A horrific World War 2 battle is the key to understanding Putin’s outlook on Ukraine: op-ed

In an op-ed for Yahoo! News this Wednesday, senior White House correspondent Alexander Nazaryan writes that the key to understanding Russian President Vladimir Putin's goals in Ukraine is to look at the history of Nazis invading his native Leningrad during World War II.

According to Nazaryan, "many Russians" also share Putin's outlook, and he cites historian Anna Reid, who said the siege of Leningrad was “the deadliest blockade of a city in human history,” which lasted 872 days and took as many as 1.5 million lives.

"Those lessons are deeply personal for Putin," Nazaryan writes. "He was born in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) eight years after the siege was lifted in 1944, but the fate of Leningrad more thoroughly defines him than any event in Russian history. He even lost an older brother, Viktor, in the siege."

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Secretary of State Antony Blinken even referenced Putin's brother's death during a Monday press conference where he seemingly pleaded with the Russian president to back off his invasion of Ukraine.

"It is impossible to understand Putin without appreciating how deeply World War II informs his thinking — how the siege of Leningrad is seen as singularly heroic in the Russian psyche, endowing (with good reason) anyone affiliated with resistance to the Nazis with a halo of moral authority. In my house in Washington, D.C., hangs the framed medal my grandfather received for defending Leningrad: 'Our cause was just. We won,' the medal says," writes Nazaryan. "The pride is deep and genuine, reaching across generations."

Read the full op-ed over at Yahoo! News.