What are the chances of the Ukraine invasion leading to Vladimir Putin being toppled from within?

The system of power the Russian president has built is unlikely to survive if he departs – and may simply fall apart, argues Nikolai Petrov

Vladimir Putin (Reuters)

Although it is impossible to predict whether a political coup will take place in Russia, we can look at how the system Vladimir Putin has built works and assess the possibilities of change for the better.

In this system there are no figures at the top who are capable of acting independently against the will of Putin – the Russian president does not – and has never had – a “first” deputy, only several equal ones. Each of whom is responsible for his or her own clearly defined area of activity. The resources that each of them has at their disposal are not enough for independent action without Putin’s direct approval. It is extremely unlikely that any members of the elite could create a coalition that could take action in the system Putin has created.

The same aspects of the system that led to the launch – and the failure – of Putin’s war in Ukraine, elements of individual power which are disconnected and are not independent, reduces the risk of Putin being toppled from within.

It is not only that strong figures are absent from the political elite, but there are also no structures that can be used to remove Putin from power. For example, in 1964, Nikita Khrushchev was removed from the highest party post by the plenum of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. In Putin’s system, he alone has the defining power. The Security Council or the State Council can theoretically gather without him, but they have no right to decide anything by themselves.

The security and intelligences agencies can hardly be imagined as active agents of change. These forces and agencies are under the direct control of Putin and no one else from his entourage. Competition, if not enmity, is maintained between them. Some of their chiefs, as in the case of the FSB, for example, are constrained by managed conflicts at the top of the agency itself. In other cases, such as the Ministry of Defence and the Prosecutor General’s Office, the senior leader came from outside the body. Under these conditions, not only are the security forces as a whole unlikely to act as a consolidated force, neither are their individual constituent parts.

It was not so long ago that regional leaders had great political weight. This is no longer the case, and there are only two who have significant status: Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin and the head of Chechnya, strongman Ramzan Kadyrov. The latter’s position in the federal political elite is weaker, but he is well connected within the security forces and, in fact, is the head of his own military and security structure.

According to the Russian constitution, if something happens to the president, the prime minister becomes the head of state for the period until an election is held. Therefore, Putin has never allowed there to be a strong premier in his more than two decades in power– except for Putin himself from 2008 to 2012, when term limits stopped him from being president. The current prime minister, Mikhail Mishustin, is not an influential figure, although, as former head of the tax service, he is not without links of his own,

If we imagine that Putin disappeared now, it is first and foremost the prime minister, Mishustin, and the Moscow mayor, Sobyanin, who would have formal and real power. Each of them has administrative and financial resources – plus a media profile. With the support of the security forces, both of them could claim leadership.

Putin stepping away would immediately nullify the power of most of the influential figures in the Russian elite, since their influence is mediated by the president. These applies to senior figures in the presidential administration, the secretary of the security council, and the oligarchs currently in favour.

At the same time, if Putin were to step down, appointing an an heir could be tricky – given the current president’s grip on the levers of power. And if Putin suddenly were to leave the stage in emergency fashion, the transfer of power to another figure or others would take the form of a fierce struggle.

Following the terrible footage of civilian killings in Bucha, near Kyiv, there have been calls on social networks for representatives of the technocratic elite in Russia’s Central Bank and the government to resign from their posts. Yet there appears little prospect of that.

State propaganda aims to shield both the Russian people from the reality on the ground in Ukraine – will anyone from the political elite stand up and dispel that notion?

After the failure of the war in Ukraine, under sanctions with horrific economic consequences, Russia is facing the prospect of rapid change. It is difficult to predict how they will affect the balance of power within the Kremlin. Putin tightly controls the system. However, the good news is that as sanctions and the repercussions of the invasion of Ukraine inevitably weaken Putin’s position, this control will also weaken.

A simple coup, in the form of a direct challenge to Putin, currently seems unlikely. It is much more likely that power struggles within the elites will increase due to a sharp reduction in the amount of wealth available for them to divide among themselves. Putin will be increasingly unable to maintain a balance between those around, and that the entire system will be destabilised as a result. The struggle for existence has already begun and I believe it will continue to grow. Putin and the system he built will both suffer as a result.

The bad news is that the political system as it stands is unlikely to survive Putin’s departure and may simply fall apart, not necessarily without conflict. There is no reason to expect that the elements of the system, or any new structure into which any of them are assembled, will be better than what came before.

Nikolai Petrov is a senior research fellow on the Russia and Eurasia Programme at Chatham House