“Vladimir Putin has been sick for a long time, his death will come soon,” Kyrylo Budanov, director of Ukrainian military intelligence, said on Wednesday, declaring that the Russian president was “dying” afflicted with cancer. News that could change the course of the ongoing war in Ukraine, if true.
Indeed, it is not the first time that the Russian president has been presented suffering since the beginning of the conflict: it has already been announced that he suffers from thyroid cancer or that he suffers from Parkinson’s. But Vladimir Putin has since continued to make public appearances by himself and has shown no clear signs of illness.
For the latest announcement, the question arises whether Ukrainian intelligence was really able to get access to such information. On this subject, often exploited, it is very difficult to have clear clues.
“No one knows the true state of health of Vladimir Putin”
The director of Ukrainian military intelligence Kyrylo Budanov “is 36 years old but he is already a major general of the intelligence services, he is a key man”, explains Ulysse Gosset, foreign policy columnist for BFMTV, represents “the new generation of Ukrainian soldiers”. The last statement does not come from anyone, and it is made in front of the camera, in an interview in an important American media. The columnist also explains that the Russians attribute the attack on the Crimean bridge in early October to him, which suggests that he is a soldier feared by Moscow.
On the other hand, “behind Ukrainian intelligence is American intelligence,” Alexandre Melnik, a former diplomat in Moscow, told BFMTV.com. According to him, therefore, we must listen to what the spies in Kyiv declare, “but take the information with a lot of tweezers, because it is necessarily partisan.”
Regarding Vladimir Putin’s illness, he remains categorical, however, assuring that “no one knows the true state of Vladimir Putin’s health, it is the most protected state secret.”
Contrary information had circulated last July. The CIA chief said that the Russian president was in very good health, dismissing rumors that his condition was deteriorating.
For Floran Vadillo, an intelligence specialist, in both cases, “when we know how Vladimir Putin behaves, the isolation in which he lives (…) we can understand that in reality there is very little chance of there being Ukrainian or even American intelligence.” . sources that have this type of information.
Ten years ago “we already heard the same thing” about the Russian president, explains Sylvie Bermann, a diplomatic consultant for BFMTV, a former French ambassador to Russia. “That is not to say that he is not sick, but here we are in the communication war and very clearly in the propaganda” of Kyiv.
“It’s a chestnut, it attracts, it makes people talk,” Alexandre Melnik abounds.
The objective “is not to reveal the state of health of Vladimir Putin but to influence his relatives and try to make a palace revolution justified by the fact that Putin would no longer be the owner of his media,” Floran Vadillo abounds. This news “is therefore speculation for purposes of political destabilization”, for the intelligence specialist.
For Alexandre Melnik, this type of rumors launched is “a denial of reality, it is a strategic error to bet on it, we must neutralize Vladimir Putine otherwise”, he declares, recalling that sick or not, “it is still there” anyway. . .
Source: BFM TV
