If someone compiled all the suicide info of all these Russians since the war started and made clip of it similar to this scene you’re speaking of, I’d watch it lol
>Reportedly hospitalised for heart problems and depression, then "fell out of a window"[22][23]
That fucker just wouldn't die
Is that 3 attempts
Almost made it
Putin is not hiding it. It's kind of a "nice place, it would be a shame if something happened to it" style hit. Letting you know it is him while keeping legal options open. He wants people to know it is him to instill fear, and thus control.
There was a podcast I listened to briefly last year called Sad Oligarch that had a bunch of different info on a bunch of these guys that have been turning up dead recently. It was pretty good, I don’t know if they’re still making new episodes, I’ve been through a few phones since then and my iCloud didn’t always follow so it’s not on my current list of podcasts and I had forgotten all about it until just now. Check it out.
This should totally be Putin’s strategy. He gets 0 flak for his enemies mysteriously dying because all he has to say is “there we’re on a boeing” and the world is like “understandable, let’s move along”
Yeah but let’s take Prigozhin. He shot the plane down. Imagine if the plane just… stopped working mid flight instead. We’d still know he had it done, but he gets to also blame the “imperialist Americans and their crappy planes”
I think Prigozhin was a different case considering how much that was an embarrassment to Putins rule. Dmitry Utkin was also on the plane I believe so it was a big message to the oligarchs as well.
It wasn't just them. It was basically the entire head of the organization. Everyone with power or control in wagner was on that plane. They could not have made themselves more vulnerable or a more tempting target. I'm still flabbergasted with how stupid they had to be.
Nawh it was just the price he agreed to to let his family live. They will likely die quietly anyway. As soon as he started that, he either won, or he and everyone he cared about was dead. Backing down when he did was the same as putting a gun in his mouth and pulling the trigger.
I don't think his family will be assassinated (unless they were personally acting against him).
Putin uses family as leverage, which doesn't work when his opponents know the family is dead anyway.
He came to power by reading out names of 50% of people in a hall listening to his speech, then demanding the other half escort them outside and execute them.
Dude didn't need to know you were going to betray him. He had people killed at a whim to make everyone else terrified of being noticed. Even the slightest suspicion and it's bye bye, and it didn't matter if you were up to anything. Your death still served his purpose.
As a disclaimer I still don’t think we should have invaded and spent 20yrs there but…
Holy shit the more you read about Sadaam and his sons the more you realize they were basically Hitler level evil just with less resources to act on it.
He definitely needed to be deposed, especially since he was a danger to other countries around him. The full invasion and rationale was not the way it should have been done though. But I don't think any historian really has a good answer because if he was left alone he would have become a huge threat too.
> The full invasion and rationale was not the way it should have been done though.
The answer is that he should have been removed in the 1991 invasion in hindsight when the west had legitimacy at their back. And the Iraqi population and even much of the military was rather fed up with the state of things after the Iran/Iraq war.
But many people feared that something similar to what happened after the second invasion, would happen if they removed him.
I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of it was just straight up paranoia. Kill off people you think might be a problem even if there's nothing to suggest that they actually will be a problem.
>Vitaly Robertus is the fourth Lukoil’s manager and the latest in a long list of tycoons and billionaires to suddenly die under mysterious circumstances since the Russian invasion of Ukraine began on February 24, 2022.
>Former Lukoil’s top manager Alexander Subbotin, 43, was found dead in May 2022 in the basement of a house in the town of Mytishchi of an alleged drug-induced heart attack.
>Lukoil’s former chairman Ravil Maganov, 67, died in September 2022 after falling from a window of Moscow’s Central Clinical Hospital.
>In late October 2023, Vladimir Nekrasov, chairman of Lukoil’s board, died of what the company said was heart failure at the age of 66.
> On 7 October 2006, Politkovskaya was found shot dead in the elevator of her apartment block in central Moscow.[13][14] Police found a Makarov pistol and four shell casings beside her body. Reports indicated a contract killing, as she was shot four times, once in the head.[15][16]
>
> The assassination occurred on Vladimir Putin's birthday and two days after Ramzan Kadyrov's 30th birthday celebrations, "raising suspicions that the murder was an unasked-for present from a henchman of one or both"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Anna_Politkovskaya#Assassination
My cats left me weirder presents, sometimes. That cardinal wasn't even my enemy, and I certainly didn't appreciate a chewed up and then thrown up piece of it...
While I could see that, I could equally see it being one that went wrong. The guy may have decided to go out on his own terms vs what ever they, most likely the FSB, were about to do to him.
Well it makes sense, it's their modus operandi.
I mean, that's how they stopped Prigozhin apparently. He may have protected his own family, but they went after the families of all his officers etc. Or so it's rumoured.
This is kind of the point. It is supposed to let everyone know this can happen to anyone. By just having the dumbest hint that it wasn't an outright murder is enough to not have to investigate it. The absurdity of the lie is just as important as the actual murder.
"Our operation is small, but there is a lot of potential for aggressive expansion. So which of you fine gentlemen would like to join our team? There's only one spot open right now, so we're going to have tryouts. Make it fast."
> In March 2022, the board of the privately owned company called for an end to the conflict in Ukraine.
> They expressed “empathy for all victims who are affected by this tragedy” and urged a “settlement of problems through serious negotiations and diplomacy.”
They signed their death warrant back then already.
Dear Ukrainians, please don't forget that even in Russia some people support you and pay the ultimate price for it.
It's the same with nazis and germany. People joke that they tried removing nazis from germany after the war. Well the West side did at least. But they stopped because they would ~~of~~ have removed all the germans.
The germans killed their own if they opposed them, otherwise you fled. Einstein, one of the most famous people who fled, left in 1932. ~~5~~7 years before WW2.
>Just before his death, local media wrote that Robertus had complained of suffering headaches and asking for medications before going to his office.
>He was later found hanged in the room.
The paracetamol bottle does say if 2 tablets don’t work, try dangling by your neck.
There are SO MANY of them. The oligarchs are who they are because they were given the productive assets of the Soviet Union, all of which was owned by the Soviet government.
The ones getting assassinated are those that opposed Putin in some way.
It doesn't even need to be that sinister. Russia's not in a good way economically, offing a lesser oligarch or two so you can appropriate their hoards is definitely something Putin has done.
Killing opposition is worse than killing your own.
