This is Democracy – Episode 258: Ukraine War

[00:00:00] Intro: This is democracy, a podcast about the people of the United States, a podcast about citizenship, about engaging with politics and the world around you, a podcast about educating yourself on today’s important issues and how to have a voice in what happens next.

[00:00:25] Jeremi: Welcome to our new episode of this is democracy.

This week, we’re returning to a topic that we’ve covered many times before with one of our favorite guests. And, um, it’s a topic that we keep coming back to because it’s a topic of such monumental importance to democracy in the United States and democracy around the world. And it’s a topic. Uh, that is constantly evolving before our eyes.

This is the war in Ukraine and the role of the war in Ukraine and the role of American society in the transformation. And we hope the survival of democracy in Europe and in the United States and elsewhere. We’re joined by our good friend, Dr. Michael Kimmage. Michael, thank you for being with us again

[00:01:09] Michael: today.

Always a joy to be with you, Jeremi and Zachary.

[00:01:13] Jeremi: Uh, Dr. Kimmage, as many of you know, is a professor of history at the Catholic University of America in Washington, D. C. He’s also been a fellow at the German Marshall Fund, on the Advisory Council of the Kennan Institute, uh, and a variety of other major think tanks and organizations producing very important policy work on Russia.

Ukraine and related topics from 2014 to 2017. Michael served on the Secretary of State’s policy planning staff at the U. S. State Department, where he handled the Russia Ukraine portfolio. And maybe we’ll have a chance to talk about this a little bit on today’s podcast, but Michael and I have been talking about the lessons he’s learned from that time to the present, uh, following this issue as a, as a Deeply engaged expert.

He’s written a number of important books, including a major book on, uh, conservative thinking in the United States. Uh, the conservative turn, Lionel Trilling, Whitaker Chambers, and the lessons of anti communism. He’s written about Philip Roth. He’s written a very important book, the abandonment of the West, the history of an idea in American foreign policy.

And after writing probably six million articles of, of deep importance on the war in Ukraine for foreign affairs, War on the Rocks, many other, uh, important publications, Michael has now published a fantastic book that I recommend to everyone. It should be mandatory reading for all of those who want to understand why there’s a war in Ukraine now, and why it has taken the path, the jagged path it has taken.

Michael’s new book is called Collisions, the Origins of the War in Ukraine and the New Global Instability. I have it here in my hands and um, it is, uh, it’s really quite an extraordinary accomplishment of analytical

[00:02:55] Michael: work, historical

[00:02:56] Jeremi: research, and rapid writing, Michael.

[00:02:59] Michael: Congratulations. Thank you so much, Jeremy.

Before

[00:03:03] Jeremi: we get into our discussion of the war and Michael’s, uh, wonderful book about the war, we have, of course, uh, Mr. Zachary Suri’s scene setting poem. What’s the title

[00:03:14] Michael: of your poem today, Zachary? If I Were at

[00:03:17] Jeremi: War. Okay, let’s hear it.

[00:03:21] Zachary: I think I’d whistle if I were at war, as I whistle now in the hall. I think of home and dream of the shore.

As I do now, though then at war. I think I’d hum if I fought at the front, as I hum a wordless prayer for the beaten, the holy, the downtrodden runt, as I do now, though I’d be at the front. I think I’d shiver if I held a gun, as I shiver on the rainy street, shivering even in the glare of the sun, with the same breath, my hands on a gun.

I think I’d skip if I were at arms, as I skip in the library shelves, counting old pages and shot up farms, as if already in arms. I think I’d live if I were at war, as I live so fully now. I think I’d live if I were at war, but sometimes I’m not so sure.

[00:04:18] Michael: That’s really wonderful,

[00:04:19] Jeremi: Zachary. Um, there’s a kind of existential element to it, there’s a, an irony to it.

Uh, what is your point in this

[00:04:28] Michael: poem?

[00:04:29] Zachary: My point is, um, how much war sort of tears the lives of young people apart. And it’s really scary for me to see in those fighting in Ukraine or in the Middle East today. People who are the same age as me who instead of being in college or exploring the world are fighting wars and Who maybe have the same hopes and dreams but are sort of confronted with a very different reality Because of forces sort of beyond their control and I think it’s easy to lose that sort of human picture It limits to this kind of war, and I think it’s important to sort of begin with that at that point.

[00:05:06] Jeremi: Very well said. Uh, Michael, your, your thoughts on, on this, particularly on the, the social effects, the human effects of the war for now more than two years in

[00:05:15] Michael: Ukraine? Right. Well, I think in a way, uh, what the poetry says, Zachary’s poetry says can’t be, uh, paraphrased. I think he brings precisely that, the human picture back before our eyes, uh, and sometimes you get it in photographs and sometimes you get it in videos, but I think the Zachary, what struck me about your poem was the repetition of the word if, uh, and so as sort of a poem in the conditional, uh, and that seems exactly right for this particular moment of the war, not just the human cost as you document them in the poem, but the very conditional nature of the war itself.

Uh, you know, it’s a series of if then propositions, uh, and to me, it captures the uncertainty of things at the present moment, which is Something I suspected we’re going to talk about in somewhat different terms. Uh, but, uh, is a theme wonderfully introduced in your poem. Thank you.

[00:06:08] Jeremi: Michael, you’ve now had, uh, more than two years to reflect on this war.

