#275 — The Russian War in Ukraine
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Summary
Today's episode is a conversation first had on Zoom for podcast subscribers with chess grandmaster, former chess player, and current advocate for democracy and Western liberal values, Gary Kasparov. We discuss the legacy of Vladimir Putin, the role of China in the Ukraine conflict, and the larger implications for the defense of the Western liberal order in a useful and all too timely conversation and I think you'll find the conversation useful. If you enjoy what we're doing here, please consider becoming a patron of the project, which is made possible entirely through the support of our subscribers. We don't run ads on the podcast and therefore, therefore, it's made possible by the support from our subscribers, we can't run the podcast without their support. To access full episodes of the Making Sense Podcast, you'll need to subscribe at makingsense.org, where you'll get access to all kinds of premium premium features, including ad-free premium features and special features, and access to our most up-to-date news and features. You'll also get the latest in our most popular podcasts, including our most listened-to episodes of Making Sense, wherever you get your news and information. The Making Sense podcast. Thanks for listening to the podcast, and remember that you're listening to Making Sense. Sincerely, Sam Harris. Make sense. -- Jon Jon Parris . Music: "Make Sense" by Ian Dorsch "Goodbye Outer Space Traveler" by Sullivans "Space Traveler (featuring: The Lonely Planet) -- "The Lonely Planet" by John McDart "Outro" by Fountains "Outer Space" by Ferell "The Good Fight" by Pylawn "Space Junk" by The Good Fight by Svetsky "Space Truck" by Cairo Bronson "Good Morning America" by Kuznet by Joseph McDart "AstroTurk" by Jeff Perla "The Badger" by Ayn Rand & "Mr. by Pynchon is out there's a song written by Robert Fjell "A Good Morning by John Singleton "The Best Thing" by Robert Baden "The Great War" by Billie by Ian McKee (feat. ) - , on Epitaph
Transcript
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welcome to the making sense podcast this is sam harris just a note to say that if you're hearing
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this you are not currently on our subscriber feed and will only be hearing the first part
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therefore it's made possible entirely through the support of our subscribers so if you enjoy
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what we're doing here please consider becoming one no housekeeping today we will jump right into it
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today's episode is a conversation first had on zoom for podcast subscribers
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with gary kasparov who perhaps needs no introduction he's been on the podcast before
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one of the greatest chess players of all time world champion for many years but in his more
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recent incarnation he has been a tireless advocate for democracy and western liberal values in his
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home country of russia and as you might imagine he now has much to say about putin's war of aggression
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in ukraine so we really cover the whole topic we talk about how we got here what the perception of
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the war is inside of russia the allegation that u.s and eu foreign policy is to blame that nato
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expansion has been too threatening we talk about the perception of american weakness and how that might
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have provoked putin we notice in passing the otherwise unimaginable republican support for putin
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we talk about the sanctions regime and how effective that may be the extent to which putin miscalculated
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in this war whether he might be the victim of a popular uprising whether the u.s and the eu should impose
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a no-fly zone over ukraine or insist upon regime change in russia and if we do either or both of those things
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how we can avoid world war three we talk about the role of china in all this and discuss the larger implications
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for the defense of the western liberal order anyway a useful and all too timely conversation i think i may do some
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more of these live on zoom because you all seem to like that and i hope you find the conversation useful
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all right uh well just to remind everybody this is a uh a live recording of a podcast so this is
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an opportunity for all of you to just uh watch us record a podcast and and i'm very happy that you're
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joining us uh and i'm especially thankful to you gary for taking the time to uh have this conversation
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with us because i know you're inundated with um demands on your time here it's um you know many
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people know you as the um one of the greatest chess grandmasters who's ever lived and um it's always
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fun to talk about that but we've got um other priorities now maybe remind us how you come to
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have such strong opinions on the topic we're going to touch today i mean you've for years have been
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politically active in and outside of russia and a great advocate for democracy and and western
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liberal values and you're working now with the renewed democracy initiative and and other orgs
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just tell us what you're doing on this front i grew up in the soviet union and i had my own experience
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living in an unfree country and uh dealing with kgb that's as every other soviet citizen and of course
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as uh being a chess prodigy and uh and a top grandmaster and eventually world champion so i was
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under very um special attention of party officials and and kgb operatives and when i saw vladimir putin
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taking over at the end of 99 year 99 so uh i i have to say i was stunned because during these glorious
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days of august revolution in the soviet union august 1991 when the jubilant crowds toppled the statue of
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the kgb founder felix derzhinsky at lubanka square in moscow i don't believe anybody could bet
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one to million that in less than nine years kgb lieutenant colonel would be in charge of russian affairs
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again and it was not just about a kgb officer vladimir putin was quite frank explaining his views of the
