Inside the Mind of Vladimir Putin: Fareed Zakaria Reports

As Russia continues to horrify the world with its brutal attacks on Ukraine, and its crush of dissent at home, CNN's Fareed Zakaria takes viewers inside the mind of the man behind the ruthless conflict, Vladimir Putin. 

Throughout his rise to power and political career, Vladimir Putin has been an autocratic enigma. What drives the notorious strongman? He was reared in Soviet poverty, served as a KGB intelligence agent in East Germany, and through a series of cunning maneuvers, rose from deputy mayor of St. Petersburg to the presidency of post-Soviet Russia. Zakaria gets answers to the many questions surrounding Putin that have confounded leaders worldwide, including at least four U.S. presidents: how did Putin's mindset move from pro-global harmony to isolation, fear, and loathing of the West.

Interviewed are: Robert Gates, former U.S. Secretary of Defense (George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations, 2006-2011); author, Exercise of Power: American Failures, Successes, and a New Path Forward in the Post-Cold War World (2020); Masha Gessen, staff writer, The New Yorker; author, The Man Without A Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin (2013); Edward Lucas, columnist, London Times; senior fellow, Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA); author, The New Cold War: Putin's Russia and the Threat to the West (2008); Dmitry Peskov, deputy chief of staff of the Presidential Executive Office, Russia; Presidential Press Secretary; David Remnick, editor, The New Yorker; author, Lenin's Tomb: The Last Days of the Soviet Empire (1993); Mikhail Zygar, former editor-in-chief, TV Rain; author, All the Kremlin's Men: Inside the Court of Vladimir Putin (2016); and Julia Ioffe, founding partner and Washington correspondent, Puck news.