Why the next six years could be Putin's last term in power | Mark Galeotti

The temptation for any successor to outright use Putin as a scapegoat and perhaps even a bargaining chip, whether allowing him to go to war crimes court in the witch, is monstrously unlikely but possible or simply blaming him for everything that goes wrong. , it would actually be quite significant and so I think Putin and I don't necessarily think we should have any special sympathy for him for this, but I still think he's stuck, he can't get off the tiger he's riding, so, to be honest, I think you know again, barring some kind of illness that actually forces him to resign or a political coup within the elite which at this point is not very likely, but either way it is something that

could

very well happen if things get worse.

I think the only way Putin leaves the presidency is a very ornate coffin hello and welcome to Frontline for Times radio. I'm James Hansen and today we're talking about Vladimir Putin and his illegal war in Ukraine and I'm delighted to be joined by Mark Gallotti, honorary professor at University College London and an expert on Russian politics and global crime Mark It's always a pleasure welcome back to Frontline. It's good to be here yesterday. Vladimir Putin took office for his fifth

term

as Russian president. How would you assess the relative strength or even weakness of his position going into that fifth?

term

is in a strange position because, on the one hand, he has no rivals, he has just awarded himself, uh, totally, uh, implausible, 87% of the votes for his election, he has just taken office with great pomp and splendor, but it was really surprising how bored, he looked downright throughout the entire inauguration and yes, he has been here before, so from his point of view, on the one hand, there is no one to challenge him, on the other hand, although there is an interesting fragility in their system, yes, there is no opposition left anyway. everything has been expelled from the country or sunk six feet under the ground and, however, the interesting thing is that the three pillars on which it has always relied in the past to face crises, its personal legitimacy, its ability to throw more or more less unlimited money in the problems and his control of the security apparatus, all of that is starting to look a little more shaky. um, you know, he himself is no longer the kind of great hope of Russia that he was 24

years

ago, which is quite extraordinary, without a doubt, that the money This is becoming much less available and even his control of the operators of Security may not be as complete as we assume, as we saw with

last

year's Mutiny of the Vagner mercenary group, so there is also a certain fragility that is fine dealing with on a day-to-day basis and, frankly, dealing with war. current situation is becoming more and more routine, but on the other hand, when there will be crises, there will be crises, whether that means Putin getting sick, or whether that means, um, some kind of Ukrainian advance in the war, if that means some kind of economic crisis, then I think we'll really get a chance to see how capable Putin is now in dealing with these unexpected incidents and we see over and over again with these autocratic leaders that it really is the safest place.

For them he is in

power

and paranoia grows accordingly. If Vladimir Putin is not Russian president, does he still have a future? I don't think Putin can resign now. Look, I sincerely believe that before the 2022 invasion he was actually playing with the prospect of withdrawing. The problem is that in a system like this, as you said, it is autocratic, it is not based on laws, it is certainly not at the top of the system, everything depends on your position, your future, the fate of your family, your own physique. It is quite possible that he will survive and his retirement means that he has to give up all that

power

to achieve success and rely on the loyalty and gratitude of his successor, and the problem is that even if today a successor is willing to be absolutely committed to you, are they going to do it?

It will be the same in a year or whatever. The temptation for any successor to outright use Putin as a scapegoat and perhaps even as a bargaining chip, whether he allows him to go to a war crimes court in the ha, is monstrously unlikely but possible or simply guilty. him for everything that goes wrong, it would actually be quite significant and so I think Putin and I don't necessarily think we should feel any special sympathy for him for this, but I still think he's stuck, he can't get off the tiger that he is setting up, so To be honest, I think you know, barring some kind of illness that forces him to resign or a political coup within the elite which at this point is not very likely, but either way it is something that well

could

happen if things get worse.

