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The key to understanding Putin? He knows he will be superior to Western leaders


Many believe that history is largely determined by the personal relationships between world leaders. Vladimir Putin's 25-year interactions with foreign leaders provide an interesting case study of that theory.

The Russian president recently invited Narendra Modi to a private dinner at his home, and the Indian prime minister said he was very impressed with the gesture. China's Xi Jinping has called Putin his best friend. At the BRICS summit in 2024, Putin said that such relations are the basis for a “new world order.”

In the past, more hostile leaders received different treatment.

There was evidence that Putin played psychological games with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, for example. In a meeting in 2007 in Sochi in which they discussed the supply of energy to Europe, the Russian president brought in his giant Labrador. Putin knew that Merkel was afraid of dogs – as a result of a dog attack years before – and disturbed her when they spoke.

In Putin's tripnew two-hour CBC documentary celebrating his fourth century in power, former Canadian foreign minister Peter Mackay said he was surprised by Putin's behavior with Merkel.

“It speaks to a dark nature, a character flaw in that person that crosses all lines in terms of diplomacy and just human nature,” MacKay said.

A woman and a man are sitting with a black dog between them.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and then German Chancellor Angela Merkel are joined by their dog Conny before speaking at the president's residence near the Black Sea resort of Sochi on January 21, 2007. (Fabrizio Bensch/Reuters)

Australian journalist Zoya Sheftalovich, who writes for Politico Europe, told CBC that Putin is “well informed, he knows what people's buttons are and he pushes them.” ”

Konstantin Eggert, a Lithuania-based journalist who works for German public broadcaster Deutsche Welle, said, “It's clear that he wants to control it all the time. He wants to prove that he is the toughest guy in the room. .”

Putin's treatment of foreign leaders seems informed by the knowledge that he will outlive them. He is playing a long game to achieve the results he wants. And he seems to like Donald Trump's return to the US presidency, especially since Trump has said so many negative things about Ukraine and NATO.

Luke Harding, former Moscow bureau chief for the Guardian and author Invasion: The Inside Story of Russia's Blood War and Ukraine's Fight for Survivalsays Putin “thinks that Western leaders are gullible and short-term. “

“They are the kind of colorful butterflies that hover around for a little while and then disappear when winter sets in. But Putin, who we know, doesn't have to who is close to unstable Stalin, to worry about strange things like elections, he knows what he will be doing in two years, four years.

'We misjudged Putin'

Shortly after Putin became president in 2000, George W. Bush was elected president of the United States. He came to meet Putin at a summit in Slovenia, where he shared an immediate judgment of his Russian counterpart, famously saying, “I looked the man in the eye … got I sense a soul.”

“I think George W. Bush regrets saying that now, because it's not clear where Putin's soul is,” said John Bolton, the former US ambassador to the United Nations and the national security adviser who has met with Putin several times, to CBC.

“But (the comment) was a sign of hope that we felt that the Cold War was over, that we could find a way to bridge the differences and work together against what we were see as common threats,” Bolton said. “I think in retrospect we will see that we misjudged Putin.”

WATCH | Former Canadian Foreign Minister Patrick Mackay on Putin:

Canada's former foreign affairs minister, Patrick Mackay, talks about a surprise meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and former Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper.

It wasn't just the Americans who seemed to be under Putin's spell. When he visited the United Kingdom in 2003, he received the royal treatment, traveling through London alongside the Queen in a horse-drawn carriage. Russian dissident journalist Vladimir Kara-Murza was surprised.

“Literally in the same week that Vladimir Putin's government pulled the plug on the last independent television channel (in Russia), he had an exciting state visit to London and a visit with the Queen of England,” Kara-Murza told CBC.

He says Putin was also arresting and imprisoning political opponents. “It was clear from the very beginning, and yet… Western democratic countries deliberately chose to turn a blind eye to these domestic authoritarian abuses. “

CBC requested an interview with Putin, but his press secretary declined the invitation.

More interest in Ukraine

Starting in 2012, Putin became stronger with Western countries, which became evident in his first private meeting with then French president Francois Hollande. Putin was concerned about NATO's expansion into Eastern Europe and the missiles being deployed there.

