Katrina vanden Heuvel: How U.S. Foreign Policy Provoked Putin

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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. As Putin's atrocity continues in Ukraine, the worst breach of another country's sovereignty in Europe since World War II, as many people are calling it, the question nevertheless becomes how does the world stop the bloodshed and the destruction of a nation's right to self-determination? The answer may not necessarily be to get tougher and tougher and acknowledging what many commentators from the left-right and center acknowledged was a US foreign policy failure going as far back as the Clinton administration might help.

This is the position of a diverse sometimes strange coalition between those on the right who like Putin because he's a white hetero cis male nationalist. To those on the left who think US imperialism is more toxic for the world than Putin's to essentialist like New York Times columnist, Thomas Friedman, who wrote an article this week called This is Putin's War, but America and NATO Aren't Innocent Bystanders.

That includes a quote from President Clinton's own Defense Secretary William Perry, who said in 2016, after a Putin's earlier invasion of Ukraine, "The United States deserves much of the blame. Our first action that really set us off in a bad direction was when NATO started to expand, bringing in Eastern European nations, some of them bordering Russia." Very candid coming from the defense secretary who was in office at the time.

Flash forward to yesterday, when President Biden announced deployment of troops to protect those countries as a matter of pride and mutual defense.

President Joe Biden: Over the past few weeks, I've ordered 1000s of additional forces to Germany and Poland as part of our commitment to NATO. On Tuesday, in response to Russia's aggressive action, including this troop presence of Belarus, and the Black Sea, I've authorized deployment of ground and air forces already stationed in Europe to NATO's eastern flank allies, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Romania.

Brian Lehrer: Is that the way to get Putin out of Ukraine, and all of the sanctions that will fairly likely hurt the people in Russia and throughout Europe and in this country too more than they will hurt or dissuade Putin, at least in the short run? We have to at least ask those questions even as everyone rightly denounces the invasion.

We will get a version of that dissenting view now from Katrina Vanden Heuvel, publisher and editorial director of The Nation and the Washington Post columnist. Her recent articles include one in The Nation yesterday, called Putin's Invasion, and one in the Washington Post last week, called A Path Out of the Ukraine Crisis. Thanks for coming on Katrina. Welcome back to WNYC.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: Thank you, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Let's start with some of your take on history, and then we'll move to the present. You heard those quotes from Thomas Friedman and Clinton's Defense Secretary, William Perry. I assume you agree NATO expansion after the Cold War was unnecessarily provocative.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: In 1997 as the NATO debate heated up in this country, and it's good that we had a debate, we don't have much of a debate around those issues now. We did a special issue with The Nation called The Case Against NATO Expansion. Put The Nation aside, it was the esteemed diplomat George Kennan, who your listeners may remember or not who, in an interview with Thomas Friedman, in the New York Times, I think correctly predicted, this was 1998, that Russia would, "React quite adversely if NATO expanded to the east. I think it is a tragic mistake." He went on to talk about, "We've signed up a whole series of countries, even though we have neither the resources nor the intention to do so in any serious way."

Since then, NATO essentially the grave mistake was in 1990 at the time of George reunification, George H.W, and James Baker, Secretary of State assured Gorbachev then the Soviet leader that NATO wouldn't move not one inch eastward and there are documents to that effect. It was a broken promise.

By 2008, the epicenter of NATO and you could say the Cold War had moved from Berlin to the borders of Russia. I think that's important that history because, for us, NATO when the Soviet Union ended, the Warsaw Pact, its countered at NATO ended.

NATO is not a coffee klatch. NATO is a militarized institution, which has militarized relations with Russia and in Europe. I do raise in two of my columns the idea of an alternative security structure, which would have been less militarizing. It's important part of the history, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Pushing back, though, another way to look at it is that Russia had a history of aggression into those lands, and the Eastern European nations and Baltic Republics were asking to join NATO to help defend against potential Russian aggression of the future. It ties to today because what I'm hearing is that Ukraine is trying to join NATO and join the EU, that's their opposition. The US and Europe have been saying no, at least so far.

