The psychology of Putin: Psychiatrist reveals what’s really wrong with the Russian leader

it's really a tragedy that Putin is turned earlier from a leader that was respected in many capitals around the world and and in many ways uh deserved and earned that respect had Putin retired in 2012 he would have been seen as one of the greatest leaders in modern Russian history so Kenneth you were previously a U.S government physician Diplomat based in Moscow but you're now a psychiatrist and I'm just wondering what would be your psychoval for the Russian president I think to understand Putin it's useful to remember uh former prime minister Churchill's a great quote that Putin like Russia is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma and even though Putin has been studied and written about for 23 plus years that he's been in power now he he still is a bit of an enigma uh my my studies of Putin in my profile would characterize them as follows what I call the three R's which is common to other authoritarian leaders that I've profiled such as president Xi Jinping of China and chairman Kim Jong-un of North Korea Putin is ruthless he's resilient and he's very rational and I think we we have to keep that in mind and I think there's a tendency to I think people get his ruthlessness uh but I think they underestimate and I think more and more they they see his rationality albeit through his eyes but they underestimate his resilience and that's important especially in light of the recent uh Mutiny uh by yevgeni pregozian back in June a lot of people they write off Putin as being crazy you know they think that he's just gone completely mad do you think it's kind of dangerous for people to be giving him that you know to to be describing him that way because maybe it's sort of using that type of language writes Putin off as a Madman but it kind of inadvertently distances him from the atrocities he's committed in Ukraine I I think it's it's it's both foolhardy and you're correct the there's a sense of distancing him he is also at this point an indicted war criminal and and the the war in Ukraine which was Putin's decision tragically in February of 2022 has had a genocidal imperative to try to destroy the Ukraine as a nation as a state to try and Destroy Ukrainian culture and and I think now that they're not really winning sadly neither side is really the ukrainians aren't winning that's sad there's there's a bit of a stalemate with the skull defensive but I think Putin's other other imperative today is to if if he can't win the war in Ukraine it would be to make the Ukraine a failed State a permanent failed State and I'm afraid that that in the latter there's a danger that he'll be successful uh it's very dangerous I think calling him crazy is just foolhardy and completely wrong he's a very rational uh person albeit who's made a a horrible strategic blunder uh in starting this war in the Ukraine but he's also shown a surprising degree of tactical flexibility and this was really seen in the pre following the pragosian Mutiny and how he's continuing to use Wagner to project power asymmetrically in other areas especially in Africa I wanted to pick up on what you said there you said that um you know Putin could be successful in turning Ukraine into a failed state is that kind of in lieu of him actually you know being able to occupy Ukraine you know kind of absorb it into Russia um you know what what does what does that look like well the tragedy of of this war is that about a fourth of the Ukrainian population anywhere from eight to ten million people are refugees both internally and externally and many may not be able to return to their homes for many years if if at all and the other part is the minds that the Russians have laid in in the donbass area which have slowed down the Ukrainian offensive and in the ecological damage using using ecological Warfare is a kind of terrorism or I I would think even War crime and using food as a weapon and Destroy destroying the economy in the the industry of the Ukraine where current projections are that it will take many many years when the war has ended uh to rebuild and anywhere on the on the order of one to three trillion dollars to reconstruct and rebuild those are huge sums of money and I think uh President Putin uh in a in a cruel and ruthless way understands that uh so that's a he the the use of food is a weapon uh the bombing of the grain Depots and the blockades in the Black Sea are particularly disturbing in this regard because of their impact not only on the Ukrainian population where food is about a third of its exports but also in terms of feeding the global South tens of millions of people in Africa for example could uh have increased food security insecurity or starvation because of President Putin's recent decision to use food as a weapon I mean if we look at it from a psychological standpoint I mean a lot of people wouldn't be able to sleep at night if they knew that they were taking food away from millions and millions of people if we look back on to Putin's past and to Putin's childhood what what signals are there to you know this type of behavior to this type of kind of lashing out Putin's childhood is is by now well known and and is actually well described in his 2000 autobiography first person which I recommend that your listeners read it's short and very