"I have no idea what he’s going to do."

Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism it's just the opposite

PRESIDENT BUSH said last week of his erstwhile “friend” Vladimir Putin, “I have no idea what he’s going to do.” Mr. Bush is not alone: no one but Mr. Putin knows whether the Russian president will relinquish power next year. Still, after Mr. Putin’s announcement that he would not be averse to becoming the next prime minister, the prevailing guess is that after the March 2 presidential election Mr. Putin will head the Russian government under a new president.

Yet before the Bush administration and the leading contenders for the White House begin to design a Russia policy based on this, its plausibility has to be examined. In the light of what we know about Mr. Putin and the political and economic system he has forged, he is more likely to find a way to continue in office as President Putin.

To begin, Vladimir Putin has done the opposite of what he publicly said he would do with regard to some major policy issues. In November 2003, he declared that “the state should not really seek to destroy” Yukos — at the time Russia’s largest, most modern and most transparent private company — and then methodically did just that through a palpably fraudulent prosecution.

He has repeatedly averred that Russia needs a robust party system — and then proceeded to make participation in parliamentary elections arduous and subject to unchallenged management by an election commission that is subservient to the Kremlin. No party may hope even to get on the ballot in Russia without the Kremlin’s approval.

Yet power in Russia today grows not only from the barrel of a gun, but also from a barrel of oil. And here, too, everything has been done to ensure that the president’s administration, not the prime minister’s office, be in charge of the daily export of seven million barrels of crude oil and oil products (like fuel oil and diesel fuel). With natural gas, these fuel exports fetched $190 billion last year.