Review by Booklist Review
Short's robustly researched biography of Vladimir Putin mines the Russian autocrat's past for perspective on his recent maneuvers. It's long been obvious that Putin was shaped by his work in the Russian intelligence services. The late Senator John McCain famously said he "looked in Mr. Putin's eyes and saw three letters--a K, a G, and a B." But former BBC journalist Short suggests that Putin's strategic priorities, as well as his opaque, calculating leadership style, were likewise shaped by other roles. In Leningrad, under Mayor Anatoly Sobchak, Putin navigated and thrived in a pugilistic environment in which the criminal and business worlds were "not merely linked, but symbiotically intertwined." Working for President Boris Yeltsin, Putin further honed his ability to manipulate public opinion, and learned the rudiments of the "power vertical" structure that would become his mode of authoritarian rule. He also had a front-row seat to the "politics of dismemberment," as former Soviet republics began to peel away from Russia, which Putin angrily blamed on Yeltsin's excessive permissiveness. Invading the Ukraine, suggests Short, was "unfinished business" many years in the making. As he did in Pol Pot: Anatomy of a Nightmare and Mao (2005), Short leavens an essentially journalistic approach with revealing anecdotes, resulting in a comprehensive and highly engaging account.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In this incisive and well-timed biography, journalist Short (Pol Pot) paints Russian president Vladimir Putin as a perfect fit for post-Soviet rule: a former KGB apparatchik who built a kleptocratic coalition of police and military bureaucrats, billionaire oligarchs, and organized-crime gangs; a genuinely popular politician who manipulated elections and suppressed political opposition; and a canny statesman who advanced Russia's recovery of territory and international clout. Short guides readers through the corrupt dealmaking and power plays that marked Putin's career, credits him with restoring stability and economic growth, and evenhandedly assesses the dire allegations critics lodged against him. For example, Short exonerates Putin of charges that he secretly masterminded terrorist bombings that were blamed on Chechen separatists but finds him guilty of authorizing the poisoning of dissident Alexei Navalny. The man himself, in Short's shrewd portrait, is an icily self-controlled, Machiavellian realist, often vulgar ("They picked all this out of their noses and smeared it over their papers," Putin declared when asked at a news conference about accusations of graft), conciliatory when necessary, brutal when convenient, and, unfortunately for Ukraine, doggedly tenacious. Short's elegant prose conveys a trenchant view of post-Communist society--"a world in which all the barriers were fluid, where yesterday's criminal was tomorrow's business magnate and a politician today was a criminal tomorrow"--that makes Putin a striking embodiment of Russia's troubled soul. This is a must-read. (July)
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
The author of authoritative books on Mao and Pol Pot returns with another impressive yet disturbing account of a dangerous world leader. Events in Ukraine will spur sales of this thick biography, but any praise is well deserved, as Short offers an insightful and often discouraging text on the Russian president. Born in 1952 in Leningrad, he grew up in a tiny, shabby apartment shared with two other families. Entering the KGB in 1975, he left in 1991 to join Leningrad's city government in the exhilarating aftermath of Gorbachev's perestroika. Diligent and efficient, Putin rose to prominence and moved to Moscow in 1996, becoming President Boris Yeltsin's trusted assistant and then successor in 2000. Russia's constitution (approved under Yeltsin) gives its president far more powers than America's, but Short shows how Putin's KGB background lowered his inhibitions on imprisoning or murdering political opponents; as time passed, his word became law. The author has no quarrel with the accusation that Putin destroyed the democratic liberties that followed glasnost, but he also points out that, for most Russians, the 1990s were a time of crushing poverty, crime, and disorder. Early on under Putin, living standards increased, and the streets became safer. Few Russians admire the Soviet Union, other than its status as an empire and great power. Many Russians, including Putin, are angry about how the U.S. boasted of victory during the Cold War, gave advice but little else during the lean years, and broke its promise not to expand NATO to former Soviet nations, thereby stoking Russia's long-standing paranoia about being surrounded by enemies. Putin's 2014 seizure of Crimea and backing of secessionists in eastern Ukraine remain popular, and many Russians support the invasion of Ukraine despite its difficulties. Having read obsessively and interviewed almost everyone, Putin included, Short delivers a consistently compelling account of Putin's life so far. Contradictions abound, and the author is not shy about pointing out frank lies from sources that include Putin as well as his enemies. Required reading for anyone interested in global affairs. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
