So please tell me, is a 117-square-meter apartment (approximately 1,250 square feet) enough for a family of 3 people to live in? Is it a decent apartment? Can you normally live there? In my opinion, it is more than enough. A living room of 30 square meters, two bedrooms of 25 and 17 square meters, and a spacious kitchen. Quite solid even by today's standards. But we are now talking about Saint-Peterburg of the early 90s. Every second apartment in central St. Petersburg was a kommunalka, a communal apartment. A family of 3 might live in one room, with a shared toilet and kitchen. And here is a private 117-square-meter apartment, located two minutes away from Palace Square and the Hermitage. What a great place! But for some people, even this apartment seemed a bit cramped. Well, it's missing some everyday things. Everyone wants to have something more than they have. For example, for the first mayor of Saint Petersburg, Anatoly Sobchak, along with his wife, Lyudmila Narusova. Just look. They bought and resettled the neighboring kommunalka. Their new, enlarged apartment was 246 square meters (2,650 square feet) for three people. 128 extra square meters. That’s a lot. Can 128 extra square meters cost a career? For Sobchak, they did. Can four extra rooms and three bathrooms change the history of a country? As it turns out, they can. We had already started traveling abroad and we already knew that people had two bedrooms, that there had to be a dining room to host guests. It was hard to overcome that temptation. And everyone had to resettle the communal apartments with their own hands. I never even imagined it could escalate to such an extent, that it could lead to such fatal consequences. I would set the fire with my own hands. If only I had known. Traitors. The successor St. Petersburg in the early 1990s was nothing like it is today. The city was dirt-poor and falling apart. Factories were closing, there was no work, wages were not being paid. The worst was that in the early days, right after the collapse of the USSR, there wasn't enough food coming into the city to feed the population. As during World War II, humanitarian aid was brought in from abroad – the US and Germany. Hundreds of thousands of tons of the most basic foodstuffs were imported: canned food, sugar, oil, and flour. The real owners of St. Petersburg were thugs and criminal gangs. Contract killings, shootings, brawls – that was the order of the day in St. Petersburg. And yet political life in St. Petersburg was no less dynamic than in Moscow, mostly thanks to the man who became the city's first mayor: Anatoly Sobchak. We need to raise the issue that the heads of the State Security Committee should no longer be part of the country's top political leadership. Sobchak was undoubtedly a very prominent political figure of that time. Not just on a city level, but on a federal scale. Together with Gorbachev, Yeltsin, and Sakharov, he was a symbol of perestroika and democratic change. He was also a scholar and professor of law at Leningrad University. In 1989, at the same time as Yeltsin, both were members of the Inter-Regional Group of Deputies, which was essentially the first legal Soviet parliamentary opposition. On June 12, 1991, the same day that Yeltsin became president, Sobchak became mayor of Leningrad, which would soon be renamed. Sobchak was a true public politician who wasn't afraid to address the crowds at rallies. He did it perfectly and inspired millions of people. We have to live differently. And it depends on each of us whether we will live better tomorrow. There is no need to wait for any miracle. Everything is in our hands. We will do everything, we will overcome everything. Our great future will be the work of our hand. For example, he inspired twenty-year-old Dmitry Medvedev, who studied at the LSU Law School and worked with Sobchak. It was very new back then. At our department, for a very long time, there was still a whole suitcase of photographs of Professor Sobchak. They were black-and-white photos printed in a makeshift way, which we took and plastered all over Vasilievsky Island. We walked around with glue, a jar, and a brush, sticking them up. Sometimes disputes arose around these portraits. Sobchak's team in St. Petersburg included not only the two future presidents Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev, but also Anatoly Chubais, Alexei Kudrin, Herman Gref, Vitaly Mutko, Sergei Naryshkin, Dmitry Kozak, Vladimir Churov, Alfred Kokh, Igor Sechin, and Alexei Miller. But Sobchak also had major political problems. As good as he was at giving speeches and working crowds, he was helpless when it came to actually running a city. This became clear very quickly. Sobchak loved to talk, but his words weren't followed by action. The city was in effect handed over to his deputies, first and foremost to the KGB veteran Vladimir Putin. Soon the entire office of Mayor Sobchak, today's political elite, became mere servants of the mafiosos who were actually in charge in St. Petersburg. Many pieces of evidence of how it worked have been preserved. One of the entrepreneurs described that to get anything approved or any document issued, you had to talk to Putin, and then he would write down how much it would cost on a slip of paper. The money was moved via Alexei Miller. Sobchak's second problem was his lifestyle. He was the prototype of everything we imagine today when we hear words such as "Duma deputy", "minister", or "United Russia", Sobchak looked like the richest, most stylish man in town, showing up at fancy events with a glamorous wife who shocked everyone with her outfits. Of course, it was annoying – how could it not be? Sobchak and Narusova were out of the league of mere civil servants. They were the elite, the beau monde. There were endless receptions and parties with supermodels. In 1994, Sobchak personally presided over the wedding of two of the country's most famous people – the singers Alla Pugacheva and Filipp Kirkorov. The banquet was organized by Putin. Dear Filipp Borisovich, dear Alla Borisovna… I now pronounce you husband and wife Let's linger for a moment on the Sobchaks' personal palace on the Moika. What is it? Is it possible for a civil servant to live like this? It was like a garish antique market where emperors shop: gold everywhere, oak furniture, candelabras, and portraits of the masters themselves in golden frames. It was as much a museum as an apartment. Nobody lived like this back then. But they did. And even according to the documentation, they owned not only an apartment: the Sobchaks' daughter Ksenia filed a declaration referring to a non-residential space of 122.5 square meters. Do you have any ideas of what it is? It's a huge loft in the same building on the Moika River, which is also owned by Sobchak's family. This was something like a creative studio. Apparently, there was no room for creativity in the enormous 250-square-meter apartment below. At the end of his first term as mayor, Sobchak was not very popular in the Kremlin. Yeltsin's entourage and law enforcement officials (especially Korzhakov) frequently belittled Sobchak, convinced Yeltsin it was better not to be associated with him, and even initiated criminal proceedings. Hence the decision to hold the elections separately: Sobchak