Explaining Putin’s Decades-Long Obsession With Ukraine
The New York Times
We spoke with Fiona Hill, a former Trump adviser, about how the Russian leader’s view of history has led him to the brink of war.
Winston Churchill once described Russia as “a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.” It’s a phrase that could equally apply to Vladimir Putin, the Kremlin’s leader, as the world awaits his next move on Ukraine.
To better understand him, we reached out to Fiona Hill, one of Washington’s foremost experts on the Russian president. Hill has served in multiple U.S. administrations as an intelligence officer and policy adviser, most recently as senior director for Europe and Russia on the National Security Council under Donald Trump.
She spoke with us about Putin’s longtime obsession with annexing Ukraine, her worries about how he’s closed himself off from outside information and his private boasts about his ability to “buy anyone” in the United States and Europe.