Is this really US provocation or is it these small vulnerable countries asking the Western powers for protection?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: Good question, Brian. The Baltic countries, when they were worried about Russian aggression, Russia until about 2007 was on its knees and the country had collapsed twice in the 20th century 1917, 1991. The idea of the aggression, I think it's a word, we're seeing it now, after a long period, Russia feels it feels aggrieved. I think the invasion surprised many, including experts like Reagan's ambassador to the Soviet Union, Jack Matlock.

Again, there were options on offer, Brian. It didn't mean that those countries, important countries would be clicked out, locked out of the west. It's how you engage the West. There was the EU, there's the OSCE, the Organization Security Cooperation in Europe. There are other ways of engaging and bringing Eastern European countries into an alliance so that NATO remained the Alliance. Again, it is a military alliance, you have to have equipment that's compatible.

Finally, the delusion is that the United States in these last months, the charter of NATO would not have permitted Ukraine to join until territorial integrity was reassessed and established and the economic solvency.

Ukraine, I think is the third failed state in the list, but it's not to deny entry into the West. In fact, the real crisis in 2013, '14, Brian, talking history was Ukraine had a choice of going with the EU or this Eurasia agreement on offer from Russia. There was an effort to have it join both. This was on offer, but in the end, the President deeply corrupt, but elected, chose to go with Eurasia partly because the subsidy cuts that the EU would have demanded might have ousted him which in effect happened.

Brian Lehrer: Again, in the present, should a country like Ukraine that wants to join NATO now of its own free will, be denied out of deference to Vladimir Putin?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: It's not out of deference to Vladimir Putin. I have no brief for Putin, but it's out of deference to the very Charter, which established NATO. Now, that can be changed. I'm sure there are constitutional arrangements made if needed. I come back to the fact I lookout, by the way, Brian, at the world right now, our world has been upended. What we've witnessed, it's 10 days that shook the world has momentous implications. One of those is there's going to be a bulking up of NATO, so to speak, more US troops on the frontlines in NATO. Is that going to be a--

[crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: You heard it in that clip that we played of Biden from yesterday.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: That's right. Will that make us more secure? Is that going to make us-- That is possibly a trigger for more war. I just think we need to rethink and be prepared and protected, but rethink security in these times. We're also witnessing possible risk of nuclear war. Putin's reference to threaten nuclear use. There's Ukraine and energy. We're going to be more reliant on fossil fuels unless we can think in new ways and the economy.

These sanctions that have been talked about have collateral damage of real kinds for the West, and it's not fully clear how much impact they will have on Russia that has already been preparing for five or six years to withstand sanctions and also level counter-sanctions.

I'm just coming back to the idea that what is being escalated now is a more militaristic response in response to a militaristic invasion, which the nation has condemned. Yet, where do we go from here? Do we continue to hunker down and Ukrainians and their resilience fight a Russian army or do we begin again to think of how we could construct nuclear arrangements, the conventional force agreement, the INF? Do we try to talk or do we have a conversation if it's all shut down, that's very dangerous too.

I think at some point there has to be, as I write in my op-ed, diplomacy, tough persistent clear diplomacy, de-escalation, and negotiation,

Brian Lehrer: Listeners. What do you propose as a way to end the Ukraine crisis with the least damage to innocent people all the way around militarily, economically, diplomatically 212-433 WNYC 212-433-9692. What do you support or what would you like to ask Katrina vanden Heuvel from The Nation and the Washington Post 212-433 WNYC, 433-9692, or a tweet, your question or proposed solution. If you can propose a solution to world peace in 280 characters, do it on Twitter @BrianLehrer and to follow-

[crosstalk]

Yes, go ahead, Katrina. Sure.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: I think it's a very different moment than 2013, '14 when Putin seized Crimea. There was a huge bump in his popularity. He had rallied the country but right now there is not much interest in this war in Russia. In fact, more protests than anticipated and not just in 50 cities, thousands of people, but a group of journalists, a hundred municipal political figures have released statements denouncing the war.

