Putin made TIME magazine’s list of the 100 most influential people in 2022. They asked Alexei Navalny to write a column about it from prison.
Below is the original text by Alexei:
Perhaps Vladimir Putin’s true mission is to teach lessons. To everyone—from world leaders and so-called global experts to ordinary people. In 2022, he was especially good at it.
He reminded us once again that a path that begins with “just a little election rigging” always ends in dictatorship. And that dictatorship always leads to war. Oh, how we should never have forgotten that, right?
For years, world leaders hypocritically talked about a “pragmatic approach” and the benefits of international trade. The cost of war—military and economic aid to Ukraine, refugees, sanctions—will all be hundreds of times greater than the profits from the oil and gas contracts whose signing was so often celebrated with champagne.
Putin reminded us of the “duck test.” Remember? If it walks like a duck, looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it’s a duck.
The same applies here: if he has destroyed the media, organizes political murders, and lives in imperial delusions, then he is a madman capable of unleashing a bloody massacre in the heart of Europe in the 21st century. And there is no need to embrace him at international forums.
Right now, Putin is teaching a lesson on how to wipe out 20 years of your country’s economic growth.
However, we will all have to find the answer to the main question ourselves: how do you stop a vicious madman with an army, a nuclear bomb, and a seat on the UN Security Council?