Top 693 Quotes & Sayings by Vladimir Putin

There is no uniform, global model for democracy.

It is extremely dangerous to encourage people to see themselves as exceptional, whatever the motivation.

Hitler wanted to destroy Russia- everyone needs to remember how that ended

Russia doesn't negotiate with terrorists. It destroys them.

Anyone who doesn't regret the passing of the Soviet Union has no heart. Anyone who wants it restored has no brains.

You can do a lot more with weapons and politeness than just politeness.

You must obey the law, always, not only when they grab you by your special place.

We are all different, but when we ask for the Lord's blessings, we must not forget that God created us equal.

It is my greatest desire, I want the people in Russia to be happy and I want our partners around the world to seek to develop relations with Russia.

They are constantly trying to drive us into a corner because we have an independent position, because we maintain it and because we tell it like it is and don't engage in hypocrisy. But there is a limit to everything. And with Ukraine, our Western partners have crossed the line, playing the bear and acting irresponsibly and unprofessionally.

If you want to become an Islamic radical and have yourself circumcised, I invite you to come to Moscow... I would recommend that he who does the surgery does it so you'll have nothing growing back afterward.

Europeans are dying out. Don't you understand that? And same-sex marriages don't produce children. Do you want to survive by drawing migrants? But society cannot adapt so many migrants.

I consider it to be the meaning of my whole life and my obligation to serve my fatherland and our people.

A happy love needs to be reciprocated.

Russian police force, fortunately, so far, do not use batons, tear gas or any other extreme measures of instilling order, something that we often see in other countries, including in the United States. Speaking of opposition, let us recall the movement Occupy Wall Street. Where is it now? The law enforcement agencies and special services in the US have taken it apart, into little pieces, and have dissolved it.

Maybe they have nothing else to do in America but to talk about me.

You know every stage of your life has an impact on you.

Chess makes man wiser and clear-sighted.

I'd rather not deal with such questions, because anyway it's like shearing a pig - lots of screams but little wool.

A country in which the people are not healthy physically and psychologically, are poorly educated and illiterate, will never rise to the peaks of world civilization.

I guess I can call myself a pragmatist with a conservative perspective. It would be hard for me to explain this, but I always take realities of today, lessons from the distant and recent past into consideration.

I have several portraits of Jigoro Kano and a bust too, a very beautiful one.

I think every person should have some faith inside him, in his heart. What matters is not an external display of this faith, but the inner state of the soul.

I don’t regret anything. I did everything absolutely correctly.

Sometimes it is necessary to be lonely in order to prove that you are right.

A policy of expansionism and conquest has no future in the modern world.

Without the values at the core of Christianity and other world religions, without moral norms that have been shaped over millennia, people will inevitably lose their human dignity. One must respect every minority’s right to be different, but the rights of the majority must not be put into question.

If you are a Christian, you are in danger. If you decided to abandon your faith and become an atheist, you also are to be liquidated according to their concept. You are in danger if you decide to become a Muslim. It is not going to save you anyway because they believe traditional Islam is hostile to their goals.

I believe that the Europeans, first and foremost, the Germans, will also understand me. Let me remind you that in the course of political consultations on the unification of East and West Germany... some nations that were then and are now Germany's allies did not support the idea of unification. Our nation, however, unequivocally supported the sincere, unstoppable desire of the Germans for national unity. I am confident that you have not forgotten this, and I expect that the citizens of Germany will also support the aspiration of the Russians, of historical Russia, to restore unity.

Whoever is the first to cry "Stop the thief" is the one who is guilty.

It's better not to argue with women... When people push boundaries too far, it's not because they are strong but because they are weak. But maybe weakness is not the worst quality for a woman.

Nuclear weapons and other weapons are the means to protect our sovereignty and legitimate interests, not the means to behave aggressively or to fulfil some non-existent imperial ambitions.

It's a historical phenomenon that in 250 years, a nation could move from a colony into the most prosperous nation of the world and the leader of the world. It is indeed an achievement, a tribute to the talent of the American nation, the American people and an optimal political and economic system.

Absolute trust is something hard to achieve even in a family, and it is much harder to achieve on an international level.

I'm convinced that a person in my position must provide a positive example to people.

I'll be honest, I felt an urge to squeeze him like a kitten and that led to the gesture I made. There was nothing behind it really.

Nobody should pin their hopes on a miracle.

There is no one to talk to since Mahatma Gandhi died.

Personally, I think that children should be left alone, they should be given an opportunity to grow up, to become aware of themselves and decide themselves who they are: men or women, if they want to have a traditional or homosexual marriage.

Democracy cannot be exported to some other place. This must be a product of internal domestic development in a society.

Berlusconi is being tried because he lives with women. If he was homosexual, no one would have lifted a finger against him.

The events in Crimea themselves have nothing to do with what happened in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and other regions. In my opinion, when the world becomes unipolar, or when someone tries to make it so, then this one pole has the illusion that all issues can be settled through power. And only when there is a balance of power does the desire to negotiate appears.

The US wants to subdue Russia, to solve US problems at Russia's expense. No one in history ever managed to do this to Russia, and no one ever will.

It's better to be hanged for loyalty than be rewarded for betrayal.

It's better not to argue with women.

We in Russia have always considered Russians and Ukrainians to be one people. I still think so.

There used to be the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact. There used to be Soviet troops in the GDR. And we must honestly admit that they were occupation troops, which remained in Germany after WWII under the guise of allied troops. Now these occupation troops are gone, the Soviet Union has collapsed, and the Warsaw Pact is no more. There is no Soviet threat, but NATO and U.S. troops are still in Europe. What for?

If Russia's interests and security are threatened, Russia will resist. Everyone needs to know that.

We should all be aware of the fact that when revolutionary - not evolutionary - changes come, things can get even worse. The intelligentsia should be aware of this. And it is the intelligentsia specifically that should keep this in mind and prevent society from radical steps and revolutions of all kinds. We've had enough of it. We've seen so many revolutions and wars. We need decades of calm and harmonious development.

Russia's partners should understand it's best not to mess with us.

Donald Trump is a brilliant and talented person, without a doubt.

Russian culture is multifaceted and diverse. So if you want to understand, to feel Russia, then of course you need to read books, Tolstoy and Chekhov and Gogol and others. Listen to music. Tchaikovsky. Watch our classical ballet. But the most important thing is that you need to talk with people.

I think: the powers like to talk about "freedom" in order to wash the population's brains.

Nobody should have any illusion about the possibility of gaining military superiority over Russia. We will never allow this to happen.

Those who fight corruption should be clean themselves.

People are always teaching us democracy but the people who teach us democracy don't want to learn it themselves.

There is no such thing as a former KGB man.

NATO and the USA wanted a complete victory over the Soviet Union. They wanted to sit on the throne in Europe alone.

Everything will probably never be Ok. But we have to try for it.

Even if we do not always agree on every aspect, nobody should take this as an excuse to declare us as enemies.