Inside Putin's Russia -- Watch the full documentary

I'm Nick Schifrin over the next hour we'll present a PBS Newshour series called Inside Putin's Russia with the help of the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting producer Zac Fannin and I travel to more than a dozen cities, conducted 40 interviews and were arrested twice will report on Russian propaganda Russia's opposition Russians who join Isis and a tense relationship with the US our first story explores a new Russian identity it's a combination of religion old Russian traditions and rediscovered patriotism this new identity helps explain a lot about how today's Russia thinks how President Putin acts and why he remains popular we begin our series in the southern city of Krassner it is Sunday morning and Russia's conservative South more than 70 percent of Russians or Orthodox Christian and under President Vladimir Putin the church has been revitalized arch priest Ivan garmisch is known as father John he tells parishioners there's only one way to be a true Christian and he says being a true Christian is the only way to be a true Russian so ghusl Moscow the state and my faith are united they can't be separated the values of the church and the state coincide in Russia faith is patriotic the Orthodox Church criticizes liberal Western values as heresies while Orthodox priests bless Russian weapons and endorse Putin politically and personally the president's faith increases his popularity well he is a religious man and he takes part in the divine worship with the people in churches what the president is doing what the government is doing of course we support it because he acts conscientiously and truthfully today's re-energized Orthodox Church helps create pride in the shared religion it is an historic Russian symbols like Cossacks help create pride and shared traditions 500 years ago Cossacks became the Russian Czars henchmen they were famous and feared and helped police the Russian empires borders the Soviets persecuted them today's Russia restores them Cossacks fill crafts in our streets an annual parade I believe Russia should be governed by tradition not the rule of law not of only the nation that has kept its traditions and honors them more than the law deserves respect the strength of the nation is in its traditions for 17 years Vladimir Gromov led the regional Cossack army he revitalized this event and helped get the Cossack state sponsorship President Putin awarded him the order of friendship medal gramado considers putin the custodian of russian pride and stability preventing the chaos of the 1990 Linnea he gained putin if it wasn't for President Putin Russia as a state would be struggling through the toughest times now and possibly may have ceased to exist only Putin has saved the state from total collapse and in return cossacks do what they feel saves putin during the 2014 Olympics the band Pussy Riot performed a song that disparages poof Cossacks unleashed their centuries-old tradition of vigilante violence last year cossacks dows the main opposition leader Alexei Navalny attacked is fact and in Kaliningrad when a small group of demonstrators demanded the government change its foreign policy a Cossack beat up 63 year old protester Yevgeniy grecian he lost 80% of his eyesight well our generation if the regime can't suppress civil protest through legal means they punish the people through affiliated associations like the Cossacks the regime acts through them why have the authorities crack down so much what I see in Russia statehood comes first and human rights come last they use any means to prove the state is the most important more important than a human the idea that the state is more important than the people is actually not new Russians have long had a collective identity for us the men is collective concept we consider ourselves to be the part of the whole so to be Russian means to share the same the same cultural and historic identity for years TV fixture and firebrand Alexandra Dugan inspired the Kremlin ideology he says Russia's collective identity comes from patriotism projection of power and respect for the rules Hooten taps into all three connecting today's Russia to its Imperial grandeur butter diesel is organic it is not artificial Empire or state is not something additional artificial because it is our breasts our skin our organic way of life today's kremlin uses that patriotism to try and unite the population and convince them only a powerful state can protect them from enemies enemy number one the US America is on the brink of a revolution Dugan in the Kremlin accused the u.s. of humiliating Russia by expanding NATO to Russia's borders and supporting revolutions in former Soviet states and satellites Dugan advocates fighting back by attacking the West with asymmetric war you talk about introducing geopolitical disorder actively supporting dissident movements extremism racist sectarian groups this seems much more than just exactly as usual it's exactly what you are supporting separatist group we are supporting any kind of admission with including Russian nationals that is against Putin my words are a fear of what you are doing it is near and you are right so much because you are doing the same thing against us in Ukraine that philosophy was weaponized did he die in eastern Ukraine Russia aids local separatists who fight against the Ukrainian government that's pro-western and in 2014 in Crimea Russia helped install separatist leaders who rushed through a referendum that led to Crimea's annexation regime regime in Russia Putin the day of annexation Putin gave a speech combining religion patriotism and imperial history he said the West had been subjugating Russia and Russia was finally demanding respect yes or no for assuming if you compress the spring all the way to its limit it will snap back hard Russia is an independent active participant in international affairs like other countries it has its own national interest that need to be taken into account and respected it is impossible to overstate how transformative eastern Ukraine and here Crimea have been in recent Russian memory after the Crimea annexation Putin's popularity spiked to nearly 90 percent Russians told pollsters that suddenly they felt like a superpower against the Germans and Russians all over the country mobilized she saves brunettes Denis Solomon in 2014 fighting in eastern Ukraine he's a former soldier who was working a mid management retail job when he quit and crossed the border it's just looseness to work quicker now we hear that behind us there's an intense battle mortars and shells are raining in our direction Solomon went to war because of that collective Russian identity he believed the Ukrainian government was attacking ethnic Russians death was a those people who were under fire I identified them as Russian people who needed protection by those who can at least hold a weapon what was it about them that you felt I need to help them those are the people with the same culture as mine the same language the same worldview English shootings he was convinced of that by propaganda in May 2014 dozens of pro-russian separatists died in Odessa Ukraine I've never felt equipped a woman among young it probably became the pivotal moment there was a lot of