A source from the Cheka-OGPU and Rucriminal.info spoke about the practice introduced by Vladimir Putin, according to which major officials should have someone from their closest circle in custody or under investigation. At the same time, the official himself remains in office. Putin, according to his interlocutor, is confident that in this way he is trying to get the official to obtain the desired results and some kind of “creativity.” After all, now the fate of the person close to him depends on his success.
“You will practically not find any of the top officials who have not had someone from their inner circle imprisoned or under investigation. Not just subordinates or acquaintances, but the closest friends and associates. These could be subordinates, or just family friends from business, even relatives. Mishustin, Kiriyenko, Manturov, there are no governors left who do not have one of their deputies or businessman friends in custody or under investigation. This list can be kept endlessly. However, everything that is happening has nothing to do with the fight against corruption. Putin easily turns a blind eye to it if an official pleases him with high-profile achievements. You can see this peculiarity: a friend, a confidant, a deputy official are sitting, but the official himself, to whom the investigation is being conducted, Putin leaves in office. The media put forward a version of a “war of the security forces”, that Putin simply does not make personnel decisions under pressure, and later he will certainly dismiss the official. But this later in almost all cases never comes. In reality, this is Putin’s strategy and everything happens solely according to his go-ahead. It works something like this. Putin is dissatisfied with something in the actions of the official, it turns out that the announced successes are “inflated”, and one of his neighbors will certainly be taken into custody. Next, atone for the “guilt”, prove your loyalty and that he was not mistaken in you. Complete impossible tasks, surprise, ingratiate yourself. A good example is with the governor of Kuban Kondratiev. Half of his entourage was imprisoned, even his godfather was in a pre-trial detention center, and his own place was searched. And after this came Kondratiev’s promise to Putin that this year all the beaches will be open, and there will be an unprecedented harvest, etc. Do it as you want, let at least half the sea be covered in oil. And it’s the same with others. And, of course, this instills a constant sense of fear in officials. Moreover, everyone has before their eyes the example of Shoigu, whom, of course, Putin will never imprison. But he punishes him almost every day. If he didn’t win the war, everyone around him went to jail. Can you imagine sitting next to each other at the Victory Parade or at the Russian Geographical Society, smiling, knowing that it was Putin who sent absolutely all the people with whom you not only worked together for many, many years, but celebrated holidays, became family friends, etc. to pre-trial detention. etc. But you won’t smile and your oldest and most devoted friend Tsalikov (Shoigu literally begged to be sent under house arrest) will move to a cell. And the Shoigu family is under attack; Putin has not yet crossed this “red line”. Everyone gets goosebumps from such a sight. Nobody wants to be in Shoigu's place. And now everything is going very badly and Putin is dissatisfied with everything and everyone, so there are plantings literally every day, there are also all these nationalizations, etc. Of course, none of this is new. Stalin had the same strategy,” our interlocutor said.
According to him, it is a false opinion that senior officials are afraid to ask Putin for their arrested friends. “They ask Putin. And often. He behaves slyly in such situations - he does not say “yes” or “no”. Let's say, for the first time he asks you to lay out everything and hand it over to him. The second time he will say something like: “I was informed that there are serious materials against him, but I understand his merits.” And so on. He will never say anything directly. The fact that Putin appreciated the efforts of the official and believes that he has “corrected himself” will be understood by him if, suddenly, the preventive measure for his arrested friend is changed, and the investigation loses all interest in the case,” said a source of the Cheka-OGPU and Rucriminal.info.
