Maybe they envy us; Maybe they merely envy themselves in a world without us antagonizing them. Dismissing the latter as if it were the former is disingenuous douchebaggery. "I'm not an asshole; They're just jealous"

As long as we have military bases all over the world I don't see how we can complain about other countries trying to influence our elections. I can't believe it's even a news story... It's just so obviously happening.

As if Russia wouldn't do the same thing if they were in the position of the U.S. This is simply a game of trying to obtain power, plain and simple.

As if the U.S. wouldn't do the same thing if they were in the position of Russia.

And yet we complain...

>no-one really cares about Russia

This is clearly false; the western media and political elites have been obsessing about Russia for the best part of a year.

>Russia cares about the USA

From my observations during one month of travelling in Russia, they could not care less about USA.

Good point. So let's talk motive.

EVs and solar are on the verge of a tipping point that will destroy petroleum at least as the world's most important resource. Sub-10k EVs are coming since EVs are actually a lot simpler to build than ICE cars.

Russia's economy is over 50% petroleum based last statistic I read. John McCain famously called them a "gas can with a gun strapped to it."

Other Petro states will fare pretty bad too. Saudi Arabia has IPOd Aramco to cash out and now via SoftBank are indirectly buying huge stakes in tons of things. This is smart, but they also have in many ways fewer problems than Russia.

Russia has a demographic crisis that is compounded by young people and high skill people leaving. If oil collapses as a major revenue source they are completely hosed. They will suffer a repeat of the economic crash that came with the collapse of the USSR.

Add to that the "we were once a great empire" bitterness that likely infests the ranks and it makes sense for them to try to disrupt the world order as much as possible. They don't have a lot to lose.

Edit: there is also an ideological dimension. Putin is an admirer of among others Julius Evola and is more or less a fellow traveler with the US and EU neo-fascist movements.

I don't understand the downvotes you're getting - the economic circumstances you cite are sound, and historically desperate and remarkable things can indeed happen as Empires and Nations come to the end of their economic rope. As for the neo-Christian-fascism it's well discussed elsewhere. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleksandr_Dugin

The Saudi's are staring at an even greater economic chasm with poor returns from their non-oil investments.