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- [00:00]
Podcast Advertiser
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- [01:01]
Podcast Host
void in Florida history as it happens. July 17, 2026. The origins of a forever war.
- [01:09]
Anatole Leven
After six and a half years in power, Mikhail Gorbachev confirmed his resignation on television tonight.
- [01:15]
Podcast Host
The tricolor banner of the Russian Republic now flies over the Kremlin.
- [01:19]
Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
Every American can take pride in this victory.
- [01:22]
Anatole Leven
One Expert today predicted 140 million Russians will soon be living below the poverty line.
- [01:28]
Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
Cold War days are over. The Cold War is in Russia. Today. The clear winner of the Russian presidential election, Vladimir Putin, began to establish the Putin era. The Cold War is over.
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Narrator/Commercial Voice
Russia is a regional power.
- [01:41]
Anatole Leven
The ousted president is wanted for mass murder. And on the run in the south, probably Crimea, seen leaving a private house there overnight. It appears the country's ousted president is now in Russia.
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Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
Breaking news overnight.
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Podcast Host
Russia has attacked Ukraine and its people of ending security.
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Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
Putin is inflicting appalling, appalling devastation and horror on Ukraine, bombing apartment buildings, maternity wards, hospitals.
- [02:12]
Podcast Host
The Russian invasion of Ukraine, now well into its fifth year, is a stalemate. On the ground in the sky, the combatants exchange missile and drone strikes. There is still no end in sight to this unnecessary war that Vladimir Putin once believed would be over in weeks. Might the war's origins, contested as they are, help us understand how it might eventually end? Can they tell us what it takes to establish a lasting peace? That's next as we report history as it happens.
- [02:41]
Anatole Leven
I'm Martin DeCaro, and that is Russia's version of the Monroe Doctrine. The Monroe Doctrine says that America will not tolerate, or at least the updated version of it will not tolerate the presence of a potentially hostile power or alliance in north and Central America who
- [02:58]
Podcast Host
in February 2022, expected that Russia would still be at war in Ukraine now that either country, in this unprovoked war of aggression, would endure so far beyond the point of sanity. I mean, I remember those initial months in all the podcasts I produced about the relevant history about Putin's rule, about NATO. It seemed so urgent then to understand the origins, but now the war seems to have normalized overnight.
- [03:23]
Anatole Leven
Ukrainian drone attacks have sparked fires at oil facilities in the country.
- [03:28]
Podcast Host
Kyiv has stepped up its attacks on Russia.
- [03:31]
Anatole Leven
President Putin has acknowledged the strikes.
- [03:33]
Podcast Host
The front lines on the ground barely move in the air. Ukraine has revolutionized warfare with drones as Russia pummels civilian infrastructure inside Ukraine with conventional missiles. The war has lasted so long and killed and maimed so many thousands of people that debating its origins may seem worse than academic at this point. But origins always matter. They are always contested. So we've got to get the story right, or at least understand why the opposing side subscribe to their own versions of the truth. Maybe there is something fundamental about this conflict. If you accept that the Russian and Western, meaning the US and Europe, if you accept that their respective visions for post Cold War security could never be fully compatible, or that Russian chauvinism toward Ukraine would lead to some kind of conflict once an independent Ukraine began tilting toward the West.
- [04:24]
Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
These steps represent a tribute to the statesmanship and leadership of President Kravchuk and to the vision of the Ukrainian people, who understand that integration into a broader, peaceful and democratic Europe is Ukraine's best path to lasting security and prosperity.
- [04:41]
Podcast Host
In 1997, the year NATO officially invited the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland to begin accession talks, the last leader of the extinct Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev, visited Congress to speak to lawmakers, and they asked him about NATO enlargement.
- [04:56]
Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
I believe it's a mistake. It's a bad mistake, And I'm not persuaded by the assurances that we hear
- [05:10]
Podcast Host
that Russia has nothing to worry about.
