25 years of Vladimir Putin: When Boris Yeltsin resigned and asked his PM to ‘take care of Russia’

Vladimir Putin became the Acting President of Russia on December 31, 1999.

Boris Yeltsin, the then-President of Russia, resigned on the New Year’s Eve after eight years of being in office. The presidency passed to his Putin, who was the Prime Minister of Russia at the time. The moment capped the meteoric rise of Putin in Russia’s politics — he began his career just six years back in 1993.

Months later, Putin was elected to a full term as the President of Russia in March 2000. Since then, he has been the leader of Russia and has transformed not just his nation but Europe and global politics. While he faced challenges in the beginning and political instability, Putin soon firmed up his rule and systematically rooted out all dissent, political opposition, and critical activism in the coming years.

By the time his second term ended in 2008, Putin was on his way establish one-man rule in Russia.

Even though Putin is now synonymous with Russia and has more power than Russian tsars or Soviet dictators before him, he had a very unconventional start. Unlike his ally Xi Jinping, the President-for-Life of China, Putin was neither a princeling nor trained for decades in politics. Instead, he was an agent in Russia’s feared secret service KGB, which is now known as FSB.

Russia entered new century & new millennium with new leader

Yeltsin’s resignation and anointment of Putin as the successor was as symbolic as it was historic.

Russia entered the new year, new century, and new millennium with a new leader. The transition from Yeltsin to Putin was also a generational shift in Russian politics. Putin was 21 years younger than Yeltsin.

Yelstin had met Putin along with Patriarch Alexy II of Russian Orthodox Church before announcing the resignation on television.

Acknowledging the moment’s gravity, Yeltsin said in a broadcast that shocked Russia and the world that as Russians would “see a magical date on our calendars, the year 2000, a new century, a new millennium” in a few hours, they would also see a new leader.

Announcing his resignation, Yeltsin said he came to the decision to leave office on “the last day of the departing century” after he had “pondered long and painfully”.

“Russia should enter the new millennium with new politicians, new faces, new people who are intelligent, strong and energetic, while we, those who have been in power for many years, must leave,” said Yeltsin.

Rejecting the charge that he was leaving over poor health, Yeltsin said that there were many reasons for his departure, but he indicated the main reason was to make way for a new generation of leaders.

“I am leaving now. I have done everything I could. I am not leaving for health reasons, but for a multitude of reasons. A new generation is taking my place, a generation of people who can do more and better,” said Yeltsin.

Naming Putin as the acting head of state until elections in the upcoming year, Yeltsin called him a “strong leader” with whom the nation had great hopes.

“I must not stand in the way of that logical progression. Why cling to power for six more months when the country has a strong leader who can be its president, a man on whom nearly all Russians are pinning their hopes for the future? Why stand in his way? Why wait another half year? That is not for me,” said Yeltsin.

As he departed, Yeltsin’s final words as president to Putin were: “Take care of Russia.”

Putin’s journey from KGB to Russia’s leader

Putin wanted to join the Soviet secret service KGB from boyhood. He was inspired by the film ‘The Sword and the Shield’ (1968).

In 1968, Putin went to the local KGB office and asked for a job at the age of 16. He was asked to return after studying law. He returned to apply six years later after completing an undergraduate degree in law at Leningrad State University and was accepted.

Starting in 1975, Putin would serve in the KGB till 1990 when he would resign at the rank of lieutenant colonel.

While details about his KGB service are scarce, there are some widely known details. He is known to have worked in counter-intelligence activities and some accounts say he was also involved in the surveillance of Soviet dissidents. When the Fall of Berlin Wall in 1989, Putin was stationed in Dresden in East Germany.

As per widely reported accounts, Putin watched from the KGB headquarters in Dresden as people stormed the headquarters of Stasi, the East Germany’s secret police. He warned off the mob as it approached the KGB facility. Later, when he requested tank squad from help, he was informed that there would be no intervention without Moscow’s authorisation which would never come.

Putin returned to Russia after seeking retirement in 1990 just as Soviet Union was disintegrating. He entered politics at St. Petersburg.

Over the next decade, Putin would demonstrate political acumen while luck would also favour him — as it did in St. Petersburg.

