 Good morning, everyone. And welcome to USIP, the United States Institute of Peace. We are thrilled to be able to offer this fourth in our series of panels on Russians in exile. I'd be remiss if I didn't note that this may be a very sad day. We don't have confirmed reports. But reportedly, Alexei Navalny was killed last night in a Russian prison. And so that obviously affects not only those who cared deeply about him, but also the theme of our topic today. So with that, I just want to introduce Dr. Jeffrey Gedman, who is the CEO of Radio Free Europe and the co-founder of American Purpose Magazine. Thank you. So good morning, everybody. It's nice to see all of you and those joining virtually. I'm Jeff Gedman, and I'm the publisher and co-founder of American Purpose. I'm now a two-time former president and CEO of Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty, and serve on its board and another new federal board overseeing US international media. My very brief framing remarks. So we've got now this month 10 years, if I count correctly, since the Russian invasion and annexation of Crimea. We have two years since the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine. And I don't have to tell you what a year, because we have this year important elections around the world in Europe, in Germany in the fall, and three important states where the AFD is surging. And of course, in the United States of America, where so much is at stake and in play. And then, as you've just heard from our host, reports today that Mr. Navalny, if I may put it this way, in Vladimir Putin's clutches is dead. It's easy to say, but I think it's fair to say that we're at one of those large moments in history where there's a great deal of fluidity and dynamism and uncertainty. I think more than anything I can recall in my professional life. We have a great panel today, this fourth in this series. In Washington, I think, we often scoff of the vision thing. We belittle it, and we minimize it. But in my view, first comes vision, and then comes strategy, and tactics, and tasks. But you have to have some sense, aspiration, of where you want to go in this life. Individuals, nations, as an international community, and Miriam, that's what your panel is about. It's not about my view. It's your panel talking about predicting the future or exaggerating our influence, actually. But it's trying to assess probabilities of scenarios and where we do have influence, because we do have a vision of a better Russia with more decent accountable government, which will provide a better life for Russians and certainly far more peace and security for Ukrainians and for the entire region. I'm going to say one last thing in my introduction, because Miriam, you invited me to, encouraged me to. In this theater and in this larger play at hand, Vladimir Putin seems to be on a hostage-taking spree. One was Mr. Navalny, another is Vladimir Karamoza. And by now, there are a number of Americans. We got out Brittany Griner, the basketball star, in a swap for a Russian arms dealer. But there are others, notably Paul Wheelan, the ex-marine in prison since 2018. Evan Gershkovich, the Wall Street Journal reporter, he will mark one year in pretrial detention next month in March. And then, of course, if I may say, my colleague, Alsu Komacheva. She went back to the Russian Federation, to Kazan in Tartistan last summer on a private trip to visit her frail and elderly mother, thinking that in this society where mothers are cherished and sacred, she'd be safe. And as you know, to Vladimir Putin, mothers are apparently not so cherished and sacred and safe. And there she sits, sense with multiple charges piling up. Please keep all of them in your thoughts and prayers. And if I may make the special plea to you, we're awaiting and hoping that Alsu will get the same designation that's been awarded to Paul and Evan. That is, the determination by the US State Department as wrongfully detained. It unlocks resources. It increases the probability that she with others will get out in a prisoner swap. And we want all of them out, an application of fullest energy and all diplomatic resources. And it's my view that the State Department is doing a good job. But it's not the right and full job until people are home with their families. And they're not yet. So thank you for letting me make that special plea. This is a fantastic panel. It's the fourth in the series, thanks to the US Institute of Peace, thanks to the Institute of Current World Affairs, and really thanks to Greg Pfeiffer. Greg Pfeiffer is a journalist. He is a book author. He's an analyst. He's worked for Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty. He leads the Institute of Current World Affairs. But it always takes, there's a committee, it's a coalition, they're partners, we're a partner American purpose. It always takes one person, if I may say, to conceive of things and then drive them and make them happen. So it's my pleasure to introduce to Greg, who played that role and made this happen principally. And he will introduce Miriam and his distinguished panel. Thanks, all of you, for being here today. Greg, you have a call? Jeff, thank you so much. And also to Sid Lipsett and everyone at American Purpose on this truly shocking day. The Kremlin's killing of Ajaxi Navalny is meant to fan hopelessness among its critics and a sense of inevitability about the longevity of Putin's paranoid, Stalinist regime among Russians at home. Our panelists will talk about that, I hope, today. But first, I want to say that we're very happy to have Jeff Gadman back here in person in Washington after having been acting president of Radio Free Europe. In addition to all the important writing and discussions that his group is putting on, he's still committed to RFERL and not least campaigning to release Al Su, who is essentially being held hostage in a Russian prison. And also big thanks to the US Institute of Peace and to Mary Glantz, to Elizabeth June, Heather Ashby, and Ambassador Bill Taylor. Thanks so much for putting on this series with us and hosting us so well here. And also thanks to everybody joining us online. This conversation is the most challenging of all of our series of four talks because it concerns very big unknowns. Even though what comes after Vladimir Putin or Putinism, if his regime is maintained by successors, has already been one of the biggest questions about Russia for the past almost a quarter century since Putin's sweeping into power ended a decade of post-Soviet Westernizing reform. Looking to history is crucial. Putin is very much the product of traditional political Russian culture, having resurrected the kind of authoritarian regime that existed not only during the 70 years of Soviet rule, but also centuries of Tsarism. But the reasons for Putin's success and his longevity exist very much in the present day. Among them, some of the determiners of the Russian character and Russian culture, the country's vast geography, its terrible climate, its terrible winter, things that reinforce the importance of the collective rather than the individual in the imagination of a society for which survival has always been challenging. So what are the conditions that will help determine what comes next, both inside Russia and globally? It's crucial that we think about them now for our sake as well as for Russia's. What are the main challenges facing institutional and social reform, including decolonialization, interpreting of history and identity, and the interests of Russia's many minorities? How can the United States and other Western countries play constructive roles next time around? What lessons learned from the 1990s? I am absolutely delighted that we have some of the leading