This is an essential read for those who still think Russia’s war with Ukraine is a regional conflict that just happens to involve a nuclear superpower.
Eugene Finkel argues that Vladimir Putin’s explicit goal is not to keep Donbas occupied and Crimea annexed, but to dismantle the Western-dominated, post-Cold War global order and reestablish the Kremlin’s control over much of Eurasia.
Without controlling Ukraine – “the gates of Europe” according to Finkel – Russia cannot succeed. The book explains why Russia’s invasion was neither sudden nor unexpected but a “logical, if shocking, continuation of past policies.”
Finkel anatomises the crimes against humanity that Russian leaders have committed over history, from the genocidal man-made famine in Ukraine, the deportations of Crimean Tartars and oppression of Jews, to mass murders in Bucha.
This description of Russia’s “two-hundred-year quest to dominate Ukraine” is told using many personal stories, including his grandfather’s. It’s these accounts which lift this beautifully written history from the factual to the fascinating.
