War Correspondent Tim Mak on the War in Ukraine

Summary

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The Al Franken Podcast

Episode: War Correspondent Tim Mak on the War in Ukraine

Date: September 7, 2025
Guest: Tim Mak – War Correspondent, founder of “The Counteroffensive” Substack

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Episode Overview

Al Franken hosts war correspondent Tim Mak, who has reported from Kyiv since the start of the war in Ukraine. The discussion centers around the current state of the war, the ongoing trauma for Ukrainians, the roles of Putin, Trump, and Western allies, Ukrainian resilience, and the formidable challenges ahead for any peace settlement.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The War’s Current State & Public Perception

• Media Disconnection:

  • Tim Mak observes that outside Ukraine, many believe intense diplomatic activity signals an imminent end to the war.

    “Every conversation I have is, ‘Well, the war is about to end soon, isn’t it?’ … I just want to kind of bring us back into reality.” – Tim Mak (03:35)

  • Contrasts international perception with ongoing daily realities for Ukrainians.

• No Diplomatic Progress:

  • Despite deadlines and rhetoric from Western leaders, the podcast agrees that:
    • No new sanctions have been imposed on Russia.
    • No real pathway to a peace deal exists.
    • Putin’s demands remain unchanged since the 2022 invasion.

  “It's been a month since that deadline. We have no sanctions. We have no plan for a peace deal.” – Tim Mak (04:20)

2. Life for Ukrainians under Siege

• Constant Threat:

  • Kyiv is hit by drones or missiles “on a near-nightly basis.” (Tim Mak, 05:28)
  • Russian attacks focus on civilian infrastructure and create regular terror.

  "Millions of people are being terrorized in this way because they can't live in peace. They can't live without the threat of violence from a dictator." – Tim Mak (10:33)

• Daily Trauma:

  • Discusses how trauma goes beyond casualties; the psychological toll pervades society.

    “Missiles explode in the city center, they destroy and alter thousands and thousands of lives.” – Tim Mak (07:18)

• Children as Victims:

  • Nearly 20,000 Ukrainian children have been abducted; Russians are “auctioning them off to be adopted by Russian parents… teaching them propaganda related to the Russian language and Russian history.” – Tim Mak (22:26)

3. Differences in Military Targeting

• Russian Approach:
  • Deliberately targets civilians, including children.
• Ukrainian Operations:
  • Ukrainian strikes are aimed at military targets (e.g., refineries), though risks persist:

    "Ukrainians have been much more clear about targeting only military sites." – Tim Mak (05:53)

4. Political Context & Western Policy

• Trump’s Diplomacy and Alaska Summit:

  • Tim and Al mock Trump’s failed attempt to leverage his relationship with Putin to achieve a ceasefire at the “Alaska summit.”
  • Trump’s approach lacked substance; European leaders and Zelensky attended follow-up talks at the White House, which amounted to damage control rather than real progress.

    “There was this wishful thinking that Trump… might be able to end the war, even if accidentally… That’s turned out, even at the low, low bar, not to be the case.” – Tim Mak (12:04)

• Skepticism toward Peace Deals:

  • Tim reiterates that Putin cannot be trusted to keep any agreement due to his record of violating past accords.

    “Any peace without a just sustainable enforcement mechanism will simply be a prelude to the next war.” – Al Franken reading from ‘Counteroffensive’ (16:07)

• Security Guarantees for Ukraine:

  • Options include:
    • Stationing European troops in Ukraine.
    • Legally binding security guarantees from European countries and the US.
    • Massive provision of arms to deter future Russian aggression.

    “Part of it is also, what’s the future of Ukraine look like?... Can it join the west and become a member of the European Union… become too wealthy to invade?” – Tim Mak (19:26)

  • But NATO membership for Ukraine is not under serious consideration (36:41).

5. Historical & Cultural Context

• Cossack Traditions and Defiance:
  • Zelensky is seen as embodying the long-standing Cossack tradition of refusing to capitulate to foreign demands.

    “The Cossacks are a hotly, hotly debated issue in historical memory. … But that rebel and defiant nature… is maintained to this day in Ukrainian culture.” – Tim Mak (23:12)

6. Economic Warfare and Sanctions

• Effectiveness of Sanctions:

  • Debate over Russia’s economic resilience:
    • Tim believes Russia is floundering economically (interest rates near 20%, inflation more than double US).
    • Secondary sanctions (targeting anyone who does business with Russia) could be devastating but have not been enacted.

    “Russian companies are sanctioned. But if you make it secondary… that has devastating second and third order effects. But we haven’t done that.” – Tim Mak (27:10)

• Autocracy’s Fragility:

  • Russia’s autocratic system makes it brittle and unpredictable; cracks may show suddenly under pressure.

