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There is "no question" that Russian President Vladimir Putin used a body double to appear at the Kremlin leader's latest public engagement in the wake of the Wagner Group armed rebellion, one expert has told Newsweek.
Following the Wagner Group of mercenaries' aborted military rebellion and advance towards Moscow on Saturday, Putin appeared before adoring crowds in the southern Russian republic of Dagestan for what the Kremlin said was a visit to discuss tourism in the region.
But footage from Putin's trip quickly reignited long-running rumors that the Kremlin leader was using a body double rather than greeting citizens himself. In clips widely circulating online on Thursday, Putin shakes hands with excited members of the public and kisses a schoolgirl on the head as she poses for a photo alongside the Russian leader.
Western journalists questioned the behavior displayed in the clips, as did prominent Russian nationalist military bloggers such as Igor Girkin.
Moscow has denied that Putin uses body doubles, with Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov dismissing reports as "yet another lie" in April. Back in 2020, Putin told state news agency Tass that he had been offered the use of stand-ins for public appearances in the early 2000s, but he "declined these body doubles." There has been no concrete proof to show Putin has used stand-ins.
However, the marked departure from Putin's observed patterns is "extraordinary," according to Matthew Wyman, a senior lecturer in politics specializing in Russia at the U.K.'s Keele University.
"There is no question that that was not Vladimir Putin," he told Newsweek on Thursday. "That was a body double."
It is "totally inconceivable" that the Russian leader would carry out an engagement in person just days after the stability of his rule was threatened by Wagner, Wyman said.
"You are not going to put yourself in any groups of unfamiliar people at all," he said.
Long-time Putin ally and head of the Wagner Group of mercenaries, Yevgeny Prigozhin, led an advance towards Moscow after his fighters seized control of the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don. Although his fighters abruptly stopped more than 100 miles from the capital, Western politicians and analysts said Saturday's events showed "cracks" in the Kremlin's leadership.
Wyman pointed to marked differences in Putin's demeanor compared with previous outings.
"In all sorts of ways, Putin just does not act like that," he said, adding his body language in the clips coming out of Dagestan do not match up to the past behaviors of a "man who does not show emotion publicly."
There were some observable changes to his behavior, particularly his "openness when it comes to dealing with the crowd," agreed Marina Miron, a post-doctoral researcher in the Department of War Studies at King's College London.
"This is probably the main reason why these 'double' theories started appearing," she told Newsweek on Thursday.
Putin is "highly, highly cautious about who he lets near him," Wyman added.
Multiple reports have previously said that, throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Putin put strict quarantine measures in place to protect himself from the risk of infection. Earlier this year, a former senior Russian security officer said that the Kremlin leader "surrounds himself with an impenetrable barrier of quarantines."
"Putin is not known to let anyone close to him (since the COVID-19 pandemic), and here we see him taking selfies with normal people," Miron said.
In the footage, Putin appears "much stiffer and much more controlled in the way that he moves" than in other clips, Wyman argued.
Although he declined to discuss the specifics of how such a likeness to the Russian leader could be achieved, Wyman said the strategy around appearing in public, and in Dagestan, makes little sense.
"The whole thing does not compute at any level," he said.
Several theories have circulated in recent years, including that Putin has multiple stand-ins. Ukrainian officials have repeatedly said the Kremlin leader uses body doubles, with Andriy Yusov, a spokesperson for Kyiv's military intelligence agency, saying in an interview earlier in June that Putin "would never talk to alleged local residents."
"We know specifically about three people that keep appearing, but how many there are, we don't know," Ukrainian military intelligence chief, Kyrylo Budanov, told The Daily Mail in October 2022 of Putin's apparent encounters with members of the public.
"Gesturing, body language and earlobes" give away the body doubles, Budanov said.
But while the person in Dagestan on Thursday "of course, could be a double," Miron said, Putin may also be "keen to show that he is not afraid to let his guard down and to reinforce his public image."
"Whether or not he used a double to do this, is impossible to tell," and he may have "decided to act in a different way to seem more down-to-earth," Miron argued.
The Kremlin is likely hoping to "rather desperately" present an image of "work carrying on exactly as normal" following the mutiny, Wyman said.
"He came out victorious out of this debacle and now he's trying to regain support," Miron said.
Newsweek has reached out to the Kremlin for comment via email.
About the writer
Ellie Cook is a Newsweek security and defense reporter based in London, U.K. Her work focuses largely on the Russia-Ukraine ... Read more