Russia is at a crossroads, and at a dangerous one at that. This forked path though is different than from what she faced while under the sway of Marxist ideology. No, this road has a hundred years of moss and undergrowth obscuring the vision of one man: Vladimir Putin. Only the ghost of Tsar Nicholas knows the hesitant uncertainty that this road entails.

While the West agonizes and frets over militant third world powers who announce their presence within the orchestrated language of despots, the real struggle has yet to be seen. One that is being played out within a small group of men huddled within the dark walls of the Kremlin. Which path will Russia tread? The one leading to Pan-Slavic imperialism or the one to Western integration?

Putin has lead his country for five years, enduring a slowly collapsing economy, lengthening a war he cannot win, and offering his countrymen a secure stability that is neither. His previous background in Soviet intelligence has already bred and cultivated a zealous cautiousness that envelopes his every move. Not fully knowing who his allies or enemies might be, and trusting very few, he goes slow-delaying decisions, seeing how events play out and thus paralyzing government. Everything in Russia increasingly depends on one man: Putin. He often appears unsure how to read the politics of his own government and country. He has increasingly leaned on a handful of supporters to counter his ever-growing paranoia, which is ironically fed by these same individuals. His circle of advisers has narrowed to two tiny groups, each numbering about six members-three of them belonging to both. One group gathers on Mondays to weigh economic and social policy, and on Saturdays the other discusses national security. In Putin's case, the inner circle is split into two feuding factions: the siloviki ("men of power") and the "liberals." The siloviki are a tight-knit band of mostly military and KGB veterans who dominate the country's security and intelligence ministries and believe, more or less, in state control of the country's political and economic life. The liberals believe more in Western-style market reforms, though politically they are far from progressive. They include the likes of Vladislav Surkov, who is said to be a leader in efforts to fix the Constitution so Putin can rule the country indefinitely. Neither faction has any love for democracy, which to their mind only makes it more difficult to govern a country that is already hard enough to rule. To put it simply, there are no insiders within the circle of power at the Kremlin who believes that democracy is a viable form of government. Ironically, the only individual who seems to give democracy a fighting chance at success is Putin himself.

Putin though is more isolated than the West knows. To the outside world, Putin looks all-powerful. He has consolidated more and more state control in his own hands. The Duma has become his tool, dominated by his party, where personal loyalty counts among all things. But this Russian president, like the tsars of old, is also a prisoner of court politics. And it can be a dangerous game, with modern barons powerful in their own right vying for his backing for policies and interests they hold dear.

The West though is adding to his paranoia and further strengthening the push for Pan-Slavic hegemony by interfering too quickly in areas within the Russian sphere of influence such as the Ukraine and lower Asian-Caucus provinces previously under Soviet control. These actions only re-enforce the paranoia and insecurity inherent in every Russian leader of the past one thousand years, the fear of isolation and containment by the West. This position is not without legitimacy though, in the past one hundred years she has been attacked by the United States, Germany and Austria (twice) Turkey and Japan, nations that border in varying degrees from the east, west, and south. For literally centuries Russian policy has been dictated by this fear, one only need look at Moscows inept bumbling in attempting to put the corrupt Viktor Yanukovych in power during the last Ukrainian election to see that this fear is a dominant and determining factor in Russian foreign policy.

Putin though knows this, and he recognizes and even fears the power given to him. He once stated in an interview he thinks of power as a "razor in the hands of a drunk, who, flailing around, risks doing damage he can neither predict nor undo". He also knows the two conflicting forces that are attempting to each shape Russian destiny and that the only individual who keeps both the aggressive siloviki and liberal factions from clashing is he, and he fears that responsibility. He also knows that the Russian populace is easily manipulated into accepting state policy in exchange for security.

Very few people realize that sanity comes in numbers when dealing with cases of extremist and irrational views. If I were the only person to believe something strange then I get locked up, but if 70 million believe it then it must be "sensible" state policy. When Russian extremism puzzles the West such as the ranting of Vladimir Zhirinovsky, who heads the third most popular political party in Russia, the West should remember that extremist views gain credibility simply by expanding the number of adherents to that particular view, no matter how absurd the view may entail. One should only look at Hitler for an example of how one man went from a perception of a jailed lunatic in 1923 to dictating state policy a mere ten years later and fooling sixty million Germans into believing that genocide was a viable option; merely by propagating his view through numerical support.

So what can we expect? My personal view is that the West-East dynamic is the key to forging a clear and reasonable path for Russia. One only needs to look at the four threats (United States, China, Japan, Latvia) that a recent poll among the Russian public has revealed to see that the ancient Tsarist paranoia is still there. Once again we have a clear indicator that Russia fears nations in every direction who express views of autonomy beyond their borders, whether reasonable or not. The West is not helping matters by meddling needlessly in the affairs of those that are or were part of her sphere of control/influence. The West needs to be much more supportive of Russian internal problems, especially with her own struggles with terrorism (Chechnya). We can still apply pressure in obtaining concessions concerning Democratic and economic reform but we must be careful in that we do not force Putin into the imperialist camp.