Quote Originally Posted by OUTLAW 09
Putin is actually an interesting character...as a KGB officer in Dresden he BTW did not make it into SVR as many in his KGB class group felt he did not have what it took...

But anyway he turns up in the Dresden KGB HQs acting as more or less a liaison officer between the KGB and Dresden MfS...

And when things collapsed he went home it was said with a refrigerator and 400 USDs in his pockets when others went home rich from their time in Dresden and the ensuing collapse...

It is also said he was tasked at recruiting GDR citizens who legally left the GDR for the BRD and who might be settling in to the areas around Bad Tolez...the then German HQs for USA SF...in order to spy in SF activities...which some say he failed badly at...but he was good at recruiting active Stasi personnel into the KGB which then linked MfS warnings to Moscow about his activities in the "brother state".....

But he had very good contacts as he had worked with the Mfs Surveillance and Political Crimes units...

What is interesting is both the MfS and Putin totally missed the developing anti GDR movement hidden under the mask of "the peace movement" building in Dresden which then led to the complete fall of the GDR...

Now if one looks at his Dresden past and now you will see little change is his character and or his actions...

Putin may well have been in the First Chief Directorate, which became the SVR, but that did not mean he was much more than a functionary; it is equally probable that he was in the Fifth Chief Directorate and liaising or attached to the First in some capacity.

What is clear is that Putin grasped how the KGB was organized and the importance of its Ninth Chief Directorate, whose successive organs (FSO, SBP) Putin has transformed into a Praetorian Guard.

One can infer parallels between Putin’s rise to power and that of Stalin’s. Both were dull bureaucrats who desired power, prestige and to be in the thick of the action, yet both were forced to content themselves learning the inner workings of how their societies were structured.

Personally, I believe that four experiences were formative for Putin:

  1. Knowledge of the grinding guerrilla war in Afghanistan from other KGB officers or perhaps military officers
  2. The fall of Communism in East Germany in 1989
  3. The fall of Communism in the Soviet Union and its dissolution in 1991
  4. The First Chechen War from 1994 to 1996, which echoed the guerrilla warfare of Afghanistan


On that basis, I believe Putin is absolutely terrified of overthrow by popular protests and defeat by guerrillas. His policies certainly reflect these fears.