Brendan Ogle has said that the political Left is too soft on Russian President Vladimir Putin who has waged war on Ukraine.

A progressive activist with Unite Trade Union, Mr Ogle is concerned with leftist attitudes towards the "imperialist fascist", saying he "should be called out much more powerfully on the left than he has been".

Mr Ogle joined The Hard Shoulder to discuss his views on the matter.

"I've always been passionate about what I perceive as injustice", he said.

"The distribution of wealth is obscene", he said, adding that the housing crisis and rising cost of living is putting too much pressure on low to middle income earners.

Vladimir Putin

"I'm very energized with the war in Ukraine and the behavior of that imperialist fascist in Moscow", Mr Ogle said.

"He should be called out much more powerfully on the left than he has been."

Mr Ogle calls on leftists to remember the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. 

"Vladimir Putin is not a communist. Vladimir Putin is not even a leftist. Vladimir Putin is a fascist imperialist."

He argued that the Left should always stand against fascist imperialism, "whether it comes from Washington, whether it comes from Iran".

Leftist ideology

"This idea that America bad, everything else good, just doesn't sit with me", Mr Ogle said.

He described leftists choosing Putin as a rejection of American imperialism as "childish".

"You're not picking a football team here."

"There's certainly not many people on the left who will overtly support Putin, but I am challenged by the memory of the anti-war marches that took place, which I was part of, during the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq ... versus what's happened in Syria", he said.

"Before you're left before you're right, you're a human being."

Mr Ogle fiercly condemned the "horrific" war crimes committed by Russia, including "the raping and pillaging of Ukrainian women and children".

"You come into this world as a human being before you learn anything but ideology or anything like that", he said.

"I think central and southern America has been destroyed by American imperialists ... but then because I recognise the behaviors as coming from Moscow now, I think it's consistent to criticise that as well."

"Before you're left before you're right, you're a human being."

Main image shows Vladimir Putin.