    “…when they bend, they snap. We won’t know until it collapses.” – Tim Mak (41:11)

7. What Would Make Putin Keep His Word?

• No Trust in Putin’s Promises:
  • Any deal must include enforceable disincentives (military, economic, political) to deter future attacks.
• The US as Key Security Guarantor:
  • Only the US currently has the power to credibly threaten Russia with the necessary force.

    "The United States is primary among them." – Tim Mak (36:32)

8. Outlook for the Future

• No Peace in Sight:
  • Neither side is positioned for a sustainable peace; Russia demands capitulation, which Ukraine rejects.
  • “All there is is a capitulation, which is what Russia is demanding. The Ukrainians aren’t going to do that.” – Tim Mak (40:13)
• Unpredictability of Events:
  • Autocracies can collapse suddenly, but at present, peace is nowhere close.

    “Peace is not likely right now.” – Tim Mak (47:21)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the perpetual trauma of war:

  “Every time I try to go to bed, there’s an attack and then you just lay awake. … You hear these ominous drones buzzing in the night sky…” – Tim Mak (09:13)

• On Trump’s diplomatic approach:

  “There was this wishful thinking that Trump, in a very chaotic way, might be able to end the war, even if accidentally and even with bad intentions. That’s turned out, even at the low, low bar, not to be the case.” – Tim Mak (12:04)

• On illusions of peace:

  “Any peace without a just sustainable enforcement mechanism will simply be a prelude to the next war.” – Al Franken quoting “Counteroffensive” (16:07)

• On Putin’s ambitions:

  “What he [Putin] said is that he thinks that the greatest tragedy of the 20th century was not the Holocaust, not World War I, but instead the collapse of the Soviet Union.” – Tim Mak (43:51)

• On the futility of negotiations without leverage:

  “We shouldn’t be distracted by all the bright lights of summits and meetings at the White House and flying to Alaska to think that, hey, the war is about to end.” – Tim Mak (39:49)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:34 – 03:35: Introduction to Tim Mak, opening questions about the war’s trajectory.
• 05:28: “How often does Kyiv get hit by drones and missiles?” Daily/near-nightly.
• 07:18: Tim describes the day-to-day trauma and toll on Ukrainians.
• 10:33: The psychological toll – unable to distinguish between drone noises and daily city life.
• 11:05 – 13:12: Trump’s Alaska summit and its lack of results.
• 16:07: Al quotes from “Counteroffensive” on the impossibility of trust in Putin.
• 22:03 – 22:26: Discussion of Russia’s abduction and “brainwashing” of Ukrainian children.
• 23:12: Ukrainian Cossack defiance as cultural background.
• 26:42: Effectiveness (or not) of sanctions and Western leverage.
• 36:41: Why Ukraine won’t get NATO membership in the near future.
• 41:11: How Russia’s economic brittleness could suddenly crack its system.
• 46:13: Forecasting the possible duration of the war.

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Takeaways

• Ukrainians remain defiant and united; trauma is omnipresent, and security boils down to credible, enforceable guarantees—ideally from the US.
• There is currently no viable path to peace, largely due to an entrenched Putin, Western caution, and ineffective diplomacy.
• Western and especially American resolve—and strategic arming of Ukraine—remain the only real leverage points for shifting the dynamic.
• The war is not merely about territory, but about Ukraine’s right to exist as a sovereign democracy—a fundamental threat to Putin’s worldview.

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Final Remarks:
Al Franken and Tim Mak cut through the headlines and posturing to lay out the harrowing, reality-based perspective from Ukraine: relentless trauma, a resilient people, and no illusions about what it will take to achieve true peace.

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Transcript

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[Al Franken]

Hey, everybody. We got a great one today, you know, for a change. My guest is Tim Mack, who's been covering the war in Ukraine from Kyiv since the day it started. And it's the second time that Tim has joined us. Tim writes the counteroffensive, a substack on the war we cover, kind of where are we now? Is Putin going to come to the table or is he just going to keep going, grinding it out on the battlefield and bombing civilians and killing children? The man is a monster. Trump should have arrested him in Alaska, should have rolled out the red carpet, put him in the beast, and then arrested him. The man is a war criminal. He's kidnapped almost 20,000 Ukrainian children and no doubt is brainwashing them. Tim and I talk about that and about where this war is going. Tim says that 70% of Ukrainians think this war is going to go on for at least another year. And we talk about what, what we should do. I think we should be sending Ukraine arms and along with our European allies, defend the free world. But we don't know what Trump will do. And neither, I am sure, does Trump. Remember, he said over and over again during the campaign that he'd end the war in one day. A couple months ago, he said he was being sarcastic, just like he said this week that Epstein is a Democrat.

[Tim Mack]

Hoax.

[Al Franken]

Well, where is the war going? Is Putin going to come to the table? What would his conditions be? What territory would he demand? Tim says that Ukraine and the west are not going to accept anything that would simply allow Putin to take a pause and then continue its assault. Tim Mack is with us. It's a great one, you know, for a change. All right, well, thanks, Tim. You've been base in Kyiv since the very beginning of the war. Right. In fact, as I remember, you arrived the first day of the war, is that right?

