Vladimir Putin

Vladimir Putin is a Russian politician and former intelligence officer. He has served as the leader of the Russian state since 1999, holding the offices of prime minister (1999-2000, 2008-2012) and president (2000-2008, 2012-present).

Putin was born on October 7, 1952, in Leningrad, now Saint Petersburg, Russia, to parents Maria Ivanovna Shelomova and Vladimir Spiridonovich Putin. His parents were factory workers, and his father had previously served in the Soviet Navy during World War II. He was the third and only surviving child of his parents, who had two other sons who died before he was born. Putin spent most of his childhood in a small apartment, shared with two other families with whom his parents had been living since 1944. At seven weeks old, he was baptized secretly at the Transfiguration Cathedral in Saint Petersburg, taken by his mother and a woman of one of the families living with them. The baptism was kept hidden from Putin's father, potentially out of fear of him or government censure. While Maria occasionally took Putin to Christian services, she did not display religious icons at home or give any other indication of religious practices.

As a child, Putin's parents were very protective of him, but not overly loving. They kept him close to home, and he was not allowed to attend school until he was about eight years old. A former primary school teacher of Putin's, Vera Gurevich, said of the family: "There were no kisses. There was none of that love-dovey stuff in their house." Shortly before starting secondary school, the family moved out of the cramped apartment to a nicer, bigger home.

Putin first attended school at nearly eight years old in 1960 at School No. 193, a primary school located on the same street as his home. His former teacher, Gurevich, said he lacked social skills and was indifferent, petulant, disruptive, and impulsive. He was friends with other students she considered to be bad influences and was once caught carrying a knife at school. His delinquent habits prevented him from being able to join the Young Pioneers (fully The Vladimir Lenin All-Union Pioneer Organization), a Communist youth organization that nearly all children in the Soviet Union were a part of.

With the prompting of his father, Putin started practicing sports in an effort to better control his outbursts and impulses. He took up boxing, but shortly quit after his nose was broken by a punch. Then he turned to martial arts, specifically sambo and judo—practices that went against his parents' wishes. Putin found a new identity and means of defense within martial arts. He even referred to it as a philosophy, as he felt it gave him a sense of confidence and allowed him to stand up to bullies at school. “It was sports that dragged me off the streets. To be honest, the courtyard wasn’t a very good environment for a kid,” he said of his formative years.

Putin's grades and conduct at school soon began improving, as the Trud (Labor) Club he was a part of required good grades to keep a membership. Eventually, he made it into the Young Pioneers, and within weeks of his induction, he became the leader of his school's branch. In 1967, he was one of the first students chosen to join the Komsomol (also known as the All-Union Leninist Young Communist League), another Communist youth organization. His secondary school was School No. 281; there, he focused rigorously on sports and his studies, pursuing the subjects of literature, history, and humanities. He also continued his study of the German language, which he'd started learning in the fourth grade. Putin aimed to make it into the prestigious Saint Petersburg State University (then named Leningrad State University) and scored enough on his entrance exams to be accepted into its law department. He remained true to his studies and competed in many sporting events throughout his time at university. While enrolled, he was required to join the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, which he remained a member of until its dissolution in 1991. Putin graduated from university with a law degree in 1975.

Putin was first attracted to the lifestyle and work of being a spy as a boy after seeing the movie The Shield and the Sword, based on the novel of the same name by Vladimir Basov. It told the tale of a Soviet secret agent who went undercover as a German in Nazi Germany to infiltrate and sabotage the German war effort as a member of the Abwehr, Germany's military intelligence service. The movie intrigued him, and he decided to become a spy, attracted to the power the position held: "One spy could decide the fate of thousands of people." While still in school at age sixteen, Putin went to the local KGB headquarters — the Soviet Union's security agency — and volunteered, but was refused and told that the KGB recruited individuals they considered worthy enough, typically enrollees at university or the army. This guided his decision to study law at university, and he kept this motive secret from his parents and coaches.

In his fourth and final year at university, Putin was called by a KGB agent with instructions to meet to talk about an assignment. By this point, he had almost given up on the dream and was thinking about becoming a police officer; although he was bothered by the idea in the past, he greatly respected the law. After the meeting, Putin underwent a background check. In 1975, Putin was officially recruited into the KGB. He first worked in the secretariat office, then in the counter-intelligence unit in the KGB Office for Leningrad and the Leningrad Region. Later, he was transferred to the foreign intelligence department of the KGB Office. In 1985, he was given an assignment at the KGB Office in the German Democratic Republic; the assignment kept him in Dresden until 1990. He acted as a senior operative and senior assistant. Putin returned from Germany to the Soviet Union, in January 1990. In February 1990, he began working at Saint Petersburg State University as a foreign affairs assistant to the rector. He was still working as a KGB agent at the same time and was using his position to spy on and recruit students. He remained a KGB agent until 1991. At the time of his leaving, he was ranked lieutenant colonel.