readable and and he grew up I'm summarizing a lot of work that I've done kind of A Hard Scrabble kid in the shadows of World War II with two traumatized World War II veteran parents who had survived the the 900-day siege of Leningrad were over a million people died um and and Putin was shaped by that time and by the Soviet era and by his desire to be a KGB officer so he's always embraced the ideology of the KGB and and now the uh the FSB and the svr and the gru of the importance of Russia being a strong state so Putin is always valued strength and in this sense he's e combined with his longtime study of martial arts of Judo and where he's actually a master in both he's a street fighter and and he he made a famous quote in 2003 after the best Land school Siege where over 300 children were killed in a botch Special Operations rate and he said we were beaten because we were weep so Putin abhors weakness and like many Russians values strength he's also shown a remarkable ability not only the cruelty over the years that we've seen in grozny in Georgia in the Ukraine since 2014 in Syria in 2015. uh the assassinations of litunienko in London or the attempted assassination of Sergey kripal and in 2000 in 2020 Alexi navalny or in Boris niemso for that matter in 2018. the the use of Hostage diplomacy is really Paramount right now I've written that Putin has held the Ukraine hostage because of Russia's uh control of six and a half thousand nuclear warheads but he's also used hostage diplomacy in other ways uh currently holding Wall Street Journal reporter Evan gershkovich and and Paul Whalen is still a hostage and the former as a teacher Mark Fogle and I think yesterday's hostage deal between the United States and and the Islamic Republic of Iran in which the U.S is going to release six billion dollars for the release of of five uh American citizens that have been held by Iran for several years will be very carefully studied by our adversaries such as President Putin chairman Kim and president XI of China and an Assad of Syria do you think then in the way that the doctors are approached Putin since this you know full-scale invasion of Ukraine you know have they really kept in mind who Putin is like as a person have they in negotiations and when they've engaged with him do you think that they've approached that correctly by and large yes I give I give leaders in the west especially here in the United States and and the director of the CIA Bill Burns who knows Russia well was a former ambassador to Russia and and is actually I believe met with Putin over a dozen times when he was ambassador he's the last Ambassador that had that kind of face time with Putin so I think people at the National Security level understand that I think what surprised a lot of people though is there there is a narrative out there that that you can't negotiate with Putin or with other authoritarian leaders like like chairman Kim or president XI that's not really true it's just you have to negotiate from a position of strength because that's where they're coming from they're very they use extreme tactics maximalist Hardball tactics and and that's to be expected I I do think that uh having Putin indicted uh as a war criminal limiting his ability to travel for example to the brics conference that's coming up in South Africa uh is clipped his wings a bit and that that's been a smart move I think the the other factor is that at the recent Jetta conference hosted by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman uh Russia was not invited but the global South was present America was present and China was present so the Jetta conference gives me some optimism a glimmer of optimism that there are a lot of behind the scenes diplomatic approaches being pursued to to end this horrible tragic War gain more territory to take Ukraine I mean you know he thought he was going to take Keith in three days and that didn't happen we're still here um you know it's actually raised a lot more questions rather than about you know gaining more territory more so about Russia losing territory there's been you know serious questions about the future of him as a president the future of Belarus um you know the potential fragmentation of the Russian Federation I mean do you think that he right now he might be regretting his decision or do you think he's still kind of in denial I think as you as you as you said earlier in the interview he sleeps well at night uh I don't think he he lives with regrets of that sort that being said there have been a few more chinks and chinks and punctures in his armor but recent levada polling suggests that he's uh his popularity is rebounded uh in in the 60 to 70 percent range and Nevada is a very respected poll he's also I think sanctions have not really worked the they they generally don't work but when you look at a country like Russia that's a huge country a great nation with a rich history uh they they have a remarkable ability as we saw in World War II where over 27 million Soviet citizens perished to absorb a lot of suffering in the Russian economy according to many economists has actually grown in the past year so sanctions have never been shown to curtail or change President Putin's Behavior so I think I think I think it's still going to be a longer drawn out conflict unfortunately and I think where what President Putin