might supposedly become dead weight and bring Yeltsin down. Looking back after 30 years, it is clear that he was not dead weight. The two politicians were simply rivals. Sobchak remained quite popular, he was independent, he was loved in the West. There was something elusively presidential about Sobchak. He and Yeltsin seemed to be of comparable stature. Apparently, that was exactly the problem. Sobchak approached election day with full confidence that he would be re-elected. His unexpected main rival was his own deputy, Vladimir Yakovlev: a tough businessman with no name recognition and the charisma of a used-car salesman. The campaign period, since we're revisiting this topic again, has already seen a lot of discussion. Yakovlev and the Moscow connection, Yakovlev is described as this and that. There's been a lot of speculation about it. And I wouldn't even like to revisit these topics. Sobchak's campaign, for which Putin, Kudrin, and Narusova worked, insisted that Sobchak was a world-famous mayor, while Yakovlev was a nobody who'd been propped up by "Moscow moneybags." "Mercantile Moscow will defeat enlightened St. Petersburg," Sobchak's flyers said. "St. Petersburg will wither away while Moscow gets even richer." Campaign posters featured vouchers for soap – a warning that rationing would return if Sobchak wasn't elected. And the classics. “Yakovlev is a kommunist.” In response, Yakovlev's headquarters hit him where it hurt: "Yakovlev or the party animal?" And then there is a comparison between them. The one only talks, and the other one gets things done. Here Yakovlev is depicted as a hard-working ant saying "shoo" to the frivolous dragonfly Sobchak, who has a wine glass in his paws. At this point, the housing scandal broke. The luxurious apartment on the Moika and other property found to be registered to Sobchak's relatives and acquaintances became the main talking point of the campaign against him. Sobchak was accused of corruption and abusing his position to enrich himself. In the first round of the vote, Sobchak received 29% and Yakovlev 22%. It was the televised debates that got him. At first, it seemed the game was being played on Sobchak's field. As everyone knew, he was an excellent polemicist and reacted quickly and sharply, with oratorical skills and a lot of experience. But in these debates, he proved surprisingly weak. Yakovlev interrupted his stories about high politics and values with questions about how much a janitor earns. Do you know how much a janitor earns in general? I know, but I also know how much the Head of Production Repair and Maintenance Association earns. Name the sum. Obviously, Sobchack didn’t know how much the janitor earns. Yakovlev commented on Sobchak's long monologues with folk sayings. When I talk to you, you know there's a saying about the dew and the eyes. It kind of goes like this. Members of Sobchak's team explained his defeat by saying he hadn't prepared at all and just assumed nothing could go wrong. Anatoly Alexandrovich himself found a more interesting explanation: it was those damn clairvoyants. Yakovlev at first flatly refused to debate. But then they insisted. They started insisting after finding a clairvoyant who was strong enough, and they put up a very strong barrier during the debates. I felt out of place during the debates. In the second round on June 2, Sobchak lost to Yakovlev by 1.7%. Vladimir Putin, Sobchak's deputy, who resigned after his boss, worked in the mayor's office until July and then moved to his dacha in the now famous Ozero cooperative. Sobchak had promised him an ambassadorial post, which didn't come through. Immediately after his move, while Putin and his friends were sitting in the sauna, a fire broke out and the house burned to the ground in a matter of minutes. We couldn't go from the second floor downstairs anymore. The whole place was already in flames. So we had to get sheets, tie them in knots and go down like that. In short, total hopelessness – but it didn't last long. After four weeks he took up a new post in Moscow. And exactly three years later, he would be appointed Yeltsin's successor. The Family Let’s get back to Moscow. The first thing Yeltsin did after taking office was disappear again. An explanation appeared only a month later, when Yeltsin admitted in an interview that he had serious health problems. I had a checkup and was diagnosed with heart disease. The doctors recommended either surgery or passive work, but I have never been satisfied with passive work. While the surgery went well, he would never again have a regular work routine. In his second term, Yeltsin bore little resemblance to his former self. He worked for a few hours a day, not necessarily every day, and often disappeared for stretches. He frequently grappled with new health issues and treatments. Everyone knew that Yeltsin was unable to fulfill his duties. He'd been elected for a second term he was unfit for from day one. That's the situation we're in. The responsibilities of the president were assumed by a group referred to as the Family. At its core were Yeltsin's daughter Tatyana Dyachenko, who took on the role of the president's counselor, and Valentin Yumashev, initially an advisor who swiftly ascended to become the head of the Presidential Administration in 97’s. The configuration is quite strange. A journalist from Ogonyok, whose only merit is the Memoirs written for Yeltsin, and the president's daughter. Both of them have no experience, no knowledge, and have never managed anything in their lives for a single day will replace the elected president. Tanya and Valya, as they were now dubbed, emerged as the leaders of a select group wielding paramount authority in Russia. And they were the ones who chose Putin. I recently suggested that the word “family” should be pronounced openly rather than in quotation marks. With a capital letter, like the Family of the great reformer and liberal of Russia, President Yeltsin. The structure of the Family, without quotation marks and starting with a capital letter, as Berezovsky insisted, was strikingly simple. Surrounding Yumashev and Dyachenko and a handful of close officials were the oligarchs, whose presence and proximity varied over time. Yesterday's bankers had evolved into bona fide oligarchs, their wealth bolstered by their power. They began perceiving themselves as Russia's rightful rulers, because they're the ones who helped Yeltsin get re-elected in 1996. They seek to dictate government appointments and leadership positions in state corporations and even to shape legislation. Every decision now required their approval. Let's just listen to the witnesses from those years and hear what they say about the oligarchs. There were about eight or nine of them gathered in one of the major banks and one of them told me bluntly: 'We put Yeltsin in power. This is our country and you'll abide by our instructions.' They handed me a list of demands, including that all decisions, including the appointment of personnel in the ministry, had to be approved by them. I asked what would happen if I refused. "Then you won't be finance minister". That's it. In the end, that's exactly how it played out. Anatoly Chubais replaced Livshits as Minister of Finance. Of course, the extent of power that Berezovsky personally