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From "one of Russia's smartest and best-sourced young journalists"
(The New York Times) comes the first work by a Russian author to
reveal his country's history of oppressing Ukraine and provide an
unprecedented overview of the war for Ukrainian independence that
affects us all. As soon as the Russian invasion of Ukraine began,
prominent independent Russian journalist Mikhail Zygar circulated a
Facebook petition signed first by hundreds of his cultural and
journalistic contacts and then by thousands of others. That act led
to a new law in Russia criminalizing criticism of the war, and
Zygar fled Russia. In his time as a journalist, Zygar has
interviewed President Zelensky and had access to many of the major
players--from politicians to oligarchs. As an expert on Putin's
moods and behavior, he has spent years studying the Kremlin's plan
regarding Ukraine, and here, in clear, chronological order he
explains how we got here. In 1996 to 2004, Ukraine became an
independent post-Soviet country where everyone was connected to the
former empire at all levels, financially, culturally,
psychologically. However, the elite anticipated that the empire
would be back and punish them. From 2004 to 2018, there were many
states inside one state, each with its own rulers/oligarchs and its
own interests--some of them directly connected with Russia. In
2018, a new generation of Ukrainians arrive, and having grown in an
independent country, they do not consider themselves to be part of
Russia--and that was the moment when the war began, as Putin could
not tolerate losing Ukraine forever. Authoritative, timely, and
vitally important, this is an unprecedented overview of the war
that affects us all and continues to threaten the future of the
entire world as we know it.
Did Lenin really create the nation of Ukraine with a stroke of his
pen? Was even its greatest hero in fact a Nazi? Just what does it
owe to the benevolence of Catherine the Great? Whatever else it is,
the Russian invasion has been an assault on historical truth - a
mythic struggle in the name of an imperial unity that is itself no
more than a myth. Yet the lies didn't start in 2022, and the truth
of Ukrainian history has always been slipperier than any simple
patriot might wish. In War and Punishment, Mikhail Zygar chronicles
how Russia was led to the brink of violence by more than 300 years
of fake history, folk tales and propaganda, from the legendary
deeds of the Cossacks to the 1970s spy novels that thrilled a young
Vladimir Putin. With a virtuoso display of erudition and
scholarhsip, he penetrates this fog to reconstruct the strange but
true stories of Russo-Ukrainian relations over the past centuries,
and uncover the often absurd origins of Russia's imperial
delusions. His insights are all the more valuable because of his
extraordinary connections. A noted expert on the Putin circle,
Zygar also has extensive contacts with President Zelensky and his
staff. And though he is now labelled a foreign agent in Russia, he
has obtained many candid interviews with witnesses on both sides of
the war - from oligarchs to former presidents, gangsters to
comedians. With the help of their frank testimony, here is the real
story behind Russia's dream of conquest.
Did Lenin really create the nation of Ukraine with a stroke of his
pen? Was even its greatest hero in fact a Nazi? Just what does it
owe to the benevolence of Catherine the Great? Whatever else it is,
the Russian invasion has been an assault on historical truth - a
mythic struggle in the name of an imperial unity that is itself no
more than a myth. Yet the lies didn't start in 2022, and the truth
of Ukrainian history has always been slipperier than any simple
patriot might wish. In War and Punishment, Mikhail Zygar chronicles
how Russia was led to the brink of violence by more than 300 years
of fake history, folk tales and propaganda, from the legendary
deeds of the Cossacks to the 1970s spy novels that thrilled a young
Vladimir Putin. With a virtuoso display of erudition and
scholarhsip, he penetrates this fog to reconstruct the strange but
true stories of Russo-Ukrainian relations over the past centuries,
and uncover the often absurd origins of Russia's imperial
delusions. His insights are all the more valuable because of his
extraordinary connections. A noted expert on the Putin circle,
Zygar also has extensive contacts with President Zelensky and his
staff. And though he is now labelled a foreign agent in Russia, he
has obtained many candid interviews with witnesses on both sides of
the war - from oligarchs to former presidents, gangsters to
comedians. With the help of their frank testimony, here is the real
story behind Russia's dream of conquest.
All the Kremlin's Men is a gripping narrative of an accidental king
and a court out of control. Based on an unprecedented series of
interviews with Vladimir Putin's inner circle, this book presents a
radically different view of power and politics in Russia. The image
of Putin as a strongman is dissolved. In its place is a weary
figurehead buffeted--if not controlled--by the men who at once
advise and deceive him. The regional governors and bureaucratic
leaders are immovable objects, far more powerful in their fiefdoms
than the president himself. So are the gatekeepers-those officials
who guard the pathways to power-on whom Putin depends as much as
they rely on him. The tenuous edifice is filled with all of the
intrigue and plotting of a Medici court, as enemies of the state
are invented and wars begun to justify personal gains, internal
rivalries, or one faction's biased advantage. A bestseller in
Russia, All the Kremlin's Men is a shocking revisionist portrait of
the Putin era and a dazzling reconstruction of the machinations of
courtiers running riot.
The Empire Must Die portrays the vivid drama of Russia's brief and
exotic experiment with civil society before it was swept away by
the despotism of the Communist Revolution. The window between two
equally stifling autocracies - the imperial family and the
communists - was open only briefly, in the last couple of years of
the 19th century until the end of WWI, by which time the revolution
was in full fury. From the last years of Tolstoy until the death of
the Tsar and his family, however, Russia experimented with
liberalism and cultural openness. In Europe, the Ballet Russe was
the height of chic. Novelists and playwrights blossomed, political
ideas were swapped in coffee houses and St Petersburg felt briefly
like Vienna or Paris. The state, however couldn't tolerate such
experimentation against the backdrop of a catastrophic war and a
failing economy. The autocrats moved in and the liberals were
overwhelmed. This story seems to have strangely prescient echoes of
the present.
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