Westminster insiders have long watched the Kremlin’s playbook with a mix of fascination and dread. Now, a cache of leaked documents has laid bare the mechanics of Vladimir Putin’s image machine. The scale of the operation is staggering. It is not just state television. It is a coordinated web of bloggers, think tanks, and regional governors. All singing from the same hymn sheet.
The documents, obtained by a consortium of European intelligence agencies, reveal a system of “narrative directives” sent daily from the presidential administration. These are not suggestions. They are orders. Local media outlets are told exactly which stories to lead on. How to frame dissent. Which Western leaders to vilify. The goal: to keep Putin’s approval rating above 80%. A figure that would make any British prime minister weep.
One directive, dated three weeks ago, instructs editors to “amplify the heroism of Russian soldiers in Ukraine” and “ignore reports of logistical failures”. Another, from February, orders a “three-day focus on Western sanctions hurting European citizens, not Russians”. The precision is chilling.
But the real revelation is the role of the “image doctors”. A small team of spin doctors, based in a nondescript building in central Moscow, monitors Putin’s public appearances in real time. They decide his eyeline. His hand gestures. The colour of his tie. One source describes it as “the most sophisticated political PR operation on earth”.
Here is the kicker. It works. Polling data, also leaked, shows that Russians under 40 are more likely to trust state media than independent sources. The propaganda has become a cocoon. And Putin is the only star in the show.
Backbench Labour MPs are circling. They want the Foreign Office to issue a formal condemnation. But No. 10 is cautious. They know the optics: Britain lecturing Russia on propaganda is like the pot calling the kettle black. After all, we have our own spin doctors. Just less effective ones.
The Kremlin has not denied the leak. Instead, spokesman Dmitry Peskov called it a “Western fantasy”. But the documents are real. And they paint a picture of a leader who is both puppet master and puppet. A man who has outsourced his own image to a machine that cannot be switched off.
For the lobby, this is catnip. The story has legs. Expect Labour frontbenchers to demand a Commons statement. Expect the Defence Secretary to offer bland reassurances. And expect Putin’s approval rating to stay exactly where it is.