I think the only way Putin leaves the presidency is in a very ornate coffin and what could be the trigger for some kind of internal movement against Putin, you say, if things get worse, what would have to happen? I think we need to realize that this is an elite that is not really full of Putins, I'm sure they will flock to the inauguration and stand there and applaud while Putin gives his rather superficial speech etc, but overall , essentially this is an elite that is full of ruthless opportunistic craters and visible, so essentially there is a constant analysis of costs and benefits right now, there is no doubt that the risks of going against Putin greatly outweigh the potential opportunities , but things may well change and I think particularly if we start to see, for example, the Eon economy overheat as it goes.

It may well happen as the war continues and we begin to see ordinary people feeling more and more the pressure of that, we are likely to see more economic unrest and that is what is particularly dangerous for the regime and if that really begins to take off. It is one thing if you know the strike here and the strike there that can be controlled. The great nightmare. I think it's kind of like the Solidarity Union in Poland back in the late '70s and early '80s, where almost out of nowhere, you know. A strike at a shipyard suddenly became a national movement because there were so many people who were fed up and a leadership that basically came out of nowhere.

I think that's the big nightmare, something like that that takes all the protest potential that it has right now. There's nowhere to go in Russia and it brings it all together and that's when we might see the elite start to think well, basically, either we break with Putin now or we risk finding ourselves hanging from a lamp post in a week, One month or one year. but I said I think they're going to need that sense that there's a real threat to themselves, so I think at the moment, you know, everything seems very calm and everyone's saying the right things, but there's that constant question that's being evaluated today. .

Today is the day, of course not, but tomorrow could be whatever, and of course a lot of that may depend on what happens in Ukraine. Let's go straight to the war. Do you expect Mark Russia to launch a new ground offensive in the coming weeks? Russia has never stopped launching ground offensives. I mean, this is what we've seen is a constant incremental advance, you know, 100 meters here, maybe a kilometer there, but little by little they are moving forward taking advantage of the fact that at the moment they have an advantage both in manpower as in ammunition, although obviously now that we have passed the US bill, at least ammunition will start to become more evident.

I'm not convinced that they have, at least at the moment, the resources for some kind of major escalation in their ground offensive, so yes, we know that we are seeing them trying to take Jessar right now, there is talk of perhaps a movement against KH in the North in the future and these are significant, but I think unless Putin bites the bullet and launches another wave of mobilization, which, if this is going to be significant, he has to do it very soon because it takes time between announcing it , gather forces, give them some basic training, arm them to get to the battlefield and, if we're really trying to take advantage of the summer, you really have to do this in June, July, so unless we see that, I think you know that we will see offensives, we will see the Russians probably advancing, but nothing that is going to be an absolute winner of the war, it will just be part of this slowly building conflict.

Are you surprised that Putin has not yet launched a new wave of mobilization? I mean, a lot of people thought maybe you were waiting for the election to pass, maybe you're waiting for his inauguration, which has already happened, are you surprised it took so long? It's not really because this is classic Putin, despite the Macho Person type of him, Putin actually tries to avoid making difficult decisions and when he does, he usually makes them quite late. We often saw too late that actually with the

last

wave of mobilization, you know again that his generals had been bugging him for months and when he finally did it, it was really just in time for the AUM winter, which actually didn't It's campaign season, um, so you know.

If it could still happen, it may be that in some ways you are right, it was the elections, the inauguration, there is one more milestone which is the announcement of the new government, um, because you know that the current cabinet resigns and appoints a new one. which will probably be very similar to the previous one, but in light of the recent arrest of the Deputy Minister of Defense on corruption charges, it is thought that Minister shyu could be being replaced and therefore it could well be that they. They'll think they'll bring in a new defense minister and use this kind of momentum from that announcement to also announce a mobilization so it can still happen, but I said it'll be classic Putin if he ends up biting the bullet and doing this. in August and September, when he missed his key window of opportunity, if he replaces Shu as defense minister, what would be the meaning of that?