Young Vladimir Putin.

Soon after returning to Saint Petersburg, Putin began working as an advisor to the mayor of Leningrad, Anatoly Sobchak. He was appointed head of the Committee for External Relations of the Saint Petersburg Mayor’s Office in June 1991. In March 1994, Sobchak appointed Putin as his first deputy of the city administration and later the deputy mayor.

After Sobchak lost reelection in June 1996, Putin was transferred to a new position as the deputy chief of the Presidential Property Management Department in Moscow, where he supervised matters of foreign properties. In March 1997, Putin was appointed both deputy chief of the Presidential Staff and chief of the presidential Main Control Directorate. He was appointed head of the Federal Security Service in July 1998. On August 9, 1999, Putin was appointed acting prime minister by President Boris Yeltsin, which the State Duma approved on August 16. The day he was appointed, Putin announced his plans to pursue the presidency in Russia's 2000 election.

On December 31, 1999, Russia's president Yeltsin resigned, following suspicions of bribery and corruption, leading to Putin becoming the acting president by the rules of Russia's Constitution. The same day, Putin issued a presidential decree, pardoning Yeltsin and his family from persecution regarding the accusations. Although the next election wasn't scheduled until June 2000, Yeltsin's resignation prompted a need for a new, lasting president, and the election was moved up to March instead. Putin had only held the position of acting president for a few short months, but he was already well-regarded by Russians for his handling of the newfound Second Chechen War. On March 26, 2000, Putin was officially elected president of Russia with 53 percent of the vote and inaugurated on May 7, 2000.

In his first term, Putin spent much of his time focused on rebuilding Russia's economy. He negotiated a grand bargain with Russian oligarchs who had been in control of the nation’s wealth ever since the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991. The grand bargain allowed the oligarchs to keep most of their power in exchange for supporting and cooperating with the government. The oligarchs were said to have "benefitted" from the agreement, and it was later reported there was an increase in Russian business tycoons during this time, mostly those who had personal relationships with Putin.

Although he was generally well-received by the nation so far, Putin faced criticism for his response to several big events during his first term, like his delayed and unsympathetic response to the Kursk submarine disaster and his aggressive approach to the Moscow theater hostage crisis. One hundred seventy people were estimated to have died in the October 2002 theater crisis after the government responded by administering an unknown gas into the theater to kill the hostage-takers, who were Chechen separatists. After the attack, Putin canceled his plans to withdraw Russian troops from Chechnya, and in November 2002, he directed an order to carry out attacks against Chechen separatists throughout Russia's breakaway republics. These actions worked to defeat some of the rebel movement but were not effective enough to end the Second Chechen War.

Putin was re-elected for a second term on March 14, 2004, this time with 71 percent of the vote. He continued to rebuild Russia's economy. He launched the National Priority Projects in 2005 as a plan to improve the quality of Russia's healthcare, education, housing, and agriculture. By the end of Putin's term in 2008, the economy had improved significantly—since his first term, Russia's GDP rose over 70 percent and the country's poverty rate lowered by about 50 percent.

Putin and the Russian government were criticized for their approach to another terror attack, the Beslan school siege in September 2004. Government authorities were alleged to be in possession of information detailing plans for a terrorist attack in the area, but took no steps to increase school security or prevent the suspected terrorists from traveling to that area. The government's rescue operation was also criticized for not being conducted in a way to minimize loss of life to civilians.

In Russia's December 2007 elections, the equivalent of the United States midterm elections, Putin’s party (United Russia) won and continued to keep control of the State Duma. The results were questioned, and while foreign election monitors at polling sites claimed the voting process was not rigged, it was purported that Russian media coverage had likely influenced the election, as it typically favored political candidates from the United Russia party. The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe both found the elections to be unfair and asked the Kremlin to investigate the allegations, but a Kremlin-appointed election commission concluded that the election results were fair and valid.

Putin's second presidential term ended in 2008, and he was unable to be elected for a third consecutive term, per the rules of the Russian Constitution. Dmitry Medvedev, who at the time was first deputy prime minister, was elected Russia's new president. Medvedev appointed Putin as Russia's new prime minister the day after his presidential inauguration in May 2008; this was the first of several times the two swapped equally powerful roles to remain in control while still abiding by the Russian Constitution at the time. In Russia's government, the prime minister (head of the government) and president (head of the state) work together and share power and responsibility, so Putin still held a significant amount of political power in the government. In December 2008, Medvedev signed a law extending Russia's presidential term lengths from four to six years, to take effect in 2012 and apply to that year's elect.

