Catastrophic merger...

Two paths through history came together, and the result was pure mayhem.

The American path...

In the mid 19^th century there was a Civil War in the USA. Some states formed a confederation then amassed armies to fight their own country in pursuit of a new, separate entity. In the new confederation each state drafted and presented a new constitution. Each of the new constitutions featured the ability of white people to own people of color, African-Americans, as slaves. Each constitution also noted a slave owner's right to pursue, punish and/or re-enslave any such person that had escaped their bonds.

The confederate states lost the war that their insurrection had begun. There were few, to no, consequences pursued against those who had been leaders of the insurrection... Few, to no, charges pursued against those who had injured and killed their fellow citizens in support of said insurrection.

Toward the end of the 19^th, start of the 20^th, century history was being rewritten to remove the fact that slavery had been the central focus of the confederation and the ensuing war. That rewrite was largely unopposed even though it was demonstrably false.

Around the mid 20^th century some hyper conservative, white people (disturbed by trends toward the integration of society and a push for equal rights under the law), began a push toward control of one of the two political parties in the USA: the Republican party.

The path through the USSR...

In the 1980s the policies of glasnost and perestroika were revealing to the Soviet leadership, and people, that the USSR was a third world country with thousands of nuclear weapons; defective nuclear weapons and weapons systems (e.g., ICBMs so poorly built and maintained that they were unlikely to clear the silo should the missiles be deployed; a brand new, nuclear submarine that had barely cleared it's Soviet seaport when an explosion on-board sank the submarine, killing the entire crew).

Then came the first, American war against Iraq: the liberation of Kuwait. It pitted a large Iraqi military, with a great many soviet made weapons, against the US and our allies. In that war, that had key similarities to what might have happened should Soviet forces attempt to sweep west against the NATO alliance, the forces of Iraq were annihilated.

A rising KGB officer observed the collapse of the USSR and started to plan alternate means to obtain the power he'd been pursuing in the former Soviet Union. The USSR was one implementation of the pursuit of a Russian empire. Among the nations that formed the opposition to the world wide aggression attempting to create a new Soviet/Russian empire was the United States and it's allies.

There had to be another way to destroy those who would impede the next attempt at a Russian empire. The aforementioned KGB officer became a major kleptocrat during the fall of the USSR, became wealthy, maneuvered himself into the position of power at the top of the hierarchy in Russia and began the process of buying a way to subdue his main adversary in the Russian dominated world he was trying to create.

Paths merge...

Russian kleptocrats began to buy power amongst the ultraconservatives who were taking over the Republican party and symbiosis began. There was, however, a major problem... Symbiosis is supposed to be mutually beneficial, but when both parties want to be the HMFICOE (Head M F In Charge of Everything) it can not end well... This will end almost unbelievably tragically.

Here we are at the merger of the oligarchy in the USA with the Kleptocracy of Russia. It is an ugly situation that can get worse. We, in the USA, still have the means (vote en masse) to undo this developing catastrophe. If we don't get it done this election year we've provided the means for feudal, dark ages to return; take hold.

I can not stress enough just how bad this can get in an age where we are already destroying our only planet's ability to support human life.