[Tim Mack]

A few hours before the bombing started. Yeah. Good or bad timing? Depends how you look at it.

[Al Franken]

And you've been writing a sub stack the counteroffensive with others who are reporting from Ukraine. Is that right?

[Tim Mack]

That's right. We've got a team of young Ukrainian journalists who were not only featuring but were kind of teaching and mentoring to make sure that they can engage in feature writing.

[Al Franken]

Well, it's great because I've been reading them and it gives a real perspective of how Ukrainians feel about the war. We last spoke to you in, I think, early March, so six months ago. Is the war in a very different place than it was then?

[Tim Mack]

I'll tell you, there's been a lot of talk, it seems like, outside of Ukraine. And every conversation I have is, well, the war is about to end soon, isn't it? Worry of activity, so it must be, must be winding diplomatic activity, so it must be winding down. Right. And, you know, they're having big meetings and I'm, you know, most people aren't super, super engaged in this topic. And, you know, I can't, I can't blame them for that. I mean, I'm very engaged in this topic, as you can imagine. And they're seeing little snippets of, you know, meetings at the White House and European leaders and talks.

[Al Franken]

Alaska, Alaska is a generated nothing.

[Tim Mack]

And they think, okay, well, you know, I mean, we're on a, we're on a, you know, a free fall trajectory to this just being over. Right. And I just want to kind of bring us back into reality that we're almost a month since Donald Trump said it was his deadline for imposing sanctions on Russia. It's been a month since that deadline. We have no sanctions. We have no plan for a peace deal.

[Al Franken]

Do we have no sanctions or. We haven't added any sanctions.

[Tim Mack]

We haven't added any of the threatened sanctions. We have not added any threatened sanctions. We have no pathway to a peace deal. We have no ceasefire. We have no bilateral meeting or trilateral meeting. No pressure on Putin as far as I can tell, so no progress at all. And Putin still has the same demands that he had when he invaded three and a half years ago.

[Al Franken]

Can I ask you, you're in Kyiv, right? That's where you're living?

[Tim Mack]

I'm based in Kyiv, but I'm talking to you from Krakow, Poland. I just went to a defense conference here.

[Al Franken]

Oh, okay. But let me ask you, how often does Kyiv get hit by drones and missiles these days?

[Tim Mack]

Depends on the week, but on a near nightly basis. I mean, we're talking, we're talking. It's a very regular occurrence.

[Al Franken]

So the Russians are hitting civilian targets all over Ukraine.

[Tim Mack]

Absolutely.

[Al Franken]

And they're killing civilians including children.

[Tim Mack]

Yes.

[Al Franken]

Now, Ukraine hits only military targets, is that correct?

[Tim Mack]

It only aims at military targets. The thing about aiming at military targets is if the Russians shoot something down, it could land something somewhere it's not intended to land. But what's clear is the Ukrainians have been much more clear about targeting only military sites.

[Al Franken]

They hit Russian oil refineries, that kind of things. Right?

[Tim Mack]

Yeah, it's been, it's been claimed by the Ukrainian government that about 20% of Russia's manufacturing and refining capability for, for oil and natural gas has been, has.

[Al Franken]

And that hits them hard where they make their money, right?

[Tim Mack]

Well, yeah. Someone who you might not always agree with, but who always knew how to make a good quip was the late Senator John McCain.

[Al Franken]

No, he was funny.

[Tim Mack]

Russia was a, was the, was basically a mafia state masquerading as a gas station. And, you know, and that's what it really, really is. It's a, it's a, it's a petro state that's run by an autocratic government.

[Al Franken]

So I just think Putin is a monster to be aiming to be deliberately hitting civilians and killing children. What is the, the war's impact day to day, to day to day life in, in Ukraine?

[Tim Mack]

Last week I was in Central Kyiv and I went by one of the, the sites that were hit. And what you really get struck by is the terrible impact of this war on not just the people who are killed, which, and injured, which is bad enough, but on the many of thousands of people who are merely traumatized by the event. When missiles explode in the city center, they destroy and alter thousands and thousands of lives. So there's the immediate impact of the, of the deaths, the immediate impact of the severe injuries. But then there's the trauma of having your apartment destroyed. There's the trauma of nearly dying or nearly being badly hurt. And then there's all the other people who live in fear of this terrorism that's existing on a near nightly basis. That's what we try to kind of highlight in the counter offensive is not just the death and the killing, but also the wider societal effects that it has.

[Al Franken]

I read a piece in the Washington Post on children that have been killed and the effects it has on the other children, obviously, when one of their mates is killed. And it's, you know, I just think Putin's a monster.

