"Putin enters final phase; Get ready..."

"Putin enters final phase; Get ready..."

As reported by Jutarnji List, he quoted an American intelligence officer who told him that Putin has changed a lot, which in reality represents a big problem for the West.

"In February, when the war started, it was still possible to discuss potential resolutions with Putin, but now I don't see how he could accept anything that we could offer politically or morally," Galeotti quotes his interlocutor from the U.S. Intelligence ranks in the article.

The text reminds reiterates that when Putin was elected president in 1999, he was quite open about what he wanted, which was to stay in a position of power as long as he wanted and make Russia a recognized power again.

"However, his ideas about what he is willing to do to achieve that goal have changed over time and now we are looking at the final, most dangerous phase of his transformation into a tyrant," said Galeotti, who is otherwise considered an experienced Kremlin analyst. And just as the doctrine and ideology of Marxism-Leninism used to be in force in the practice of the Soviet Union, today's Russia, claims Galeotti, is in the grip of Putinism, but also of Patrushevism, because Putin's view of today's world as an eternal competition in which one dog kills another, reflects the bellicose paranoia of his adviser on national affairs, Nikolai Patrushev.

"Patrushev is a champion of an aggressive attack on Ukraine who likes to quote the Russian imperial general Mikhail Skobelev who, commenting on the massacre of the enemy in 1881, said that 'the duration of peace is in direct proportion to the carnage you have committed against the enemy: the harder you hit them, the longer they will keep quiet'. Patrushev says that Russia must wage a merciless war in Ukraine," writes Galeotti.

Galeotti sees Putinism-Patrushevism as the last stage of Putinism in which it is difficult to predict Putin's future moves. In the last month, he turned Russia into a war machine and subordinated everything in it to war.

Putin, he claims, is in the most dangerous phase. In the worst case scenario, he faces the risk of being ousted from power and suffering the fate of a scapegoat. In the most optimistic scenario, he will have to cross out the original dream of entering the pantheon of Russian national heroes.

Be that as it may, this situation will have significant consequences for the countries of the West. If we accept the fact that "Putin in the final phase" believes that he is in an existential battle with the West, then it will be easier to understand that this war will continue - even by unarmed means - even when peace reigns in the Ukrainian sunflower fields.

The West, the Kremlin analyst further points out, should not be fooled that Putin will be ousted from power so easily and quickly. It would be better for the West to avoid such a scenario, because experience shows that it is not that successful at it.

"Fidel Castro survived an alleged 600 attempted attacks and eventually died of natural causes at the age of 90, and it's even worse if we remember Afghanistan and Iraq," says Galeotti.

If, on the other hand, Putin's overthrow is started, it is quite certain that he will respond, and in addition, there would be a risk of justifying the worst paranoia of Putinism - Patrushevism, and allow Putin to be replaced by someone younger, healthier and even more furious. Nor did the sanctions imposed by Western countries on Russian oligarchs, reminds Galeotti, produce the expected results. Russia is not in economic collapse nor has its economy imploded.

The West must come to terms with the fact that it will remain trapped in an indirect conflict with Russia for at least as long as Putin is in the Kremlin, and perhaps longer. The West will suffer the consequences of the war in Ukraine and that will mean much more than having to buy gas elsewhere. We have to get used to the fact that the world is going through a kind of new cold war in which China and Russia are preparing for a race and we have to face its consequences such as increased defense costs, he concluded.