Putin and Ukraine

 Think Putin is playing 11 dimensional chess in Ukraine? Think again. Lifted from a comment thread over at jabberwocking.com:

"Think of what an ideal structure would be to ensure that somebody running a vast organization has access to the information, perspectives, projections, modeling, and feedback to make proper decisions. It would need independent consultants, institutional structures to quality check information, relevant metrics, public feedback, ways to identify and elevate new ideas, trustworthy and longitudinal data collection systems, and accountability for mistakes. Does that look anything like Russia?

"Putin suffers from all the problems of an out-of-touch CEO--he's surrounded by cronies whose advancement is tethered to how much they praise their leader--without any of the institutional safeguards. He has no board of directors, no stock price to let him know how his company is doing, no accountants or external benchmarks. Worse, he has to deal with the fact that he can't actually rely on or fully trust his adjutants and oligarchs, because he knows that some or all of them are just a cup of polonium tea away from replacing him.

"And that's on top of the fact that his whole gangster-state system absolutely depends flooding a vast media system with noise, bullshit, and propaganda to which of course _Putin is not immune_.

"Under such a situation, how could Putin do otherwise than to make terrible decisions? Even if he wanted to be a benevolent ruler of Russia (and by all accounts, he doesn't), there's no reason that he could.

"We all wonder what genius game Putin is playing, when in reality, this is exactly what autocrats do: make stupid destructive moves that the rest of us are either harmed with or have to clean up."