Navalny, Putin, Russia and Ukraine

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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good Friday morning, everyone. We'll begin today on the news this morning that Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, has died in prison. We've got none other than Masha Gessen from The New Yorker to talk about it with, but first on MSNBC's Morning Joe, the former US ambassador to Russia, Michael McFaul, who served under President Obama and was a personal friend of Navalny, had this blunt reaction to the news.

Michael McFaul: Putin killed Navalny. Let's be crystal clear about that. I don't care about any investigation. His ill, [unintelligible 00:00:47] had arrested, had put him in solitary confinement. He's put him in a cell which was designed to-- Today, he's dead. Putin killed Navalny, and why did he? Because Putin is weak. You don't kill people if you're strong. Putin killed Navalny because Navalny was the one opposition leader in Russia that Putin feared the most. This is a really tragic day for me, and it should be a tragic day for anybody who cares about democracy.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, those little dropouts were on McFaul's line, not on your device, but Michael McFaul on MSNBC. We have probably the perfect guest to talk about the apparent murder by Putin of Alexei Navalny, and what it means. The journalist, Masha Gessen, dual citizen of the US and Russia, wanted by Putin themself for their reporting on Ukraine. Staff writer for The New Yorker, and author of 11 books, including Surviving Autocracy and The Future is History, How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia, which won the National Book Award in 2017.

Masha's family, by way of background, immigrated from the old Soviet Union to the United States when Masha was 14. Masha went back to Russia in the '90s, and worked as a journalist there until 2013, when it became too hard to be an independent minor journalist there. Then, moved here again, and has been living in New York since for this past decade.

They have met, debated, and written about Alexei Navalny in the past, not always favorably. Their latest New Yorker article published last week was called Tucker Carlson Promised an Unedited Putin. The Result Was Boring. We'll get to that too. By the way. We can't take credit for jumping so fast on the breaking news to get a great guest like Masha Gessen. Masha was scheduled to lead our show today already to talk about Russia and Ukraine, but now tragically and outrageously, we have this development.

Listeners, I want to open up the phones. Anyone else with ties to Russia want to eulogize, or comment on Alexei Navalny and his sudden death in a Russian prison? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, call or text. Anyone with ties to Ukraine want to talk about what now appears to be a kind of permanent state of war. Masha wrote a long article on that recently, and we'll get to that in some detail as we go. Any Ukrainian Americans out there right now, or people with any connection to Ukraine? 212-433-9692.

Domestically, listeners, anything you want to say, or ask about the United States' relationship to Russia, like the apparent pro-Putin wing of the Republican Party rising in the House of Representatives, or the US role in Ukraine on any of those things from Masha Gessen from The New Yorker, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. We're having a little trouble getting Masha's line connected. We're almost there. Are we there? Yes. Can I say, "Hello"? I can. Masha, always good to have you on the show. Welcome back to WNYC.

Masha Gessen: Thank you. Good to be here.

Brian Lehrer: Do you assume as unambiguously as Ambassador McFaul in the clip we just played that Vladimir Putin has had Navalny killed?

Masha Gessen: Yes.

Brian Lehrer: Navalny had already-- Well, I asked a "yes" or "no" question. You gave me a "yes" or "no" answer. [chuckles]

Masha Gessen: You did. Correct.

Brian Lehrer: Navalny had already been sentenced to a long prison term in a remote part of Russia. What would Putin gain by taking this next and ultimate step?

Masha Gessen: I think that Putin continued to be scared of Navalny, and Navalny's popularity, and the way in which Navalny symbolized the future Russia without Putin, and a different Russia. He's also just, he's a vengeful little man. He has wanted Navalny dead for a long time. I think there's a combination of fear, which Putin always feels around the time of so-called elections.

He's coming up for election next month. Oh, so-called elections, not actually an election. At the same time, I think he's also feeling empowered. He's feeling empowered because Ukraine is faltering, US aid to Ukraine is stalled. He feels confident that there's an incoming Trump administration that will not in any way protect Ukraine, or really bother with trying to stop Putin from what he's planning to do to the rest of Europe, and to his own people. That combination of feeling both scared and emboldened, I think is what moved his hand at this time.

Brian Lehrer: That's an interesting answer in the context of the McFaul clip that we played for Morning Joe, I don't know if you heard it as your line was getting hooked up.

Masha Gessen: I didn't hear.

