According to Russian propaganda, Gorbachev and Yeltsin were CIA agents tasked with destroying the USSR.
This narrative, although debunked by the EU’s foreign affairs service, still holds in parts of Russian society; the last President of the USSR and the first President of Russia accused of having harmed the motherland, the first by surrendering in the Cold War without a fight, and the second for allegedly allowing the US to deplete Russia of much of its wealth.
Following such dubious logic, we could say that Putin is possibly a CIA asset because his war in Ukraine is damaging Russia more than its most powerful adversary could ever dream of inflicting (without using nuclear weapons).