Because of course there was a lot of dispute, suppose you could say between Progin and Shu, maybe Putin felt that he couldn't. move Shu too soon because it would seem like he was giving in to those demands. What would be the meaning if he moved it right? I think to some extent he depends a lot on who replaces him. I mean, the point is he looks, Shyu has proven it. I mean, he was a very capable civilian, you know, minister of civil defense in peacetime, he has proven to be catastrophically bad in wartime, now you have to realize that what happens is in war and, although technically it is an operation special military, in practice it is a In war, in many ways, what happens is that the roles of the Minister of Defense and the Chief of the General Staff are reversed in peacetime.

The Minister of Defense is the boss in war, in fact, it is the Chief of the General Staff who makes the decisions, reports directly to Putin and the The Minister of Defense's job is simply to more or less ensure that the soldiers have everything they they need. Shu has done a mediocre job, but the point is that the key job he hasn't done is being able to bring some real realism to Putin's speech. own discussions, so you know, although it is clear that, if it were, it would be very popular with the soldiers, for whom they become deeply unpopular and it would probably mean a new chief of the General Staff because usually a new defense minister will also bring a new chief of the general staff and therefore the interesting thing is that it all depends on who these people are now.

One of the potential candidates sometimes discussed is the head of the National Guard, Victor Zotov, very much a kind of close and loyal Putin who sings who he is. In reality, he would probably be even a worse defense minister than Shyu. I mean, certainly, if he were sitting in kyiv, he would be supporting Zolotov, on the other hand, another possibility is a man named Alexe Duman, who is the governor. from the Tula region, a former Putin bodyguard, but also a former deputy defense minister who actually has a pretty good reputation as a capable organizer, so if it were him and you met a more effective soldier as chief of the general staff general, suddenly the russian army could be looking at a much stronger position, this is why it's not exactly so much about shyu leaving.

I mean, Putin has clung to him because shyu is a friend, a personal friend and also because shyu could say that the continuity candidate Putin does not want. I see disturbing unrest at the top of his security apparatus, but if he leaves, a lot will depend on who replaces him. Returning to this question of Putin's personal position, it was interesting that you recently wrote for the Times Mark about reports that warlord Cetan Ramzan Kadirov is terminally ill, just remind us why Karov is in the first place. so important and why that would have significant implications for Putin in many ways.

One of the events that really made Putin and his reputation in Russia was the second Cetana war that started when he was actually prime minister before he was president, but then it was sort of the first real challenge of his presidency and look, the Russians won, but the way they won, apart from being monstrously brutal, you know, we saw Gry's capital limit practically leveled.Basically, Chaniz made the conflict find his own Chens to fight against the rebellious Chens, and as a result, a kind of dynastic government emerged. First of all, it was Kadir's father, Akmad Kadirov, who became the first leader of a kind of loyal chcha and then, in due time, ramzan kadiro, the current one replaced him and what really happened is that, in name of subdue cha, basically ccher was bought on a massive scale, i mean, kadirov basically runs ccher from his own private personal thief with extraordinary brutality and extraordinary levels. of corruption more than 80% of Cen's budget comes from Moscow it is provided by the federal government and every time Someone says: "Oh, isn't it time to reduce this money?", so basically Kadiro throws his toys out of the stroller and Moscow gives back off because, frankly, I think Putin and his courts have convinced themselves that Kadirov is the man keeping the lid on. about Cheta, who is actually through a mix of brutality and local politics and is able to keep the cens under control and what terrifies them, especially right now, is that the chia will boil again because you know that cnia is a small region, but it has periodically rebelled against Russian control every chance it gets, essentially, and the censuses, frankly, are tough as nails, so I mean, for all these reasons, there's that sense of gaze , let's just not make waves, we know that basically what is happening in Ccher Es Gastly, you have more or less Sharia law in contravention of the Russian Constitution and Moscow has to pay for it, as well as for many vanity projects, but look, it is much easier to maintain the status quo, but now it is true that Gadirov is mortally ill and it certainly shows.

