The phrase stuck. Over the past four years Medvedev has done nothing to dispel the impression that he is anything other than a useful seatwarmer, his time in the Kremlin a legalistic blip in an epoch of endless Putin rule.
It wasn't always like this. At the start of Medvedev's presidential term there were faint hopes that he might preside over a partial liberalisation of Russian society. The president himself spoke of ending "legal nihilism". Commentators, meanwhile, scrambled to make sense of Russia .. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/russia .. 's historically anomalous ruling arrangement – the "tandem", as it became known.
In the shadow world of Kremlin politics it was hard to work out what was going on behind the scenes. Some looked in vain for signs of an intra-leadership struggle. Others speculated that Medvedev might eventually escape from Putin's gravitational pull, or even fire his mentor.
The Obama administration tried to reach out to Medvedev in the hope this would nudge Russia's foreign policy away from its hawkish Putin vector towards a more constructive approach. By 2010, however, US diplomats had concluded that Project Medvedev was hopeless.
Medvedev's position became one of humiliation. I heard one expert describe Russia's ruling model not as a tandem but as "a bicycle with a child's seat in the front".
US diplomats even cabled back to Washington the following joke: Medvedev sits in the driver's seat of a new car, examines the inside, the instrument panel, and the pedals. He looks around but the steering wheel is missing.
He turns to Putin and asks: "Vladimir Vladimirovich, where is the steering wheel?" Putin pulls a remote control out of his pocket and says: "I'll be the one doing the driving."
Medvedev's announcement on Saturday .. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/24/vladimir-putin-kremlin .. that he was stepping down to allow Putin a third presidency came as a surprise to no one, then. Medvedev's only significant act as president was to extend Russia's presidential term from four years to six, hardly a democratic step forwards. This was seen, rightly, as teeing up the conditions for a triumphant comeback during elections in the spring of 2012: Putin's.
So what now? Putin's return means the west faces another decade of difficult relations with Russia. During his first two stints as president, the former KGB agent demonstrated his gift at G8 gatherings and other international get-togethers for sardonic repartee mixed with snide remarks about western hypocrisy and double-dealing. We can expect more of this.
There is no prospect of any real improvement in UK-Russian relations. David Cameron did manage to meet Putin this month during his trip to Moscow, the first contact with him for four years. But until Downing Street caves in to the Kremlin's demand that it resumes co-operation with Russia's FSB spy agency – suspended after Alexander Litvinenko's polonium murder – no "reset" is possible.
The prospects for Russia itself are equally gloomy. The country now faces a long period of political and economic stagnation and single-party rule. Increasingly the Putin era resembles that of the Soviet Union under Leonid Brezhnev, another too-long authoritarian period sustained by a commodities boom, which left ordinary citizens frustrated. Increasing numbers of talented but Disenfranchised Russians are voting with their feet and moving abroad.
In theory Putin could go on until 2024, when he will be 72. Or longer.
This week, however, the blogger and anti-corruption campaigner Alexey Navalny predicted that Russia's kleptocractic system would collapse well before that. "People now realise it doesn't work. It worked between 2000-2005. There was stability up until 2008," he said. "But now it's useless, even for the corrupt people who benefit from it."
With no political mechanism for removing Putin from power, Navalny said, another Russian revolution was inevitable. At some point, he said, frustrations would boil over. "Maybe in five months, maybe in two years, maybe in seven years," he said. Asked what would spark it, he suggested: "The Caucasus."
Many observers have plausibly argued that Putin is tired of being leader. So why did he come back? The Kremlin, of course, is more prestigious that then prime minister's office, and gives Putin an international platform. More than this, though, it allows Putin to protect his own alleged secret assets and those of his team, US diplomats believe. And it allows him to avoid potential law enforcement prosecution – inevitable, once he steps down from power.
Russia capital flight reaches $US50bln Reported by AAP Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Russia on Tuesday reported $US18.7 billion ($A19.69 billion) in capital outflows in the third quarter, far more than state estimates and underscoring the uncertainty that has gripped the country in recent months.
The Central Bank said the poor quarter came on top of the $30.6 billion that had left Russia between January and June. The nine-month total has now reached $49.3 billion - three times the $16 billion seen one year ago.
Government officials have blamed the capital flight on a fragile business climate in which investors complain of red tape and the inability to defend their rights in court.
But some economists said that even more money headed for safer harbours in the second half of the year because investors could not tell whether Prime Minister Vladimir Putin planned to run again for the presidency which he held in 2000-2008.
Putin last month ultimately disclosed plans to return in March polls that will almost certainly see him replace his hand-picked successor Dmitry Medvedev as president.
