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Nina L. Khrushcheva

While Russia has not reverted to full-bore Stalinism, there is no doubt that President Vladimir Putin has made tremendous strides toward totalitarianism.

COMMENTARY / World

Apr 20, 2026

How de-Stalinization may offer lessons for post-Putin Russia

This is not Stalinism yet. While thousands of dissenters have faced punishment for their "crimes" under Putin, millions rotted in Stalin's Gulags.

Modern authoritarians, like those of old, centralize power so tightly that their personal fears, ambitions and miscalculations often drive national actions with global consequences.

COMMENTARY / World

Mar 3, 2026

The high price of political paranoia

In authoritarian systems, national interests and objectives often conflict with the leader’s beliefs, desires and insecurities.

Russian bloggers are criticizing Vladimir Putin’s silence after the U.S. attacked Venezuela and seized the country’s president, Nicolas Maduro.?

COMMENTARY / World

Jan 16, 2026

Why is Putin silent on the capture of Maduro?

While Russian President Vladimir Putin certainly does not relish appearing weak, nor does he want to risk exacerbating tensions with the US.

U.S. President Donald Trump receives the FIFA Peace Prize from the organization’s president at the Kennedy Center in Washington on Dec. 5.

COMMENTARY / World

Dec 19, 2025

Daddy Trump: When democracies flatter autocrats

Trump’s second administration has vindicated the most dire warnings, targeting agencies and institutions that safeguard democracy at home and project soft power abroad.

Vladimir Putin's crackdown on dissent mirrors the repressive tactics of Peter the Great and Josef Stalin, using fear and fabricated charges to suppress opposition amid the ongoing war in Ukraine.

COMMENTARY / World

Nov 3, 2025

In Russia, enemies are everywhere

The number of terrorism-related cases opened in Russia has soared since the country’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, with convictions also rising,

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office on Aug. 22, where he showed off a photo from his meeting earlier that month with Russian President Vladimir Putin at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska.

COMMENTARY / World

Sep 23, 2025

Donald Trump and Russia's 'useful idiot'

Putin is employing two Soviet-era tactics: enlisting “useful idiots” in the cause and employing “salami tactics” to achieve his ends.

Vladimir Putin has been rehabilitating Josef Stalin for more than two decades — and reviving some of the worst elements of the Soviet era in the process.

COMMENTARY / World

Aug 3, 2025

Glory to Stalin and the whitewashing of history

Russia’s Communist Party recently asserted that, in Stalin’s “deeds and works,” Russians can seek “answers to the fateful challenges of our time.”

The public breakdown between U.S. President Donald Trump and Elon Musk highlights a familiar pattern among authoritarian leaders: They elevate allies only to discard them when their loyalty falters or their influence threatens the throne.

COMMENTARY / World

Jun 12, 2025

No loyalty lasts: Why authoritarians always betray their allies

The very public and acrimonious split between U.S. President Donald Trump and his once-favorite aide, Elon Musk, would be amusing if it were not so terrifying. Their puerile public feud demonstrated just how insecure — even unhinged — the world’s most powerful person and its wealthiest really are....

With Russia holding the upper hand in Ukraine and its people likely to support a favorable peace, why is the Kremlin unwilling to negotiate?

COMMENTARY / Japan

May 22, 2025

Russia’s two minds on Ukraine

Russian people used to have savings; today, they spend whatever they can get their hands on and even take out loans.

Russian leader Vladimir Putin meets with U.S. President Donald Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, in St. Petersburg on Friday.

COMMENTARY / World

Apr 13, 2025

The U.S. and Russia are negotiating in bad faith

For now, Trump says he is “pissed off” at Putin for not being more amenable to his administration’s ceasefire proposals and he is threatening to impose yet more sanctions.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s public humiliation tactics, such as belittling foreign leaders and political opponents, mirror those of dictators like Stalin and Mao, reflecting his authoritarian tendencies.

COMMENTARY / World

Mar 14, 2025

Fear and loathing in the Oval Office

Trump should be thought of as a dilettante despot, the Roman emperor of reality TV.

Russian Communist Party supporters carry a flag after a ceremony in Moscow to mark the 150th anniversary of Vladimir Lenin's birth in 2020.

COMMENTARY / World

Feb 10, 2025

Russia’s nostalgia machine works for strongman Putin

If Russians are gripped by a yearning for an imaginary past, they will not fight for a better future.

Destruction left in the wake of Russia's military invasion of Ukraine in the city of Hulyaipole, in the country's Zaporizhzhia region, in September 2022

COMMENTARY / World

Dec 9, 2024

Does a savage war of partition await Ukraine?

Donald Trump appears bent on striking a “peace” deal with Russia that involves Ukraine’s dismemberment.

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump managed to win the support of over 72 million Americans despite his history of trying to overturn elections, a lack of policy expertise and his authoritarian rhetoric.

COMMENTARY / World

Nov 7, 2024

A Donald Trump victory: How did it come to this?

How did a convicted felon, who sought to overturn a presidential election that he decisively lost just four years ago, win the votes of more than 72 million Americans?

Vladimir Putin’s actions in Ukraine, much like those of past Soviet leaders, stem from a desire to be recognized as a global power and from perceived Western threats.

COMMENTARY / World

Oct 7, 2024

The sources of Russian conduct

From Josef Stalin to Mikhail Gorbachev, Soviet leaders shared Putin’s desire for “great power” prestige.

Giant figures depicting Russian authors Anton Chekhov, Alexander Pushkin, Daniil Kharms and Fyodor Dostoyevsky are paraded through a carnival in central Moscow in September 2015.

COMMENTARY / World

Aug 27, 2024

When art is all that remains

Looking at the Kremlin today, one wonders, “Do they really now know how this story ends?” Art will always have the last word.

Russia isn’t a theocracy but Orthodox Christianity, the state religion, has become all-encompassing, with President Vladimir Putin claiming to have a divine mission.

COMMENTARY / World

Jul 4, 2024

The demigods of populism

By claiming to represent the will of the divine, populist leaders like Putin, Modi, Erdogan — and even Trump — stake an otherworldly claim to political power.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese leader Xi Jinping meet in Beijing on May 16.

COMMENTARY / World

May 26, 2024

The fragile fraternity of China and Russia

Putin’s Mao-like bid for a full-fledged military alliance with China, including commitments to mutual defense, also seems to have failed.

Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin (left) and then-Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu in the Kremlin on May 7. While President Vladimir Putin has no real challengers, powerful actors within his government are vying against each other.

COMMENTARY / World

May 16, 2024

The battle of ministries in Putin’s Russia

Historical parallels suggest that Putin’s top-down approach, like Khrushchev’s de-Stalinization and Gorbachev’s perestroika, risks sparking opposition by causing intra-elite infighting.

Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich (right) with then-wife Dasha Zhukova in 2014. Zhukova's mother, Elena Zhukova, is engaged to media mogul Rupert Murdoch.

COMMENTARY / World

Mar 31, 2024

The oligarch, his ex-wife, her mother and Rupert Murdoch

Were it not for other stories coming out of Russia, Rupert Murdoch's engagement to Roman Abramovich's ex-mother-in-law would have made more headlines.

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Projects like the BuddhaBot aim to re-create dialogue once lost to time, raising questions about whether AI can extend the teachings of Buddha or merely simulate them.

Can AI replace a priest? Japan’s temples and shrines are testing the limits.

By Alex K.T. Martin

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