Russian exile voices here to discuss these questions. And I think another way to describe them simply is leading global intellectuals. Sergey Guryov joining us online from Paris, I think, is provost and professor of economics at Sciences Po at Paris University. And later this year, he will be the next dean of London Business School. He previously ran the new economic school in Moscow. He's served as chief economist of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. And he is co-author of the book Spin Dictators, The Changing Face of Terny in the 21st Century, which is an absolute must read. He is also a central hub of the Russian intelligentsia in exile. Natalia Arnaud here with us in Washington is a well-known advocate of democracy and human rights who is founder and president of the Free Russia Foundation, a fantastic, dynamic organization that provides all kinds of help that is very crucial and nurturing to civil society actors, to future leaders, and many other exiles persecuted by the Russian and Belarusian governments. Free Russia is also a leading voice here in Washington and generally to Western policymakers advocating effective Russia and Eurasia strategies. Joining us from Berlin online, I think he's in Berlin, where he's based, is Michael Zyger, a leading independent journalist who worked for Newsweek Russia and the business daily Commissant before becoming founding editor-in-chief of the TV news channel Dost. He is the author of the acclaimed All the Kremlin's Men and most recently, the excellent new book War and Punishment, Putin, Zelensky and the Path to Russia's Invasion of Ukraine, although the British version that I read had a different subtitle. Michael won the International Press Freedom Award in 2014 and he had a fabulous piece just yesterday in the New York Times about how the Kremlin may feel that even completely sham elections are too much of a risk for Putin. Also joining us here in Washington is Jordan Andrews. He is a State Department Fellow here at USIP. He was previously Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, where he oversaw justice sector assistance programs across Europe and Asia. He's also served on the National Security Council and abroad, including in Russia and Kazakhstan. Here at USIP, Jordan has overseen an impressive big expert project considering the potential for future political change in Russia. And we are honored to have as moderator, Miriam Lanskoy, who is Senior Director for Russia and Eurasia at the National Endowment for Democracy. She is a political analyst and an expert in democracy promotion in post-Soviet Eurasia. She co-wrote the Chechen struggle, Independence One Unlost, with former Chechen Foreign Minister Ilyas Akhmadov, and it's great that we have Miriam moderating today. So our panelists will talk for about 50 minutes, followed by a Q&A with the audience. Here in the room, please raise your hand if you have a question during that time. For those joining on Zoom, please type your questions into the Q&A box and we will read them to the panelists. And with that, we'll hand over to you, Miriam. Good morning, everyone. It's a difficult and sad day. We learned that most likely Navalny passed away and I think correctly characterized as killed by this regime. And I think, although the lawyers representing him and his team are looking for confirmation for facts before we can be absolutely certain, most likely it probably is true and I think we do have to start with thinking about what this means for Russia, for Russia's democratic movement and for the future. Let me start by saying that, of course, I'm very, very sad for Navalny, for his family and consider this a real tragedy for everybody that knew him. At the same time, even though I'm very sad, I feel more deeply that I must do tomorrow more than I've been doing yesterday. And that is how martyrdom works. It is the most powerful narrative in human history. I'd like to point out to you that Pontius Pilate did not destroy Christianity hardly and that many, many people in Russia today, I suspect, are feeling the way that I do that the people who are in jail demand from us more on the path of defining Russia's future. So why don't I stop there? That's kind of my own first reaction. What I would suggest to our panelists is perhaps what we start with is to go around and get your reactions to this news. And then on the second time around, we will get more into scenarios and questions about different paths of Russian development in the future. And Sergey, why don't we start with you? Thank you. Thank you very much, Miriam. The panel is about the possibility in Russia, future of Russia. Interestingly, in the last conversation with Alexei before he's going back to Russia in January 2021, we had this conversation with him in December 2020. It's still on the YouTube channel of TV Rain, the TV channel that Mikhail was at some point the founding editor-in-chief. And also on my YouTube channel, we talked exactly about those issues. And I think this conversation is something that I really recommend to watch because it clearly communicates what Alexei was standing for. I still don't know and I still that this tragic news is not confirmed. But I would just say that Alexei had a very clear vision for Russia. He's Russia. His possibility in Russia was an East and will be the vision of a European democratic peaceful country, inclusive, civil nation state and not empire. This country where everybody would have an opportunity to prosper. And this is something that was very, very clear. And I highly recommend reading this transcript of this interview or watching this interview. That's a very, very clear message, which I certainly support. And I guess that's where I would like to end my introductory remarks, because I think on this day I just can say listen to what Alexei has said. Also watch his words in the film, Navalny, where he is actually asked this question, what happens if they kill you? He tells exactly this, like you said, Miriam. They kill me because they will if they kill me, they will kill me because they're afraid because they know that we are strong. And you should continue doing more exactly because you know that we are stronger than them. And so we should continue this fight. So I'll stop here. And I guess later on we'll have more specific questions. Thank you, Mikhail, will you come next? Yeah, thank you, Miriam. I think one of the most important questions for this morning is not about post-Putinist Russia, but about post-Navalnyist Russia and how Navalny's death can affect us. Can what influence to the Russian society, to the Russian state, to the Russian bureaucracy? And actually, there are two different, two quite opposite versions. And the first answer is that everything is going to change because for a lot of people in Russia and outside of Russia, Navalny for many years has been the symbol of the future. He was, for many years, he was considered to be the future president of Russia and a lot of people have lived with that knowledge, that he is the path. He is the person who gets the vision. He has always been the most prominent visioner about Russia's post-Putinist future. And it was very clear and it was very straightforward. And he has always been ready to admit his mistakes if previously he says something wrong. Another answer that I should speak about as a pragmatic journalist, pragmatic Russian watcher who has seen a lot of changes and this answer would be that nothing would change, that all emotions aside. But Alexei Navalny was in prison for so many years. He was not particularly visible by majority of Russians inside the country. He was not the actor of the life outside of Russia. So probably the theory might have been that actually it's going