 My name is Mary Glantz, and I am a senior advisor in USIP's Center for Russia and Europe. Thank you for joining us. One year ago, on February 24th, Russia launched a new offensive against Ukraine. This latest stage in Russia's decade-long war against its neighbor brought violence and destruction on a scale unseen in Europe since World War II. Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians and Russians have been killed or wounded with over 10,000 of those being Ukrainian civilians. Over 8 million Ukrainians have become refugees, and 6 million have become internally displaced. And in Russia, 500,000 people have fled the country. While the brunt of this brutality of this war has been visited upon Ukraine, its impact has been felt far beyond that epicenter. Russia has been roiled by mobilizations, sanctions, and an increasingly authoritarian regime opposed to any criticism of its war effort, including efforts to describe what it euphemistically calls a special military operation as a war. Europe has taken in refugees, supplied weapons and assistance, and dealt with the impact of sanctions. The entire world has felt the impact economically, most notably in food prices and shortages. And in new pressures on the international system. Today, we are fortunate to have gathered a panel of experts who can speak to the varied impacts of this war. Ambassador Maria Ivanovich is a senior advisor in USIP's Center for Russia and Europe and a senior fellow in the Russia and Eurasia program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. She is also a non-resident fellow at the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy of Georgetown University. Previously, she served as US Ambassador to Ukraine, the Republic of Armenia, and the Kyrgyz Republic. Among other assignments in her distinguished diplomatic career, she served as dean of the School of Language Studies at the Foreign Service Institute and as the Deputy Commandant and International Advisor at the Dwight D. Eisenhower School for National Security and Resource Strategy of the National Defense University. Earlier, she served as the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, where she coordinated policy on European and global security issues. Maria Snigavaia is a senior fellow for Russia and Eurasia with the Europe, Russia, and Eurasia program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and a postdoctoral fellow in Georgetown University's Walsh School of Foreign Service. She studies Russia's domestic and foreign policy, as well as democratic black siding in post-communist Europe and the tactics used by Russian actors and proxies who exploit these dynamics in the region. Her analysis has been published in multiple policy and peer-reviewed journals. Her research and commentary have appeared in a number of publications, such as the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, The Economist, and Foreign Policy. Throughout her career, she has collaborated with multiple U.S. research centers and think tanks, such as Center for American Security and Center for European Policy Analysis. She holds a PhD in political science from Columbia University. Lisa Howard is a senior scholar in residence with USIP's Russia and Ukraine team for the 2022-2023 academic year. She is a ten-year professor of government and foreign service at Georgetown University and president of the Academic Council on the United Nations System. Her research and teaching interests span the fields of international relations, comparative politics, and conflict resolution. She has previously held year-long fellowships at Stanford University, Harvard University, and the University of Maryland. She is fluent in French and Russian and speaks some Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian, Spanish, and German. Prior to her career in academia, she served as Acting Director of U.N. Affairs for the New York City Commission for the United Nations. She earned her master's and doctorate in political science from University of California, Berkeley, and her bachelor's in Soviet Studies from Barnard College at Columbia University. She holds certificates in Philology and Law from what is now St. Petersburg State University in Russia. Her first book, U.N. Peacekeeping and Civil Wars, won an award from the Academic Council on the U.N. System in 2010. Her other book, Power and Peacekeeping, won the 2020 Best Book Award from the International Security Studies Section of the International Studies Association. We are really grateful to have them here to discuss with us the impact of this war on Ukraine, on Europe, and on the international system. We will begin with a brief discussion and conversation in which I will ask them questions and we'll discuss their thoughts on the war. And then I will turn to the audience, both online. You can submit your questions online or here in person for a brief question and answer period. Thank you. Let me return from a trip to Ukraine. Can you discuss your observations during your visit? Yeah. So I was in Ukraine really only for two days, and it was in Kyiv, the capital. On the 23rd and the 24th, so we were there for the anniversary. And it was