The Trump Administration Goes to Europe

Title: The Trump Administration Goes to Europe [MUSIC]

Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. One of the many ways that the US and the world are grappling with actions and sensibilities of the new Trump administration is how Europe, much of Europe, has been shocked by what appears to them as JD Vance and Elon Musk basically telling Germans to be nicer to the Nazis. As the New York Times reports, Musk has publicly endorsed the far-right Alternative for Germany party in this weekend's coming elections, telling party members last month that Germans have "too much of a focus on past guilt." The Alternative for Germany party denies any Nazi sympathies, we should say.

MSN reports that a 2019 survey, for example, found that 15% of AfD supporters believed "the Holocaust is propaganda of Allied powers," as opposed to just 2% of the whole German population. This past Friday, many of you have heard this, at the annual Munich Security Conference, Vice President Vance stunned mainstream European leaders when he called for more openness to the AfD party by saying things like this.

JD Vance: I believe deeply that there is no security if you are afraid of the voices, the opinions and the conscience that guide your very own people. Europe faces many challenges, but the crisis this continent faces right now, the crisis I believe we all face together, is one of our own making. If you're running in fear of your own voters, there is nothing America can do for you.

Brian Lehrer: Then he said this.

JD Vance: While the Trump administration is very concerned with European security and believes that we can come to a reasonable settlement between Russia and Ukraine, and we also believe that it's important in the coming years for Europe to step up in a big way to provide for its own defense, the threat that I worry the most about vis-à-vis Europe is not Russia, it's not China, it's not any other external actor. What I worry about is the threat from within.

Brian Lehrer: The threat from within. Sound familiar? He didn't mean the far right. As the New York Times reported after the speech, Chancellor Olaf Scholz said this in Munich on Saturday morning as part of a lengthy rebuke of Mr. Vance, "A commitment to never again is not reconcilable with support for the AfD." This is all happening as the US opens talks on ending the Ukraine war in Saudi Arabia this week. With us now is Fred Kaplan, War Stories columnist for Slate and author of books including The Bomb: Presidents, Generals, and the Secret History of Nuclear War. His latest Slate article is about the Ukraine situation. Hi, Fred. Welcome back to WNYC.

Fred Kaplan: Always good to be here.

Brian Lehrer: Before we get to Ukraine, can you describe how you see the reactions in Europe from the Vance and Musk approach and statements regarding the continent, and specifically the Alternative for Germany party, in this coming weekend's elections?

Fred Kaplan: Yes, quite reasonable. It also has to be put on top of the speech that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth gave at the meeting of Ukraine donors a few days earlier, where he said, "The security of Europe is not among our primary security interests right now. You're going to have to deal with a lot of this on your own." Then you couple that with the quotes that you just played-- By the way, it's not like these two, the vice President and the Secretary of Defense are going rogue. Trump was asked about Vance's speech afterward, and he thought it was a very brilliant speech.

You're in Europe, and you're looking at this, and you see that talks are about to begin about Ukraine, but they're just consisting of the United States and Russia. Ukraine is not a part of these talks. Europe is not a part of these talks. There's a lot to suspect about Trump's attitude toward Russia, that he's just going to push the Ukrainians under the bus. He's talked openly in the past about pulling out of NATO. This is all very concerning. I should emphasize because not a lot has been written about the Alternative for Deutschland, the AfD party. This is not just a right-wing party that doesn't like Muslim immigrants, though that's how its appeal began to spread.

Its leaders really are-- They're neo-Nazis. Their delegate to the European Parliament is a guy whose license plate is A-H, like Adolf Hitler, 1-8-1-8. 1-8, being 1 is A, 8 is H. Their slogan-- The leader of their party, who's actually a very interesting woman named Alice, at rallies, her followers say, "Alice for Deutschland." Now, Alice for Germany, but the term Alles for Deutschland, Alles, meaning everything, is a Hitler slogan. It's a Nazi slogan that is in fact banned in Germany. These people are making their sentiments quite clear. Let me just add one more point, which is very important.