Brian Lehrer: He said that Putin wanted Navalny killed, because Putin is weak. It sounds like you don't agree with that.

Masha Gessen: I don't agree with that, no. There's no evidence that Putin is weak. He is really stronger than he has ever been. The war has been great for his hold of power. It's been great for the Russian economy. He sees himself becoming ever more powerful. He's also paranoid, but nobody should mistake paranoia for weakness. Dictators are often paranoid, and in fact, that's a strength for dictators. The more paranoid they are, the longer they stay in power.

Brian Lehrer: Do you think there's kind of a wishful thinking, Putin is weak strain that keeps surfaces? I'm thinking about the armed uprising last summer by Yevgeny Prigozhin and members of the Wagner Group, which had been fighting for Russia in Ukraine, but then Prigozhin wound up dead, but some of the analysis at the time of the uprising was, it was happening because Putin was weak, or Putin would then be weak because of the uprising, but he crushed that rebellion with an iron fist, and had its leader put to death, and now there's this. Do you think there's some, "Putin is weak," wishful thinking that comes and goes.

Masha Gessen: I do. We've been hearing that Putin is weak for, I don't know, over a decade for sure. I think I engaged in some "Putin is weak" theorizing back during the mass purchase of 2011/2012. Then I, for one, learned that there's a big difference between the presence of some sort of unrest, the break in the power monolith, an occasional break, and a path for that break to actually lead to change of regime.

That path is very, very long, very non-linear. Basically, I think at this point with the way that Putin has changed Russia, and has established his power, I think that path is non-existent.

Brian Lehrer: I was already reading your most recent New Yorker articles when I heard the Navalny news this morning. I went back and read your piece from 2021 called The Evolution of Alexei Navalny's Nationalism. I saw that it was also about your own evolution on how you perceived Navalny. He had taken some pretty hateful positions in the past, and I see that you had debated him. How did he, and how did your view of him evolve?

Masha Gessen: I think Navalny was one of those extraordinary politicians who actually grow, and think out in public. I think that's what one of the things that made him so compelling, so charismatic, and made him have such a broad appeal in Russia. He did start out as a not terribly well-educated, young, fiery activist, with some really hateful foreign nationalistic, ethnonationalist positions.

He evolved over the course of about a decade into a civic nationalist. Now, I know Americans are not generally used to that kind of distinction between civic nationalism and ethnonationalism, but it's a very important distinction. Ethnonationalism is what we often use, what we often mean when we say nationalism, and what we mean then is far-right politics, ethnicity-based politics, politics of xenophobia and hatred. Civic nationalism is a politics of building a healthy democratic nation state for all its members. That was very much Navalny's position.

He also very interestingly moved from libertarian to social democrat positions. He was an always student. He was constantly learning languages in new areas. He studied political science. He studies religion. He studied economics. He was a learner. He was strategic, but not embarrassed to talk about things that he had learned.

Brian Lehrer: Can you tell us about a time that you debated Navalny? What was that about, and how you processed it over time?

Masha Gessen: It wasn't exactly a debate. He was running for Mayor of Moscow. At some point, I was asked, not by him, but I was asked what he would have to say, in order for me to support him. I said that he would have to renounce his ethnonationalist positions. I don't really remember what I said, but I proposed a way in which he could talk about the issues that compelled him. His campaign manager agreed, but Navalny never actually adopted that statement.

I think a more interesting conversation, and one that's really haunting me, was a conversation that I had with him when I interviewed him for The New Yorker right after he came out of a coma, precipitated by the poisoning with chemical weapons, with Novichok when he was then saved by Russian doctors, and then evacuated to Germany. He was in a medically induced coma in Germany for a number of weeks.

When he came out of the coma, before he really even started rehab, he gave a few interviews. I said to him, "You and I have had this argument in the past, where you have always insisted on calling Putin and his people crooks and thieves. I've always insisted on calling them murderers and terrorists. And are you convinced now that they're murderers?" He said, "No, they're crooks and thieves. They murder, in order to protect their wealth." This was his lens, and it was a lens that was incredibly compelling for the Russian audience.

This idea that what was wrong with the system, was that it was profoundly corrupt, and he was not wrong, but I don't think it's the fundamental trait of Putinism. The fundamental trait of Putinism, is that it's murderous and terroristic. The side effect of that is the accumulation of wealth, and the consolidation of power. I think that his insistence on the idea that there are crooks and thieves, who killed to protect their wealth was probably self-protective. It's probably what gave him hope. It's probably what gave him the ability to go back to Russia, but in the end, they're just murderers.