I think this country Russia has been consumed with COVID. It has handled it badly and their pension issues, their wage issues, Putin's into his 22nd year, and supposed to leave in two years, that's a bet. I'm just saying there's a real widespread sense of protest, especially the editor of the leading independent newspaper, not many of them, but he released a statement, just the shame of war and rally journalists to be writing about it. There's some action which may grow because I think Putin calibrated this in a different way.

Brian Lehrer: You wrote on The Nation that if Russia tries to occupy the whole of Ukraine, it may face a prolonged gorilla war far more costly than the Soviet debacle in Afghanistan, so presumably there would be that kind of pushback in Ukraine. If this goes on and expands, there would be the kind of protest movement that you just referred to in Russia.

On the Russia side of that, why now think that Putin will just squelch it like he squelched other protests, he already arrested from what I read 1700 people in the last day at those protests. As far as the journalist, he has a record of killing them in some cases, having them murdered. Why think that they will have the power to influence his actions?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: I think there's more resilience in the protest than there has been. It's widespread, it's anti-war, which is, there was real anti-war protest. It was much more masked because it was the early Glasnost years during Afghanistan. I do think this is a more serious frame of protests around the country, in the regions. The biggest protests really were not the ones in Moscow and St. Petersburg a few years ago, Brian, but in, Vladivostok up in the far east, those have real implications.

You mentioned, I'm sorry,-

Brian Lehrer: The journalists?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: -journalists, well the newspaper, I mentioned Novaya Gazeta, which has published an important coalition of a hundred journalists denouncing the war, but very much about the humanitarian crisis, which cannot be overlooked, Brian. You're already looking at perhaps 1 million, 3 million people displaced in another crisis of displacement, which we've seen in Syria.

These newspapers were the journalists. The key journalists you mentioned have been killed and the editor of that newspaper believes it really was the Chechen war lord, Ramzan Kadyrov, which doesn't mean that Putin hasn't created a climate of impunity. Someone once said, and again, I have no brief for Putin, but we lose sight of Russia and the fact that there's a blob in Russia, there are forces that are more militaristic that wanted negotiations, but demonizing Putin is not a policy. It's an alibi for not having a policy.

Brian Lehrer: Couple of the tweets coming in, one says, "Thank you for having on this guest to simply explain the context and say anything other than Putin is Hitler gets you labeled a Kremlin agent, very dangerous jingoism going on right now". That person is happy to hear you and your perspective. Another one though, writes, "Who the h is this Putin apologist calling Ukraine a failed state? Please go back to this guest's assertion that Ukraine is a "failed" state."

Why did you use that term with respect to Ukraine when it's certainly being portrayed here as a young democracy under Volodymyr Zelenskyy?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: Let me just say to the first caller, I'm grateful to you, Brian. I don't want to pander, I'm just grateful to you because what's happened in our country, it seems to me, is we haven't had a debate. It's been one hand clapping in terms of views of Russia. I think it's important to have that debate. I think it's dangerous for all times, especially in times of war, that when you raise skeptical questions, try to hold government accountable that, it suggested your parroting Russian talking points or you're a puppet or whatever.

Failed state came from work done by a very important, respected economist named Adam Tooze, T-O-O-Z-E who teaches at Columbia. In his report, in his work, it is a technical term and it has to do with measurements of the state's economy, other metrics.

I don't think it's a failed state in the sense of its culture, it's potential, its history, but it, as someone raised earlier, I think, there is a proxy war underway. This is a civil war and it's become a proxy war for geopolitical struggle. In that context, I don't know if that helps Ukrainian democracy. Russia is deeply corrupt so is Ukraine and Ukraine has its oligarchs and has its, I don't know if Zelenskyy is his own man. You could say that about Putin. I mean, the oligarchs are very powerful in these countries. The military is powerful, the battalions in Ukraine so I raised that.

Brian Lehrer: But none of that says anything about what Putin's rights over Ukraine should be, should it?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: I'm sorry.

