[baybal2]

I find it surprising that somebody still finds it surprising.

Neonazism was for all purposes Putin's de-facto state ideology for Russia since around 2005 or so.

The only fig leaf they have is the official denial of connection in between the skinheads and other neonazi groups and the state. That is only skin deep of course https://www.aljazeera.com/mritems/Images/2017/11/23/dbb8470a...

Putin is of course afraid of image taint and loosing personal access to the Western politicians if he were to dress like a nazi himself. So he keeps himself nominally distanced

[mirimir]

The Soviet Union was always fundamentally fascist, and so is the current Russian government. Or at least, after the second 1917 revolution, when the gangsters took over. But now more openly kleptocratic.