[Peter] Reddaway has emphasized that modern Russian political life cannot be understood without reference to „political technology,“ which represents an extreme form of political consultancy involving manipulation of individuals and large-scale deception. Since, Reddaway explained, at the core of any „political technologist’s“ plan, there lies a conspiracy, any good analyst of Russian politics needs to be a conspiracy theorist as well. Conspiracy theorists, he noted, are usually mocked in countries with transparent political systems. But a system becomes more prone to conspiracies if the ruler remains in power for a long time and controls large parts of its wealth. Russia and Iran, he observed, would be two examples of present-day countries with conspiratorial politics.

—John B. Dunlop, The Moscow Bombings of September 1999, (Stuttgart: ibidem-Verlag, 2012), 17-18.

For me personally the bombings of the apartment houses are a key moment in our most recent history. Because if those bombings were not accidental in the sequence of the events which followed; if, to put it bluntly, they were the work of our [Russian] authorities—then everything will once and forever take its proper place. Then there is not and cannot be an iota of illusion about [the nature of] those who rule us. Then those people are not minor or large-scale swindlers and thieves. Then they are among the most terrible of criminals.

—Anton Orekh, in John B. Dunlop, The Moscow Bombings of September 1999, (Stuttgart: ibidem-Verlag, 2012), 7.

Ursula K. Le Guin accepts the National Book Foundation’s Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters at the 65th National Book Awards on November 19, 2014

Russia has a sprawling edifice of institutions held together by an understanding of the general line that has been laid down by Putin in consultation with the rest of the ruling cabal.

—Robert Service, Kremlin Winter, (London: Picador, 2019), 81.

And Service’s is one of the better volumes on Putin. How are western readers to understand the world when this is the language with which they are spoon-fed?