information about how people were simply getting beaten and killed but as anyway I must Russian media exaggerated yes even using an actress to play a victim we know she was an actress because she appeared in unrelated pro-russian stories as three entirely different people that disinformation campaign convinces the Kremlin's critics the new Russian identity is manufactured a product of deception and repression sometimes that repression shows up in masks guns and camouflage those are special forces surrounding 66 year old ill me o merav in the jacket and Jean Loup merabh is a leader of the Tatars a Muslim minority in Crimea he and other Tatars fight the Russian annexation in response many Tatars have been jailed on questionable charges and Umarov was thrown into a local insane asylum we're good the film is together so this all together we call one big act of intimidation the purpose is to silence some and keep others ignorant turn them into zombies so they think the same thing these are the necessary conditions in order for the people to be loyal to their government but do you acknowledge that that is the majority of the population who feels that way career synchronously of course of course we can't say that this is a stupid population or stupid people they're just living in a constellation of fear and the propaganda machine rolls over them like a steamroller Umarov may accuse Putin of manipulating the population but under Putin Russia has revitalized majority religion brought back historic tradition and projects power so until there's an alternative he'd considered the creator and will remain the caretaker of the new Russian identity for years the Kremlin and the media it controls have waged a multifaceted information and disinformation campaign inside Russia and pointed externally and it's perceived adversaries and last year that effort crescendoed here during the u.s. presidential campaign so our second story is about the information war the media publishing Dogu Sudarsan in russia whoever controls the media controls the country and Saturday night sir sir Gabriel EOS sourcing that the 44 year old is an anchor for Russia one if the country's most popular channel and its state-owned do you think that that means that you have a Russian perspective when you report the Russian perspective these a perspective of your country in any reporting brilli of says he doesn't feel pressure to push the government's line during the show we saw he challenged the government minister about police jailing a former theater director who's a government critic I imagined that tomorrow tonight's the broadcast I may have in some security agencies in saying what I think he's saying Russian state media have long delivered the government perspective and rallied the public behind it really of denies that's his job but he hints at whose job it is a sandy program which is quite conservative in western terms ultra-conservatives I would say aggressive perhaps Oh Fox News pass car apart or CMEs Sunday night anchored Dimitri Kiselyov is part Sean Hannity part Stephen Colbert he's crass and entertaining and widely believed to reflect the Kremlin's thinking Americans get Priuses again yet the American press is driving Trump into a bullfight with no rules the aim is impeachment no pretext it will be created invented engineered exaggerated thought my architect Eero CIA staff hackers are hiding behind another name for example behind the so-called Russian hackers kiss we have started targeting Russia's opponents in 2012 an inch Nikko massive protests threaten President Vladimir Putin says journalist and author Mikael digger that was very important to start hating the enemies that's the the point when the audience starts bleeding you when I see it Russia is the only country in the world and is realistically capable of turning the United States into radioactive ash so Putin got all moving until 2015 Ziegler was the anchor and editor-in-chief of TV reign in a sea of state media TV rain was an independent TV island we've had reputation of the ala TV channel that is trying to make real investigations in a Kenyan assignment in 2014 TV reign accused the Kremlin's cheap political strategist of corruption that was very short but very effective campaign against us I was getting like hundreds of personal messages with people wishing me that then all the major networks had direct phone calls from Kremlin and they had to switch us off within one month their audience dropped from 20 million to 60 thousand protesters fought to keep them on the air but targeting critical media is nothing new in the last six years the Kremlin's targeted 12 critical newsrooms say president ronpa so the GAR says state TV tries to convince russians to support their government by replacing reality with a carefully crafted message democracy does not exist our system is much more stable because we we have much more much stronger leadership which in consumption Putin is universally accepted as one of the most qualified heads of state on the planet if not the most qualified but this isn't only about shaping Russian opinion guess we all considers the news a weapon aimed at Russia's enemies as he put it in an interview on his own channel well you see what my by absorbing it if you can persuade a person you don't need to kill in let's think about what's better to kill or to persuade because if you weren't able to persuade then you'll have to kill if the politics of defending your country's interest is pro-russian then probably a pro-russian margarita simeon is the editor-in-chief of our team formerly known as russia today she says the network reaches 35 million viewers day in six languages including American and international channels its stay down and aimed foreign audiences as an alternative to channel Simeone calls pro-western CNN and BBC if you look at any station you will see that what people are reporting comes from what they believe in where they stand their background what their countries believe in and let it be one of the voices in that quiet American and coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations because when the choir sings just one song awful things happen like the war in Iraq critics say our tea isn't just another media voice it highlights conspiracy theories the article basically accuses the u.s. of manufacturing the Cibola outbreak it describes a Holocaust denier as a human rights activist Russia is a threat to us is hegemony and a neo-nazi is a German expert Germany is the country which supports violent Islamist criticism is again that you're trying to confuse rather than inform now that's absolutely a lie we're never trying to confuse we're informing if we do have people appearing on the air life that are later found out to be Holocaust deniers or anything like that we in middle immediately put them onto a list of people have rapport forbidden from the air you are telling me that people in the West are seeing as well believe me most of the people in Russia I see in the west of the threat for the West the biggest threat in terms of information comes from that building that is the headquarters of the FSB successor to the KGB during Soviet times the KGB launched deliberate disinformation campaign like planting the idea that President Kennedy was killed by the