is likely hoping for now is uh if there's a new president in the United States next year I think Putin's playing a waiting game because recent polls as of this week have shown that now a majority of American citizens a slight major majority are no longer favor giving the large amounts of Aid to the Ukraine that we've given and in the Republican Party those numbers are higher so President Putin is well informed and he looks at those numbers so he and our other adversaries are are playing a waiting game to see what happens after November 2024. we recently had um a bit of a cyber security scare here in the UK our electoral commission was hacked and it's widely what many people are speculating and they believe that it's likely that it was Russia I mean should the U.S be more concerned you know given how you know if if the Republican party you know is going to limit the amount of Aid given to Ukraine should we be worried you know should America be worried about Russia interfering in that election yes America continues to be worried about Russian cyber attacks and ransomware attacks in the United States we certainly know they interfered in the 2016 election and they've tried to interfere in the con in the midterms in 2018 and 22 and they tried to interfere in the 2020 election uh thankfully there's widespread awareness at the National Security level of this and leadership in in organizations such as sisa the NSA the Cyber command Homeland Security are are working Full Throttle uh to to prevent these sort of attempts I think it's realistic to expect the Russians to increase their asymmetric Warfare capabilities uh the projection of the Wagner group in in Africa is one example cyber warfare is another and and the use of propaganda and disinformation I think we can expect that they'll step it up I want to make one other point that we all got wrong but certainly President Putin done wrong but actually the west and the United States got wrong is everybody everybody missed not only underestimated but completely missed the courage and heroism of Ukraine's President Vladimir zielinski I think had had zelinski got on that plane in in February of 2022 this war would have had a different outcome yeah he's a remarkable he's a churchillian type of leader probably the mo one of the most admired leaders in the world today he's an icon of Beacon of leadership in a world that is sorely in need of that kind of leadership I have nothing but admiration for president zielinski the Ukrainian people I've I've traveled to the Ukraine for my work in the past I've been to Kiev about 15 times and I'm I'm horrified at the tragedy in the war and I I pray that that negotiations will eventually move forward a blend my fear is that when it when it ends it won't be satisfactory but it'll Stop The Killing it'll it'll feel and look a lot like Dayton did in 1996 in the Balkans uh where where it stopped The Killing but the uncertainties and the hatreds uh between the Bosnian serbs for example in in the Bosnian Muslims and the Bosnian croats remain to this very day and continue to be exploited by cynical and ruthless politicians in the Balkans I say I talk about the Balkans because that's an area where President Putin and his Security Services are again trying to project asymmetric power disinformation and propaganda and diplomacy yeah I wanted to talk about negotiations and I know our viewers are probably running to the comments you know yelling at me right now but it seems very unlikely from the analysts that I've spoken with that this war will end in an all-out victory for either side for you know it's likely that there will be a negotiation potentially as early as this Autumn and the plan for Ukraine seems to be to get to a stage where they're in the best possible place to negotiate how how should the West be approaching these negotiations you mentioned there at the Balkans I mean you know what lessons could we take from there who needs to be in the room the Balkan negotiations uh succeeded because the United States finally engaged militarily with NATO and was and was working from a position of strength but they also had the late uh great uh Statesmen and Diplomat Richard Holbrook who who had the the expertise and the Charisma and Pizzazz to engage and negotiate with the late Slobodan milosevic who have actually profiled with my mentor the late Dr Gerald Post in 1999. uh and and bring that war to a close we also saw the use of an outside mediator in Kosovo with Nobel Laureate former Finnish prime minister Martia visari that helped break that conflict down after I think 88 days so I think what what we can expect to see is the use of a trusted third-party mediator that both that the Russians and and the Ukrainian government the Russian government and the West meaning the Americans and the Europeans can trust my guess would be if they picked somebody it would be somebody from China India uh or or or from the global south or the Middle East I mean Xi Jinping seems to want to be that Peacemaker do you think do you think it's likely that he'd take up that role I think I think eventually it's possible he he certainly he's he's tried to walk a tightrope line between being supportive of President Putin and Russia he doesn't want to see Russia become a failure uh because the Chinese have equities and and but I don't think and I never thought it was a