had, and overall, within the community of the seven largest business leaders, was colossal and excessive. Well, let's say key personnel decisions, at least during Chernomyrdin's time, often went through the LogoVAZ mansion. They got special passes approved by Yumashev, they had unrestricted access to the Kremlin. And suddenly the phone rings. And Tatiana Borisovna says to me, "Did you coordinate this decision with the guys?" I say, "With which guys?" Phone numbers, addresses, secret codes. With which guys?" "Well, there's Boris Abramovich, Vladimir Alexandrovich..." I say, "Are you crazy or what? Why would I discuss it with them? Who are they?" In the end: "You don't understand anything!" Does this sound like a democracy worth rigging the 1996 election for? Abramovich But there was a very interesting optical illusion in this story. It seemed that the high-profile skirmish brought the protagonists into the national spotlight. The most odious of them, Berezovsky, just like in a theatrical play, named the key figures right from the start. He explicitly named the seven oligarchs who ruled the country at the time in the Financial Times: Berezovsky himself, Khodorkovsky, Fridman, Gusinsky, Potanin, Smolensky, and Aven. Their names became widely known, and these "Seven Bankers" came to symbolize this era. However, the most important oligarch and benefactor of the Family was missing from the list. Roman Abramovich. Roman Abramovich only came to public attention in 1999, but he had long been a close friend of Yumashev and Tatyana and had considerable influence in the Kremlin. But unlike Berezovsky, who never leaves the TV, no one knew what Abramovich looked like. He has an extraordinary ability to stay out of the lenses of TV and photo cameras. Not a single editorial office in Moscow can boast of having any clear portrait of this man. Abramovich pursued a clever strategy: he kept a low profile and was the quietest, most unassuming, and most business-oriented of the oligarchs. Unnoticed by others, he gradually and discreetly endeared himself to the Family. Even more than Berezovsky, who was loud and scandalous. Nemtsov recounted his first meeting with Abramovich at the dacha of the president's daughter. He scurried around, grilled kebabs, and poured wine for everyone. Tatiana told him, “Meet Roman Abramovich and he knows how to be friends." Now there's plenty of evidence of how their relationship was structured. Nemtsov also described how Abramovich and his colleagues formed a "tight ring" around the two and recalled an instance when Abramovich demanded that he appoint his preferred candidate to head up a state enterprise. In 1999, the Wall Street Journal uncovered that U.S. law enforcement officials had discovered two secret accounts belonging to Tatyana's former husband, Leonid Dyachenko, in the Cayman Islands. Some of the funds were traced back to the Swiss company Runicom, whose owner was a mystery at the time. Now we can say with certainty that it was Abramovich. As early as 1999, Abramovich, who was only 32 years old, was directly involved in government appointments, as Alexei Venediktov, the head of Ekho Moskvy, told British journalists. In the summer of 1999, during a visit to the Kremlin, he met several high-ranking officials waiting to be interviewed for ministerial posts by Abramovich himself. Years later, Venediktov questioned Abramovich about that day and the oligarch's role in selecting ministers. Abramovich jokingly deflected and said they were just having friendly conversations. This took place in August 1999, which means Abramovich was holding talks with candidates for the first government under the new prime minister – Putin. It's the right time to remember where Putin came from. Putin moves to Moscow In August 1996, just two months following Sobchak's electoral defeat in St. Petersburg, fate had smiled on the unemployed Putin. To be honest, I didn't really want to leave St. Petersburg. I consider myself a true St. Petersburger, this city is my home. I had no desire to move. It just turned out that way. His former colleagues from the mayor's office, Chubais and Kudrin, helped him find a new job in Moscow. Initially, he was offered a position in the press service of the Presidential Administration. However, Putin found the offer unattractive, and his wife also advised him against it. She had two compelling reasons. First, they had just gotten their 140-square-meters-apartment on Vasilievsky Island in St. Petersburg (and here arises an interesting question: where did the apartment come from?). Lyudmila said in the interview that they hadn't even had the chance to live in it yet. Second, as Lyudmila Putina complained to a friend, the position was pathetic, without opportunities for extra income. Then another opportunity arose through connections with old acquaintances: a legal position in the Administrative Directorate of the President. The decision to bring me into the directorate was primarily made by the head of the Directorate himself – Pavel Palych Borodin. Honestly, I was surprised by his warmth toward me. It was entirely his initiative. Putin, of course, was not actually surprised. As it turned out, Pavel Palych owed him a favor. In 1995, Borodin's daughter fell ill during her stay in St. Petersburg, and Putin had allegedly helped her get treatment. Here's the situation: my daughter is ill, could you help her? He replied: "No problem." He helped generously; he provided my daughter with a car, took care of her treatment, and behaved extremely decently. He really is a very honorable man. But there's another explanation for Borodin's efforts to get Putin a job, and it's more convincing: At one point, his daughter's drunken husband was involved in a car accident in Leningrad. And Putin resolved this issue? Sobchak received a phone call, and then he ordered this issue to Putin. So Putin resolved this issue? Yes, he did. Putin only spent seven months in the Administrative Directorate. He found the work boring. Less than a year after he took office, in March 1997, less than a year since he moved to Moscow, Yumashev, Yeltsin's chief of staff, chose Putin as his deputy and put him in charge of the Control Directorate. Prior to this appointment, Putin and Yumashev hadn't met. Putin had been recommended for the role. Chubais' description of Putin was that he was an exceptionally talented official I could count on. He was sure this was someone whose work I'd be pleased with." Putin hasn't worked much in every position. Putin's work in the Control Directorate was his lengthiest gig in his Moscow career prior to his presidency, lasting 14 months. What exactly he did during this time remains a mystery. His boss said there wasn't much activity in the department, but Putin still managed to make a big impression on him. However, Putin wasn't fond of this role, either, and attempted to resign on multiple occasions. He stood out from all the deputies and formulated his thoughts brilliantly. Although the work in the Directorate is ridiculous, there is not much work there. Putin didn’t actually like his position. He tried to quit several times. He asked Yumashev to let him go. By the end of May 1998, Yumashev had promoted Putin to first deputy head of the Presidential Administration, effectively making him the