to be the same, nothing would change. But as a historian, I know that this answer is wrong. So the pragmatic, the usual answer, that hypothesis that great leaders go and they don't leave a trace or just that great newsmakers can disappear and nothing will happen. In Navalny's case, this answer is clearly wrong because he is going to be much, from starting this day, he's going to become much more than he was. If we accept the fact that he's dead, that means that his story is fully written. And he has become the pure and genuine example of Russian Messiah. It sounds weird. I'm sorry for those strange words. But in contemporary Russian history, we have never had that example of the person who was so idealistic and who was so devoted to his Russia's case, who could show us that ideal moral example. And I think that was one of the reasons for a lot of Russians to become very cynical. We have been discussing the cynicism as the mortal disease of Russia today for many years. We have been discussing that Russians are cynical. They do not believe in democracy. They do not believe in freedom of speech. They do not believe in fair elections. They think that everything is propaganda. They think that every politician is the same. So now they have a chance to stop believing that. Now they have a chance to see that not everyone is equally cynical. Now there is the way for many Russians to think twice. So I guess that post-Novolnist Russia could be very different from the day we had yesterday. Sorry for my emotional words. No, that was great. Natalia, come to you. Yeah. Well, first of all, I would urge everybody not to talk about Alexei Navalny in the past tense. We still don't know what happened. Navalny's lawyers are now en route to the strict regime colony in Yemal, and what the Russian authorities did happened on Friday. It's very, very possible that the lawyers will be allowed to enter the prison only on Monday. And the Russian authorities, whatever they did, will have a lot of time to hide any crimes they did. And of course, also, we shouldn't, if confirmed, we shouldn't say like the Kremlin, pushing the narrative that Navalny has died in prison and speaking about blood clots and things like that, which is very ridiculous. In that case, it would be clear that the Kremlin's regime and Vladimir Putin personally assassinated Alexei Navalny. And I will never be able to talk in any case about him in the past tense, like I cannot do that about Boris Nemtsov. For me, he is the most alive person. Alexei Navalny is the Russian opposition leader who developed this vision of the beautiful Russia of the future. He is a hero. He is a symbol of Russian resistance, a courage of Russian people. Heroes don't die. Heroes motivate us, as Miriam said, to do more things. I feel very outraged, I feel very angry. But I know that when me or anybody on my team or anybody in our community feel exhausted, feel nervous breakdown, feel burnouts, whatever, we will always remember about people like Boris Nemtsov, like Anna Politkovskaya, like Natalia Stimirova, like Alexei Navalny. And I hope that we just, all of us, do a lot to change the situation inside Russia, because we do need Putin Russia as soon as possible. It's too murderous, too atrocious. And the beautiful Russia of the future that Alexei Navalny believed in is really something we do need. It's very possible. We do deserve it. The world will be better. And it's maybe just only emotional things, but it's also what gives us motivation and courage to all of us. Alexei said himself in this interview, to Sergei Guriyev and many other interviews, that if it ever happens, it means that Putin fears him and people like him. It means that regime is not strong at all. Even if it's scared of people who are in jail, like in the very, very far north. And again, and we also should think about all other political prisoners. They are not safe, all of them. I'm immediately thinking about Vladimir Karamurza, about Lya Yashin, about Alexei Gurinov, about Ivan Gershkovich, about Sokormashv and many others. We should do everything. We just, we cannot sit still. We should act and act more and double our efforts. Thank you. Thank you. So very hard to add to what's already been said. But what I would mention is that with this somber news today, if it turns out to be true, it's really a reminder of just how, as has been said, how fearful, how insecure, how brittle an authoritarian regime is and becomes. And it further demonstrates the moral and the political bankruptcy of Putin and the system that he has created. It also reminds us that it's important to stay connected to our faith that regimes like this, who are this insecure, this weak, this fearful, already carry within themselves the seeds of their own destruction. And the analogy I like to use is a pressure cooker. Regimes like this, in their growing insecurity, feel the need to close off every little escape valve that lets pressure out of the system. And as they do that, the pressure builds and builds inside the pressure cooker. And this leads them to be fearful that any release of pressure, however small, could cause the whole system to blow, that the lid would blow off the pot. And so this is why regimes like this tend to look very, very strong until they're not. It's a cliche, but the pressure cooker looks stable until the lid blows. And part of the challenge here, since none of us can predict when or exactly how the lid will blow, we try to envision different ways change could come politically in a system like Putin's. And it was my privilege about a year ago to lead an exercise. We had close to two dozen very experienced Russia hands from across a wide spectrum, some from civil society, academia, think tanks, and current and former government officials in the national security and foreign policy realm. All told, probably hundreds of years of experience in the group working on Russia. And their strong recommendation was to not get sucked into specific scenarios of how political change might happen or who might succeed Putin. There are endless rabbit holes to go down. Instead, they encouraged policymakers to think about the type of regime that would be produced if and when political change comes. And we know political change will come. We don't know when. Putin's lifespan will end at some point, however it ends. But to be prepared for that, this group was very emphatic that we are not about regime change. Putting the US finger on the scale, trying to pick a winner in Russia's internal political dynamics is almost certainly counterproductive and not likely to succeed. But that said, there were lots of things that that group felt that we could be prepared for. And they grouped all of the many scenarios into three buckets. One was we will get a regime in Russia that is aggressive, not unlike the Putin regime, perhaps even more so. The second one is we will get a regime that either genuinely or falsely appears to be liberalizing. And then the third bucket is the chaos bucket that there will be strife or a contestation of power inside Russia for some period of time. And their overwhelming recommendation was, just to summarize a lot of material, their overwhelming recommendation was don't be afraid of the chaos bucket, that sometimes things do need to fall apart in order to build something anew. And they were very reluctant to get sucked into personalities and individuals and particular modes of transition to avoid some of the mistakes that they felt were made in the 1990s. So there's a lot more to unpack there, but those are kind of the three major pieces. And there are lots of other takeaways that we'd be happy to discuss further. But from a perspective of people who follow Russia closely here in Washington, those are some