[Tim Mack]

It's terrorism that occurs not just to the people who are killed and injured, but to millions of people who have to live in fear. You know, as I mentioned, I just crossed the border into Poland and the Feeling of relief that you get. And the night's sleep that you get when you realize I'm not at any threat at all of being bombed this evening is something I can't quite describe in real terms. What we did at the counteroffensive was we recorded all the sounds that you hear at night. So when you're in the dark, just picture this. You're in the dark, you're in your bed, you're trying to go to sleep. As you close your eyes, an air raid alarm almost inevitably sounds. Every time I try to go to bed, there's an attack and then you just lay awake. If you don't go to the bomb shelter, you lay awake and you listen and you hear a series of sounds. You hear these ominous drones buzzing in the night sky, these kamikaze drones called the Shaheds. You hear the explosions of both incoming missiles and outgoing interceptors. You hear anti aircraft fire in the night. And then it's not just the terror that takes place in periods of acute danger. There's also your subconscious tension and fear, even when you're safe. So one of the things that's been terrorizing the residents of Kyiv recently has been all the trash trucks, the trash collection trucks. Everyone's talking about how they make sounds that are similar to drones when their engines go and it just sets something off. You get this kind of instinctive reaction.

[Al Franken]

Sure.

[Tim Mack]

And millions of people are being terrorized in this way because they can't live in peace. They can't live without the threat of violence from a dictator.

[Al Franken]

Now, a few weeks ago, Trump rolled out the red carpet for Putin in Alaska and it was a total failure for Trump. He went with the stated goal of a ceasefire and he came back with nothing. Did that surprise you?

[Tim Mack]

No. I remember talking to a bunch of friends in Kiev right before the summit in Alaska, and we were kind of debating because it's really, you know, the time difference between Alaska and Ukraine is very, very big. And so if you wanted to stay up for the news, you'd have to stay up until the 2, 3 o' clock in the morning to figure out what was happening. The folks I was talking to were saying, you know, I'm going to sleep pretty well tonight. You know, I'm not worried that any news is going to happen. This is going to be a total nothing.

[Al Franken]

Yeah.

[Tim Mack]

And they turned out to be right. I think, I think a lot of us have this sort of expectation or this, this, this poorly founded hope that maybe Trump, you know, for his many, many flaws, could, in his in some chaotic way, accidentally pull a rabbit out of a hat and lead to a, lead to a good outcome.

[Al Franken]

Well, he said he would do it in one day.

[Tim Mack]

When, when, when, when Trump was elected, a lot of people in Ukraine actually said, oh, well, maybe this could be a good thing. We have this kind of instinct as humans to, to hope for the best or create fantasies in our mind where, like, it's. It's all we have. Right. It's all we have is trying to connect current bad events to possible future better events. And so there was this wishful thinking that Trump, in a very chaotic way, might be able to end the war, even if accidentally and even with bad intentions. That's turned out, even at the low, low bar, not to be the case.

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[Tim Mack]

Right now, the United States is engaged in a series of sharing of intelligence with Ukrainians and is willing to sell, through NATO partners, totally critical air defense assets to the Ukrainians. So do I think that the EU partners were there thinking that they were two or three meetings away from a peace deal? No, I think that they were there to minimize the damage of the Alaska summit, to keep Trump, if not on their side, then to keep the problem from escalating any further to the extent that that was their goal. Well, at least it hasn't gotten any worse.

[Al Franken]

This is a quote from counteroffensive Ukrainians want to be free of Russian influence and oppression, and any peace without a just sustainable enforcement mechanism will simply be a prelude to the next war. In all these pronouncements about trading territory and recognizing Russian control, I see virtually no talk about how the world will make Putin keep his word. Indeed, Ukrainians don't take the current process very seriously. Nearly 70% say that they don't think it's likely that the war will end in the next year. That's what it is for Ukrainians, right? What do Ukrainians want? What are they willing to accept? What should they be negotiating for?

[Tim Mack]

I think that if you ask Ukrainians if they want the word, and you'll. You'll get a very substantial and rising percentage of Ukrainians. But then if you ask them, what would they be willing to give up for that, would they be willing to cede the territorial claims even to various places that Russia now occupies? And I think you're going to hear a pretty resounding no. When we look at a map of Ukraine, sometimes it just looks like hexagons and various shapes on the front lines. But one thing that Putin is asking for, he's asking for specific kinds of territory in hopes that he can kind of sneak it through. Right now there's this series of entrenchments called the Fortress Line in the east of Ukraine, which has held up for more than a decade of war. Putin wants the territory just on the other side of that. Okay, let's say that that's. The Ukrainians go completely mad and say, okay, well, here's. We're willing to give that up. Should Putin want to restart a new invasion, he'd do so on the other side of that fortress line, of that critical defensive position.

[Al Franken]

Ukraine wants assurances that this won't just simply start again from Russian positions.