kind of a difficult decision to make, whether or not to go, but in the end I'm glad I did. Because even though the President of the United States had been there, just been there, bipartisan, congressional delegations, all sorts of world leaders, the Ukrainians really appreciate all of the support that they can get from all of their friends. And making that journey signals we are with you. The Ukrainian people are still, you know, as united and resilient as ever in fighting back against Russian aggression in all of its many forms. And they are courageous and they are confident of victory. But the big impression that I got, which is not going to be new to this audience, is that they're also tired. The soldiers are tired, they have not had a break in a year. And the population is tired as well. You know, they are going to keep on going, in part, because they believe, they believe in Ukraine, they believe in their freedom, they believe in their families. And they have no choice, because this is an existential war. If they stop fighting, Russia will either crucify them or kill them. And so there is no other choice than to keep on fighting and they will do that. But I think what they need from us, and this was, you know, expressed by everybody, starting, of course, with President Zelensky, and again, this is not going to be a surprise to this audience, is more assistance. They are grateful for everything the United States and the international community is providing, whether it is security systems, whether it's sanctioned support, whether it is crucially economic support, and we just saw that Janet Yellen was in Ukraine, you know, with a pretty big assistance package for direct budgetary support. But, you know, it still isn't enough. And so, you know, what I came away with was that as reassuring and as important the tagline, you know, we are with you for as long as it takes, was in the beginning and, you know, for many, many months, I think we need to update that tagline. I think we need to update it to say, we are with you and we will provide as much as you need, as quickly as you need it, so that Ukraine can win. Because I think winning is absolutely critical. It's important for Ukraine to keep that country intact. The Ukrainian people, culture and language, as it is today, and going into the future. But it's also important for, I think, the world system, because if Russia is victorious, if Russia is rewarded with territory, Ukrainian territory, that it seized illegally, Russia will keep on going beyond Ukraine. And President Putin has told us that in his writings, in his speeches, and I think we need to take him at his word. And that would be a real problem, not only for Ukraine, not only for Europe, but for the United States and the international system. This would be in contradiction to the values that, you know, all countries, including the Soviet Union and then Russia, signed up to in the UN system and in numerous treaties and agreements. And it would be, I think, a real blow to international security, certainly the US. The international system that was established after World War II, again, not news to this audience, is not perfect, needs updating. But it has kept us more secure, more free, and more prosperous than at any other time in human history. That's really interesting, and it's very interesting, especially to hear about the impact on the people there, how they're very resilient, and they're very determined, but also tired. One other thing you hear a lot about in the news is, you mentioned Putin is trying to erase Ukraine, get rid of Ukraine, and he's talked a lot about how Ukraine isn't really distinct or different from Russia. But you hear on the news when people are being interviewed, they talk about how this war has really made Ukraine and United Ukraine. Did you sense that difference between now and, say, when you were ambassador there? Well, I sense the difference more between... So I was in Ukraine as the number two at our embassy from 2001 to 2004. So 2001 was 10 years after independence. Ukraine's still sort of forming itself. And when I came back in 2016 as ambassador, that's when I really noticed it, and I think it's just become stronger ever since. And I'll give you two examples of that. One is, you know, everybody knows the Ukrainian shirt with the beautiful, beautiful embroidery they're called vishivankas. And when I was there the first time in the early 2000s, nobody really wore them. That was something your grandmother made you wear in the villages, and you didn't really want to be seen in that in Kiev. When I came back in 2016, everybody was wearing them. And you can see that they are still wearing them. It is now a symbol of pride in Ukrainian culture and justifiably so. The other example I would give you is that, you know, the Fourth of July is the biggest event when you are a diplomat overseas. We give a big party. We invite, in this case, all the Ukrainians and various other people. And at the residence in Kiev, there's what I call the Juliet balcony where the ambassador sort of addresses the assembled throng in the garden. And, you know, when I was there the first time, I was on the