Putin and Litvinenko

If you think the Russian president didn't order a hit-job, the evidence is worth a new look:

Litvinenko's widow Marina and his friend, Alex Goldfarb, have written a compelling narrative account of the story. Not to beat around the bush about this, they prominently name the president of Russia as a suspect in the homicide investigation. New Scotland Yard has formally named and is seeking the extradition of one covert FSB agent, Andrei Lugovoi, and is possibly after two more in connection with the killing. And links between the crime and the Kremlin are at this point irrefutable.

Still, this book offers some unexpected treasurers. Most significantly, it gives us an internal account of the rise of Vladimir Putin and the role that Boris Berezovsky played in that process. The entire story of Litvinenko is inextricably entangled in Putin’s rise to power: how Putin resurrected the KGB, how he endeared himself to Boris Yeltsin, became Yeltsin's seventh prime minister, and then emerged as his dark horse successor. At each of these steps, Berezovsky is on the scene, and Litvinenko is not far away either. Once you’ve worked your way through this, you’ll realize how absurd are the Kremlin’s dismissals of Litvinenko's importance. He is the man who knew too much. And he was viewed, very early on, as a traitor to the KGB.

We need to deal with Russia. They are critical to any successful Iran policy. But that doesn't mean we have to be in denial about who's running the place.