second-in-command. Putin now oversaw regional affairs, cultivated relationships with governors, and accompanied Yeltsin on official trips. Evidently, it was this role that proved decisive, giving Yeltsin the chance to observe Putin closely and evaluate him as a successor. A fascinating theory, but it doesn't seem very realistic. Especially when you consider that Putin only held that position for 60 days. How much can you really learn about someone if you've only traveled with them a few times? How can you decide to hand over a country to someone 60 days after meeting them? Then, on July 25, 1998, Putin, again at Yumashev's urging, was appointed to a position that he finally found appealing: director of the FSB. "For me, returning to the security agencies is like coming home. Putin's tenure at the FSB would be short, lasting only one year. Then, in August 1999, Yeltsin declared Putin the new prime minister and his chosen successor. This is the Secretary of the Security Council and Director of the FSB — Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. Even with thousands of pages of memoirs from those involved and dozens of hours of interviews, it's still not clear how Putin managed to make such a profound impression on everyone in such a short time. What did he accomplish, given how short all of his stints were? How was he able to get hired at the Administrative Directorate, then the Presidential Administration, then the FSB, and then the government, all while directly mixed up in criminal activities? Why did no one ever look into this? There were newspaper articles and Duma investigations into shady dealings, and there'd even been comprehensive reports on Putin himself. He had been personally accused of fraud and connections with organized crime. It was impossible not to have noticed all this; one had to actively ignore it. I immediately noticed Putin's fantastic work. Very precise wording. Putin was brilliant at formulating ideas. He is good at formulating. He is brilliant at formulating. He was very precise. He was precise in his wordings. Putin is brilliant. He is a superb official. I think Putin is a superb candidate. He was brilliant with people. That’s it! The puzzle is complete. Putin may have been brilliant. He may indeed have been conscientious and effective, and he may have handled paperwork like a champion. However, there were thousands of other competent executives, many of whom were surely more remarkable. Nevertheless, it was Putin who was chosen. He was quickly promoted and given positions for which he objectively lacked the experience, knowledge, reputation, or merit. So did Putin just get lucky? Far from it. He had made a lasting impression on Yumashev and Yeltsin in November 1997, when he helped his former boss Anatoly Sobchak, who was about to be imprisoned, leave the country secretly. Saving Sobchak On October 3, 1997, Sobchak was detained for questioning regarding several cases against him, including in connection with his double apartment on the Moika. They sat him in a car and took him to the police station, where he began suffering heart trouble. Sobchak was hospitalized and gave an interview from his hospital bed. There is a bus with OMON, a dozen or two operative officers in leather jackets. They surrounded the whole place. I said, “You could send a summons home." He then disappeared. In early November, he was found in Paris, having flown out of Russia on a private medical plane for surgery. It remains a mystery how Sobchak was able to leave the country despite the criminal charges. According to the official version, his wife made it all happen. It was pretty hard. I remembered every detective novel I've ever read. I realized that only under conditions of absolute secrecy could I accomplish this. I had to arrange for a medical plane, and I was amazed at how easily it was done, like ordering a taxi. I sent a representative to Helsinki, where they booked the plane, and friends there paid the money as if it were a loan. Was it expensive? Yes, very expensive. We're waiting for royalty payments to pay them back. It was the year of 1998. Twenty years later, in 2018, Ksenia Sobchak released a film containing an exclusive interview with Vladimir Putin in which he admits that he was the one who organized Sobchak's secret escape. Out of pure nobility, of course, because he was sure Sobchak was innocent. I was 100% sure that he was innocent. It was a real blockbuster. Putin explained to his boss Yumashev that he will be gone for a few days and if it is not okay he can fire him. Apparently, as a trusted person, it was Putin whom Narusova sent to Finland. The one who paid for Sobchak's plane was Putin's close friend Gennady Timchenko, who happened to live in Finland. Putin and Narusova prepared a cover operation. On November 5, Ksenia Sobchak was turning 16. Narusova invited a number of guests to make it look like there would be a big celebration in St. Petersburg. Meanwhile, at the hospital, Sobchak convinced his doctor to release him, leaving with a thick stack of diagnoses. It remained for Narusova to contact the French so that someone would meet Sobchak there. I went to the Air France agency at the Bolshaya Morskaya, where you could make a direct call to France. But with surveillance, it's hard to just go in there. So I entered the neighboring Trussardi store and picked up a few items. Instead of heading to the fitting room, I went through the back door into the inner courtyard, shared with Air France. I got in there, asked for a certain employee, and she gave me access to the phone. Yeltsin took special note of this episode and that it was one of the reasons Putin was ultimately chosen. After a short pause, he looked up and said: “You did the right thing.” A couple of years later, Sobchak returned to Russia with political ambitions. In early 2000, he became an authorized representative of presidential candidate Putin. And a few weeks later, during one of the election campaign trips, he died under very mysterious circumstances in a hotel room in Kaliningrad. Anatoly Alexandrovich Sobchack was one of the most vibrant politicians of the modern Russia. One aspect of this entire story is particularly surprising. How so many people as Yeltsin, Yumashev, and Chubais could see anything heroic in Sobchak's evacuation? Putin wanted to save himself. He was a subordinate of Sobchak's and was involved in every case against him. Putin had signed documents, received apartments, and taken bribes from St. Petersburg gangsters. By saving Sobchak, Putin only wanted to avoid going to prison with him. But everyone saw what they wanted to see. For the Kremlin elite, though, he looked like a savior: if someone ever came after them, Putin would save them, too. The successor Since the beginning of Yeltsin's second term, the Family's primary objective had been to find someone who could take over in 2000. However, after three years, they were still looking. Prime ministers came and went in rapid succession. Chernomyrdin was in duty up to 1998, Kirienko held this position for only 5 months, Primakov for 8 months, and Stepashin for less than 3. Millions of people looked at the TV and thought, “Is it him? Is it him now? Is it the future president? Or Luzhkov? Or maybe Nemtsov?” In 1999, the Family was up to its neck in