Putin’s Global Proxy Empire Is COLLAPSING

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Become a Member Today and Unlock EXCLUSIVE Videos: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKfak8fBm_Lhy4eX9UKxEpA/join  Watch as Putin's global proxy empire completely collapses. From Armenia rejecting the Russian military alliance to seek EU membership, to the fall of Bashar al-Assad losing Putin critical Syria bases. We analyze how the Ukraine war dismantled Russian influence, leading to Viktor Orban losing power in Hungary, Nicolas Maduro's arrest in Venezuela, and Ali Khamenei's death in Iran. Discover why Kazakhstan is publicly confronting the Kremlin.  ⏱️ CHAPTERS: 0:00 - Putin Puppet Empire Faces Global Collapse 1:12 - Armenia Rejects Russia and Seeks EU Membership 5:08 - Bashar al-Assad Falls and Putin Loses Syria 8:07 - Viktor Orban Loses Hungary Election and EU Veto 10:38 - Nicolas Maduro Arrested and Iran Leader Khamenei Killed 12:50 - Kazakhstan President Tokayev Confronts Putin on Live TV 15:21 - Georgia Territories Reject Russian Proxy Integration 17:15 - Is the Russian Proxy Empire About to Collapse?  Support us directly as we bring you independent, up-to-date reporting on military news and global conflicts by clicking here: https://www.youtube.com/@TheMilitaryShow/join  #militarystrategy #militarydevelopments #militaryanalysis #themilitaryshow  SOURCES:  https://pastes.io/rb3tTd8C

Transcript

00:01For years, Russia has worked to create a puppet empire spanning from the Caucasus to the Middle East.

00:08Influence has been Putin's most important tool, but that influence is waning and the puppet empire is on the verge

00:14of collapse.

00:16Russia has been found out.

00:17The fragile spiderweb of alliances Putin spent so long trying to build and manipulate is tearing apart at the seams.

00:25And no matter where you look, we see evidence of nations pulling away from Russia.

00:30We start with Armenia.

00:32Russia has had problems with Armenia for a while.

00:35Most of them centered on the country's Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.

00:39Recently re-elected to his post, Pashinyan has long set out his stance as a Russo skeptic

00:44and as a man who wants to develop deeper ties with the collective West and especially the European Union.

00:50Moscow hates Pashinyan for these actions.

00:53It's going to hate him even more after what he just did.

00:56Before we explain why, everything you see here is researched, verified and produced by real people.

01:02If you value that, subscribe, comment below and consider becoming a member for access to exclusive content.

01:09In an August 27th news conference, Armenia's Prime Minister declared that Russia can no longer be considered a strategic partner

01:16of his country.

01:17Moscow has failed to meet its treaty obligations, Pashinyan raged, and that failure includes Russia refusing to come to Armenia's

01:25assistance during the Second Karabakh War.

01:28That inaction in 2022 has set the stage for the collapse in the relationship between Russia and Armenia in 2026.

01:35What we're seeing here is the downgrading of the relationship between Armenia and Russia.

01:40And to further twist the screw, Pashinyan has also outlined his plans to apply for Armenian membership to the EU.

01:46Those membership efforts are going to be stepped up, Pashinyan claims, stating,

01:51This process of applying for EU membership also requires a great deal of work and we will probably soon start

01:57this process especially to hear the appeals for our EEU partners.

02:01A referendum will likely be held but only after the application has been made official.

02:06Russia won't be happy about that.

02:07It wants Armenia to hold a referendum before the application is lodged because Russia would then have a better chance

02:13to manipulate the results through misinformation and voter coercion.

02:16Moscow is furious.

02:19Several of Putin's talking heads have already come out to lambast Pashinyan for his statements.

02:24Chief among them is Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, who whined that Pashinyan's plans for the relationship downgrade reveals

02:32fundamental contradictions.

02:33This tactic by the Armenian authorities appears frankly inappropriate.

02:37Armenia intends to gain the benefits of EU membership without sacrificing its privileges within the EAEU, Zakharova said.

