This is John Batchelor.

Conversation between my colleagues, John Hardy of the Foundation for Defense of Democracy,

answering the inquiry by Bill Rajau.

What would happen if Vladimir Putin disappeared?

This following reporting in the Financial Times that Putin is increasingly persecuted or thinks he is.

He spends his time in bunkers, doesn't go home,

has a heavy guard around him,

and worries about coup d'etatres,

worries about assassination, frets often,

and spends all of his time on the war, geopolitical questions, not about domestic and very troubled economy.

The inflation, the breakdown in amity, the manufacturing sector dominated by guns which are not TDP.

They're not about building. They're not about the future.

They're broken quickly on the battlefield.

And what would happen if Putin disappeared?

Just was no longer on the scene.

Who would replace him?

What would happen in the transition?

Here John posits on the basis of his following the war these many years.

Much more of this later. Thank you.

I'm John Batchel. Bill Rajo, my colleague and co-host of the Foundation for Defensive Democracies,

we're going to the Ukraine conflict, thanks to John Hardy of FDD,

who was our eyes and ears on the battlefield,

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