Publicly and privately, world leaders have called for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s removal from office in the wake of the Ukraine invasion. Could Russian oligarchs, many of whom are facing sanctions in response to the war, overthrow or even assassinate Putin? Straight Arrow News contributor and geopolitical strategist Peter Zeihan reviews the two groups of oligarchs and who’s most likely to take action.
The first are the ones who got their assets by robbing the state blind in the 1990s, in the post-Soviet collapse. This group includes folks like Petr Aven, Mikhail Fridman of Alfa Bank. This includes Mikhail Prokhorov of Norilsk Nickel, which is the world’s largest nickel, platinum, palladium, copper, deposit.
These folks have minimal influence over the Putin government. They can’t demand a meeting. They don’t have access to the guy. Whenever he calls they come running because they cut a deal with Putin back in 2000, right when he became president. Putin said that you can keep your assets. As long as you pay your taxes, start paying your taxes, and you never get involved in politics. And that deal has more or less stuck for the next 22 years.
They’re widely disliked, not just by Putin, but by the entire Russian population.
And if Putin wanted to get a few more points in popularity, executing a couple of these guys would probably do it for them, and they know it. So they are not the kind of group that you can really turn to for any sort of political change.
The second group of oligarchs are the ones who became rich because of Putin.
This includes folks like Sergey Chemezov, who is the world’s most sanctioned person. He’s in charge of the military industrial complex of Russia. And whenever you see equipment breaking down on the field, that’s his fault, cuz he is breathlessly corrupt.
And Alexei Miller of Russia’s Gazprom, which is the world’s largest natural gas concern.
These guys have access to Putin and some of them, like Chemezov, are actually in the inner circle, but they are blindly loyal.
Everything they have is because of their position next to Putin. And if he were to fall, they would probably fall too. There’s one exception. There’s a guy by the name of Igor Sechin, who’s in charge of Rosneft, which is the state oil company of Russia. He used to be a gun runner during the Cold War, and he’s got the guts, and he’s got the means, and he’s got the access.
If anyone in the inner circle or anyone of the elite is going to off Putin, it’s gonna be him. But if there’s one thing that the rest of the elite, whether in the inner circle or out agrees upon, it’s that Sechin is kind of a jackass and they would probably pool to their strengths to off him the next day after he got rid of Putin.
So I don’t see a palace coup being very likely or a coup from within the inner inner circle or the oligarchs in general.