KREMLIN COUP?What Are the Chances of a Kremlin Coup?
Russia experts are divided over the question of whether Vladimir Putin is facing a genuine risk to his power. A minority view is emerging among some Kremlin watchers that Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s days are numbered. Other seasoned Kremlin watchers are not yet persuaded Putin is at any immediate risk.
With Russia’s ground invasion largely stalled and stuttering, a minority view is emerging among some Kremlin watchers that Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s days are numbered.
“Whatever Putin does, he does not look as if he can survive for long,” tweeted Anders Aslund, a Swedish economist and former economic adviser to the governments of Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Ukraine.
Aslund believes a major power struggle is already evident inside the Kremlin. Others who hazard that Putin’s position is becoming precarious point to the public opposition to Russia’s war on Ukraine by Arkady Dvorkovich, a veteran Russian government official and a former Russian deputy prime minister.
Dvorkovich last week told the American magazine Mother Jones, “My thoughts are with Ukrainian civilians,” he said, adding, “Wars are the worst things one might face in life… including this war.”
“Wars do not just kill priceless lives,” Dvorkovich was quoted as saying. “Wars kill hopes and aspirations, freeze or destroy relationships and connections,” he explained.
Other seasoned Kremlin watchers are not yet persuaded Putin is at any immediate risk, saying the opposition is mainly coming from Yeltsin-era oligarchs who have little political sway and are intimidated by the security strongmen around Putin. The strongmen are nicknamed “siloviki” and, like Putin, came into politics from the security, intelligence or military services.
They share Putin’s revanchist aim of reversing the territorial losses suffered when the Soviet Union splintered apart.
“There is a general feeling that, objectively, a split is already happening among the elites: former Yeltsin oligarchs versus Putin’s conservative elites. This isn’t a confrontation or a political struggle; it is simply a case of two camps exhibiting opposing views about how to proceed in the current situation,” according to Tatiana Stanovaya, an independent analyst and non-resident scholar at the Carnegie Moscow Center, a think tank.
“The former has the economy in their hands and the latter control politics. The oligarchs are intimidated and under pressure, while the conservative elites are on horseback with drawn swords.”
