According to information from American intelligence, Vladimir Putin received treatment for “advanced stage” cancer in April 2022.
Vladimir Putin’s state of health is at the heart of much speculation. Between blood cancer, Parkinson’s disease and Hubris syndrome, rumors are rife. If the 69-year-old Russian president were to die, one thing is certain: the consequences would be serious.
Who could succeed Vladimir Putin?
“If my theory materializes I think that Putin will be gone by 2023 from power. He will probably disappear in a sanatorium, from which he will not emerge as the leader of Russia”, declared Sir Richard Dearlove, in particular. former director of the British intelligence services (MI-6) from 1999 to 2004, in the podcast “One Decision”, estimating this scenario in the long term due to the total absence of a legitimate heir to succeed to power.
The best person to replace him would be, according to Dearlove, Nikolai Patrushev, Secretary of the Security Council of the Russian Federation. Speculation as to the successor of the Russian president has only been reinforced lately, particularly with the assassination attempt against Putin. In this case, we should not expect a radical change in policy, quite the contrary. According to American intelligence, it was he who even encouraged Vladimir Putin to continue his invasion of Ukraine.
“Putin’s thinking has evolved to join that, harder at the beginning, of Patrushev. The latter is ferociously conservative and anti-liberal. They are now united against the United States, seen by Patrushev as a renegade power, which frees, too, from the rules”, explains to Mediapart Russian political scientist Tatiana Stanovaya.
In any case, in the event of death, article 92 of the Russian Constitution provides that the interim would then be ensured by the Prime Minister – in time of peace as in time of war. In the event of a permanent incapacity of the President, the Prime Minister would again ensure the interim, here Mikhail Michoustine, but for a maximum period of three months, a period of time during which elections to elect the new Head of State should be organised.
Already, to begin with, Russia still has a Constitution. And according to art 92 of the Constitution, in case of temporary impediment of the President (in time of war also), his interim is ensured by the Prime Minister: auj. Mikhail Michoustine. 2/9https://t.co/CmV8t9LC15
— Anna Colin Lebedev (@colinlebedev) May 29, 2022
In the event of a permanent incapacity of the president, the Prime Minister would again ensure the interim, but for a maximum period of three months, a period of time during which elections to elect the new head of state should be organized, recalls Slate.
The name of another figure is also mentioned: that of Sergei Shoigu, the Russian Minister of Defense, since he would be among the first people to have been informed of the intention to launch the invasion of Ukraine. .
What impact on the war?
Between the war in Ukraine and the other burning issues that Vladimir Putin would leave behind him, his successor would in any case have his work cut out for him.
“The president’s death could effectively destabilize the soldiers for a few days in Ukraine. And Zelensky’s army might have enough to take advantage of to carry out serious counter-offensives”, according to Julien Grand, deputy editor of the Swiss military journal.
A change of direction regarding the conflict in Ukraine after Putin’s death remains difficult to determine for the time being.