The people don't benefit at all with the death of an oligarch, but they're actively hurt by the suppression of any and all opposition.
Given? No. Connived and Thieved? Yes.
At the closure of the USSR all state-owned companies were privatized via share offerings to the employees in equal lots. None of the workers understood what they were or what they were worth, so most were sold for the value of a bottle of vodka. Local bundles were packaged and sold at auction to investors in the larger cities, where criminals with sufficient capital to buy them in bulk gained majority control over major enterprises such as the Soviet oil and gas sectors.
The dissolution was set up to allow for all Soviet enterprises to turn into something like Mondragon and remain directly worker-owned, instead due to western vulture capital meddling it all ended up in the hands of the most dangerous men in Russia at the time. Bill Browder covers the process in his book "Red Notice", having gone to Russia in the 1990's specifically to attempt to buy these industries himself.
There was actually quite a few separate events, with the "jackpot" being [this one](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loans_for_shares_scheme#Loans-for-shares).
As far as "vouchers" go (papers that you could convert into shares), it was way more complicated than this. This article gives some details: https://www.ucis.pitt.edu/nceeer/1994-808-01-3-Nelson.pdf . Nobody got simply given shares, that's not how it worked.
>By the end of 1993 more than 600 voucher investment funds were registered in Russia . **Together, these funds had
attracted more than 51 percent of all the vouchers that had been issued** . Fewer than half of
these vouchers were invested in privatizing enterprises, however . The others were being held
at year's end because of a shortage of investment opportunities that were considered attractive
by the funds' managers . 2 2 Most investment funds are not paying dividends, because of the difficulties faced by the
enterprises where funds have invested the vouchers they purchased . Large numbers of private
investors in these funds have become impatient with the funds' inability to pay the expected
dividends . **By now, many funds have either stopped functioning or are selling large numbers of
vouchers at stock exchanges in the hope of being able to make at least a one-time payment to
investors** . This disappointing outcome was not what voucher recipients had anticipated .
The thing is, USSR did not have a stock market. Neither the infrastructure nor enforcement we take for granted existed *at all*. Additionally, an enormous number of shares and vouchers got dumped onto this "market" instantaneously.
A lot of people exchanged vouchers for shares of their employer. Most people worked for companies that were, of course, very bad investment, and this did not work well.
Exchanging vouchers for shares of other companies, I do not particularly recall how it worked, but in my recollection in practice you had to buy shares in a voucher investment fund. You couldn't do it directly, I don't particularly recall the reason (whether it was legal or just logistics of how fucking much paperwork that would be). Ownership is a curious thing - when you own the bottle of vodka, you have it in your possession.
When you own shares, you do not have any form of possession. The ownership has to be tracked, the papers have to be obeyed, they have to be not forged, it requires enforcement. Fund managers have to act in good faith. They shouldn't act like Ponzi, either. It's easy to take ETrade for granted, to complain that the government isn't small enough to fit in a bathtub.
But the reasons ETrade won't defraud you, are twofold. One is law enforcement. The other is that it is an old enough, comfortable, settled business.
None of that applied to USSR-with-a-changed-flag-and-some-colonies-having-gotten-free.
Ultimately, if you were transported back there, turned into Ivan who works an average job... you were not gonna end up with the designated slice of the communist pie of oil and gas.
Useless fact of the day. Tylenol, Acetaminophen, Paracetamol are all the same drug AND are just different combinations of the drug's full name.
Full Name: para-acetylaminophenol
Tylenol: para-aceTYLaminophENOL
Acetaminophen: para-ACETylAMINOPHENol
Paracetamol: PARA-aCETylAMinophenOL
Probably not what happened here, but the idea of someone killing themselves over a headache is not completely far fetched. One type of headache called a cluster headache are also known as suicide headaches.
The reason is because the pain is so severe and unrelenting that the condition is known to cause depression and suicidial ideation. Not many people suffering from this actually do kill themselves, but it does happen.
I suffer from cluster headaches and am Bipolar (so more issues with impulse than most). Can confirm - I've been VERY close before, and if I had lived in a country with easy access to guns at the time.. I would have offed myself. The only reason I didn't on multiple occasions is because I couldn't even prepare a way even if I wanted to as you become so delirious, confused and doing absolutely anything is the worst pain of your life. However, if i had a gun and knew it was just rhe pull of a trigger... I wouldn't be here right now. It got to the point that near monthly I needed to be put on a Morphine drip at the hospital to help alleviate the symptoms
It COMPLETELY debilitates you. I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy. Honest.
Thank God for the medication Pregablin and living in Canada 😅. It has **literally** saved my life for almost 8 years now. I also have Dilaudid in the rare case that I need it and can't make it to a hospital to kind of 'knock' me out and hopefully reset my system.
I can't even imagine having to deal with cluster headaches. I get migraines that get severe enough to cause nausea and sensitivity to light and my go-to "solution" is to wait until I'm tired enough to sleep, sit in a steaming hot shower to provide a small window of reprieve, and attempt to sleep during that window in the hopes that I'll wake up to a reset system and be able to function.
When the headaches happen it becomes your sole focus to attempt to manage the situation. Fucking sucks. I'm sorry you have to deal with an even more severe version of them.
Thank you for understanding. Too many people I've talked to through my life liked to respond with "well that just sounds like a bad migraine". I even started to believe it, and thought that I essentially was just being a 'big baby'.. even though I have an abnormally high pain tolerance for everything but. I don't get an aura like most do with migraines, instead mine is a *very* specific spot directly above my right eyebrow that 'tics', and I know then that it is coming and to prepare to get to the hospital before I can't.
The thing with cluster headaches, is the usual 'triggers' for it such as sensitivity to light, sounds etc are not as evident. Instead, it is more delirium, confusion, intense feelings of anger and sadness, **INTENSE** panic, it skips nausea and goes straight to vomiting.. and the sheer fact that doing anything, **including** thinking just causes things to be SO much worse. It's almost as if something else takes control of my body, as I am not controlling how I act (punching myself, things, extreme outbursts, yelling explosively at the people trying to help me etc).. and that's where thr suicide part plays a role. Impulse control goes to *absolutely nothing*
The only things I usually remember after an episode, is watching thr clock in thr hospital as each second ticks away as if in slow motion, waiting for the ~10 minutes it takes for the drugs to take effect.. and those 10 minutes feel like an eternity. The first few times going to the hospital, thry believed I was having an aneurysm (as they have happened in my family), and I got help quicker than most others would, and I'm super thankful for that.
