On top of Georgia doing a complete 180 ever since our war with them, you can also add Azerbaijan to that mix now.
A couple of years ago, when Azerbaijan was pummeling Armenia, everybody on PF was cheering: "Woooohoooo, Russia's allies are getting crushed and there's nothing they can do about it!"
Nobody seemed to care then, that a rich petro-state was preying on its much smaller and poorer neighbor. For PF masters of strategy - if something is bad for Russia - it's good enough for them.
In the years since, the powerful Armenian diasporas in places like France and the United States have worked hard to turn Azerbaijan into a pariah. The only thing keeping Azerbaijan from being lumped into the same club as Russia, is that Europe needs it oil - for now.
A bit surprised at how fast it went from being the West's darling (for embarrassing Russia's allies), to again being termed a regressive eastern dictatorship, Azerbaijan is slowly coming back into the fold.
Their little foray into being independent (by leveraging Turkish and Israeli help), has pretty quickly come to an end.
I guess you can't fight the laws of gravity inside the former Soviet Union.
So the reply to people that say Ukraine will not forgive Russia for at least a century, is IT CAN HAPPEN MUCH FASTER THAN YOU WOULD EXPECT.
A couple of years ago, when Azerbaijan was pummeling Armenia, everybody on PF was cheering: "Woooohoooo, Russia's allies are getting crushed and there's nothing they can do about it!"
Nobody seemed to care then, that a rich petro-state was preying on its much smaller and poorer neighbor. For PF masters of strategy - if something is bad for Russia - it's good enough for them.
In the years since, the powerful Armenian diasporas in places like France and the United States have worked hard to turn Azerbaijan into a pariah. The only thing keeping Azerbaijan from being lumped into the same club as Russia, is that Europe needs it oil - for now.
A bit surprised at how fast it went from being the West's darling (for embarrassing Russia's allies), to again being termed a regressive eastern dictatorship, Azerbaijan is slowly coming back into the fold.
Their little foray into being independent (by leveraging Turkish and Israeli help), has pretty quickly come to an end.
I guess you can't fight the laws of gravity inside the former Soviet Union.
So the reply to people that say Ukraine will not forgive Russia for at least a century, is IT CAN HAPPEN MUCH FASTER THAN YOU WOULD EXPECT.