Andrew S Weiss - The Life and Lies of Putin - and the Disasterous Culmination of a Toxic Character

It seems like the past century has been least kind to Ukraine, of all the countries in Europe. Fought over repeatedly in WWII by rampaging armies, which came off the back of revolution, civil war, terror, and genocide in the Holodomor. Ukraine has bene plagued with monumental events — wars, famines, political upheavals. But there's a recurring theme – its struggle to break away from Russia – which, like an abusive husband, refuses to let Ukraine go, while threatening to destroy everything in retribution. Putin is just the latest incarnation of a leaders pursuing a monstrous policy of imperialism, domination, and genocidal action whenever they felt Ukraine slipping out of their control.

Andrew S. Weiss is James Family Chair and Vice President for Studies at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington DC. There he leads an international team of experts on Russia, Ukraine, and the wider region. He has previously been a Director at the RAND Centre for Russia and Eurasia. Andrew’s career has spanned both public and private sectors. He served as director for Russian, Ukrainian, and Eurasian Affairs on the National Security Council staff, as a member of the State Department’s Policy Planning Staff, and as a policy assistant in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defence for Policy during the administrations of Presidents Bill Clinton and George H. W. Bush.