Pentagon papers: Vladimir Putin is ‘receiving chemo for cancer’

The Russian President’s generals are taking advantage of his ill health to change the direction of the war in Ukraine.

Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on Thursday. Picture: AFP

Russian President Vladimir Putin is undergoing chemotherapy for cancer and his generals are taking advantage of his ill health to change the direction of the war in Ukraine.

The latest revelations from the leaked intelligence documents, which began being widely circulated on social media in the past week, show the US was told Mr Putin, 70, was being treated with chemotherapy.

The documents from the Pentagon include details of a chemotherapy appointment scheduled for March 5.

The intelligence leak relating to Mr Putin’s health appears to add weight to rumours that have swirled around the Russian leader since the invasion of Ukraine in February last year. It also suggests that senior Kremlin officials were looking to take advantage of Mr Putin’s ill health.

“According to the (redacted name), who received the information from an unidentified Russian source with access to Kremlin officials, Russia planned to divert resources from the Taganrog, Russia to Mariupol, Ukraine and focus its attention on the southern front,’’ one document says.

“According to the (redacted) the plan for ‘the offensive’ … was suspected to be a strategy devised by Russian National Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev and Russian Chief of the General Staff Valeriy Gerasimov to sabotage presumably Putin.

“Gerasimov reportedly planned to continue his efforts to sabotage the offensive, noting that he promised to ‘throw’ the so-called special military operation by 5 March, when Putin was allegedly scheduled to start a round of chemotherapy and would thus be unable to influence the war effort.”

Last November an alleged Russian insider declared Mr Putin had Parkinson’s disease as well as cancer and was regularly pumped full of steroids.

Weeks later Ukrainian intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov said he was convinced Mr Putin was seriously ill, saying “I think he will die very quickly,’’ before adding “I hope very soon.”

The leaked Pentagon documents indicate that the US believes China may support Russia in the Ukraine war and that the Ukrainian gains may only result in modest territorial gains in a spring counteroffensive.

There were references to special forces operatives from Britain, as well as from a handful of other countries, being deployed to Ukraine.

The documents also say Russia had been seeking stronger relationships with the United Arab Emirates, something denied by the UAE, and that Egypt had held discussions to secretly supply Russia with 40,000 rockets.

Some of the first documents released suggested that Ukraine was running out of ammunition for the BUK and S-300 systems.