Mark Hollingsworth

Is this the man who will one day take over from Putin?

The chilling prospect of Nikolai Patrushev succeeding Putin is very real

Russian president Vladimir Putin, accompanied by Secretary of Russia's Security Council Nikolai Patrushev (Credit: Getty images)

Boris Ratnikov, a former KGB officer and retired chief advisor to Russia’s security service, gave a remarkable interview back in 2016. Ratnikov, who died in 2020, claimed his boss had penetrated and read the mind of Madeleine Albright while she was US Secretary of State in the mid-1990s.

Ratnikov said his superior officer used a photograph to penetrate Albright’s subconscious where he discovered her secret thoughts about the priority of removing Siberia and the Far East from Russian territory.

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Written by
Mark Hollingsworth

Mark Hollingsworth is the author of ‘Londongrad – From Russia with Cash’. His new book, ‘Agents of Influence – How the KGB Subverted Western Democracies’, will be published by Oneworld this April.

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