of our thoughts. And I think if today's news, unfortunately, turns out to be true, the kind of Black Swan event that could release a little bit of pressure in the Russian regime could very well be upon us, could still be years away. So I look forward to today's discussion and thank you, Miriam and others, for allowing me to join you. Thank you. Thank you very much, Oregon. You've given us sort of an ideal way of segueing to the question of scenarios. And I like very much how you phrase this that what the experts that you've consulted with to write the non-paper, they seem to be of the opinion that you can't get to a positive scenario, perhaps without chaos, perhaps chaos is a step towards it. And maybe that's a question that I'd like to ask the others. We tend to group different kinds of scenarios as the present continues indefinitely. In my personal opinion, that's the least likely. We're in a historical pivot point where unexpected things are happening all the time. And Russia is changing very, very rapidly. There are many scenarios of destabilization, be it some kind of popular revolt, be it private armies, be it a technocratic coup. I would like to push, if I may, panelists to tell me, how do you think about them? How should how should we think about potential destabilizing scenarios? What might be positive ones? Would you always consider them to be negative in a situation where the present seems to be dragging Russia further and further into totalitarianism? How do we think about the possibility of some kind of protest, other kinds of possible scenarios in the future? Often we're very scared of them because we saw, we have a story about the Russian Revolution, we have a story about the 1990s, and we consider chaos to be extremely, extremely harmful. So why don't we go around again and talk about kind of future scenarios and how to approach or how to judge the possibility of different kinds of instability in the future? Why don't we start with you, Sergey? Thank you, Miriam. I think, by definition, blacks ones are impossible to predict. But indeed, we can identify trends that can bring destabilization of regimes. The pressure on the regime that we talked about is indeed mounting through different events. And we saw pre-Gosjean school, which was completely unexpected, and yet it happened. We also know that other people have learned from pre-Gosjean school that it's dangerous to rebel against Putin, physically dangerous. And I'm pretty sure that that's been clear to many people around Putin before and now even more clear. But we do see protests, we see protests of family members and mobilized soldiers. We do see that Putin bets everything he has on victory in Ukraine. It will be very hard for him to just leave Ukraine. And therefore, I think if Ukraine gets to win this war, and that depends to a great extent on Ukraine's allies, Putin will be much weaker. But in any event, I think the change of the regime will come when Putin is gone this way or another, either because he's a mortal human or because people around him understand that he's too weak and he's a liability. And even though there are huge risks involved in standing up against him or conspiring against him, they would still see that he is dragging them down the drain. So at some point, at some point, he will go and that will destabilize the regime. This regime is based on Putin. We talked about distinctions between Putin and Putinism. But for me as a scholar of non-democratic regimes, this regime is a personalistic regime. It's based on Putin. It's based on Putin's report with some Russian people on his narrative that he brought stability and prosperity in the first decade of his rule. Nobody else around him can base their legitimacy on that. He also picked people around him so they hate each other. They don't trust each other. That helps him to protect himself from the coup in the palace. On the other hand, once he's gone, the whole system won't be able to function as before. And so I guess the regimes like this are succeeded by a collegial role of people around them who can choose a weak successor or try to establish something like a junta, a collegial body to run the country together. And eventually, I think, unless they succeed in building a very, very repressive Stalinist-level repressive or North Korean-level repressive regime, eventually they will have to start negotiations. And that will involve internal liberalization and also the bargaining over removing certain sanctions in exchange for getting out of Ukraine over whatever calendar. So I think there is an opening here once Putin is gone. Before that, I think we shouldn't really hope for the change and to push Putin out either physically. That is not something I can predict, nor I am an expert on Putin's health or socially and politically, meaning that Russians will protest. Now we see protests of families of the draftees, but there will be more protests related to economy. Economy is not doing well. So eventually this will make Putin a liability more than a asset to people around him. It's hard for them to coordinate. They are scared of being poisoned and killed themselves. But at some point, as Jordan said, this pressure cooker will not manage to function as before. So I think these are big trends which we can already observe. The pressure is mounting. And unfortunately, we cannot identify a specific moment when the system cannot function as before. Thank you. Mikhail? Thank you so much. As a person who has once written the book called The Empire Must Die about the Russian Revolution of 1917, I love comparing Russia today to what used to happen 100 years ago. And I think that for now, those comparisons do not work. So yes, the revolution as happened 100 years ago won't happen again due to a lot of different reasons. Professor Guriev says that Russian economy is not doing great, but still it's not catastrophic enough to cause the revolution of a scale of 1917. As we remember Vladimir Lenin was describing the situation, saying that Russian working class has nothing to lose except for the chains. And that was the very important condition for the revolution. And we see that in Russia today, the majority of people still have a lot to lose. And overall, the level of living, the standards of living are much higher than they used to be 20 years ago or like ever in Russian history. And when it comes to the bureaucracy, when it comes to regional authorities, when it comes to the people who run the security apparatus, it makes it even more important. They have a lot. They have a lot to lose. And I think that's, in a way, that's for me, that's the proof that the real chaotic scenario is not possible within the nearest work. At least if I was, if I had to speak about the perspectives for Russia yesterday before the news we received this morning, I would be definitely saying that I do not believe in chaotic scenario because of that kind of stability in Russian bureaucracy, because of that kind of interdependence of Russian bureaucracy that seems to be very unified and very enjoying a lot the way of life they have. They still didn't lose a lot after the beginning of the full-scale aggression. They still are not suffering because of sanctions. They still are really thankful for President Putin for the way of life they have. And I think that provided that moral atmosphere within Russian bureaucracy, within Russian security services, the most probable scenario is obviously, and it's not the shortest scenario, is some kind of the second act of Stalin's death. Putin is gone and a group of people who surrounded him are starting, trying to deal with it, trying to organize a junta in the interim system of balances. And that could be the beginning of the very long process