Yale historian and political commentator Timothy Snyder writes: “Repeatedly asking ‘What is Putin thinking?’ leaves us mesmerized by shadows. Remembering how a tyrant must think breaks the spell.” Many in the media have been asking the first question. (Fiona Hill’s response, from a couple of days ago, was quite lucid.) Snyder answers that a tyrant must think with two companions: death and fear. Death relates to the “odd essay” (that’s an understatement) Putin wrote last year, in which he imagines a millennial reunification of Russia and Ukraine; fear, to his vulnerabilities. The implications are here.
Snyder’s Substack blog has been alternating between writing about American politics (alongside the Olympics and other things) and about Ukraine. His recent posts “How to think about war in Ukraine“, “Putin has an exit from the conflict“, and “Ukraine and Russia: is there a simple solution?” are well worth reading.
Meanwhile, elsewhere on Substack, Columbia historian Adam Tooze provides some economically and geopolitically astute analyses of the Russo-Ukrainian conflict in “Putin’s challenge to western hegemony” (Jan. 12), “War in sight? Russia-Ukraine scenarios” (Jan. 14), “Strategy of tension – Updated on the economic fallout of Russia-Ukraine crisis” (Jan. 31), and “Permanent crisis or black earth agro-giant: Alternative futures for Ukraine” (Feb. 12). The latter, with its note of optimism on Ukraine’s agricultural potential, will seem especially poignant if the invasion proceeds as planned.
The two historians come at things from entirely different directions. That’s a good thing.
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