For Vance to go over there and talk about, "Oh, you're violating freedom of speech for these people whose views you don't agree with," Germany's concept of freedom of speech is quite different from ours. As you pointed out, it's nestled in the overwhelming slogan of never again. One part of their idea of never again is that you do not allow even the slightest figment of Hitlerite sentiments to rise. For Vance not only to say what he said, but then he brushed off a meeting with the chancellor of Germany and instead met for 30 minutes with the head of the AfD, this is all very alarming.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, if you have ties to Europe, we're going to give you first priorities on the phone for this segment. 212-433-WNYC. Anybody listening in Germany right now? Anybody listening right now who's originally from Germany? We can talk about Germany, in particular, as well as Europe as a whole because there are parties like that in other countries in Europe. They are rising as a percentage of the electorate, so we'll get into some of that. We'll definitely talk with Fred about the negotiations over Ukraine, in particular.

If you have ties to Ukraine or Russia, 212-433-WNYC, you can call on that aspect as well. What do you see as at stake? Anybody listening right now with ties to Germany in the elections this weekend, how do you perceive the AfD? How do you perceive free speech in the nation of Germany or on the continent of Europe compared to the United States? Which approach is better or worse in your view? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. Let's first see if we get anybody calling in from Germany or with ties to Germany or from elsewhere in Europe or with ties to elsewhere in Europe with respect to the right-wing parties, or with ties to Russia or Ukraine or anywhere relevant to that, with ties to those countries.

Call or text 212-433-9692 for Fred Kaplan, War Stories columnist from Slate. Fred, what do you think Musk and Vance really want by elevating the right-wing party? We know that mainstream leaders in Germany have called Vance's speech just one week before the election a big campaign gift to the AfD. What do they want by having a right-wing party there? They don't want to return to the Holocaust. Let's assume that. Is it just that they want allies in their fight against mass immigration? Where are they really coming from, as far as you could tell?

Fred Kaplan: You mentioned Musk. We should clarify that Musk has spoken at AfD rallies.

Brian Lehrer: Yes.

Fred Kaplan: He wrote an op-ed piece in Die Zeit, one of the major newspapers in Germany, saying Germans should stop feeling guilty about the Holocaust. AfD is the only party that could make the country restore to its greatness. This is just astonishing. It's unclear. I think all of these people, Trump, Musk and Vance have, let's say, authoritarian leanings. Look what's going on in our own country. People are fearing, quite rightly, that the instruments and the institutions of democracy are being dismantled. They also really have no particular attachment to the values that have long tied the United States with Western and now parts of Central and Eastern Europe as democracies, with the shared mutual defense treaties. Trump has come very close to saying such things, I think they would rather just carve up the globe in spheres of influence, and it doesn't really matter what the politics of the countries inside are.

Brian Lehrer: Martin in Woodstock says he has ties to Germany. Martin, you're on WNYC. Thank you for calling in.

Martin: Yes, good morning, Brian. Thanks for taking my call. I've been in this country for over 25 years. I grew up in Germany. Of course, this is all very disconcerting. Straight from the Trump playbook, divide and conquer. What JD Vance did is close to against the law in Germany, like inciting this right-wing speech. Don't forget, Germany is divided over this significantly, in that the peaceful Germans are against the AfD in general. A lot of support for the AfD comes from former East Germany, where people feel "forgotten." They also supported Putin more.

Understand they're very Russian [unintelligible 00:11:46] because the way they grew up. Alice Weidel, the leader, is also very divisive. She lives in Switzerland with her adopted children. A big opportunist. It just sets a bad example and precedent again, for the world, what can be done. The German politicians all have said, "Stay out of it," from the conservatives to the left. I don't think it gets a lot of support in Germany, what Vance did. It's bad for what is being said to the outside world with this action.

Brian Lehrer: Maybe not a lot of support, but some people are definitely seeing it as a potential turnout boost for the AfD. As they try to take an increasing percentage of the seats in parliament, if they get a few more, then they're going to have that much power, and their coalition is going to be needed to get policies passed through the parliament.