of transformation. And I guess that Putin's regime is going to survive and is going to be slowly transformed after his death. But his death is obviously the major condition for any changes in future Russia. I don't think that any kind of revolution, any kind of popular protest, or at least yesterday I was sure that any popular protest is not able to change the situation. Okay, thank you. Natalia, do you want to say a bit about scenarios? Sure, well, it's difficult to predict talking about Russia. When in December of 2012, I had to flee Russia on a 48-hour notice, I thought I'll be back in a year because I saw the biggest rally on Balotna and Sakharov. It seemed like the situation is going to change. It was unimaginable even to believe about the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. It was hard to think that it can last that long. I think, but now we don't need a crystal ball, all of us, to discuss this so-called upcoming presidential elections. We understand that Putin will win with a landslide and just strengthen his power of Russia and portray his predetermined and staged reelection as an endorsement of the war with Ukraine. But at the same time, yes, we understand that this regime is personalistic and it will change. The same as Miriam, I don't believe that it will be the same. And Putin is more like, I don't believe in Russian elites who are the most cowardice or I don't believe that Russian military would start being an actor. I more believe in biological reasons and I more believe in Russian society. And I don't think that again United Russia will play some role in this personalistic vertical of power. Putin is more like, I don't know, Portugal, Salazar or Spain's Frank or rather than Chinese Mao or Soviet Stalin. But also, I understand that there are a lot of skepticism about good scenarios in Russia. But as a pro-democracy Russian, we just cannot afford not to believe in the good scenario and, moreover, to fight for it, to have this vision and to have to build roadmaps, how to get there. It's impossible for us just to give up and just to listen and be pessimistic. We just don't have this luxury to do that. We have to fight every second of our life for that. Also, from history we know that all regimes eventually fall and we should be very prepared. It was a big mistake to be ready for changes after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Also understand that we have to act now, improving the things in the future. For example, I cannot not help like Freedom House and many other organizations in the Netherlands of course and others, not to help exiled Russians because we know how they understand the situation inside Russia, how they are influencing the public opinion, how they understand how to counter propaganda and do many other things. They will be the ones, not foreign agents as the Kremlin regime portrays them, but they are agents of change. They are the ones who will be. The good scenario is when it's implemented by pro-democracy Russians. I understand that if my organization, many others, that we stop working in Ukraine, with the Ukrainians, searching for Ukrainian POW, civilian hostages for children, working with the Ukrainians to return them, documenting war crimes, doing many other things, like saying what is efficient with sanction regime, what is not, how the Kremlin regime circumvets the sanctions, things like that, the regime will prolong more. So again, our action now is much more important than again thinking about it. There are so many probabilities, but if we don't act now, it will be like when, again, when Putin dies, and he will eventually, again, Putin won't die. And this won't be the triumph of democracy. It will be just the beginning of a very painful work with our society, which is zombified by this propaganda for so many years. And again, we cannot afford to waste time working with Russians now. Yeah, please, Jordan. Just a really quick comment. So our group of Russia experts identified the war in Ukraine as crucial to the future of Putin's regime, acknowledging that Putinism may survive long after. They basically concluded that the sooner and the more overwhelming Russia experiences a defeat in Ukraine, the more likely Russia is to get a true opportunity for change, significant change. And so their overwhelming recommendation to policymakers was support Ukraine as much as possible as soon as possible, because that's what gives Russia the greatest hope for positive change along the lines of what Natalia was saying. Yes, I think that's a very correct comment and point. I would note a couple of things. One is my concern right now about political prisoners, especially Vladimir Karamuzov and Yashin and Pivotov. But of course, first of all, Karamuzov, because he's also suffering in terms of his health and the need to do a trade. Putin indicated in his interview that he's looking for a trade. I would note that Russian authorities arrested a German tourist recently, and perhaps that's one area. And then of course, support for Ukraine is essential part of looking for change in Russia itself. Should we open up to questions? I have many. I can keep going and asking questions, but we may have some in the room. We have microphones coming around, so please wait for a microphone. There were several hands up here, and then there's one with her. That's Russia. Thank you all for speaking today. I have a question. Do you think that the events that happened today with the death of Navalny, do you think that will convince the Republican and Congress to support Ukraine, to give more aid to Ukraine, and do you think it will also maybe help to lead to the downfall of Trump? Thank you. I don't know who wants to take that. I would say there are a number of things going on right now. There's, in addition to the news today about Navalny, there's also statements about new threats from Russia from in our Congress, and there's clearly a conversation going on in the House. Surely these two things are perhaps related. I don't know if anyone wants to say more about kind of US politics on these issues, but yes, support for Ukraine is key for Russia's future also. Gregory and then Alexei. Thank you very much, Miriam, and thanks to all the panelists for really a terrific, terrific discussion on this very sad and depressing day. I have a question for all the panelists, but I'd like to say that, or anyone who feels free to address it, Mikhail, you've written very compellingly about the formation of the Russian imperial creation myth. You've written about it in a very nuanced way, but lots of others have recently written about this too. Often the conclusion is, well, Russians have been doing these kinds of things for hundreds of years, and so that's why they'll continue to do it. At the same time, Sergei, you've looked at the globalization of authoritarianism and external factors affecting them, and you've written about what you call a modernization cocktail. Mikhail Sergei, anyone else? Could you say a few words about both of these things, looking inwardly to Russia and Russian history, and also external conditions, and specifically, have your opinions changed since both of you published your recent books, and especially perhaps now with today's news? Thank you, probably I should start. You know, Russia is not the only empire in this world, and when you say that Russia has been doing that for centuries, that's true. Exactly, Russia has been doing that for three centuries. Just recently, I was preparing my new project about the history of colonization of different parts of former Russian empire. I realized that we have silently passed the three centuries from the beginning of the war in Caucasus that started exactly in 1722 with Peter the First attacking