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world even before he became president of russia being a prime minister and as an apparent heir apparent
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of boris yeltsin he spoke uh at the gathering of kgb officers in the headquarters which was
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televised and he said there were no former kgb officers one kgb always kgb he never tried to hide his
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uh uh sympathies uh for the soviet union it's his famous phrase repeated many times the collapse of the
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soviet union was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of 20th century the first thing he did as a president of
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russia it's a restoration of soviet national anthem and of course the war in chechnya uh carpet bombing of
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grozdy and other chechen towns and villages uh very mysterious explosions of apartment blocks in moscow and
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other uh russian cities as a pretext for the for this war i didn't know what could have happened
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but i knew that the guy could be a great danger for the world if given the chance and every time you know
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he did something that you know was a warning signal to me i tried to communicate my my concern
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to the rest of the world and uh i think that's it's it was it was it was more than enough to listen
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to vladimir putin in person if nobody cared what gary kasparov or boris nemtsov said about putin
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and repeatedly said putin was our problem but at one point it would be everybody's problem but putin
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himself at certain point decided that he could express his views about the future of our planet
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in public 15 years ago in munich at security conference in europe he talked openly to the
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world leaders about what he called spheres of influence returning to not even the 20th century
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to the 19th century where the big countries big guys as he said would be in charge of all affairs
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and will dictate uh to smaller countries how to behave and he believed that russia
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under his command was entitled to control not just former soviet union but eastern europe it was
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within russia's heritage rights and every time that he did something to materialize his views like
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attacking the republic of georgia in 2008 or annexing crimea in 2014 i thought that the world would wake
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up because he did it and unfortunately nothing happened so basically we are now in this in this
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tragic situation uh and ukrainians are paying with their blood every every not day every second as we
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speak it's because for so many years nobody wanted to take this threat seriously we read history books
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about 1930s and many of us i guess as myself were surprised how come that nobody could see the danger
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coming from hitler because in 1933 was one story 34 is another story 35 36 37 but when i mentioned
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hitler or just german berlin olympic games in 1936 compare them to 2014 sochi games i was ostracized by
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international media saying how could you compare anyone to adult hitler and i said look right hitler
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hitler is a monster with no comparison but it's hitler of 1941 42 and onward but in 1936 just read your
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newspapers american canadian german french british and he was treated differently so again dictators never
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ask why so is why not and putin attacked ukraine now because he believed that he could get away
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with this crime as he did many times in the past and vis-a-vis ukraine putin said many times also we
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just you know again you don't have to uh take my word ukraine was not a real state according to
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he believed that ukraine basically belonged to russia and could be split between russia maybe poland
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hungary and ukraine for him was something like poland for stalin an obstacle on the way for their
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geopolitical plans so what do you say to people who you you hear from now both on the left and the
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right in in certainly in american politics that there's been something provocative about
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u.s and eu foreign policy that nato expansion is really the reason why putin has done this that
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there's you have to sort of see it from his side and and sympathize with his security concerns
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uh we're hearing a fair amount about this and there are other i guess you might even just run
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through some recent presidents and just how their dithering has enabled putin's sense that he could
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do this right i mean there's been something provocative about american weakness too so i wonder
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i guess i've asked you two questions there i mean what's the role played by nato and nato expansion
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and what's the role played by just the perception of american and european weakness and internal
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division i think we're dealing with two separate questions so one is more strategic one is more
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tactical so i use the chess metaphors so i'm always reluctant to use chess metaphors discussing
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putin i prefer poker but in this case let's start with this the argument about nato expansion and
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the provocative foreign policy of nato you didn't you said did i hear you say eu european union
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provocative politics right it's the it's a it's a toothless organization that you know just that's
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they buy a lot of gas shadow but it's this uh but it's good because that's that's that's the way
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that this that's it's everything's been mixed it's like a salad oh it's nato eu i mean all sorts of
