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Barry Posen, professor of political science at MIT, argues that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 qualifies as a preventive war and was motivated in part to thwart U.S.-led efforts to expand NATO in Europe. He responds to detractors from this view and also discusses the partial political responsibility of U.S. leaders, the difference between explaining the war and justifying it, the lack of strategic empathy in U.S. foreign policy, how best to negotiate the end of the war, and whether the U.S. is making a similar mistake in incentivizing preventive war logic in Beijing with respect to Taiwan.

Show Notes

Barry R. Posen, “Putin's Preventive War: The 2022 Invasion of Ukraine,” International Security 2025; 49 (3): 7–49.

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Strategic Empathy & the Roots of the Ukraine War