A man with glasses and a tie.
Former French president Francois Hollande was struck by the psychological methods of Vladimir Putin in their personal meetings. “It is no coincidence that he trained with the KGB. The KGB was all about “I threaten you, but I also catch you in an almost personal relationship.”' (CBC)

As Hollande told CBC, “He asked for a piece of paper, which is very rare for a meeting between heads of state. And on it, he drew a map of Europe and put the missiles that were positioned in central Europe that directly threatens its security already he wanted to play the victim – 'I'm under attack' – to better justify what he could do to defend himself. ”

Hollande was struck by Putin's psychological tactics in their personal meetings. “It's no coincidence that he trained with the KGB. The KGB was about 'I threaten you, but I also accept you in an almost personal relationship.' Always playing the double game: 'I'm threatening you, but I'm ready to talk.'”

By 2013, Putin had turned his attention back to Ukraine, urging the anti-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovych, to cancel a proposed new deal with Europe. The majority of the Ukrainian population rebelled against the West, and Maidan Square in Kyiv filled with anti-Russian protesters, with European and American politicians on the move.

Yanukovych tried to put down the Maidan protest with police violence, but the demonstrators held their ground. After many casualties, Yanukovych fled the country by helicopter in the dead of night.

Politico journalist Sheftalovich says it was a hard blow for Putin.

“He saw Ukraine as part of Russia, and he saw Euro Maidan more or less as the first part of a revolution that could end in his removal from power. Therefore, it was not appropriate for him that Euro Maidan had swept in and that these were complaints that took his husband out of work.”

Amid joyous celebrations in Kyiv, Putin was plotting revenge. He had decided to break Ukraine by seizing the Crimean peninsula in the south and most of the Russian-held areas in the east of the country. In 2014, he sent Russian soldiers without any uniform markings to Crimea. They were called the “little green people”.

When asked about them, Putin said they had nothing to do with Russia. At the same time, Russian troops and Russian-backed separatists began to attack the Ukrainian army in the eastern regions of Russia in the Donbas.

Garry Kasparov, a former world chess champion who gave up the sport to work against the Putin regime, saw Crimea as a turning point.

“That was the best way to tell the West that it's not, you know, playing by the rules anymore…. Appropriating land is just a very important element in destroying the world order. Dictators, they are an opportunity. , or Stalin.

Great G20 meeting

Again, the Western response to Putin's actions seemed weak. He was still invited to the commemoration of the 70th anniversary of the Normandy invasion in France in June 2014. Hollande welcomed him as the guest of honour.

The new president of western Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, was also there. Putin agreed to hold a short meeting with Poroshenko, who knew what he was up against.

“I have several suggestions for those who have a plan to meet with Putin,” he told CBC. “Point No. 1, don't trust Putin. He is a KGB officer who specially learned to lie. Second, don't be afraid of Putin, because if you are afraid of Putin, this is feeding him. only go as far as we let him go.”

At the G20 meeting a few months later in Australia, then Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper tried a tough approach.

According to McKay, “Vladimir Putin came into this private session with other world leaders and immediately went to our prime minister … who had been very vocal about Putin and his apparent plans for Crimea. Putin made a beeline for him, put out a hand … Prime Minister Harper looked at him and said, 'You've got to get out of Crimea.' And Putin said, 'We are not in Crimea.'

“That was the beginning of the end for Russia's participation in the G8, because everyone in the room knew he was lying.

Two men talk.
Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper speaks with Russian President Vladimir Putin as he arrives at the G20 Summit in St. Petersburg, Russia, on 5 September 2013. (Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)

Amidst mounting casualties and a stalemate in the war with Ukraine, Putin appears to have returned to his waiting game as he watches the clock tick down on the President's term Joe Biden, who led the NATO campaign in defense of Ukraine.

While many Western leaders were horrified by Putin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Hollande said, “There is a huge misunderstanding between Europeans and Putin, and in general, the West and Putin.

“Europeans don't want to go to war. For them, war has a terrible history, the history of the 20th century, and there is no reason to think that war is possible on the continent today.

“But for Putin, war is possible. That's the disconnect. We are peaceful, democratic nations that do not like death. But for Putin, death is part of the action. “

WATCH | The full Putin's Journey documentary:



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