Martin: Correct.

Brian Lehrer: If they get a few points bump, or something like that, from Vance coming over and helping to mobilize that electorate, it may actually matter. Martin, let me ask you one follow-up question about something you said.

Martin: Yes.

Brian Lehrer: The sympathy in East Germany for Russia, Russia was the oppressor of East Germany, right, in the pre-Berlin Wall falling days, the Cold War days of pre-1989?

Martin: Yes.

Brian Lehrer: How do you understand their affinity for Russia as opposed to the West in the context of Russia becoming expansionist again?

Martin: It's an interesting point because, and I researched it quite a bit, it is all based on post-reunification sentiments because upon reunification, West Germany rolled in and told the East what to do and how to behave, and all the institutions being bad, and we only introduce everything from West Germany. The East Germans felt forgotten or being run over. That has settled a little bit. Money took its course, and infrastructure was built, et cetera. Now with the Ukraine war, West Germany, again, in their eyes, said, "Putin is bad, Russia is terrible. You have to think this way. We all want you to be against Russia."

Brian Lehrer: Right. The enemy of my enemy is the reaction in East Germany that you're describing.

Martin: Yes, correct.

Brian Lehrer: Martin, thank you very much for your call. We really appreciate it. Fred, before we move on to another caller and get to your reporting on the actual negotiations over Ukraine, any thoughts listening to Martin?

Fred Kaplan: Yes. Martin, I don't know what he does. That was really a very astute analysis. I would just add to it that we can see this in our own lives as well. As East Germany, the eastern part of Germany, became sidelined in the development of post-reunification Germany, a kind of idyllic nostalgia for one's youth bubbled up. That included a nostalgia for the good parts of the GDR of East Germany. When I was in Russia as a correspondent in the early '90s, there were many Russians, especially older ones, who had a nostalgia for the age of Brezhnev. Not because they loved Brezhnev either then or at the time, but things were easier back then. They remembered the good parts, not having to hustle for money all the time and so forth. I think that that feeds into it as well.

Brian Lehrer: Here's a text, Fred, from a listener who writes, "I am a lifelong civil libertarian. I was on the legal staff of the ACLU years ago. Does Vance, whom I loathe, have a point about being afraid of one's own citizens? The problem is, why do so many Germans like, and how do we address the reality regarding AfD, not how to suppress its views?" says this listener.

Fred Kaplan: Look, as I say Germany, maybe if we've been through a period of fascism and Nazism and concentration camps and all the rest, we might have a slightly different view toward absolute freedom of speech as well. I would say that this isn't a left-right thing. Every other party in Germany, including other right-wing parties, abhor the idea of forming any coalition with the AfD, not just ruling coalitions, but even coalitions to pass certain bills. It does feel a little strange to us, but, again, a founding slogan of the Federal Republic of Germany, as the new Germany was called after World War II, was never again. One prime directive is to prevent any aspect of Nazism from bubbling up. It's a recognition. It's not, as Musk put it, feeling guilty about what your grandfather did. It's acute sensitivity to there being something in German culture and history that could facilitate the re-ascension of these ideas if they weren't careful to keep them down.

Brian Lehrer: It's interesting that you put that in the context of a re-ascension of something in German culture. On yesterday's show, we spoke to the directors of the Oscar-nominated documentary about Ukraine.

Fred Kaplan: Yes, I heard that.

Brian Lehrer: I don't know if, with your interest in the topic, you've seen that film, but when I asked the Ukrainian director, "What do you think Putin really wants?" he said it's not just Putin. I'm paraphrasing here, but it's the tendency of Russians to glorify expansion over many generations. It was in czarist Russia, it was in Soviet Russia, now it's in Putin's Russia. You hate to paint with a broad brush on any culture, but that's a perspective from a Ukrainian that is similar to what you say many Germans are warning about with respect to there.

Fred Kaplan: Absolutely.