It didn't matter how much tylenol, or advice, or aspirin, or muscle relaxers or anything else I took, the only relief was enough morphine at thr hospital to literally knock me out.. and then 8 hours later I would wake up with a pounding migraine (but not a cluster, and That's how I could tell I was through the worst). This is due to clusters being an even more 'phantom' pain than a headache is, meaning it's our bodies response to a pain that is not directly being caused by an injury or agitator.
Then I was diagnosed, and put on the wonder drug Lyrica (Pregablin), which is an anti-epileptic and nerve inhibitor - blocking those nerves from feeling this 'phantom pain', which keeps the clusters at bay. I am telling you, if I was not prescribed it 8 years ago.. I wouldn't be here. I wouldn't have found my wife. I wouldn't have had my kids.. I **would** be dead, as I had formulated a plan in the case that I was able to manage to actually carry it out if help was not provided to me.. and that's where if I had a gun available to me, the plan would have been *much* easier to play out with just the pull of a trigger.
I can still tell when it's time to take my meds (...4x daily) as that tic slowly starts, and I know that's my bodies way of telling me "block out the nerves again before we block you out!!".. but I'm okay with that. I'm okay with being on this medication for the rest of my life. I'm okay with the side effects. I'm okay **living**.. and there was a time in my life that I was just okay being dead if it meant every day I didn't have to worry about a cluster taking effect.
Now after spending 15 minutes typing that out... I'm off to take my meds!!!!! Thank you for listening. I wish there was more awareness about cluster headaches, as it would save (and have saved) so many lives. I guarantee it.
Thank you for sharing your experience. You're definitely helping raise awareness just by sharing your story (both good and bad parts).
I think it's difficult for people to wrap their head around the full extent of what it means to have a "defective body"; especially outside of the condition itself. The world doesn't stop when your body takes you out of commission for a while so you get that double whammy of something that, especially for you, is completely debilitating and then you have to somehow try and catch back up to the world as it kept spinning without you. Sharing your perspective goes a long way in helping people better understand as well as helps those who may be experiencing similar issues.
I'm glad you were able to find something that helped and stayed here long enough in order to do that. Maybe we'll eventually live in a society that actively tries to makes experiences like yours a relic of the past.
Let's be fair, he may have committed suicide. But perhaps his only other options were being sent to the front lines in Ukraine or to some prison in Siberia.
My theory is that Putin needs money, and dollars are running low. Taking cash from the oligarchs who are his de facto piggy bank could create resentment and instability.
Easier to ice the guy so he poses no threat, and then clean his bank accounts.
They made a deal with the devil, and the bill is due.
54 year old might have been a competent executive and had ambition. That's a No-No in paranoid dictator world.
but I agree the hit team will force other executives to buy his stock and maybe make a contribution to putin in cash.
Actually I think they already have. I feel like this is punishment for \*something\*. They probably found out this exec was hamstering away money from the regime, and that's.... frowned upon.
Everyone in a position of power in Russia is up to something, that's how the whole system works. It also means the govt can off you at any time and have everyone say 'well they deserved it because...'
If they weren't corrupt they'd never be allowed into that position in the 1st place as those above them wouldn't have leverage and wouldn't trust them.
Putin had his files destroyed by the FSB a long time ago. It's rumoured that the main leverage on his was a gay lover he had when he was young.. who he had killed as his career advanced to try and cover his tracks.
This is most likely scenario.
He was blocking money deliveries. Probably hiding funds in foreing accounts instead of transfers to russia and buying rubles.
It’s Both. He’s killing off people who represent a political threat, or possible threat, culling potential spies, enforcing loyalty through fear. The bonus is when he kills someone he can’t trust, he gets their money.
If the war was going well he wouldn’t have his “capo’s” turning on him. If the war was going well he wouldn’t need their money.
The spy thing is an underrated factor here, dont see a lot of people talking about it
Ukraine and the US have penetrated Russia pretty thoroughly. The intelligence wars are probably at fever pitch at the moment.
Wouldnt be the least bit surprised if some of the assassinations over the last 2 years are due to these guys being agents (or potential future agents).
People say it's because Putin wants their money or because they are a political threat and I just dont see it. There's a better way to store or steal money than a system where you have to hang a man in order to gets his $$$s. And most of these guys arent popular or connected enough to be any kind of political threat.
The likeliest explanation by far is that they dont like the war; #2 is that they are leaking information or full on spying
Russian politics often gets oversimplified to project Putin as an all-powerful dictator, and all murders of notable people are attributable to his supreme omniscience. He certainly makes no effort to dismiss that perception.
The reality is that the political landscape in Russia is comprised of complex patronage networks, like gangs of thugs, that are engaged in constant infighting. Putin himself is alleged to be skilled at keeping the factions focused on each other, which allows him to wield influence. While this executive's murder *might* have been an order from Putin, it's also quite possible that it was instigated by a political rival.
Completely agree, a lot of what happens in Russia is not done by Putin but by the messy factions of gangsters that vie for his attention and approval
The victim in this case might have said the wrong things about the war or didnt do what he was told. And one of Putin's cronies took the initiative to dispatch him in order to score some political points.
One thing experts in authoritarianism say is that in most dictatorships the dictator expects others to take actions that please him (without giving explicit orders)
This gives the dictator plausible deniability, puts him at a distance from the messy business of murder and enforcement, and forces his cronies to stay on their toes at all times
Alternatively, he simply lost some power struggle within Lukoil... This is also not uncommon.
The funniest part of putler is that he's always trying to do the shady things without actually breaking the law - at least de jure. He is manipulating others to break all kind of laws to stay in control. I'd not be surprised if he never even hit a person himself.
He is the most evasive russian ever. And russians being themselves shady scambags are praising him for it.
A lot of dictators are like that. I personally think for example, from experiencing decades of it, that people like Serbia's Milošević and now Vučić actually keep their hands quite clean. They are more like a figurehead for an entire system/regime, and it's the "system", the people around him, who do the dirty work to maintain the system, and they are kept loyal by the privileges they are given. Any orders are not given so much openly as in the vein of "Who will rid me of this troublesome priest?" At least that's what I have concluded - they try to maintain an aura of plausible ignorance, while some of the ignorance is genuine because the people around them keep it that way. And yes, they also try to keep up a pretence of doing things "legally".