relationship Without Limits I think China has become the bigger brother in this relationship but it would not surprise me if president XI sent a high-level interlocutor such as um uh State counselor foreign minister Wang Yi in that role or someone who knows America who knows Russia and knows all the players and has the expertise to lead these kind of negotiations it wouldn't surprise me if if India made an offer they have close relationships with Russia and President Putin and Prime Minister Modi have close relationship if they sense someone like foreign minister Jay Shanker who has served in Russia was an ambassador to both China and the U.S to be a mediator I think what I'm getting at is it is this is such a complex horrible conflict that it will take a mediator at that level to help bring the parties together in what will be very difficult negotiations and probably lasting a great deal of time and initially they'll probably not be done in public they have to be done quietly and secretly what we call track 1.5 or track 2 diplomacy and then once you get the pieces moving in a four Direction then it can become public it certainly can't be public at the beginning because then there's too many risks that that leaks and things like that will sabotage them the negotiations will inevitably end up in Putin losing some of his illegally annexed territory and some people that I've spoken with have said that could actually include part of or all of Crimea I mean how do you think that Putin would react if he were to lose Crimea this he he's you know held illegally for almost 10 years I I don't think he'd react well and I I think he would do anything politically and militarily to avoid losing Crimea now could you see Putin or a successor of Putin Putin is healthy but he's not young he's 70. um negotiating some kind of deal where they kept a military base in Crimea such as Sebastopol with a long-term lease I know it's hard to think of these things uh in the middle of a war but that's what negotiators do they kind of try and imagine the future so it wouldn't surprise me if if Crimea became a very serious kind of bargaining chip the other thing is the the regions of the donbas where you have a large percentage of Russians speaking uh Ukrainian citizens and and all the issues that surround that both economically politically and culturally will be very important and the issue of reparations will be very important one one area where I would not be surprised to see China get involved is before the war the Ukraine was part of the Bri the Belton Road initiative China right now has a slumping economy they've had decreased exports and decreased domestic Demand with with Chinese citizens kind of hoarding their savings if you will if China is good at building infrastructure if China somehow wove Ukraine into the Bri when the war is over and rebuilt a lot of the infrastructure they they have the resources and the financial ability to do that where I'm I'm uncertain that that the American taxpayers or that the EU can can cough up two to three trillion dollars and the idea of of using Russia will have to pay some sort of reparations but that will be negotiated there have been ideas floated about that you would seize uh assets of oligarchs uh you know kind of automatically to pay for reparations but that that has all sorts of higher order economic ramifications and complex legal ramifications that make that I think that would have to be done very carefully and legally and there would be a lot of court rulings at the international level that that look at that I want to ask you more about China's relationship and what happens after all of this is over but I just wanted to pick up on something that you said about Crimea and you know potentially Russia having a military base there but it you know being Ukraine you know kind of a leasing situation could we see Crimea maybe ending up looking a bit like Cyprus or it being you know split in half or something and what are kind of the implications of that happening because it feels like it's such a delicate situation that it's kind of all or nothing it's a good analogy that's that's one to think about the one I'm more concerned about is that it looks more like a posse in in North Association and that's uh in in or that that it looks like that that's these are really thorny complex political military and diplomatic struggles that don't have easy answers but I think you have to in the end you have to use negotiations to find Solutions because there are no real military Solutions in in any of those areas now that being said president zielinski cannot both he and President Putin in their negotiating positions have to think what's best for their respective countries but they have to appeal to their equities in domestic constituencies so uh the neither of them at this point have come out uh and and said you know we're ready for negotiation but president zielinski's Presence at the Jetta conference I think was was important and critical and I was very pleased to see that it sends a symbolic message but he's going to want to negotiate from a position of strength just like President Putin and Putin has equities to answer to like like yevgeni pregozian whose popularity rating after the coup is still high and who met with President Putin and who was seen at the hobnobbing at the recent uh Russia Africa