You have all the powers that Putin currently does. Everyone completely loyal to Putin is now loyal to you. Enemies of Putin are enemies of you. Putin no longer exists, and there has been a clean and absolute transfer of power to you. The economic, military, social and political situations are the same as they now are. You are not inhabiting Putin’s body, you are just you. You’re magically transferred to the Kremlin. The world at large doesn’t know your past life, to them you have magically appeared as the new ruler. To everyone who knew you before, you just vanished.
Edit: no one knows your past life YET. They’ll quickly figure it out. You will not lose any support based on your actions in your past life.
Try to learn Russian really quickly.
Blyat
You’re the president, just make English the official language. Now it’s their problem.
- Give Volodymyr a call
- Pull out of Ukraine and Georgia
- Hand over Putin to ICC
- Instruct the loyalists that democratic reform is coming, and nobody is to be given the window/tea treatment.
- Call Navalnys widow and tell her to prepare her political aparatus
- Announce an election in 6 months (should be enough to prepare everything, I guess?) with international observers encouraged to participate
- Realize that I have no fucking idea how to ensure that elections on that scale are free and fair, so I ask for assistance from aforementioned observers.
- Pull an epic prank on Lukashenko. Possibly involving potatoes.
- Realize that I am in no way fit to run a country, and start planning my (safe) exit. Once the election results are in I’ll be gone without a trace.
- Repeal putins laws
- Start releasing political prisoners
- Last thing I do before leaving is calling this guy named/called Misha whether he’s fine with Murmansk, or if he wants the city to have a new name.
- Get murdered somewhere around step 4 at the latest
Fortunately for OP, they didn’t use numbered bullets, so they’re safe!
Sounds like a good way to get a pro Putin oligarch elected. Even with fair elections they have a lot of support.
There will be an epidemic of falls through windows. It will affect oligarchs and will spare the population. There is a cure: leaving the country after having relinquished all your money to the government.
Oligarchs problem solved.
Sounds like how Stalin got his start. “If I just kill this small group of bad people things will be better.”
Oh no, the people who replaced them are corrupt too. Ok, this next wave of executions will surely send the right message.
“The murdering will continue until corruption decreases”
I think it’s a good plan. I either stop corruption or I run out of people (which technically will stop corruption too).
I mean, it kinda worked for him
They’ll try a coup
Only if I’m not fast enough spreading the pandemic
Nice try, Putin.
Just asking for a friend
Get the fuck out of Russia
Ideally, I’d call up Zelenskyy, ask if he wanted to hang out, have a beer and offer him the job.
Realistically, I’d be doomscrolling on Lemmy, have a wank, get drunk and go to bed.
Probably get assassinated if I’m being real
For starters:
Arrest Putin and all his enablers.
Stop all hostilities with Ukraine.
Return all prisoners.
Help rebuild Ukraine.
Develop Russia into what it can be. It’s the largest country in the world, lots of land and resources. Build it up responsibly and sustainably.
Recognize the positive achievements of Russia while trying to avoid past mistakes.
It’s the largest country in the world,
It’s a federation. You could balkanise Russia into dependencies.
Resign. I can’t handle that kind of responsibility
What are my goals? The same as Putin?
If yes: continue attrition fighting, but defensively. The goal is to stretch out ukraine losses past the point of western support. Keep offering varying “peace deals” that solidify the capture of oil and gas resources and access to the black sea. Claim the fighting will stop once the Russian territory is liberated (the captured oblasts). In the backroom arrange to let israel to start their middle east ground war, that will distract and drain support from Ukraine. Move the conscript soldiers to the Russian side of the north eastern border with Ukraine. Negotiate to get CIS volunteers as part of the defensive home guard.
If no: pull back troops to very defensive lines across rivers. Dig in. Don’t try to take any territory. Negotiate for return of some territory in exchange for crimea and total access to black sea, settle for crimea and a promise not to join NATO for 20 years.
Focus on energy export pipelines to Europe and China, try to pivot industrial base to post solar future. China is the biggest long term competitor, find a niche that is critical to Chinese interests like oil (negiotate with kz to be sole supplier)
Goal is whatever you want, but keep in mind if you erode your base of support you’ll likely be defenestrated.
In the second scenario, would you opt for less adversarial relations with the West? Would you try to maintain/rebuild the greatness of Russia?
Second scenario Is all about economic health. Can’t pay my cronies if we don’t have money! Russia’s diplomatic past, and its current position, requires an antagonistic relationship. It could be built out so it’s not necessary, but that would take a very long time, more than one generation. However, staged niceness could be negotiated for economic concessions or trade deals. The greatness of Russia would be an exercise in public relations, military victories are not necessary.
Can’t pay my cronies if we don’t have money!
Someone knows their keys to power
I’m not saying I’d demand a functional set of Doctor Doom armor, but I’m not saying I wouldn’t.
Probably shit my self.
Not because it’s scary or something, just because I have so much power that I can shit myself and no one would dare say anything.
I think i’m starting to understand dictators
Reminds me of an ‘elseworlds’ Batman story from a while ago.
Bats kills R’as al Ghul but realizes that Ghul’s evil empire is still operational. Batman takes the role of R’as, but sets it up so that all his top lieutenants take each other out. It takes a few years, but eventually the League of Assassins is a force for good in the world.
Something similar in Russia. Pit the worst of the worst against each other and let democracy prevail.
Do you happen to remember the name of it? It sounds good.
John Byrne wrote and illustrated.
The idea is that they start with the characters in 1939 [when they premiered] and move forward decade by decade. Supes stays young while Lois gets older; Robin takes over from Bruce.
It’s been a while, but that should be enough.
I would have ice cream for supper, that’s for sure. If I started getting fat, I’d start taking the new weight loss shots to trim down. I’d offer everyone in the country ice cream for supper and then I’d also offer them weight loss shots if they got fat from eating ice cream.
Finally! Someone who tackles the REAL issues!
I remove the nukes.
Aren’t you worried about invasion by China or the West?
yeah, “the west” is going to invade 🙄
I mean, if I were in charge of the US and I was certain the nukes were gone, I absolutely would. Can’t waste that opportunity. Put a puppet government in Moscow. Add some blue and white to the red square.
If Russia didn’t have nukes, I guarantee you they would have been invaded over their invasion of Ukraine. (Not that they would have done that without having nukes)
Immediately stop the war against Ukraine and pull back to the 1990s border, then enlist international experts to improve the country and peacefully integrate with the global community
How do you avoid a coup by the oligarchs?
I have all Putin’s powers, right? He seems very capable of having anyone bothering him arrested and tried for something at the least. I think I would arrest a handful of the most prominent complainers and show the rest their option B.
True. You also have control of the state media.
Would you be worried about other nations trying to take advantage of your perceived weakness?
If you can successfully build strong relationship in international community…
I would listen to the international experts that i gathered and generally follow their recommendations on how to do that