Brian Lehrer: None of that, whatever the limitations of Ukrainian democracy are, it doesn't say anything about what Putin's rights over Ukraine should be, right?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: Absolutely not, except for the fact that the issue of a civil war, a proxy war is real because of the divisions between east and west. The fact that it has said nothing about Putin's right, but it does suggest, but there is an asymmetry that has arisen and Biden has spoken to it in the sense that he has been clear all along that American men and women are not going to be sent to fight in Ukraine.

Now, have we sent weapons that we've done over time in other places? Have we sent advisors? Yes, but there's an asymmetry in the sense that it's understood that if there's a more vital national interest, so to speak, for Russia and its neighborhood and its borders, then for the United States,

Brian Lehrer: Katrina Vanden Heuvel with us, editorial director of The Nation and a Washington Post columnist. To the point you were just making, here's another Biden clip from yesterday in which he minimalizes Putin's intentions.

President Joe Biden: He has much larger ambition is in Ukraine. He wants to, in fact, reestablish the former Soviet Union. That's what this is about.

Brian Lehrer: Do you agree or disagree that that's Putin's goal and that he won't stop with Ukraine? What Biden is saying there is he won't stop with Ukraine if there isn't a military line drawn at the NATO nations borders, including Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: I do not agree. Let me just, I want to read you something. Hold on. First of all, in his speech, if you read Putin's speech, tonight I did not read all of it, but someone sent highlights. He writes that, "Our plans do not include the occupation of Ukrainian territories. Take that as you will." He said it. One thing he did say many years ago, which got miscalculated, he said-- I'm sorry.

Brian Lehrer: That's all right. Why don't you look it up? We have to take a break anyway within this segment so you find that reference. We'll continue in a minute with Katrina Vanden Heuvel and we'll start taking your calls. Brian Lehrer on WNYC.

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC as we continue with Katrina Vanden Heuvel, editorial director and publisher of The Nation and a Washington Post columnist, as we get what is a dissenting view from her from much of the US Democratic and Republican establishment on what to do about Ukraine.

Katrina, I don't know if you heard the break, and if you don't mind, I'm going to spring this breaking news on you to see if you have any reaction of the reports that president Biden will nominate Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the US Supreme court today, of the various people who were known to be on his short list. Do you have any opinion?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: I think terrific choice. Talking to people in California, the selection from California Supreme court was more moderate, but I'm surprised because the other choices I recall is, representative Clyburn's choice and that was thought to be a top contender. I'm glad president Biden selected today. He had to, in the sense on the Eve of the state of the union. I would've thought he'd had a nominee ready to go.

My daughter who's a lawyer and follows all the legal podcasts said she was sure yesterday it would be this selection because they issued a decision from the court of appeals in DC yesterday which they never do. They only do on Tuesday, but there's a view that she needed another important opinion, so that was the insight. It's a vital, important moment in our history, and may there not be the craziness. Good luck with the judicial nominations we see.

Brian Lehrer: If I'm remembering the conversations correctly about the various people on the short list, she's the mainstream pick coming up in the traditional way through the DC court of appeals, Ivy league education. I think, Congressman Clyburn from South Carolina was representing, Ms. Childs. I forget if she's a judge per se down there. I think she is in South Carolina who said to be, maybe not one who had the Ivy League pedigree that so many people on the Supreme court have. Maybe it's time for somebody other than that, in addition to Child's being extremely, extremely bright as they all are, but a very impressive person, but with a slightly different background.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: No, I agree that Sherrilyn Ifill has been very good on this, on the issue of diversity on the court in the sense of lives lived different experience.

Brian Lehrer: She too is on the list, the head of the NAACP legal defense and education fund, Sherrilyn Ifill.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: This is an African-American woman, that is a different experience than many on this court, but the Ivy league piece.

Brian Lehrer: Anyone ever.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: The DC court of appeals is your traditional pathway, so it's true, but this is exciting. I think so.