[Tim Mack]

Many people think that the war started in 2022, three and a half years ago. The war started in 2014 with the annexation of Russia, Crimea and Russian backed troops in Eastern Ukraine. And every negotiation that was supposed to bring about peace turned out to be quickly violated by the Russian side. So the Ukrainians are willing to stop the fighting. I think a lot of Ukrainians are willing even to say, okay, for the time being, Ukraine is not going to be able to win back these territories. We're not going to demand them back, but we're certainly not going to cede them. We're willing to stop the fighting if we can assure that this is the only time an invasion like this will happen again to us. Because otherwise, what was this all for?

[Al Franken]

So what does that mean? Does that mean European troops in Ukraine, does that mean, what does that mean? What does that look like?

[Tim Mack]

It could be a number of things to include European troops, security guarantees where European countries are obligated specifically to defend Ukraine in the case of another invasion. It could mean arming Ukraine to the teeth so that it's so much, it's such a difficult country to invade that the Russians would never do it. There are a number of different ways to create security guarantees. Part of it is also, what's the future of Ukraine look like? Can it join the west and become a member of the European Union and integrate with the economies of the eu? Can become too wealthy to invade in that it's grown so much and gotten so many resources that it's well armed and, and will defend it and can't be invaded again. All of those are elements in a sustainable long term peace.

[Al Franken]

So you think that is possible that Ukraine becomes so armed with aid and does this mean European troops in Ukraine as part of defense?

[Tim Mack]

It doesn't have to mean that, but that would be one strong element of a security guarantee. Look, I guess the entire purpose of a security guarantee is to say Putin can't be expected to keep his word if he says, I pinky promise, I'm not going to invade Ukraine again. Okay, so what are the elements that will dissuade him? So we, you know, the, the global community, Ukraine, the West, America, whatever, can believe that this won't occur one more time. It's not based on, oh well, you know, we had a handshake deal with Vladimir Putin, he said he wouldn't do it again. That's not going to be enough. A sustainable peace will only occur.

[Al Franken]

Of course. Of course.

[Tim Mack]

I mean, you can't dissuaded sufficiently from ever doing it again by threats, by the costs that will occur to him if he tries to do it again or Russia tries to do it again, by an economic hammer that will come down on him, that will isolate and marginalize him. All of those things could be elements to guarantees that will prevent Russia from invading again.

[Al Franken]

Now, let me ask you, are Ukrainians, do they want the 20,000. Is it 20,000 children who have been kidnapped by Russia?

[Tim Mack]

Of course they want the thousands of children that have been kidnapped by Russia. I mean, it's one of the most urgent and pressing issues that the Ukrainian government raises.

[Al Franken]

And what are the Russians doing? Are they brainwashing these kids? Are they turning them into Russians? Are they teaching them Russian and teaching them Russian history and the Russian side of this war?

[Tim Mack]

So public reporting shows that they've been kind of trying to find the right word here. They're kind of almost auctioning them off to be adopted by Russian parents and, of course, teaching them propaganda related to the Russian language and Russian history.

[Al Franken]

Now, at the August 16th 18th White House meeting, Zelensky said, no territorial concessions. And I was reading a piece in your substack about the Cossack tradition in Ukraine, and Zelenskyy was being defiant in that tradition. Can you tell us about that?

[Tim Mack]

Sure. So Ukraine is a country of the Eurasian steppe, a geographical area that was characterized by long areas of flat land and grassland. Everyone from the Scythians to the Mongols to the Cossacks understood that these long, flat areas across the Eurasian steppe were very dangerous because you could be invaded at any point. If you settled in these areas that were not particularly great areas for agriculture, you could be looted or killed or worse by roving bands of essentially land pirates. The Ukrainian identity really does descend from this rebel culture in a way. The Cossacks, of course, are known for a great number of things in the West. They're particularly known for the massacres and pogroms and anti Semitism that they engaged in. But in Ukraine, while Ukrainians condemn those historical misdeeds, they also see in themselves a sort of rebellious identity. And so the Cossacks are a hotly, hotly debated issue in historical memory. Probably not an issue that we can resolve very easily. But that rebel and defiant nature that the Cossacks have been known for is maintained to this day in Ukrainian culture.

[Al Franken]

And Zelensky said no to any territorial surrender.

[Tim Mack]

Yeah, I mean, in doing so, he channeled a long history of Ukrainian refusals to accede to foreign demands for capitulation. I think that was the point of our piece.

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[Al Franken]

I hear two diametrically opposed stories about Russia's economy and its ability to sustain the war. One is that when we threaten further sanctions on Russia, it's meaningless. And the other is that Russia's economy is slandering and then posing more sanctions could bring Russia to the table. Do you have an opinion on which which prevails?

