A potential Trump's return, or a Trump-like figure, is likely to return to the United States. And there is something the West must be aware from it

I read from an article of The Michigan Daily, where a columnist published an interesting fact that always appears in my mind for a long time, yet finally revealed after too long. It is frequently neglected by Western media, something I can't stand for it.

Brandon Cowit, who has made an attempt to search about Russia, has come to a clear conclusion that the Americans totally "ignore" the grief Russians endured. During the 1990s, Russia was led by Boris Yeltsin, considered the friendliest President for the West. Despite Yeltsin's reputation as a drunk, inept and incompetent, with a disastrous neoliberal reform, the West did nothing to solve the problem. Furthermore, the United States openly helped Yeltsin to be re-elected in 1996. As Yeltsin was running like a drunk in Dublin, London, Washington and Paris, Russia's reputation was tarnished globally, including the shock defeat in the First Chechen War to the Chechen separatists. That nurtured Soviet nostalgia that eventually culminated in the rise of Vladimir Putin as Russia's autocratic President in 2000. Under Putin, human rights violation is widespread, crackdowns are severe, elections are unfair, invading Georgia and Ukraine like it is his own property - but one thing Putin did was his determination to restore Russia's position. And he did. He demonstrated how to project authority and power, adding to Russians' obsession with strongmen.

When Trump was elected as President of the United States in 2016, Trump replicated many of Yeltsin's behaviour - ignorance, arrogance, belief in hoax news and distorted opinions. At the same time, the U.S. Government became notoriously corrupt under Trump - the 45th appointed yes-men to his power base, coming and talking without any idea of how and why. He alienated everyone he met, resulting in the United States being increasingly isolated. He didn't pay attention to improving infrastructures, approving down-to-earth many polluted projects, reversing many educational programs to embrace his racist supporters. But it was the disastrous response of Trump during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic - which led the United States to the worst hit and the most fatalities in the world in just three months, that finally made the United States a laughing circus. By contrast, though Russia did struggle to it too, Russia suffered lesser fatalities and infections than America.

Yet unlike Yeltsin, who is now still not loved by many Russians today, Trump remains a significant presence even after he lost the 2020 elections to Joe Biden. He was notorious for rallying his radicals to attack Capitol Hill for an attempted coup. He rebuffed the offers coming to Biden's inauguration ceremony. He is now lambasting Biden's policies as a coward, and still attracts millions of supporters. Trump has made it clear that he would return to Presidency in 2024, and his attempt was endorsed by the Republican Party, the majority of them.

But this is not the only difficulty the West is dealing with. Russian meddling in the 2016 elections in the United States and Trump's sequence signalled a greater sign of problems: the West was not prepared to play a physical battle with Russia.

Russia has long advanced its agenda and has improved it radically since 2000 with hope to recover its lost glory, and no Russians forget how the West supported Yeltsin to starve and humiliate Russia. Putin, while truly respects Yeltsin for giving him power, has many times underlined that Russia must return to the big stage. By contrast, the West isn't serious about the Russian threat, still see Yeltsin in a positive light as a liberator, rather than a flawed President. As the West stopped thinking about Russia, the Russian government began to make its moves. Two wars against Georgia and Ukraine, largely due to these countries' aspiration to join NATO - well, it does make the whole organisation unite on the side of the oppressed, don't we?

But what about the inside? The West is not ready. Putin has planted seeds with figures belong to radical, Eurosceptic groups to power. In Britain, a shocking 2016 Brexit vote was believed to be orchestrated by Russia, which ended with the UK leaving the European Union with plenty of issues unsolved. The loss of the UK, a major economic power, left the EU in disarray. In the Netherlands and France, anti-EU people like Marine Le Pen and Gert Wilder emerged. In Hungary, Viktor Orbán, the PM, was seen sympathetic to Russia; while in Poland, an old ally of Hungary, saw the rise of PiS (Law and Justice Party), led by Eurosceptic Andrzej Duda. While Poland is far from being a friend of Russia due to historical hostilities - both Hungary and Poland are working to wrestle against the European Union rather than paying attention to Putin.

