Vladimir Putin has been looking pretty chipper of late. Two weeks ago saw him wearing his trademark vulpine smile as he presided over the Victory Day commemorations in Moscow. It was a rather more upbeat occasion than in the two years previously, given recent Russian successes on the battlefield. Then, pausing briefly to unleash a fresh offensive against the Kharkiv region in northeastern Ukraine, he was off to Beijing where he and the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, agreed on closer ties and deeper military cooperation, “to counter Washington’s destructive and hostile course”.
In the interim, Putin has rearranged Russia’s military establishment, shifting several key players including erstwhile defence minister Sergei Shoigu, who has become national security minister. Shoigu’s replacement is deputy prime minister, Andrei Belousov, an economist. The rationale behind this manoeuvre is to hasten the transition of Russia’s economy fully on to a war footing. But it must be added that the Russian leader also likes to keep his subordinates on their toes and encourage rivalries.
It’s a far cry from this time last year, writes Stefan Wolff of the University of Birmingham. Since them, Putin has faced down a mutiny from his old crony, the late Wagner Group boss Yevgeny Prigozhin – whose aircraft subsequently and conveniently fell out of the sky not long afterwards. His most credible political foe, the opposition figurehead Alexei Navalny, died suddenly in prison of mysterious circumstances (a medical condition that appears to be on the rise in Putin’s Russia). And his alliances with North Korea and Iran have ensured a steady supply of weaponry, while his own planners worked to transform Russia’s economy on to a war footing.