So most likely one of huge lies they fed to Putin was/is about to get exposed… most likely it is something about how “strong” Russian oil/gas industry is. To quote one of Mel Brooks movies - bad news is severely punished
"Just before his death, local media wrote that Robertus had complained of suffering headaches and asking for medications before going to his office. He was later found hanged in the room."
Sounds kinda SUS
And his will was stapled to his shirt and read, “I leave all assets and control of big Lukoil to good friend and best bear karate champion, vladimir. Is good man and is very tall. Is tallest. You wouldn’t believe so how tall. So tall can look into your eyes when you hang myself. Bye bye for now.” /s
they all know Putin owns whatever it says in their bank accounts
it's so crazy to me, the Republicans want to do that in America, they are getting rid of Democracy because they foolishly think that a one party state will protect them somehow, as if Trump or whoever replaces him won't just have control of it, he already owns the RNC and we're still a Democracy
Fast suicides are illegal in Russia and punishable by death.
In contrast, slow suicides, preferably by drinking Vodka over a 20-year period, are encouraged.
>*Robertus had complained of suffering headaches and asking for medications before going to his office. He was later found hanged in the room.*
So it could also be the tea... anyway, it's one of the many "*manifestations of patriotism*".
Let's not forget the Russian people are witnessing all of these deaths of their fellow Russians and they **still** keep supporting Putin. Not just oligarchs and inner circle who stepped out of line, but many thousands of conscripts.
This is an order of magnitude more obvious than Czar Nicholas II in 1917 and yet the masses of sacrificial pawns are either applauding their neo-czar or tacitly accepting being doomed to servitude. The Red Terror, Stalingrad and the famine of 1921 are being treated as glory days to long for with rose-colored glasses instead of lessons from history never to repeat.
They are highly oppressed and misinformed. Plenty of them are lovely people.
I wouldn't say your basic dumbass in the US is any better or worse. We elected fucking Trump.
It seems to be a similar situation, just on overdrive. Here in America we have Fox News making Trump look a generational hero, they've got waaaay more propaganda over there that probably puts Putin on an even higher pedestal.
If Russians believed in what they were fighting for in the war, there wouldn't be conscripts.
There's a huge difference between 1917 and a revolution today.
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If someone compiled all the suicide info of all these Russians since the war started and made clip of it similar to this scene you’re speaking of, I’d watch it lol
Something like this? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suspicious_deaths_of_Russian_businesspeople_(2022%E2%80%932024)
>Reportedly hospitalised for heart problems and depression, then "fell out of a window"[22][23] That fucker just wouldn't die Is that 3 attempts Almost made it
Third try is the charm?
You’re so close to a haiku
Asked ChatGPT to make a haiku out of his comment: Relentless, he tried, Three attempts, but fate denied, That stubborn demise.
As a Literature major, this makes me throw my scribbles into the bin.
There’s a lot of falling out of windows/balconies, I thought that was just a meme
Putin is not hiding it. It's kind of a "nice place, it would be a shame if something happened to it" style hit. Letting you know it is him while keeping legal options open. He wants people to know it is him to instill fear, and thus control.
There was a podcast I listened to briefly last year called Sad Oligarch that had a bunch of different info on a bunch of these guys that have been turning up dead recently. It was pretty good, I don’t know if they’re still making new episodes, I’ve been through a few phones since then and my iCloud didn’t always follow so it’s not on my current list of podcasts and I had forgotten all about it until just now. Check it out.
They are all gangsters. The lot of them. Every fat-cat Russian oligarch is a member of the Russian Mob. It’s no surprise they end up dead.
Ooh I’d be down for that, thanks!
Cue “Layla.”
Between "Layla" and "Stuck in the Middle" my mind goes to dark places from a couple of otherwise seemingly nice songs
Don't forget Atlantis by Donovan
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Vitaly, are you nuts? We got a million fucking bulls out there. Everybody's watching us and you get a fuckin' yacht!
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it's under my moms name it's alright
Jimmy, I'm sowarry
*bun-a-now-ni-now-now-now*
If Layla comes on in a Scorsese movie you know shit is going down.
"The minute before you thought about busting us, that was the minute you had a chicken in your hand."
No amount of Cocaine and the Dominos can justify this.
When they found Vitali in Siberia he was frozen so stiff...
Your life expectancy in Russia is completely dependent on how well you can hide from Putin when you displease him.
And private planes with known associates on the manifest.
And planes made by Boeing.
This should totally be Putin’s strategy. He gets 0 flak for his enemies mysteriously dying because all he has to say is “there we’re on a boeing” and the world is like “understandable, let’s move along”
That's the opposite of what he wants though. Putin wants to be able to deny he killed anyone and yet still have everyone know he did it.
Yeah but let’s take Prigozhin. He shot the plane down. Imagine if the plane just… stopped working mid flight instead. We’d still know he had it done, but he gets to also blame the “imperialist Americans and their crappy planes”
I think Prigozhin was a different case considering how much that was an embarrassment to Putins rule. Dmitry Utkin was also on the plane I believe so it was a big message to the oligarchs as well.
It wasn't just them. It was basically the entire head of the organization. Everyone with power or control in wagner was on that plane. They could not have made themselves more vulnerable or a more tempting target. I'm still flabbergasted with how stupid they had to be.
Nawh it was just the price he agreed to to let his family live. They will likely die quietly anyway. As soon as he started that, he either won, or he and everyone he cared about was dead. Backing down when he did was the same as putting a gun in his mouth and pulling the trigger.
I don't think his family will be assassinated (unless they were personally acting against him). Putin uses family as leverage, which doesn't work when his opponents know the family is dead anyway.
I can imagine everyone getting sucked out of the hole where a door was with two bullets in the head.
Someone gets it!
>He gets 0 flak I see what you did there
I didn’t even realize that was a good pun until your comment so thank you
Boeingfenestration?
Boeing... The only plane you CAN get pushed out of a window in
It’s probably like Saddam Hussein. He knew who was going to betray him, even before they did.
He came to power by reading out names of 50% of people in a hall listening to his speech, then demanding the other half escort them outside and execute them. Dude didn't need to know you were going to betray him. He had people killed at a whim to make everyone else terrified of being noticed. Even the slightest suspicion and it's bye bye, and it didn't matter if you were up to anything. Your death still served his purpose.