CIA today Western governments accused the FSB of launching the same kinds of campaigns except instead of offering communism as an ideological alternative they're waging a kind of hybrid war against their enemies with a new kind of soldier hackers over the last two years the Russian military ran online recruiting ads where soldiers put down their guns to fight a cyber war in a January report US intelligence agencies accused Russia of hacking Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton campaign emails and leaking them to WikiLeaks to fuel Russia's propaganda campaign it was designed to quote undermine public faith in the u.s. democratic process denigrate Secretary Clinton and harm her electability and potential presidency it worked the Clinton campaign has now had to deal with more than a week of embarrassing daily revelations thanks to WikiLeaks now these wiki leak release have rocked the campaign WikiLeaks has released what appears to be transcripts of paid speeches by Hillary Clinton to Goldman Sachs hacked emails became anti-clinton talking points and many of those talking points were spread online by fake accounts known as trolls believed to work in the st. Petersburg building 42 year old Marat mindy ARA used to be one of those trolls suddenly you see a lot of comments at night and they're always saying yes and this is actually the people are doing their job they have their coffee they have a time to do it their identities every day Mindi RF would get a document that instructed him what to write on christmas eve 2014 he was told to quote create a negative attitude about obama's foreign policy so he posted photos comparing Obama to Hitler portraying the u.s. as a fish about to eat the planet and an eagle sharpening his talons he posted under the headline can the US take Russia out on 50 websites in 23 cities and fellow trolls kirilov Ashkan Gennady Orlov Mike Brandon expressed the exact same thought six hundred posts from 70 fake accounts in 12 hours just one battalion in a sock puppet army manufactured by a handful of trolls how many identities will the workers be expected to pretend to be 100 hundred really hundred I myself made to have 2030 I didn't count them US intelligence says the likely troll financier is Afghani priests Koshien a businessman with catering companies he's been dubbed Putin's personal chef Mindy Aarav left the factory because he didn't believe in its product but he says it's effective because the stories are succinct and echoed widely everything is very simple there yeah Blair my real father the second quiet Russian propaganda is actually very predictable and relatively simple and I think of it as the four DS which are dismiss distort distract dismay then Nemo is an Atlantic Council senior fellow studying how Russian media hacking and trolling combined you get your own people to write this but then you pretend it's not your people is just some do-gooders in Russian society all the different parts of your machine then amplify it and what you're doing is you're pushing out in dozen different languages on all the different platforms there are one story and what that story is what the Kremlin wants it to be dellavedova say to yourself in January 2016 it was a fake story that a Russian German teenager had been abducted and raped by Muslim migrants Russian state TV apparatus repeatedly reporting false claims after the German police had come out and said there was no abduction and there was no rape but if the fake story helps parts real protests against German Chancellor Merkel a frequent Putin critic but even though it was fake Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov used it to criticize one of Russia's taught adversaries the motivation behind the campaign as a whole was precisely to weaken Merkel by amplifying this this very personalized story about crimes committed by in a vertical most mackerels migrants we investigate the stories misrepresented by the mainstream media last year the Russian propaganda machine exploited a research psychologist who argued Google was manipulating its results to favor Clinton so this is a gentleman called dr. Robert Epstein he came out with a paper which said that by altering the results of a search engine you could potentially alter people's voting choices and Google support for Clinton is is really very strong it was quickly debunked but the different parts of the Russian propaganda machine echoed the story from RT to State on website Sputnik to Russian trolls this was a classic example in which the different parts of the machine were amplifying each other what you then had was the claim being picked up by a number of larger conservative media in the US it like Google is in the tank for Hillary there's no question about it and there you've divorced the story from the source well you've laundered you literally I know that says that the source has been laundered then candidate Trump said was the effect of Google was ringing its results in favor of Clinton Google search agent was suppressing the bad news about Hillary Clinton now we don't know where he got that from but we know that to be an assertion point for that story were they crammed in this information at that for any purveyor of propaganda your dream is to have some high-value amplifier amplifying you especially if you can contrive that in such a way that you were divorced from it how about oh how about that next we travel to Russia's southernmost border the Republic of Dagestan is in the North Caucasus a kind of bridge between Asia and Europe over the last two decades Dagestan each have fought a brutal separatist insurgency against the Russian state with violence spilling over from neighboring Chechnya where Russia's fought two wars Americans might know Dagestan because the Boston Marathon bombers were Dagestan II immigrants but now there's a new problem by one estimate as many as 5,000 Dagestan E's or fighting for Isis we traveled to Dagestan to try and understand why so many Dagestan E's are fighting in Syria and Iraq if any some change it is no accident that the youth are tempted to go to serious because today there is a revival of Islam kazeem nurmagomedov is 62 years old and his son fought for Isis he was never tempted to go to Syria but he and his wife Rashida understand why their son marat was well there the islam the islamic color was talking about the one in every muslim soul is hidden deep down it's like a light in someone's heart nurmagomedov lives deep in the caucasus mountains were nearly dried up rivers meander through thousand foot high cliffs and beyond ancient rock formations isolated dirt roads connect secluded villages one of those villages is Kurata official population is 4,000 but residents say it's half that size this area is nearly a hundred percent Muslim before Friday prayers men greet each other in the small town center there are a few young people in part because this village sent as many as two dozen to Isis al-qaeda and the wars in Syria and Iraq that's her that's another Amina kondakova is a Muslim convert she shows me photos from a happier time that's very cute she says they grew up traditional and comfortable and then two years ago her daughter Miriam and her son Alyoshka told her they were going on vacation instead they traveled with Miriam's