Your take on the strength of the Russian economy is poor. Inflation is high and high interest rates impacts greatly on low income Russians, many of whom are borrowing to cover declining real incomes.
“The Kremlin, as a result, is in a three way bind of its own making, The government can’t cut spending as long as the war continues. The war, however, saps the labour force, fuelling inflation and diminishing both welfare and public sentiment. And high interest rates, necessitated by all the inflation, stifle investment and productivity and further distort the economy”.
”… with every tick of the clock, Russia’s wartime economy becomes more susceptible to external (or internal, for that matter) shocks”.
source: CEPA - Russia’s Economy: Closer to the Edge Than it Looks. 14 May 2024.
It’s not that unusual to see what on the surface looks like a booming economy, very quickly go from boom to bust.
As I said, unsustainable.