Caucasus during his war with Persian Empire. So, yes, Russian experience as an empire is three centuries, and it's not the only country in the world that had to struggle with this experience, and who posed a threat to its neighbors, to other peoples, to the people of Russia as well. That was the key issue of that idea of how can we overcome it? How can we get rid of that imperial curse? What should we do with our mentality? How we should change the perception of our history to get rid of the imperialist approach to Russia? When I say we, I mean the Russian people, and in my recent book, War and Punishment, I started it and I actually finished it with the presumption that the beginning of full-scale aggression of Ukraine changes everything. That brutal point is a symbol that all previous perception is not going to work anymore, that more and more Russians would understand that the idea of Russian greatness, the idea of Russian superiority, the idea of the unique God-chosen people is really brutal and is really murderous, and after these war crimes in Ukraine, it's not going to be possible to spread that imperial disease for decades. And I still believe that even more, I was expecting very different reactions from Russian audience. What I expected was that I would face a lot of hatred because I was trying to debunk, in a very painful way, the imperial myths of Russian history. I actually started, and I will do that again and again, rewriting Russian history. I'm now still trying to eliminate traditional imperial narrative and try to write another narratives of new Russian history. And the reaction I encountered is completely different from what I was expecting. I see a lot of people who thought differently before that, before the beginning of this conversation, before the beginning of the full-scale aggression, before sometimes reading my book, they are getting involved into that conversation. Sometimes it's hard, sometimes it takes time, but I don't see that hatred from both sides. We all know that sometimes Russian liberals can also be Russian imperialists, but still, occasionally I think that we have started that very dramatic work and it's inevitable, it's going to be long, but I see some positive signs while I'm working. Sergey, did you want to comment on this? Yeah, I would like to answer the Greg's question about globalization and the impact of globalization on the nature of dictatorships. So what we wrote in this book, Spin Dictators, was that the coming transformation of authoritarian regimes from being based on open repression and fear to being based on manipulation of information and lies, this is something that is linked probably to what we did called modernization cocktail, the spread of new technology globalization. The potential benefits have been part of the global economy, not just for democratic societies, but also for authoritarian leaders. We talked about how it's harder today to grow your economy if you don't have a creative class, if you don't have people with tertiary education who are much more critical than people who can only read and write and who are good industrial workers, Stalin needed those in the 1930s. While today, if you're a successful authoritarian, like for example, leader of Singapore, you need educated knowledge workers, if you like. And this creates powerful incentives to walk away from the old model of dictatorships and indeed rule based on lies rather than on fear. Now, some authoritarian leaders decide to go back to the 20th century model. In the book, we already talked about how that was the case in Venezuela, where Chavez regime was a typical 21st century regime based on manipulation because those regimes spin dictators. While his successor, Madura, who neither had Chavez charisma nor Chavez a lack of having a lot of oil money, Madura succeeded Chavez exactly when oil prices came down. Madura went back in time and started to use brutal force. So that happens. That happens. Some of those spin dictators no longer can rule through manipulation. Actually, this is what happened in Russia as well. In the second edition of this book, which we sent to print in the end of 2022, we said that we consider what's happened as indeed Putin going Madura way. Exactly because he was facing the problem that Navalny and people like Navalny have been too effective. And then your question, Greg, is also, does that mean that our theory is wrong? No, we don't think so because what Putin has done going back in time, opening up to the model of mass repression and fear, which he already started to do before the war in 2021. In our first edition, which we finished in spring 2021, we were talking about signs that may be happening, but really completed this transformation the first week after February 24, 2022, when he closed down all independent media, blog, Facebook and Instagram and announced military censorship and started to put people in jail for many years. So that transformation also undermined Russian economy. And that, I think, eventually now understood as a big Putin's mistake because it shortened the life expectancy of Putin's regime exactly because it undermined the capacity of Putin's regime to produce those benefits that Mikhail has mentioned in the beginning for his elites, for his entourage, and of course, for Russian people at large. So I think the modernization, the globalization still creates incentives to be less brutal. But some leaders decide that they go back in time because they lack capacity to continue functioning in the state dictators or for some reason make mistakes. I think in the case of Putin, it's both the effectiveness of Russian opposition using social media. And Alexei Navalny was the leader in that. He really attracted more people than TV shows to his YouTube channel, his weekly show. He was poisoned exactly on the day when he was coming back to Moscow on Thursday to go live again on his YouTube show. Why? Because that was the most important thing for him. He understood this is the most effective tool in every week wherever he was. He was trying to come back on Thursday to go live because it was an effective tool against Putin's propaganda and lies. And in addition to opposition using social media so effectively, it's also a mistake Putin underestimated the courage of Ukrainians. He underestimated unity and result of the West, which is now being tested as we just discussed in the House of Representatives as well. But still, the West has done unexpectedly well relative to Putin's expectations. And he also overestimated his own army, which turned out to be corrupt and demoralized. So that was a mistake by Putin. But again, and I agree with everybody who said, we need to give more weapons to Ukraine, more money to Ukrainian government to win this war. If you want Russia to be democratic and peaceful, if you want to kick out Putin, Ukraine should win. And I think this is something which has nothing to do with spin dictators book, which I agree is a great book. But this is something which is, we see a war from 20th century going on in Europe today. And these are the wars which are not only one in the informational battle field. These are the wars which are also being fought. These are hot wars which are being fought on the battle field. And Ukraine needs weapons for this. And unfortunately, the European Union cannot help Ukraine with that. Only the United States can. A quick two-finger. I mean, I was pointing. A quick two-finger and then I think we'll collect some questions. Right. Get back to some questions. So on this question of Russia with an imperial identity, in many ways it's like Russia is still a 19th century European colonial empire power. Somehow Russia didn't get the memo in the 20th century that empires are