The death of Alexei Navalny: Putin, like Stalin, kills because he can

One can safely suspect that Vladimir Putin ordered the murder of Alexei Navalny? Obviously. This death occurs approximately twenty days before the “elections” in Russia in which the autocrat will seek a new mandate. It is almost a symbol of how the Kremlin autocrat understands power.

Navalny, a nationalist and rebel leader, was no longer a serious enemy for the Russian leader. Accused maliciously by a judicial system aligned with Moscow, They had transferred him to one of the prisons furthest from civilization, in the worst Siberia. Opposition allies, including his brother, had to flee the country or deactivate.

His death occurs in the style of the bloody dictatorship of Joseph Stalin, as a confirmation that the regime can just do it. Putin does not allow opponents. Not even those he defeated.

He acted similarly with the execution of the mercenary leader of the Wagner Group, Yevgeny Prigozhinwho in June 2023 had rebelled against the authority of the Russian Tsar and the direction of the war in Ukraine. He ended up dead along with his top lieutenants in August 2023 when his St. Petersburg-bound plane exploded in mid-air or was struck from the ground.

In the same month, but in 2020, Navalny appeared in Germany seriously ill after suffering possible poisoning, one of the classic procedures of the current Russian power against its adversaries.

AND extensive list of victims with this type of attack and very few survivors, including Navalny himself who was assisted until he recovered. Surprisingly, in January of the following year return to Russia knowing that he would be arrested with a load of fictitious complaints.

But the opposition leader, who had achieved centralization thanks to his strong denunciations of widespread corruption in the Kremlin structure, argued that it was not possible to fight the regime from the outside. He offered, more than virtually, to lose your life for the sake of that criterion of struggle. This is what happened now.

Putin moves in these ways at a time when Circumstances have turned in your favor, in the main theater of the occupation war launched two years ago against Ukraine. Both in the United States and in Europe Rejection is growing, doubts about support for Kiev, by Moscow’s allies, sympathizers or simple opportunists.

Former President Donald Trump, favorite to return to the White House in next November’s elections, already has enough parliamentary strength to cut down on aid that Joe Biden’s government demands for the tormented European country. The Democratic leader is convinced of the enormous cost that the defeat of Ukraine would have for the United States and of the precedent that would be created from that moment on.

Trump watches another movie and even claims that if the Kremlin were to advance militarily, he would prefer Russia to a NATO ally. Europe, in turn, does not have similar economic or military strength.

Within the bloc there are allies of Russia, such as the Hungarian ultranationalists Viktor Orban and, moreover, Germany is no longer the locomotive of that structure, whose economy is damaged, among other things, by the disappearance of the cheap energy that Russia itself provided in the past. It’s a serious moment. Navalny’s death is another example of this circumstance.