The Tsar Himself: uncovering Vladimir Putin‘s Hidden Life and the Price of Truth
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The summer dawn of June 29th,2021,broke with a chilling intrusion for Roman Badanin. As the leading Russian investigative journalist prepared for his day in Moscow, a team of six to eight plainclothes FSB officers - Russia’s powerful federal security service – arrived at his door. A search warrant in hand, they systematically dismantled his apartment, scrutinizing every detail of his life, while uniformed police examined his and his wife’s vehicles.
The reason for this intense scrutiny? Badanin hadn’t uncovered a financial conspiracy or plotted against the state. His “crime” was publishing a brief interview with a young woman he believed to be the unrecognized daughter of Vladimir Putin.
“It’s quiet simple,” Badanin, now 48 and living in exile in California, explained recently. “putin’s private life is one of the most taboo topics. Among Russian journalists, ther’s a saying: ‘Don’t touch his family.'”
This incident is the catalyst for The Tsar Himself: How Vladimir Putin Deceived Us all, a new book co-authored by Badanin and his long-time collaborator, Mikhail Rubin. The book pulls back the curtain on a carefully constructed image, revealing a pattern of alleged extramarital affairs and a world of power, secrecy, and control surrounding the Russian President.
[Image of Alina Kabaeva posing in Maxim magazine in January 2004 with caption: The ‘secret first lady’: Putin’s lover alina Kabaeva]
For decades, Putin has cultivated a public persona as a staunch defender of customary family values.Yet, the Tsar Himself alleges that this image