On Sunday, May 24, 2026, a detailed investigative report exposed a massive, quiet shift in the mood behind the Kremlin walls. As the war in Ukraine drags on and the domestic economy slides into a severe downturn, interviews with intelligence officials and Russian billionaires reveal that the initial loyalty to the president has completely evaporated. Instead, a terrifying consensus is forming among the elite, proving exactly why Putin’s closest allies are secretly praying for his demise as the only realistic way to save the country from a total self-destructive collapse.
The Illusion of Total Control
In early May, the Kremlin released carefully staged footage of Vladimir Putin driving a casual SUV and warmly hugging his childhood schoolteacher in Moscow.
The video was a direct attempt to debunk Western intelligence reports claiming Putin was hiding in a deep underground bunker, paralyzed by paranoia over assassination plots and a military coup. While a violent street coup remains highly unlikely, intelligence officials confirm that Putin is more isolated than ever, surrounded by a deeply disillusioned political and business class.
Prominent Russian business leaders admit that any sense of a stable future has completely vanished, with one insider noting that people who used to fiercely defend Putin have completely stopped doing so.
The System Runs on Lies
If you ask me, Vladimir Putin has built a political engine fueled entirely by fake news and terror, and it is finally running out of gas. For 25 years, he functioned as the ultimate boss who kept the oligarchs rich and the public quiet. But now, he has broken the fundamental social contract that kept him in power. He told ordinary Russians they could ignore the war as long as daily life was stable. Today? Inflation is skyrocketing, taxes are up, and the powerful second service of the FSB has literally shut down the mobile internet across central Moscow to stop drone strikes, costing local businesses billions of rubles.
The most ridiculous part of this entire tragedy is that Putin is operating in a complete information vacuum. His own generals and ministers are deliberately feeding him fake, rosy reports claiming a massive military breakthrough in the Donbas is just weeks away. Why? Because in Putin’s Russia, if you tell the truth, you get thrown out of a window or arrested, just like former Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu’s top associates. The generals lie to keep their jobs, and Putin believes the lies and orders. No one is going to march an army on the Kremlin; they are far too terrified. They are simply sitting in their mansions, watching the country turn into a nuclear-armed North Korea, quietly praying that the old man’s health fails before the entire nation collapses.
The Broken Promises and Broken Web
The domestic situation inside Russia has dramatically deteriorated over the first few months of 2026, sparking unprecedented public anger. The FSB’s severe crackdown on messaging apps and regional internet access has caused massive disruptions, prompting Kremlin insiders to bitterly joke that Russia is now closer to North Korea than Europe. According to state-backed pollsters, Russia’s general happiness index fell to an absolute 15-year low in April, with independent data showing Putin’s approval ratings hitting their lowest point since the 2022 invasion.
The widespread optimism in Moscow that a Donald Trump presidency would force Ukraine into a quick surrender has completely evaporated. With Europe unblocking a massive €90 billion loan to Kyiv, Russia realizes the war will not be ended by Washington backchannels.
A Downward Trend to Nowhere
Ultimately, Vladimir Putin remains in absolute bureaucratic control of the state, and his obsession with capturing the entirety of the Donbas region before the end of the year has not changed. But his power no longer rests on respect or strategic genius; it rests entirely on momentum and fear. As exiled billionaire Oleg Tinkov bluntly summarized, the elite have realized that trying to stop Putin is suicide. They have accepted the downward spiral, abandoned all long-term planning, and are simply waiting for nature to take its course.