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Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
You cannot, you may not, humiliate a nation, a people, and think that it'll have no consequences.
- [05:26]
Podcast Host
Now, we know Ukraine never joined NATO and will probably never join NATO. But just the possibility, which never went away altogether, served as an index to measure hostility as US Russia relations deteriorated over the course of 30 years, Russia
- [05:40]
Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
has tended to view the expansion of freedom and democracy as a threat to its interests. The opposite is true. Free and prosperous societies on Russia's borders will advance Russia's interests by serving as sources of stability and economic opportunity.
- [05:59]
Podcast Host
Although there were moments of optimism on the road to war, even if short lived, we want to reset our relationship. The President of the United States of America, Barack Obama, and the President of the Russian Federation, Dmitry Medvedev, are signing the treaty between the United States of America and the Russian Federation on measures for the further reduction and limitation of strategic offensive arms.
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Narrator/Commercial Voice
Finally, this day demonstrates the determination of the United States And Russia, the two nations that hold over 90% of the world's nuclear weapons, to pursue responsible global leadership.
- [06:43]
Podcast Host
Yet despite some high points over the years, an independent denuclearized post Cold War Ukraine's relationship with Europe, the US NATO with Russia was a point of near constant contention. In 1999, for example, the year the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland officially joined NATO, the historian Mary Elise Sarati writes about another burden weighing on Boris Yeltsin, this one involving NATO. The alliance was once again the source of active contention between the Russian president and his Ukrainian counterpart, Leonid Kuchma. The two Slavic presidents were haggling over modernization of marine aviation equipment for the Russian Black Sea Fleet. As part of their negotiations, Yeltsin demanded that Kyiv sign a document setting out limits of relations with NATO. The orientation of Ukraine first and foremost toward Euro Atlantic structures was causing growing anxiety in Russia. And the Russian president apparently wanted to prevent the nightmare of the Atlantic alliance parking US Navy warships in the Black Sea fleet's home port. Fighting between Moscow and Kyiv over relations with NATO in the west was clearly going to be yet another landmark of the 21st century, with consequences far beyond the border of either country. And again, that is Mary Elise Surratt in her essential book Not One Inch. And remember, that was 1999. If Vladimir Putin was largely an unknown, that would soon change.
- [08:04]
Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
We had a very good dialogue. I was able to get a sense of his soul.
- [08:09]
Podcast Host
There were many major turning points on the road to war, and all seemed to grow out of this fundamental conflict over Ukraine over what Moscow believed were its legitimate economic and security interests. Vis a vis Ukraine. Such as in 2014 when Ukrainians in the Maidan Revolution forced out President Viktor Yanukovych after he backed out of an economic deal with the European Union. Putin responded by annexing Crimea. The US did not respond much at all.
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Narrator/Commercial Voice
It is very important to recognize that a military solution to this problem is not going to be forthcoming.
- [08:44]
Podcast Host
Eight years later came the full scale invasion, and Russia remains stuck in a quagmire today. More now with Anatole Leven, the director of the Eurasia Program and the Andrew Bacevich Chair in American Diplomatic History at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. Anatole Leven, welcome back.
- [09:02]
Anatole Leven
Hi, very glad to be back.
- [09:03]
Podcast Host
Joining us from the United Kingdom. You know, it is amazing that a war like this can slip from the headlines, but you know, that's what happens over the course of four and a half years. Recently, however, Russia, Ukraine has been on the front page again because of developments on the battlefield and on the diplomatic front, such as it is. So it's got me thinking again about the origins of the war. I think we need to understand the origins of the war, contested as they are, if we're going to see a way out of this finally.