02:44As she tried to use Armenia's membership in the Eurasian Economic Union as leverage.

02:49Armenia is one of five member states of the EAEU, which is intended to serve as a common market, much

02:54like the EU, though focused on former Soviet states.

02:58Realistically, it's an organization through which Russia tries to control what it views as puppet regimes.

03:03Holding the EAEU over Armenia's head likely isn't going to work, as Armenia and Pashinyan have seen how Russia tries

03:09to use the group to get its own way.

03:11Between January and May, Armenia's turnover from trade with Russia declined by 21%, the $2.2 billion compared to the

03:19same period in 2025.

03:21That was part of a Russian plan to put pressure on Armenia to vote the way it wanted, which would

03:26mean booting Pashinyan out of office.

03:28It didn't work.

03:29Rather, the plan just showed Armenia that Russia will try to use the EAEU to strong arm it when the

03:35Kremlin doesn't get its way.

03:36And Russia is still doing it.

03:38Russia has already gone against the entire spirit of the supposed free trade entity by imposing bans on Armenian goods.

03:45What use is EAEU membership if the group doesn't function as intended?

03:49That's the question that Armenia will be asking, meaning Zakharova's threats are likely not being taken too seriously.

03:56Perhaps knowing that, Russia's foreign minister Sergei Lavrov has also weighed in on Armenia's decision to downgrade its relationship with

04:03Russia.

04:03In my opinion, this doesn't speak to a great deal of trust in Armenian voters or the Armenian people, Lavrov

04:09said on August 28th, when discussing Pashinyan's decision to delay an EU referendum until an application has been lodged.

04:17Lavrov claimed that Armenia has developed due to the EAEU, noting that higher trade turnover.

04:22But that turnover means nothing when Russia can take it away whenever Armenia does something the Kremlin doesn't like.

04:28Armenia's decision is a bad sign for Russia.

04:31It shows that the Kremlin's influence has all but collapsed in the country, leaving Armenia, more likely than ever before,

04:37to head into the arms of the collective West.

04:40But this is just the latest issue Russia has faced as it tries to maintain its grip on its proxy

04:45empire.

04:46No matter where you look, Russian allies are either falling or making the conscious decision to distance themselves as far

04:53away from the Kremlin as possible.

04:55Armenia is in Russia's backyard, and that's where the collapse of the Russian proxy empire is most damaging to the

05:00Kremlin.

05:01But before we head there, we first travel to the Middle East.

05:04On December 8th, 2024, Bashar al-Assad lost power in Syria.

05:09The collapse of the Assad regime ended 50 years of dictatorial rule.

05:14For millions of Syrians, this was a cause for celebration.

05:17But for one man in the Kremlin, Assad's fall was the worst thing that could have happened for his attempt

05:22to build a Middle East power base.

05:24Putin had spent decades and billions of dollars building up bases in Syria from which Russia was able to project

05:30power into the Middle East, Africa and the Mediterranean region.

05:34In the space of a few weeks, what was once a rock-solid foundation of influence crumbled from beneath Russia.

05:40Syria transformed from a strategic asset into a potential liability, and Putin's attention immediately turned toward trying to salvage Russia's

05:49interests in two key locations, the Tartus naval base and the Khomeini mayor base.

05:54Russia has spent the last couple of years trying to maintain the exclusive rights to use these two bases.

05:59At least then, Syria wouldn't be a lost cause for Russia's influence campaign.

06:04However, August 2026 has seen Syria's new government declare that Russia no longer has exclusive control over these bases, reports

06:12the Times.

06:13In Armenia, we're seeing the democratic process ruin Russia's attempts to maintain its proxy empire.

06:19In Syria, an uprising upended the Kremlin's plans, leaving its Middle East power base in ruins.

06:25The fall of the Assad regime was especially painful for Russia.

06:28The relationship between Russia and Syria has been carefully cultivated since the Soviet era, starting in 1953, when the Soviet

06:37Union began seeking ties with nationalist Arab regimes.

06:41Bashar's father, Hafez al-Assad, was more than happy to accept help from a foreign superpower, and he was just

06:47as happy to grant that superpower access to its main military foothold in the Middle East.

