Rumors are swirling that Russian President Vladimir Putin used a body double as a stand-in for a recent surprise visit to Ukraine. Previous allegations claimed the leader uses three surgically altered impersonators.
Is Putin using a body double?
Speculation that Vladimir Putin uses a double is nothing new, but the allegations multiplied again after the Russian President made a surprise visit to occupied areas of Ukraine recently, Yahoo! News reported.
Anton Gerashechenko, an adviser to the minister of internal affairs of Ukraine, shared three recent photos of Putin on Twitter. Two of the photos were supposedly taken during a trip the Russian leader made to Ukrainian territories recently, the New York Post reported.
Can you spot the double? It’s all in the neck and ears
Skeptics have long claimed that Putin uses up to three body doubles, all of whom have had plastic surgery to look like the Russian leader. They say the way to spot the difference is to look at the ears in a variety of photos that are supposed to be Putin.
In a Twitter post, Gerashechenko’s photos were laid out as side-by-side images, each featuring red circles around the neck and chin area of the man in each photo, which seemed to suggest not all three men pictured are Putin.
The photos were all taken within the span of a month, with the earliest dated February 21, 2023, taken in Moscow, and the two latest dated March 18 in Sevastopol, and another on March 19 in Mariupol.
Immediately apparent is the thinner neck in the February photo, with a pronounced jowl in the other two photos.
Captioning the photos, Gerashechenko asked: “Which one do you think is the real one?”
What is Russia hiding? Ukrainian General wonders if Putin still exists
Back in October, Ukraine’s head of military intelligence, Major General Kyrylo Budanov, wondered aloud: “The question is whether the real Putin still exists?”
“We know specifically about three people who keep appearing, but how many there are, we don’t know,” Budanov said.
“The one thing that gives them away is their height,” Budanov continued. “It’s visible in videos and pictures. Also gestures, body language and earlobes, since they are unique for every person.”
General says actions inconsistent with Putin
Budanov not only speculated on Russia using doubles to impersonate the leader but questioned actions by the country that did not seem logical, wondering if the president was still making the key decisions, the Daily Mail reported.
“No matter how bad” Putin was in the past, Budanov said, “he was not an idiot.” The Major General stated that Russia’s war “does not follow any logic.”
