A Brief History of Vladimir Putin

Unassuming, colorless, charisma-free, a cipher, a bureaucrat: early in his career, first at the KGB and then working for the city government of St. Petersburg, Vladimir Putin was deceptively easy to ignore… even as he was climbing the ladder of post-Soviet chaos at lightning speed.

It was this ephemeral quality that led the oligarchs that really controlled Russia to make him the second President of the Russian Federation in 2000, under the assumption that he would be unable to act independently… until he turned on, dispossessed and disposed of them.

And now, after a quarter-century in control of Russia, Putin has grown into one of the wealthiest, most powerful, and least constrained rulers on Earth. Putin is synonymous with Russia, and for the the costs he has incurred in Ukraine and elsewhere, there is no ignoring either the man or his country now.

Setting aside the optics and wisdom of inviting Putin to Alaska unconditionally, as President Trump did yesterday, peace in Europe stands no chance without him. But what kind of peace is Putin after, exactly? Can we find any clues over the course of his long career?