On March 4, 2012, Putin was elected president for the third time, this time garnering 64 percent of the vote, and was inaugurated on May 7, 2012. Again, there were accusations of a rigged election and public protests over the results. Government officials had installed webcams and transparent ballot boxes at polling stations in an alleged effort to fight voter fraud. The webcam footage was publicly broadcasted online. Each polling station was equipped with two webcams, one pointed at the ballot box and the other at the desk of the election commission, where the final vote is counted. Putin addressed many election fraud protests by jailing the protestors. After his inauguration, he immediately appointed Medvedev as prime minister again.

His third term was rife with more controversial acts, including some legislation and policy changes, such as a law he signed in December 2012 that prohibited United States citizens from adopting Russian children. The following year, he banned same sex Russian couples from adopting children too, and passed a law against the distribution of various materials to minors that promote or discuss same sex or "non-traditional" relationships. Russia's relationship to the United States was damaged after Putin granted temporary asylum to Edward Snowden, an American whistleblower and former NSA employee who leaked highly confidential government documents regarding the surveillance of American citizens. This resulted in US. President Barack Obama cancelling a meeting with Putin planned for August 2013. Putin called Snowden a "human rights fighter." He later granted him permanent residence in Russia.

In March 2014, Putin announced Russia's annexation of Crimea and its intent to absorb the territory into Russia. Putin claimed Crimea was an independent state, but it was actually Ukraine's territory. The city of Kyiv said it would not give up its claim to Crimea, but did not have the number of troops needed to stop Russian forces from seizing it. Russian soldiers quickly took control of Crimea in the beginning of March, and on March 16, the Crimean Supreme Council held a vote on whether to join Russia or to go back to following a previous constitution enacted in 1992, which would grant the territory more independence than it currently had. There was no option to vote for Crimea to remain Ukraine's territory. No official observers were present to supervise the vote. An 83 percent turnout of eligible voters was reported, and nearly 97 percent of votes were said to be in favor of joining Russia—an implausibly high number, given Crimea's large population of ethnic Ukrainians and Crimean Tatars who likely would have opposed the bill. In fact, a report from the Presidential Council for the Development of Civil Society and Human Rights claimed eligible voter turnout was only about 30 percent, with just half of votes in support of Russia's annexation. The Treaty of Accession of the Republic of Crimea to Russia was signed on March 18, 2014.

Donald Trump and Putin.

Russia was found to have interfered in the United States presidential election of 2016 and influenced the results in favor of Republican nominee Donald Trump through a variety of means, mainly by spreading misinformation and propaganda regarding Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton on social media sites—most notably on Facebook. Tactics used to spread misinformation included the use of troll farms. Putin has been accused of being the primary orchestrator and controller of these events. After investigating, the US Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security stated in October 2018: “The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian government directed the recent compromises of emails from U.S. persons and institutions.” While not admitting to any wrongdoing, Putin said in 2018 that he had wanted Trump to win the election.

Various computer systems and networks were hacked, and confidential political information was leaked. Russians were found to have hacked voter registration records in several states; twelve Russian nationals were indicted in July 2018 in connection to the hacking. Hackers also got into the email accounts of Clinton's presidential campaign staffers by sending them emails disguised as site security alerts, which prompted the users to change their passwords by clicking on a link and in turn gave the hackers access to their accounts. Tens of thousands of emails between staffers were then shared on WikiLeaks. The release of these emails was seen as exceptionally damaging and one of the biggest controversies of Clinton's campaign.

Russian hackers infiltrated the computer networks of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and then, as a result of the first, the Democratic National Committee. They attempted to hack the Republican National Committee site, but the domains they attacked were no longer in use by the committee. Some hacks were made on the campaign emails of Republican candidates Lindsey Graham and Marco Rubio, further supporting the idea of the Russian agenda to sway public perception and votes specifically in favor of Trump.

The goal of the interference, determined by the U.S. Intelligence Community based on evidence found and provided by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, was to harm Clinton's campaign in order to help Trump's. The efforts were also made in an attempt to dissuade trust in democracy in the United States.

Putin's fourth term presidential election win occurred on March 18, 2018. He received about 76 percent of the votes, and 67 percent of eligible Russian voters were said to have voted in the election. Over 1,600 protestors were detained in May 2018 for protesting against Putin's fourth reelection. His inauguration took place on May 7, 2008.

In May 2019, Putin signed a law that introduced the first steps to facilitating the creation of a “sovereign" internet, capable of operating in the country independently. Under the law, which took effect in November that year, Russian internet providers were required to install new equipment to enable a form of data processing used to monitor and censor web traffic.

In early April 2021, Putin signed a law enabling him to serve two more consecutive terms, should he be reelected again. This would allow him to potentially serve as president until 2036.

