Back in January, there was this moment where Ben Judah thought, there is something wrong with Vladimir Putin.

Ben has written a book about Putin, so he was watching official Kremlin video of the president celebrating Orthodox Christmas.

The video shows only Putin himself, totally alone, listening to a religious service, lighting candles.

And it's really a haunting video that we will see in many documentaries far into the future

of this one man completely alone in a gold-clad chapel, his legs buckling slightly as if

he's unwell.

He kind of gulps.

He like gulps and his face is red.

And his face twitches very strangely.

What stood out to Ben was how isolated Putin looked.

Ever since the pandemic started, Russia's president has kept to himself.

You might have seen those pictures of him, meeting with other world leaders. Putin's on one

side of an extremely long table. His counterparts are yards away. Has Putin always been alone like this?

The answer is no.

Vladimir Putin's been in power almost 203 years.

That's a generation.

There are millions and millions of Russians that have never known the country without him.

Over time, if we look at the political science, populist strong men tend to turn into leaders of authoritarian regimes. authoritarian regimes can have a tendency to descend into

personalist dictatorships. And throughout that time, you can see a transformation of the man at the heart of it.

A personalist dictatorship is when the entire power of a state lies in the hands of a single person.

And Ben says, that's what Russia's become. If you look closely, you see the hallmarks

everywhere. Just compare Putin's decision to launch a war on all of Ukraine to his decision

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