We, we had you on the podcast, uh, many episodes ago, soon after the war began. How has your perspective on the war changed over two

[00:06:23] Michael: plus years? Well, I think I did get one thing. Right about the war. Um, you asked about what changed. This is the one thing that really hasn’t changed for me too much. I think I did sense correctly, and then many other people did as well, that this was going to be a long war, uh, that, uh, the length of the war, uh, Proceeds from Ukraine’s will to fight its capacity to fight, uh, and the very large number of countries that it has, uh, supporting it, uh, it’s going to be a long war from the Russian side, um, for somewhat more difficult reasons to characterize for Russia.

It’s a war of choice, uh, but it’s not one that Putin is going to take back. And I think Putin has in some ways checkmated Russia into continuing this war, even if he’s not Uh, even if he’s not there. So that’s a perception that from the beginning, I think was, um, something that the war, uh, reinforced for me.

And I don’t think I believe any less than that, uh, proposition today, uh, and, uh, have often said, and we’ll repeat now. The point that we need to conceive of this war in decades, not just in years, months, days, uh, and, uh, hours. It’s a grim point, um, but, uh, it’s, it’s, uh, it’s one to mention. One surprise to me, one maybe way in which I’ve changed is that I thought the war would be more unpopular, uh, in Russia.

And I thought that Putin would have a much more difficult time navigating the domestic politics of this war. And there are moments of that, you know, I think the fall of 2022 when Ukraine was doing really well on the battlefield. You see a kind of jumpiness from Putin, the moment of mobilization, and a few cracks in the edifice, and of course, the Prokhorin mutiny of last, uh, of last June.

Uh, but on balance, you know, it seems like it is a popular war in Russia, whatever that might mean. Uh, you know, it seems like Putin has sort of mastered the Russian domestic scene. Uh, and it’s a bitter point to make in the wake of, uh, uh, Alexei Navalny’s death. But, uh, not one that Alexei Navalny’s death Uh, disproved, sadly, uh, and, you know, that’s been a revelation to me.

I didn’t, uh, expect that to be the case and it seems, if anything, you know, sort of more rock solid now, uh, two years into the war than it was, uh, at the, uh, at the beginning. Uh, you know, I think initially I didn’t expect Ukraine to do quite as well as it did on the battlefield. So that was a surprise. That was sort of a collective experience, uh, to a degree.

But, you know, since Ukraine showed its resilience in the first days of the war, It’s still showing its resilience. So that’s a very important feature and fact of the war. Uh, but it’s not really something that, uh, has changed. And so finally, in answer to your question, Jeremy, I would say also the many ways in which Russia has globalized the war or globalized its relationship to other countries for the sake of prosecuting the war, this too has been something of a surprise to me.

You know, Russia has managed its relationship to outside markets. It’s managed to keep investment coming into the country. Uh, the technologies that it needs for the war are still flowing into Russia. And that to me would have been a very difficult thing, uh, to predict. Uh, I think I was taken very much in the first few months by the clumsiness of the Russian war, the ineptitude.

Uh, which is an objective fact, and I think that that clouded my eyes to some of the things that Putin was doing to lay this foundation, really a global foundation for Russia to maintain this war for a long time, uh, for a long time to come. So I’ve been surprised by how, in a sense, uh, how well that has worked for, uh, for Russia.

I wouldn’t have predicted that before. I don’t think I would have predicted that even in the first year of the war, uh, and so I’ve changed in the way that I think about how Russia, Manages and negotiates a number of its global relationships. You write in

[00:10:12] Jeremi: your book, Michael, at the very beginning, and you really weave this throughout, that to understand the war in Ukraine, we have to think about it in the terms Thucydides used for the Peloponnesian War.

And you quote him as saying that, uh, the war was really caused by the growth of Athenian power and Spartan fear of it. It seems your entire book

[00:10:34] Michael: is about power and fear.

[00:10:36] Jeremi: How should we understand the role of power and fear

[00:10:38] Michael: in this war? Wonderful. I’m so happy that you mentioned this, um, uh, this quote. I mean, uh, since we all, since Zachary, you are a student and Jeremy.

Uh, you and I work a lot with, uh, with students, uh, there’s one very general point to make about Thucydides, which is that when you’re confronted with something new, as we all were with the 2022 war, uh, there’s a real sense of solace and insight that you get from going very far back in time and reading stuff that’s very far away from us, uh, in a way, but it does cast this kind of light, uh, on the present moment.

And that’s just one of those books that for centuries, for millennia has been casting a kind of. Uh, intellectual light. So, um, you know, when in the midst of darkness, these are the sources of light that we have, and it’s good that we, uh, it’s good that we have them. In a certain sense, this is something that maps, you know, kind of incompletely or inaccurately from Thucydides onto the, uh, onto the present moment.

Um, it is not as if Russia is Sparta and is fearing the growth and power, uh, of the United States. That’s not a correct interpretation of the 22, 2022 decision, uh, to invade. Uh, and that to me would be a kind of misapplication, uh, of, uh, of Thucydides. So there’s a bit of a twist that has to occur for this to be.

A useful analogy and the twist is that Russia did not fear, uh, um, so much a United States that was growing in strength. If anything, as I argue in the book, he looks at the U. S. as a country that’s in turmoil and possibly Uh, in decline, what he feared was the growing relationship between Ukraine and Europe on the one hand and Ukraine and transatlantic military structures, uh, on the other.