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the guys that are trying to attack mother russia that's that's a classical russian propaganda
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unfortunately parroted by people on the right and on the left yeah some of them are on the payroll
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some of them are useful idiots but these arguments you know this could be discussed before putin's
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invasion of ukraine now looking at the war crimes on an industrial scale i hope some of these people
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should now recognize that they were not just wrong they were dead wrong and by and and their
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their attempts maybe genuine attempts to spread the blame it emboldened putin to to move beyond
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imaginable because so many times we heard no putin would never do that the long of the list of things
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that putin would never done because it's so bad i mean it's too long and uh now i think everybody
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recognizes that the man cannot be stopped until he's stopped and uh same people who said he would
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never do that now they are seriously disgusting whether you can use nukes now speaking about this
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so-called concerns i don't think we can blame paul's or lithuanians or estonians or latvians
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who rushed to nato because they had an experience a genetic memory of being occupied the price they paid
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for soviet occupation was too high i mean just to blame them or for their desire to join nato
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and to hide under under american nuclear umbrella now speaking about threat to russia estonia latvia
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lithuania the three baltic states they joined nato officially in 2003 the distance between estonia and
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st petersburg is about 150 miles i never heard about any threat coming from estonia or latvia
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or lithuania or even poland to russia it's about russia it's about russian aggressive wars
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and and open threats to to the neighboring countries that we we reached the the this is this climax
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now speaking about american aggressive policy they clinton bush bush bush 43 obama trump biden i'm not
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here just debating their the political views but until very recently it was concession after concession
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and i think that's if we if we try to understand putin's rationale if you may call it rationale for
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attacking ukraine it's not nato strengths but it's a weakness it's it's lack of american leadership
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and his belief that he could get away with direct assault on ukraine de facto if not the uri liquidation
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of an independent nation and um in installment of a puppet government and continuation of his uh imperial
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policy policies beyond russian border or even beyond former soviet union let's not forget you know this
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says putin had other call it foreign adventures what about syria so this is i don't think there's the
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there's any any argument about syrian rebels threatening russia but russian planes carpet bombed aleppo
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gary do you share the view that putin significantly miscalculated how the west would respond and just how world
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opinion would turn against this war so quickly uh yes and no i mean it's he made mistakes in his
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calculations but it's it's probably not so much about western response immediate response because
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he had a simple plan the way i see it and what i read from russian propaganda machine and putin by the
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way he has been building his military presence around ukraine for quite a while unlike the dictators
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of the past that tried to hide their plans putin was quite open about it he even brought part of his
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pacific fleet to the black sea last time i looked at the map it's quite a distance and he surrounded
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ukraine from east russia south crimea and also from belarus from the north so the ukraine was surrounded
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and he had russian fleet in the black sea ready to to to shell ukrainian ukrainian infrastructure
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and last year there was an argument that putin did it all for blackmail he wanted to squeeze
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concessions out of ukraine maybe but i think that is just you know after he met president biden in
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geneva we all remember the summit and the summit was according to american administration all about
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ukraine and and biden and his team said that they looked at putin put straight in putin's eyes and said
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forget about it if you do it will impose sanctions just that's beyond your imagination i don't think
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putin believed him it's just you know there was um as we were told some decrease of the tension
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around around ukraine but putin hasn't removed his troops so he looked around so just and and then he
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continued his buildup then it was a one call between biden and putin same result then the third call
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i think that is this is what putin read putin's reading of his calls was america was not ready
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was not ready to oppose him uh decisively and also while american intelligence it's not me and it's u.s
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intelligence and biden is not trump trump didn't trust american intelligence biden did
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kept repeating over few last few months attack was imminent the question is why if attack was imminent
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ukraine received no military support that could inflict great much greater damages to to russian troops
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especially to russian warships and russian plates so um why do you think that is what why didn't we