no longer advisable, desirable, sustainable, acceptable. And our group identified that Russian idea as a great imperial power with the right to a sphere of influence on its neighbors as the greatest impediment for progress. That until that idea is surrendered and Russia embraces a different future for itself, we will continue to face an aggressive Russia and have to take measures to protect ourselves, our allies, and our partners. So why don't we collect a few more questions? So I saw Alexei, I saw this lady here. So maybe do one, two, three, and four. Is that okay? My question is to Mr. Andrews. What do you expect would be the current administration's response to Navalny's murder beyond verbal condemnations? Would there be any physical act? Like for example, we know that President Biden limited the range of the missiles provided by the United States to Ukraine in order to avoid escalation. Would be the murder of Navalny sufficient reason to escalate the situation? Thank you. Thank you very much. My name is Matthew Murray. I teach at Columbia and I formed an NGO in Russia to fight corruption and worked with Alexei for five years. And so a question about what he might be thinking right now about a response is the following. Is there an opportunity now to flood the information space in Russia with all of the great work that he did over the history of his anti-corruption foundation that was very analytical, right? Extremely technical and sort of making the case around Putin's systemic corruption. So strategically, tactically, is there a moment here? And I'm really asking this question because I don't know whether we in the West have done enough to flood the Russian information space and make the case around just how corrupt Putin and his people are, whether there are limitations on that technically, whether there are risks to it. I'm sure you all have views of this, but I'm just sort of re-raising this question at this point. Thank you. Thank you. Can we take two more? Thank you. I'm Priscilla Klap with USIP. I'm in the Asia Center here. I'm looking at Russia from a different perspective than what we've been discussing this morning. I think that the decision to invade Ukraine has created some other significant pressures that will affect Russia's future from the East, particularly the alliance with China. China is in the process of repopulating Siberia, both demographically and economically. Millions of Chinese have moved into Siberia. They are taking over large parts of Central Siberia. And that's a long-term Chinese ambition, particularly with Xi Jinping. This is being ignored, obviously, because he's dependent upon the relationship with China. The other big thing that he's doing that could affect internally is using the Asian minorities and other minorities in the country as cannon fodder, fodder in the war on Ukraine. And how will that affect internal stability in the future? Will other parts of Russia start to peel off towards Asia in the future? Is Russia going to get split between Europe and Asia? These are global trends that I think we shouldn't be ignoring as we look at the post-Putin period, because he has sown the seeds of a lot of Russia's potential future destruction. Thank you, and behind you. Thank you. My name is Elena Davlikanova. I am a democracy fellow with the Central European Policy Analysis. And thank you very much for talking a lot about the meaning of the victory of Ukraine for changes in Russia and the recent report of the Central European Policy Analysis containing Russia securing Europe also thinks that it is extremely important. But I would like to ask you what do you mean by the victory of Ukraine, because the narrative changed from as long as we have to, as long as we can. And now Ukraine is still standing, and this is already a victory. And my second question is, do you think that the strategy of the United States, which allowed Ukraine to not be defeated, but never allowed Ukraine to actually win this war by now, should be forgotten? And how should it be changed? Thank you. Okay, we've got a lot of questions who wants to start. Natalia, why don't we start with you? We haven't spoken. Yeah, so on history, it's very important for us Russians to understand that we are in this point because we didn't analyze our history well enough after the collapse of the Soviet Union. We didn't condemn the crimes of the Soviet regime. We didn't think about all this. When I was in school, we were taught that like my ethnicity of Bryats and many others, we were voluntarily joined the Russian Empire. And so we didn't discuss all of that. We didn't discuss that, because it's a huge country, it's not 11 time zones, it's not now 80 plus regions, it's 190 ethnic minorities as well. All this is very important for us to move forward. But at the same time, it's very important not to become hostage of our history. This is what Putin does. He's twisting history. He's making it as a dominance while the mentality and behavior of many people, it's impacted by their experience, but who is next to them about their environments. And so it's very important for us, for democracy Russians to find good things, positive things in our history, to find new heroes, new concepts and just to build on that. To make our history not like leader-centric, not to discuss Tsars and then Soviet leaders and then Putin and all that, but to remember about people's resistance. Right now in history, not only all these who are on the Putin side, but also we should remember about those who resisting inside Russia and in exile about all these political prisoners and all these protests about setting conscription centers on fire, derailing trains and all that. It's also part of the history. So I think this is also very important about flooding the space. I think it's also up to Russians to talk to Russians and to give this truthful information what is happening. Technically it's very difficult because of all these restrictions and self-imposed sanctions of the big tech and not be able to target, have more targeting inside the country and things like that. While at the same time Russia is the second country in the world to install VPNs or again a lot of things are happening in social media and even old school methods like printing out internets, stuffing mailboxes and things like that. So this is happening. On ethnic minorities, Asian minorities, it's true that it was very disproportionate, especially in the beginning of the war, but it's not only ethnical, national republics. It was more, those being conscripted to the war, they are from the poorest regions of Russia, including of course the majority of them are national republics. And it was of course a deliberate strategy, a deliberate policy of the Kremlin's regime to empowerish regions, to take all the money to Moscow and then distribute it between regions. The biggest demand is for federalization. Russian federation is a very patenkin village. It has never existed as a unitary state. There is more demand to have democratization of Russia, decentralization and federalization rather than anything else rather than separatism. And even if it happens, it's also not that easy. It's still 80 percent Russian minority, majority. It's still 70 percent of territories. It's very difficult even to think about all this border-wise and anything else, composition-wise. Again, in the Republic of Buryat there are less than 30 percent of Buryats and only I think six national republics where the titular ethnicity is in majority in this region. It was again Stalin's policy to divide to like again the Republic of Buryatia was dividing the five parts now with three regions of the Russian federation. And all this, it will be huge Pandora box, it will be, it's more like all