husband to Mosul Iraq to join Isis who told mom they lied to me about going there I was so disappointed and then I became afraid about what could happen to them she says this town is pious but wasn't really just enough for her daughter did she feel judged by people in this society the closest weapon yes they gave her looks they didn't like how she was dressing they wanted her to dress like everyone else she wanted to dress the way it's written for a Muslim woman to dress kondakova believes that judgement drove her daughter away she reluctantly admits that in Mosul her daughter is happy raising her first grandson mama Yakult is his mom I feel like I was reborn here I regret all those years I spent in Dagestan don't you want to come here too I want to live with you I want you to see my boy growing up and Herman Chamitoff gets to see his grandson when his son Murat left for Syria he abandoned a pregnant wife Oh Alexei is now three years old they look at photos of Murad as a boy and a young Murad clowning around with his older brother shamil when you look at these doesn't make you wish that your sons could all be here with you together yeah daddy yes I am a realist I know there's no return life isn't a book where you can tear out the pages if you didn't like what you wrote and write new ones the Dagestan youth who fought for Isis continued a decade's old legacy here of radicalism and militancy there's been a local insurgency here in the capital Dagestan mahadji allah for years targeting both local authorities and symbols of the national government their most prominent attacks targeted civilians in larger cities in Moscow in 2010 militants allied with al-qaida blew up the subway in 2013 in Volgograd they blew up the bus station and then a commuter bus as seen on Russian media nimbala so suddenly there was no social or physical protection every day there were bombings terror attacks that calls people's lives a be Magomedov is a former police lieutenant colonel and member of Dagestan anti-terrorism committee he says conservative Islam combined with high rates of unemployment and poverty to radicalize the reunion it's the living conditions absence of possibilities absence of social mobility which creates waves of anger and distress there has to be some sort of history that sets the person on a certain track where you only need to light a match for the fire to start that match is often a brutal security crackdown in January 2013 Russian Special Forces flooded into Dagestan II villages local state security services have practice collective punishment against entire families torture even extrajudicial executions mama Mehta admits they went too far but he tries to explain their motivation well yes the if keeping people safe requires limiting rights and freedoms of certain individuals it's probably worth it my brother died in 1990 when someone threw a grenade in his house you know the freedom of one man ends where the freedom of another starts today the violence is diminished but it's still religious Muslims whose freedoms are most often restricted this mosque practices an austere and aggressive form of Islam it also rails against government policy and that makes it a police target after prayers police set up a checkpoint officers must meet a monthly quota of arrests leading to what many call indiscriminate - tensions including of journalists trying to tell the mosque story we were filming that scene from across the street - standing on the sidewalk for only about 90 seconds when police came up and arrested US they threw us into their car they drove us to the precinct they refused to tell us why they were arresting it and when we were in the station we thought dozens of men have been in that mock before also arrested that is simply how police here act thirty three-year-old manga met Magomedov is the mosque spokesman Levitt I drew G as you saw yourself they arrest people not because they're suspicious but only because they came to a mosque do you think that the tactics that the police used can help radicalize young people here there is - of course this is the thing that provokes people since literally everyone can be arrested not on the basis of actual cause but something totally subjective then of course that irritates and that helped lead so many to Isis the group exploits the abuse ahia Russian language propaganda says Russia oppresses Muslims and present Syrian Iraq as a pious paradise fit for family and as Isis recruited Dagestan ease Russian security services showed some the door exporting extremism by facilitating their travel to Syria this first of Allah brothers doing it was the right thing to do since the moment these people left Dagestan for Syria local terrorism dropped dramatically if they had stayed there would have been terror attacks there would have been human casualties who helped you leave who facilitated your departure one of those who was pushed is this 27 year old Dagestan who now lives in Turkey we agreed to hide his face and alter his voice Rugel river holes of people who were on the federal wanted list could somehow get a passport and leave the country some security officers said to them will either kill you or you can leave the country the way I was helped was that every time I went to my local government office I was taken by the police and interrogated but when I went to get a passport nobody stopped me and after the dagestan he's left Russia made sure they never came back we're apostles they simply said that if I come back they'll do bad things to me so I won't ever go back many dagestanis who fought for Isis have died in Syria and they're celebrated by Isis propaganda but some managed to escape often to the port city of Odessa Ukraine former Isis fighter Marat agreed to talk to us if we didn't show his face well since the majority went to Syria with the notion of jihad that Assad was repressing Muslims and we needed to help them really we've actually already met marajó he's the son of Kazim Norma Gannett off because neem is often in Odessa to visit is she oh-hoh she says we consider our family lucky he is back alive and healthy and realized that where he ended up wasn't what he thought it was when his son left for Syria kazeem didn't sit back and let him die he traveled to the outskirts of Aleppo and saw the destruction he helps convince Murad he'd made a mistake Marat finally left when he thought about his own son the more thoughtful I was thinking about him constantly hoping that I could leave and see my child I was always thinking about what a big mistake I made thank God I was able to leave there alive because practically everyone I knew there no one is left alive they all died there Marat will never return here to Dagestan and that's what's inspired Kazim to speak on camera for the first time the Asian who did come there are thousands of Isis fighters in Syria who want to leave I feel it maybe my story will be a lesson how to do it what obstacles to expect I feel some sort of responsibility to use my experience to help get others out people like cos Eames neighbor Amina she fears her daughter is dead she hadn't heard from her in four months what would you say to a mother in America who's listening to this story well yet subscribe to new Qaddafi don't let your children go anywhere look after