Brian Lehrer: We will get to hear her later in the day apparently, and I'll say one more time, if that happens during the show, we'll take it. If it happens later, I think we'll take it too on the station as president Biden is expected to make that formal announcement with judge Jackson, sometime today. Back to Ukraine you were looking up a reference, remind me what that was. Do you have it?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: I do. I'm so sorry but there's a view that Putin wants to reconstitute the Soviet Russian empire. About 10 years ago, I think he was quoted as saying, "Whoever does not miss the Soviet Union has no heart. Whoever wants it back has no brain." There are polls taken consistently, Brian, and there are independent polls. There's one center called Levada, which is independent showing that many Russians, certainly of a certain generation would like to see the Soviet Union back and not gulags. It was a cradle to grave welfare system under some previous leaders.

They don't want the Gorbachev system back sadly because they remembered as chaos and was really Glasnot about freedom of speech, less about the economy. That's pretty clear in Putin's remarks, I have to say of the other day where he doesn't implicit in those remarks is a critique of Gorbachev's weakness in letting the Soviet Union end and also not getting a written agreement about NATO expansion. I'm not sure that would've mattered.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take a phone call. Daniel in Ramsey, New Jersey, you're on WNYC with Katrina Vanden Heuvel. Hi. Daniel, are you there?

Daniel: Yes. Hello. Hi, good morning, Brian, and good morning, Ms. Vanden Heuvel.

Brian Lehrer: Hey there, Daniel, go ahead.

Daniel: I'd like to push back a little bit on Ms. Vanden Heuvel's assertion that this wouldn't be happening if it hadn't been primarily for NATO's expansion to the east. One of the things that I haven't heard her specifically address is what specific threats does NATO pose to Russia sovereignty. We would be crazy, NATO as a whole would be crazy to ever attack Russia, they have more nuclear warheads than any country in the world. Maybe she could speak not only from her perspective, but what does Vladimir Putin specifically see as NATO's threat to Russian sovereignty?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: NATO expanding to the borders of Russia, is one issue. The other is that in NATO state surrounding Russia, you have a lot of weapons. The third is that there have been provocations, which have been underreported by the media of nuclear submarines, NATO bomber planes 12 miles from Russia's border. There's been a lot of as with the South China Sea, in the Black Sea, even on the borders, there have been more activities, than we've understood.

I also think of the Monroe Doctrine, it's been brought up quite a bit in these last months, but how would we feel if Cuban missile prices, we can go back to that, and this is as perhaps as dangerous a moment, but those were missiles put into an island 90 miles off the shores of the United States. What if Russian troops were in Mexico or in Canada, put yourself in, by the way, diplomacy is an art form that has not been the muscle, diplomacy muscle hasn't been used enough in recent years, and certainly the coverage of diplomacy, which is often behind saint doors and complex is more difficult to find high level insightful reporting.

Brian Lehrer: To press the caller's point a little bit, does anybody think could Putin have possibly thought that with NATO expanding as far close to Russia as it has, that there was any intention to go to Moscow and that somehow the West wanted to take over Russia and occupy it?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: That's more extreme, but that there were attempts to encroach on Russia's sovereignty via NATO is not to be excluded in a certain part of the Russian establishment. I'll tell you what has happened. 10 to 15 years ago, there were westernizers in the Russian elite, meaning people who were more pro-American, there's always been that divide. They've been undermined. Their position has been undermined because of US policy via NATO, in other instances. I would say that, that it has had an effect, it doesn't need to be a onto Moscow, but in terms of the political classes, framing of the world, it has played a role.

Look at [crosstalk] the other day, you don't have to accept it, but it's important to read adversaries remarks but it's all about NATO, a lot of big part of it is about NATO. I don't think that's made up. I think it's real, and I do think it's also real that you have eminent people in this country who to this day understand, including the CIA director under Biden, Burns, who wrote a few years ago how dangerous NATO expansion was in terms of undermining a relationship with Russia.