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support them earlier i i think that because uh biden administration played a game again either we say
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on many chess boards or on or if we use poker analogy on many tables united states uh viewed russia as a
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partner in climate change talks you have to listen to john carey who even mentioned the climate change
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change uh change talks after putin's attack on ukraine but more importantly on iran i think it's it's it's
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some sort of the cognitive dissonance to to have russia as a part of the iranian deal which is as we
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are being as we're being told to prevent iran from getting nuclear and russia has to stockpile
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enriched uranium from iran and and and russia today is is is is a country that is openly threatening to
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use nukes in in conventional conflict so yeah i think that's the u.s administration tried to
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separate these issues and putin saw nothing but weakness so he could downplay americans warnings about
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ukraine because he could always negotiate and he's quite good give him credit he's very good in
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negotiating and uh shifting these bargaining chips on the on the on this table of geopolitical casino
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it's poker he's a he's a great poker player who used to bluff and to win because even if he had a
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weak hand he raised the stake so high that opponents always folded the cards can you generalize about the
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perception of the war inside of russia or is that is it just i mean i guess the question is how effective
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do you think the propaganda is domestically in russia oh uh it's a question it's not just about
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information that's available or not available in russia because putin now is closing every
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every hole that you know that's that's we could use to to send messages to to russian people the
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internet is still functioning there but you know facebook is now is is is a band twitter now youtube is
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just you know it's slowing down so there are very few channels left for information to travel
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back to russia because the the the pictures from ukraine they are very different from what what
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was expected and i think now this is talking about information war so the putin is losing it because
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his main plan to take over ukraine failed miserably no doubt that he wanted to and he believed he could
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to take over kiev within next within two three days after beginning of of his advance since the the
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distance to kiev from belarus was very uh it's much shorter than from from russia and he thought that
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the moment he takes over kiev zelensky is on the run ukrainian government is paralyzed or just you
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know it's it's it's it's gone the infrastructure is is military infrastructure is is broken and
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his puppet is sitting in kiev as the newly um proclaimed leader of ukraine maybe victor yanukovych
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the deposed president who was hiding in russia after he was kicked out from ukraine in 2014
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and he expected and not without a reason that the free world would be talking to him and we'll hear
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so many pragmatists saying oh it's a new geopolitical reality the same way they told us about this after
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crimea oh it was it was just you know it was bad but we had now a new choice but to accommodate
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putin because what else we can do so this is classic you know this nothing is being done and
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eventually say it's it's too late for anything so nothing can be done now and the failure to take
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over kiev and to break stiff ukraine resistance in kiev and kharkiv and other other major cities
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i think led to the change of the strategy and and bombardment of ukrainian cities in the first three
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days they tried to avoid direct hits the campaign was very different they it's obviously they they
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hit occasionally few buildings but it was very clear that they they had an order to avoid civilian
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casualties because putin wanted to present the story of liberation of ukraine only when he failed in
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kiev they changed it and now this is they they try to bombard ukraine into submission same way they did
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in grozny in 2000 or in aleppo in 2015 and i think the information actually is is is traveling to
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russia even even through this putin's information bubble one of the reasons massive russian losses
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massive losses i think we can trust ukrainian sources because they they they count it's it's head it's
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good headcount there are more than 11 000 soldiers being killed uh we don't know how many wounded the
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reports that are finding its way through the censorship in crimea telling us about the
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hospitals they are all overcrowded with russian was wounded sick and wounded so it seems that you know
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the from again from various sources that i think we can trust with you know some level of confidence
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that public opinion russia is is slowly shifting because you you can't deceive people all the time
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it's already it's nearly two weeks we are at war and by the way now the word war is banned in russia
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so this is this the new laws that have been adopted by russian puppet parliament now if you are uh
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protesting is the war if you are standing in the streets of russia with with with with a poster note
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note war three years in jail if you try to tell russian people using your social media account