06:52Since 1971, Russia has held exclusive control over the naval and air bases we mentioned.

06:58Those bases helped to sustain the operations of Russia's Afrika Korps.

07:02Russia even helped the younger Assad survive during the 2015 civil war in Syria.

07:07But the rebel uprising in 2024 came too fast and too strong for Russia to respond, especially after two years

07:14of brutal war in Ukraine.

07:16Bashar al-Assad fell, and with him fell another nation in Russia's global proxy empire.

07:21The fall of Assad was perhaps the first indicator that Russia is losing its grip on its proxy empire.

07:27So long propped up by promises of security, that empire is in decline, as other puppets either fall by the

07:34wayside or actively turn their backs on Putin.

07:37We'll explain more in a moment. First, this is a reminder that you're watching the military show.

07:42If you're getting insight from our channel, don't forget to subscribe and enable notifications so you never miss a video.

07:48If 2024 set the stage, 2026 has been the most damaging year yet for Putin and his ambition to create

07:55his own version of the Soviet Union.

07:57The year has seen several of Russia's favorite puppets disappear. Most recently, it was former Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán's

08:05turn.

08:06In April, Orbán's 16-year stint as the leader of Hungary came to an end, as the country voted to

08:12elect a new Prime Minister who wouldn't be so beholden to Russia as Orbán had been.

08:17The loss of Orbán was a body blow to Russia in more ways than one.

08:20Orbán was living proof that sovereign, illiberal democracy is possible, popular and even sustainable in some parts of the European

08:28Union, the Center for European Policy Analysis points out.

08:32Losing him was a blow against that ideology, which, in turn, was a shot against Russia.

08:37But worse for the Kremlin was what Orbán represented when it came to Hungary's dealings with the EU.

08:43Orbán was the veto master, often ensuring that he, and often he alone, stood in the way whenever the EU

08:49wanted to take an action that would damage Russia's campaign in Ukraine.

08:53Putin would jump and Orbán would leap to Russia's defense, as we saw toward the end of 2025 and into

08:5926.

09:00Hungary under Orbán tried to get in the way of the $102 billion loan that the EU intended to give

09:05to Ukraine, backed by frozen Russian assets used as security.

09:09Orbán is now gone, and Hungary has approved the loan.

09:13That, in a nutshell, demonstrates the importance of Orbán to Putin and his attempts to influence EU policy.

09:19Russia tried to play off the loss of Orbán as no big deal.

09:23Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov even tried to claim that Russia and Hungary were never friends,

09:28as he also tried to ensnare Hungary's new prime minister in the Kremlin's tendrils.

09:34In this instance, there is mutual willingness on our part, and we will then proceed to take our cue from

09:39the specific steps taken by the new Hungarian government,

09:42Peskov said of the relationship Russia hoped to strike with Peter Magyar upon his election.

09:47Not long after, Magyar made sure Hungary got out of the way of the EU loan.

09:52Another puppet went down.

09:53Russia followed up its loss of influence in the Middle East with the loss of a proxy in Hungary.

09:57And the great irony is that none of this would have happened if Putin weren't so obsessed with Ukraine.

10:03It's that obsession that has caused Putin to direct almost all of Russia's military focus on one nation,

10:09rather than spreading it across every country that it tried to control.

10:13Armenia has backed away due to Russia's failure to meet its treaty obligations, which included security.

10:19Assad fell due to Putin not being capable of focusing on Syria.

10:22And Orban is gone in part because Hungarians were sick of their leader cozying up to an authoritarian,

10:28trying to rampage through a country that is on their doorstep.

10:31And still Russia's power declines.

10:34Russia has been having an awful geopolitical 2026, even before it lost Orban.

10:39At the very beginning of the year, the US ousted Venezuela's strongman authoritarian leader, Nicolas Maduro,

10:45in a bold raid that saw Maduro arrested and taken into the US.

10:49Russia lost another leader it wanted to manipulate.

10:52And that also meant it lost a potential power base in Latin America.

