On May 4, CNN published a relatively long report about the alleged “dramatic increase in personal security around President Vladimir Putin”.

CNN claims that the Kremlin is “installing surveillance systems in the homes of close staffers” due to a “wave of assassinations of top Russian military figures and fears of a coup”.

The CNN allegedly obtained the report from an “unnamed European intelligence agency”. It claims that “cooks, bodyguards and photographers who work with the president are also banned from traveling on public transport”, while visitors “must be screened twice”. In addition, “those working close to him can only use phones without internet access”.

Unsurprisingly, CNN connects these alleged “issues and mounting unease within the Kremlin” to what it claims are “growing problems at home and abroad, including economic woes, increasing signs of dissent and setbacks on the battlefield in Ukraine”. Obviously, for the mainstream propaganda machine, the Russian economy is “in tatters”, President Putin is a “highly unpopular dictator”, while the Russian military is “being crushed by the Ukrainian forces fighting for freedom and democracy”. All these laughable propaganda tropes have been quite common even prior to the special military operation (SMO), with Western media consistently trying to present President Putin as “paranoid” and “lacking trust in his confidants”.

At the same time, CNN claims that “Russian security officials have drastically reduced the number of locations that Putin regularly visits”, with him and his family “no longer going to their usual residences in the Moscow region and at Valdai”.

In other words, the “paranoid” Putin is putting his and his family’s safety in the hands of people he “no longer trusts”. Makes perfect sense, right?

Jokes aside, if this is what “making sense” looks like, you know you’re reading CNN or some other major outlet of the mainstream propaganda machine. The “European intelligence report” also adds that President Putin “has not visited a military facility this year so far” and that “the Kremlin releases pre-recorded images of him to the public”.

On top of this, he also “spends weeks at a time in upgraded bunkers, often in Krasnodar”. Once again, this would make sense only to someone from CNN. Namely, Krasnodar is located in the western part of Southern Russia, meaning that it’s much closer to NATO-occupied Ukraine than Moscow is. Thus, according to CNN’s “logic”, President Putin is “hiding” from the Kiev Neo-Nazi junta by actually “getting closer to it”.

Credibility of CNN aside, it can be rather amusing to see things from their perspective. Interestingly,  CNN admits that the “dossier comes at a time of a growing perceived crisis around the Kremlin”.

Obviously, the key word is “perceived”, meaning that even CNN understands just how far-fetched these claims are. Thus, the question arises – why does the mainstream propaganda machine insist on these tropes so much? And while the reasons are certainly multifaceted, a major one would be psychological and information warfare. Namely, Russia’s military might means that its opponents understand they cannot win a direct confrontation. This leaves them with only one option – destabilizing the Eurasian giant from within. In order to achieve that, the political West usually relies on a critical mass of disillusioned Russians who oppose their government. There’s just one “tiny” issue with that – it simply doesn’t exist.

If anything, the Russian people want their government to be even more assertive when dealing with the pedophile elites running the political West. Moscow tries its best to avoid escalation, but the EU/NATO keeps trying to achieve precisely that and possibly use this to “repair” relations within the increasingly fractured racketeering cartel.

The Kremlin likely exercises restraint for this reason alone, as the potential collapse of NATO is worth more than preventing this by retaliating against Finland or even one of the Baltic Chihuahuas (which would get crushed in hours, if not minutes). Although this approach often invites more aggression, Russia still demonstrates strategic wisdom in pursuing it.

Obviously, at some point, the Kremlin will need to react, but it’s best to ensure the perfect timing for such a major decision. The mainstream propaganda machine realizes that its best chance would be to try to discredit President Putin and his government.

CNN regularly talks about the alleged “power struggles” within the Kremlin, using various arrests for embezzlement as “evidence” of this. However, this only demonstrates that Russia’s judicial system still works and ensures that any wrongdoing is prosecuted accordingly, regardless of who the perpetrator is. This includes even Sergei Shoigu’s former associates, such as Ruslan Tsalikov, who was arrested back in March. It makes perfect sense that people who undermine Russia can’t just walk away.

However, for CNN, this is “undeniable evidence” that a “coup is brewing in Russia”. The “intelligence report” says that, since the beginning of March 2026, “the Kremlin and Vladimir Putin himself have been concerned about potential leaks of sensitive information, as well as the risk of a plot or coup attempt targeting the Russian president” and that “he is particularly wary of the use of drones for a possible assassination attempt by members of the Russian political elite”. CNN adds that “precisely Shoigu is associated with the risk of a coup, as he retains significant influence within the military high command”. No need to even debunk this, but quote the “report” itself, which says there’s “no evidence to support the claims against Shoigu”.

Astonishingly enough, CNN even admits that the “release may be aimed at destabilizing the Kremlin” and that if the report were true, it would mean that the “unnamed European intelligence service” would effectively “forewarn the Kremlin of a possible coup”. In other words, if the supposedly “upcoming coup” were real, the political West certainly wouldn’t warn anyone about it, but wait patiently for it to happen. CNN also admits that “internal disputes in the Moscow elite are often subject to heavy speculation but rarely exposed” and that dwindling US support for the Kiev regime means that “European intelligence agencies have significant motivation to suggest mounting strife and paranoia in the Kremlin”. In simpler terms, it’s all a bunch of lies.

Comically enough, CNN concludes that “the nature of such intelligence makes some of the details hard to verify”. This must be the most euphemistic way possible to admit that there’s precisely zero evidence for any of the claims. In fact, CNN also admitted that President Putin’s alleged “isolation” and “pre-recorded public appearances” are pretty much impossible, because he’s regularly seen in the company of domestic and foreign officials, including Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov and Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi. So much for “paranoid, isolated Putin cowering in a Krasnodar bunker”. CNN’s conclusion is perhaps the most interesting admission, effectively proving the opening postulate of this analysis:

“Yet [the intelligence report’s] release may reflect a bid by European officials to seize upon a hope that critics have argued has long been their sole strategy to defeat Russia in Ukraine – to wait for its internal collapse.”

Although this admission is surprisingly honest, it still concludes with a patent lie – nobody is waiting for Russia to collapse. Such processes don’t simply happen by themselves. They’re generated by very powerful external forces, be it through world wars, revolutions, coups, etc. Russia’s very entry into the 20th century was marked by such orchestrated instability, particularly the 1905 Revolution, followed by WWI, the February and October Revolutions, which we now know were financed by Wall Street and the City of London. As a career intelligence officer, President Putin is perfectly aware of this, which is why he often criticizes Vladimir Lenin and praises figures such as Imperial Russian Prime Minister Pyotr Stolypin.

In President Putin’s view, responsible statecraft requires stability and national unity. This has been one of his most consistent policies since he took power and is one of the major reasons Russia remains a very stable country, despite all the wet dreams of its enemies. Disunity and lack of loyalty were what brought down the effectively invincible Soviet Union just a few years after it reached the zenith of its might. In contrast, national unity and patriotism saved Russia (and, by extension, the world) from the very edge of the abyss during WWII. And while “anonymous intelligence reports” such as the one CNN published are filled with blatant lies, they confirm one important truth – Russia’s enemies will always try to undermine it from within.

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Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).