[Tim Mack]

Well, it's obvious that in order to push Putin to change his actions, you can either give him incentives or disincentives. Right. Obviously, he's not serious about peace right now. I mean, well, maybe not everyone feels that he's not serious about peace, but I think it's obvious to me that he's not serious because he hasn't changed his demands and he hasn't changed his outlook.

[Al Franken]

So. So you're saying that he's not going to come to the table now?

[Tim Mack]

Well, what I'm saying is if you want him to come to the table, you need to either give him a reason to through incentives or force him to come to the table due to disincentives. And there's not that much we can offer in the ways of good things other than perhaps better relationships with the West. And in terms of disincentives, we have not added any new disincentives. So the idea of, for example, secondary sanctions where we don't just sanction Russia, but we also sanction anyone who does business with Russia could be very, very devastating for Russia. Because when, when forced to choose between the Russian market, Russia has the GDP of approximately Italy, or the United States of America, most people are going to say, I'd rather do business with America. Right. Right now, Russian companies, Russian entities, the Russian parts of the Russian government are sanctioned. But if you make it secondary, where anyone who does business with them, whether it's Indian firms, Chinese firms, South American firms are also sanctioned, that has devastating second and third order effects. But we haven't done that. The United States has not done that. There are other cards, to use Donald Trump's terminology, there are other cards that the United States could play. We're not playing them.

[Al Franken]

And why is that?

[Tim Mack]

Donald Trump doesn't want to hurt Putin's feelings. Let's just cut through it. Donald Trump has always had an admiration for Vladimir Putin. And I don't want to get into the psychoanalysis of Donald Trump that's a little bit outside of my particular purview. But if we just take a look at the actions that he's engaged in, that's Donald Trump is engaged in, we see him as being pretty spectacularly aligned with Putin over, you know, now more than a decade of having conversations about this topic. He seems just unable to bring himself to do anything that might harm Vladimir Putin's interests. It's been very, very consistent for a decade now. He isn't willing to create new penalties against Russia in order to bring them to the table.

[Al Franken]

Do you think Putin will come to the table anytime soon?

[Tim Mack]

Not unless the situation changes so that he's forced there or incentivized to be there. I guess. Let's take a step back. This is not a war over certain parcels of land in Ukraine, whether it's 20% or 23% or 25%. The fundamental challenge that Russia has is that Ukraine is a prosperous, democratic society on its border, is a huge, huge threat to Russia and Russia's system, and because it shows that the Western democratic pathway is more successful than theirs. So Putin's strategic objective is to crush Ukrainian sovereignty, is to crush the ability for Ukraine to exist as an independent country and make its own decisions.

[Al Franken]

And he hasn't been able to do that.

[Tim Mack]

He hasn't been able to control the country from a territorial perspective, but he can crush Ukraine's future by continuing to threaten war and violence, by destroying the cities of Ukraine by limiting the economy of Ukraine because it can't get any investment or rebuild during a period of war. The longer the war goes on, the more difficulty Ukraine will have in rebuilding and coming to eventual economic prosperity. It's not just a matter of territory. It would be a mistake to think that it was just about land. It's about preventing Ukraine from succeeding. And ultimately, the longer the war goes on, the more, I mean, the war is being fought on Ukrainian soil. So the longer that it goes on, the more disproportionate effect, negative effects are occurring to Ukraine. And so if Ukraine is suffering, the longer Ukraine is suffering, the longer, the more Russia succeeds in its eventual strategic aims, which is to crush Ukrainian sovereignty.

[Al Franken]

Is it possible that Putin would just agree to a deal to put a halt to the war and then start again at the moment of his choosing? Is that part of his strategy?

[Tim Mack]

That's entirely possible. But right now I don't see that he's serious to stop. So there's two parts to that question. The first part is is it possible that he would agree to peace? I don't see that that's even remotely on the table right now. But let's say that he did. Let's just presume that he did, that he is interested and he would agree to it. The second part of that is, can he be trusted to keep his word? And I think we talked a little bit about that under the security guarantees part of our conversation, because I think we all have to go into this with the presumption that he is not going to keep his word and he.

[Al Franken]

Is going to reinvent what would we, on our side, on Ukraine's side, its allies, and that's the Europeans and to some extent the United States. What would we need to guarantee that he couldn't do that, that Putin couldn't do that?

[Tim Mack]

You would need a series of allies that would declare that they would step in. If that were to happen again, you would need Ukraine that is rebuilt and able to, on its own two feet, build an economy that can generate enough revenue to healthily rearm and make sure that they don't get invaded again.

[Al Franken]

That seems like it take a while to do that.

[Tim Mack]

It would, it would. I mean, this would have to be a long term process. The most important part of that in the short term is a security guarantee from well armed, well equipped nation states that would agree to step in should anything be, should the peace be violated.

[Al Franken]

So this would be weapons from the United States that the Europeans buy. That's the way it's set up now.

