Russia in the Age of AI Power

The empire of code

Alexander Dugin on faith, sovereignty, and the digital frontier.

See how stylishly AI has mapped the core principles of The Technological Republic by Alex Karp onto the Russian context:

Russia is a civilizational power (a state-civilization), not merely a nation-state or a peripheral economy. Its historical existence and future are determined not only by raw materials, territory, or even nuclear parity, but by its ability to preserve and develop a sovereign identity in an era when the primary struggle takes place in the domain of software, algorithms, artificial intelligence, and the digital control of reality.

Here is a symmetrical set of principles adapted to Russian/Eurasian civilization:

Russia has been an empire from the very beginning. Russian civilization achieved victory and survival not through democratic procedures (which are alien to it) or market efficiency (which remains a secondary factor), but through technological and spiritual superiority at decisive moments: from the firearms and artillery of Ivan the Terrible and Peter the Great, through the nuclear project and space program of the USSR, to today’s hypersonic weapons and electronic warfare. Victory in the Great Patriotic War and the Cold War alike was the result of an alliance between the state, engineers, scientists, and a deep faith in its mission.

The contemporary Russian elite (including the IT and digital sector) has lost its way. After 1991, talent either emigrated or moved into the consumer digital sector: copycat social networks, fintech, e-commerce, gaming, crypto speculation, and “import substitution” in the form of copying Western platforms. Resources and intellect are spent on trivial replication instead of addressing civilizational-scale challenges: defense, sovereign AI, cybersecurity, predictive analytics for the state, and the digital identity of the Russian world.

The current model is mortally dangerous for the survival of Russian civilization. In the 21st century, power is software power. Whoever controls software (algorithms, data, AI models, quantum computing) controls reality. The West and China are already engaged in a total struggle for software supremacy. If Russia remains on the periphery—with dependence on imported semiconductors, foreign clouds, open-source libraries, and Western neural networks—it will lose its sovereignty faster than from any military defeat. China and the West will not wait for Russia to “catch up.”

A new alliance between the state-civilization and the software/AI industry is required. The state must radically reorganize itself along engineering principles: speed, results, boldness, and the rejection of bureaucratic formalism. The IT and AI elite must direct its talents towards civilizational tasks: sovereign AI (not a copy of ChatGPT, but a model imbued with a Russian worldview), predictive analytics systems for military operations and the Russian world, cyber defense, digital identity without backdoors, and autonomous weapons systems. Structures similar to Palantir Technologies are needed, but grounded in a Russian logic and free from Atlanticist bias.

Hard power is impossible without deep faith. “Hard power” (missiles, tanks, drones, hypersonic systems) rests entirely on “faith”—a shared civilizational identity, a sense of mission, collective unity (sobornost), rejection of the liberal “end of history,” and a willingness to sacrifice for the future. Without this, even the most powerful AI or nuclear arsenal becomes a dead instrument. The contemporary Russian elite lacks this faith. Cynicism, consumerist nihilism, relativism, and the mentality that “everything is permitted if it brings profit” prevail.

Engineers, scientists, and developers are not free from obligations to their civilization. Talent and success do not arise in a vacuum. They are made possible by a thousand-year-old Russian civilization, its sacrifices, culture, language, and statehood. Therefore, those who possess knowledge are required to show loyalty and to contribute to the defense and development of this civilization—rather than merely maximizing personal income, emigrating, or working for global corporations.

Do you know why AI was able to do this so easily? Because for decades, the supporters of the Russian Idea—whom no one noticed until recently, and even now only barely—have been working relentlessly on books, articles, texts, posts, materials, and translations. Through this sustained effort, they have constructed an extensive map of Russian civilization. Empire, Eurasia, multipolarity, the state-civilization, the Russian World, the eternal significance of Orthodoxy, deep identity, great-power statehood, the ontology of the state, the geopolitics of the Land, the sacralization of power, traditionalism and traditional values, the great mission of Russia, the great people, the critique of unipolarity, Atlanticism, liberalism, the West, and so on—these are not slogans, but theories, systems, schools, and intellectual currents.

There exists a vast Russian patriotic narrative, complete with its own theories and concepts, terminologies, and systems. When AI is tasked with performing a given job, it automatically turns to this body of thought as something self-evident. This may go unnoticed at first glance, but it is precisely AI—still not fully censored—that reveals the scale of this immense effort: not only the work of many decades, but of centuries, if one includes the Slavophiles, the Eurasianists, the National Bolsheviks, the monarchists, the Orthodox thinkers, the Sophiologists, and Soviet patriots.

For the sake of completeness, I will present what the AI wrote about Alex Karp himself and his project.

The book by Alex Karp (CEO of Palantir Technologies), The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West (2025, co-authored with Nicholas W. Zamiska), is a sharp critique of the modern West—and especially Silicon Valley—as well as a manifesto on how relations between technology, the state, and national identity must be restructured.

Here are the main ideas of the book in condensed form:

The United States and the West have always been a “technological republic.”

America dominated the twentieth century not only because of democracy, but above all because of technological—especially software—superiority. Victory in World War II, the Cold War, and the rise of the internet all resulted from a close alliance between the state and engineers (the Manhattan Project, DARPA, early Silicon Valley driven by Pentagon contracts).

Silicon Valley has lost its way.

After victory in the Cold War and the onset of Pax Americana, engineers and entrepreneurs shifted from nationally significant tasks to consumer products: social networks, food delivery apps, advertising, and shopping platforms. Talent and resources are being spent on “trivial” pursuits instead of addressing real challenges such as defense, crime, medicine, and education.

The current model is dangerous for the survival of the West.

In the twenty-first century, the main struggle for power is the struggle for superiority in software and artificial intelligence. China and other authoritarian regimes actively use technology to enhance military and geopolitical power. If the West does not return to serious priorities, it will lose the new arms race.

A new alliance between the state and the software industry is necessary.

Karp explicitly calls for close partnership—rather than separation—between government and technology companies (such as Palantir Technologies). The state must adopt an engineering mindset (rapid solutions, boldness, focus on results), while tech companies must direct their talent towards defense, national security, and major civilizational goals.

Hard power requires soft belief.

“Hard power” (military and technological strength) is impossible without “soft belief”—a shared national identity, culture, values, patriotism, and a sense of duty. The modern elite, including the tech elite, lacks these “soft” foundations: there is no common purpose, no pride in civilization, and instead there is conformity, relativism, and consumerist nihilism.

Engineers are not free from obligations to the nation.

Talented engineers and company founders do not create their success “from nothing”—they benefit from the achievements of American (and Western) civilization. Therefore, they are expected to show loyalty and contribute to the defense and development of that civilization, rather than merely maximizing profit or personal comfort.

A critique of decadence and a call for ambition.

The book is an indictment of intellectual fragility, the cowardice of leadership, the loss of ambition, and spiritual emptiness. Karp calls for a “revolt” against this decline and a return to bold, transformative projects—even if they are unpopular or politically controversial.

Overall, the book functions simultaneously as:

— an indictment of contemporary Silicon Valley,

— a call for the revival of America’s “national project,”

— and a justification of the mission of Palantir Technologies (working with government institutions, defense, and AI for security).

[At this point, the AI begins to lean slightly “woke,” though it still holds back.]

It is a strongly “hawkish,” national-capitalist, and anti-postmodern text, which many have interpreted as a manifesto for a new era of technological militarism in the West.

(Translated from the Russian)