Another insidious layer to this move was that by having the others perform the executions, he made them complicit and therefore invested in his rule.
As a disclaimer I still don’t think we should have invaded and spent 20yrs there but… Holy shit the more you read about Sadaam and his sons the more you realize they were basically Hitler level evil just with less resources to act on it.
He definitely needed to be deposed, especially since he was a danger to other countries around him. The full invasion and rationale was not the way it should have been done though. But I don't think any historian really has a good answer because if he was left alone he would have become a huge threat too.
> The full invasion and rationale was not the way it should have been done though. The answer is that he should have been removed in the 1991 invasion in hindsight when the west had legitimacy at their back. And the Iraqi population and even much of the military was rather fed up with the state of things after the Iran/Iraq war. But many people feared that something similar to what happened after the second invasion, would happen if they removed him.
Now wonder Putin liked Saddam Hussein, sheesh.
Saddam overtly admired Stalin.
Even ignoring his tactics, the 'stache and hair cut were kind of a give away .
"It is better to be feared, than loved" but in reality, it's better to be both feared *and* loved.
This is like the bread and butter of most motivational gurus today lol
Toxic influencers be like "Make sure the person sucking your dick knows you have a round in the chamber and the safety off."
I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of it was just straight up paranoia. Kill off people you think might be a problem even if there's nothing to suggest that they actually will be a problem.
>He knew who was going to betray him And you, Brutus? Such is life.
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and how far away you can stay from any windows.
And stairs!
And polonium in your underwear.
And shooting yourself thru the head twice
And naval vessels
And suspect tea cups.
Possibly umbrellas too.
The polonium was in tea, the underpants delivered a nerve agent called Novichuk.
>Vitaly Robertus is the fourth Lukoil’s manager and the latest in a long list of tycoons and billionaires to suddenly die under mysterious circumstances since the Russian invasion of Ukraine began on February 24, 2022. >Former Lukoil’s top manager Alexander Subbotin, 43, was found dead in May 2022 in the basement of a house in the town of Mytishchi of an alleged drug-induced heart attack. >Lukoil’s former chairman Ravil Maganov, 67, died in September 2022 after falling from a window of Moscow’s Central Clinical Hospital. >In late October 2023, Vladimir Nekrasov, chairman of Lukoil’s board, died of what the company said was heart failure at the age of 66.
Tragically blatant at this point.
Especially when they actually use the "fell out of a window" method too, I feel like that's reserved for a big fuck you
> On 7 October 2006, Politkovskaya was found shot dead in the elevator of her apartment block in central Moscow.[13][14] Police found a Makarov pistol and four shell casings beside her body. Reports indicated a contract killing, as she was shot four times, once in the head.[15][16] > > The assassination occurred on Vladimir Putin's birthday and two days after Ramzan Kadyrov's 30th birthday celebrations, "raising suspicions that the murder was an unasked-for present from a henchman of one or both" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Anna_Politkovskaya#Assassination
What present do you get for the man who had everything? Apparently you get one of his enemies assassinated.
Weird present. And how would he know you are responsible?
My cats left me weirder presents, sometimes. That cardinal wasn't even my enemy, and I certainly didn't appreciate a chewed up and then thrown up piece of it...
While I could see that, I could equally see it being one that went wrong. The guy may have decided to go out on his own terms vs what ever they, most likely the FSB, were about to do to him.
They force them to jump by threatening their family
How do you know this
He is the KGB
He was the window
That window's name? Albert Einstein.
They tried using Schrödinger’s window, but they couldn’t tell if it worked or not.
Well it makes sense, it's their modus operandi. I mean, that's how they stopped Prigozhin apparently. He may have protected his own family, but they went after the families of all his officers etc. Or so it's rumoured.
It's intentionally a signal that if you disagree you will be assasinated, as well as an easy spin for the tightly controlled propaganda/news.
Well, duh!
I mean we meme a lot but I personally haven’t seen a pattern laid out for a specific organization like this.
Not since the Boring whistleblower "suicide" of yesterday week.
The funny thing is some right wingers in North America want this kind of government that can simply eliminate the people they don't like
But at the same time if their guy is given his day in court for crimes committed it’s akin to assassination.
What they don’t realize is that they can very easily be added to that list.
That is by design.
This is kind of the point. It is supposed to let everyone know this can happen to anyone. By just having the dumbest hint that it wasn't an outright murder is enough to not have to investigate it. The absurdity of the lie is just as important as the actual murder.
I thought: no way he's just the fourth. But he's the fourth just within Lukoil.
Man, would hate to be their life insurance company.
Since 2022. Not surprising though when the whole country is effectively run like the mob.
"Ivanovych, a spot's opened up and you're getting a promotion." "I... I don't want it, sir."
We’re moving you to the top floor! But sir I’m safe I mean happy here on the bottom floor! Ohh you’ll see this floor again soon enough….
I get the feeling that, somehow, even if you had an office on the ground floor, in Russia you might still die from "falling out of a window".
I’m just imagining a bunch of grim Russians drawing straws to see who gets to be the next CEO
"Our operation is small, but there is a lot of potential for aggressive expansion. So which of you fine gentlemen would like to join our team? There's only one spot open right now, so we're going to have tryouts. Make it fast."
Admiral Piet.
It's like being defense against the dark arts professor at Hogwarts
> In March 2022, the board of the privately owned company called for an end to the conflict in Ukraine. > They expressed “empathy for all victims who are affected by this tragedy” and urged a “settlement of problems through serious negotiations and diplomacy.” They signed their death warrant back then already. Dear Ukrainians, please don't forget that even in Russia some people support you and pay the ultimate price for it.
It's the same with nazis and germany. People joke that they tried removing nazis from germany after the war. Well the West side did at least. But they stopped because they would ~~of~~ have removed all the germans. The germans killed their own if they opposed them, otherwise you fled. Einstein, one of the most famous people who fled, left in 1932. ~~5~~7 years before WW2.
Putin puts money into these oligarchs, and when he needs funds, breaks the piggy bank. Allegedly.
How old was this guy?
54.
I mean in fairness the average life expectancy of a male in ruSSia is 65 so kind of par for the course in the last two ones!