So we can go past, you know, the somewhat dry, uh, rather boring at this stage debates about NATO and NATO expansion, NATO enlargement as, Uh, the cause of the war. I don’t think that that’s correct. Um, that’s to me, the, you know, the wrong way to go about it. Uh, but in 2014, Ukraine makes a decision to turn west rather than to turn east.

Uh, and that decision is something that some, that we very much celebrated for as outside observers of the country, the Maidan Revolutionary Dignity, the Euromaidan. Uh, and there is, uh, after 2014, a real assimilation of European values. Uh, and there is much greater proximity, not that Ukraine joins the EU, but much greater proximity between Ukraine and the EU.

Uh, and there are growing military relationships, uh, after 2014 that really do put Ukraine on a Western path. I think Putin, and I think I do mention this in the preface when, when writing about Thucydides, it’s sort of a mix of two things. That Putin fears this development, because I think what he fears is a Ukraine that’s just going to lurch out of the Russian orbit.

Uh, but he also resents it. So it’s not only fear, it’s sort of a blow to Putin’s ego and a blow to Putin’s vanity. But it merges together in the premise that a Ukraine that’s on the western side of the ledger is unacceptable to Russia. And the final point that I’ll make here, uh, is that Russia and Putin pursue this project of sort of keeping Ukraine on its side through different phases and through different approaches.

So at first they tried to You know, sort of corrupt Ukrainian leadership, that’s up until 2013 2014 with the figure of Yanukovych, to sort of buy off Ukraine, and that doesn’t work. And then they bite off a piece of Ukraine and use diplomatic tools clumsily to try to keep Ukraine on their side, and that doesn’t work, and then there’s a decision.

for war. But there is a progression. I do think fear plays an important role. Uh, and the first hundred pages of Thucydides Peloponnesian War, in which he’s talking about alliance structures and what happens when one country becomes kind of an object of contestation, all of that I think is Uh, is, uh, is deeply relevant, and to me, it’s not exactly reassuring, uh, but there’s something that Thucydides gives that, um, you know, sort of allows us to see this event as not entirely anonymous, anomalous, not entirely strange, uh, not entirely Uh, without, uh, without context.

So I think, you know, Thucydides is ultimately important to me for the context that he, uh, that he furnishes. Uh, he makes a decontextualized event that we all felt in 2022, uh, an event with real context. Well,

[00:15:00] Jeremi: and he gives us, uh, some, some ways of understanding the chaos around us, right? He provides a framework, right, Michael?

[00:15:07] Michael: Yes. No, uh, precisely. Um, and, um, I think also for Thucydides, this is, I feel where I’m very much in his debt, uh, that like many of his Greek contemporaries, there’s an interest that he has in human nature, uh, and how does human nature set the conditions for it. War. And so fear is, of course, one part of it.

But I think also for Thucydides, sort of pride was another part of it. And there’s this human dimension. This is a very different understanding of the human picture, Zachary, than the one that you outline in your humanist poem. But we probably do need to understand the human dimension of Vladimir Putin.

And it’s not all just the pure search for power. And it’s not all just institutional structures and strategic doctrines. There’s the kind of human element there. And, and again, that kind of mixture of pride and fear, uh, is what pushes Putin forward. And I think Thucydides helps us to just to see that first and foremost to see it.

Uh, and then probably the more we would study Thucydides, he really helps us to understand that. Zachary?

[00:16:14] Zachary: You mentioned, uh, Navalny earlier, and I, I hate to divert us from a discussion of the classics, but I’m really curious what your perspective is on the, the, the response, uh, in the international community, but also within Russia.

Um, to the death of Navalny. I mean, one of the insights of, um, the affinities is that these dramatic leaders, uh, who maybe don’t have like a huge impact, uh, in a concrete way, but who, who speak in grand rhetoric can actually have a huge impact on the outcome of events. Uh, do you see Navalny having a long term impact in that way?

[00:16:48] Jeremi: And Michael, if you would just say a little bit about who Navalny is for, for our readers who, or listeners who might not be quite as familiar.

[00:16:56] Michael: Sure. No, Alex a Navalny emerged as a, uh, a political candidate, mayoral candidate in, in, in Moscow. Uh, and back then, you know, 2011, 2012 was sort of dueling with the figure of, uh, of Vladimir Putin, uh, and was pushed outta the political domain, uh, and then became.

In his practical functions, more of a opposition journalist and a very unique kind of social media spokesman for critique of the Putin regime, often critiquing corruption and after 2022, the decision to wage war against Ukraine, he was poisoned by it. Um, the Russian state, um, you know, with a very, very powerful, uh, chemical agent after which he went to Germany, uh, to recuperate and then, kind of knowing, I think, what his destiny would be, returned to, uh, to Russia, was imprisoned, uh, and then, uh, under somewhat unclear circumstances.

Uh, died not, not, uh, not more than, you know, sort of two, two and a half weeks ago. Uh, I think, Zachary, I’ll just give you the answer that I feel is correct, although it’s, it doesn’t give me, uh, much pleasure to, to give this kind of answer. I, I don’t think that, um, uh, any kind of sea change is to be associated with Navalny.

I’ll return to that in a moment. I think there is a possibility, and I appreciate very much your reference to Thucydides and big political figures and the effects that they can have. And maybe that will be the story of Navalny, uh, in the future, but it’s a hard thing to say, uh, at the present moment, there are a lot of ways in which Navalny is not properly a political figure, although.