- [09:35]
Anatole Leven
No, I agree. I mean, for me there are lots of factors involved, but I think it's quite useful for an American point of view to understand that even one of them would have been sufficient. And that is Russia's version of the Monroe Doctrine. The Monroe Doctrine says that America will not tolerate, or at least the updated version of it will not tolerate, the presence of a potentially hostile power or alliance in, in north and Central America. And the US has repeatedly acted with extreme ruthlessness to prevent that happening. Now, it's a long time since the US has ever invaded anywhere, but you know, it's blockaded them, subverted them, backed military coups, backed rebellions. You know, from that point of view, Russia is no different. Russia does not wish to see, well, not just potentially, but an actually hostile military alliance on its borders. And then on top of that, of course there is the particular, you know, historical attach to Ukraine, the fact that the Russian state originated in Ukraine, all these things, the position of the Russian language in Ukraine, the fact that Crimea was part of Russia until 1954 when it was trans or 53, I can't remember when it was transferred by Soviet diktat from Russia to Ukraine. And a majority of the Crimean population at least always wanted to go to Russia. So there are all these things. What happened obviously in 2014, the, the Russians call it a coup, we call it a revolution, but which certainly overthrew a legally elected president, however unpleasant he was, and led to great discontent in some of the Russian speaking areas. So all of these factors were present.
- [11:14]
Podcast Host
Yeah. So there are causes and I think we know what the cause of this war was. The immediate cause was Putin deciding to invade in February 22. There are origins, there are deep origins. And I think all of us by now who've been paying attention to this can trace a chronology in our heads of the major moment. And so the fall of the Soviet Union. Collapse of the Soviet empire, Ukrainian independence in the early 1990s, a day when
- [11:38]
Anatole Leven
Mikhail Gorbachev resigned as the president of a Soviet Union which had already ceased to exist.
- [11:43]
Podcast Host
The new power broker, Russian President Boris Yeltsin. The tricolor banner of the Russian Republic now flies over the Kremlin. The disastrous and humiliating decade of the 90s for the new Russian Federation.
- [11:54]
Anatole Leven
One expert today predicted 140 million Russians will soon be living below the poverty line.
- [12:00]
Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
But I don't believe anyone could ever have doubted that there would be obstacles on Russia's road to a vibrant economy and a strong democracy.
- [12:09]
Podcast Host
Putin's rise to power at the end of that decade.
- [12:12]
Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
In Russia today, the clear winner of the Russian presidential election, Vladimir Putin, began
- [12:16]
Anatole Leven
to establish the Putin era.
- [12:18]
Podcast Host
The 04 Orange Revolution, the 07 Munich Security Conference speech, the most famous or infamous diplomatic speech in world history by Putin. The 08 Bucharest conference. And we're going to revisit some of these. I know I'm rattling off a lot of dates here. We'll revisit them in the conversation here in Bucharest.
- [12:37]
Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
We must make clear that NATO welcomes the aspirations of Georgia and Ukraine for their membership in NATO and offers them a clear path forward to meet that
- [12:47]
Podcast Host
goal, followed by the 2013, 2014 Maidan revolution that you just referenced. Yanukovych flees Ukraine and then of course the annexation of Crimea right after that. And the small scale invasion of Eastern Ukraine, the Donbass region. A Russian invasion of Ukraine. Russian troops spreading out throughout the strategic Crimean Peninsula.
- [13:09]
Narrator/Commercial Voice
We've seen an illegal referendum in Crimea, an illegitimate move by the Russians to
- [13:15]
Podcast Host
annex Crimea until we get to 2022. That was a condensed chronology. So we can trace those events, we can understand those events as causes of how we got here. But origins are kind of the underly ideas. And you just brought up the fact that Russia viewed NATO as a hostile, potentially hostile military alliance on its borders. So, you know, we could pick a lot of dates to talk about. One that springs to mind immediately, of course, is the Bucharest conference in 2008 when President George W. Bush mentions membership action plan for Ukraine. But Ukraine was never going to join NATO. So how do you square that with Russia's perception that NATO is coming too close?