problems: the debt default, the constant changes of government, and the State Duma's attempts to impeach Yeltsin. The oligarchs Berezovsky and Abramovich were on different sides of the barricade: Berezovsky defended the Family, while Gusinsky's NTV had stories about Yeltsin's and his cronies' corruption. Through fake companies, sometimes specially established for this purpose, huge sums of money were laundered and stolen from the pockets of the Russian taxpayers and from the treasury. This money filled the pockets of the Yeltsin’s clan. “Roma thinks of the Family, the Family thinks of Roma” billboard went up on Kutuzovsky Prospect with a picture of Abramovich – a hint that he was secretly sponsoring the presidential "Family" in exchange for benefits. Yeltsin himself looks profoundly insane during his speeches. At the meeting of the organizing committee it is necessary to determine.... You all sit in the wrong way. Stepashin is the first deputy. The most important corruption scandal of this period was the Mabetex case. Prosecutor General Yuri Skuratov initiated criminal proceedings for "improprieties by officials of the Russian Presidential Administration in the signing of contracts for the renovation of the Kremlin." Skuratov alleged that a contractor, the Swiss company Mabetex, had paid bribes to Russian officials – Borodin, the head of the Administrative Directorate. 300 millions. I also stole 10 more. And Yeltsin's family. Foreign credit cards that were issued in the names of Yeltsin's family members were found. They spent this money abroad. The situation could not be worse. An official investigation was also launched in Switzerland. The prosecutor general, supported by Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov, took direct action against Yeltsin. I don't accept any companionship in the fight against corruption. An extraordinary solution was found: In October, 1999, federal television showed footage of the Prosecutor General Skuratov cavorting with prostitutes. Then, his identity in the footage was confirmed by FSB Director Vladimir Putin. Everyone knows my opinion about this issue. My opinion is the same as the President’s and prime minister’s. Yurii Ilyich should resign. Skuratov soon resigned. Yeltsin’s problem was quickly and effectively resolved. Pretty the same as with Sobchack. I have learned that Putin was deeply involved in the Skuratov case. Putin investigated this case. I think President Yeltsin liked him a lot. And they must have paid a lot of attention to him at the time. In May 1999, the Family already was thinking that Putin would be the successor. The journalist Ksenia Ponomareva, former head of ORT, said that in June of that year she was on the same plane as Yeltsin's daughter when they were discussing politics. She asked: “What do you think about Putin?” “Who is Putin?” At that time, if I remember it correctly, he was a director of the FSB. I told her: “Putin? Come on.” Igor Malashenko, the head of NTV at the time, said the same things. The Family really needed media support. Like in 1996. Tatyana and Yumashev asked Malashenko what his thoughts were about Putin being a successor and told him that he was a good guy, Yeltsin liked him a lot. To Malashenko's reasonable response that Putin was from the KGB and couldn't be trusted, Tanya and Valya replied: "He didn't betray Sobchak, and he won't betray us either." Malashenko nevertheless agreed to meet him. Pyotr Aven organized a dinner at his dacha, inviting Malashenko and his wife as well as Putin and his two daughters, Katya and Masha. Malashenko said that Putin spent the evening trying to be invisible. He didn't keep the conversation going or ask any questions and when someone asked him something, he'd answer in one or two words. At one point, however, Putin had something to say. Malashenko's daughter had called from London after landing at Heathrow. The school car that was supposed to pick her up hadn't arrived. The daughter asked what to do, and her parents said to take an official black cab. Putin strongly disagreed. He said to my wife that she gave bad advice to her daughter. You shouldn’t tell your daughter that she can take a random cab. How could you be sure it was a real taxi? My wife was like: “Listen, we are talking about London, there are lots of black cars with official taxi signs. It’s not possible to make a mistake.” He said: “It doesn’t matter. You never know whether it is a real taxi or not.” Putin's KGB mentality and his total lack of charisma made a terrible impression on Malashenko, and NTV, which Malashenko ran, didn't support his electoral bid. That cost the station its existence. Police raids began immediately after Putin's inauguration. Gusinsky was arrested for a while. In 2001, the old NTV was crushed and taken over by the state-owned Gazprom. At today's shareholders' meeting, which the NTV journalist considers illegal, a new Board of Directors was elected, mainly from Gazprom representatives, and then the replacement of the NTV management was announced. Alfred Kokh, the organizer of loans for shares, was appointed the new director. I was elected as chairman of the Board of Directors and we had a real opportunity to save the company. Berezovsky, though, supported the Family's choice. At the end of July, he flew to Biarritz, France, where Putin was vacationing with his family. Well, where else would the director of the FSB have a vacation? Berezovsky persuaded him to become Yeltsin's successor. We were talking about this for the whole day. At the end, he agreed to be a successor. On August 5, back in Moscow, Yeltsin himself offered Putin to become prime minister and successor. He initially declined, saying politics wasn't for him. But then he changed his mind. I was at the president's office this morning and he signed my resignation. Thank you for a good job. Putin has been appointed to this post. The big question for the Family now was how to elect a man with zero support among Russians. But this wasn't the first time they had solved that problem. From the moment he was appointed, Putin appeared on television constantly. A few days afterward, he traveled to Dagestan, which had just been nearly captured by militants. You should know that Dagestan will always be a part of the Russian Federation. On August 31, there was a terrorist attack at Moscow's Okhotny Ryad. On September 4, 64 people were killed in Buinaksk. Four days later, a residential building on Guryanova Street in Moscow was blown up, killing 109 people. On September 13, a day of national mourning, a building on Kashirka was blown up. Then a terrorist attack in Volgodonsk. Then the infamous incident with the bags of sugar in Ryazan: either an official drill or a terror attack that citizens accidentally prevented – a murky, insufficiently investigated story potentially linking FSB officers to the explosions. It was an official drill. There was sugar. There was no explosive material. I personally remember these times quite well. The country was plunged into icy horror. And Putin promised from every TV screen to put an end to it. We will follow them everywhere. That means, excuse me, if we catch them in the toilet, then we'll finish them in the latrine. There are no other questions. But things didn't go so smoothly for Putin. His victory in the