them look after there every step but don't let them leave you ever but their children have left this place and most will never return next we look at the fate of some of the Kremlin's enemies according to one study in the last three years 38 prominent Russians have been the victims of unsolved murders or suspicious deaths the high mortality rate has a long history but critics say it's emblematic of how President Vladimir Putin runs today's Russia in today's Russia there are consequences to criticizing the state we tell protesters their rally isn't sanctioned they're asking President Vladimir Putin not to run for reelection this demonstration is sponsored by the opposition group open Russia from saint-petersburg and across the country police arrested more than a hundred protesters it is democratic opposition activists are being arrested and given lengthy prison sentences it is members of the Democratic opposition who are being forced into exile a harassed or attack unloaded 35 year old Vladimir Carr Mirza is open russia's vice chairman he's an outspoken activist demonstrating against putin and organizing protests we first sat down with him late last year we believe in the rule of law would be different human rights we believe that Russia should enjoy the same democratic institutions of the rest of Europe enjoys to try and create those democratic institutions he teamed up with the man he calls his mentor or a stem Soph a former Deputy Prime Minister who became the country's leading dissident the two travelled to Washington to highlight the mysterious death of Sergei Magnitsky a lawyer who exposed corruption among senior officials nemstov and cara mirza convinced the US Congress to freeze the assets of Russians believed connected to Magnitsky's death these people in account Russian regime who rule like to keep you know the money the asset in the West they won a vacation in the West's and the kids to churches schools to the west and this you know personal accountability may well be the only thing that will make them think twice a little more than two years later Nemtsov was assassinated a few hundred feet from the Kremlin walls his death was brazen and shocking this is the spot where Boris Nemtsov was killed and you can see the corner of the Kremlin right there just hundred yards away and you can see the memorial for him that's on this bridge today in Moscow a court sentenced five people in themselves murder whether or not they were the mastermind they permanently silenced them sobs outspoken criticism you live in car Mirza believed someone used poison to silence him too I started suddenly feeling really really sick and within the space of 15 to 20 minutes I went from feeling could be normal like I am now to having a really rapid heart rate sweating palpitations started vomiting and then I just lost consciousness kidneys I think one first and it was the heart the lungs the stomach the liver everything everything just shutdowns I have no doubt that this was deliberate attempt to murder based on my political activities motivated by my activities in the Russian opposition there are people working as opposition who are not targeted what is the line that you apparently crossed there's a clear line between just saying things that are against the regime and it's a totally different thing to go off to their own personal interests after their pockets the history of assassination goes back decades in 1940 Leon Trotsky was killed with an ice axe in 2006 crusading Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya was murdered and in 2014 Alexander Litvinenko a former intelligence agent who accused Putin of ordering polar Kostas death was killed by radioactive T Dennis Warren n Coppedge lawmaker who defected to Ukraine and became a Putin critic in March he was walking down the street in Kiev when a gunman shot him three times his body bled out on the sidewalk in the middle of the day Maria mock Zhukova is his widow I was reading about my first spring and Keith was beneath I was screaming so desperately first I thought it's very nuts to be born at all when you lose something like moxa Cova lives in kiev where she's raising their son in Moscow she and Lauren in Cabo lawmakers allied with Putin and they enjoyed the spoils that come from power but he'd also been an investigator who uncovered corruption in the Russian intelligence agency the FSB who do you think killed your husband he had certain enemies and these enemies are in the FSB the anti-corruption schemes that he would investigate from here that is lots of money and lots of influence lots of of everything physicians and that is something that they would not let him do Russia calls her claim a fabrication but his death fits a pattern a once loyal family member becomes an outspoken opponent and ends up dead my family you can be born in truth it can be adopted inted can't believe it voluntarily people who have tried to leave the Putin family voluntarily have not fared very well Masha Gessen is a Russian journalist author and prolific anti-putin activist you've been dubbed by some an enemy of the state are you an enemy of the state well I'm certainly an enemy of them office in absolutely yeah I'm not an enemy of the Russian state gessen was the first journalist blacklisted by Putin's Kremlin she's also been targeted because she's a lesbian who's raising adopted children nothing Western woman you want to do a new health intervention up of micromanagement condemnable of dog warden in 2013 she helped lead a video campaign criticizing an anti-gay propaganda law it helped condone homophobia and attacks on gay Russians and Gessen argues the law explains how Putin rules the autocrat needs everybody out in the street would would Flags aloft they need that's primaries they need for mobilization to have mobilization you need to have it you can have all the beauty people as enemies today and then you can have Americans tomorrow and keep the LGBT people in your back pocket and then pull them out and you need them again and Gessen says above it all is a boss served by loyal lieutenants who don't need explicit instructions to launch attacks let a patriarchal family will fit in you know do I always have to tell you what to do like don't you know what the right thing to do is that the Kremlin kill is political enemies hundred percent sure not the Kremlin denied our interview request but Sergey Markov a member of Putin's party and Russia's national strategic Council reflects the Kremlin's defense counterpunch and embraced conspiracy theories starting with the assassinated opposition leader Boris Nemtsov who organized his killing I strongly believe that it's terroristic organization as both intelligence service of Ukraine Ukraine calibers names you not you create the Ukraine is country you know captured by terrorists but terrorists who captured Ukraine they killed by eating soup but it's more than observe right Vladimir karmerz has been poisoned twice Anna post gaya was was killed there there are a lot of people who criticized the Kremlin who end up dead first of all not too much this atmosphere which is killing people exist but this atmosphere had been created not by Vladimir Putin but by Western countries against Russia for the people Putin target that argument is an attempt to distract