Challenged and overshadowed by his rival Volodimir Zelensky, Vladimir Putin is working on a new image. While the Ukrainian president was elected Man of the Year by several media, he visited Washington and regularly appears at the front in his army green outfit, the Russian president largely kept aloof from the war. Until now.
Putin hid behind military leaders or long maintained the myth that everything went crescendo during the ‘special military operation’. Zelensky’s success, however, forces Putin to attempt to bolster his image, in fits and starts. Recently, Putin admitted for the first time that there was a war going on in Ukraine. Until then, that word was taboo and one could only speak of ‘a special military operation’.
Prison sentence
It gave a courageous member of the Russian opposition the chance to nominate Putin for the prison sentence the Russian leader had decreed for anyone in Russia who spoke the word war. But the use of the so-contaminated word war is a sign of change, as is Putin’s visit to the bridge to Crimea, which he says has been repaired and damaged by a Ukrainian attack.
After Zelensky had almost defiantly visited the front line of Bachmut, an area known as the ‘meat grinder’ because of the many war violence, the Kremlin spokesman said that the Russian leader had also gone to the front.
However, the video images revealed that he was at the military headquarters of Rostov-on-Don, about 200 kilometers from the front line. This was established by the editors of opposition newspaper Novaya Gazeta. Earlier, the Minister of Defense Sergei Shoigu had also shown himself there. The latter tries to play a bit more macho and recently showed off with a helicopter flight along the front line.
Compassion and fighting spirit
All this is nothing compared to the images of Ukrainian generals and politicians such as Zelensky, who visit there regularly and, above all, keep the population informed of developments there, although bad news is also kept secret for a long time. But the compassion and fighting spirit that Ukraine exudes in communicating with the population is in stark contrast to that of Putin, who recently even canceled his annual TV talk with the population. Russian generals who occasionally appear in front of the camera know no better than to read obligatory texts from a reading device.
With the war going on for so long, and especially after the controversial mobilization of the Russian army, Putin seems to realize that he needs to become more visible and cannot leave PR to generals who have mostly failed in the war so far. “Putin has changed his view of the world with the war in Ukraine. Everyone had to adjust there, meanwhile he went about his daily presidential work. The fighting and the losses were the generals’ business,” political scientist Dmitry Oreshkin told Novaya Gazeta.
Extremely stubborn
According to Oreshkin, Putin is extremely stubborn and it took him 10 months to face reality. It’s not a quick military operation anymore, so he has to take responsibility as commander in chief. That is why he recently showed up with a visit to Belarus, where Russian troops train, as was the case before they invaded Ukraine from there. He also shows himself more often in the picture with the military top.
As commander-in-chief, Putin should give orders, take responsibility for military equipment, motivate the troops and, above all, visit the front. But that’s not in his character. “Even in his time as a KGB spy, Putin was primarily a desk man. He fears for his life, his army of security guards is still growing. He is now trying to show a little more bravura, but he is faring a lot worse than Zelensky,” said Sergei Kanaev, an expert in the Russian security services.
Takeover of power
Oreshkin also does not expect much from the attempts to polish Putin’s image. Only success at the front would help. Many experts warn of a new wave of attacks on Ukraine, but Oreshkin doubts a Russian success. He even thinks that Putin’s entourage is already working on a takeover of power by radical groups within the military apparatus.
“Putin is forced into actions, which are therefore forced and predictable. Kiev and the West are completely on top of his plans. It resembles 1943, when Hitler was already in a tight spot but had not yet lost.”