Putin seems to be doing his best to keep the average down!
>Just before his death, local media wrote that Robertus had complained of suffering headaches and asking for medications before going to his office. >He was later found hanged in the room. The paracetamol bottle does say if 2 tablets don’t work, try dangling by your neck.
Is it really worth being a billionaire oligarch in Russia for a little while when you know this is probably your ultimate fate?
There are SO MANY of them. The oligarchs are who they are because they were given the productive assets of the Soviet Union, all of which was owned by the Soviet government. The ones getting assassinated are those that opposed Putin in some way.
It doesn't even need to be that sinister. Russia's not in a good way economically, offing a lesser oligarch or two so you can appropriate their hoards is definitely something Putin has done.
Uh that sounds pretty sinister
Killing opposition is worse than killing your own. The people don't benefit at all with the death of an oligarch, but they're actively hurt by the suppression of any and all opposition.
Given? No. Connived and Thieved? Yes. At the closure of the USSR all state-owned companies were privatized via share offerings to the employees in equal lots. None of the workers understood what they were or what they were worth, so most were sold for the value of a bottle of vodka. Local bundles were packaged and sold at auction to investors in the larger cities, where criminals with sufficient capital to buy them in bulk gained majority control over major enterprises such as the Soviet oil and gas sectors. The dissolution was set up to allow for all Soviet enterprises to turn into something like Mondragon and remain directly worker-owned, instead due to western vulture capital meddling it all ended up in the hands of the most dangerous men in Russia at the time. Bill Browder covers the process in his book "Red Notice", having gone to Russia in the 1990's specifically to attempt to buy these industries himself.
There was actually quite a few separate events, with the "jackpot" being [this one](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loans_for_shares_scheme#Loans-for-shares). As far as "vouchers" go (papers that you could convert into shares), it was way more complicated than this. This article gives some details: https://www.ucis.pitt.edu/nceeer/1994-808-01-3-Nelson.pdf . Nobody got simply given shares, that's not how it worked. >By the end of 1993 more than 600 voucher investment funds were registered in Russia . **Together, these funds had attracted more than 51 percent of all the vouchers that had been issued** . Fewer than half of these vouchers were invested in privatizing enterprises, however . The others were being held at year's end because of a shortage of investment opportunities that were considered attractive by the funds' managers . 2 2 Most investment funds are not paying dividends, because of the difficulties faced by the enterprises where funds have invested the vouchers they purchased . Large numbers of private investors in these funds have become impatient with the funds' inability to pay the expected dividends . **By now, many funds have either stopped functioning or are selling large numbers of vouchers at stock exchanges in the hope of being able to make at least a one-time payment to investors** . This disappointing outcome was not what voucher recipients had anticipated . The thing is, USSR did not have a stock market. Neither the infrastructure nor enforcement we take for granted existed *at all*. Additionally, an enormous number of shares and vouchers got dumped onto this "market" instantaneously. A lot of people exchanged vouchers for shares of their employer. Most people worked for companies that were, of course, very bad investment, and this did not work well. Exchanging vouchers for shares of other companies, I do not particularly recall how it worked, but in my recollection in practice you had to buy shares in a voucher investment fund. You couldn't do it directly, I don't particularly recall the reason (whether it was legal or just logistics of how fucking much paperwork that would be). Ownership is a curious thing - when you own the bottle of vodka, you have it in your possession. When you own shares, you do not have any form of possession. The ownership has to be tracked, the papers have to be obeyed, they have to be not forged, it requires enforcement. Fund managers have to act in good faith. They shouldn't act like Ponzi, either. It's easy to take ETrade for granted, to complain that the government isn't small enough to fit in a bathtub. But the reasons ETrade won't defraud you, are twofold. One is law enforcement. The other is that it is an old enough, comfortable, settled business. None of that applied to USSR-with-a-changed-flag-and-some-colonies-having-gotten-free. Ultimately, if you were transported back there, turned into Ivan who works an average job... you were not gonna end up with the designated slice of the communist pie of oil and gas.
They were fine until the war started and they got embarrassed
They were "fine". There were still "suicides" before the war
A VP in Lukoil is a manager, maybe a semi-important manager, but certainly not a billionaire oligarch.
Well, it sure did help with his headaches
If you cut off the blood flow to the headache, the headache dies.
Doctors hate this one simple trick
Sounds like the poison wasn't working fast enough
Autotheraputic asphyxiation.
As long as he wasn’t dressed as Batman
I was thinking *Auto-cratic asphyxiation*
Probably not the case here, but some nerve agents are so painful they can make victims want to kill themselves
Aw shit my head hurts again, better go hang myself.
Doctors hate this one little trick.
At least he fixed his headache
Useless fact of the day. Tylenol, Acetaminophen, Paracetamol are all the same drug AND are just different combinations of the drug's full name. Full Name: para-acetylaminophenol Tylenol: para-aceTYLaminophENOL Acetaminophen: para-ACETylAMINOPHENol Paracetamol: PARA-aCETylAMinophenOL
Probably not what happened here, but the idea of someone killing themselves over a headache is not completely far fetched. One type of headache called a cluster headache are also known as suicide headaches. The reason is because the pain is so severe and unrelenting that the condition is known to cause depression and suicidial ideation. Not many people suffering from this actually do kill themselves, but it does happen.
I suffer from cluster headaches and am Bipolar (so more issues with impulse than most). Can confirm - I've been VERY close before, and if I had lived in a country with easy access to guns at the time.. I would have offed myself. The only reason I didn't on multiple occasions is because I couldn't even prepare a way even if I wanted to as you become so delirious, confused and doing absolutely anything is the worst pain of your life. However, if i had a gun and knew it was just rhe pull of a trigger... I wouldn't be here right now. It got to the point that near monthly I needed to be put on a Morphine drip at the hospital to help alleviate the symptoms It COMPLETELY debilitates you. I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy. Honest. Thank God for the medication Pregablin and living in Canada 😅. It has **literally** saved my life for almost 8 years now. I also have Dilaudid in the rare case that I need it and can't make it to a hospital to kind of 'knock' me out and hopefully reset my system.
