From A Mouse To A Tsar

In a high-ceilinged room at the St. Petersburg mayor's office in 1992, overlooking St. Isaac's Square and its statue of Tsar Nicholas I, two small men shared one big desk. The older man was a tough ex-KGB lieutenant-colonel named Vladimir Putin; he ran the mayor's commercial dealings and was always "very businesslike and serious," recalls Dmitry Lenkov, a member of the city council who was a frequent visitor. The other served as Putin's loyal sidekick, and was a bright young lawyer with a fondness for Versace jackets and Parker pens. His name was Dmitry Medvedev; he was a "hardly noticeable gray mouse—nobody really paid attention much to him," says Lenkov. "Putin made all the decisions, Medvedev did the legwork."

Sixteen years later, this gray mouse is set to take over from Vladimir Putin as his anointed successor to the presidency of Russia. [Read Anna Nemtsova's story on Medvedev's meeting with business leaders.] Medvedev will have no serious opponent in the March 2 vote—a striking testament to the efficiency of the "managed democracy" that Putin created by closing independent media and cracking down on opposition parties. And, on the surface at least, it seems that the dynamic of the two men's political partnership hasn't changed much since those days in St. Petersburg. Two days after Putin backed Medvedev for president, Medvedev returned the favor by promising to appoint Putin as his prime minister—and to keep "the efficient [Kremlin] team that the incumbent president has assembled." Decoded, that seemed to be an assurance that Medvedev would be a loyal Putin 2.0, conducting business as usual. "Medvedev is absolutely dependent on Putin," says Kremlin-connected analyst Stanislav Belkovsky. "It's extremely important for Putin to have subordinates who cannot challenge or threaten him."

Without doubt, Medvedev's chief qualification for the post of president of Russia is his longstanding loyalty to his mentor. Even after nearly two decades of friendship, Medvedev still addresses his boss by the formal "vy"—the equivalent of calling him "Mr. Putin" in English. And he's been careful never to utter a word of criticism. "The secret behind Medvedev's fantastic career has been his sense of subordination, his understanding of how to obey the rules, of how to surround Putin with respect and attention," says veteran human-rights activist Ruslan Linkov, who often dealt with the two men in the 1990s.

But a closer look highlights some very real generational and personality differences that suggest Medvedev could one day veer off from his mentor's path. First, there are the superficial contrasts. Putin loves martial arts and seems to relish a good fight. He watches war movies and listens to patriotic Russian rock. On vacation last summer he posed for photographers shirtless with a hunting rifle. Medvedev, by contrast, is a slightly built, soft-spoken corporate lawyer who has written a slew of respected legal textbooks. His favorite sport is swimming, and possibly the toughest thing about him is his taste for Western heavy metal bands from the 1970s, like Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin.

There are also far deeper differences between the two men, in both tone and political emphasis. Putin, age 55, was brought up as one of the last believers in communism. As a young man he saw the Soviet Empire at the peak of its Brezhnev-era glory, power and prosperity. As president, he was openly nostalgic for those days, calling the collapse of the Soviet Union the "greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century." Like many of his generation, his instinct is to measure national greatness in terms of hard power and militaristic might. Medvedev, by contrast, was born in 1965 and brought up in the world of the St. Petersburg intelligentsia. His years as a corporate lawyer and later as a businessman gave him a different perspective on Russia and its role in the world. While Putin loves to pose in naval uniform and throws vitriol at enemies, both real and perceived, Medvedev, with his tailored suits, likes to check economic statistics on his favorite new toy, an iPhone, and is more interested in preventing another of Russia's economic collapses than adopting bellicose rhetoric. In Medvedev's view, national greatness comes not from bullying neighbors but from creating "sustainable growth and normal lives for our citizens."

There are already signs that Russia is looking for just such a change in style. With an approval rating of 79 percent, Medvedev is more popular than Putin, suggesting that even those who never cared for their authoritarian president are starting to see something to like in a potentially more liberal successor. There is also speculation that Medvedev will emerge into a powerful president in his own right, who will shape the office—and Russia—in a way that is in keeping with his own more liberal background. "We all said that Putin would be the puppet of the Yeltsin clan who put him in power. But he very quickly set his own course," says a former Kremlin aide. "There has always been a magic to the office of tsar in Russia … Medvedev will surprise us all."