Aleksandr Dugin’s neo-imperialist “Eurasianism” provided ideological support for Putin’s Ukraine invasion.
— Read on www.vox.com/2016/3/1/11142048/dugin-russia-trump-endorse

Dugin is no longer relevant to Putin!

But when I met with Dugin’s own allies in Moscow last spring, I found that they were isolated and despondent, and no longer considered Putin an ally — but rather saw him as their enemy.

It turns out that Dugin had been dumped by the Russian establishment in 2014, just as his usefulness ran out. Putin had stopped short of overtly invading Ukraine, infuriating Dugin and other far-right leaders who wanted Russia to take part or all of Ukraine. When those far-right leaders agitated for escalation, using their newfound public influence to pressure Putin, the Kremlin put them down.

In June 2014, Putin formally rescinded an earlier order that had granted Russia legal authority to invade Ukraine — indicating he would not invade overtly. The next week, as part of a larger crackdown on far-right voices, Dugin was expelled from his prestigious job at Moscow State University.

But in spring 2015, when I traveled to Moscow, I found the once-triumphant Duginists and ultranationalists no longer saw Putin as an ally, and even considered him a traitor to the cause. Some had been pressured by security services, which they took as a sign that their views were no longer tolerated. Meanwhile, Putin had largely dropped his grand Eurasianist rhetoric.

In retrospect, it seems likely that Putin’s short-lived embrace of Duginism was opportunistic and superficial.