- [13:56]
Anatole Leven
That's not what NATO said. NATO said that Ukraine will eventually be a member. It just didn't give it a membership action plan for early membership. And you know, from a Russian point of view, that meant they would have to live for the foreseeable future with the possibility of Ukraine joining NATO. And the Russian Black Sea Fleet being expelled from Sevastopol, they were not going to accept that. But you see, to some extent, it has to be said, NATO membership is almost a kind of metaphor. What it's a metaphor for for is really close security relations and military relations between Ukraine and the West. And when it came to sort of precipitants of the war, well, the U.S. ukrainian defense cooperation pact in October or November 2021, that I think gave Putin the idea that if he didn't act now, it would be too late, because US military aid to Ukraine would make Ukraine impregnable. Actually, Ukraine turned out to be impregnable anyway, partly, of course, because of sheer Russian incompetence. It was after that that Putin actually issued an ultimatum to Ukraine and, you know, accumulated the army on Ukraine's borders. And of course the problem is when you do that, you either have to withdraw the army again and look without getting any concessions and look very stupid, or you have to use it. And after issuing his ultimatum and getting no response from the West, Macron went to Paris and made all kinds of nice noises, but offered nothing concrete to Russia. Putin decided to launch the war, believing of course that it was going to be very quick and easy, as indeed did a great many Western analysts as well.
- [15:45]
Podcast Host
Yeah, hubris is an underlying cause and of course that's hardly unique to Putin. That's all through history. The war will be quick and easy. We've seen that happen over and over again. So where do you draw draw the line though, between perceived legitimate Russian security interests? And there's also the issue of Russians or the Russian establishment, even Russian liberals seeing Ukraine as not a real independent country or not worthy of independence. Where do you draw the line between that and Russian imperialism, that this is just a flat out war of aggression to dominate a neighbor?
- [16:20]
Anatole Leven
I don't think that there is a line. These things all shade into each other. Where do you draw the line between legitimate US security concerns in its own hemisphere and completely illegitimate US intervention in the affairs of its neighbours? Look, I think what you have to say is you don't have to approve of what the US has done over the years in Central America to recognise that, like it or not, the US will act to prevent the appearance of a foreign alliance or hostile power. You don't have to approve of it, you don't have to give it moral sanctions. But from a realist point of view, or not realist, just realistic and responsible point of view, any country which is planning such an operation in Central America has to know in advance. This will almost certainly bring appalling trouble down on the heads of the people concerned. And we know that because we can. We know history doesn't make it right.
- [17:22]
Podcast Host
Sure. Do you agree that the real problem with Bush's blunder in 2008, this Week
- [17:28]
Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
Our alliance must also decide how to respond to the requests by Georgia and Ukraine to participate in NATO's Membership Action Plan. These two nations inspired the world with their Rose and Orange Revolutions, and now they're working to consolidate their democratic gains and cement their independence. Welcoming them into the Membership Action Plan would send a signal to their citizens that if they continue on the path to democracy and reform, they will be welcomed into the institutions of Europe.
- [18:04]
Podcast Host
Well, first he went ahead and announced that when he didn't have the other European allies on his side, it left Ukraine really in the worst of both worlds. It wasn't going to ultimately join NATO, but it alienated Russia. And I'll cite a passage here from Philip Schwartz biography of Putin, by the way. Thank you, Anatole. You're the one who recommended this book to me. He says Here, on page 571 of this very long book, Putin had made clear at Bucharest, again, that's the NATO conference in 08, that any move towards Ukrainian membership of NATO would have grave consequences. The Georgian war that same year had been a warning, and had been intended as such, of how Russia was likely to react if that were to ever happen. The Europeans insisted the EU was quite separate from NATO and blithely assumed Ukraine's association with the EU would not pose any particular problem. It was not merely shortsighted, it was willfully blind. And that, of course, is a reference to the 2013-2014 deal that fell through when Yanukovych changed his mind about that treaty or economic pact with the eu. But the initial point there made by Philip Short, is that while Putin had said, don't do this, the west went ahead and did it anyway, talking about Ukraine and NATO in 2008. And then nothing happened. So Ukraine was left in this no man's land.