Brian Lehrer: Listener writes, ask Masha why Navalny returned to Russia, knowing he would be arrested and imprisoned?

Masha Gessen: He wanted to be president of Russia. I think he thought that he could outlive Putin, that he would be Russia's Nelson Mandela. He knew that if he stayed in the West after the assassination attempt, he would lose touch with his potential future voters. He would lose political standing. He would be just one of those guys like Mikhail Khodorkovsky or Gary Kasparov, who say smart things from abroad, but don't have a domestic audience.

He took what he thought was a calculated risk. He was willing to stay in prison for a decade, or two decades, however long it took. He was 30 years younger than Putin. He thought he would outlive him, and become president.

Brian Lehrer: Now, he's dead. Matt in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC with Masha Gessen from The New Yorker. Hi, Matt.

Matt: Hi. Thanks very much for having me on. I am just calling because I'm a colleague of Evan Gershkovich, and obviously, this is a terrible news and a different situation, but--

Brian Lehrer: Let me just say for listeners who don't know the name, he is The Wall Street Journal reporter detained in Russia. Go ahead, Matt.

Matt: I just couldn't help but I think, "Here's another person who's imprison under false claims, and has written things that are highly critical of Putin personally, in terms of his economic handling of Russia." I'm just concerned, and also I wonder if this means anything for the potential for a swap that could get him home sooner.

Brian Lehrer: Matt, thank you. Masha.

Masha Gessen: I think this is a terrible, terrible sign. There was a moment in Putin's interview with Tucker Carlson, probably, the only truly informative moment when Carlson asked Putin about a potential release of Evan Gershkovich. Putin said that he would only be swapped for Russian assassin named Krasikov, who is in a German prison. I can't go into a lot of detail on this, but I think that part of what we're seeing is a message to the Germans, and to the West more generally, that if you want to get these people out of Russian prison alive, you better give up Krasikov.

Brian Lehrer: Who is he, and any chance of that?

Masha Gessen: I don't think I'm qualified to speak on the chances, but he is a Russian assassin who carried out a murder in the middle of Berlin of a political target, and was arrested, and is serving his sentence in Germany. He is really the only-- To my knowledge, the only Russian assassin of the many who have been roaming the streets of Europe, and killing Russia's opponents. He's the only one who's been caught, and brought to justice.

Brian Lehrer: Not a fair exchange, I guess is the implication that kind of assassin for a Wall Street Journal journalist?

Masha Gessen: Well, I think it's fair in Putin's eyes. Putin imagines the world as two giant systems that wield their agents. He, I think sincerely perceives Western journalists, especially, enterprising Western journalists like Evan Gershkovich as agents of power to him. They could be put on the same level as an assassin.

Brian Lehrer: We'll get back a little later to your latest article in The New Yorker, which is about that two-hour media interview that Tucker Carlson just gave Putin, but to the point we were just discussing, if I may, can you remind people of, in what way you are wanted in Russia for your journalism? We talked about it briefly the last time you were on, and this is still new just a few months old. Are you at liberty to say why it escalated to that point?

Masha Gessen: Well, I'm one of several hundred journalists and activists who have been charged by Russian authorities with what they call knowingly spreading false information about the special military operation, which is what they call the war in Ukraine. I talked about Russia's war crimes in Bucha, the suburb of Kyiv where people, where civilians were summarily executed in the streets.

I was charged with this, and arrested in absentia. Then, eventually, will be tried in absentia, and sentenced in absentia, probably, to somewhere between 7 and 10 years in prison. A number of people who are facing these kind of charges are also living in exile, but a number are serving these ridiculous sentences in Russian prisons.

Brian Lehrer: Do you feel safe as long, as you're not physically in Russia?

Masha Gessen: I don't think any opponent of Putin ever feels fully safe. I think I'm a lot safer than many others.

Brian Lehrer: We will turn to Masha's reporting on Ukraine, a very detailed article on the war at two years in The New Yorker a few weeks ago, and take more of your calls and texts. 212-433-WNYC. Stay with us.