these decolonization should happen in our, without values, without mentality rather than like it's a process again but also it's good and all the ethnicities nations they should have the right for choice but only after democratization this is the first thing. Only democracy in Russia is a guarantee of sustainability of Ukraine's victory and under Ukraine's victory we understand borders of 1991, internationally recognized borders, no Russian troops everywhere, no influence, nothing, just like mind your own business and Ukraine of course joining NATO, EU, whatever Ukraine wants like and be like civilized normal neighbor. This is the victory of Ukraine like for us and then. Just to pick up a couple of questions. So as a fellow here at USIP I certainly don't speak for the US government, I don't represent the government and I wouldn't presume to predict their reaction to today's events if it proves to be true. What I will say is that this news would add to an already massive pile of evidence that the Putin regime is engaged in an endless stream of illegal, horrific, immoral, dangerous, destabilizing behaviors in Ukraine and elsewhere and so this just adds to the case that our job number one should be to help Ukraine and to deter, contain and mitigate Russia's unhelpful, unconstructive, destructive behaviors throughout the international system. On the question of communicating and kind of saturating messaging into Russia, Putin's ability to control the modes by which people can communicate with Russians, he spends a lot of time and resources on preventing those kinds of communications. So without a doubt it is hard. Lots of folks are racking their brains trying to figure out how do we communicate directly to Russians? How do we communicate a vision to Russian, ordinary Russian citizens that there is a potential future out there in which they can be independent, secure and prosperous and they don't need to fear us or anyone else for that matter and the tools are limited, it's difficult and that's why in some ways and those messages also often are better from other Russians and so you know there are lots of communications with the Russian community in exile about how they communicate with their friends and the family and colleagues back in Russia. So I'm certainly not an expert in that field but I know a lot of folks spend their time trying to build those bridges and establish that communication and you know however we may feel about the Putin regime getting those messages, a hopeful message to the Russian people should be and is part of the goal here. Sergey Mikhail did you want to comment on any of those questions? Yeah I would just say a couple of words on what victory of Ukraine is. I understand the question, I understand that today in the US indeed the narrative has changed but since we call this session exchange with Russian exiles I would like to say that all Russian opposition organizations, communities have spoken really clearly what victory of Ukraine is, should be and why we need victory of Ukraine and all opposition politicians including Alexei Navalny exactly a year ago when he wrote his letter, open letter from prison on the first anniversary of the full scale invasion, his 15 points of Russian citizens, in this letter he said very clearly Russia should come back to 1991 borders withdraw from Ukraine, Russia should send war criminals to international tribunals, Russia should pay reparations to Ukraine and all other opposition leaders in Russia have said the same myself including as a member of Russian actions committee and I've also signed a Berlin declaration that's been done and we all agree on what victory of Ukraine means. Now is that victory feasible this year? I don't know, I certainly know it's not feasible without massive support from the United States and Europe to Ukrainian government and I call on Western leaders to provide the support exactly to support to honor Alexei Navalny's call from prison a year ago and his other speeches so in that sense I think the victory of Ukraine is very clearly defined and should be perceived. Thank you. I just want to add a few sentences I definitely agree with Sergey that victory of Ukraine is very important for Russia and for the future of Russia and that's definitely the top priority. Another important issue that comes to my mind today after all those questions is that yes we need to remember that the Russian people doesn't mean Putin and we don't need to we must remember not to equalize that and we must remember that there are a lot of people inside Russia who believe in the democratic future of Russia. We now see the videos and the pictures we're receiving from Russia that in a lot of cities there are spontaneous memorials being organized for Alexei Navalny although the news is not confirmed but a lot of people are very emotional they are paying the tributes they're bringing flowers although they understand that it must be very dangerous for them physically and we must remember that we and like the West has a lot of allies in Russia and these people are important because these people are the future of Russia and yes it's important to think about them it's important to think of how we can help them it's yeah we don't need to flood Russia with any kind of information because there are a lot of very high quality Russian media working in exile and they are working they are watched in Russia they have their audience but there are very easy steps for for example after the the beginning of full-scale invasion Google and YouTube made a sanction against all Russian media all Russian YouTube users and any independent Russian media working in exile cannot monetize their work and I think that that's a problem that's that's a well-known problem for everyone who's dealing with with Russian media with Russian independent media and it seems like it's a possible to solve this problem although it's very easy to solve it so yes we I think we do we do not need to impose something we should just think of helping those Russians who already work thank you well thank you our time has ended I just want to kind of redouble the point made about flooding Russian media Navalny's films the film about the mansion had 100 million views or more than that the film that yeah please 250 250 250 minute we do not need to flood and I would I would just add Mikhail's film that he made a few weeks ago has over a million at this point looking precisely at the question of Russia colonialization of Siberia so there are there are Russians making excellent material and the best thing for us to be doing supporting them supporting their work on the question of Ukraine's victory I think all of us are very clear it's Ukraine and it's 1991 borders I'm very grateful to everyone to all of our panelists thank you it's a difficult time and very difficult questions that we're considering and thank you also to the audience and to USIP and oh Greg I'm sorry you're you're going to make some closing comments into Greg thank thank you so much Maryam and all of our panelists for an absolutely terrific discussion on this very very difficult day thank you and thank you to all of you who came here in person and to everybody online and apologies that we couldn't get to questions online and thanks also to the US Institute of Peace and to American Purpose for joining the Institute of Current World Affairs for this panel series just before we go I would like to say that video of this talk will be available on the Institute website and also on the USIP and American Purpose sites we also have video from the three previous discussions in the series including on Russian scholars in exile and on the political opposition I look forward to continuing these important conversations thank you all