These Are The People Who Could Replace Vladimir Putin

Sunday the 30th of August, The Economist published something that at one point would have been unthinkable, a statement that Russian President Vladimir Putin had allegedly told his cronies during the war in Ukraine. Quoting him here, they will hang me.

Putin was apparently admitting that his life would be in danger if the war ended without Russia at the bare minimum capturing all of Ukraine's eastern Donbass region.

This was an extremely rare admission of vulnerability by a man who had clawed his way to the top of Russian politics from the KGB. A blood-soaked realm where any sign of weakness will get you thrown out faster than someone suggesting a bath in the French parliament.

The they that Putin was talking about seem to be the Russian elite, who according to the outlets seem to be getting angrier and angrier at the amount of time Putin's wasted in Ukraine.

In fact, they seem to be angrier about that than they are at the lack of battlefield successes or the current state of the nation's economy, neither of which good. it's not just the elites who are concerned about the country.

According to a survey by the Levada Center, one of Russia's few independent pollsters, 57% of Russians described the situation in the country as tense because of the war, the death toll, the ever-present of mobilization, and constant drone strikes by Ukraine on everything from logistics facilities to oil depots.

For Putin, the fact that both the elite and the ordinary people seem to be in agreement that things aren't going in the right direction is catastrophic.

The once unshakable grip strong man is looking increasingly fragile, which means it's time to ask the question international analysts for decades now. The Russian constitution already has a plan place for Putin's succession.

If he is unable to discharge his duties at any point before the end of his term, let's say because he developed a sudden love for really tall buildings with wide open windows, then the prime minister would take over within three months.

The acting president needs to have organized an election during which the Russian people will get to choose the next ruler. Russia's current prime minister is Mikhail Mishustin, who's held the position since 2020 when the former officeholder Dmitry Medvedev resigned alongside his entire cabinet.

Mishustin is an economist who spent a decade running Russia's federal tax service before Putin unexpectedly appointed him prime minister.

He had quietly built a reputation for himself as one of the country's most effective technocrats and the financial times dubbed him the tax man of the future for his efforts to drag Russia's notoriously leaky corrupt tax system into the digital age kicking and screaming.

He had carried over that reputation for competence into his political career, working tirelessly in the background to try and limit the impact of the western sanctions on the Russian economy. He has also developed a habit of staying as far from the war as the job allows.

Meduza reported that he doesn't speak about the war even behind closed doors, choosing instead to refer to it as an external challenge.

He has further been described as the faction leader for officials who would prefer to talk cryptically about Ukraine or just say nothing at all that distance from the ukraine war might be his greatest strength especially with the rising death toll and polls showing rising support for ending the war and speaking of polls 72 of the public approved of

Mishustin's performance according to a lavada center poll from january this year while 84 approved of putin's role these are remarkable numbers for someone who became a premier with no political base and no recognition outside the tax office in fact when he was appointed former opposition lawmaker gennady garkov wrote him off as quote a new faceless

Functionary without ambition putin apparently views mishustin's rising public profile as a threat and has according to the new eurasian strategy center appointed several officials to act as checks and balances their job is to ensure that mishustin and his team can't make independent decisions this his opposition to the war and the fact that he is for all

Intents and purposes still an outsider in russian politics means that he isn't likely to be putin's chosen successor so let's look at some of the other names on the list shall we on top of that list is dennis manturov who has served as russia's first deputy prime minister since 2024 and was one of the officials that putin appointed to restrain the pm's power

Manturov began his political career in 2007 as the deputy minister for industry and energy according to the atlantic council he's currently at the height of his political power and is going to remain part of russia's ruling elite for quite some time outside of politics manturov is the right hand man of sergey chemozov the head of rostec which controls the

Entire russian military industrial complex putin and chemozov developed a close bond when they were both kgb officers stationed in east germany and manturov's meteoric rise has come partly because of his close relationship with chemozov chemozov is expected to retire soon given that he's 74 years old when that happens manturov as the most experienced and

Trusted official in chemozov's orbit is positioned to inherit his empire however that does not guarantee that manturov will inherit the presidency the russian elite may decide the control over rostec and also over the entire russian nation is too much for one man and they may try to derail a presidential bid to maintain the delicate balance of power that

Keeps the country running putin has already publicly dressed him down once in what some observers saw as an attempt to keep him from getting too big for his breaches during a cabinet meeting in 2023 putin ripped into manturov accusing him of failing to keep up with orders for military equipment amid the war in ukraine basically putin was blaming mantra for

The troops in ukraine not having the necessary equipment to sufficiently fight the war away from mentor of there's another deputy prime minister worth watching dmitry petrushev who is in charge of the agriculture and natural resources portfolio he's also the son of nikolai petrushev who at one point was one of the most powerful men within russia like his

Father the young petrushev is a graduate of the fsb academy and inside the kremlin he's known as the fsb prince the most senior of a growing cohort of officials referred to simply as the princes the son of the most powerful families within the country.