I mean, he was at the inauguration and saw this video. He needed two guys to help him take off the Jack. You know he definitely wasn't in good shape if that's true. so in some ways Putin's hand is going to be, um, you pushed at the time when he least needs this to happen, because if there is some kind of start in Chia, the question is who is going to deal with it when his army is . I believe it is 97% of all operational ground forces are currently deployed in Ukraine. The last thing he wants is a third Cen War.

Is there any obvious successor to Kadirov in Chetna? Well, Kadyrov clearly wanted to keep this in the family and was grooming his sons to take over, but his eldest son is only 18, he has no real credible position, and in any case the law says you have to be 30.

years

to be Chet Chen Le now again, maybe they could tweak that a little bit, but probably not, not in 12 years. and although in the past, when Kadyrov, when Raman was not old enough to take over when his father died, they put into effect a kind of temporary Regent, but you know that a 12-year temporary Regency is not possible, so there are several candidates, the man Moscow seems to favor is apti alov, who is currently the head of cetan forces inside ukraine and to be honest you know he's a bit more urban, even to the point that he speaks good russian in the way.

Raman k as a woman speaking Russian with a comically bad accent sounded a bit like something out of alo alo um, you know, so clearly they would like Alo dinov to take over, but the problem is that there are a whole variety of other Cen bigwigs who can too. I feel that they have an equal status and position, if not better, and you know the big worry is that if they try to impose themselves, are others going to start kicking and saying no, we won't accept it and you know that in Chia there is a whole variety of security forces that are theoretically controlled by Russia, in practice they are controlled by Kadirov and if you eliminate Kadirov, these people take a personal oath to Kadirov, so if you eliminate him from the picture, then the risk is that a lot of different warlords will have their own armies ready while we talk about the mortality of leaders we should move on to the news about zalinsky this week Ukraine says it has arrested two security officials on suspicion of conspiring with Russia to take the president hostage Zalinsky and assassinate him, what else can we do?

I know the details of this plot, Mark, I mean, it's still pretty hazy, so what's interesting is that the two individuals in question must actually be colonels within the security apparatus, which, as you know, says something: a colonel he's essentially a pretty important figure and I mean, again, we have no idea how accurate he is and more details will emerge, but it's completely plausible, first of all, clearly, that the Russians dramatically underestimated Zalinski at the beginning of the war, as he did To be fair, he also did. Everybody else, nobody thought that he would become this extraordinarily effective wartime leader. um, you know, I think they are aware of the degree to which he is an absolutely crucial factor, not only in keeping Ukraine united and mobilizing it, but also in terms of his ability to intimidate and seduce the West into continuing to support Ukraine. , you know, although I suppose there's always the risk of turning him into a Marty, I can totally understand why Moscow would prefer him to be out of the picture. permanently, but it also speaks to the fact that in reality Russia still has a continuous penetration of the Ukrainian apparatus and particularly the security apparatus.

I mean, I think this is something that we've seen even two years later, is the degree to which the Ukrainians are still finding Russian agents. Look, in some cases, I have a suspicion there's a little hint of The Witch Hunt at work. You know it's very easy to find someone and decide that they are somehow sympathetic to Russia because back in 2021. They said, oh, maybe Moscow has a case on this point or something, but in many other cases they clearly aren't, They are finding genuine Russian agents and in that sense I mean, actually for me the surprise is precisely that if they had officers of this Considering that they basically had not deployed them yet, I mean, again, it is quite interesting and we don't know if it is due again to the political vacillation in Moscow, you know that that store, well, you know, will it really make the situation worse and turn Zinsky into a Marta pressured, for example, the American House of Representatives to support Aid, you know, or simply because they were not physically in a position to be able to launch their plot, but again this is a case where the Russians a powerful asset and wasting it is a very good point you raised because surely if Russia assassinated president zalinski that would provoke a reaction strongest of the West and perhaps would intensify this war exactly.

