Sasha Lensky

The two faces of Vladimir Putin

His split-personality will decide Russia and Ukraine's fate

‘Putin’s Philosopher’ Aleksandr Dugin, self-styled deep thinker and ideological architect of current Russian expansionism, has claimed there are two distinct version of the president. There is a ‘Lunar Putin’ – practical, cautious, a supporter of the capitalist economy and free trade, alert to international opinion. And a ‘Solar Putin’, a messiah, fully embracing his mission to restore the great Eurasian Empire and confront the collective West. 

This split-personality may well be at the heart of recent inconsistencies in Russian policy. Having warned via former president Dmitri Medvedev of a ‘judgment day’ should Ukraine attack Crimea, the Kremlin, following the devastating raid on Crimea’s Saky airbase, instead sought to minimise it as a ‘fire-safety incident’. So too with the repeated Russian threats to hit Ukrainian decision-making centres: the defence ministry, general staff and so on, none of which are followed through. It seems the Russian state is still undecided as to what level of escalation, whatever the bluster, is really open to it.

Likewise, this might spring from opposing factions – lunar and solar – in the Kremlin itself. In one corner is the pro-war contingent, the siloviki (security, defence and law enforcement) headed unofficially by their long-term leader Nikolai Patrushev, former FSB head and now secretary of the security council. This group’s overwhelming wish is for the special military operation to be turned into a full-blown war with all the customary trimmings: martial law, national mobilisation (at least partial), and complete sealing of the country’s borders.

In the other corner are the war-sceptics, barely noticeable but very much there, made up largely of figures in economics and finance. Their abiding aim – a conflicting one – is to keep the Russian economy afloat. The two agendas, like Putin’s two selves, are almost impossible to reconcile.

Garry Kasparov said it more succinctly: ‘Putin wants to rule like Stalin but live like Abramovich.

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