When Vladimir Putin emerged from the chaos of the Yeltsin era with its liberalisation and fabulously wealthy oligarchs, he was riding high in Russian popularity. His presidency saw a steady plundering of the treasury to maintain his position in the world, but events such as the annexation of Crimea in 2014 bought him just enough credit to take him through the 2018 election with 77% of the vote. Pre-Crimea the economy had been the world's 5th largest, but with Putin's men increasingly being granted monopolies it dropped swiftly as corruption impacted the cost of foodstuffs and everyday living. The economy was further weakened by raiding pension funds and open displays of dominance in the middle east, with 3bn given to Syria alone. In 2020 Putin changed the constitution giving him effective power for life. This book was published in 2020, before the war in Ukraine, but its meticulous account of Putin's rise and his behaviour in power are highly relevant. Much information comes from Pugachev, the banker who financed both Yeltsin and Putin, ignoring warnings from Boris Berezovsky about the dangers of facilitating the rise of a KGB man to the presidency. Putin first rose to be deputy mayor of St Petersburg on the back on the perestroika of the 1990s, pretending to support Mayor Sobchak as Gorbachev's reforms gave way to the rise of the oligarchs, while operators like Abramovich, Berezovsky and Khodorkovsky played all sides against each other. Meanwhile the old-guard KGB were siphoning huge sums from the Russian economy and stashing them away with a view to getting one of their own back into power. That man was Putin, whose asset was charm coupled with a fake humility that enabled him to infiltrate the system without people noticing. A gripping book of investigative journalism. 13.3 x 21cm, 624pp, paperback, photos.
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