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC with New Yorker journalist Masha Gessen. We've been talking so far about the news this morning of the death of Russian opposition leader, Alexei Navalny. Masha, today is February 16th, next Saturday, the 24th. As you know, it will officially be two years since the invasion of Ukraine began. One main point of your recent article on the war, was that Ukrainians are beginning to consider the war a permanent state, rather than something short-term that they will win, and move on with their lives. Is that how you would describe it today?

Masha Gessen: Yes. For one thing, Ukrainians are quite aware that the war is not two-years-old. It's 10-years-old. The war began with the occupation of Crimea in February 2014. The full-scale invasion, which began two years ago to Ukrainians, at first, felt like an emergency. Their defense was so robust that most people, I think, believed that, and had to believe to survive, that they would be able to beat Russia back and really, truly decisively defeat Russia.

Decisively defeat Russia means, take back Crimea, which would really precipitate the collapse of the Russian Empire. What they're understanding now, is that the counter-offensive that began last spring has faltered. The situation at the front is, in the best case, a stalemate. In the worst case, it's a slow, slow retreat on the part of the Ukrainians. American aid is stalled, Ukraine is going to run out of munitions next month, and it's running out of people who can fight at the front.

It's a really dire situation, and psychologically, it is a dire situation, because people were mobilized and inspired, but more and more, they feel tired, they feel disconnected from the people who left the country. They feel like the population of the country has basically split in two, and will never be able to reunite. The thing that I really wanted to focus on was, when we talk about the war in Ukraine, we speak rightly of, not only Ukraine's existential struggle, but the struggle for the future of democracy anywhere.

Ukraine was an inventive, hopeful, young democracy that was willing to go to war to protect its political system. You can't have democracy in war. Obviously, elections are postponed. Military administrations take a lot of authority, and this is all inevitable. A de facto rule by decree is inevitable. All of that in the long run is destructive to the very thing that they're supposed to be protecting.

Brian Lehrer: You quote a prominent Ukrainian journalist, Kateryna Sergatskova, who asked, "What are we fighting for? Land?" Should I take from that question that some Ukrainians are beginning to think, fighting for total victory is not worth the sacrifice?

Masha Gessen: I think they are. I think they at least want that question to be part of the public discussion. Of course, it's incredibly politically fraught, because they're not only talking about land, they're talking about people. At least five million Ukrainians are living under Russian occupation. Any Ukrainian leader, any Ukrainian negotiator, who, if there were ever any negotiations, which by the way, none are, because Russia is not sitting down.

Even if we imagine the negotiations happen, we would be asking Ukrainians to say, "We're giving up our people to the treatment that they receive from Russian occupants." That's a politically incredibly difficult proposition. Should it be more difficult than the proposition that Ukrainians should be fighting an endless war with so many people dying at the front, and so many civilians dying daily, nightly, during Russians bombing and shelling?

Brian Lehrer: Let's take a phone call from Steven in Brooklyn, who says he's a Ukrainian American. Steven, you're on WNYC. Thank you for calling in.

Steven: Hi. Despite the apparent stalemate on the ground, Ukraine has made certain advances, and I was wondering if Masha could talk about those, such as the opening of a corridor in the Western Black Sea. Do you think its use of the drones, these marine drones to blow up the Russian ships, and so, that has created this corridor for grain to come out?

Ukraine has also made some advances in blowing up ammunition depots, and shipyards in Crimea. I was wondering and I think the perception out there is that, the war's had its whole stalemate, and I was wondering if Masha could possibly talk to some of the positive advances that Ukraine has made, despite the stalemate on the ground.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you, Steven. Masha.

Masha Gessen: Look, I'm not a military expert. I am much more interested in what it feels like, what people who are not at the front lines are talking about, and how they're imagining their lives. As far as whether or not it's a stalemate, I am going on what Ukrainian military experts are saying, such-- [unintelligible 00:25:47] people whom I quoted in my article, also Valerii Zaluzhnyi, the Commander of Ukrainian, or the Armed forces, who was dismissed shortly after the article came out.

No connection there, but he called it a stalemate. Obviously, yes, there incursions that Ukrainians have made into Russian territory. Again, because I'm more interested in the psychological aspect of it, they have made Russians feel affected by the war. They have made Russians certainly who live near the border feel unsafe, which I think is part of warfare, and is an important part of warfare.

When you get to the question of, is it realistic to expect that Ukraine will win this war? I think more and more people in Ukraine are coming to the conclusion that, "No, that it's not realistic." What that means is that, either the war just goes on forever, which is a prospect that I think appeals to Putin, or there's a temporary negotiated settlement.