Russia surrounded by enemies we should support even stronger than before our leader etc etc there's a standard propaganda for any of territory and resume mikhail kasyanov was Putin's first prime minister in the early 2000s the two worked together to pass much-needed economic reforms in 2004 Putin fired him in castiana became an outspoken opposition politician appearing alongside Boris Nemtsov and Vladimir car Mirza last year a prominent Putin Ally posted a video of him and Kara Mirza in crosshairs but not all of the Kremlin's enemies end up dead some end up humiliated how did they target you on television go there blackmailing me and just creating your two stories etc as ever five months before 2015 elections state television broadcast castiana having sex with his assistant the video helped fracture is party they will try to destroy publicly to destroy morally and reputation of all of us and they're doing this quite successfully and they day and they they can book and here doing this is there anything you can do to stop them we cannot do anything because we have no protection we have no free and fair elections we have censorship in the media we have political prayers more than 100 political prisoners now in Russia today one year after he nearly died from poisoning car Mirza got better and restarted his work in February he was a few hours away from boarding a plane to Washington where his family lives for their safety when he says he was poisoned a second time we sat down with him and his wife yevgenia in March I couldn't breathe and at this stage you know when you're lying there trying to gasp for air you know I think I felt just life slowly going out of the whole body and I remember that distinct feeling this is it is it again now I'm going to die the only thing I was able to do I called my wife if Kenya who was here in the United States I asked them to take him to the hospital to the same medical team that had treated him in 2015 had it been on a plane had it been alone in his apartment had it been somewhere with I don't know in the streets of Moscow oh my god he didn't talk Karl Mirza had noticed that almost every night Moscow city workers removed Boris nemtsov's memorial so we made a film to protect his mentor's career and life buddy screams wolf on Norwegian analogy what film was the most difficult thing I ever did in my life this film is about the portrait of a man who could it's not for a quirk of fate a very well become president of Russia do you miss him Turner was this quite fortunate sort the risks they do hit closed home closer and closer every time have you ever asked him not to go back it is very fine I'm not going to lie to you but I want him to continue to do what he thinks is important what he thinks is right and her fate allows car Mirza to keep his faith that he can change the system he says after recovering he'll go back to Russia to finish the work that he and nemstov started Vladimir Putin is now serving an unprecedented third term as russia's president and he's expected to seek another six-year term in next year's presidential election putin's been widely popular but this spring for the first time in years there were large anti-government demonstrations across the country this is the season of Russia's discontent under President Vladimir Putin there's been a tacit agreement that people enjoy their lives and stay at a politics now many Russians are deciding that bargains no longer worth it the value of him respect until recently people were thinking politics were somewhere far away but now people understand politics hits close to home 38 year-old Alexei kodoroff and his neighbors had considered themselves a political but they launched these protests when the city of Moscow planned to evict them from their apartments to knock them down and build high-rises as always police presence was strong but some Russians fear of their state seems to be fading and faith in themselves rising do you think you can make a difference that one wasn't with me we can change things if we stay together we need to stay active it's very important right now to recreate civil society for the last five years civil society has almost disappeared in the 1960s the former Soviet Union built coder AUVs apartment complexes inexpensive housing your home is home for people like him to have their own space whatever I'll go inside it's nice with a view of the Moscow River quarter of accuses local officials of wanting to seize valuable land to rich Jefferson wozmak busca now is a very important moment the people are starting to unite to show the government their point of view I was gonna but it has the man most responsible for creating that unity is Alexei Navalny the 41 year old lawyer is the country's most prominent opposition politician on a crusade against corruption evil I've never mind look what he did just because the ruling United Russia party the party of crooks and thieves in March he posted an hour-long YouTube expose about mansions yachts and land that he says were corruptly acquired by Putin's Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev we did Medvedev can steal so much and so openly because Putin does the same but on a greater scale the system is so rotten there's nothing healthy left the volleys been fighting Putin for six years in 2011 he sparked massive protests ahead of a parliamentary election he called rigged let's in raw food it's very simple power to the people two years later he ran unsuccessfully for Moscow mayor against the Putin backed incumbent yes some will Chuck today by using YouTube Navalny circumvent state-run media and maintains a huge following this video has 23 million views at the mashallah this is our country and these swindlers are stealing our money everyone should fight however he can tens of thousands of people answered his call on March 26 and June 12th Russians launched the most widespread unsanctioned protests in a quarter century they were held in 185 cities nearly all the protesters were young and motivated to speak out by corruption Putin's a thief they chanted police joined the people they say don't serve the government of monsters police declined our invitation and arrested 1,700 protesters across the country including Navalny he was sentenced to 25 days in jail for organizing an unsanctioned rally he was also arrested and jailed in March and back in 2014 he was convicted of a felony defrauding clients of a shipping company helped his brother Oleg start Oleg remains in prison Alexei calls his brother a hostage and the charges fabricated his conviction means legally he can't run for office that hasn't stopped him from campaigning for next year's presidential election we want you won you dog food we do not owe the government anything it is the government who owes us they build an authoritarian regime that doesn't give anything back his rallies are unusual in a country where retail campaigning is almost unheard of the crowds are young and he talks like them Lorna she says they think we have no right to ask questions that we have to shut up and listen they tell us you and we have to say oh okay we're very sorry but no we have gathered here to say we're going to ask these questions and will obtain the answers his anti-corruption message resonates with me and I think that