Sputnik/Sergei Bobylev/Kremlin via REUTERS Russian President Vladimir Putin walks before his inauguration ceremony at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia May 7, 2024
He could probably have walked it blindfolded.
For the fifth time, Vladimir Putin took the long walk through the Grand Kremlin Palace to the St Andrew’s Throne Hall. There he took the oath of office and was sworn in as Russia’s president for a new six-year term.
“We are a united and great people. Together we will overcome all obstacles, we will bring all our plans to fruition, and together we will win,” President Putin told an audience of ministers and dignitaries.
The red carpet route may have been familiar to him. But much has changed since President Putin’s first inauguration ceremony in May 2000.
Back then, President Putin pledged to “preserve and develop democracy” and to “take care of Russia”.
Twenty-four years on, the Kremlin leader is waging war against Ukraine; a war in which Russia has suffered heavy losses. At home, instead of developing democracy, President Putin has been curtailing it: jailing critics, removing all checks and balances on his power.
“Putin thinks of himself now as Vladimir the Great, as a Russian tsar,” believes Fiona Hill, a former White House national security advisor.
“If we took ourselves back to his first two presidential terms, I think we’d have a fairly favourable assessment of Putin. He stabilised the country politically and made it solvent again. The Russian economy and system were performing better than at any other previous time in its history.
“The war in Ukraine, going back to the annexation of Crimea 10 years ago, has dramatically changed that trajectory. He’s turned himself into an imperialist instead of a pragmatist.”
Putin 5.0 had plenty of supporters in the hall.
“Putin is leading Russia to victory!” Russian MP Pyotr Tolstoy told me.
“What is victory?” I asked.
“Victory is when Britain and the West realise that Russia is a superpower and recognise Russia’s national interests.”
“And if the West doesn’t do that?”
“Then that’s the end of the West,” concluded the MP.
Inside the Kremlin Palace, I met one of President Putin’s biggest fans. Vyacheslav Volodin, speaker of Russia’s lower house of parliament, is famous for having declared that “If there is Putin, there is Russia; if there is no Putin, there is no Russia,”
“The West needs a weak Russia that will fall apart,” Mr Volodin told me. “Putin is in their way.”
It’s remarkable to think that since Vladimir Putin first came to power, America has been through five different presidents and Britain has had seven prime ministers.
After nearly a quarter of a century running Russia, Mr Putin has certainly made his mark. In the past, people rarely spoke of “Brezhnevism”, “Gorbachevism” or “Yeltsinism”.
A mural of Vladimir Putin in the town of Kashira, 70 miles from Moscow
Most people have grown used to one man running Russia and no imminent prospect of change in the Kremlin
But Putinism: that’s a thing.
“We have one more -ism in our history: Stalinism,” says Andrei Kolesnikov, senior fellow at the Carnegie Eurasia Russia Centre.
“I would say that Putinism is one more incarnation of Stalinism. He behaves like [former Soviet dictator] Stalin. His power is personalised, like in Stalin’s time. He prefers to use a lot of political repressions. And like Stalin, he is ready to keep himself in power until the physical end.”
The challenge, for the West, is how to deal with an increasingly authoritarian Russian leader determined to restore what he sees as Russia’s greatness; a modern-day tsar… with nuclear weapons.
“On the issue of nuclear weapons, there’s an awful lot that we can do,” believes Fiona Hill.
“Some countries, like China, India, Japan, have been extraordinarily nervous when Putin has engaged in nuclear sabre-rattling in Ukraine and have pushed back against that. We can enforce restraint on Russia by creating an international framework for pushing back on this wild and speculative talk about using nuclear weapons.
“Perhaps that is something of a model for how we can deal with Vladimir Putin, who in many respects is something of a rogue leader. We need to create a more constraining environment, less permissive for the kinds of actions that he wants to undertake.”
Officially, Vladimir Putin won more than 87% of the vote in the March presidential election. However, he’d faced no serious challenger in a contest widely seen as neither free nor fair: a point I put today to Ella Pamfilova, chairperson of Russia’s Central Election Commission. It didn’t go down well.
“Many opponents of the president weren’t allowed on the ballot,” I said.
“People who make such a criticism have either never been to Russia or haven’t been here for a long time,” Ms Pamfilova replied. “It’s all myths and lies.”
The Grand Kremlin Palace isn’t the only place you can find Vladimir Putin.
Valentina
“We don’t know who would come next if Putin goes,” says Valentina
In the town of Kashira, 70 miles from Moscow, a gigantic Putin portrait, a massive mural, takes up one whole side of an apartment block.
In Kashira, Big Vladimir is watching you.
“I like him,” says pensioner Valentina, who is selling flowers by the roadside.
“Putin has good ideas and does a lot for people. True, our pensions aren’t big. But he can’t fix everything in one go.”
“He’s had nearly 25 years,” I point out.
“But we don’t know who’d come next [if Putin goes],” Valentina replies.
“In Russia, we’re all expected to think the same way,” says Victoria, who is walking past the Putin mural.
“If I say anything against Putin, my husband says: ‘You criticise Putin again and I’ll divorce you!’ He’s mad about him. He says that if it wasn’t for Putin, life here would be as tough as in the 1990s.”
When I ask another passer-by, Alexander, what he thinks of the president, he replies: “It can be dangerous now to express an opinion. No comment.”
Most of the people I talk to say that they walk past Putin’s portrait without even noticing it now. They’re used to it.
Just like they’ve grown used to one man running Russia and no imminent prospect of change in the Kremlin.
•Steve Rosenberg is BBC Russia editor