Brian Lehrer: Let me play another clip of Biden from yesterday. This time it's on sanctions, which he acknowledges will hurt Americans economic interests, as well as people, regular people in Russia, and maybe all of Europe. I think you're going to be against those two. Then I'm going to ask you what your diplomatic path is to a solution here. Here's Biden on sanctions.

President Joe Biden: I know this is hard and that Americans are already hurting. I will do everything in my power to limit the pain the American people are feeling at the gas pump. This is critical to me, but this aggression cannot go unanswered. If it did, the consequences for America would be much worse. America stands up to bullies. We stand up for freedom. This is who we are.

Brian Lehrer: Biden yesterday. Katrina, I know you'll say the US in many cases has backed dictators and other bullies and standing up for freedom has often not been who we are. That's indisputably true that we have a checkered history in that respect.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: I wasn't going to say that, but thank you.

Brian Lehrer: You weren't going to say that

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: No. What I was going to say is when Biden said we don't like bullies, absolutely I think that's an all American trait. Unfortunately, in our sanctioning, and there is an over-sanctioning, it's true, one has to come up with an alternative but very often sanctions punch down, not at the bullies, the bullies get off but it's ordinary people who suffer the consequences. I think in Russia, there's a real chance because Russia over the last five, six, seven years has isolated itself. It has a way to counter these sanctions, which are coming, oligarchs, I think will find ways havens. Russia has wanted them to repatriate their profits.

I think one needs to worry about the humanitarian costs and the fact that politically, it often leads people to turn against the sanctioning country. What are the alternatives is a very good question, because there's almost this situation between sanctions or war. Those sanctions are often an act of warfare. I think that's incumbent upon people who raise problems with sanctions to come up with.

Brian Lehrer: What is the diploma- [unintelligible 00:31:08]?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: I will say, I think the oligarchs have not gotten fiercely, obscenely rich without complicity from US, European banks, and legal firms. The alternative, in this case, was a process that began in 2014, '15. Named it's an odd name, but the Minsk process, which had Russia, Ukraine, France, and Germany, it was endorsed by Samantha Power was at the UN then, the UN, the EU, and the idea was that you would make the Donbas region autonomous with language rights but Ukraine would be protected and defended in its independence, sovereign borders. There was a lot of momentum, then Ukraine wouldn't move, Russia wouldn't move so it was suspended.

In these last months, there were marathon talks in Berlin and Paris elsewhere to revive this process and it was going along. I think [unintelligible 00:32:14] who until this time I hadn't really admired except for his marital situation, showed real diplomatic energy, channeling his inner DeGol and the meetings were serious. When Russia and this is Russia declared the Luhansk and Donetsk Republic's independent, it undermined Minsk. Certainly, the invasion at this point, has made Minsk very, very difficult to talk about.

There will need to be a forum in which to talk unless we're going to witness the destruction of Ukraine, and an escalation, perhaps in light of the new doctrines held by Russia and the United States of nuclear issues.

By the way, the Chinese the whole issue of China's very interesting because I don't think Russia and the United States, I'm sorry, Russia and China are natural friends but you could see Russia move east, totally outside of the Western sphere of NATO, the west, toward the east, which has always been on offer. China I saw the other day is going to buy an enormous amount of wheat. That may help with some element of sanctions.

Brian Lehrer: Diego in Sunset Park, you're on WNYC. Hi, Diego.

Diego: Hi, thank you for taking my call. If I'm getting this Ms. Vanden's opinion, NATO should be disbanded or changed in a meaningful way to please Vladimir Putin, a man who not only poisons his opponents on foreign soil, murders the press in his own country but you just mentioned the Minsk agreement. He never agreed to it. They've been fighting in Donbas from the initial moment till now.

I don't understand how we could give this man who's made his intentions very plain to everyone who's looking with clear eyes, that he wants what he wants, and nothing else. He wants to be bizarre. That's right. He doesn't want to answer to a Politburo, sure. The Soviet Union would be insane because he'd have to answer to someone. He doesn't-

Brian Lehrer: Diego, I'm going to leave it there. Let me amplify what Diego was saying about Minsk. This is the first time that a lot of our listeners are probably ever hearing of the Minsk protocols. Reuters says 0.10 of the Minsk protocols, calls for the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations and military equipment from the two disputed regions, Donetsk and Luhansk. Close to the areas in the east with the Russian separatists.

