Who will win the duel between Navalny and Putin?

The return of Alexei Navalny to Russia from his German exile this week was predictable. The opposition leader had warned that his poisoning with Novichok would not intimidate him. After a ritual denial of responsibility for the botched assassination, Vladimir Putin remarked that if his agents had been involved “they would have finished the job”. Equally inevitable were Navalny’s arrest at Moscow airport and his incarceration — in the same grim prison where the lawyer Sergei Magnitsky died of torture and neglect.

But this latest chapter in the long drawn-out duel between Navalny and Putin had an unforeseen twist. No sooner had he walked into the clutches of the Russian security apparat, than a two-hour documentary was released on YouTube by Navalny’s supporters. You can watch it with subtitles here, but it is in Russian and aimed at the people of Russia. Like every film made and presented by Navalny, it is sharp, witty and compelling. Within hours of its release, the video had gone viral and been watched by millions. At the time of writing, it has had well over 20 million views.

The subject of Navalny’s investigation is none other than Putin himself — and his fabulous wealth. “The richest man in the world”, as he calls Russia’s President-for-life, began in the KGB office in Dresden, then rose via St Petersburg and Moscow to become Boris Yeltsin’s enforcer. Navalny highlights the corrupt networks of former KGB men who now control the economy, naming names and following the money. The film culminates in a 3-D reconstruction of “Putin’s palace” on the Black Sea, based on leaked floor plans. “It is the most secretive and guarded facility in Russia,” Navalny tells viewers. “It isn’t a country house or a residence — it’s an entire city, or rather a kingdom.” He is not exaggerating. Costing 100 billion roubles (£1 billion) to build, the estate is surrounded by 7,000 hectares (17,000 acres), which is 39 times the size of the Kingdom of Monaco. The palace has its own chapel, theatre, spa, casino and, of course, strip club. Built in the Soviet style, in the most expensive and execrable taste, this is far more than a pleasure dome: “It is a separate state within Russia. And in this stage there is a single and irreplaceable Tsar,” Navalny declares. “Putin.”

Much of the film is devoted to the James Bond villains who paid for this presidential retreat — how they robbed and pillaged Russia with Putin’s blessing and lavished their ill-gotten gains on his Black Sea Valhalla in return.  But what is so brilliant and so devastating about Navalny’s documentary is that it taps into the very human fascination with extremes of wealth. If he had concentrated solely on the networks of corruption or the brutality of the regime, many Russians would have lost interest. They take these for granted in their everyday lives. But the sheer excesses of luxury depicted here are bound to grab their attention. Their President’s greed, it turns out, goes far beyond the imagination of any tsar or dictator. It is plain for every Russian to see: Putin is not the pious servant of the state, the faithful son of Mother Russia and the Orthodox Church, as he presents himself in public. He is avarice incarnate.

Why should anyone believe Navalny? Why take his word rather than that of the vast Russian propaganda machine that awes even London and Washington? This brings us to the new factor in the endless duel between the dissident and the despot. Navalny has come back from the dead. Last summer he was nearly murdered twice: once when his underwear was impregnated with Novichok just before he set off on a trans-Siberian flight, then again in the hospital at Omsk. He arrived at the Charité in Berlin more dead than alive and remained in an induced coma for weeks. His survival is a miracle and its significance will not be lost on a nation that lives and yearns for the miraculous. Navalny is no longer just a smart-aleck satirist, nor even merely another intrepid advocate of democracy. He is a modern strannik, or holy pilgrim, wandering the steppes and thirsting for justice. He has acquired the nimbus of a martyr — but he is still alive. And in the contest between this solitary avenger of the people and the bloated plutocrat in the Kremlin, it is no longer clear who is the true Tsar and who the pretender.

In this contest, there can be only one victor. One is master of a militarised surveillance state, armed to the teeth with a nightmarish arsenal of nuclear and chemical weapons; the other has only one weapon — the truth. For the first time in his two decades of absolute rule, Putin must at some level be afraid. He now has Navalny in his power, but if he has his rival killed in custody, the mask will finally have slipped. The power of a martyr extends far beyond the grave — think of St Joan of Arc, for example. The fact that Putin tried to do away with him last year shows that he lives in fear. What could not kill Navalny has made him stronger.

Already comparisons are being made with Solzhenitsyn, Sakharov and Sharansky. Such men survived because their captors feared the consequences of their murder. This is a dangerous moment for Putin. The young no longer fear him and their parents are no longer indifferent. His popularity has slumped and sanctions are limiting his patronage. Last summer Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus was almost toppled by a popular uprising after a rigged election. Putin kept his only close ally in power, but the same thing could happen to him. The murder of Navalny now would bring people onto the streets, perhaps in very large numbers. If the security forces were to sense that Putin had become a liability, they could turn against him. That is probably not a risk he is prepared to take.

For the moment, then, there is a balance of power between David and Goliath. Navalny may be kept in prison indefinitely on trumped-up charges, but he has earned respect and admiration by his refusal to remain in the safety of exile. If there is a show trial, Putin will find himself in the unenviable role of Pontius Pilate. And he faces a man who has already been resurrected. Even in prison, Navalny could become a Nelson Mandela. Let Putin enjoy his Black Sea palace while he still can. Thanks to the implacable nemesis that is Alexei Navalny, it has already become a gilded cage.

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