Seen on CNBC earlier today:
As Russia holds massive show of military might in Moscow,Putin looks to cement power
He first cemented his power years ago. Back in office in 2012. Crimea 2014. World Cup 2018.
Cracks started to appear in 2011. He plastered them over. Bigger cracks followed in 2019. Riot police are expert at cosmetic repairs.
Now everything is starting to deteriorate, again. Beyond a certain point, no adhesive in the world would hold the pieces together.
To quote from a rather different source:
The radiance was that of the full, setting, and blood-red moon which now shone vividly through that once barely-discernible fissure of which I have before spoken as extending from the roof of the building, in a zigzag direction, to the base. While I gazed, this fissure rapidly widened—there came a fierce breath of the whirlwind—the entire orb of the satellite burst at once upon my sight—my brain reeled as I saw the mighty walls rushing asunder—
and so on, al fine.