Brian Lehrer: A listener writes, "I am a Lithuanian who's lived in the US since 2003. I consider myself very much affected, fearing for my home country. It is the strongmen cult that's coming back across the world like madness because the World War I and World War II is just something that happened a long time ago, so they have no real understanding what the war will do. It's a strong man's world, and that's a strong man's disregard for life," writes that listener from Lithuania. Valerie, in Manhattan, with ties to Germany. Valerie, you're on WNYC. Thank you for calling in.

Valerie: Oh my God, I can't believe it. I'm a longtime listener. I love your show. I'm calling in because I was born in Germany to a US soldier and a German mother. I grew up there, and I went to school and to university. Then I moved to the US. I've been here almost 40 years. My grandfather helped the Kissinger family leave Germany, and my grandmother hid Jewish friends in the countryside. To see this happening here is just so frightening, that today I marked my calendar and I said I have to apply for a German passport because I don't know if I can live in this country because of what my grandparents and my parents, my mother, lived through and how that's affecting this society here.

Brian Lehrer: It's such an irony. I know other Jewish people in this country who, because of their family's roots in Nazi Germany and having escaped that, are eligible to apply for joint citizenship, German citizenship in addition to US citizenship, and have begun to do that in the way that you're describing. What an irony, Valerie, right, that Germany, of all places, the AfD notwithstanding, is seen as a potential refuge from far right antisemitism as compared to the United States?

Valerie: Yes.

Fred Kaplan: I would advise you to stick close to Berlin. There are certain parts of Germany that still aren't very hospitable.

Valerie: I know. I'm flying over there actually, mid-March, for three and a half weeks to reconnect and just see what the situation is there. It's just it's very upsetting because intergenerational genetics, how it passes on. The fear of my mother, the photos, I have photos of my grandfather in the war, and so seeing the direction this country is going into is just frightening.

Brian Lehrer: Valerie, we really appreciate your call. Thank you very much. Fred, it's also maybe a complicating factor on how to view this free speech question with respect to Germany, that I'm sure you've seen some commentators on the left argue that Germany is too restrictive of speech because it's been harder to criticize Israel's role in the war in Gaza, in Germany because of the restrictions on anti-Jewish or anti-Semitic speech that seemed, to critics on the left, to cross over too much into criticizing Israel for its actual war policies.

Fred Kaplan: That's true, yes.

Brian Lehrer: They're getting it from the left and the right on free speech because of the legacy of the Holocaust.

Fred Kaplan: I don't think they're getting it from the left on the AfD.

Brian Lehrer: No.

Fred Kaplan: It is true though, you're right, there was a huge controversy. Germany is probably the most anti-anti-Semitic country on earth. Again, it is against the law to express anti-Semitic sentiments. Yes, it's quite likely, I think I agree with the fundamental point that it's not legitimate to carry those laws over to critical comments about Israeli policy, which is where they crossed the line a little too far. No, it's an interesting issue, the whole array of free speech issues and how you reconcile that with both democratic rights and German history and culture.

For a vice president just to go stumbling into this with seemingly little awareness of what's going on, and especially for someone like Elon Musk to do so, given how he's crashing around every American institution right now, and also, really, come on, these guys are not exactly paragons of free speech, to begin with. They ban AP reporters from the White House press room because the AP style book doesn't go along with Trump's arbitrary naming of the Gulf of Mexico, the Gulf of America.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, not only that, but we'll talk about this later in the show in another segment, federal employees in certain agencies, the Pentagon, for example, can no longer voluntarily use their pronouns in their emails, like She/her, that kind of thing. They can no longer observe voluntarily things like Black History Month or, by the way, Holocaust Remembrance Day at places like West Point, which used to be those things used to be officially recognized by the schools until this month.

Fred Kaplan: Yes. Also, the lawsuits against CBS and ABC. This free speech thing is a cover for what are really much more ominous sets of motives, I think.

