I think puppet gives him far too much credit and implies he got something in return, he's not clever enough to be a puppet. The puppet, if anyone is, is Seamas Milne. He really cannot and will not shake off his Stalinist leanings, it's there for all to see in his media columns.
I'm not sure what good your Boris Johnson whataboutism is doing to any argument you think you have. But Johnson and the Tory Party have been exposed many times for their Russian connections, I'm not entirely sure how you've missed that. Moreso than Corbyn for that matter. The Tories and Johnson have been bought by Russian money, we all know it, hell they've accepted £62,000 since the Ukraine war started
But getting back to St Jeremy, he'd have shaken off the Russia thing, if he'd stopped saying the same things as Putin but he can't seemingly help himself