[Tim Mack]

That'S not going to be enough for security guarantees because the Ukrainians need not just specific weapons systems, but they need a series of interlocking allies that will step in to help them. Look, the idea behind dissuading Russia from any future invasion is that the cost would be too high for them to take that path. So a few systems and purchases of weapons, that's not going to be enough. They've got to be convinced that the penalty for reinvasion is going to be so incredibly harsh that they don't even give it a second's worth of thought. That is, that is a high, a high burden.

[Al Franken]

So where is that in the negotiations right now? Where you see that or are there. Are those not happening?

[Tim Mack]

Well, the Europeans are trying to put together a series of assurances for the Ukrainians that involve potentially American backstops to the security guarantees. Marco Rubio has been tapped by the White House to lead that conversation about security guarantees. To be honest, it doesn't look very reassuring to me. There is the so called coalition of the willing in Europe, and that's feeling kind of shaky to me.

[Al Franken]

Really? These are the European countries.

[Tim Mack]

Yeah. Ukrainian allies like France and the UK Europe has its own problems. Europe has for the last 30 years really enjoyed the peace dividend dramatically cut its spending on the military and the development of weaponry. And suddenly it's realizing that it has this autocratic neighbor on its doorstep and they haven't done enough to protect themselves.

[Al Franken]

When they met at the White House, all these European leaders, was that part of the assurances that they were given to Zelenskyy or not?

[Tim Mack]

Well, they were trying to put on a united and unified front both to talk to Donald Trump, to reassure Zelenskyy, of course. But ultimately America still holds this place of centrality in the world where it and us are the most powerful military in the world. And when America says we'll back you, there are real consequences for crossing the United States of America. Put Donald Trump aside for a second.

[Al Franken]

Well, that's a big. I mean, he's there for three plus years.

[Tim Mack]

That's the thing. When I talk about security guarantees requiring the cost to Russia being so high, they don't even envision thinking about invading Ukraine again. There are very, very few countries in the world that could actually step in and make that guarantee. And the United States is primary among them.

[Al Franken]

So the NATO allies acting either as NATO or not acting as NATO don't provide a sufficient force.

[Tim Mack]

Depends how all in they are. Right. So NATO is not going to agree to admit Ukraine in the near term as a member. Right. NATO is a defensive alliance that, you know, the Article 5 is, you know, one of the key parts of the NATO alliance. And that, and what that sets out is that attack on any member state is an attack on all member states because of the ongoing war. At least, at least in part because of the ongoing war. NATO doesn't want to admit Ukraine to the alliance. Individual member states can make their own assurances, and that's what they're trying to do. They're trying to have some subset of European Western countries come together and make assurances for Ukraine. But the devil's in the details. You'll remember, in 1994, Ukraine gave up its large stockpile of nuclear weapons in return for assurances from the uk, the United States and Russia that its borders would not be violated and that its sovereignty would not be infringed upon. Of course, that turned out, as we now see, to have been a very big mistake. Well, a big mistake, but that it was absolutely foolish to rely on the word of putting aside Russia, the UK and the United States to come to the rescue when ultimately its sovereignty was infringed upon and its borders were violated.

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[Al Franken]

So what will the world, Europe and the United States and Ukraine have to negotiate with Putin to make him keep his word and not to roll over Ukraine again and take all of it. What conditions would need to be put on any deal to assure Ukraine that that won't happen?

[Tim Mack]

Well, incentives to get Russia away from Ukraine and disincentives for the invasion of Ukraine or the re invasion of Ukraine. Economic penalties, geopolitical penalties, sanctions and military costs in the form of violence. Essentially, you know, everything that we've been talking about is, you know, how can we dissuade someone who really wants something from trying to get that thing? You can either say we'll give you something even better or we can say if you try to get that thing, thing we will impose such incredible violent costs on you that, you know, it'd be, it really would be wise for you not to go down that path.

[Al Franken]

So it sounds like you're suggesting that we don't have the critical mass on our side to make that threat.

[Tim Mack]

I'm not convinced that we do in the near term. That's why I don't think that a sustainable peace is really in the off. Right. That we shouldn't be, we shouldn't be distracted by all the bright lights of summits and meetings at the White House and flying to Alaska to think that, hey, the war is about to end.

[Al Franken]

Well, all those things are pretty, been pretty useless, obviously.

[Tim Mack]

Well, they've been pretty useless and that's why I think, you know, we don't, we don't have. There's no sustainable or just peace in the offering. All there is is a capitulation, which is what Russia is demanding. The Ukrainians aren't going to do that. So we're not in a place to achieve peace. And the faster we realize this, the faster we can move on to arming the Ukrainians and ensuring they have what they need to defend themselves. Wear down the Russians and have the Russians come to the table when they really are incentivized to make peace.

[Al Franken]

I hear two diametrically opposed stories about Russia's economy and its ability to sustain the war. One is that when we threaten further sanctions on Russia, it's meaningless. And the other is that Russia's economy is floundering and then imposing more sanctions could bring Russia to the table. Which do you see it as?