Brian Lehrer: We're going to continue in a minute with Fred Kaplan from Slate, and we're going to turn the page from this conversation about Vance and Musk and Hegseth and the right in Germany, to, specifically what Fred has been reporting on, the negotiations starting over the fate of Ukraine and the invasion of Ukraine by Russia and where that's headed. Stay with us, Part 2, with Fred Kaplan right after this. Brian Lehrer on WNYC as we continue with Slate's War Stories columnist, Fred Kaplan. Fred, also author of many books, including The Bomb: Presidents, Generals, and the Secret History of Nuclear War. His latest article on Slate is, Where are Trump's talks with Putin headed? There are some clear hints. Fred, give us a hint.

Fred Kaplan: The first big hint is that this is talk involving Americans and Russians only. Ukrainians are not at these talks. Other Europeans are not at these talks. What most administrations would have done if they had decided to hold talks would be to have a big meeting with Ukraine and with our European allies and fellow donors to Ukraine on this and work out a common position. Even if they weren't going to take part in the talks, a common position should have been worked out before.

Brian Lehrer: Let me jump in right on that point because what I heard in at least one news broadcast was they're going to start with a separate meeting with Russia and a separate meeting with Ukraine before they try to put them together. In the version that I heard, it sounded reasonable. Okay, we're going to talk to one side first, separately, we're going to talk to the other side first, and then we'll figure out how we move toward a negotiation. Is that inaccurate?

Fred Kaplan: Let me ask you this. If you were a Ukrainian and you saw that some relatively novice American diplomats were in the room with the longtime foreign minister of Russia and another senior official who had once been the Russian diplomat ambassador to the United States, and they were talking for four hours about the fate of your country without you anywhere in the room, would you be reassured by a statement saying, "Don't worry, you'll be in on the later talks."? I wouldn't be.

Brian Lehrer: What do you think they're going to talk about with Putin?

Fred Kaplan: Putin isn't in the room right now, but I'm not really sure.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, Putin's representative, yes.

Fred Kaplan: Apparently, they talked about a lot of things. Look, there are things to talk about. Biden would have been fine having talks with Russia, but they had to agree on a few things first, for example, that Ukraine is a sovereign country and has rights to its borders. For Hegseth, and I think he might have said this on his own, to say at this meeting in Europe a few days ago that it's just unrealistic to think that we're going to end up with Ukraine in its pre-2014 borders or as a member of NATO, now he might be right.

Brian Lehrer: Before the negotiation starts, he's giving away part of Ukraine's negotiating position.

Fred Kaplan: Before the negotiation starts, yes. Really, talk about the art of the deal. This is not the way to get a good deal.

Brian Lehrer: I'll ask you the why question again, like we did in the last segment about those issues. Why do you think the Trump administration wants to let Russia chop up Ukraine?

Fred Kaplan: I don't think they necessarily want that, but I think he doesn't care. He wants, Trump wants, to restore good relations with Russia. By the way, there is a school of thought among certain, even scholars like John Mearsheimer and Elbridge Colby, who might become the undersecretary of defense for policy, that in order to provide a common defense against China, we need to rekindle the alliance with Russia, which I think is just insane, but it is a school of thought. He wants to do that. He thinks that we have a lot of common with Russia.

He thanked Putin for having the phone call, which lined up the talks that are going on now. He thanked Putin for letting out this American teacher, although it was really part of a trade. It was Putin who arrested the guy and held him in jail for three years in the first place. Whatever the motives, and there's been a lot of controversy about this, as we know, he sees Putin as sort of a kindred spirit, somebody that he even admires, I think, whose power he envies. I think this is Trump's real thing about dealing with Putin and Xi Jinping and Kim Jong Un. He envies the complete power that these guys have over the country.

Brian Lehrer: It's not even that he likes Putin. Even more frighteningly, he wants to be like Putin.

Fred Kaplan: Yes. He said he wants to bring Russia back into the G7. They were kicked out when they annexed Crimea. If that is something you want to offer Russia, you do it at the end of the negotiations as a final sweetener, not as the premise to the talks. He's conveying to everybody, friend, foe, and all in between, where his sentiments lie. Look, his first impeachment was over an attempt to bribe Zelenskyy into digging up dirt on Hunter Biden in exchange as a condition for him to get anti-tank missiles. He doesn't really particularly like Zelenskyy.