Ukraine says this refers to forces from Russia, who the protocol say would be withdrawn but Moscow denies it has any there. When you take this together with Putin's speech this week saying Ukraine was never really a country, do you have too much faith in Putin's word when it doesn't really mean anything in the Minsk accords?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: I think we need to do two or three things. One is, think a new about a security architecture in Europe, that is not as heavily militarized. Two, understand Putin is the leader of Russia, but that Russia's a broader multifaceted, multi-tiered, multi powered country. I know people believe he's all-powerful. There was a study a year ago showing 40% of his decrees were not fulfilled in the country. That just means that there's a blob in Russia, there are other forces.

The Foreign Minister wanted more diplomacy, the military was both opposed to a war and supportive of a war. Process and protocol would have to have demanded and would have demanded that Donbas, the region be demilitarized but be autonomous. The language rights, for example, it's Russian speaking, I don't have faith in Putin. I don't trust him. I don't even use the Russian expression, I value trust, but verify, distrust but verify but you got to move forward, it seems to me unless you want endless war.

By the way, we haven't even talked. I value your callers but I think in this country, I don't want to speak for this country. I do think there's fatigue with endless war. We've just exited Afghanistan, cost about 5.6 trillion. The international community, the United States can't put up 5 billion for humanitarian crisis. I mean, I'm just pointing out this crisis in Ukraine is going to be a humanitarian crisis rivaling World War II.

I just think it's important to have a debate and I don't know if I'm a dissident view, I guess I am on Russia but I guarantee you there are people who feel in different ways the same way, but haven't had a chance to think about it, speak about it, read about it. Hear about it.

Brian Lehrer: I don't think your previous writing on Ukraine, like most people's anticipated Putin going all the way to Kyiv rather than just trying to seize those eastern regions but now it looks like he might be going for complete capture and regime change. Now that he's bizarrely called Ukraine's Jewish President a Nazi and said Russia is aiming for denazification and we see the military action that is taking place in Kyiv as we speak. Do you think that's what's happening? Is he trying to completely occupy and cause regime change in the capital?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: I mentioned, Brian, that veteran watchers of Russia. I mean, I'm thinking Anatol Lieven, Jack Matlock, Nikolai Petro people have been astonished, horrified, saddened by not only the recognition of the two Republic's but then hours later, the invasion. What does that say? It says that there's something that has changed in the dynamics of Russia, that it's willing to do this, which is going to be horrific for the world, but horrific for Ukraine, for Russia.

There's more analysis, there's more we need to know about what led to this decision, as we deal with it. Now, Putin says he's not going to occupy Ukrainian territories. That's what he says. I suspect, if you had to occupy Ukraine, it would be a low-level attrition war for decades. Does he mean regime change and what goes in place of the Zelenskyy regime? Zelenskyy, who, by the way, came to office with a pro-peace platform?

He's not his own man and I'm not talking about the charges of this and that, but the oligarchs in Ukraine, the right-wing battalions, which have been folded into the army. They're very powerful forces in Ukraine, which may or not want Zelenskyy there putting aside Putin, the Russian army, and what's going on with the military.

Brian Lehrer: Let me say that there's nothing that you've said in this segment that has enraged some people on Twitter and on the phone so we haven't even gotten to more than asserting that Zelenskyy is not his own man and using that as any kind of, if not rationale for what Putin is doing contributor to what the solution should be.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: Zelenskyy he's of character. He's a great character. I mean, he was in a TV show called to Service to the Country, I think. When I say he's not his own man, he comes to power very tight with this oligarch and there are forces around him, which are very powerful. In saying that you could say that about a Senator, because of corporate contributions, he's not his own person because he's in debt to these places.