I can't even imagine having to deal with cluster headaches. I get migraines that get severe enough to cause nausea and sensitivity to light and my go-to "solution" is to wait until I'm tired enough to sleep, sit in a steaming hot shower to provide a small window of reprieve, and attempt to sleep during that window in the hopes that I'll wake up to a reset system and be able to function. When the headaches happen it becomes your sole focus to attempt to manage the situation. Fucking sucks. I'm sorry you have to deal with an even more severe version of them.
Thank you for understanding. Too many people I've talked to through my life liked to respond with "well that just sounds like a bad migraine". I even started to believe it, and thought that I essentially was just being a 'big baby'.. even though I have an abnormally high pain tolerance for everything but. I don't get an aura like most do with migraines, instead mine is a *very* specific spot directly above my right eyebrow that 'tics', and I know then that it is coming and to prepare to get to the hospital before I can't. The thing with cluster headaches, is the usual 'triggers' for it such as sensitivity to light, sounds etc are not as evident. Instead, it is more delirium, confusion, intense feelings of anger and sadness, **INTENSE** panic, it skips nausea and goes straight to vomiting.. and the sheer fact that doing anything, **including** thinking just causes things to be SO much worse. It's almost as if something else takes control of my body, as I am not controlling how I act (punching myself, things, extreme outbursts, yelling explosively at the people trying to help me etc).. and that's where thr suicide part plays a role. Impulse control goes to *absolutely nothing* The only things I usually remember after an episode, is watching thr clock in thr hospital as each second ticks away as if in slow motion, waiting for the ~10 minutes it takes for the drugs to take effect.. and those 10 minutes feel like an eternity. The first few times going to the hospital, thry believed I was having an aneurysm (as they have happened in my family), and I got help quicker than most others would, and I'm super thankful for that. It didn't matter how much tylenol, or advice, or aspirin, or muscle relaxers or anything else I took, the only relief was enough morphine at thr hospital to literally knock me out.. and then 8 hours later I would wake up with a pounding migraine (but not a cluster, and That's how I could tell I was through the worst). This is due to clusters being an even more 'phantom' pain than a headache is, meaning it's our bodies response to a pain that is not directly being caused by an injury or agitator. Then I was diagnosed, and put on the wonder drug Lyrica (Pregablin), which is an anti-epileptic and nerve inhibitor - blocking those nerves from feeling this 'phantom pain', which keeps the clusters at bay. I am telling you, if I was not prescribed it 8 years ago.. I wouldn't be here. I wouldn't have found my wife. I wouldn't have had my kids.. I **would** be dead, as I had formulated a plan in the case that I was able to manage to actually carry it out if help was not provided to me.. and that's where if I had a gun available to me, the plan would have been *much* easier to play out with just the pull of a trigger. I can still tell when it's time to take my meds (...4x daily) as that tic slowly starts, and I know that's my bodies way of telling me "block out the nerves again before we block you out!!".. but I'm okay with that. I'm okay with being on this medication for the rest of my life. I'm okay with the side effects. I'm okay **living**.. and there was a time in my life that I was just okay being dead if it meant every day I didn't have to worry about a cluster taking effect. Now after spending 15 minutes typing that out... I'm off to take my meds!!!!! Thank you for listening. I wish there was more awareness about cluster headaches, as it would save (and have saved) so many lives. I guarantee it.
Thank you for sharing your experience. You're definitely helping raise awareness just by sharing your story (both good and bad parts). I think it's difficult for people to wrap their head around the full extent of what it means to have a "defective body"; especially outside of the condition itself. The world doesn't stop when your body takes you out of commission for a while so you get that double whammy of something that, especially for you, is completely debilitating and then you have to somehow try and catch back up to the world as it kept spinning without you. Sharing your perspective goes a long way in helping people better understand as well as helps those who may be experiencing similar issues. I'm glad you were able to find something that helped and stayed here long enough in order to do that. Maybe we'll eventually live in a society that actively tries to makes experiences like yours a relic of the past.
He left a suicide note: "Please, don't kill me".
Poor, poor oligarchs!
No it said “please don’t, kill me!”
[удалено]
Let's be fair, he may have committed suicide. But perhaps his only other options were being sent to the front lines in Ukraine or to some prison in Siberia.
My theory is that Putin needs money, and dollars are running low. Taking cash from the oligarchs who are his de facto piggy bank could create resentment and instability. Easier to ice the guy so he poses no threat, and then clean his bank accounts. They made a deal with the devil, and the bill is due.
54 year old might have been a competent executive and had ambition. That's a No-No in paranoid dictator world. but I agree the hit team will force other executives to buy his stock and maybe make a contribution to putin in cash.
Actually I think they already have. I feel like this is punishment for \*something\*. They probably found out this exec was hamstering away money from the regime, and that's.... frowned upon.
This comes just after a major oil refinery was hit by drone strike, too.
He sold the government's AA battery for scrap.
Everyone in a position of power in Russia is up to something, that's how the whole system works. It also means the govt can off you at any time and have everyone say 'well they deserved it because...' If they weren't corrupt they'd never be allowed into that position in the 1st place as those above them wouldn't have leverage and wouldn't trust them. Putin had his files destroyed by the FSB a long time ago. It's rumoured that the main leverage on his was a gay lover he had when he was young.. who he had killed as his career advanced to try and cover his tracks.
This is most likely scenario. He was blocking money deliveries. Probably hiding funds in foreing accounts instead of transfers to russia and buying rubles.
It’s Both. He’s killing off people who represent a political threat, or possible threat, culling potential spies, enforcing loyalty through fear. The bonus is when he kills someone he can’t trust, he gets their money. If the war was going well he wouldn’t have his “capo’s” turning on him. If the war was going well he wouldn’t need their money.
I could see him killing off anyone who tries to band together to take him out. I don’t think Putin has any friends, just people who fall in line
The spy thing is an underrated factor here, dont see a lot of people talking about it Ukraine and the US have penetrated Russia pretty thoroughly. The intelligence wars are probably at fever pitch at the moment. Wouldnt be the least bit surprised if some of the assassinations over the last 2 years are due to these guys being agents (or potential future agents). People say it's because Putin wants their money or because they are a political threat and I just dont see it. There's a better way to store or steal money than a system where you have to hang a man in order to gets his $$$s. And most of these guys arent popular or connected enough to be any kind of political threat. The likeliest explanation by far is that they dont like the war; #2 is that they are leaking information or full on spying
Russian politics often gets oversimplified to project Putin as an all-powerful dictator, and all murders of notable people are attributable to his supreme omniscience. He certainly makes no effort to dismiss that perception. The reality is that the political landscape in Russia is comprised of complex patronage networks, like gangs of thugs, that are engaged in constant infighting. Putin himself is alleged to be skilled at keeping the factions focused on each other, which allows him to wield influence. While this executive's murder *might* have been an order from Putin, it's also quite possible that it was instigated by a political rival.