I think he's bought on. He said it in a press conference recently, yes, Ukraine shouldn't have gotten into this war. Well, they didn't get into this war by choice. They were invaded. He said, "Russia, yes, they can't give up all this land in Ukraine. They fought very hard for it." If you're Putin and if you're a fan of fine champagnes, I think you've been uncorking a few bottles lately.

Brian Lehrer: You brought up the release of that American by Russia. I haven't read deeply on this, so you tell me if I missed something, but I didn't see that there was an exchange like there have been sometimes of prisoners, maybe somebody who was arrested here for something real and in America who was detained over there for something not real. Was it an exchange like that?

Fred Kaplan: Yes, there was.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, there was.

Fred Kaplan: I forget the guy's name, but it was for a crypto criminal, a fraudster, somebody who had been arrested for fraudulent exchange of cryptocurrencies. He'd been convicted. In fact, he pleaded guilty.

Brian Lehrer: Ah, there was then.

Fred Kaplan: It wasn't such a big deal. This wasn't somebody like Max Boot, the merchant of death who was traded a few years ago, but, oh yes, no, there was an exchange. Absolutely.

Brian Lehrer: Nora on Staten Island, you're on WNYC with Fred Kaplan from Slate. Hi, Nora.

Nora: Hi, Brian. Good morning and pleasure to talk to both of you. My solution to Ukraine is very simple.

Brian Lehrer: Do I see, sorry, from our screener, that you have ties to Poland, that's part of the reason for your call?

Nora: That's correct. I'm 100% Polish American. Just withdraw the troops back to the 2021 border, or ideally, to the January 2014 border before Crimea, and all problems are solved. Very simple.

Fred Kaplan: That's absolutely right. It has been often said that Putin could end this war in a moment by just going back to where his troops were. What does he really fear? Does he fear that Ukraine is going to invade Russia? He could keep 50,000 or 100,000 troops right on the border. Yes, no, you're absolutely right. In case the reality of the situation hasn't been clear before, this simple fact illuminates quite a bit about the nature of this war and the nature of the resistance. It was, a lot of people don't understand that there's been a war going on in Ukraine since 2014, first when Russia annexed Crimea and then when Special forces joined separatists militias in the eastern districts of Donbas in eastern Ukraine.

This wasn't just a light skirmish. Even before the invasion in February 2022, 15,000 people had died in this war. This was a very big thing. They've had their eyes on Donbas for some time. When Putin first invaded in February 2022, his rationale was that the Ukrainians were committing genocide against Russia speakers in Donbas. I think if he had just restricted his invasion to just trying to capture Donbas once and for all, he probably could have gotten away with it, but no, he went all the way to Kyiv. Ever since, people who still believe that Putin's real motive was just to keep Ukraine out of NATO, Zelenskyy offered to give up aspirations for NATO. He just ignored it. Putin has been saying, all you have to do is read his speeches, all along, that he doesn't believe that Ukraine is a real country.

It's not a real language, it's not a real people, that this belongs to Russia. In terms of your concerns about Poland and your previous callers about Lithuania, he's talked about restoring the great Russian Empire, which includes those countries. I think sometimes this is also the case with Trump, by the way, it's worth paying attention and taking seriously what people say about what they want to do.

Brian Lehrer: One more call. Saanich in Newark. You're on WNYC. Saanich, hello.

Saanich: Hello. Hello, Brian. A long time. I spoke to you in December 2021, warning you about this situation in Ukraine between Russia, Russia issuing the ultimatum that was ignored, and it was warning that this situation will escalate. Let me give you a little bit of feedback about what this propagandist from Slate is talking about.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, boy.

