OTR365 said:
In Putin's Russia, it is not possible to make billions without being part of the inner circle. People who were not ready to bend the knee - such as Mikhail Khodorkovsky - and could thus become a challenge to Putin's gang, were jailed and stripped of their wealth. They were probably also dirty, but dirt was never the problem. Leaders of the real opposition, such as Boris Nemtsov, were assasinated. Even smaller nuisances such as the journalist Anna Politivskaya, were murdered. The leaders of fake opposition parties - such as Vladimir Zhirinovsky - were always safe and on Kremlin's payroll.
Those oligarchs whose yachts are now being reposessed are not innocent. They are enablers and deserve all the (minor) s**t is that is coming to them, and much more. Sure, a point can be made about property rights in Western countries, but we crossed that Rubicon already in the 1980s when the concept of money laundering appared. Property rights will be further eroded e.g. with central bank digital currencies.
In the greater scheme of things, a $50 million yacht taken from Putin's friend is just pocket lint. Even the money confiscated from Russian Central Bank - about 300 billion euros - is pittance. Europe's biggest country is being reduced into rubble without any valid reason. Ukraine will never become Putin's little puppy dog, and that means a very long guerrilla war with untold miseries.
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