presidential election wasn't guaranteed. Prime ministers change each other several times a year. Who knows, maybe he is just another replacement? There were no guarantees. True, he was being praised on ORT, but NTV and the Moscow channels had their own favorites: the "Fatherland – All Russia" electoral bloc of former prime minister Primakov and Moscow mayor Yury Luzhkov. It had been founded especially for the 1999 parliamentary elections and had every chance of winning. Primakov was much more popular than Yeltsin, not to mention Putin. He, too, presented an image of strength and stability, a way out of the crisis. He was appointed prime minister after the government default in the summer of 1998 during Kirienko's tenure. Primakov managed to stabilize the situation as much as possible within six months. Secondly, he had authority. Primakov was not a man from nowhere like Putin. He's had decades of public service, serving as Foreign Minister, and being a head of the Foreign Intelligence Service. And Luzhkov, the mayor of the capital, was the country's main economic manager, overseeing vast budgets. It was under him that Moscow was transformed. Yuri Luzhkov, a proven man. Fatherland – All Russia. Believe in deeds only. Many governors joined their bloc, including the most influential ones: Shaimiev, the president of Tatarstan; Rakhimov, the president of Bashkortostan; Aushev, the head of Ingushetia; and Yakovlev, who defeated Sobchak in the elections in St. Petersburg. The Duma elections in December 1999 would decide everything. If Fatherland – All Russia won, Primakov's victory in the 2000 election would be guaranteed, and Yeltsin's successor would be left in the dust. The corrupt are afraid of us. We'll slap the hands of the bribe takers. We will revitalize the country. On December 19, pick number 19. Unity On the first day of 2024, on the very morning of January 1, Vladimir Putin visited the Vishnevsky Central Military Hospital in Krasnogorsk. He toured the rehabilitation center, the therapeutic gymnastics hall, and the water therapy room, and he met with soldiers wounded in Ukraine. Officials regularly have meetings here. Nine soldiers, eight of them without legs, one without an arm, were given medals. When Putin personally does it, they tend to pick up the wounded in a slightly more presentable manner, without severed limbs. The Vishnevsky Military Hospital, which now often appears on television in stories about the maimed soldiers Putin has sent to fight, is actually a symbolic place for his career. Twenty-five years ago, Boris Berezovsky had a bed in the generals' ward. Very ill with jaundice, with a high fever and on a drip, he had an epiphany: if Putin wants to win the presidential election, he needs a party, a counterweight to the Primakov/Luzhkov bloc. It would be called Unity and would have a bear on the logo. If you take the first two letters in the word Bear (russian: Medved’), it would be: interregional (russian: MEzhregionalny), movement (russian: DVizheniye), unity (russian: EDinstvo) I'm going to see him. He's in Vishnevsky Hospital in Novaya Riga with hepatitis. As I walk down the corridor, I notice he's in a general’s ward. On the right, Misha Leontiev is sitting, scribbling something by hand. Misha is drafting a program for Putin's party right there on the bench. "We'll screw everyone over again," he shouts. I replied, "Why are you shouting? Do you need to change your IV drip?" He asks, "Do you believe me?" I responded, "Not a word of what you say." He insists, "Unity!" I retort, "Crap." The plan was great. It was Berezovsky's greatest personal contribution to Putin's career. No one's trying to argue that it was an idea and the name of the party I came up with. Nowadays, one doesn't recall this event in polite society; it is a rather unpleasant memory for Putin. His party, after all, the party of power, was originally created by Berezovsky (Unity evolved into United Russia). He founded it, apparently paid for it with Abramovich's money, and led it to victory in the 1999 elections. Without this victory, Putin would not have become president. In 1999, in the parliamentary elections, they all simply disappeared. Two oligarchs remained on the stage: Gusinsky, who supported Primakov and Luzhkov, and myself, who supported Putin. All the others withdrew and said: 'Well, we'll wait until the election is over and then we'll start licking whichever we need to. Unity had no ideology and no program. It was pure "political technology," head-spinning political PR. Random people were chosen as the party's leaders – above all, the head of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, Sergei Shoigu, who was not much in the public eye but had a good reputation as a saver of lives. Russia should be saved. We will save our country ourselves. The second scene, it's him lying down and talking: “Think of a woman! Think of a woman. First one is Putin, second one is Shoigu, now we need a woman!” I told him: “Come on, well, we can choose that soldier's mother. Wouldn't that be okay?" They didn’t find a woman, but agreed that Olympic wrestler Alexander Karelin was invited in. Apparently, he was a symbol of power. Russia should be powerful. Power is what can provide citizens with a decent life. We should live in such a country. Then there was the retired police official Alexander Gurov, famous for his fight against organized crime. That’s it. They showed these three men against a backdrop of oh-so-Russian birches, wrote that they wanted to live decent lives, and added the now-familiar bear logo. I, as a citizen of Russia, will personally vote for Unity! Unity's victory was secured the old-fashioned way. One of the most significant events in the highest echelons of power was a new attempt of capitulation by the Fatherland — All Russia bloc before Prime Minister Putin. The journalist Sergei Dorenko produced 15 newscasts that destroyed Primakov and Luzhkov. Luzhkov's family gets money from the well-known Mabetex company. On the shore of the pond is a huge mansion, which is a house of receptions, with a sauna and all sorts of entertainment for guests of the mayor. Luzhkov is known to be receiving treatment in Austria, and Primakov in Switzerland. We went to Switzerland to the clinic where they talked about the surgery that Yevgeny Maximovich recently did on the hip joint. A hug that is extremely difficult to wash off. Primakov's approval rating, which had been 30% in August, was now practically zero. Unity, which had been expected to get at most 10% of the vote, received more than 23% in the Duma elections in December – almost as much as the Communists. Luzhkov and Primakov received only 13%. Putin's party had triumphed. The political season was over, and the country gave itself over to New Year's festivities. But the holiday mood didn't last long. Today I am addressing you for the last time as President of Russia. I'm leaving. Valya [Yumashev] and I had discussed this back in the fall, just discussed it. But it was all Yumashev's doing. Yumashev proposed doing it on the 31st, and Yumashev thought up everything else. And he persuaded Boris Nikolayevich to do it exactly like that. On December 30, Valentin Yumashev delivered the text of the farewell New Year's speech to Yeltsin. Yeltsin initially intended to make some