not sure if that was propaganda or a threat…
Azov are ideological extremists but I wouldn't read much into it being a motivator for Putin. It's a combination of imperialism, a significant population of ethnic Russian separatists being in Ukraine, and NATO concerns.
I think it's more accurate to see the government's primary function as deciding who gets what sinecure, not accomplishing things. I would wager that's the historical norm.
Your list of failures, among others (homeless industrial complex), make much more sense through this light: they're all wealth transfers to political friends.