I think this is a problem that the UK The Ukrainians have proven time and time again to be very difficult for the Russians to predict and partly, you know, there are actually a lot of really smart Russia analysts and so on within the pitiful analysts. of Ukraine within the structure of the Russian government. Whether we're talking about the intelligence services or the Foreign Ministry or whatever, the problem is that the people at the top of Putin and the people closest to him have this extraordinary notion of Ukraine. You know, it's clear that we've seen in Putin's speeches and in his deeply strange historical essays that, as far as he's concerned, Ukraine is not a real country, Ukrainians are not a real people, you know, part of Ukraine.

Frankly, it's just a semi-detached part of Poland and the rest is really part of a kind of cultural space of Russia and you know, once he has it fixed in his mind, Putin is clearly not willing to listen to alternative perspectives and this has been one of the recurring problems for the Russians over and over again, you know it's not that they don't know what's going on. It's that Putin can't or won't accept reality, so in this context I think that's probably why it's so difficult to try to accurately assess it. I mean, it's hard for any of us to have a real sense of how removing Zalinski from the picture would improve or worsen Ukraine's position.

I think what we're seeing now is precisely that, having managed to get Ukraine wrong so often, to the point that the Russians are partially paralyzed by their realization of the fact that they don't. I understand Ukraine and therefore again you know. I imagine it's very possible that this is one of those types of plots that someone operationally organizes more or less saying, look guys, boss, if you want Zinski dead, we think we can, we found a way to do it, and yet the leaders politicians, um and ARS, not out of any kind of humanitarian impulse. I mean, after all, they clearly tried to kill Zinsky at the beginning of the war, so it's certainly not humanitarian, it's just that they don't really know they should do it. to some extent paralyzed by his continued inability to truly understand what motivates Ukrainians, much less how the West might respond.

It's fascinating how this was reportedly planned as a housewarming gift for Vladimir Putin. How much does Zalinski personally get under Vladimir Putin's skin? clearly he does and I think again it speaks to a broader issue in some respects, the problem when it comes to Putin is that zalinski is quite well known in some respects or has been a fairly Russified Ukrainian, you know, he, he, grew up talking. Russian, at the beginning of his career it was in Russia, that's when he really started to make a name for himself as a comedian and then as an actor, he was on the Russian scene before he went home, now we know that Putin has this kind of strange way of looking at you , the kind of distinction between enemies and traitors, enemies that you fight, but the point is that sometimes you can reach some kind of agreement with the traitors, although you can't do anything with the traitors except eliminate them, whether that means that we have seen a defector get shot in spain or i think that is why

putin

has problems with zinski as far as he is concerned zalinski is somehow a traitor because he should be on the pro russian side of the ukrainians. it should be as Putin sees it willing to understand Moscow's point of view and willing to accept that Moscow has cultural-political-historical hegemony over Ukraine and the fact that Zalinski turns around and somehow holds together this extraordinary coalition government um or People's Coalition actually better said.

To precisely resist Russia so effectively, I suspect that again trying to psychoanalyze Putin is in many ways a foolish and dangerous undertaking, but we all do it anyway. I suspect that's what really bothers Putin because, as far as he's concerned, Zinsky is not an enemy but a traitor and as you say, we know that Russia has been hatching plots to assassinate Zinski for years. Do you think the opposite is true? Is the gru Ukrainian Military Intelligence actively planning to assassinate Putin? I mean, to be honest. I'm sure they would have no problems, I mean, in particular, you know, of all the various agencies of the Ukrainian government, military intelligence seems to be the most enthusiastic, sometimes I would suggest that it is counterproductive in terms of some of the operations that they carry out. out, but on the other hand, we have to recognize that there is a massive security structure built around Putin.