What they're saying to me is, any temporary negotiated settlement is just going to mean a constant military threat at Ukraine's borders, and time for Russia to regroup and attack again. Russia will never recognize the right of Ukraine to exist.

Brian Lehrer: Jean, in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC with Masha Gessen. Hi, Jean.

Jean: Hi. Thanks for taking my call. I'm just wondering, in connection with the previous conversation as well, is there any sign of any opposition among Russian legislators or leaders, because of the war in Ukraine? This would be a disaster for Russians, if they actually understood it. I have a close friend in Russia who assured me at two days before the invasion that Russia would never invade Ukraine.

They were cousins, they were friends, they would never happen. I haven't been able to speak to her since then, because I'm afraid that she'd get into trouble if I said anything. I can't believe Russia is-- There isn't Russian opposition to this war.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you, Jean. Masha?

Masha Gessen: Russia is a totalitarian dictatorship. Opposing the war, lands you in prison. People who've staged the tiniest little protests, such as, there's an artist in St. Petersburg who replaced price tags in a supermarket with little, tiny microscopic anti-war slogans. They're not even anti-war slogans. They're like facts about the war. She has been sentenced to seven years in prison. I'm not sure what the caller imagines Russia to be, but there's no such thing as Russian legislators or leaders.

Brian Lehrer: Well, this election coming up in Russia that, as you said, is not a real election, Putin running for yet another term. What do you think would happen hypothetically in a Putin-Navalny election, where Navalny alive, and the election were free and fair? Is it a question even worth asking?

Masha Gessen: It's not a question worth asking. It is worth unpacking just how much Russia has restored totalitarianism. In order to stage an election, you would not only have to put somebody on the ballot, you would have to change the entire country. You would have to create from scratch electoral mechanisms. You would have to create from scratch, media that have been completely taken over by the state, and who are always in a competition to say more extreme things to please the Kremlin evermore. You couldn't even have an election in Russia, I think, without at least a year or two of political rebuilding.

Brian Lehrer: Let's turn in our remaining minutes to the US role. In the last week, Donald Trump and Speaker of the House Mike Johnson rejected two bills from the Senate that would have funded Ukraine, the bipartisan compromise that included new border controls, though that did not technically get out of the Senate, and the bill without the border that was just military assistance for Ukraine and others.

Here's Biden's National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on Morning Edition today on NPR responding to Speaker Johnson's reluctance to fund Ukraine, claiming that Europe should be doing more.

Jake Sullivan: A substantial amount of the military assistance going to Ukraine right now is coming from our European allies and partners. We've rallied a coalition of 50 nations to make major contributions in weapons systems and other capabilities, but to your question, there is no substitute for the kinds of resources, and the types of capabilities that only the United States can provide.

It is an obligation we have to help defend the people fighting for their freedom, to help support European security, and to help avert a situation where Putin wins in Ukraine, all of Europe is a threat, and the likelihood that the US gets dragged into a conflict goes up.

Brian Lehrer: Jake Sullivan, National Security Advisor to President Biden on Morning Edition today. Masha what's your take on what Trump and now Speaker Johnson are up to here? Is it as fundamental as, if Trump gets back into office, they want to shift the US alliance structure from European democracies as a core partners to Putin, and other pro-Trump authoritarians?

Masha Gessen: I don't really think they think in terms of alliances. I think they're truly isolationist and ignorant, and want to break things. I also want to say that this is a situation created by the Biden administration. Even when there was early on in the full scale invasion, when there was overwhelming support for aid to Ukraine, the aid was consistently insufficient.

There's a myth created that this is the greatest amount of aid that the United States has ever given to a war effort anywhere. That claim really does not stand up to fact-checking scrutiny. In any major foreign war that the US has been involved in, its contribution has actually been greater since World War II. The United States has had the ability to stop the war, and to stop the carnage of Ukrainians since the very beginning of this war, and has not done so.

Now that we're in a situation two years later, where even this insufficient amount of aid is being questioned, we also have to remember that it's partly the result of indecision and dragging our feet, and using the buzzword "escalation", which basically translates as, we only want to help Ukrainians, as long as it's only Ukrainians who are risking their lives. That's gotten us to the situation where we are now.