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in russia about russian losses in ukraine and about just tell anything that contradicts official version
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of of events in ukraine which is called special operational war up to 15 years in prison so that
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tells you that the truce is is is a mortal enemy for putin's propaganda it's this they are afraid of it
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as much as vampires are are scared of of daylight and on that point do you think putin is vulnerable to
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some domestic uprising at this point i mean whether it's coming from the top from oligarchs or or it's
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coming from an anti-war movement lower down is what what's the prospect that we could see putin
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actually unseated by this and see a complete reset of of the russian government i mean navalny coming out
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of prison and etc no as for alexi i i've been saying that alexi got life in prison putin's life as long
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as putin is is in kremlin alexi will be in prison the moment putin is out alexi is also out and i'm
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sure you'll if he survives i mean god forbid anything horrible happens to him in putin's jail
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so he will definitely play a role in very important role in in uh the future of my country but analyzing
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the the probabilities of some sort of uprising and you put together all all these ingredients
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oligarchs uh police army security apparatus popular uprising and political and and socio-economic
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protest i think what we're seeing now it's it's quite a significant political protest when i say
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significant it's it it is quite amazing and i'm i'm i'm i was very proud for tens of thousands of
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people who made it to the streets of russia you say oh country of 145 million and you have what
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20 30 40 000 people protesting is the war but that's not demonstration in new york or in san francisco or
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in berlin or london you go to the streets protesting as a war almost guaranteed beaten arrested detained
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and then you can end up in jail for many years so for people of different ages you can look at them
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this is demographics is it's it's very broad to take this risk just to defend i don't know whether
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they think about owner of the country or about their own feelings i i feel a shame i'm a russian citizen
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when i just talk to ukrainian journalists and i do it every day i know it's tough because it's being
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done it's not on my behalf i'm one of the staunchest opponents of putin from day one in his day one in
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office but still it's it's russia that brought death and destruction to ukrainian soil and many
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people i think you know feel the same and they just believe that they have no other choice even with a
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huge risk but to show up on the streets they don't nobody's going to defend them nobody's nobody
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knows their names but it's it's it's it's very personal choice but that's not something that can
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shatter putin's dictatorship but if sanctions are working and i say real sanctions sanctions that
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will throw russia back to the technological stone age sanctions that will be will include financial
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economic technological measures also total isolation and eventual military defeat in ukraine
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this combination could create an explosive mixture that could lead to a social economic protest and
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that's a revolt that will bring millions of people to the streets and if putin is running out of cash
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and it looks now that he is no longer in charge of the greatest fortune in the history of of of humanity
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because most of the assets are frozen so how he's going to pay for his military police and propaganda
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so that's why i think the chances for for massive revolt against putin within next months or two
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if situation doesn't change on the ground and and the war continues more losses and the free world
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stands firm united against putin might lead to internal conflict because loyalty you don't see a
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possible backlash against the sanctions i mean could if the sanctions are really biting the people of
00:27:10.420
russia could they be perceived through a russian nationalist lens basically confirming that the
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west is the enemy of russia and that you know putin is right to view it i hear this argument all the time
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i think it's just it's it's not realistic yeah for maybe for a day maybe for a week for two weeks
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they can blame the west at the end of the day you have to feed your family and and it's putin who
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started the war and uh it's people have to find solution and uh free world is far away the west is far
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away putin and putin's cronies are just nearby so i don't think that you know we should now worry about
00:27:48.340
about the hard economic hardship i sympathize with these people but but please don't tell me about that
00:27:55.340
when ukraine is being killed it's not about economic hardship it's it's people women children
00:28:01.460
elderly being killed as we speak now so it's time for russians to make a choice and i i wish you know
00:28:08.760
they could rise earlier and it will influence people around putin his henchmen his cronies because
00:28:16.620
they're loyal to him not because of ideology great ideas communism imperialism russian nationalism
00:28:24.280
it's a mafia state every state has its mafia but in russia mafia has its state and putin is is is
00:28:33.220
a mafia boss cabo de tutti copy and he again give him credit he built this very sophisticated system
00:28:40.560
where loyalty is just it's being changed for personal gains but people who always show loyalty to him
00:28:48.360
for personal gains for benefits i don't think they're willing to die for him whether they are just
