As the invasion of Ukraine drags on into its fifth year, cracks are emerging throughout the system of Russian President Vladimir Putin. After cementing his strongman image with the Second Chechen War in 1999, Putin styled himself as a "czar" with the annexation of Crimea in 2014. The governance formula of consolidating power through war is now backfiring in Ukraine's protracted war of attrition.
Putin is scheduled to visit Beijing on the 20th for talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping. On the 19th (local time), the Financial Times (FT) in the United Kingdom called it "an occasion for Putin to showcase his vigor alongside a fellow leader," adding that "he is trying to divert attention from the cracks showing both in his domestic power base and in the prolongation of the war in Ukraine." Analysts said the very fact that he is going to see Xi only four days after President Trump's visit to China shows Russia's weakened geopolitical standing. Pavel Baev of the Jamestown Foundation said, "This visit underscores Russia's weakened geopolitical position and reinforces the perception that Moscow is a junior partner dependent on China."
Putin's czar image is shaking at home and abroad. In public, his trembling hands and legs, swollen face, frequent coughing, and scenes of him gripping a desk have been repeatedly captured. In an authoritarian system like Russia's, a leader's health is directly tied to regime stability. After Western media recently raised bunker seclusion rumors, the Kremlin unusually released a video of Putin driving himself in downtown Moscow to meet his former teacher. The AP said, "The heart attack rumor is disinformation from a low-credibility Telegram account." Some noted that because the succession plan remains undecided, even small signs regarding Putin's health tend to be read in an exaggerated way. Still, experts said the repeated spread of rumors and the Kremlin's need to rebut them each time are eroding the image of an "invincible leader." A figure known to be close to Putin told the FT, "Putin spends 70% of his day thinking about the war," adding, "Only the remaining 30% is devoted to Russia's domestic issues."
At the Victory Day event on the 9th of this month, Putin's anxiety—he had cast himself as a "strong man"—was laid bare in compressed form. This year, for the first time since 2008, Putin concluded the event without a parade of tanks and missiles. It was a step taken out of concern over Ukraine's long-range drone strikes. At last year's 80th anniversary military parade, heavyweights such as Xi and Brazilian President Lula, and Palestinian Authority President Abbas stood by Putin, but this year it was limited to the leaders of Belarus, Kazakhstan, Laos, Malaysia, and Uzbekistan. The Council on Foreign Relations said in a report that "an event once used to flex military muscle exposed the defensive psychology of an aging long-term ruler."
The situation on the Ukrainian battlefield is also drifting further from the victory narrative Putin has long cultivated. Russia's military leadership initially vowed to fully seize the remaining unoccupied areas of Donbas by this fall. But over the past four weeks, Russia's control of Ukrainian territory has shrunk on net. As front-line conditions worsened over the past year, the additional Ukrainian territory secured amounts to less than 1% of the country's total area. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said, "Even excluding the wounded, Russian forces are seeing 15,000 to 20,000 killed in action each month." Entering the third year of the war in 2024, the Russian government raised the upper age limit for conscription eligibility from 27 to 30 to make up for personnel losses, but even that is now insufficient.
The economy is finding it harder to endure the war. As Ukraine's long-range drones strike oil refineries and defense factories inside Russia with precision, even crude sales—the last remaining export lifeline—are being disrupted. The Russian government cut its 2026 growth forecast to 0.4% from 1.3% and its 2027 outlook to 1.4% from 2.8%. The official inflation rate is 5.6%, but perceived inflation is higher. The benchmark interest rate has risen to 14.5%. As rates have surged, bad loans among corporations and banks have jumped. The Economist, citing a former senior Kremlin official, said, "In the past three years, the state has forcibly nationalized or redistributed to insiders about $60 billion (about 90 trillion won) in asset from private businesspeople."
Public patience has also reached its limit. According to a survey by the state-run pollster VTsIOM, Putin's approval rating at the end of April was 66%, the lowest since the war began and down 8 percentage points from 74% two months earlier. In the same survey, the proportion of respondents who said they were "generally dissatisfied" with domestic politics soared to 36%, the record high since December 2021. Demand for antidepressants in Russia jumped 24% last year. Online searches for "how to leave Russia" have more than doubled since January this year. Denis Volkov, director of the Levada Center, analyzed, "War fatigue with no end in sight, tax pressure, and a worsening economy have fueled the spread of pessimism."
The diplomatic landscape is also turning against Putin. The Syrian regime of Bashar Assad, which Russia had invested 10 years in, fell to a rebel offensive in December last year. Russia lost, in vain, its strategic naval base asset in the Middle East to counter the United States. Armenia, once considered a staunch ally in the Caucasus, is hinting at leaving the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) and is discussing a 2.5 billion-euro (about 4.4 trillion won) investment deal with the European Union (EU). Azerbaijan, which had been under the rule of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union in the past, rejected Putin's invitation to Victory Day. The Economist said, "Putin started the war to preserve the power and system he built for himself, but paradoxically, once the war began, Russians started to imagine a future without him."