You know, he’s sort of thematized in that way, if you watch the documentary film about him, which isn’t bad. Uh, and, you know, sort of read a lot of the journalistic coverage. He doesn’t have a political party. Uh, there’s no political movement, uh, connected to Navalny. I’m not sure if that was really his true gift in life.

I mean, he’s not a Vladimir Lenin, uh, in, uh, in that sense. Uh, he was a very decent person. He was charismatic. He was funny. Uh, and he was courageous, but, uh, he did not have the capacity to build a viable, uh, or, you know, structured alternative, uh, to Putin, uh, and to Putinism. So it’s Vladimir, or it’s Alexei Navalny against the whole apparatus of the Russian state.

And in a certain sense, it’s not a surprise that he would, uh, sort of be destroyed by the state in the way that, uh, he was. I think I would employ a somewhat different vocabulary for, for Navalny than the purely political vocabulary. He’s apparently quite pious, or became in his 20s quite pious. Uh, and I think that he’s a martyr.

Uh, because I think he had to know, uh, what he was, what was waiting him, uh, awaiting him in Russia when he came back. Uh, and he sacrificed himself. Uh, he sacrificed himself for the sake of, you know, appealing to rule of law, uh, and telling the truth, uh, and to, uh, anti democratic decency. But in, in no sense are any of those things sort of instantiating themselves.

Uh, in Russia, it’s, I think, kind of communication that Navalny has to the next generation. He died at the age of 47. He’s communicating to people who are in their 40s and their 30s and their 20s. Teenagers and younger to kind of chart a path, uh, and it will be up to Russians to, to say or to decide whether they ever travel down, uh, that path.

But, uh, you know, there’s not more of a, there’s not more or less of a legacy than that, uh, that Navalny is gonna Uh, is going to leave. He’s become a martyr to the Putin regime.

[00:20:32] Jeremi: Michael, is the, um, image and, uh, compelling nature of the, uh, Ukrainian president Zelensky, is his, is his image still powerful as a motivator for Ukrainians?

[00:20:48] Michael: Yes, um, he’s still crucial, uh, and he holds a lot of things together, uh, and it’s not really Zelensky’s fault that his job has become harder when he goes to Western capitals, European capitals, and comes to Washington. It’s not what it was a year ago for Zelensky. It’s a much, much more difficult political landscape to work with, but that’s through no fault of Zelensky’s and I doubt that there’s anybody in Ukraine who could do that better, you know, the decency, the charisma, the communication skills that Zelensky has are as important now as they were at the beginning of the war.

I think Zelensky suffers from perhaps two problems, one of which is maybe a bit more Him and the other is a bit more situational. But the first problem that he suffers from, uh, is being perhaps a bit over invested in media narratives. Uh, and I think that he created this image of Ukraine that was winning and he embodied it and he lived it and he was very persuasive and he’s struggling now that the war is not yielding victory.

He’s struggling to come up with. The right message. Uh, and, uh, you know, I think that, uh, he may not be the very best of military leaders. He needs to get good advice. Uh, and there’s been a little bit of turmoil in Ukraine, uh, in that regard. Uh, you know, kind of shakeups and, and changes in the military, uh, command.

So the thing that Zelensky has to focus on now, uh, is less the storytelling part of the war and more the strategic decision making part of the war. And I have a few worries and concerns, uh, in that regard. But I don’t think any of that equals unpopularity. In Ukraine or meaningful unpopularity, uh, in Ukraine, the second point that I would make about Zelensky in terms of just the challenges that he faces is that he’s got a really hard decision to make, uh, in the next few months.

And this is about mobilization in Ukraine. So at the moment in Ukraine, if you’re under the age of 27, you’re not going to the war. Uh, and this is an investment in Ukraine’s future and a commitment to the younger generation and, uh, something that’s important for the Ukrainian economy. Um, but the war is, uh, in one of its toughest phases for Ukraine, uh, and it is, you know, sort of probable that the Ukrainian military will need that sort of manpower and need younger people to go out and do the very difficult fighting that’s demanded.

That’s not going to be politically easy. It probably won’t be politically popular. Uh, and there you’ll have to just see how much capital Zelensky, uh, has, but it’s not really a problem that can be finessed or postponed or, or, you know, sort of, you can’t use charisma to get yourself through a problem like that.

He’s going to have to make the hard decisions and pay the price for making those. Uh, those hard decisions. So it’s, it’s a lot less intuitive, natural and easy. Uh, what he’s doing now, not that the beginning was easy for Zelensky, uh, but this is simply, uh, tougher and it will show us. Uh, no doubt the true medal of the, uh, uh, of the man, but I, you know, I think that he will, uh, I think he will carry on, uh, and I say this with great respect and admiration, I think he will muddle through.

That’s, that’s an important part of what people do in war.

[00:23:51] Jeremi: That’s, uh, very Rooseveltian, uh, to muddle through difficult circumstances. Yes. Do you see the Ukrainian People continuing to fight, has their resolve flagged in any way or, or have you seen a consistent commitment to this conflict?

[00:24:10] Michael: It’s difficult to know what the metric would be for something like that.

You do hear lots of eyewitness accounts of war weariness, uh, at the front. It’s a really hard phase of the war, not just because Russia’s been making a few advances, but because, you know, people now are fighting for tree lines and Uh, and, you know, minimal gains, a war of attrition, uh, and I think that there’s, that’s just hard on the soldiers and then because there’s a manpower problem, people haven’t been rotated out or given the rest that they need and that definitely has an effect on morale.

