Andrew Weiss explores Putin’s motivations for war in new graphic novel, ‘Accidental Czar’

William Brangham:

As the United States and other countries try to help Ukraine defeat the Russian invasion of their country, there has been a renewed focus on the man who started this invasion, Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Who is he? Where did he come from? And what does he want?

Nick Schifrin his back, and he talks to an author who brings a fresh perspective to Putin story.

Nick Schifrin:

There's been a lot of attention on what Russia will do next in the war in Ukraine. Could President Putin escalate with nuclear weapons? What terms could Putin accept to end the war? Will the Russians continue to fight no matter what?

But Putin's motivations run much deeper than these ultimate decisions.

To better understand Putin's motivations and the history that helped shape them. Andrew Weiss, Carnegie Endowment vice president and former National Security Council staff, State Department and Defense Department official, has written a new graphic novel with art by Brian "Box" Brown called "Accidental Czar: The Life and Lies of Vladimir Putin."

Andrew Weiss, thank you very much. Welcome back to the "NewsHour."

Andrew Weiss, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace: Thanks for having me.

Nick Schifrin:

There are a lot of books about Putin, but none, as far as we could tell, that is a graphic novel.

Why did you write a graphic novel?

Andrew Weiss:

Vladimir Putin is a fascinating character, and he's been in the public eye for more than two decades.

But a lot of this is deliberately either shrouded in mystery, like what makes the man tick. And a lot of it's constantly being embellished. And I thought it was really important to pull the myths apart and try to tell people who Vladimir Putin actually is, but situated in a bigger context.

Being able to stretch things out and show people what the institution of being the czar is and how Putin in many ways has become a latter-day czar was a key driving force behind putting this together.

Nick Schifrin:

As I just said, you write that you pursued this book "So that we could better understand Putin's motivations, along with the heavy burden of history that helped shape them."

Do you think the world doesn't understand his motivations or the history that shaped him?

Andrew Weiss:

Well, think about Vladimir Putin's personal story.

His family barely survived World War II. He — his mother was plucked off a cart carrying corpses. And his father came back from the front and found her barely alive. He never met his older brother, who died during the war and was buried in a mass grave.

So, the overall history of trauma for people of his generation, we shouldn't underestimate it. But what we shouldn't forget is the level of opportunism and the extent to which Putin twists things around about Russia's history, particularly the relationship with Ukraine, in ways that are entirely self-serving and that basically allow him to justify the course he's taken Russia down.

Nick Schifrin:

And the country that he has created, the course that he has taken Russia down perhaps is personified by one piece of art that I want to show in the image here.

This is a pyramid. And you write: "Russia is a society that operates on the basis of personal ties, not institutions or the rule of law."

What do you mean?

Andrew Weiss:

Well, think about how Vladimir Putin was put in power in the first place.

The Yeltsin family was worried about its safety, and they wanted to find a loyal person who would make sure that they didn't face any accountability for their ill-gotten gains during Boris Yeltsin's tumultuous presidency. And they plucked this person from obscurity who they thought would live up to an unwritten understanding to protect them. And that is indeed what Vladimir Putin did.

Nick Schifrin:

The very first scene of the book is not actually in chronological order. It's an incident during a KGB training program that shows how much of a hothead Putin was.

Why did you start there?

Andrew Weiss:

Well, Vladimir Putin had dreamed of being in the KGB his whole life. Starting as a teenager, he was obsessed with the pop culture of the time, which glorified the KGB.

When he finally made it, he had to spend 10 years in the bowels of the KGB. He did these jobs like in the H.R. Department. He worked in counterintelligence. He worked in a provincial center, Leningrad. None of this was the mark of a high flier.

And then, after waiting 10 years, he finally got into the training program that he dreamed his whole life that would open the door to an overseas assignment. And then he unraveled his own career because he got into a fight on a subway train in the middle of the weekend when he was home visiting Leningrad.

And it basically led to him being, we think, pushed out of the training program early and sent to a backwater assignment in East Germany in Dresden. So, people who've gone on to this image that the Putin is some James Bond super spy have been misled. This is a person whose own impulsivity and emotionalism nearly derailed his career.

Nick Schifrin:

In fact, you point out at one point that he famously portrayed himself as a tough guy, especially during 1999 in Chechnya, and said that he would pursue terrorists even as they went to the toilet, even in the outhouse.

Was the tough guy image — is the tough guy image an act?

Andrew Weiss:

There's a great moment in the book where Putin is being asked to do these tough guy things.

And what at the time was important to the Kremlin's image masters was to contrast him with the booze hound Boris Yeltsin and to show that Russia was in a safe pair of hands. And they played up all of this action hero imagery. He had to be pushed to be the coarse, tough guy. It wasn't something he naturally felt comfortable doing.

And then the problem for us, that we weren't really in on the joke. And so, over time, all of this imagery of Putin with his shirt off or Putin carrying guns and stuff like that, we have taken it to heart and not seen the cartoonish quality. And that — it's impossible to disentangle now.

Nick Schifrin:

You point out what Putin wants essentially is regional influence and to be part of the board of directors, I think, as you put it.

Doesn't that suggest that he does have legitimate concerns about Ukraine becoming a member of NATO?

Andrew Weiss:

There's something about Ukraine that drives Putin into paroxysms of self-injury.

He's lost Ukraine three times, in 2004 during the Orange Revolution, 2014 during the Revolution of Dignity, and now most spectacularly and horribly in this horrible war. And the question is, why is it so important to him? What is it? And I think it comes back to the illiteracy about history, a sense that, as he's written…

Nick Schifrin:

His illiteracy.

Andrew Weiss:

His illiteracy, that Russians and Ukrainians are somehow the same, two, a complete inability to understand the agency of individuals and the ability of individuals to take ownership of their future, the way the people of Ukraine have.

It was their vote in 1991 in a referendum that was the death knell for the Soviet Union. And, then again, they came out on the streets to defend their freedom and their independence. And now we see them fighting for their country, in incredible, brave, and very dangerous circumstances.

And Putin keeps thinking, oh, it's all just an act. There's no real country here.

Nick Schifrin:

You call it pseudo-history. But this question has been asked of President Biden and others, is, is Putin rational?

Andrew Weiss:

There are parts of his behavior where he doesn't behave entirely rationally.

And I think that's why the nuclear saber-rattling is so concerning right now, because we don't know, if he's cornered, what's he going to do? And so there's this funny scene in the book when he's a kid chasing rats around the corridors of his dilapidated apartment building, and he corners a rat with a stick, and he's trying to chase this rat out.

And the rat jumps on him, and Putin learns this important lesson, basically, don't corner a rat. And the story itself is kind of ambiguous, because, as a kid, Putin backed off. He sort of got the point that he was cornered.

Now that Putin's been in power for 20 years, and he is this important figure on the global stage, we just don't know where he will back off.

Nick Schifrin:

Andrew Weiss, thank you very much.

Andrew Weiss:

Thank you.