changes, but then decided the text was fine as is. I want to apologize to you. The speech was excellent, but there was one serious mistake. I accomplished the main task of my life. Russia will never return to the past - now it will always move forward. In fact, the main task of his life was not accomplished. Russia had been catapulted into another of its Times of Troubles. And this had been the work of one man, who never should have held the office that he did. I have signed a decree assigning the duties of the President of Russia to Prime Minister Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. Why Putin? The passage below is extremely important. This is a post written by Tatyana Yumasheva, who married Valentin in 2001. It is from 2009, when she had a LiveJournal and a desire to justify herself. The text is called "Why Putin?" It is a crucial text from a person who was deeply involved in all the events and directly made all the decisions. So, the main question here should be. Tatiana asks to imagine yourself as president in the spring of '99 who is choosing a successor. Primakov - not suitable, too harsh and promises imprisonments. Chernomyrdin? Can't win the elections. Luzhkov? A traitor. Yavlinsky, Gaidar - good, but unlikely to win the elections. Nemtsov? No chance. And then there's Putin. You liked his informative reports, his arguments, his calm, restrained approach to the urgent problems that arose in various regions of the country. You couldn't help but appreciate how honorably he behaved when his boss, the first mayor of St. Petersburg, Anatoly Sobchak, was attacked with trumped-up criminal cases. You are not at all bothered by his former work for the KGB. On the contrary: in Soviet times, spies always had a glowing image. You decide that he is your top candidate. He will lead the country on a democratic path. He favors market reforms. He has a strong character, he will keep Russia moving forward. Yes, nobody knows him yet. But you're sure people will immediately sense his charm and inner strength. You just keep thinking and analyzing, Putin or not Putin. And then you decide – Putin. And… that's it. If you read this text in the hope of finding an intelligible explanation, you can't find anything other than that Putin wrote nice reports and saved Sobchak from going to prison. If you read through Yeltsin's memoirs, which are actually Yumashev's memoirs, you want to find an answer to a basic question – what were they guided by? How could they choose Putin? Why did they exercise the power that fell to them (by chance and undeservedly) in such a reckless way? Why did they create the oligarchs, why did they give them so much wealth, why did they introduce such brazen propaganda and sham elections? Why did they, these few "democrats" and reformers and oligarchs who despised the opinions of ordinary people, decide that they knew what was best for our country? You're one of the few people who doesn't consider themselves at least partially responsible or sorry for what you've done. Zhanna, I am absolutely not sorry. Absolutely not. I believe that this result of Putin that the majority continues to support him shows how Putin is suitable for our beautiful Russia. I am a Putin loyalist and sympathize with him. As you can see, the perpetrators have no regrets and no remorse. They've told their own fictitious version of events in the spacious, bright halls of the Yeltsin Center: of warriors of liberty, of patriots and democrats who saved the country from disaster. That story is nicer than the truth, which is that they carried out a crime of historic proportions. They are the people who, through their actions and decisions, have undermined and distorted genuine democratic values. And they have betrayed the hopes of millions of people. They had a chance to turn Russia into a rich, European country, but they traded that future for personal gain. They handed over power to a random crook in order to save their own hides. It was these people who laid the foundation for Putin's gangster-KGB regime. And Putin is their creation, a product of the chaos they plunged Russia into in the '90s. 25 years later Boris Yeltsin, Jr., the grandson of the president, has been photographing the same view every winter for ten years. This is the island of St. Barthélemy, "the island of millionaires," a French territory in the Caribbean. He comes here to celebrate every New Year's. Instead of the Kremlin's chimes and Putin's television speeches, he listens to Paul McCartney, Prince, or the Red Hot Chili Peppers, who give private concerts in the villa where he lives. It is a Yeltsin family tradition to celebrate the New Year at Roman Abramovich's villa. Tatyana, Valentin Yumashev, and their daughter Masha Yumasheva, who was born in London in 2002, converge on the island of billionaires. Private jets, yachts, beach vacations in the company of beautiful people. Here are Tanya, Abramovich, Yumashev in blue bathing shorts, and Pozner in striped ones. It's so good here that Tanya and Valya, not content just to visit Abramovich, bought their own villa in 2020. At 14.5 million euros, it was an expensive indulgence. It's been 30 years and the Family is still inseparable. As the billboards on Kutuzovsky said, "Roma thinks of the Family, the Family thinks of Roma." 2000 didn't really mark the end of an era; the Family didn't disappear after Yeltsin's resignation. Their brief five years of public power in the 1990s were just a prelude to an eternity with Putin. The mafia is truly immortal. And the most important mobster, Vladimir Putin, does not forget those to whom he owes it all. He brings Tatyana flowers and presents on her birthday, and Valentin Yumashev has been Putin's official advisor since the first day of his presidency (he was last reappointed in 2018). This post is unpaid, but that doesn't matter – the Yeltsins won't have to work a single day for many generations to come. Yumashev gets money from the oligarchs: he's an advisor to Abramovich and the banker Andrey Kostin, Alisher Usmanov paid him $6 million dollars for certain "services," and Vladimir Yevtushenkov got him a place on the board of the telecom company MTS. Tanya and Valya have even joined the family of an oligarch: Yumashev's daughter from his first marriage is married to Oleg Deripaska. He gave his father-in-law and mother-in-law a $20-million house in the elite Rublyovka neighborhood and shares in his company, En+ Group, so they could receive dividends. The man who made this all possible, from the election of Yeltsin to the election of Putin, is long gone. 11 years ago, in 2013, Boris Berezovsky was found hanged with a scarf in his bathtub in his Berkshire home. In the last 10 years of his life, he had fought desperately against Putin, whom he said he had created. As soon as Putin came to power, Berezovsky lost everything. Sibneft remained with Abramovich. ORT was also given to him so that he could gradually hand over the channel to the Kovalchuk family, who gave Putin full control of television. The newspaper Kommersant, which also belonged to Berezovsky, went to the oligarch Alisher Usmanov. Once the main newspaper in the country, it is now an organ of the Kremlin. And Berezovsky lost his famous London lawsuit against Abramovich, effectively bankrupting him. In 