President Vladimir Putin 's tirade on Wednesday has been poured over and one expert has characterised him as a ' hostile enforcer '.
The televised address covered remarks - and warnings - aimed at traitors, oligarchs, and his enemies.
Putin's harshest words were directed to Russians who disagreed with him, calling pro-Western Russians "scum and traitors".
Russia's invasion of Ukraine has entered its fourth week amid broad Western sanctions and protests inside the country and globally.
For his enemies in the West and abroad, Putin sent out a chilling warning and doubled down on his claims he was not at fault for the invasion of Ukraine.
Aubrey Immelman, an associate professor of psychology at the College of Saint Benedict, Saint John's University, spoke to the Mirror to break down the Russian president's speech.
He has spent years researching and creating psychological profiles of political leaders.
In his attempted rallying cry, he singled out "traitors" that would be spat out by Russians "like a midge that flew into their mouths".
'Hostile enforcers' are people who are sticklers for rules and believe they have the right and obligation to control and punish those who break them.
Furthermore, they believe they are best qualified to determine what the punishment is.
The hostile enforcer will operate under the guise of serving the public interest.
In politics, these personality types will search out the rule breakers and exercise their uncompromising punishment to retain power and control.
Prof Immelman spoke to the Mirror about Putin's speech and his motives.
Putin makes reference to "oysters" and other high-end food during his rambling speech seemingly talking about wealthy Russian oligarchs.
He said: "I do not in the least condemn those who have villas in Miami or the French Riviera, who cannot make do without foie gras, oysters or gender freedom as they call it."
He says the problem is that they are not with "our people and with Russia " and goes on to accuse them of thinking they belong "to a superior caste, the superior race".
He added: "People like this would sell their own mothers just to be allowed to sit on the entry bench of the superior caste. They want to be just like them and imitate them in everything. But they forget or just completely fail to see that even if this so-called superior caste needs them, it needs them as expendable raw material to inflict maximum damage on our people."
Prof Immelman said believes he is attacking his own oligarchs and appears to be attacking 'woke culture'.
He said: "I think he is referring to his own oligarchs because many live in Europe and go on luxury vacations to the Mediterranean.
"What he is doing is consistent with the hostile enforcer personality.
"They are very heavy-handed, they are sticklers for the rules and if someone violates any of them then they come down on them very harshly.
"His reference to 'gender freedom' seems to be a swipe at 'woke culture' or liberalism in general."
"It is a little bit concerning that he has this view that Russian culture is somehow superior and that echoes back to 1930s Germany.
"Most people understand that Russian people are not responsible for this and that it is Putin's own doing.
"It is an extension of his original narrative that he wants to de-nazify Ukraine.
"And for a lot of Russians that have limited access to sources of information outside of state media, they actually believe this idea that Ukraine is in danger of falling to Nazification.
"He's doubling down on his narrative and what he is doing from a social influence point of view is appealing to Russian patriotism, which he frames as being superior."
Nazi hysteria
In his speech, Putin expanded on earlier claims the invasion was to "de-Nazify" Ukraine, now saying the West itself was a “direct analogy" with Hitler's Nazi Germany.
Putin claimed the West was trying to "cancel" Russia, the West tore off all the masks of decency, began to act boorishly, demonstrated its true nature.
He said: “It just begs a direct analogy with the anti-Semitic pogroms that the Nazis staged in Germany in the 30s of the last century.”
Putin also expunged a world view long outdated and worryingly similar to the Nazis, despite claims he was the one opposing Nazism today.
He would go on to talk about ‘purifying’ Russian society as a natural process.
Putin said: "The collective West is trying to divide our society using, to its own advantage, combat losses and the socioeconomic consequences of the sanctions, and to provoke civil unrest in Russia and use its fifth column in an attempt to achieve this goal. As I mentioned earlier, their goal is to destroy Russia."
Prof Immelman said: "Most people understand that Russian people are not responsible for this and that it is Putin's own doing.
"It is an extension of his original narrative that he wants to de-Nazify Ukraine.
"And for a lot of Russians that have limited access to sources of information outside of state media, they actually believe this idea that Ukraine is in danger of falling to Nazification.
"He's doubling down on his narrative and what he is doing from a social influence point of view is appealing to Russian patriotism, which he frames as being superior."
Putin also makes worrying comments that bare horrible similarities to some of the darkest moments in history.
He said: "But any nation, and even more so the Russian people, will always be able to distinguish true patriots from scum and traitors and will simply spit them out like an insect in their mouth, spit them onto the pavement.
"I am convinced that a natural and necessary self-detoxification of society like this would strengthen our country, our solidarity and cohesion and our readiness to respond to any challenge."
Prof Immelman raised his concerns with what he is describing.
He said: "The description of cleansing is the most concerning thing that jumps out and we've all heard of ethnic cleansing and we've seen in our recent history in Bosnia, Rwanda and Burundi.
"It has echoes of that and it is always dangerous to invoke Hitler or Nazi Germany but of course, that is in the world history of the past century.
"This is not to say that Putin is a Hitler but he might resonate to some of the same political ideologies.
"It reminds me of his appeal to patriotism."
A threat to Russians?
In Putin's speech, he also makes threats to "traitors", which is something Prof Immelman says fits with his personality type.
Prof Immelman said: "It is a threat in the same way he's issued veiled threats about nukes. I don't think at this point in time nukes will be used but it goes back to the personality of the hostile enforcer.
"He is highly sensitised to the norms and rules and if they are not followed he will come down like a ton of bricks. He does not tolerate any dissent.
He said this threat could also be a message to his inner circle.
He said: "There is a smaller circle around him that are the true power holders and he can lose a lot.
"It's not at the people because he can control them easily, it's to prevent a coup."
Mad or just bad?
In light of the speech, one of the most common debates about the Russian leader was reignited, whether Putin was mad or mentally ill.
Leading US politicians such as Nancy Pelosi, suggested earlier this month he had some kind of illness.
She told reporters: “Some people say he has cancer and some people say he has brain-fog from Covid,” and conceded that “others just think he’s a complete, raging bully”.
Republican Senator Marco Rubio of Florida said that “it’s pretty obvious… that something is off with Putin”, and “it would be a mistake to assume that this Putin would react the same way he would have done five years ago”.
One former Russian foreign minister, Andrei Kozyrev – a staunch Kremlin critic – claimed that “Putin is a rational actor” and that the invasion of Ukraine is “horrific but not irrational”.
Prof Immelman does not believe Putin is 'unhinged' and that this speech is very much part of this plan.
He said: "We use the word rant we suggest he is impulsive and is losing control. I don't think it is impulsive, he is highly conscious and I would say borderline obsessive. He is very programmed and detail orientated.
"What sounds like a rant is very well planned and it fits into his narrative. It also fits into his worldview. I think it was all planned out. I don't think he sounds psychologically unhinged."