- [19:26]
Anatole Leven
If Bucharest had declared a Membership Action Plan for Ukraine, I'm quite convinced that what happened in 2022 would have happened in 2009. Russia would have provoked, brought about a rebellion in Crimea and the Donbass, and the Russian army would have intervened. Now, who would have won that war? God knows. I mean, the Ukrainian army was much, much, much weaker, but then so was the Russian. Very likely one would have ended up with some version of what we've got today, in other words, a partitioned Ukraine.
- [19:57]
Podcast Host
In 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea, its military had been modernized over the previous decade and the Ukrainian military was pretty weak. Why didn't Putin invade, do the full scale invasion then? He waited eight years.
- [20:12]
Anatole Leven
That, you know, is a real weakness for Putin today. Because in private, obviously Russian hardliners, but even Russian moderates say, look, if we were going to do it, why, why, why didn't you do it in 2014 when the Ukrainian army was much weaker, when you had much stronger support within Ukraine, when you had an elected president who'd been ousted from Kyiv, you could have put back in Kharkov or Odessa or Dnipropetrovsk, and you had a massacre of pro Russian protesters in Odessa, which would have given you an excellent casus belli. But Putin, my information is that he still hoped for some form of reconciliation with Germany and France and he was still hoping for the old Russian playbook going back to the 90s or indeed much further, of splitting America from Europe. And so he preferred to take Crimea and then to, well, I mean, hardly covertly, but sort of semi deniably back the rebellion in the Donbass. But of course, as a result, Russia got the worst of all worlds. It took millions of Russians and Russian speakers out of Ukraine who could no longer therefore influence Ukrainian politics, which they would have done if he'd left them inside Ukraine. But at the same time, of course, he only got a fraction of the Russian speaking areas of Ukraine. And by doing this, he allowed, well, sort of more or less compelled the Ukrainian state to engage in a really, really systematic nationalist program justified by the war in the Donbass of mobilization against Russia. And that that's one reason why eight years later, when Russia invaded, there were far, far fewer Ukrainians who were prepared to welcome or support that tap.
- [22:07]
Podcast Host
Subscribe now in the show Notes to skip ads, get early access and enjoy all of our bonus content or go to history as it happens.com.
- [22:30]
Podcast Advertiser
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- [23:02]
Podcast Host
I have A two part question, but I know it's always best to ask one part at a time. It's an old trick I used to do at news conferences when I was a local news reporter. I usually only get one question, so I'd break up my question into two or three parts. But I'll just do one at a time here. I mean, I have my own views on this one, but I want to hear from you first. Are we any closer today than we were in February of 2022 to understanding the timing of the full scale war decision by Putin? I mean, why then? And does it even matter anymore?
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Anatole Leven
Well, some Russians have said to me that if Hillary Clinton had been elected instead of Trump in 2016, you would have had an invasion of Ukraine in 2018 rather than 2022.
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Podcast Host
Why is that?
- [23:48]
Anatole Leven
Well, because a Trump was seen by Russia as more favorable to Russia. But also Trump's election drove a huge wedge between the United States and Europe, which is what Russia had always been hoping for. But also, you know, for a long time. Well, not for a very long time, perhaps, but for several years, Russia was really hoping that the Minsk agreement could be made to work whereby the Donbass would be left within Ukraine as a fully autonomous area and would thereby be able to act within Ukraine as a bloc against Ukraine joining NATO and also as an advocate for the rights of Russians across Ukraine. But the Ukrainian parliament, by refusing to grant autonomy to the Donbass, even with a time lag, made it clear that Ukraine was never going to abide by that agreement. And the Germans and French refused to. And the US as well, of course, refused to push Ukraine into that. Putin essentially waited for the 2020 elections. And then if you remember, in 2021, the Russians, you know, really made a push to try to get the Biden administration to recognize what they saw as Russian security interests, to establish a new security order in Russia, but the Biden administration refused categorically to do that. And so then Putin eventually issued his ultimatum.