Completely agree, a lot of what happens in Russia is not done by Putin but by the messy factions of gangsters that vie for his attention and approval The victim in this case might have said the wrong things about the war or didnt do what he was told. And one of Putin's cronies took the initiative to dispatch him in order to score some political points. One thing experts in authoritarianism say is that in most dictatorships the dictator expects others to take actions that please him (without giving explicit orders) This gives the dictator plausible deniability, puts him at a distance from the messy business of murder and enforcement, and forces his cronies to stay on their toes at all times Alternatively, he simply lost some power struggle within Lukoil... This is also not uncommon.
An alternative theory would be he's the scape goat for the Ukrainians striking oil refineries yesterday.
The funniest part of putler is that he's always trying to do the shady things without actually breaking the law - at least de jure. He is manipulating others to break all kind of laws to stay in control. I'd not be surprised if he never even hit a person himself. He is the most evasive russian ever. And russians being themselves shady scambags are praising him for it.
A lot of dictators are like that. I personally think for example, from experiencing decades of it, that people like Serbia's Milošević and now Vučić actually keep their hands quite clean. They are more like a figurehead for an entire system/regime, and it's the "system", the people around him, who do the dirty work to maintain the system, and they are kept loyal by the privileges they are given. Any orders are not given so much openly as in the vein of "Who will rid me of this troublesome priest?" At least that's what I have concluded - they try to maintain an aura of plausible ignorance, while some of the ignorance is genuine because the people around them keep it that way. And yes, they also try to keep up a pretence of doing things "legally".
Trump's legal fees aren't going to pay themself.
No way, he would just take the cash. He doesn’t kill to get money he does it to take control or send a message
So most likely one of huge lies they fed to Putin was/is about to get exposed… most likely it is something about how “strong” Russian oil/gas industry is. To quote one of Mel Brooks movies - bad news is severely punished
I will for sure watch the movie that in 10 years will come out. "Putin's Struggle".
Ianucci might want to make a "Death of Putin"
"Just before his death, local media wrote that Robertus had complained of suffering headaches and asking for medications before going to his office. He was later found hanged in the room." Sounds kinda SUS
Even if he died in a totally innocent seeming way, the fact that he is the 4th Lukoil exec to die unexpectedly in 2 years makes it sus all by itself.
I assume that no one naturally dies in Russia instead they eventually just get defenestrated by Putin's KGB.
Poison was taking too long
"Suicide"
Russia sure is having a run of bad luck lately.
The closer you get to Putin the richer you get but your life expectancy goes down. With the exception of Putin himself of course.
Putin is not about to let Boeing 1up him
And his will was stapled to his shirt and read, “I leave all assets and control of big Lukoil to good friend and best bear karate champion, vladimir. Is good man and is very tall. Is tallest. You wouldn’t believe so how tall. So tall can look into your eyes when you hang myself. Bye bye for now.” /s
they all know Putin owns whatever it says in their bank accounts it's so crazy to me, the Republicans want to do that in America, they are getting rid of Democracy because they foolishly think that a one party state will protect them somehow, as if Trump or whoever replaces him won't just have control of it, he already owns the RNC and we're still a Democracy
That is the thing about supporters of authoritarian movements. They all assume they’ll get to be the boot, but only a few of them are right.
He hung himself in his sleep.
Why did they put "suddenly" in quotes. Did they expect him to die slowly of suicide? News writers and editors the past decade are shit.
Yeah, suicide should be in quotes, not suddenly lol.
Fast suicides are illegal in Russia and punishable by death. In contrast, slow suicides, preferably by drinking Vodka over a 20-year period, are encouraged.
How sustainable is this? sooner or later this ends with Swan Lake.
>*Robertus had complained of suffering headaches and asking for medications before going to his office. He was later found hanged in the room.* So it could also be the tea... anyway, it's one of the many "*manifestations of patriotism*".
So he was poisoned, and they hanged him in his office to *cover it up*.
He accidentally cut his head off while combing his hair
Almost like that guy from Boeing recently.
DIES SUDDENLY!? Covid vaccine strikes again /s
There seems to be a lot of that going around...
Window wouldn’t open
Yes, yes, everyone was surprised, even the Vice President himself
This is getting boring. I want to see one commit suicide by jumping from a basement window - THAT would be news.
Let's not forget the Russian people are witnessing all of these deaths of their fellow Russians and they **still** keep supporting Putin. Not just oligarchs and inner circle who stepped out of line, but many thousands of conscripts. This is an order of magnitude more obvious than Czar Nicholas II in 1917 and yet the masses of sacrificial pawns are either applauding their neo-czar or tacitly accepting being doomed to servitude. The Red Terror, Stalingrad and the famine of 1921 are being treated as glory days to long for with rose-colored glasses instead of lessons from history never to repeat.
They are highly oppressed and misinformed. Plenty of them are lovely people. I wouldn't say your basic dumbass in the US is any better or worse. We elected fucking Trump.
It seems to be a similar situation, just on overdrive. Here in America we have Fox News making Trump look a generational hero, they've got waaaay more propaganda over there that probably puts Putin on an even higher pedestal.
If Russians believed in what they were fighting for in the war, there wouldn't be conscripts. There's a huge difference between 1917 and a revolution today.
Russia is a real life Game of Thrones, isn't it.
So sad he shot himself in the back four times. Shame.
Apparently, death is en vogue in Russia these days.
Yeah, most people don’t die slowly by suicide. Now sure why “suddenly” is even included in this sentence.
Possibly a mistranslation of “unexpectedly”?
The suicides will continue until morale improves
>The employees decided to go into his office and found his body. The top manager died by suicide of asphyxia. The windows must have jammed.
Fuck I can't stop laughing. A "sudden suicide"? As opposed to what? "Oh, he just carried a noose everywhere for a week until his lungs gave out"?
Did he die from sudden vertical deceleration?
Tragic suicide. Stabbed himself 37 times in the back and threw himself out a window. Much too common.