he is a very charismatic politician 23 year old cyril Kozlovsky and anyone in the crowd who wanted one got a photo with Navalny Kozlowski promptly posted it to his profile on VK russia's equivalent of facebook Kozlovsky acknowledges that Putin has brought relative prosperity to Russia he's not even old enough to remember the political and economic chaos that Putin helped end when he came to power in 1999 what would you say to your parents or grandparents who say look things were a lot worse for us before President Putin in the 18 years that have passed he and his team could have done a lot more to help the situation a lot more to make it better and he didn't so did the blame for this in Cheboksary 375 miles east of Moscow the local government made sure no one in the city center would rent space to the Navalny campaign so as gatherings take place on the edge of towns like this apartment complex as a guy father Semyon coach ken is the local campaign manager a level coletek see we were rejected by all the landlord's by all the hotels even the International hotels even construction fields rejected us coach Ken says he's been targeted personally last year on VK he posted a clip from comedian John Oliver's HBO program last week tonight scamming Aussies is the best thing anyone did on earth thanks wait the video shows band Isis symbols and coach Ken was arrested for extremism he took a selfie in the back of a police car he accuses the government of exploiting anti-terrorism laws to silence novotny's campaign by ellicott we are constantly fighting with the authorities and it's always one-sided because when it comes to election season they make it impossible local police also arrested 35 year old Andre Yusupov he's the local orchestra's first violin on March 26th he joined the Navalny protest and a week later police interrupted a rehearsal to take him to jail I asked him if he thought he'd be arrested for protesting if Navalny were president yeah absolutely beautiful couplet I'm absolutely certain this would not happen because under Alexei Navalny the country will be more open Alexia's for transparency and only with transparency can we overpower corruption arrests are only one way the Russian establishment pushes back directed in the one ample will Sheila's state TV portrays novela knees protests as an existential threat to Russia stability listen to what the country's most popular anchor said last month see when the provocative they use people to provoke the crowd and make the situation spiral out of control achieving chaos first in one square in one city and then they plunge the entire country into poverty I'm afraid to say civil war government-run high schools for students to watch a video comparing Navalny to Hitler accusing him of being a fascist trying to undermine the state but for the first time in a generation young people are rejecting the government talking points in a classroom 2,000 miles from Moscow students posted a video of themselves challenging a government funded school teacher who called Navalny supporters freaks and defended corruption in the state home drive a second avocado would cool yeah another thing you gotta mine now I am young but I like impulsive and you must have been dealing the pressure on Navami himself is sometimes physical last year members of the pro-government Cossacks doused Navalny with milk and beat up its staff in April a state TV channel showed an assailant after he sprayed in a volley with green dye and chemicals Navalny is right I needed surgery Navalny accused the Kremlin of organizing the attack no does really let's get backwards even if I look like this does that mean that we will accept money's been stolen and used to buy yachts I don't think so more Navalny x' poll numbers remain low but he's changing public opinion 2/3 of Russians now identify corruption as the country's number one problem President Putin avoids responding to Navalny substantively but the Navalny effect means at a town hall in moscow where questions are usually screened in advance this teenager dared to ask Putin about corrupt officials undermining the public's faith in government but for the Dominions oh how are you planning to solve this problem Putin responded and venules digital applause pathetic you read your question did you prepare it yourself or did someone put you up to it little life prepared me for this question hey that's vastly while he's inspired the younger generation some fellow Putin opponents criticized Navalny for being a nativist six years ago he released videos comparing immigrants who work in Russia to cockroaches if only stands by the videos instead he wants to appeal the Nationalists which is why he rarely criticizes Putin's muscular and popular foreign policy in Ukraine and Syria Navalny turns down interview requests including ours and tries to keep the focus on corruption you save your harshest criticism of the president for his domestic policy obviously not his foreign policy in fact you don't talk very much about its foreign policy is that because you agree with most available avenues two-party system I don't talk a lot about foreign policy because here everyone is interested in wages income and bad roads he tries to feed populism to an audience that's hungry he highlights government corruption to people who feel they have nothing to lose and he's trying to convince a generation and perhaps the country that politics requires participation and finally the us-russia relationship to say it's been tense is an understatement so next we try and understand how Washington sees Russia and how Russia sees the United States on Russia's most patriotic holiday Russians of all ages remember what they consider their finest moment they mark the anniversary of victory in World War two by honoring the dead Korea nom nom ovitch his grandfather fought the Nazis he says Russian the US were once allies and should be again we can finally read what you really want to love you and be friends with you we are waiting for you to finally meet us halfway for Russians it's the u.s. who's unwilling to come halfway many here believe President Trump wants to improve things but is being blocked by what Dmitri sheikin calls the American establishment we'll go area by Lee to cool Trump wants to do something but he's forced to follow the general political line Donald Trump is the most right-wing candidate of the Republican Party perhaps nobody expressed more hope in Trump's and Alexander Dugan a right-wing TV firebrand and philosopher who's helped inspire the Kremlin's ideology really we supported trumpism which supported our agenda Dugan says the Kremlin saw Trump is a kindred spirit who vowed not to meddle in turn ash we supported this choice of anti-establishment conservative America revolution that changed when President Trump ordered a missile strike on Russia ally Syria and Teddy felt he must respond to a chemical weapons attack as long as America stands for justice then peace and harmony will in the end prevail we trusted not in trump as pro-russian figure we trusted in trump realist and we are disappointed the disappointment and tensions have been growing last month over the Baltic Sea a Russian jet flew within 5 feet of a US Air Force reconnaissance plane that same week a NATO Jets shadowed the Russian