I’m sure we’ll turn to American politics and, you know, the supplemental and, and what Congress is up to, but this is denting, uh, Ukrainian morale, uh, to be sure, uh, and, you know, the costs of a war like this, of the kind of war that Russia, Russia is waging. Over two years time on every member of society, every generation, obviously they’re immense.

Uh, and there’s got to be, you know, kind of, um, uh, sort of matching, uh, to the immensity of the suffering. There’s got to be a matching sense of fatigue. Uh, and, uh, and perhaps even at times, uh, of despair, but in a sense, the kind of war that Russia has waged from the beginning has clarified what Ukraine needs to do, and I think this is really the fundamental point.

Everything I’ve said, you know, leading up to this is natural for a war of this scale, uh, and of this duration, uh, but I don’t think Russia provides any possibility for Ukraine to yield, and by yield I mean Negotiate a ceasefire or what some people are discussing in the expert community, a kind of armistice as a, uh, as an ideal outcome.

I don’t think that that’s viable. Um, Russia has taken every territorial gain in the past and made it into a pretext or a launching ground for the next phase of the war. And you have to assume that that’s what Russia is going to do, uh, for the foreseeable future. The attempt to eviscerate Ukrainian statehood is as much a Russian ambition now as it was on the 24th of February, 2022.

And the brutality of the occupation, uh, with, uh, forced efforts at russification, you know, that’s something that every Ukrainian would be. Uh, aware of. So it’s an extremely difficult struggle. Uh, there isn’t a sense that victory is around the corner, uh, by any means. But there’s no viable argument for backing down, uh, or for yielding.

You know, Putin has not given Ukraine, uh, that option. It’s maybe an odd way to put it, but I think it’s the, uh, I think it’s the truth. Uh, and it tells us something about Russia, uh, the kind of war that Russia has been waging, this ruthless war. Uh, but I think it also tells us something about Ukrainian resolve.

Uh, and morale. So this is not something that has substantially diminished, uh, over the last two years, Zachary,

[00:26:49] Zachary: but it does seem that at least in the United States, the bandwidth for this war has, has tapered, uh, at the very least. Um, how do you see the, uh, the future relationship, uh, between the American public and Ukraine, particularly on the question of whether a negotiated ceasefire is necessary?

Or whether, um, the war should continue.

[00:27:14] Michael: Well, I think the negotiated ceasefire would be the wrong policy choice. And I think that, and I trust the Biden administration to be canny enough about this, that they would not read the domestic political tea leaves and start to think differently about this. I think Russia would use this as an operational pause and then would sort of use it to hammer away at Ukraine six months from now or a year from now, uh, in ways that would be.

You know, sort of maximally damaging for, uh, for Ukraine. So I don’t think that that’s a viable policy option. Obviously, governments don’t always go with the viable policy options. They sometimes go elsewhere. But I think that, again, the Biden administration is not, uh, um, you know, muddle headed about this.

They’re clear eyed about, uh, what the meaning of this war is. Uh, and, you know, you can make almost two contradictory points about the nature of domestic politics. On the one hand, it’s a kind of maddening situation for those of us who would like to see Congress. provide the aid to Ukraine because it’s a fairly small number of members of the House of Representatives who are holding things up.

The Republicans have a thin majority, uh, and so, you know, you have these sort of peculiar rules about, uh, how the Speaker of the House has to function at the moment. And all of this, you know, has, has, has sort of tipped things, uh, In a very, very bad direction, uh, for the U S but it’s a little bit of an accident or a kind of quirk of the system.

You could say, and I think that that’s true. Uh, and that’s the first point I would make, but the second point goes in almost the opposite direction. I mean, Donald Trump is going to be. Getting his coronation today is super Tuesday. Uh, and he’s going to be the heir apparent for the Republican party. Uh, you know, as of today, he’s been that for a couple of weeks already.

Trump is not a big friend of Ukraine and I’m sure it’s he who’s directing the intransigence on Capitol Hill. And with polling data, sort of roughly half of Republicans, you know, think that the U. S. is spending too much money on Ukraine. That doesn’t mean a pullout or a, you know, a full stop to, uh, to support.

But, you know, there is some kind of groundswell, uh, among Republican voters that is changing the overall Uh, dynamic. So that is, um, you know, almost a structural feature of things. And, you know, the election is anybody’s, uh, guess, uh, but that’s really put the U. S. on a different footing. Uh, from where it was a year ago and from where it was two years ago.

But I do hope that the White House just carries out its constitutional mandate to set foreign policy as the executive branch, uh, you know, until and unless, um, uh, uh, you know, sort of Trump is elected and then, uh, it will be, uh, uh, it would be a different, uh, a different story, but I would be horrified to see the Biden administration, you know, sort of.

Start talking over the Ukrainians head with Putin a month from now because they think that the the rope has run out for them in terms of domestic politics. How much

[00:30:05] Jeremi: does American military and financial support matter for the Ukrainian cause, Michael?

[00:30:13] Michael: It’s hugely significant. Uh, you know, you could imagine a world in which, you know, the enormous sovereign wealth fund of Norway could just be tapped into and the 60 billion that we’re talking about, uh, could be paid from other sources.

