JRL NEWSWATCH: “Surkov Hints Putin Himself No Longer Essential for the System to Persevere; Does Vladislav Surkov’s latest piece of post-modern fancy have a serious political message?” – Moscow Times/ Mark Galeotti

February 13, 2019 JRL Russia List JRL NewsBlog, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections

“… Surkov … coined ‘sovereign democracy’ and ‘non-linear war’ … a presidential adviser with apparent overall responsibility for policy over Ukraine …. [H]e has to negotiate razor-toothed factional and jurisdictional disputes between the Kremlin, the presidential administration in Old Square, the FSB and the military. … [one of the] high-flyers … lack[ing] a strong personal connection with Putin, or a powerful network of allies, clients and patrons. … leav[ing] him vulnerable … [B]uried within the grandiose rhetoric of his article, Surkov is trying to reassure three important constituencies [about] the end of the Putin era …. ‘for many years Russia will still be Putin’s state,’ not least because Putinism is ‘the ideology of the future.’ … Surkov returns to his old theme, that the West is no better. … The point is not the specifics of this flamboyant rhetorical exercise which, as ever with Surkov, is probably too smart for its own good. … [T]his bellwether of the Kremlin is willing to broach transition in a context … suggest[ing] … Putin … is no longer essential. … being turned from a president to a precedent … to history.”