Leaves you wondering, didn't the Russians, like, have a revolution against their royal family? more things change. 29, Dmitry was already a senior vice president of VTB, one of Russia's largest banks, before heading Orotohos Bank, the state agricultural bank, and then becoming agricultural minister in 2018. even yet 50. while he does have an incredibly

Impressive resume, wasn't why he was appointed to his current position.

According to the Atlantic Council, Nikolai Petrushev lobbied hard for his son to be made prime minister outright. mentioned earlier, would have effectively made him the second most powerful person in the country, poised to become the acting president in case anything were to happen to Putin, and one election away from permanently becoming the full-time

President.

That, apparently, was too much too soon for Putin, who was hesitant to elevate the heir of one of Russia's major ruling clans. Instead, Petrushev had to settle for the agriculture docket.

Still a major post, not quite powerful enough for Petrushev to be an immediate concern. all of this does raise a major question. we're talking about the son as a potential successor to Putin, not the father, who has a lot more experience and deeper political networks? answer that question, need to mention a few facts about Nikolai Petrushev.

The older Petrushev served alongside Putin in the KGB's Leningrad Directorate back in the 1970s. while they were in different departments, Putin has said that he felt a comradeship with Petrushev.

Petrushev worked as Putin's deputy when the latter led the FSB in 1998. when Putin was elevated to the role of prime minister in 1999, Petrushev took over the security service, position he would hold until 2008. there, Petrushev would serve as secretary of the Security Council, position which afforded him a lot of influence over Russian foreign policy.

These are the kinds of credentials that would look great on a campaign poster. Then, in May 2024, he lost it all. removed him from the Security Council and handed the former job to Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.

Petrushev was given a new role as presidential aide for shipbuilding, move which was widely seen as a demotion, despite it being dressed up as an honor.

Petrushev lost his regular access to Putin, his seat at the meetings where real decisions were made, and lost the small army of loyal bureaucrats he had built up at the Security Council. didn't take this lying down.

Petrushev set up a new maritime policy department inside the Kremlin, staffed it with loyalists pulled from his old Security Council team, successfully lobbied for a new maritime board stacked with senior officials and the heads of major state companies. this gave him a level of access to the kind of money and networks that he used to have while at the

Security Council.

However, none of this fixes the fundamental issue that Putin, and by extension those close to him, don't trust the elder Petrushev as much as they once did.

This means that his path to the presidency is murky at best.

Instead, his best bet would be to take a page out of Tywin Lannister's book and hope that can amass enough influence and allies to become the next president while the prime minister and his deputies are the ones best place to succeed putin they aren't the only ones who have a shot there's a whole host of people who could take over from the russian strongman

If putin's downfall were to go just right other candidates our first non-traditional pick is someone who has already held the office of the presidency dmitry medvedev from 2008 to 2012 medvedev served as president while putin took a detour to become prime minister because the constitution barred him from running for a third consecutive term this of course

Was way back in the day when putin had to at least pretend to care about term limits a leningrad native and former law professor medvedev went right back to being prime minister once putin reclaimed the presidency and he stuck around in the premiership until 2020. he's currently deputy chairman of the security council as well as the chairman of united russia

The party that formally controls parliament he's also the first deputy chairman of the military industrial commission where he oversees weapons production and defense manufacturing for the war in ukraine those are a lot of titles and they would ordinarily come with a lot of power but that is the one thing that medvedev actually lacks what he does have is a

Loud bully pulpit which he has used to shed his previous image as a liberal reformer who at one point visited silicon valley and received an iphone from steve jobs instead he's become one of the most hawkish and anti-west voices within putin's government he threatened that russia would unleash nuclear strikes on nato capitals called ukraine's government a

Foreign puppet regime and picked a public fight with donald trump over submarine deployments for most observers including political scientist ekaterina shulman medvedev's transformation is an attempt at remaining politically relevant in an environment where the most hawkish voices often win out her here he's trying to save himself from political oblivion by

