The Wall Street Journal recently showed Vladimir Putin in Crimea.  There was the saturnine Slav in an unusually ebullient mood.  He was standing in front of a banner ostensibly celebrating the victory of the USSR in what Russians still call “The Great Patriotic War” against Hitler in 1945. Of course, some would argue that the only reason Vladimir Vladimirovich appeared before the large red banner with its Communist hammer-and-sickle insignia is for historical accuracy. Those victory banners from 1945 have a long history in Russia. Defenders of Putin’s public association with the symbols of Soviet power might say it is rather like us celebrating America’s victory at Fort McHenry in 1814 with a fifteen-star, fifteen-stripe “Star-Spangled Banner.” Or we might see all this for what it is.  Vladimir Putin is a KGB agent who thinks the collapse of the USSR was an historic tragedy.  During the champagne-fizzy euphoria of the...(Read Full Article)