David A. Andelman, visiting scholar at the Center on National Security at Fordham Law, wrote an op-ed for CNN about Vladimir Putin becoming the president of Russia for another six-year term.
After the weekend’s election in Russia and the expected coronation of Vladimir Putin as president yet again, some 20% of the world’s population and 17% of its entire land mass will could be ruled by two individuals serving, unchallenged, for life.
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What Putin looks to have won in this vote, against a hand-picked selection of seven opponents he was guaranteed to overwhelm at the polls, is another six-year term — after which, should he desire, another will no doubt be enabled by a simple vote of the Duma, which is utterly under his control.
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In every respect Putin needs to be stood up to — in economic, military and diplomatic terms. So far, he has come to feel himself all but untouchable, but his paranoia remains — and his goals that only feed that paranoia.
Putin feels a strong need to divide NATO. And he has worked determinedly along its fringes — seeking to pull Turkey on its eastern flank away from the alliance, challenging the Baltic states on the northern periphery with deployment of advanced, nuclear-capable weapons.