I mean, I remember one time, I mean, this was even before the war. I lived on one of the big roads that lead to the center of Moscow and you know. the ones that Putin would take those rare times that he would go to the Kremlin from his Palace outside and, you know, for hours before having snipers on the rooftops and people checking all the manhole covers and people being prevented from getting out of their houses. apartment buildings, etc., I mean, you know, it really was an incredible operation before this huge caravan of 60 cars and motorcycles came down the road and I'm sure now, in wartime, it became even more restrictive, so I mean, I think in that context it would be very difficult for the Ukrainians to get to him, especially because the Russians have been basically penetrating the Ukrainian political and security structures for years, in part benefiting particularly from certain leaders like the previous leader Yanukovych , who were actually quite pro-Moscow and in some ways opened windows of opportunity for the Russians to recruit agents.

There's never been that kind of similar opportunity or they really needed until recently for the Ukrainians to do the same thing, so again, I mean, you know, if they felt like they had a chance, would Ukrainian Military Intelligence take out Putin? Although, on the other hand, I also suspect that, as we have seen in the past, it will be Zalinski who controls them for fear of something like this happening. would lead to a catastrophic escalation and I don't know of nuclear explosions above ke or anything similar, so again I'm sure the Spooks would love that but they tend to get carried away by their own opportunities, I suspect the Ukrainian political leaders They would ultimately say it's better than not, and again, I'm sorry to ramble a little, but this is one of those classic problems in hedging, soFor example, if the Allies had been able to kill Hitler during World War II.

I've done it and the general consensus tends to be not before the war at all, but once the war started and, in a way, once Germany got caught up in it, Hitler was a pretty bad war leader and the danger It's that if you take out Hitler, you might have someone. more competent in his place, actually, the same goes for Putin in many ways. Putin has been Ukraine's secret weapon during this war and why would you want to throw that away just to keep things away from Mark? If we zoom out a little bit, where do you think we are?

We are in the broader context of this war. How important is the moment we are in? It's always tempting to think about why now it really matters in some way. I don't think it's crucial. I mean, I think we knew going into this. year that would be the year that Russia would have the advantage, now the delay in getting US aid to Ukraine has magnified that advantage and that is what we are seeing happening on the battlefield, but even with all the advantages it is clear The Russians are not in a position to deliver some kind of knockout blow.

Now you know who knows what can happen in the war, tomorrow there could be some kind of break in the Ukrainian front line that allows the Russians to advance further, but there are very few signs that that is going to happen and we are still talking about This is like a year in which Ukrainians mainly have to do two things, one is to endure, which is no small matter. I mean, in particular, when you look at their casualties in proportion to their population, they're actually higher than what the Russians are suffering, and secondly, they have to find proper ways to metabolize the new weapons and the new equipment that they're getting. from the US West because the plan currently seems to be that 2025 is when the Ukrainians plan to launch another major counteroffensive, so in some ways this is a year of some sort of holding action as far as the Ukrainians are concerned and will be

next

. year then, that's really crucial because, frankly, if that counteroffensive doesn't work or is kind of a partial success, I'm not sure if Ukraine will have a third counteroffensive and I'm not sure. that the West, despite all its current protests about being in this for the long haul and so on, would really be willing to continue supporting at this level, so I think at this point it's simply a question of, from the Ukrainian point of view , minimize their losses and build up the forces necessary for proper operations

next

year, at which point, as you know, Western attempts to build up ammunition supplies will really begin to bear fruit, we will have the F-16 F aircraft in our hands Ukrainians, as well as a large amount of not only long-range missiles, but also other types of equipment and, perhaps most important of all, hopefully by that time the Ukrainians have had the opportunity to really discover how they can develop new tactics to make the most of what is already available. something that we didn't really see happen fully effectively in last year's counteroffensive, Mark, we always appreciate your insights and experience.

Thank you for joining us on the front lines today. I'm glad to join. Thanks for watching Front Line on Times Radio to find out more. Global security and the war in Ukraine you can listen to the Times radio video, subscribe digitally to the Times and click subscribe on our YouTube channel.