The History Behind Putin’s War in Ukraine

In the 1980s and 1990s, Anatol Lieven covered the former Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, and the wars in Afghanistan, Chechnya, and the southern Caucasus, for the Financial Times and the Times of London. In the 2000s, he worked at several think tanks in Washington and is now a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. He also has seven books to his name, most recently Climate Change and the Nation State.

Earlier this month, Doug Henwood spoke with Lieven about Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine and the post–Cold War expansion of NATO. Henwood edited the...