Overreach: The Inside Story of Putin and Russia’s War Against Ukraine

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Even Ukrainian Russian speakers do not like to join Putin’s Russia. After all, they are much richer than the Russians. Writing with authority and clarity, Matthews weaves disparate events into a bloody tapestry of invasion and resistance. An astonishing investigation into the start of the Russo-Ukrainian war – from the corridors of the Kremlin to the trenches of Mariupol. The author details the development of Russian nationalist attitudes from the fall of the Soviet Union and up the invasion. He also gives a detailed account of many of the idealogues that introduced Putin to Russian Ultranationalism and Fascism, in addition to figures in his inner circle. The portraits painted of figures such as Nikolai Patruschev are in particular quite chilling, being if anything more steeped in paranoia and conspiracy theory thinking. Patruschev is also thought to have been behind the planning and execution of both the Litvinenko assassination and the attempted assassinations of Sergei and Yulia Skripal.

Owen Matthews (born December 1971) is a British writer, historian and journalist. His first book, Stalin's Children, was shortlisted for the 2008 Guardian First Book Award, [1] the Orwell Prize for political writing, [2] and France's Prix Médicis Etranger. [3] His books have been translated into 28 languages. He is a former Moscow and Istanbul Bureau Chief for Newsweek. By mid-March, even Matthews himself has to leave for a while, fearing that his 19-year-old son, a Russian passport holder, may get drafted. Yet amidst this chaos and personal upheaval, he has produced a book that is not merely the first full account of the war, but may set the standard for some time to come. Matthews’s analysis of why the invasion has foundered also offers insights. He challenges, for example, the notion of Kyiv’s armed forces as outnumbered amateurs, pointing out that during the last eight years of the simmering Donbas conflict, some 900,000 Ukrainians have served, “making a vast reserve force with recent combat experience”.

He remained convinced that belief was the only gravity that could hold his contradictory world of duty and lies together. But he was no longer sure he had preserved enough of it to make the center hold.” Imagine that Russia had colonised America". News – Telegraph Blogs. Archived from the original on 28 August 2013.

Somewhere on his prudent little journey to power, Efremov had taught himself to smile. It was an underhand weapon to use on people, rather like silence on the telephone, but effective. Efremov smiled now, a thin smirk. Though he outranked nobody still seated at the table, his presence caused every man to stiffen and compose his face. Theirs was the quiet not of insolence, but of fear.” Chapter 2 (“And Moscow is Silent”) gives a brief biography of Putin that largely aligns with the conventional Western interpretation. As the Chapter title suggests, much is made of Putin’s distress at the fall of the Soviet Union (Matthews quotes Boris Reitschuster’s claim that the infamous ‘Moscow is silent’ moment is “the key to understanding Putin”) and its development into simmering anti-NATO resentment. The last part of Chapter 2 and Chapter 3 summarise the history of post-USSR, pre-Zelensky Ukraine, including the Euromaidan protests and the subsequent conflict in the Donbas.The title refers to Putin’s hubris in launching the Ukraine invasion, yet this book is much more, charting how the dream of reclaiming Moscow’s old empire went from “the marginal fringes of Russian politics to become official Kremlin policy”. Nor, in a country that still suffers an “addiction to imperial fantasies”, is it likely that Putin’s replacement will be Gorbachev 2.0. Nationalism, Matthews says, is a far more powerful current in Russia than pro-Western liberalism. He adds: “A military defeat at the hands of NATO weaponry would likely strengthen, not weaken, that tendency.” Rough edges and a weaker third act do not prevent Overreach from achieving its aims. It is timely, compelling and arguably more perceptive than could reasonably be expected so soon. It is strongly recommended, especially for readers who have been following the war since February 2022, or who have some prior knowledge of Putin or Russian politics.

It paints Putin (and rightly so IMO) as a power-hungry, war mongering dictator hellbent on destroying not only Ukraine but his own country as well to restore the USSR. Feb 2022, quote formerly pro-NATO Putin rightly stating before wrongly invading, "De-Nazify Ukraine." Using the accounts of current and former insiders from the Kremlin and its propaganda machine, the testimony of captured Russian soldiers and on-the-ground reporting from Russia and Ukraine, Overreach tells the story not only of the war’s causes but how the first six months unfolded. Owen Matthews 'Glorious Misadventures: Nikolai Rezanov and the Dream of a Russian America' ". Pushkin House. An Impeccable Spy: Richard Sorge, Stalin's Master Agent (Bloomsbury, 2019) [24] A biography of German Communist spy Richard Sorge, the first English language work written with extensive access to the Soviet archives. Chosen as a Book of the Year by The Economist magazine: "A tragic, heroic story, magnificently told with an understated rage." [25]

A wave of hurriedly written books about the Russo-Ukrainian war is about to crash over our bookshops and overburdened shelves, but it is hard not to feel sorry for most of their authors. Owen Matthews has already come out with what is not only one of the fastest, but also likely to be the best, setting a painfully high benchmark for those who follow. After a year of the conflict, the world wonders how the second best army in Ukraine (the Russian) is doing. And it is that the Russians are fighting a 20th century war in the 21st century. NATO is providing kyiv with modern weapons and although they are not tanks or planes, they are missiles capable of destroying tanks and planes. Yet in a war already extensively reported from the Ukrainian side, it is Matthews’s take from Russia that may jolt readers the most. Russians, he points out, are long used to hardship, so despite the misery caused by sanctions and mobilisation, things would have to get “far, far worse” for any anti-Putin uprising. Dining With the Author: Dangerous Misadventures With Owen Matthews". HuffPost. 28 April 2014 . Retrieved 5 June 2015. The author briefly goes over some key battles such as the one for the Hostomel airport. However, there are few details about other major battles such as the siege of Mariupol and Azovstal. The war crimes at Bucha are covered in more detail including the story of the young Russian soldier that committed war crimes and was subsequently captured and sentenced to life in prison. Various actors in the war such as the foreign volunteers, the Chechens, the Wagner mercenaries are each discussed in turn.