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Frontline tonight: "Putin's Road to War". Check your PBS station listing.
The email I received:
Dear FRONTLINE community,
For years, we have been examining Russian President Vladimir Putin’s rise and how he has wielded power.
Tonight, as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine continues, we’ll premiere Putin’s Road to War — a documentary special investigating what brought Putin, and the world, to this dangerous tipping point.
Through in-depth conversations with multiple heads of U.S. intelligence agencies, diplomats, Russian politicians, historians and journalists, this special report chronicles defining moments that shaped the Russian leader, the grievances that drive him, and how a growing conflict with the West exploded into war in Europe.
“Vladimir Putin is going to rank up there as one of the worst and most brutal killers of the 21st century,” New Yorker staff writer Susan Glasser tells us. “And his career in power has been marked by a willingness to use extreme force and violence and war as a tool of his repression, internal and external.”
From acclaimed filmmaker Michael Kirk and his award-winning team, the documentary traces how Putin went from low-ranking KGB agent to longtime Russian president. It delves into his crackdown on dissent — and the media — inside Russia. It reveals how he has tested the West’s appetite for confrontation over and over again, including in Ukraine in 2014, as he’s tried to expand Russia’s global footprint. And it raises difficult questions about the path forward from here.
Because he is backed into a corner, he is the most dangerous he has ever been, because it is now existential for him,” says journalist Julia Ioffe, a founding partner of and Washington correspondent for the media company Puck.
Putin’s Road to War premieres tonight at a special time — 9/8c — on PBS stations (check local listings), and will also be available to stream in the PBS Video App, on our website and on our YouTube channel. Its PBS premiere will be followed at 10/9c by an encore presentation of Putin’s Way, our earlier documentary looking at the allegations of criminality and corruption that have accompanied Putin’s reign.
You can watch and read our extended interviews with Ioffe, Glasser, Eugene Robinson and other Putin’s Road to War sources on our site and on YouTube as part of our ongoing FRONTLINE Transparency project.
In these tumultuous times, we are grateful for the opportunity to bring you independent journalism that holds truth to power. Thank you for watching.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH
Executive Producer, FRONTLINE
For years, we have been examining Russian President Vladimir Putin’s rise and how he has wielded power.
Tonight, as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine continues, we’ll premiere Putin’s Road to War — a documentary special investigating what brought Putin, and the world, to this dangerous tipping point.
Through in-depth conversations with multiple heads of U.S. intelligence agencies, diplomats, Russian politicians, historians and journalists, this special report chronicles defining moments that shaped the Russian leader, the grievances that drive him, and how a growing conflict with the West exploded into war in Europe.
“Vladimir Putin is going to rank up there as one of the worst and most brutal killers of the 21st century,” New Yorker staff writer Susan Glasser tells us. “And his career in power has been marked by a willingness to use extreme force and violence and war as a tool of his repression, internal and external.”
From acclaimed filmmaker Michael Kirk and his award-winning team, the documentary traces how Putin went from low-ranking KGB agent to longtime Russian president. It delves into his crackdown on dissent — and the media — inside Russia. It reveals how he has tested the West’s appetite for confrontation over and over again, including in Ukraine in 2014, as he’s tried to expand Russia’s global footprint. And it raises difficult questions about the path forward from here.
Because he is backed into a corner, he is the most dangerous he has ever been, because it is now existential for him,” says journalist Julia Ioffe, a founding partner of and Washington correspondent for the media company Puck.
Putin’s Road to War premieres tonight at a special time — 9/8c — on PBS stations (check local listings), and will also be available to stream in the PBS Video App, on our website and on our YouTube channel. Its PBS premiere will be followed at 10/9c by an encore presentation of Putin’s Way, our earlier documentary looking at the allegations of criminality and corruption that have accompanied Putin’s reign.
You can watch and read our extended interviews with Ioffe, Glasser, Eugene Robinson and other Putin’s Road to War sources on our site and on YouTube as part of our ongoing FRONTLINE Transparency project.
In these tumultuous times, we are grateful for the opportunity to bring you independent journalism that holds truth to power. Thank you for watching.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH
Executive Producer, FRONTLINE