When he returned to Russia, the Mayor of St. Petersburg was Anatoly Sobchak, one of his teachers at university. Putin joined him as an adviser and worked his way to become Deputy Mayor in 1994. Two years later, he moved to Moscow.

In 1996, Putin joined the presidential administration as a deputy to Pavel Borodin, the Kremlin’s chief administrator. His rise at Kremling was rapid — much more rapid than at St. Petersburg.

In 1998, Putin appointed him as the head of FSB, the successor agency of KGB that he was part of for 15 years. Soon, he was elevated to be the Secretary of the Security Council.

Then, in August 1999, Yeltsin appointed Putin as the Prime Minister of Russia. Months later, on the New Year’s Eve, he became the Acting President of Russia.

Putin starts as a strongman amid war

Even though he was practically unknown, Putin soon organised a military campaign against separatists in the autonomous province of Chechnya that won him public approval even before he became the acting president.

In a midnight address after becoming acting president, Putin said set the tone for his reign.

“Any attempt to exceed the limits of law and the Russian constitution will be decisively crushed,” said Putin.

The situation in Chechnya would continue to prop troubles in initial years as terrorist attacks in the forms of bombings and hostage-taking continued. However, Putin retained popular support as Russians sought economic stability above all and the economy continued to perform well.

A key driver of his popularity was his harsh rhetoric and scorched earth policy. At one point, Putin said he would wipe out whom he called enemy “even in the toilet”.

In the Chechnya campaign, he ordered a full-scale land invasion that left the capital Grozny devastated, leading to the United Nations (UN) to call Grozny the most destroyed place on Earth. Even after the Russian military bulldozed through the province to acquire its control, an insurgency went on for nearly a decade more until it largely ebbed. Even as several thousands were killed and cities destroyed, Putin emerged as a staunch Russian nationalist strongman.

Stronger than tsars, more influential than Soviet rulers

Putin transformed Russia from a multi-party electoral polity to a one-man county.

To firm up his position, Putin reshaped the Russian polity. Politically, he presided over a campaign to root out all opponents over the next decade. He either jailed or exiled oligarchs whom he did not like. He also propped new oligarchs and warlords. He renationalised the economy to the extent that the Russian state at one point controlled 70 per cent of the economy. Her also curtailed the power of regional governors and instituted top-down centralised governance.

Putin also cracked down on media freedoms. He either shut down outlets or forced them to leave the country.

When Putin reached the constitutional limit of two consecutive presidential terms, he became the prime minister in 2008 and a loyalist, Dmitry Medvedev, became the president. In 2012, Putin returned as president for a six-year term after the parliament, which he had by then shaped into a body of yes-men, extended the four-year term. He was re-elected in 2018. In 2020, he got the constitution amended allowing him to run for two-more terms, making way for him to be Russia’s leader till 2036.

By then, Putin had reshaped Russia into his image and eliminated all critics and opposition leaders. Those who did not surrender or go into exile were killed. Boris Nemtsov, an opposition leader who led protests against Putin in 2011, was shot dead in 2015.

Alexei Navalny, the most notable critic of Putin, was attacked with a nerve agent in 2020 while he was incarcerated as part of crackdown on the last remnants of political opposition. He was airlifted to Germany for treatment and survived. He was arrested on his return in 2021 and died in jail earlier this year. The death as well as the previous failed nerve agent poisoning are widely believed to be staged at the behest of Putin.

By 2020, Putin’s control of Russia was absolute. He had also flexed his muscles in Europe, invading Giorgia in 2008 and invading Ukraine in 2014 and annexing the province of Crimea in 2014. He would also go on to turn Belarus into a satellite state.

Driven by a desire to restore the glory of Soviet Union, Putin made it clear that he considered eastern Europe as his sphere of influence. As Ukraine did not become a satellite state like Belarus and embraced the West as Russia continued subversive activities, Putin ordered the invasion of the nation in February 2022. The intention was to capture Kyiv, kill President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and establish a puppet regime.

By invading Ukraine, Putin mounted the biggest war in Europe since the World War II and plunged Europe in the biggest security crisis since World War II.

As Putin enters the 26th year as Russia’s leader, he stands more powerful than Russia’s autocratic tsars or Soviet dictators the likes of Stalin ever were. As a friendly figure, Donald Trump, is set to be the President of United States, he is looking forward to wrapping the war on Ukraine in his favour with Trump’s support.