10:56Again, the Kremlin complained, calling America's actions an act of banditry.

11:00But what the Kremlin really meant was that Russia had been trying to control Maduro by providing him with air

11:05defense systems

11:06and attempting to build an economic partnership with Venezuela under Maduro.

11:10You could argue that this relationship was still in the very early stages, as the nest center points out.

11:16The air defenses Russia sent to Venezuela were likely old, faulty, and as proven by the US, incapable of stopping

11:22Western power.

11:23Trade between the two nations only amounted to $200 million in 2024.

11:28But symbolically, this was another blow to Moscow.

11:31Maduro was an ally, albeit not a powerful one.

11:34He could have represented a route for Russia into Latin America, but he, like so many others since the start

11:39of the Ukraine invasion, is gone.

11:41Also gone is Iran's former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

11:45He was blown to pieces by a bunker-busting bomb on the first day of Operation Epic Fury.

11:50And though he has been replaced by his son, the loss of Khamenei represents another dent in Russia's attempts to

11:56build a global proxy empire.

11:58Now, this particular power collapse is in progress rather than completed.

12:02The younger Khamenei is still an ally to Russia, and we won't see the true impact of the loss of

12:07Ali Khamenei until the conflict between Iran and the US is over.

12:11Still, the Kremlin could do without the turmoil of forced leadership shakeups in Iran, especially as Russia relies on Iran

12:17to provide it with weapons to use against Ukraine.

12:19The Shahid-type drones we now see flying into Ukraine almost daily were created by Iran.

12:25Now, the level of support that Iran can offer has been weakened due to repeated airstrikes by the US and

12:30Israel.

12:31All over the world, we're seeing the collapse of Russian influence.

12:35But now we come back to Armenia and the nearby nations.

12:38Armenia is in Russia's backyard, and it's there where we're starting to see the Kremlin power base crumbling, the point

12:44where it's hard to see how Russia can recover.

12:46The relationship between Russia and Kazakhstan is fracturing, to the point where Kazakhstan's president, Kassim Jamar Takayev, has sat across

12:54from Putin and flat-out told him to end the war he started in Ukraine.

12:59The conflict should be frozen, the Kazakh president said, adding that the reasons for Putin's war are not understandable.

13:06Putin, sitting ashen-faced as he was dressed down by an ally, could only sputter that he would explain the

13:12details of the war to Takayev later.

13:14All of this happened on live television.

13:17It also happened in the wake of a record-breaking strike against the Omsk oil refinery in Siberia, showing us

13:23that Russia's Central Asian allies are now getting very wary about what Putin's war could mean for their security.

13:29Returning to the South Caucasus, we're also seeing that Armenia's neighbour and long-time enemy, Azerbaijan, isn't happy with Russia.

13:37Bilateral relations between Russia and Azerbaijan have been in trouble ever since December 2024, when Russian air defences shot down

13:45an Azerbaijani civilian jetliner.

13:47That incident happened on Christmas Day, and it resulted in the deaths of 38 of the 67 people on board

13:54the flight.

13:55Azerbaijan responded to this by shutting down the Baku offices of the Russo-Trudnich-Yestvo agency, which Russia uses to

14:02exert its soft power inside Azerbaijan through humanitarian work.

14:07This particular rift seemed to be on the mend in 2026 until August 27, when Azerbaijan complained about what it

14:14saw as a Russian provocation outside the Azerbaijani embassy in Moscow.

14:19Azerbaijan also accused Russian media sources of waging a dirty and biased campaign against the country.

14:25Armenia and Azerbaijan are now holding peace talks after years of conflict, which Russia has been more than happy to

14:31fuel.

14:31If those two nations can come to an understanding, Putin's tactic of divide and conquer fails, and yet more of

14:37the proxy empire collapses.

14:39Even in Serbia, we're seeing signs of another traditional ally of Moscow turning its back on Putin.

14:44Back in August, Serbian President Aleksandr Vucic welcomed Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky to Serbia.

14:50But I just hope, without any real facts behind these hopes, that this will end tomorrow, Serbia's President said, marking

14:57yet another supposed ally of Russia, calling for an end to Putin's madness.