00:28:53.740
he's you know he's from his government security apparatus or this is military that's why i'm so
00:28:59.380
adamant demanding the no-fly zone because i don't think that russian pilots will be willing to
00:29:05.280
sacrifice their lives to uh give putin a pretext to uh start a war against nata i i want to see how
00:29:12.720
many russian pilots or russian generals will follow putin's orders to enter confrontation with nata
00:29:18.800
because that's for them it's it's a suicide and i don't think that the morale in russian army in
00:29:24.760
russian political circles in security apparatus it's it's can can can resemble anything that we
00:29:31.800
witnessed in hitler germany or stalin soviet union because many old dictatorships they had this
00:29:37.500
ideological craziness and and fanaticism i don't see it in russia it's it's all about oh we can we do it
00:29:44.180
because we can do it if we cannot do it i'm not so sure that they'll be willing to to put their their
00:29:49.380
their lives at at risk well so i want to talk about the strategic logic of a no-fly zone but
00:29:56.020
one more question on sanctions what do you think about the strategy of rolling them out incrementally
00:30:02.820
the way we have i mean i naively when i look at this it seems i mean i understand that the logic of
00:30:09.020
holding something in reserve so that you can you know when putin calls our bluff again and again we
00:30:14.800
can ratchet the um the sanctions on him but why on earth are we still buying russian oil and gas
00:30:22.180
directly funding his war on a daily basis well what what do you think of the sanction regime thus far and
00:30:30.640
what do you think we should have done differently this is a very important question sam it's it's it's
00:30:36.260
just helps us to understand the the roots of the current crisis because in theory incremental
00:30:46.140
sanctions could influence decisions of a potential aggressor but it it's important that you you have
00:30:55.380
an adequate response now even 50 of the sanctions that have been imposed lately maybe 25 of the sanctions
00:31:04.160
in 2014 after annexation of crimea could have saved us from this nightmare right some sanctions
00:31:10.920
imposed let's say between geneva summit and and and first biden putin zoom call uh so from june
00:31:19.320
20 to 2021 to i think november the last year also could actually send a message to putin and his and his
00:31:26.520
inner circle that america was serious i think the big mistake was to threaten the sanctions without actually doing it
00:31:34.160
so now we reached a point where unfortunately no half measures will work and that's another rule
00:31:40.260
that's i i learned from history books and unfortunately we're all learning today every day of our delay
00:31:47.540
responding decisively to the threat of a dictator the price goes up and something that could have worked
00:31:54.360
before the invasion doesn't work now when americans american administration talked about sanctions at the
00:32:01.540
threat i said many times i put it on it was on my twitter on my facebook sanctions cannot stop tanks if
00:32:08.680
tanks are rolling if planes are just dropping bombs so sanctions could actually help to prevent it maybe
00:32:14.960
but now we reach the point where it's it's no longer prevention it's about solving the problem
00:32:23.180
you do not compromise with cancer you have to cut it out and i think now it's there's no other choice
00:32:29.260
for us to see that the the end of the war must lead to the collapse of putin's regime because as long as
00:32:36.720
so would you favor ramping up all the 100 sanctions at this point i mean so that we uh exert every
00:32:45.360
feature of economic war we can all of a sudden look it's a oil embargo sounds great but it's the it's the i
00:32:53.260
said it's it's it was not even necessary if america could impose technological embargo because russian
00:32:59.740
oil industry will not function without or gas industry without a full tech support from the from
00:33:05.160
the free world but obviously you know oil embargo has a psychological effect my only concern is just you
00:33:11.260
know that is this doing this oil embargo we are helping other bad guys as much as i i'm concerned
00:33:19.020
about putin and and his his criminal uh uh war in ukraine and and and people being killed all the
00:33:24.720
time look helping iran saudi arabia or venezuela that's those are also bad guys with blood on their
00:33:32.700
hands so um it's i understand there's a balance so you just have to find a balance i what i think is
00:33:38.300
important now is is to come up with a strategy because at the end of the day look it's it's we're all
00:33:43.680
concerned about climate change but what's the difference there's more oil in from venezuela or more
00:33:48.180
more oil from america at the end of the day you could or from canada so i think it's important to
00:33:53.420
to agree on priorities and if priorities are about putin and about the let's be honest about change of
00:34:00.440
the regime in russia then we have to concentrate on on this goal and i think it can be done but
00:34:06.240
i'm not sure that the there's an agreement about the the future goals and how we're going to solve
00:34:13.480
putin's problem which does not disappear with the defeat of his armies in in ukraine and also
00:34:19.520
we we are all talking you just mentioned in the beginning of our conversation about putin's attempts
00:34:25.080
crazy attempts to spread the war beyond ukrainian borders so i think it's time to recognize that
00:34:30.600
we are playing the game again let me use chess analogy this time that cannot end in a tie
00:34:37.220
it's that's why it's not exactly chess either we win or putin wins and and i think we just we just
00:34:44.700
have to do whatever uh mobilizing all the resources of the free world and also from political to to
00:34:51.740
call it spiritual and ideological because ukraine i think gave us very powerful spirit to show how to
00:34:57.780
fight and and die for freedom and democracy and to make sure that as a result of this war not only
00:35:04.520
ukraine will be safe and and will restore its territorial integrity but russia will become free
00:35:10.340
so you've spoken two phrases that i think are going to strike fear in many people the first is a no-fly
00:35:16.460
zone and the second is regime change and each in their own way by a slightly different logic
00:35:23.120
seems to uh invite a serious escalation of the conflict and even the threat of of a nuclear war right
00:35:32.400
so i mean many people are looking at the situation and all of their bandwidth is taken up with a
00:35:39.420
concern about just avoiding world war three how do we prosecute this conflict in such a way as to know
00:35:45.780
that we're not going to go over the brink here and so let's take them by turns a no-fly zone a no-fly
00:35:52.220
zone seems synonymous with a shooting war between the u.s. slash eu and russia which is to say
00:36:02.260
a a shooting war a conventional shooting war with nuclear arm powers where one is run by a psychopath
00:36:10.520
who increasingly has less and less to lose and who's already threatened in some form to use nuclear
00:36:16.980
weapons if he's antagonized so talk to me about a no-fly zone how is it that you can advocate that
00:36:24.140
again we're dealing with a strategic question because you raised a very good point and i
00:36:32.180
again hear it all the time no-fly zone involves consider
00:36:37.880
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