2008, Berezovsky's closest business partner, Badri Patarkatsishvili, died unexpectedly at his villa in England, allegedly of a heart attack. In 2018, the body of Berezovsky's second partner, Nikolai Glushkov, was found in London. He was a former executive of LogoVAZ, AvtoVAZ, and Aeroflot, a member of the board of directors of ORT. Glushkov was strangled with a dog leash. A stepladder was found next to his body. The investigation revealed that someone had tried to stage a suicide (as in Berezovsky's case, it was death by hanging) but had made a mistake. Normally the ladder falls down in such cases, but here it was upright. According to the police, Glushkov had been strangled from behind by someone who had broken into his house. One way or another, everyone who knew and was willing to talk about Berezovsky's role in Russian politics has disappeared. Let's be honest: this isn't a coincidence. What those who are still alive but are staying quiet think is an excellent question. Perhaps Tanya and Valya mull over this mysterious series of deaths on long family evenings. In a bizarre turn of events, their daughter Masha has long been dating Berezovsky's son Gleb. They spend a lot of time in the house in Berkshire where Berezovsky's body was found in the bathroom on the second floor. They communicate with each other in English; both have lived abroad since birth. Gleb Berezovsky is a citizen of the United Kingdom, while Masha Yumasheva is a citizen of Austria. In fact, her parents – Tatiana and Valentin Yumashev – are also citizens of Austria. According to the media, they obtained Austrian passports about 15 years ago. As for the rest of the Seven Bankers, their fates have been varied, depending on how they felt about Putin and what they were willing to do about it. Alexander Smolensky moved to Austria, buying a huge villa in Vienna in the '90s. He has completely disappeared from the public eye. In fact, it's not even clear whether he's still alive. After 10 years in prison, Khodorkovsky moved to London and is now part of the Russian opposition. Until recently, Pyotr Aven and Mikhail Fridman also lived there. They bought huge estates, obtained foreign passports, and invested, not in Soviet metal concerns, but in developed Western economies. But then came the war: the oligarchs were sanctioned and their bank accounts were frozen. After complaining in the Financial Times that it had become impossible to pay his servants, Fridman returned to Russia. Aven, who introduced everyone to everyone, lives in Latvia, where he is a citizen. He also has a Luxembourgish passport, but he regrets getting involved with the West. Those investments, he now says, were a mistake. Vladimir Gusinsky, the former owner of NTV, has had an interesting fate. He left Russia and now lives in Israel. There are rumors that he has reconciled with Putin. A Proekt investigation found that Gusinsky still receives hundreds of millions of dollars by selling TV shows about police to federal channels. Cop Wars, Investigative Secrets, Streets of Broken Lights – these are all Gusinsky masterpieces. Putin's very public struggle with the oligarchs was selective: he only destroyed those who weren't ready to obey him. For instance, Potanin supported Putin from the beginning. He gave a speech at a United Russia forum and gave the party money. Today his company Nornickel sponsors the Federation of Acrobatic Rock 'n' Roll – a style of dance just happens to be the main hobby of Putin's daughter Katerina Tikhonova. Potanin was the biggest beneficiary of the withdrawal of Western companies from Russia: he bought insurance companies and Rosbank from the French Société Générale. He also acquired Tinkoff Bank. Its founder, Oleg Tinkov, said he was forced to sell his shares "for a few cents" – just 3% of the bank's actual value. Roman Abramovich began sponsoring Putin during his first term. He gave Putin his first superyacht, Olympia. He donated money for the president's palace in Gelendzhik and even bought an apartment in Israel for Putin's old teacher. In addition to ORT, he bought shares in the TV advertising monopoly Video International and passed them on to the cellist Sergei Roldugin, a childhood friend of Putin's, whom he uses as one of his wallets. Abramovich no longer likes being thought of as an oligarch. He presents himself as a Philanthropist, a Patron of the Arts, who sponsors ballet, theater, and galleries. His personal art collection, featuring names like Malevich, Picasso, and Monet, is estimated to be worth one billion dollars. But of course, Abramovich is an oligarch. He still holds shares in Nornickel and the steel company EVRAZ, and he earns on the side by selling Russian timber to China. A few days before the war began, he transferred most of his assets to his children – sanction-proof. Chubais should also be mentioned here. He submitted to Putin straight away in the 2000s and worked faithfully for him for almost 25 years. He was the head of RAO UES, special representative of the president, and head of Rusnano. For a time, Chubais took on the role of the country's chief innovator. He said groundbreaking discoveries were just around the corner and showed Putin a miraculously flexible tablet computer "unmatched anywhere in the world." Half a trillion roubles of state funds was invested in Rusnano. Now the company is on the brink of bankruptcy. Without saying a word against the war or Putin, Chubais quietly moved to Israel, leaving behind something that's far from nano: a huge mansion in Peredelkino worth $40 million. Can you guess what Chubais is doing at the moment? He's working on reforms for a post-Putin Russia! Anatoly Borisovich is apparently of the opinion that the reforms he already carried out weren't enough. He organizes seminars and debates and writes articles. He believes that real democracy, with fair elections and independent courts, isn't suitable for Russia. The Russian people are just too stupid and will vote for the wrong person. So who is the right person? Why, Chubais – he believes that he's not only worthy, but actually has a chance to lead Russia after Putin. No joke. There were some who had a real chance of becoming president instead of Putin. Some of them were only one step away. It's hard to say what our lives would have been like then. Primakov, Chernomyrdin, and Luzhkov didn't express any political ambitions after 2000, confining themselves to quiet, secondary roles and remaining loyal to Putin. Boris Nemtsov became an opposition figure, a protest leader, and was elected as a Member of Parliament. In 2015, he was shot dead on a bridge next to the Kremlin. The rest have also met their fates. Only Putin still remains. Putin – and us. We did not choose him through the fair elections. None of us appointed him as the successor. We did not help him seize power, build palaces, and start wars. We simply got him as a "gift" from the oligarchs and the Family that had taken power. Fairly or not, the greatest responsibility fell to our lot – to put an end to Putin's madness. To put an end to two decades of the oppression, lawlessness, and suffering that Putin has brought to our country. We must take back from him the things we cherish the most: our freedom, our people, our future. And we must never let something like this ever happen again.
