Former MI6 Chief: Putin lacks rationality unless in a ‘permanent state of antagonism’

Putin lacks rationality unless in a ‘permanent state of antagonism’Source The Independent

Transcript

00:00Is it an imperial agenda that Putin has?

00:03Yeah, I think of necessity.

00:08What does Putin have to offer the Russian people, really?

00:12He offers them security, and that's beguiling for Russians

00:15because of the disaster of the democratic experiment,

00:19which the West is semi-complicit in, by the way.

00:23But I think when he came to power, there was a craving for security,

00:27so he puts himself out there, he's Mr. Hardman, as security.

00:32Of course, what you need in that environment, though, is a threat,

00:37particularly, by the way, when you have no other offer,

00:40because fundamentally what the Russians are buying

00:42isn't a corrupt oligarchy that is ripping them off,

00:46but it's doing so because it craves security.

00:49Security needs a threat, and I think at the beginning

00:52the threat was that Russia was fundamentally falling apart

00:56and Putin did fix that.

00:59But now, of course, Putin feels the need to take this to another level,

01:06and I think Putin doesn't have a rationale

01:09unless he's in a permanent state of antagonism,

01:13specifically with Europe.

01:16And so this needs to continue.

01:20Now, you don't need a spy to tell you this.

01:22He kind of said it before the invasion.

01:24He was clever as spies in revealing his attack plans,

01:28which completely lent the lie to the idea

01:30that this was some kind of defensive manoeuvre, rubbish.

01:33But the really revealing bit came before that in August 21,

01:37where he wrote an essay, complete with spelling mistakes,

01:40it was definitely him, about the destiny of Ukraine and Russia.

01:45Unity, I think, was even the word.

01:48And that revealed his sense that Russia just isn't complete without Ukraine

01:52and the implication that the reverse is also true.

01:55You've got stuff, the sort of Russian mythology, Ruskimia,

01:59all invested in Ukraine.

02:02He made it super clear that Ukraine's existence

02:05was inimicable to Russian greatness.