But even if that fantasy were to come true, Uh, it just doesn’t work, uh, that way. It’s not as if, uh, the very particular things that the U. S. gives Ukraine, uh, could be paid for by other countries or quickly subbed in, uh, by other countries. So when it comes to air defenses for Ukraine, there’s something unique that the U.

S. does, uh, and, you know, it can’t be replicated by South Korea or by Japan or by, uh, the countries of Europe, not for. Uh, quite a while. Uh, and you know, you could sort of go down the list of things that the U. S. is giving, uh, that matter in the short to medium term. So it’s it’s urgently significant. And there is already a battlefield effect that’s being felt from the delay or the denial of aid.

Uh, to Ukraine. But there’s another layer to the situation, which is that, you know, the U. S. Is the convening power when it comes to outside supporters for Ukraine. It plays a very important diplomatic role. You know, they’re just things that are coordinated and done by the U. S. That I don’t think the E. U.

Or Germany or the U. K. Or France is capable of doing. And it’s not as if the Biden administration is not doing that convening. But if you have the chief convening power that’s not providing assistance, it sends a terrible message to all of the countries that are in the coalition. Uh, and so for those, those countries that are somewhat on the fence, let’s say Hungary, uh, at the moment, Slovakia, maybe not quite Italy, although potentially, uh, Italy, the more the U.

S. lags behind, the more they have the political room, uh, to become, you know, sort of detached, uh, and less committed, uh, to Ukraine. And, of course, there’s just the conclusions that Russia’s going to draw from this. So if the U. S. looks like the time has run out, uh, that’s something that’s going to really motivate and embolden, uh, the Russian side, if it hasn’t already.

Obviously, Russia misreads a lot. They misread Ukraine a lot. They misread the United States a lot. Uh, but how Russia reads the United States is really important, and we’ve given Putin a rather remarkable gift over the last six months, uh, in, in that regard. So in all of those ways, you know, the sort of larger convening role of the U.

S., the practical support that it gives, and just the symbolism, uh, it’s not the crux of the matter because Ukraine is much more important, uh, for how everything is going to go in the future. I wouldn’t want to over Uh, you know, sort of invest in, in, in the significance of the United States, but it’s nevertheless pivotal.

[00:32:45] Jeremi: So I guess, Michael, that brings us to our final question for today, which is one we’ve asked every time we’ve had you on the podcast. And I think it’s the question so many of our listeners are thinking about right now, which is what should we do as citizens who care deeply about this? Um, There might be differences of opinion on what role the United States should play, whether one should have one mix of diplomacy and military affairs with another mix.

Uh, but one way or another, I think there’s a widespread, uh, sympathy. for the Ukrainian cause, uh, even in the Republican Party, certainly among Democrats. And there’s a widespread concern about this war, uh, and what it will do to the future of Europe, what it will do for the future of, uh, the world system, what it will do for the future of democracy.

Uh, what should we be doing as citizens? How should we be thinking and acting in light of this, uh, war of attrition that will clearly be with

[00:33:47] Michael: us for a while? Well, it’s a question very dear to my And what I want to take through in answering it, Jeremy and Zachary, is three levels of support that can be rendered to Ukraine or three reasons for supporting Ukraine that can be, uh, upheld, argued for, uh, you know, sort of, you can make the case for, uh, for these.

And since your podcast is about, uh, democracy, I think it’s a very suitable question to think of in terms of public debate. Obviously elections voting in, in, in this particular year, uh, all of what’s done on the level of citizenry, of course, uh, resonates. Uh, and if we spoke a moment ago about the Biden administration, potentially changing course as Zachary was asking about, uh, because of the mood of the electorate, we could imagine the opposite scenario that they stayed, of course, uh, because of the mood of the electorate.

And that’s, uh, in a sense, the power that. Uh, that we have, so I want to return just for a moment to my book with the first level of, uh, of, of support for, uh, for Ukraine. Uh, one of the things that became clear to me, uh, not really until I wrote the book, but became clear to me in the course of writing the book was how costly half measures have been.

So for whatever reason, Ukraine was the country that got a lot of half measures and it’s not just the U. S., but let’s focus here on the U. S. You know, 2014, uh, Russia annexes Crimea, invades eastern Ukraine. We do a lot of diplomatic dancing around and we say that the Russians have to get out and they have to leave and we sanction Russia, uh, but it was too little, uh, and it didn’t, it didn’t work.

Uh, we do arm Ukraine starting, you know, 2019, 2020. But it’s pretty small scale, uh, and much more could have been done, uh, in that, uh, in that regard. So if we want to succeed as a country in terms of these kinds of commitments, the commitment that we’ve made, uh, to Ukraine, I don’t think that we succeed through half measures.

Does it mean that we can get Ukraine into NATO tomorrow or that we send U. S. soldiers to fight? No, uh, but, uh, let’s think through something and let’s stick with something that’s not, uh, a half measure. And that makes the denial of aid at the present moment especially agonizing, I find, because it’s Almost not a half measure.

It sort of means that we’re now doing a kind of quarter measure in support of Uh of ukraine and historical precedent would tell us That, that’s a pretty good recipe for failure. So I think we all want to succeed, you know, most of us, you know, most Republicans, most Democrats want to see the United States succeed, uh, with Ukraine.

