Kim Hjelmgaard and Anna Nemtsova
- Putin is not an over-sharer with aides and avoids phones and computers over surveillance fears.
- Many of Putin’s opponents have died in violent or suspicious circumstances.
- Putin’s personal life and the source of his apparent fortune, too, are shrouded in mystery.
MOSCOW – What can a table possibly say about a person’s loyalties, habits, truthfulness, state of mind and, if you are Vladimir Putin, determination to invade Ukraine?
Maybe not a lot. But at least four times in the past week Russia’s longest-serving president hosted talks with foreign dignitaries and his own senior diplomatic and defense staff over the prospect of a full-scale war with neighboring Ukraine from one end of an outlandishly, imposingly long desk.
