Protecting towns from fires is defending the country too. How many towns has NATO bombed? Exactly: zero.
I didn’t sleep all night and worked out how to keep the security forces from fighting the people. Let them fight God instead: fires and floods. “Acts of God,” American-style. You can’t prevent an earthquake, but you can prevent its consequences. I asked the ministers for people and got shovels. Then I phoned my wife: “We’ve been found out. Let’s get married. A wedding for the whole country. Everyone else can fly to Mars.”
I whispered to him: “You’re scaring them. Sweeten it.” Then there was nothing left to whisper: I vanished. Maybe they simply found me. He had to carry on alone.
I didn’t sleep all night. Not from duty or patriotism. I didn’t want to follow my predecessor into the abyss. The report is ready: four sections, a conclusion, a request for money. I was told: “Cut the last subpoint.” I cut it.
The double chose a quiet path: not to give orders to the army, but to give it work. Yet the whole elite knows he’s a stranger. Now one thing matters: can he become useful before he becomes a convenient enemy? And the wedding for the whole world has already been set.
Read the complete story in “Putin in Space.” This page contains only a short excerpt; the book has the rest.
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