[Tim Mack]

I think that Russia's economy is floundering and that additional sanctions could bring it to the table that right now interest rates are near 20%. Inflation. Talk about inflation. In the United States it's more than double, probably more even than double in, in Russia. At the moment their economy is running mostly due to the war machine. They've lost more people in three and a half years of war in casualties that's injured and dead than in over a decade of war. When the Soviets invaded Afghanistan, which as you'll remember is, is, is a, was one of the contributing factors to the collapse of the Soviet Union. They've had already an internal mutiny in their armed forces against the, the autocratic government in Russia. They are not doing well. But the thing about autocratic regimes is they're very brittle structures. It's hard. The not transparent, not. The people who are angry about the current situation are not free to speak out about it. And so they're brittle structures. And what that means is when they bend, they snap. We won't know until it collapses. We saw, for example, the collapse of Bashar Al Assad's regime in Syria in a period of weeks. It was a lightning collapse, and that's because dissent against the regime was not aired until it built up to such a pressure point that the regime was simply unable to sustain itself.

[Al Franken]

But that's not going to happen with Russia and Putin, is it?

[Tim Mack]

I think that ultimately, if you don't let people find peaceful ways to air their grievances, they will find non peaceful ways to air their grievances.

[Al Franken]

Except that when you're under a dictatorship like his, a brutal dictatorship, that opportunity doesn't exist with fear of penalty as severe.

[Tim Mack]

Of course. But we've seen many revolts in human history against dictatorships. When the economy has done poorly and the dictator is unable to point to foreign scapegoats or unable to improve the general living conditions of people. Yes, there are costs, but I believe there's an underlying human spirit that demands more.

[Al Franken]

Is this ultimately about Putin's expansion of Russia under him to establish his greatness in sort of the pantheon of great Russians? Is Putin in this for the long haul and will never agree to a truce unless it's completely on his terms?

[Tim Mack]

I can't get into the head of Vladimir Putin precisely in the way that might satisfy you with that question. Let me say that, you know, we, we have a, we have a pretty good sense of Vladimir Putin's worldview from his public statements and from his actions. And what he said is that he thinks that the greatest tragedy of the 20th century was not the Holocaust, not World War I, but instead the collapse of the Soviet Union. He believes that Russia is entitled to a sphere of control and dominance over Eastern Europe, including Ukraine. And that's what he wants to achieve here. He understands that he can't win on the battlefield right now. He wanted to take over all of Ukraine, but where he's failed to make gains on the battlefield, he now wants to achieve this diplomatically through a either winning or non wedding partner in Donald Trump.

[Al Franken]

I'd say not winning in terms of his relationship with Putin.

[Tim Mack]

Well, I mean, I don't think try to convince Donald Trump that he's being played. I don't think, I don't think that's going to be, I don't think you're going to get very far with him on that. Donald Trump, I think in some strange way thinks that he, by his own personal relationship with Vladimir Putin is entitled to Putin ending the war as a favor to him. We've seen that that's not the case. When he said it would end in a day, I think Donald Trump had convinced himself that they had such a great relationship. He could just call up Vladimir and say, hey, that huge war that you've started for me as a favor to me, and that would end the whole conflict. Turns out geopolitics is much more complicated than that. And Donald Trump is totally outplayed on the world stage. He thinks that all politics is about personal. All world politics is about personal relationships, and that's just not the case.

[Al Franken]

So this is going to last, you think, at least another couple years, is that right?

[Tim Mack]

I'm very hesitant to make a prediction like that because we cannot predict the course of human events that way. I think, you know, current trajectories changed very dramatically and very suddenly. Like I said, autocratic states are brittle structures. You have the Arab Spring, Arab Spring set off by a single man who was angry about living conditions in Tunisia. You have a revolt by one of Russia's most nationalistic mercenary leaders. You have maybe a death of a major political figure. You have increasing signs of strange and maybe some sort of economic collapse in Ukraine or Russia. And the whole trajectory of these predictions change. And that's why I'm so reluctant to say, oh, well, the war will definitely. What I can tell you is that peace is not on the table right now.

[Al Franken]

Right.

[Tim Mack]

I can't tell you what events might transpire in the next three or six months, and it just. Peace is not likely right now.

[Al Franken]

Well, thank you. I do appreciate your. You're coming on every six months or so and giving us a progress report. I hope that the progress report is in the next one has a better outcome.

[Tim Mack]

Thanks, Al. I hope so, too. Really appreciate you having me on to talk about this important topic and what we're doing at the counteroffensive.

[Al Franken]

Well, I hope you enjoyed listening. That beautiful music is by Leo Kotke, the great Leo Kotke. I want to thank Peter Ogburn for producing this podcast. We'll talk again next week.