Out heriting herod and consequently posturing as a candidate in a kremlin apprentice show end quote despite these attempts rebranding there's an open question about whether he has the political wherewithal to succeed putin especially without putin there to guide him during his tenure as president there was an oft-repeated joke among kremlin insiders about

Medvedev in the driver's seat looking for the steering wheel in the car and putin in the passenger seat pulling out a remote control while this might dent his standing among the russian elite it hasn't completely eliminated from the running systema radio free europe's russian investigative unit surveyed dozens of leading russia experts including political

Scientists sociologists and journalists from russia the us and europe to find out who they thought could replace putin medvedev came in fourth place next on our list is sergey kirienko a politician who was once seen as one of the country's brightest liberal reformers so much so that boris yeltsin made him the country's youngest ever prime minister in 1998 at

The age of 45 35.

He served for five months before being kicked out of the job because Moscow was in the grips of one of the worst financial crises in recent history.

Somewhere within those five months, actively lobbied for Putin as the head of the FSB and succeeded in getting Yeltsin to appoint him. Kiryanko is now 64, has the official title of presidential first deputy chief of staff, and he is no longer the same liberal reformer who rose to power on the promise of bringing change to Moscow.

He has instead reinvented himself as the man Putin sends when he wants to get things done, including the sham referendums in the occupied regions of Ukraine.

He also organizes endless events for the president to attend and coordinates the elections that reassure Putin that he is supported by the masses. All of this gives him access to people at all levels of government, people who likely owe him favors because of his proximity to the center of power.

David Farris, a professor of political science at Roosevelt University, believes Kiryanko's best shot at the presidency is if the succession process is managed by Putin or his close allies.

And then there's Sergei Sobyanin, who has been the mayor of Moscow since 2010 and was the second most popular pick in the Sistema poll that we mentioned earlier. Sobyan has served across multiple levels of government, including as deputy prime minister, and has earned a reputation as a skilled technocrat.

The Moscow Times reported that during his time as governor of Tumen Blast, he turned it into the country's most prosperous region and led local initiatives that went on to be embraced nationwide.

He has also shown a remarkable level of loyalty to Putin, with analyst Olga Kayin crediting this and his ability to stay silent on the trickier issues besides the war as reasons why he has remained a popular choice to replace Putin. However, there are observers who question whether he can transition from being a mayor to being president of all of Russia.

Moscow, even with its massive population of wealth, is still only one city.

Ruling the whole of Russia will require a completely different skill set, which Sobyanin hasn't had as much time to practice as some of the other names on our list. And finally, there's the true dark horse, Sivileva, the current deputy minister of defense. Sivileva's resume isn't one you typically associate with such a position.

She has sold medical supplies, worked as a psychiatrist in a mental hospital, and is one of the country's wealthiest coal tycoons. Her husband is the current energy minister, Sergei Sivilev. Again, incredibly wealthy and well-connected, but not the kind of resume that screams deputy defense minister.

Instead, Anna Sivileva's key qualification appears to be the fact that she is related to Putin. She's his first cousin once removed. Sivileva isn't the only person related to Putin who works with the government.

A report by the independent investigative outlet, Proyacht, found that more than 20 of his relatives had secured key roles across government institutions and state-linked corporations. However, she is in the most high-profile spot and is arguably one of the most powerful women in all of Russia, which has catapulted her into the succession conversation.

Unlike some of Russia's other powerful women like the banking savant elvira nabalina civileva isn't really prone to rocking the boat instead she's a reliable familial connection who just happens to be high enough in government that she could be slotted in to the top job fairly easily if she actually ends up taking over from putin given how little actual

Governing experience she has then it will be a level of nepotism that makes the old sars proud now we can't say for sure that putin's successor is on this list but we've tried our best to find the most likely names however this is still russia we're talking about putin could wake up tomorrow and announce that his successor is someone the rest of the world

Has never heard of but who's been secretly personally groomed by putin and is in a circle for years what we do know for sure is that whoever ends up taking the mantle from putin will have the unenviable task of steering a russia whose place in the world is not as secure as it once was its inability to secure a quick and decisive victory in ukraine means that

Its military might and status as a global superpower is being called into question domestically they will have to deal with an economy that is best described as shambolic and a population of young men who will return from the war with untreated ptsd and the kinds of skills that jason statham pretends he has that's a lethal combination one that we called a

Demographic time bomb in a past episode writing this ship will require a deft hand and the russian people had better hope that their next president is up to the task because if they aren't then russia will be well and truly thank you for watching