Summit in Saint Petersburg which only 17 African leaders attended so I think there's a lot of moving pieces uh that are happening my guess is Putin will continue to do militarily what he's been doing and that he'll wait because the 2024 elections in the United States are a huge game changer depending on what happens I wanted to pick up on the China piece now I mean we we had Robert Fox on our Frontline series with Kate Sherbert when he was talking about you know the potential of negotiations opening up at the U.N this autumn and said you know actually what could happen is that you know because it's it's not in zelenski's political interests to negotiate you know he's said you know this war isn't over until we have Crimea and all of the all of the territory but you know they might be able to win him over by saying you know this war will end a negotiation but then you know immediately Ukraine would would exceed into NATO and Ukraine would become the Eastern flank of NATO with a lot of money and Armament poured in there which you know is a strong strategic move for you know Western Powers there I mean is it likely that it's a lot of money that they would have to funnel into Ukraine even more money to funnel into Ukraine but do you think that posed with that opportunity that the West would give up so easily and allow China to be you know putting money in and you know doing the Belt Road initiative I don't think the West would would be pleased with it but the risk is if the West doesn't really take an aggressive lead and have kind of a 21st century Marshall Plan with a willingness to spend two to three trillion dollars than the then the Chinese will step into that vacuum because it's in their interest to do so the it's analogous to the situation in Niger uh America has while we while we've had a large counter-terrorist presence in Nigeria for a decade uh the Sahel is very economically and politically fragile and we've neglected Africa frankly in uh for many years and now with the French kind of pulling out after Mali Burkina fazzo and now Niger there's a there's a vacuum and that unfortunately creates a space for other actors to move into the vacuum such as the Wagner group and and other entities in in Africa so I think the same thing could happen in the the Ukraine in terms of money I think political influence is really important but money is the key weapons and money for Ukraine are the key someone someone has to come and step up and say this is in our national interest this is in the west national interests in terms of a a struggle of uh Liberty and democracy versus authoritarianism that we need to both save and rebuild the Ukraine uh the the one of one of my I think President Biden while there's been bipartisan support in Congress for President Biden's initiatives um when you go to the Heartland and I live in the Heartland in Texas I get asked this question all the time by friends relatives and acquaintances which is you've you've traveled in the Ukraine you lived in Russia why does the Ukraine matter to me and if they're asking that question that means that the president has not successfully delivered an answer to the question on a national level at the bully pulpit level and that's what President Biden really needs to do in the next uh six months to a year yeah and I think there's a key difference in the United States compared to the UK because in the UK you know the fear of another war in Europe is much more real and you know Russia to us is a much bigger threat you know in the same way that China feels like a bigger threat to you know the United States um that's the other part about China if I may which is China is in a mixed position because the ongoing conflict uh in a way is in China's partial interests not because of the the horrible number of deaths and that and China is affected by the use of grain as a weapon and fertilizer as well but if if we're taking our eyes off the eight ball and focusing solely on Russia and Ukraine we're not focusing as much in terms of resources on China so I think that's that's an important uh thing to think about as as well I just quickly I don't want to take up too much more of your time because I could just sit here and talk about this all day um but I wanted to return to Putin in you know kind of the aftermath of um the Mutiny by pregosian when you look at the videos of Putin afterwards what's your analysis of how he's doing at the moment I mean how damaging do you think that that was for him I I think it was partially damaging but not as much as analysts have have written about in the media I think there are chinks in his armor but he retains control of the security services and the state uh through the various institutions that he's built up I do think that what what's been called the power vertical that he's built over 23 years got a bit wobbly for about 36 hours uh during and after the Mutiny there was a sense of indecisiveness and part of that is because the way Putin has maintained and used power is to create competing equities and they and the these different equities be they the ministry defense including the gru the FSB uh the ministry the interior couldn't make it there was an indecisiveness because they all want to please the boss and they're not sure what the boss will do and Putin is always thrived on uncertainty and ambiguity in its decision-making