The television in our barracks spends all day straining itself in a dramatic battle against NATO. Every channel is full of stories about the NATO threat. Putin himself laments that NATO is at our doorstep and that we have nowhere left to retreat. It seems as though all of Russia lives for this alone, and that no other news interests people anymore. And then the lawyer arrives and brings news from real life. It turns out that Roman Abramovich, the oligarch closest to Putin and one of the men who holds his money, has obtained Portuguese citizenship. In a NATO country. So he did find a country where you can pay bribes, make semi-official and official payments, and end up in the EU and NATO—on the other side, so to speak, of Putin’s front line. And Abramovich also gave himself a New Year’s gift and bought a new plane: a Boeing 787 for $350 million. The aircraft was made in NATO’s leading country, and the money went into its economy. For the same amount, you could buy 10 Russian-made Sukhoi Superjets. In case anyone has forgotten, Abramovich made the bulk of his fortune like this: in 1997, he privatized Sibneft for $100 million. In 2005, he and Putin pulled off the deal of the century: the state (through Gazprom) bought Sibneft back from Abramovich. But this time for $13.1 billion. Brilliant, right? In other words, they simply pulled $13 billion out of our pockets. That is the money used to buy football clubs, real estate, and airplanes. The same money flows to Putin himself. In our investigation (as I mentioned in the carousel post), we said that Putin’s palace in Gelendzhik was built in part with Abramovich’s money. And so here we are. Putin’s “wallet” flies to a NATO country on an obscenely expensive plane. How brave of him. And everyone is happy. Putin and Abramovich steal from the budget and invest the money in the West. The West frightens itself with the prospect of Putin attacking Ukraine, yet grants citizenship to his trusted oligarch. Portuguese officials carry around suitcases full of cash. The U.S. economy gets $350 million. Television hosts foam at the mouth praising Putin for his struggle against NATO. A perfect cycle of hypocrisy and corruption. And only the sad Russian citizen who paid for all of this stands in a store, trying to figure out whether he has enough money left to buy a bottle of vodka and three mandarins for New Year’s.