So if we do want to succeed, we’re not going to get there with half message, half measures. We have to look at the historical record and apply it to the present, uh, in that regard. There’s another part of this, though, that’s, uh, maybe a little bit more abstract, uh, but that matters certainly a lot, uh, to me when I think about the war in Ukraine and the reason for supporting, uh, Ukraine, and this is that the U.

S. has already pledged a lot of things to Ukraine. A lot of promises have been made, uh, and a lot of commitments have been made, maybe verbal commitments. You know, it’s not yet a kind of Article 5 commitment that Ukraine has of, of the U. S. leaping to its defense, uh, because of a treaty, uh, but the U. S. has committed a lot to Ukraine.

Uh, and I think Ukraine has sort of acted accordingly. One of the reasons that Ukraine has been fighting with the kind of self confidence that it’s had is that it knew for the first year of the war. Uh, that the U. S. Was by its side. So you don’t leave your friends. You know, you don’t abandon your friends on you.

Stick with your friends on you. Stick to your word as a country. You know, American foreign policy, uh, tends to be abysmal when it wavers and goes in and out and, uh, you know, is full of, uh, intellectual on clarity and, uh, and vacillation. So let’s, you know, let’s be true to ourselves, uh, in terms of our policy commitments into those that we’ve already made.

Uh to Ukraine we will undoubtedly it doesn’t mean that China’s gonna rush into Taiwan if we get this wrong But we will undoubtedly make the world a much more dangerous place for ourselves Uh, if we don’t honor our existing commitments the commitments we’ve already made, uh, to um, To ukraine and then finally in terms of the level of support that we need and how do we justify it and argue for it?

is to remember and remind us, as Zachary’s poem does, about the stakes of this conflict. So, here are just a few very brief points. The stakes of the conflict are first and foremost humanitarian for the people of Ukraine. And so there’s an ethical, uh, you know, there’s an ethical issue, uh, there. Uh, there is the question about what kind of Europe is going to emerge from this conflict.

Uh, and it will be a new and different Europe. It will be determined to a great degree by what happens on the battlefields of Ukraine. Uh, and we don’t have to go with the full out disaster scenarios of Russian soldiers in Paris, uh, if Russia takes Ukraine. Uh, but if Russia takes Ukraine, It is going to fill Europe with fear, anxiety, division, fractiousness, all kinds of things that Russia would be able to capitalize, uh, and to diminish the stature of NATO, uh, and, uh, to diminish the stature of the transatlantic relationship.

Uh, and that’s something that would be very negative. Uh, for, uh, the United States. And then there are also kind of global or international stakes, uh, to this, uh, to this conflict. Uh, we’ve learned over the course of the 20th century that, uh, you know, Europe has a kind of undue influence in a way on the global, uh, world.

Uh, scene. Maybe it’s unjust, unfair, uh, how much influence Europe does, does have, but it’s, uh, often, you know, sort of immense, uh, and in that sense, um, uh, if this conflict were to end very badly for Europe, uh, the international and global repercussions would be dire, uh, as well, and would be very much a reflection on where the United States is, uh, and where the United States stands.

Uh, is going to, uh, is going to go. So we need to zoom in and out of the big picture, uh, and the local individual realities of this war. We need to merge ethics with, uh, strategy, uh, with, again, this sort of very basic sense that if you’ve given your country, a country your word. That you’re going to help you should stick to your word

[00:39:56] Jeremi: and you make this point very well in your book that this this is a war.

That’s not just about Ukraine. It’s about the larger structure of Western society, democratic. Um, relations between societies and and perhaps most importantly, uh, our hopes for a more peaceful world. That’s not a world free of war, but it’s a world where, at the very least, there are some protections for the sovereignty of a

[00:40:24] Michael: society like Ukraine.

Absolutely. No, that’s, uh, that’s, um, absolutely the case. And here we might want to conclude our conversation with a few thoughts about Uh, about Russia, uh, and, you know, one of the things that we’ve consistently done with Russia is to underestimate, uh, what the country is capable of and what the country wishes to do.

Putin’s Russia, uh, of course, Navalny’s Russia would be a different story, but it’s Putin’s Russia that for the time being we have to, uh, we have to worry about. Uh, the bet that Putin was making when he invaded Ukraine, of course he was betting on a short war, a quick victory, which he didn’t get, uh, but the bet that he was making is that Europe and the United States wouldn’t really come.

Uh, to Ukraine’s assistance, that they wouldn’t really care, uh, and that what Putin could start doing is rewriting the rules, uh, of international engagement, uh, and it’s not world conquest that Russia is bent on or Putin is bent on, that’s a, uh, you know, a science fiction movie version of all of this, and it’s not, uh, it’s not accurate, um, you know, what Russia, uh, is bent on is a world of probably three great powers, China, Russia, and the United States, each with spheres of influence.

Uh, around themselves, each doing exactly what they want in the most selfish possible way. And now and then they’ll kind of convene these meetings and, and try to avoid, uh, you know, the breakout of nuclear war. Uh, and that’s the world that Putin, uh, wants to see. Uh, and that would by definition be a world with much less democracy and exactly as you’re saying, Jeremy, a world with less sovereignty.

Uh, territorial integrity of, you know, how does one put it? Smaller states, medium sized states, uh, you know, weaker states, poorer states, the states that are not, uh, great powers, uh, and that’s another reason why, uh, to prevail in Ukraine, uh, is, uh, you know, not just, um, uh, aspirationally good, uh, but really necessary.

