It could be called Petro-Kremlin. Over the past year the Russian state has effectively renationalised a third of the country's vast energy resources, creating an oil-and-gas goliath that could be used to revive Soviet-style great power status.
'Instead of the military force the Soviet Union used to use to project its power, Russia is using oil as a major tool of foreign policy,' says Michael Heath, a political analyst with Aton, a Russian brokerage.
Last week's gas war with Ukraine, which ended with Kiev accepting a nearly fivefold increase in the price of Russian energy, handed a symbolic victory to the Kremlin.
Ukraine, which broke free from Moscow's influence in the 'Orange Revolution' a year ago, had protested that Russia's proposed price rise - to US$230 per thousand cubic metres of gas - was more than twice the rate paid by other neighbours of Russia, including Georgia, Latvia and Estonia. Belarus, a loyal ally of Russia, pays just US$47 for the same amount of gas.
'This may not be a great geopolitical policy, but it's better than nothing' says Vladimir Zharikhin, deputy director of the official Institute of Commonwealth of Independent States Studies in Moscow.
The Kremlin has gone far beyond taxing energy profits, and moved to take over the industry.