I think Zelenskyy if it was a different period, he was far better than the chocolate oligarch he followed. Who is prepared for what he is witnessing? Imagine coming from the background, he was one of the leading comedians on one of Russia's leading comedic shows called [unintelligible 00:40:59]. I'm sorry, there was such rage. I don't know if that was meant that I slurred his background.

Brian Lehrer: One more call, Al in Miami, you're on WNYC. Hi, Al.

Al: I got two questions. Actually my main question is there's always been apologist, there's a lot of historians that even think that Jews were at fault for Hitler killing them. If you always get up and say the opposite, the alternative, the contrarian view, you can sometimes back up the wrong people. Also besides from backing up the wrong people, if you would want to say your own contrarian view, you'd probably want to be competent enough to know what Putin's saying down on the field and not misquoting him as you're talking on a radio show.

Brian Lehrer: Al, I thought you were calling to say something about energy. Do you want to say that?

Al: Oh. You had another question also that if you're going to prepare your country for some war out in 100 years to the future by fixing the grid and rewiring the grid. Then you might be like the great wall of China, build some massive defense force that will never come to use. We got to build a country to save our country now, today, not in 100 years from now.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: Could I pick up-- if I understand what you're saying at the end is the importance of rebuilding our own country before we go out to the world. That is not necessarily, isolationist, it's a belief that we do better by being an example. I am struck that there is more and more of that attitude and I suspect if you polled the country, there is a belief that we have real issues, crises at home whether it's voting rights or climate crisis, inequality, healthcare issues in this COVID time pandemics.

All I'm saying is I think the debate is important for this country, but also thinking a new about how we may not be the indispensable nation, the triumphalism to didn't get as far, but we should think hard about how to build our country better and be part of the world as a good citizen, but I'm not sure the militaristic piece of it is what we envisaged as being part of the world in the best ways.

Brian Lehrer: Last question. I thought he was going to bring up energy more explicitly that the West needs to be more energy independent from Russia because that's one of the things keeping Europe from maybe doing all that it wants to do. My question to you about that and listeners, our next segment is actually going to be about the rising cost of energy in your utilities bills.

How weird is it to you, if it's weird at all, that there's this overlap now between some of you on the left, like yourself and Glen Greenwald from formerly the Intercept and people like Tucker Carlson and Steve Bannon. I saw Greenwald on Tucker Carlson's Fox show last night and strange bedfellows calling for the US to take care of its own interests. Fox was using it as an excuse to say, "We should pursue more nuclear energy, because that would create more independence from Russia as well as be pro-climate." Is this a strange bedfellows moment that causes you any dissonance or cringing?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: Let me just say quickly that we have to find a way to not increase our reliance on fossil fuels, which is going to be a real issue. On the bedfellows, listen at The Nation, if there's a through-line and it's 160 years, it's that military misadventure abroad does not permit true democracy at home. I think you stand for your own principles. You agree with what you agree, you subsume the differences.

I have joined the Quincy Institute, which, I recommend people check out. You have people there like Andrew Bacevich who served in the military, his son died in Iraq. He has his own views, which are very powerful. You could compare them to the Greenwald but it's a value set. I think Tucker is running for president and I'm interested in the divide in the Republican party between those who support a Tucker Carlson and those who are much more traditional and think Biden is an appeaser, which is [unintelligible 00:45:57]

But, there have been strange bedfellows through time. The nation is more independent. The democratic party at this moment with a few exceptions believes we're going to add-- there is a bipartisanship, Brian, sadly in Washington, which is to add more to the defense budget, which is not going to make us more secure.

Brian Lehrer: By the way. Maybe I don't follow the far right closely enough. But did you say Tucker Carlson himself is going to run for president, you think?

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: Oh, yes. I think so.

Brian Lehrer: There we leave it with Katrina Vanden Heuvel, editorial director and publisher of The Nation and a Washington Post columnist where you can also find her views on a regular basis. Katrina, thanks as always for coming on. We appreciate it.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel: Thank you [unintelligible 00:46:44] Brian.

 

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