Putin to Biden. We're very similar you and I. Isn't that a super-villain cliche?

[Bucky]

11. "Join me on the dark side, Luke, and together we will rule western Eurasia!"

We probably need to get past the view of Putin is simply a murderous petro-thug. In the grand scheme of geopolitics, right now he's really just a fairly effective catspaw for expanding Chinese global strategy. He might even be a little bit in denial of that. He has his own agenda and his own mischief to stir up. But in the big picture, what Gaddafi was to Brezhnev, Putin is to Xi.