The real question is, what is Putin up to? Why suddenly make gays a target after Snowden took refuge there.
He made gays a target because homosexual rights are a big thing in America.
The Soviet empire was brought down by rights movements. People grew tired of the blatant corruption that existed under the totalitarian Marxist doctrine. They grew tired of the distrust of each other and the contempt they had for those around them (the bottom line of communism is "why work harder than the other guy?")
The people realized that things needed to change, and the rights movements and protests eventually brought it down (particularly when combined with a 'weaker' soviet premier who did not desire to launch endless military campaigns into lesser states to try and maintain the death-grip on control).
Then start trouble with Ukraine.
Putin didn't really start anything, there.
Many of those regions have some split loyalties between Western and Russian influence. Keep in mind that the Balkans has been something of an endless battleground for the past 200 years, or so. The Ottoman empire, French Empire, British Empire, Russian Empire, Muslim Empire - all of it has been clashing around that region that no one seems to be able to define as European, Mediterranean, Asian, or what the hell.
To make matters worse, the general population has largely been somewhat on the poor side - being farmers, mostly. When the larger powers weren't causing problems, 'corporate' conglomerates would arise and tax the population into supporting warlords commanding peasant uprisings.
They've always been struggling for some kind of identity. Probably why they damn near kill each other over adding or changing a letter to their alphabet - where many of those nations have two alphabets - a cyrillic (russian) derived alphabet and a roman/latin-based alphabet.
Now that Russia is a growing influence again, it would only make sense that the region begin brokering their allegiances between Eastern and Western influences. Tensions were bound to flare up, and Putin is just backing his horse.
It seems like he is trying very hard to cover something up. That or he has a plan, and he's just starting it. I don't think Putin would make his country more hostile, unless he had a good reason. Then again, I don't really know that much about Russian culture.
Putin is a very shrewd individual. I'd trust him to get things done.
Unfortunately - he and I disagree on what needs to be done, and he's the type to kill people over such differences of opinion (by throwing them out the top of office buildings).
Russian society is in a bit of a vulnerable state, right now. On one hand - they enjoy the new found freedoms they gained through the collapse of communism. On the other hand - Russia is far from the great power it once was, and there is a lot of nationalist pride in Russia.
Putin is aiming to capitalize upon that. He wants to inspire a sense of a coming era of Russian greatness and to convince people that he is the one to lead them to it.
Of course - a lot of that expansion will come at the end of a gun barrel - but Putin only needs to capitalize upon the turbulence that an expanding Russian sphere will create in the neighboring lands. By playing the 'other side' as radicals, extremists, and as a threat to Russian citizens - he can gain enough support to launch military campaigns into portions of the former Soviet empire to bring them back under his influence and control.
He doesn't really need to do much. Many of those regions will divide themselves and start squabbling over whether they should or should not remain independent (many simply because they don't want tanks rolling through their streets in protest to their voting results).
America's recent announcement that we're going to be trying to slash our military in half only helps Putin's agenda. Our current administration has no ****ing clue what it is doing, and they are going to get a lot of people killed with their ignorance.
