WASHINGTON — For greater than a yr, the notion that Vladimir V. Putin is critically unwell has been a topic of lurid hypothesis, web video forensics — and potential wartime propaganda, although U.S. officers say there isn’t a proof the Russian chief is dying.
Now, a doc among the many trove of leaked labeled supplies affords the most recent instance of the fascination with Mr. Putin’s well being. It describes a dialog between two Ukrainian officers about what one claimed was a conspiracy amongst Mr. Putin’s inside opponents to problem his rule at a second when he was mentioned to be present process chemotherapy.
No proof has emerged to substantiate the declare, or many earlier ones, and the leaked doc provides no indication that the United States finds it credible. In July, the director of the C.I.A. dismissed hypothesis about Mr. Putin’s well being, and lots of Russia specialists discover no purpose to doubt him.
Analysts known as the general public dialogue of Mr. Putin’s well-being unsurprising. It is a predictable byproduct of the aura of thriller round highly effective autocrats who maintain their distance from observers and their private lives properly hid, mentioned John Sipher, a former C.I.A. official who ran the company’s Russia operations.
In current years, North Korea’s chief, Kim Jong-un, has been the topic of seemingly unfounded claims that he was gravely unwell and even lifeless. Similar hypothesis has centered on President Xi Jinping of China, notably when he stopped touring overseas through the coronavirus pandemic.
“I’ve never put much stock in health talk,” Mr. Sipher mentioned. “We’ve heard the same stuff for years. I just think that it’s always a discussion point in closed societies where they hide and lie about everything.”
The declare about Mr. Putin is one in every of many to emerge since he launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February final yr. Some analysts prompt that his critics unfold disinformation to undermine his picture as a vigorous and menacing powerful man.
In an interview with ABC News in early January, Ukraine’s navy intelligence chief, Kyrylo Budanov, broadly endorsed the rumors. “He has been sick for a long time. I am sure he has cancer,” Mr. Budanov mentioned. “I think he will die very quickly. I hope very soon.”
Two weeks later, Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, went even additional, questioning whether or not Mr. Putin was nonetheless alive.
The newest instance of hypothesis is in one of many paperwork that Airman First Class Jack Teixeira, whom federal brokers arrested this month, is accused of leaking. It asserts {that a} member of Ukraine’s parliament, Yelizaveta Bohutska, claimed to find out about a plan by Russian officers to undermine their very own navy to “sabotage” Mr. Putin.
Ms. Bohutska mentioned the plan was to engineer a navy setback by March 5, “when Putin was allegedly scheduled to start a round of chemotherapy and would thus be unable to influence the war effort,” the doc states.
Ms. Bohutska disclosed the plot on Feb. 17 to Andriy Yermak, the chief of workers to Mr. Zelensky, in keeping with the doc. Ms. Bohutska, it added, had “received the information from an unidentified Russian source with access to Kremlin officials.” Neither Ukrainian official responded to requests for remark.
The doc didn’t point out how the United States knew concerning the dialog, however the leaked studies verify suspicions that the Biden administration has been surveilling Ukraine’s authorities and different allies.
Subsequent occasions haven’t borne out the claims. While Mr. Putin made no public appearances on March 5, in keeping with a Kremlin archive of his actions, that date fell on a Sunday, when he would normally not be lively in public. And Mr. Putin had quite a few conferences the next week.
Nor is there proof that Russian forces skilled a shocking setback round that point.
Social media sleuths have lengthy seized upon movies of Mr. Putin’s public appearances, claiming to establish modifications in his look, speech, gait, or posture as proof of faltering well being.
“Fiction and falsehood,” the Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, mentioned final April when requested concerning the most cancers rumors, in keeping with a publish on Telegram by the veteran Russian journalist Alexei Venediktov.
That seems to be a uncommon level of settlement between Russian and American officers. Asked about Mr. Putin’s well being on the annual Aspen Security Forum in July, C.I.A. Director William J. Burns didn’t hesitate. “There are lots of rumors about President Putin’s health,” Mr. Burns mentioned. “And as far as we can tell, he’s entirely too healthy.”
Mr. Sipher and others pointed to a current growth that doesn’t provide encouragement to these hoping Mr. Putin’s days could also be numbered: an account from a current defector from Mr. Putin’s elite safety service, Gleb Karakulov.
A safe communications specialist who fled Russia in October, Mr. Karakulov has known as Mr. Putin a battle legal and would seemingly be completely happy to substantiate unhealthy news about his situation.
But in an interview with The Associated Press this month, Mr. Karakulov did the other. If something, he mentioned, Mr. Putin is in higher well being than most individuals his age.
Source: www.nytimes.com