defense ministers plane and a Russian jet came up and rocked its wings demonstrated was armed last year the Obama administration accused Russia of hacking the election and then seized Russian properties and increased sanctions all of that has led to Russian frustration Maria Zakharova is the Foreign Ministry spokeswoman we were trying to establish normal relationship normal didn't know this word normal relationship what is wrong with food president and I have been discussing various things going very well last week the u.s. took steps toward normalization presidents Trump and Putin announced a deal on Syria both presidents called their meeting the first step to warming the relationship asturias if we develop our relations in the same way there is every reason to believe that we would be able to at least partially restore the level of interaction that we need the president echoed that hope on sunday he tweeted he wouldn't dwell on 2016 hacking and wrote now is the time to move forward and working constructively with russia foaming-at-the-mouth this is not the language other Trump administration officials use about Russia on Syria how many more children have to die before Russia cares now is the my view on Ukraine we do call on Russia to exercise influence over this separatist in the region whom they do hold complete control over and on potent personally this is a man for whom veracity translated into English the one senior administration official who's declined to echo that criticism is Donald Trump if candidate and president wouldn't it be a great thing if we could actually get along with Russia with nothing sir a respect vote is a strong leader I can tell you that unlike what we have we have a pathetic leader Putin C kill'uh a lot of killers get a lot of killers while you think our country's so innocent and last week in Warsaw President Trump once again questioned the US intelligence community's unanimous assessment that Russia hacked the 2016 election I think it was Russia but I think it was probably other people and or countries and I see nothing wrong with that statement nobody really knows at the very least giving the president all the benefit of a doubt this is very bizarre behavior Democratic Senator Mark Warner is the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee we are seeking to determine if there is an actual fire but there is clearly a lot of smoke Warner's helping lead the Senate's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and whether President Trump or his campaign colluded with Russia's attempts to sway the election we first interviewed him three weeks ago it is very strange that any presidential candidates and in particular Republican presidential candidate would pair it so much of the Russian line Republican Senator James Lankford is also on the Intelligence Committee in some ways as president Trump aligned himself with the ideals expressed by Russia yeah he's pushing out the messages that are consistent with the Kremlin policies and I would tell you every opportunity that I have I try to articulate very clearly there's no question that the Russians were trying to hack into her election there's no question that we should have a strong NATO and the United States should be a part of that NATO alliance do you believe that he's not echoing that because the Russians have compromising material on him I don't know I hope not but the goal of this investigation is not only reconfirm Russian intervention and explain that to the American public but to also see if there was any contacts between the Trump campaign and the Russians and just this week we learned that last June Donald Trump jr. met with lawyer Natalia Vissel MIT skya and lobbyists Rinat Akhmetov both believed to have ties to the Russian government I spoke to Senator Warner again last night this indication that they were willing to accept this information from Russians and it was part of an overall Russian government effort to help Trump and to hurt Clinton I think this is the first time the American public has seen that in black and white much of this town has been worried about Trump in Russia since he became president current administration officials tell Newshour the White House drafted an executive order that would have lifted sanctions imposed on Russia over Ukraine senior administration officials and the intelligence community successfully lobbied against it and this spring senators passed a bill that would restrict the president's ability to lift those sanctions the bill is not yet a law but it was designed to be a nearly unanimous message to the President and to Putin we believe strongly that what Russia continues to do they will threaten Ukraine threaten its neighbors threaten NATO to continue to pry into not only our elections but other elections is destabilizing it in a demands a response what they've yet to have a consequence for what they did in the election time and they should in some ways the president has fallen in line on Sunday he tweeted he wouldn't lift sanctions on Russia over Ukraine until Ukrainian and Syrian problems are solved and last week he also endorsed article 5 NATO's collective dissents the United States has demonstrated not merely with words but with its actions that we stand firmly behind article 5 the mutual defense commitment that convinces many in Moscow that the u.s. establishment is making sure the US remains anti-russian Dmitri trenin is a former Soviet Army colonel who directs the Carnegie center in Moscow the United States has been remains and will be the power that defines a common Western ie us driven foreign defense and security policy and given that treinen says the US remains Russia's main adversary and Russia is simply targeting the US with whatever tool it can I'm sure that the Russians have been looking at things I've been hacking things have been using the material that they've hacked my are you surprised that that you are being packed this is a method of espionage this is what you do if you can do it do it if you can't protect against that protect against it but don't whine but it goes one step further many in Russia look at Washington's turbulence and see a US state considered strong and unified suddenly weakened and they're exploiting that weakness in the US foundation it is not so coherent it is not so stable it and it is vulnerable I would say and we have seen that we have seen what we needed to see to see vulnerability of American society and with that vulnerability with that lack of unity both American and Russian officials acknowledged that Russian interference in the United States is going to continue for all of us at the PBS news hour I'm Nick Schifrin thanks for watching you

Channel: PBS NewsHour

Views: 1,934,244

Rating: 4.0309424 out of 5

Keywords: Russia, Putin, Kremlin, critic, policy, United States, Moscow, PBS, PBS NewsHour, propoganda, hacking, Nick Schifrin, Vladimir, documentary, full, report

Id: _AkAZIk73F0

Length: 61min 22sec (3682 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 21 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/Markleft]

Thank you, unlike most US programs, that was pleasantly calm and informative.

[u/TaneVII]

Same old Russia

[u/FuzzyAlbert7]

Do you expect a program about Russia made by americans to be objective?