Brian Lehrer: Well, is the two-hour media interview that Tucker Carlson gave Putin that your newest article is about a sign that the MAGA movement, which is put America first, wants to push Russia alongside it, and marginalize the West?

Masha Gessen: Again, I don't think they really think in terms of alliances. I think they love their dictators. I think Tucker Carlson genuinely finds Putin and Moscow inspiring, just as he found Orban and Budapest inspiring, whenever that was a year or two ago. In that way, he is Trump's doppelganger. Trump also finds them inspiring. I don't know that I see them building alliances.

I do see them simply taking an isolationist stand, and letting Putin do what he is going to do to Europe, and what he is going to do to Europe is absolutely terrifying. Russia is an expansionist power, and Putin has made his intentions clear.

Brian Lehrer: Let me take one more call. This is going to be push back to a lot of the premise of the conversation we've been having. Michael in Huntington, you're on WNYC with Masha Gessen. Hi, Michael.

Michael: Good morning, good afternoon, everybody. I got tell you, I've really just tuned in late, but this is the same nonsense we've been hearing since this thing started. We act like the war started two years ago. This started back in 2014 when we had a coup, when we helped change the government of the Ukraine. It's really not in the United States' interest what happens there.

I'm sorry, it's just not. Russia moved in to protect the Russian speakers of the Luhansk and Donetsk. It's the same justification we use when we went into Yugoslavia, responsibility to protect. Now, look, I don't really care about either side, but all I know is that this country doesn't defend its own borders, and we really have no national interest in the Ukraine. Honestly, the expansion of NATO was completely unwarranted, and was the cause of a lot of this. [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: Michael, I'm going to leave it there, because Masha has to go in a couple of minutes. [crosstalk] Go ahead, Masha.

Masha Gessen: He really has his Kremlin talking points down. Wow. He hit every note. That's incredible. That is what Kremlin propaganda sounds like. That is exactly it, note-for-note. Ukraine is a sovereign country. It's by the way, Ukraine, not The Ukraine. It's an actual country. The people of Ukraine staged a heroic revolution in 2013, 2014. They stayed in the city square for three months, even as the police fired at them, even as more than 100 people died.

They stayed and they defended their future, their idea of democracy. To call that a coup, which is what Putin does, is so incredibly disrespectful to the really inspiring, and heroic people of Ukraine. The same goes for the rest of the caller's points. I can't regurgitate them, but really, just go on any Kremlin website any time of day, and they will all be there, note-for-note.

Brian Lehrer: Last thing. I want to thank you for giving us all the scheduled time that you were going to be on for today, anyway, before the Navalny death news broke, and I know you have to go, and write about it. One more listener comment, and we'll close with your reaction to this. Listener writes, "I was born in mid-'70s Lithuania, and [unintelligible 00:37:17] when Lithuania declared independence.

The fact that Russian people became a victim to another dictatorship, and they don't have a possibility to break it off at this point, as your guest Masha Gessen is saying, I agree with. It may sound defeatist, but my country is free only because Ukraine has withstood the Russian aggression for so long with the help of NATO. I shake in my boots when I see a prospect of Trump being elected. Not only would he support every other dictatorship of the world, but he would institute one in the US himself," writes that listener.

Masha, you end your Putin-Tucker Carlson article with a line, "If I were Poland, I'd be afraid." Apparently, Lithuania too. Do you think Putin, or the Russian people actually want to occupy, or dictate to the government of Poland again?

Masha Gessen: Putin, obsessively, talked about Poland in his interview with Carlson. He mentioned Poland more than 30 times. He blamed Poland for starting World War II, not just for starting World War II, but for inciting Hitler's aggression against Poland, using the exact same words as he uses when he talks about how Ukraine incited Russia's war against Ukraine.

Yes, I think he's putting things in place propagandistically for an invasion of Poland. Poland, which not coincidentally, has just unseated an authoritarian government, and is rebuilding its democracy. It's very much in the same stages of political reinvention that Ukraine was when Russia first invaded Ukraine in 2014. This is the thing that gets Putin going. This is his righteous anger against the former subjects of the Russian Empire. He's reaching back into history to when much of Poland was part of the Russian Empire, to find justification for invasion. I believe he really wants to crush Poland.

Brian Lehrer: New Yorker staff writer Masha Gessen. Masha, thank you again very much.

Masha Gessen: Thank you for having me.

 

 

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