- [25:17]
Podcast Host
I think that's a good answer because it reminds us of the importance of contingency. The war can look inevitable in retrospect. And there was some fundamental conflict here, not just between Russia and Ukraine in their history, but Russia and the West. This is a conflict between Russia and the west insofar as Putin and others, when they see Ukraine tilting more toward the west, they feel that they're losing that country to the west. And it's because of manipulation by more powerful Western, meaning European or United States, more powerful Western powers. I was just listening to an interview Michael Kimmage at the Kennan Institute. He spoke to Yaroslav Herzak, a historian at the Ukrainian Catholic University. A series of interviews Michael's been doing about the origins of the war. Herzak argues that it was after the Georgia war in 08 where Putin decided for a number of reasons, including that he now saw the west as being incapable of stopping him or weak or just lacking the gumption to do anything about his moves. Obviously there was no Western intervention in Georgia. It would have been crazy anyway. But it was after the 08 war where Putin decides he would use force against Ukraine should Ukraine continue to tilt toward the west. And for the reasons you stated, by 2022, that's when he's going to lose it. There were moments along that chronology where it looked like he might be able to accomplish his goals without having to go to an all out war.
- [26:46]
Anatole Leven
Yes, but I mean, I don't think Putin didn't throughout this period want to go to war or use force. After all, he didn't do so after the Orange Revolution. He didn't do so immediately after the Bucharest summit. Putin is a secret serviceman, not a soldier. He always prefers to work indirectly through politics and subversion. And of course, the election of Yanukovych in 2010 made it seem that there was still more than half of the Ukrainian population was still very willing to get on with Russia. It was the EU association agreement and the crisis that that brought about and the European Union's refusal to negotiate, as Philip Short also records, refusal to negotiate with Russia, some sort of of deal which would keep Ukraine open to both sides.
- [27:35]
Podcast Host
They had a very condescending attitude toward Moscow. Why was Putin so opposed to that agreement?
- [27:41]
Anatole Leven
It didn't in any way guarantee Ukrainian membership of the European Union. I mean, this was why it was so in a way irresponsible on the part of the Europeans. Because I mean, what it did was to a very limited degree open European markets to Ukrainian goods. But as part of that, essentially setting a series of conditions which was going to radically restrict Ukrainian trade with Russia and therefore, of course reduce the links with Russia and Russian influence, it was entirely legitimate for Russia to wish to negotiate some kind of trade agreement that would keep those links open. But this of course then became part of the whole internal political struggle in Ukraine, the Ukrainian nationalists and to be fair, the Ukrainian modernisers, you know, against Yankovych and the old Soviet elites.
- [28:31]
Podcast Host
Let's go back to the early post Cold War period and Ukrainian independence. This is a point I brought up earlier wasn't very articulate in my rambling question. But this notion that Ukraine is not a legitimate nation state of its own, an attitude that's held not just by right wing nationalists in Russia, but by others as well. In fact, I referenced Hertsak's interview earlier. He said that conventional wisdom in Russia was that Ukrainian independence wouldn't last, that the state would collapse and they'd come begging back, asking to reunite with Moscow. Isn't that an important factor in all of this, the Russian attitude toward Ukraine, that it's not allowed to be an independent country?
- [29:12]
Anatole Leven
Yes, undoubtedly. But I mean, the thing was that in the 90s, there were a great many Ukrainians who said to me that Ukrainian independence isn't going to last. That inevitably will come back under Moscow in some form. The CIA, actually, in a report I think it was 95, warned of the strong likelihood of civil war in Ukraine between these two. I wouldn't say that it was a majority of Russians or even the Russian establishment, wanted to simply turn Ukraine into a province of Russia, restore the Russian empire in that form. They wanted a friendly and cooperative Ukraine. You know, for a long time it seemed quite possible to have that.
- [29:53]
Historical/Political Figure or Narrator
Sure.
