Russia is going through reversal to the system that existed there in the 70's, but it has fundamentally much closer to the totalitarian regimes that existed in interwar Europe. One the main driver toward totalitarian regime is Orthodox church. In the history of humanity, there was never country which had Orthodox religion, prosperous economy, and democracy. Russia resembles a hybrid between Brezhnev socialism (which was international) by nature of dictatorship and national socialism due extreme nationalism.
JWs are not the only non-orthodox religious group that faces oppression. If Putin manages to put them underground and illegality, it will actually boost WT membership ranks. JWs there survived Lenin and Stalin, and they will survive this. The biggest threat to WT membership ranks in Eastern Europe was actually steady rise of the living standard there and consumer society, where population under communism was deprived of goods and services. This changed in last 25 years with opened borders and full stores and population embraced this capitalist model.