The worst, however, came within NATO, as friction between NATO's second most powerful member, Turkey, with the rest, increased. Turkey has also been led by an autocrat since 2003, recent years has seen massive military buildup and the development of death squads sending to assassinate dissidents, while President Erdoğan lives in a luxurious palace in Istanbul. Erdoğan, likewise, is far from being an ally of Moscow, but the Turkish dictator deeply admires how Putin centralised power and ushered the same dream to build an imperialist Turkey - all around the idea of nostalgia for the loss of an empire that once ruled the Balkans, North Africa and the Middle East.

He's not afraid of doing so. Currently, he has started the project of reviving the Ottoman Empire in 2023, which began with the takeover of the Middle East, before coming to North Africa and the Balkans - seen as an integral part of the lost empire. He also sought to crush dissidents who oppose this regime - he sent death squads, assassinating or beating people opposing him.

There is also a growing number of Putin or Trump-like parties like that of the Republicans looking to emulate Putin's formula. In Georgia, a political party called Georgian Dream, led by a Russia-backed billionaire, is wreaking havoc by taking courts and reversing political reforms. In Ukraine, a Russia-based actor became President and has shown signs of becoming a new autocrat. In Slovenia, Janez Janša, a Trump supporter, took power with desires to wrestle power from the EU.

Meanwhile, frictions between the EU and NATO states have shown no sign of thaws, though. Greece, a long time EU and NATO member, have been dissatisfied with the group over perceived bias and lack of solidarity. On one hand, France and Germany have been accused of bullying EU members from the former communist world. The others, former communist states turned EU/NATO members, are notoriously corrupt, with Romania and Bulgaria always top the rank of both organisation's blacklists; only the Baltic nations and the Czech Republic seem to be okay with the path they chose. This easily fed Putin's idea about the nostalgia of the Soviet past came to reality - this is rising in Bulgaria, for example, anti-Borisov protests and the fact that the EU has done nothing to help Bulgaria overcome its crisis has mounted the nostalgic feelings of the old Bulgarian days, not necessary communist, but a feeling that they should not join the EU at the first place (only solved by the resignation of Borisov cabinet).

With rising resentments, temporarily shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic, various countries in the Western order has leaned to Russian authoritarianism in unofficial ways. They're bending, using the benefits of the EU and NATO, to stand against the same groups that fed them.

Current President of the U.S., Joe Biden, appeared not clear about this. Though he is aware of Russia's influence on Trump, he has failed to see how Putin is playing with the EU and NATO like in no man's land. Putin managed to turn Turkey from an ally to become enemy of Europe in just a flashpoint, despite Ankara and Moscow remain to confront in the Middle East and South Caucasus. Putin also turned a number of EU and NATO nations like Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia and Bulgaria, into their emotional and mind captives; whilst playing Poland to think of the EU as an authoritarian organisation. Some aspiring ones like Ukraine and Georgia are facing a reversal of their initial progress into returning to the same corrupt states. Putin also succeeded, in some aspects, calling the British populace to rebel and left the EU.

This means a Trump comeback, or a Donald Trump-like person, could gain power and threaten European stability and further, the West. Putin is unlikely to stay long enough, but it is certain that Putinism will not disappear, just like how Trumpism is. The fault lies on the United States and its friends for failing to back the right candidates that can serve Russia as a future friend; instead, by backing the tinpot and corrupt Yeltsin government, the West has settled the future of relations with Russia as a hostile one. Moscow wants revenge and they are slowly taking the West not by guns - but by the undeclared support of totalitarian governments rising in the continent that once proclaimed itself a fortress of democracy.

How Putin is feeding the nostalgia or the nationalist, Eurosceptic fervours could be seen as a damning lesson for most of Europe and America. As long as we choose leaders not based on competence but on loyalty, it can be very costly, as seen in the current chaotic situations of NATO and the European Union. Putin's high approval in totalitarian Russia reflects this.