Overview

"""Having saddled the tiger of militarized patriotism, Putin expertly made it trot in the right direction. But the animal required more and more meat; as it grew, it became harder to dismount."" In this gripping tale, Leon Aron, the author of the acclaimed biography Yeltsin: A Revolutionary Life, shows how Vladimir Putin has refashioned Russian society in his own image, placing militarized patriotism front and center. Through hundreds of Russian-language sources and arresting images, Aron chronicles the emergence of the new Russia. Riding the Tiger challenges the conventional idea of Putin's regime as a traditional autocracy, bolstered by propaganda, political manipulation, and repression. The book tells the story of how Putin shaped ordinary Russians' views of their country, their history, and their own selves. The fast-paced narrative is a crash course in the political and cultural history of Russia according to Putin, his vision of Russia's manifest destiny, and his role in fulfilling it. In exploring Russia's recent past, Aron offers insights into Russia's future. He argues that Putin's actions, including the invasion of Ukraine, are driven by the Russian president's need to ensure his regime's survival, avenge the fall of the Soviet Union, combat the America-led West, and make Russia a superpower again. Thus, regardless of the outcome of the war in Ukraine, war-or the threat of war-will remain his preferred means of holding on to power and recovering national glory. Could Putin bring the world to the brink of nuclear Armageddon in pursuit of those ends? At the close of the book, Aron offers a chillingly detailed scenario of how such a crisis might play out."

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Reviews

"""A fantastic read. If you want to understand Putin, how the Russian dictator has shaped Russian society over the last quarter century, and why so many Russians support his wars, ideas, and regime, you must read this book."" --Michael McFaul, professor, Stanford University; special assistant for Russian affairs to President Barack Obama; author, From Cold War to Hot Peace: An American Ambassador in Putin's Russia (Mariner Books, 2018) --Michael McFaul ""Leon Aron's brilliant and concise new book is just the urgently needed primer on Vladimir Putin's Russia today I've been hoping someone would write--perceptive, historically grounded, beautifully written and very worrisome. What emerges is a sharply drawn portrait of a nuclear-obsessed president on a mission to reassemble parts of the lost Russian empire. It should be required reading for anyone who hopes to understand not only Russia's ongoing war in Ukraine, but its leader's obsession with confronting the United States and the West."" --Susan Glasser, staff writer, New Yorker; coauthor, Kremlin Rising: Vladimir Putin's Russia and the End of Revolution (Scribner, 2005) --Susan Glasser ""Leon Aron, one of our most astute observers of Russia, has produced a vivid analysis of Putin's state, founded on militarized patriotism and primed for war. One of the most important stories of our time.""--Anne Applebaum, Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Gulag: A History (Anchor Books, 2004); staff writer, Atlantic--Anne Applebaum ""This elegantly written book is an incisive chronicle of contemporary Russian history. It offers important insights into the complex set of factors that motivated Vladimir Putin to launch a brutal full-scale war in Ukraine in February 2022. Leon Aron has the firsthand observer's keen eye for the twists of fate and the skilled analyst's deep knowledge of the interplay of events that brought Putin to, and then well-beyond, the point of no return."" --Fiona Hill, distinguished senior fellow, Brookings Institution; senior director for European and Russian affairs, National Security Council; and author, There Is Nothing for You Here: Finding Opportunity in the 21st Century (Mariner Books, 2021) --Fiona Hill"

Author Information

Leon Aron was born in Moscow and came to the United States as a refugee from the Soviet Union. He is the author of Roads to the Temple: Truth, Memory, Ideas, and Ideals in the Making of the Russian Revolution, 1987-1991 (Yale University Press, 2012); Russia's Revolution: Essays, 1989-2006 (AEI Press, 2007); and Yeltsin: A Revolutionary Life (St. Martin's Press, 2000). From 2014 to 2020, he served on the board of trustees of the US Agency for Global Media. He holds a PhD from Columbia University and is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

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