Vladimir Putin Quotes and Sayings

“The world has to be multilateral because it is so diverse… Our role is not, as back in the [days of the] Soviet Union, to provide a counterbalance to the United States.”

“We cannot do without conscription for economic reasons but the numbers should come down. From January 2008 the term of service will be 12 months. The number of career soldiers will increase.”

“Without democracy there is no future for Russia. We have made our choice ourselves and we believe that the democratic path is the optimum path for the country.”

“This is a very dangerous thing for Russia because it is a multi-ethnic, multi-religious country. The country is not doing enough to protect foreigners. And there is a lot of education involved, of course. I can understand [those African students] who feel vulnerable and I really feel for them.”

– on racism in Russia

# Putin on Chechen extremists, on September 24, 1999: “We’ll follow terrorists everywhere. We will corner the bandits in the toilet and beat the hell out of them.” (“мочить в сортире” in Russian slang, “wet (cap) them in the toilet”):

# “Russia has made its choice in favor of democracy. Fourteen years ago, independently, without any pressure from outside, it made that decision in the interests of itself and interests of its people — of its citizens. This is our final choice, and we have no way back. … Any kind of turn towards totalitarianism for Russia would be impossible, due to the condition of the Russian society.”

# “I see that not everyone in the West has understood that the Soviet Union has disappeared from the political map of the world and that a new country has emerged with new humanist and ideological principles at the foundation of its existence.”

# “We have spoken on many occasions of the need to achieve high economic growth as an absolute priority for our country. The annual address for 2003 set for the first time the goal of doubling gross domestic product within a decade.”

# “Russia must realize its full potential in high-tech sectors such as modern energy technology, transport and communications, space and aircraft building.”

# After saying the US shouldn’t have gone into Iraq in the first place: “But if the U.S. were to leave and abandon Iraq without establishing the grounds for a united and sovereign country, that would definitely be a second mistake.”
# “Above all, we should acknowledge that the collapse of the Soviet Union was a major geopolitical disaster of the century”.

Putin

Sources for quotes