Greg Palast for BuzzFlash: How Billionaires Picked Putin as "Russia's Pinochet"
Vladimir Putin did not arrive from outer space on an abalone shell.
Putin went from the virtually unknown Deputy Mayor of St. Petersburg to Russias President and potentate by winning a weird competition organized by Russian billionaire Boris Berezovsky who sought a "Russian Pinochet" to succeed Boris Yeltsin as President.
The competition, dubbed "Operation Successor," went so far as to send Russias "Larry King," Mikhail Leontyev, to interview General Pinochet for Russian TV while Pinochet was under indictment in Chile on murder charges. Russians were treated to the old dictators advice on choosing a leader who could imitate Pinochets "strong hand," a police state, while promoting a hyper-capitalist economy.
And Putin fit the Pinochet profile.
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https://buzzflash.com/articles/greg-palast-for-buzzflash-how-billionaires-picked-putin-as-russias-pinochet
Oligarchs must pay for their treachery.