Saanich: It was very funny call from Nora from Staten Island, which was really, really funny. Just to give you a point about the AfD was a comment that the father from this Alice from AfD or something like that, he said, Alice for Germany. It's not the same as Deutschland [unintelligible 00:37:18] Alice. It's different. Just to give you points, Ukrainians saying--

Fred Kaplan: There's another slogan called Everything for Germany. Both of those are part of the banned language.

Brian Lehrer: Also indicating, I think, the implications, let's say, of the way people over there who are AfD supporters are using the name and pronouncing the name, that kind of thing. Saanich, go ahead.

Saanich: I understand, but I'm just simply saying that the same time this gentleman doesn't have a problem with Ukrainian, say [unintelligible 00:37:52], which means Ukraine above all. Just to give you my point, Russia is a mafia state. Putin is the head of the mafia. Very effective, but he is. Ukraine is a Nazi state. They were trying to push their Russian speakers out [unintelligible 00:38:09] and that was the point.

Brian Lehrer: To say Nazi state, that has certain meaning in today's world. What are you trying to say?

Saanich: What I'm trying to say is that we're in very dangerous spot. Yes, Ukraine relied on American promises. I would say that 60% of the reasons for this conflict is the State Department that promised skies to Ukrainians, and they totally went for it. Ukraine was created as the anti-Russia. There was a lot of anti-Russian sentiment in there. In 2014, they used to send the Ukrainian Nazis to Crimea, to Donbas, trying to do all kinds of fights with Russian speakers and so forth.

Brian Lehrer: You're saying Ukrainian Nazis. Again, that just seems way over the top to me.

Saanich: Trying to push-- They were trying--

Brian Lehrer: Go ahead.

Saanich: I'm just trying to say they were trying to push Russian speakers. You can say whatever you want, who the Nazis are, but they are basically saying Ukrainize Ukraine. Significant part of Ukraine are Russian speakers. They were established by Russia back in 19th century, whatever. There was a [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: You're saying there's complexity. I'm going to leave it there, Saanich. We're almost out of time in the segment, but I hear your arguments, and I'm going to get Fred to respond to them. Leaving aside that he kept calling contemporary Ukrainians Nazis, there are people on the left as well as people on the right who say the US goaded Russia into this war by trying to expand NATO closer and closer to Russia ever since the fall of the Soviet Union. Russia feeling like part of going into Ukraine was a matter of defense against American imperialism. You've heard this from the left as well as the right, and plus, as he adds, whatever Ukrainian nationalism may have been doing to stamp out Russian culture in those parts of Ukraine. Your take?

Fred Kaplan: I'll be very brief or try. First, I would agree with him that Putin is running a mafia state. That's basically what it is.

Brian Lehrer: That much you agree on.

Fred Kaplan: Yes. As for Ukraine, it is true, of course, in World War II, Ukraine was a hotbed of Nazism.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, at that time.

Fred Kaplan: Babi Yar was in Ukraine. Until even fairly recently, there were still militias that did spout a certain kind of Ukrainian nationalism that had ties with those earlier groups. However, at the same time, it's worth pointing out that Zelenskyy, who, by the way, is Jewish, I don't think a Nazi state would elect a Jew to be its president, but in the election that put Zelenskyy at the top, I believe something like only 2% of the vote went to far-right parties. Ukraine even then was having much less support for far right parties than just about any other country in Europe. I think it's just, I don't see the parallels at all. I see certain things about Ukrainian history that were certainly worth taking into account, but for a country to say, "Everything for Ukraine," at a time when it's under invasion from Russia, versus another party in Germany saying, "Everything for Germany," when in fact it's doing quite well and isn't under attack or anything, I think that the differences are quite stark.

Brian Lehrer: Fred Kaplan writes the War Stories column for Slate. His latest article, Where are Trump's talks with Putin headed? There are some clear hints. Thank you for sharing them with us.

Fred Kaplan: Anytime.

Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC, we turn the page. Much more to come.

 

Copyright © 2025 New York Public Radio. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use at www.wnyc.org for further information.

New York Public Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline, often by contractors. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of New York Public Radio’s programming is the audio record.