Mar 16, 2015 3 min read

At the end of 1991, when the Soviet Union had its going-out-of-business sale – statues of Lenin for 75 percent off! – the most wide-eyed optimists hoped a still-powerful Russia would become more like its neighbors to the west and not only adopt free markets but also a measure of democracy and openness.

But old habits die hard, as we’ve learned in the almost quarter-century since the hammer and sickle came down over the Kremlin. The Russia of today is perhaps as much an autocracy as it was in the Soviet days, maybe even more so. Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet leader, is remembered as being a man with whom we could do business, as British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher once famously gushed. Today, we ultimately have no other choice than to do business with Russian President Vladimir Putin, though it’s best to keep a focused, wary eye on the proceedings.

And it seemed the old Soviet style of leadership returned over the last couple of weeks or so as Putin disappeared as mysteriously as Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 did one year ago. Starting March 5, appointments were canceled, a trip to Kazakhstan was called off, as was a treaty-signing ceremony with officials from South Ossetia.

As you would expect, rumors flew like vodka bottles on a wild Saturday night in Volgograd. One had it that a coup took place and Putin was ousted; another had it that he was dangerously ill or dead; yet another had Putin being spirited secretly off to Switzerland so he could be present when his mistress gave birth to their child.

With little explanation, however, Putin finally surfaced Monday. Though he turned up an hour late to a confab with the president of Kyrgystan, he nevertheless appeared reasonably hale and hearty. He didn’t offer any clues to what he was up to, but remarked life “would be boring without gossip.”

The whole episode seemed more than a little reminiscent of the Soviet days, when enfeebled Politburo time-servers like Yuri Andropov and Konstantin Chernenko would drop out of public sight for weeks on end, with the public only being told the leaders were suffering from colds or other minor ailments. But, soon enough, the solemn music would begin to waft out of radios, followed by the announcement they departed the mortal coil.

Considering he was once a devoted soldier in the secretive world of the Soviet Union’s spy agencies, it seems very safe to say Putin learned a thing or two when he was on the job.