[00:42:19] Jeremi: So, Michael, you close your wonderful book with poetry, just as we opened our discussion today, you close with the Iliad, which we all know well, um, and, uh, you close with really one of the most poignant moments in that epic, when Odysseus listens, uh, to Demodocus, uh, sing about the tragedy of war, his version of what the Zachary gave us at the start of the episode and Zachary, this is unprecedented for us, but I want to read you, uh, the excerpt from the Iliad that Michael has in his book and I want you to react Zachary to this poetry that would be the odyssey though.

What did I say? The Odyssey? The Iliad? Oh, it is from the Odyssey. Yes, of course. I’m sorry. Well, thank you for correcting me, Zachary. Uh, but it is in Michael’s book. That part I had correct. Uh, I need to reread, obviously, the Odyssey and the Iliad. Okay, so here we go. This is, uh, Demodocus, uh, singing to Odysseus.

Tears running down from his eyes to wet his cheeks as a woman weeps, her arms flung around her darling husband. A man who fell in battle, fighting for town and townsmen, trying to beat the day of doom from home and children. Seeing the man go down, dying. Gasping for breath, she clings for dear life, screams and shrills.

But the victor’s just behind her, digging spear butts into her back and shoulders. Drag her off in bondage, yoked to hard labor. Pain and the most heartbreaking torment wastes her cheeks. So from Odysseus eyes ran tears of heartbreak now. Zachary?

[00:44:09] Michael: Yeah, I mean,

[00:44:10] Zachary: I think it’s, it’s an important reminder. Of the, the, the tragedy of war, even for the, for the great warriors.

Um, and I think, um, I think it’s important for us to keep in mind too. Um, the importance of these stories of war, certainly, but also of, of, of keeping in touch with the reality of what’s going on on the ground. I think it’s very easy for us as young people in the United States to lose track of what’s happening in Ukraine, especially as other issues take over the headlines, um, and especially as the sort of long.

years long, um, stalemate, uh, or at least very sort of stagnant fighting seems to, seems to entrench. Uh, it’s very easy for us to lose track of what’s going on in Ukraine. And I think this poem is a reminder that even if we don’t pay attention, there’s still suffering and that the war continues. Uh, even when we’re not listening.

And so we need to listen.

[00:45:07] Jeremi: Well said, Zachary. I, I think, uh, next to the Odyssey and Zachary’s poetry, I think, uh, reading Michael’s book is, uh, really a reminder of, of the humanity of the war, the, um, fundamental role it will play, not just in our current world, but in our future and how important history and classical literature is to understanding this tragedy and the difficult not we’re in as a world and the work we have to do as Michael said so well to stay aware and involved and to help those who are fighting, fighting for their freedom.

Quite literally. I encourage all of our listeners to pick up a copy of Michael Kimmich’s book, Collisions. You’ve had a taste of it here, and there’s so much more, so much more to read. Michael, congratulations again on your really, um, stunning, uh, stunning book. I can’t say it’s an uplifting book, but it is a stunning book.

It’s a book filled with memorable, memorable descriptions and compelling analysis. Uh, thank you for sharing some of it with us. Thank you for being such a consistently insightful and inspiring guests on our guests on

[00:46:14] Michael: our podcast. Well, first and foremost, thank you for the kind words, Jeremy and Zachary.

And, uh, you know, as ever for your Wonderful questions. And just for the intellectual space that you create with this program, I can say by way of, uh, of, of conclusion of the book is dedicated to my own daughters. And it’s also dedicated to the conviction that we can learn from history. So it’s so nice to speak to a father son combination, uh, in this regard, uh, to think of all the historical learning that happens, uh, in your family and all of the ways that you find to communicate that to the.

Uh, to the wider public. Once again, we spoke at the beginning of our conversation about the kind of light that Thucydides casts, uh, in the, uh, in the darkness. And of course, the light that comes from, uh, poetry as well, but also from, uh, just historical inquiry, uh, in general. So, you know, we can’t be cowed into submission, uh, by wars and atrocities and these terrible things that happen.

We do need to give it the resistance. Uh, of our careful thinking, uh, and I’ll emphasize the adjective here of our rational inquiry. Yes, I like

[00:47:23] Jeremi: that. And, and thank you for emphasizing the community nature of this, the knowledge. As this is the whole reason Homer and Thucydides wrote, knowledge is to be shared.

And, and that’s what we’re doing on this podcast. That’s what Franklin Roosevelt saw as the core of each chapter in the book of democracy. That’s what you’ve added, Michael, with your, with your work in a new chapter of our difficult book of democracy. Thank you, uh, Michael. Thank you, Zachary, for your, uh, insightful poem, for your correction of my miscitation of Homer.

I will never live that down.

[00:47:59] Michael: For a moment, Jeremy, I thought you were merging the Odyssey and the Iliad into the idiocy. Yeah, . Thank

[00:48:05] Jeremi: you, Michael. All those nice things about you, I take them back for that comment. ,

[00:48:12] Michael: irresistible.

[00:48:15] Jeremi: Oh my gosh. Thank you. Uh, most of all, to our loyal listeners for joining us for this week of This Is Democracy.

[00:48:30] Outro: This podcast is produced by the Liberal Arts ITS development studio. And the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Texas at Austin. The music in this episode was written and recorded by Harris Codini. Stay tuned for a new episode every week. You can find This Is Democracy on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Stitcher.

See you next time.