But the market's relief over that announcement was followed by the shock resignation days later of Russia's respected finance minister Alexei Kudrin.
The veteran fiscal conservative's brief has since been handed to First Deputy Finance Minister Igor Shuvalov - another Putin ally who previously oversaw Russia's industrial policies.
The English-speaking Shuvalov has a reputation for being a consummate political insider who is responsible for restoring Russia's image at international forums such as the G8.
Yet he is also seen as a more pliable figure who may be more willing to fit the country's tight budget in line with Russia's plans to boost expenditure on the military and other pricey projects.
Shuvalov told a US investment forum on Tuesday that his government was open for business despite Russia's reputation for corruption and graft.
But he also urged patience and stressed the importance of social stability - a mantra of Putin's rule that worries some investors.
"Improving the country's business climate is a long-term process," Dow Jones Newswires quoted Kudrin as telling a US-Russian Business Council in Chicago on Tuesday.
"It's impossible to change the country very quickly," said Shuvalov.
"It's very hard work that will need time. In order to have that time we need social stability."
The Central Bank figures were reported only moments after Shuvalov spoke and no Russian official has yet referred to them directly or tried to explain the enormous jump.
Officials had earlier predicted $36 billion in total capital outflows for 2011.
The Central Bank meanwhile also gave estimates for the capital position dependent on the price of oil, a key export earner for Russia and crucial for the public finances.
It said that if oil prices averaged $US75 per barrel in 2012, the export income generated would still leave the country posting capital outflows of $US15 billion as money continues to leave.
At $US100 per barrel, oil income would balance the capital outflows while a price of $US125 would result in a capital gain for the year of $US10 billion - still a very small figure compared with actual oil earnings.
The estimates highlight the importance of energy exports even as Putin and Medvedev have stressed the need to wean Russia off them and modernise its economy.
VTB Group Chief Financial Officer Herbert Moos said oil price shocks now posed one of the biggest risks to foreign investors in Russia.
"There is no large manufacturing, banking or financial sector (in Russia) that could absorb the shock" of plunging oil prices, Moos told the RIA Novosti news agency.
"And in addition, now we have a new risk ... I think that with Alexei Leonidovich Kudrin's departure, there is a new risk of the budget facing a structural deficit," Moos warned.
Kazakhstan welcomes Putin's Eurasian Union concept
Governments in the West may have read with alarm that Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin wanted to build a Eurasian Union out of the former Soviet bloc but in Kazakhstan the news was welcomed.
Kazakhstan's president Nursultan Nazarbayev Photo: REUTERS
By James Kilner, Astana
8:20AM BST 06 Oct 2011
Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev first mentioned the concept of a Eurasian Union during a speech at a Moscow University in May 1994, less than three years after the breakup of the Soviet.
Since then Kazakhstan has transformed itself from a Central Asian backwater with aging Soviet infrastructure into a confident, global energy supplier complete with a new capital city full of glass and steel towers designed by some of the world leading architects.
But despite massive investment from the West and more recently China, the old ties to Russia remain strong as Roman Vassilenko, head of press and information at the Kazakh foreign ministry, explained.
"Kazakhstan and President Nazarbayev personally have always stood for closer economic integration with Russia and other countries of the former USSR," he told the Daily Telegraph.
"The Eurasian Union that President Nazarbayev first proposed in 1994 is envisaged as a mutually beneficial union of mutually respectful partners."
Kazakhstan is already an enthusiastic member of the customs union with Russia and Belarus that Mr Putin sees as the launch pad for a more integrated Eurasian Union.
In his article for the Russian newspaper Izvestia, Mr Putin wrote that a Eurasian Union would not be a return to the Soviet Union. Instead he described a modern economic and currency union that would stretch further into Central Asia and include both Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.
Businesses in both Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan have faced higher tariffs trading with Kazakhstan and Russia since the customs union came into force this year putting pressure on their political leaders to join the union. Kyrgyzstan has since officially applied to join and Tajikistan is thinking about applying.
Most analysts, though, don't expect Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, which are both rich in natural resources, to join a Russia-lead economic union.
Dosym Satpayev, an Almaty-based analyst, said he thought that Mr Putin's real motive behind creating the customs union and potentially the Eurasian Union was political.
"The Eurasian Union is important for Russia at it will let them remain strong in international affairs," he said.
In contrast he said that Mr Nazarbayev's aims were driven by a desire for access to the Russian market and to give Kazakhstan more options.
"This will show everybody that he is able to pick from a lot of partners," Mr Satpayev said. "This is a position of strength."
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