He's a thug and a mafia dictator, but "communist" doesn't really apply here. Venezuela, from whom we are now purchasing oil, sure. But russia? It's basically Mexico, but with different flavored cartels and nukes.
Jeeze... the guy is a KGB Communist hard liner. They don’t change their spots.
Well... Putin was a KGB guy, he likes Stalin.
So in that sense he can be categorized as being a communist, or the very least a neo-soviet fan.