15:01About a month later, Ukraine welcomed Vucic for a state visit, and according to Euronews, Serbia is seeking membership of

15:08the EU, just like Armenia.

15:10Over and over we see the same thing, allies distancing themselves from Russia and decrying Putin for his actions.

15:16The sole bright spot that Russia has as it watches its proxy empire crumble comes from the former Georgian territories

15:22of Abkhazia and South Asia.

15:25Both have declared independence from Georgia, and Russia has supported those calls and essentially recognizes them as sovereign entities.

15:32Finally, something is going right for Putin.

15:34He has two relatively new territories he can manipulate into the Kremlin fold.

15:39Only, that isn't going quite how Putin envisioned either.

15:41Russia wants deeper integration with these two territories, to the point where it's given one of the Kremlin's most senior

15:47officials, Sergey Kiryenko, the job of overseeing Russia's interests in Abkhazia and South Asia.

15:54Kiryenko has met with new leaders, and he wants to ensure that Russia can both maintain military bases in these

16:00two territories, in return for Moscow continuing to finance them.

16:03However, opinions within Abkhazia and South Asia remain very mixed.

16:08Protests have happened in the former, in response to the Kremlin attempting to push through legislation.

16:12Those protests have even been strong enough to bring down local governments, reports Georgian Abkhaz Context.

16:19South Asia is a little different, being a much smaller territory, and much more dependent on Russia.

16:24But the same outlet points out that South Asia is often wracked by corruption scandals, often linked to Russia's financial

16:30assistance.

16:30There is no smooth sailing going on here.

16:33And if George Machedlishvili, who is an associate professor at the European University in Tbilisi is to be believed,

16:39it's just as likely that these two territories will reintegrate into Georgia as they are to fully fall under Russia's

16:44sway.

16:45He points to the wise plays made by the Georgian government, as it welcomes people from their territories and even

16:50provides them with free medical treatment.

16:52Some of them come to Georgia and are surprised that no one is going to kill them.

16:56No one is going to persecute them, Machedlishvili says.

16:59That's the sort of approach that will soon lead to residents of Abkhazia and South Asia asking questions, chief among

17:05them being,

17:05is it worth it to be independent when Russia is trying to turn you into a proxy and Georgia is

17:10so willing to reintegrate you if you're willing?

17:13Putin is watching all of this with horror.

17:15The strategies of control that worked in the past are no longer effective, in large part because Russia has proven

17:20itself weaker than anybody thought against Ukraine.

17:23The Kremlin can no longer threaten and cajole in the same way that it did before.

17:27What has happened in Iran and Venezuela also proves that Russia can't protect its proxies and those that are under

17:33the Kremlin's influence will have taken notice.

17:35Russia is getting desperate to keep hold of the crumbling vestiges of its puppet empire.

17:40That's why we're seeing Putin escalate, both in Ukraine and in Russia's hybrid campaign against NATO.

17:46As it loses more stable allies, Russia is also turning to more dangerous states such as North Korea to cure

17:53its increasing isolation.

17:55And though the situations in Iran and Syria don't look great for Russia, Putin is playing the waiting game and

18:01hoping that things will work out for him in the end.

18:03Still, none of these are the actions of a strong leader.

18:06They're the actions of a president who has seen most of his efforts fail as the global spiderweb he created

18:11gets ruined.

18:12The puppet empire is no more.

18:14By trying to build on that empire with victory in Ukraine, Putin has done nothing but set the stage for

18:19the empire's collapse.

18:21And that collapse is clear in Kazakhstan, where Russia isn't just dealing with a leader who is willing to call

18:26Putin out on live TV.

18:28Kazakhstan is making all sorts of moves that are slowly distancing it from Russia, and you can find out all

18:33about them in our video.

18:35But before you go, are you enjoying our reporting? Subscribe and share your thoughts below.

18:39And if you'd like to support the real people behind the channel, consider becoming a member for exclusive content.

18:45And thank you, as always, for watching.

18:47For watching.

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