- [29:53]
Podcast Host
I mean, because depending on who would be elected, Ukraine went back and forth between more pro west or pro Russian leaders during this couple of decades.
- [30:02]
Anatole Leven
Yeah. And was very, very evenly divided. And also, of course, if you look at the whole series of elections, there was a very clear division between the west of the country and the east and the south, with the Russian speakers in the east and the south. But it's also, you know, worth remembering the Soviet referendum in the spring of 1991. A very large majority of Ukrainians voted to remain within the Soviet Union.
- [30:25]
Podcast Host
That was Gorbachev's confederation plan, right?
- [30:28]
Anatole Leven
That's right. So, you know, there was a very substantial body of opinion in Ukraine that did want to stay with Russia. And by the way, I mean, until 2014, every opinion poll showed that while a majority of Ukrainians wanted to join the European Union, but to join the European Union to be members, not to be in some waiting room like Turkey. But there was Always more than 2/3 of respondents in every opinion poll said that they did not want to join NATO because that would obviously lead to a real and dangerous breach with Russia and American diplomats.
- [30:59]
Podcast Host
Burns made that warning as well. Many times. That confederation plan that Gorbachev hatched was never realized. Soviet hardliners tried to overthrow Gorbachev off because of it. He was on the verge of signing it. Then he went on a vacation Actually, didn't he go on a vacation to Crimea? Wasn't that. Yes, well, history is something, isn't it? So it would seem, then, if we can agree on the origins of the war, which are of course contested and will continue to be contested, that any peace settlement would have to address these deep issues. Is that possible now, after four and a half years of destructive war?
- [31:39]
Anatole Leven
Very, very difficult. I mean, some, at least, of Russia's minimal conditions are achievable. I mean, Ukraine is not going to be a member of NATO anyway. It will only take one veto. And if Le Pen wins in France next year, the French will not agree to this. But other East European countries will not either. And there isn't going to be a European force within Ukraine, especially if Le Pen wins, because European countries will not contribute to it. Lord Dannett, the former a chief of the British army, has said that for Britain to keep just one brigade in Ukraine would basically require the entire British deployable army. So there are all sorts of concessions we could make. What Ukraine can't do is withdraw from the rest of the Donbass that it holds. And then, yes, I mean, there are these questions of Russian language rights in Ukraine and the position of the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine. Ukraine. Now, in an ideal world, these could be sorted out as conditions of Ukraine's EU accession, because the EU in theory, has all the. The aqui communitaire has all these things in it about minority rights, but the EU has totally failed to protect Russian minority rights in the Baltic states. And also, it's very unlikely that Ukraine ever will be a member of the European Union. So in a way, this whole whole
- [33:02]
Podcast Host
question is, yeah, is it realistic to think Russia would voluntarily withdraw all of its army units out of Ukraine, restore Ukraine's territorial sovereignty, its integrity, and then there could be some deal that allows the Donbass to, if not become part of Russia, have some kind of autonomous status.
- [33:24]
Anatole Leven
I mean, look, in many ways, do
- [33:27]
Podcast Host
I sound like a hippie, a hippie dreamer here?
- [33:30]
Anatole Leven
Well, I mean, look, in a previous age, what would happen is that Russia would simply annex, you know, Ukraine would recognize the Russian annexation of the Crimea and the Donbass, because reincorporating these places in Ukraine is virtually impossible. It would require the ethnic cleansing by now of the population. And in return for that, of course, Russia ends the war, guarantees the territorial integrity of the rest of Ukraine and so forth, but Ukraine will never agree to that. And so the best that can be hoped for is not legal recognition, but a de facto recognition of Russian control over the territories it now occupies.