and keeping people kind of uncertain I'm not sure which foot they're on but his hesitation in this regard and his backpedaling made him look made him look weak although tactically he needs Wagner so it was probably a good move that being said while Putin can sleep well at night pregosian should not should be careful and he he he probably will not sleep as well at night I think Putin I could see President Putin continuing to use Wagner to project Force asymmetrically if not anymore in the in the Ukraine but certainly in Africa and other conflicts and and appointing a different person to be a CEO of Wagner such as someone like Victor boo who who knows it former Gru officer knows Africa well has worked and lived all over Africa knows many of the leaders that would be a really smart move on on his part to name someone like that who's not as politically threatening to him but who's very effective in terms of Wagner's power projection and using Wagner asymmetrically is a projection of power of the Russian state so that'll be interesting to see how this plays out with pregosian in in the next six months pregosian's criticism was very interesting that was posted on Telegram and has been seen by probably one half to two-thirds of of Russian citizens where he he really criticized the rationale for the war and the elites and the fat cats I think Putin has can borrow from that because the elites and the fat cats are have never been popular and and what we've seen with the oligarchs is a tendency to again bring them to heal and to also use all sorts of propaganda against them including anti-semitic propaganda as many of them were are of Jewish origin so I think that plays well with old kind of Russian narratives the last thing I'd say about Putin is if you look at Putin in the early 2000s he he gave a remarkable speech to the bundestag in 2000 in perfect German where he talked about Russia being a part of the West he visited uh uh the United Kingdom I believe in 2003 and there are photos of him meeting the queen and and being very gracious and and kind of being very appealing and even even uh to borrow a phrase from uh the late uh prime minister Margaret Thatcher people saw Putin in Britain and in Europe and in America someone they could do business with kind of a western leaning Russian that part of Putin is no more that this reflects an old tendency and tension in Russian history between the westernizers and the slavophiles a more Oriental orientalist Outlook and Putin is clearly turned toward that so I think it's important to see where he fits into Russian history and his turn over the last decade toward a more inward tightly controlled Russia and a Russia that really doesn't care about its relationships with Europe anymore in in the previous way or with the United States but is turning toward the global South in Eurasia and Asia by final question to you can I you spoke there about Russian history and I wonder overall what impact do you think this will have on Russia's future you know will I as an American slash British you know dual National be able to travel to Russia in my lifetime do you think you know it is you know our Putin's warning's valid could we see a breakup of the Russian Federation I don't I don't believe we'll see a breakup of the Russian Federation I think there's concerns about that that are legitimate but I think Putin will do everything in his power to preserve a wrong Russian State he's always been that way as as Fiona Hill and Cliff Gaddy have written in their excellent book but it's really a tragedy that Putin is turned earlier from a leader that was respected in many capitals around the world and and in many ways uh deserved and earned that respect had Putin retired in 2012 he would have been seen as one of the greatest leaders in modern Russian history but now Russia has become he's a pariah and because of that and because of the horrors of the war that the Russians are perpetrating uh he Russia has become a pariah State and they've had a brain drain they've lost over a million of a generation of young talented people that have left probably not to return so I I see that as as tragic for Russia because Putin is fighting really he has a cold war in 20th century wartime mentality when you look at his tactics militarily on the intelligence front but but the war the the co the new cold Wars of the 20th 21st century will the most important variable is human capital and and you don't let a million of your top citizens who are in the in the throes of their productive lives well-educated starting businesses working in all sorts of different fields if they leave a country like that it hurts the country so I think I think Putin completely missed the importance of that of that

Channel: Times Radio

Views: 166,341

Keywords: russia, vladimir putin, psychology of vladimir putin, putin, russian leader, putin russia ukraine war, putin psychologia, psychology, north korea: inside the mind of a dictator, watch the national, vladimir putin explanation on russia ukraine crisis, russia president vladimir putin, russian election, north korea laws that terrified the nation, vladimir putin russia ukraine, russia ukraine war, russian presidential election, putin can break everything, russia president

Id: ZdpPPK-wKM4

Length: 38min 25sec (2305 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 11 2023