Russia's first confirmed COVID case was on January 31, 2020. In March, Russian labs began testing the first COVID vaccine prototypes. As the number of cases in the country climbed into the hundreds, Putin announced a non-working week from March 28 to April 5 to help curb the spread; the order was extended twice, until it finally ended on May 11. During this timeframe, Russia stopped all international air traffic and closed all border points. The city of Moscow enacted a lockdown that lasted until June 9. Russia developed its own vaccine, Sputnik V, which was first registered on August 11, 2020.

Putin and the government have been criticized for not taking enough appropriate measures to stop the spread of COVID cases throughout Russia. Russia's vaccination rate is low due to citizen distrust in the government and the safety of the vaccine —even Putin did not get vaccinated until March 2021. The lack of public awareness on the disease has been attributed to his hands-off approach and lack of an organized plan on how to combat it.

On February 24, 2022, Putin announced a full-fledged war with Ukraine and ordered bombings in the cities of Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Dnipro. The strikes came after years of rising tensions between the two countries, beginning in 2014 with Crimea's annexation. Putin says his aim in attacking Ukraine is to demilitarize and "de-Nazify" the country, although he does not refer to it as an invasion or war. Putin's attempts to capture Ukraine have been increasingly aggressive. He has launched strikes on civilian homes, hospitals, and shelters, among other buildings. As of March 20, 2022, over 900 Ukrainian civilians have been confirmed killed and nearly 1500 wounded.

International efforts have been made to assist Ukraine and to isolate Russia as a way to condemn the invasion. Strict sanctions have been imposed upon Russia, and many international companies have ceased business operations there to avoid funding the country's economy, and thus the war. Most countries are reluctant to become any more involved in the conflict, due to Putin's threats against any country that does so: “To anyone who would consider interfering from outside: If you do, you will face consequences greater than any you have faced in history. All the relevant decisions have been taken. I hope you hear me.” Putin has responded to Russian protests of the invasion by arresting protestors. He has also banned Russian media from reporting or acknowledging the truth of the war.

Critics and opponents of Putin and the Russian government have often been jailed, silenced, and even killed, although the government continues to deny its involvement in such cases. Journalist and activist Anna Politkovskaya was shot and killed by an unknown assailant in the lobby of her apartment building on October 7, 2006 (notably Putin's birthday.) She was a frequent critic of Putin and had publicly exposed various corrupt practices by the Russian Army. The government denied any responsibility, and Putin stated her death "caused him more problems than anything she had ever written about him."

Alexei Navalny is a long-time critic and protestor of government corruption in Russia. He ran for mayor in Moscow in 2013. In March 2013, he was indicted on charges of financial fraud and found guilty in July; he was investigated for other fraud charges in October that same year and found guilty for those in December 2014. Navalny has suffered several attacks on his life and physical well-being that have been attributed to the Russian government. In August 2020, he was poisoned with a chemical nerve agent while on a flight to Moscow. He received medical treatment in Germany. In February 2021, he was sentenced to over two-and-a-half years in prison for violating his probation from the 2014 case. This prompted protests across the country. On March 22, 2022, Navalny was sentenced to nine years in a maximum security jail.

Putin's first wife was Lyudmila Shkrebneva, whom he married on July 28, 1983. Together they had two daughters, Mariya and Yekaterina Putina. Their separation was announced in June 2013, and their divorce finalized on April 1, 2014. Putin does not often share details about his private life, nor the lives of his family. He rarely discusses his children in public. Putin is long-rumored to have had an affair with former gymnast Alina Kabaeva and is said to have four children with her (only two of the alleged children have been confirmed to exist, twins she birthed in 2015.)

Putin posing shirtless with a horse.

Putin is an avid sportsman and enjoys various outdoor and physical activities. He has practiced martial arts since he was a child. He eventually earned a black belt in judo and was declared a Master of Sport in sambo. He is also a fan of hockey, skiing, diving, fishing, and racing sports cars. Over the years, Putin has acquired many different sports titles, both earned and honorary. He was stripped of several of these titles following the start of the war on Ukraine. Putin has cultivated a public image of himself as excessively masculine and active and has published photographs of himself practicing sports or doing other outdoor activities.

Putin's net worth is a figure of speculation. He was said to have earned 38.5 million rubles between 2011 and 2016, 18.728 million rubles in 2017 alone, and about half that in each following year. Putin declared his 2020 income to be 9.994 million rubles. In February 2022, before the rapid loss of value in the ruble due to the invasion of Ukraine, 9.994 million rubles was worth approximately $120,000. Putin claims he makes his earnings from his presidential salary, military pension, stocks, and interest in savings accounts. His official income statements show ownership of a small apartment and two Soviet sports cars, but he is unofficially reported to own much more. Putin is rumored to own multiple homes, planes, yachts, other expensive cars, and even a presidential palace.