- [34:12]
Podcast Host
What about Putin's ultimate aims here? It seems to me in this quarter century or more of history we've been discussing, that many in the west, namely American presidents, didn't understand Putin underestimated him. Of course, in the 1990s, during the disastrous Yeltsin years, Russia was weak, weak and humiliated. Even after Putin was restoring some Russian state power, modernizing its military, presidents such as Obama underestimated him. I'm not sure the Trump administration really understands Putin either. Certainly not the amateur comedy duo of Kushner and Wyckoff, who've been negotiating, if you want to call that an end to the war.
- [34:54]
Anatole Leven
Yes. But, you know, I mean, in some ways it's not too difficult to understand because, you know, you mentioned Bill Burns, the former US Ambassador to, to Moscow, when he was talking about Russian attitudes to NATO. He wasn't just talking about Putin. He said it was the reddest of red lines for everybody in the Russian establishment. The Russian establishment, in many ways, the security establishment is not fundamentally different from the American one. It has very many of the same attitudes. But I think with Putin, the other thing to keep in mind is, look, leaders have desires, wishes is. And then there is reality. You know, of course, Putin would like to get the whole of Ukraine. He would like a client government in, in Kiev. He would like to get to Odessa and, you know, incorporate that in, in Russia, but he can't do it. And the question is, just how pragmatic is he? Well, I mean, the Russians have scaled down their demands. I mean, very, very considerably. They were claiming the whole of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson on as a precondition of peace talks. But the Russian army on the ground has made so little progress that I think they know they can't get that Putin had great ambitions. But I don't see Putin as a man who is going to pursue those maximalist ambitions after it becomes clear that Russia can't achieve them.
- [36:16]
Podcast Host
So he's fighting for the Donbass. Then. What do you make of reports or the notion that the war is going so badly for Russia, that internally this could bring about the end of Putin's rule, that there will be internal opposition to how bad all this is, because it is hurting Russia, too.
- [36:33]
Anatole Leven
Very, very few Russians believe that. I mean, even people who are deeply hostile to Putin within Russia, in the liberal opposition in exile, you have these dreamers, frankly, just as throughout the 1920s and 30s, you had white Russians in exile who believed that this year, next year, the Soviet regime would collapse and they would go back. No, I mean, there is this growing war weariness. But the thing to keep in mind is if the west were to make, I mean, if Europe, backed by Trump, were to make a peace offer that a large majority of Russians could regard as reasonable and Putin refused, then I think he might be in very serious trouble. But you see, nobody who might be dreaming of replacing Putin wants to take responsibility for defeat. It's the Weimar scenario. You know, in the 1920s, many German politicians in private were saying, we shouldn't have taken power. We should have left the generals in charge. And then they would have had to take responsibility for Versailles and German defeat. Whereas it was, of course, the general shuffled it off on the politicians, then accused them of, you know, the stab in the back theory. You know, I've talked to Russians about this. It's not just that anyone who replaced Putin would be faced with the same. Same basically unacceptable set of European demands. But of course, if the Russian states seem to be collapsing and to be greatly weakened, it's very likely that the Europeans and the Ukrainians would increase their demands. And so it would be, you know, the new government would come to power with this dreadful burden of defeat hanging around its neck. Nobody wants to inherit that.
- [38:16]
Podcast Host
I find this situation so frustrating. A war, a war no one can win, and a war no one seemingly is capable of bringing to an end either at the table.
- [38:25]
Anatole Leven
Yeah, exactly.
- [38:26]
Narrator/Commercial Voice
Russia is a regional power that is threatening some of its immediate neighbors not out of strength, but out of weakness. Ukraine has been a country in which Russia had enormous influence for decades since the breakup of the Soviet Union. And we have considerable influence on our neighbors. We generally don't need to invade them in order to have a strong cooperative relationship with them.
- [39:01]
Podcast Host
On the next episode of History as it Happens. The history of liberal patriotism and the democratic socialist. Or is it social democratic tradition in America? With Michael Kazin. That is next. As we report history as it happens, make sure to sign up for my free newsletter. Just go to substack and search for the name of this podcast.
- [39:27]
Anatole Leven
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- [39:56]
Podcast Advertiser
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