PBS eyes ‘Putin and the Presidents’

“Frontline” (10 p.m., PBS, check local listings) continues to prove itself worthy of the description of journalism as the first draft of history.

Tonight, the series, now in its 41st season, presents “Putin and the Presidents,” examining how Vladimir Putin has tested five American administrations, from Bill Clinton’s to that of Joe Biden.

“Presidents” picks up on themes from earlier “Frontline” Putin profiles, recalling how he was a KGB agent stationed in East Germany at the time of the Soviet Union’s disintegration. He saw the USSR’s fall not as a moment of freedom and liberation, but as a historical tragedy of the first magnitude. And he blamed the West and the United States for this national humiliation.

Fueled by his authoritarian single-minded pursuit of restoring an old Russia to grandeur, Putin made the most of American presidential administrations that did not see Russia as a high priority.

Putin arrived in power in 2000, the last year of the Clinton administration. And Clinton shared misgivings that Putin did not have democracy “in his heart.” President Bush would be somewhat charmed by Putin’s stories of religious experiences and claimed that he had been able to “look into” the Russian leader’s “soul.”

The Bush administration would be challenged by Russia’s brutal invasion of Georgia in 2008. Russia’s annexation of the Crimea in 2014 was met by sanctions by the Obama administration, a move that Putin saw as acquiescence.

The depiction of Donald Trump’s relationship with Putin would be unbelievable, if it weren’t so well documented. Suffice it to say that if Trump were not recruited as an active Russian agent, he essentially acted as a Russian asset in the Oval Office. He actively spread Putin’s own propaganda about Ukraine, attacked our NATO allies and acted in concert with Putin’s cynical psy-ops operation to divide Americans and weaken their faith in their own country and the sanctity of the ballot box. As the narrator observes, Jan. 6, 2021, was a very good day for Vladimir Putin.

Having essentially had his way with four presidents, Putin initially thought Biden was too old and weakened by our nation’s division to challenge his 2022 invasion of Ukraine. History and recent events proved him wrong.

Some experts interviewed here think that a floundering and weakened Putin, presiding over a military catastrophe, an economic freefall and a resolute West may be more dangerous than ever.

This “Frontline” squeezes a lot into 60 minutes, and there are some shocking omissions. Trump’s crude efforts to blackmail Ukraine’s president Zelenskyy, an act that resulted in his first impeachment, goes entirely unmentioned.

America’s complicated relationship with Putin deserves a multipart examination. An hour could explore the cozy relationships between Putin’s oligarch allies and Western financial institutions. Another could be spent on the “bromance” between Putin and elements of the American political right, far-right media and so-called Christian Nationalists, who seem to admire his brutal oppression of dissent and his cozy relationship with the Patriarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church.

Putin’s pull with this ilk may rear its head if the House of Representatives attempts to curtail military aid to Putin’s chief tormentor, the government of Ukraine.