balcony with the ambassador. And, you know, our national anthem was played, and, you know, all the Americans sang along and they put their hand on their heart. When the Ukrainian anthem was played, nobody knew the words. When I came back in 2016, you know, on the American anthem and on the Ukrainian anthem, everybody knew the words. Everybody sang along. A lot of people put their hands on their hearts. And you can see that, you know, at various gatherings. And it is very, very touching. In just one short brief little follow-up, just because I, myself, having been a Russia watcher for years and now watching Ukraine, I've been struck by the number of Ukrainians who are Russian speakers. Yes. You find that the knowing of the anthem and the feeling of Ukrainianness extends beyond any sort of linguistic divide. Yes, absolutely. You know, unfortunately, some people are now, unfortunately, unfortunately, because of the war, many Russian speakers are now transitioning to Ukrainian, because, you know, again, as a sign of their patriotism and of their pride in their culture and language, so I think we're going to see less and less Russian over time. Because of Russia's aggressive actions. Yeah, thank you very much. It's good to hear about their determination and the importance of our support for their effort. It is critical. Like I said, the Ukrainians are confident of victory. The question is, at what cost? And we in the United States and the international community have the ability to reduce that cost greatly. And so, you know, let's just get on with it. Let's get them the weapons they need to ensure victory. Thank you. I'm going to work my way down. So I'll go to Marie. Dr. Sniegevaya next. First, it's really great to have you here. I know you're an expert on a lot of things, but one of the things in one of our earlier conversations that I really enjoyed talking to you about was what's going on inside of Russia with the Russian population. And so it'd be really valuable to have your insights on how the war in Ukraine is impacting Russian society if you could describe the sentiment in Russia around the war and how people in Russia get their information, what they understand. Sure. I'd say in a lot of ways what we see and how the Russian public responds to this war, in a lot of ways it's similar to what we've seen in the past because this is unfortunately by far not the first war. It's during his rule or reign. At the same time, there's differences. So where it's similar, Russians usually tend to rally around the flag every single time Putin starts the war. We see the spikes in approval for Putin every time, like starting with the Second War in Chechnya and people can argue that the pools are not entirely reliable in Russia today, but they've seen the same situation happening before. In this sense, this is not new. After the war, Putin's approval has spiked and so did other ratings of other authorities because these old things are correlated in Russia these days. At the same time, one thing I have to say that we come to realize this time that we haven't fully understood before is how important for Russians is this sense of belonging to this greater whole, which unfortunately tends to dominate other considerations like personal economic insecurity. All this uncertainty is being thrown away for the sake of this idea of belonging and rallying around this political leader. Putin, of course, has also over the years established this position in the Russian society where he is the leader of the Russian foreign policy and he's making Russia great again, effectively. And this legitimacy that he's got, he's using in this war in order essentially to sustain this support. This is in a lot of ways similar to what we've seen before. What is new is the underlying sort of the components that constitute the support. Because if you look at Crimea back in 2014, for example, the underlying sentiment was, we did it Crimea's outwards, it's great, everybody was enthusiastic and the society was actually unified in this almost an inspiration of how cool they felt they were. This is no longer the case. While we still see the same sort of rallying around the political leader, the underlying emotions are stress, anxiety, uncertainty, reluctance. People also actually haven't trouble to name one particular reason why Russia is actually taking part in this war, military operation. Actually, increasingly, people in Russia call this war a war. Even if some people went to jail for saying that, now it's fine. This is typical Russia. But when asked why, what is this for, people actually tend to get lost, maybe. And if you actually look at the official narratives by the Kremlin propaganda, they also sort of tend to be running out of excuses. It used to be protecting the Russian speakers in Ukraine, denitification, demilitarization of Ukraine, desitinization, my personal favorite. But essentially, even in the polls, you see that people actually are lost as to what we are doing there. And in the long term, this might be a good news because it suggests that it will be probably harder for the Kremlin to sustain this crafted majority as opposed to what we've seen back in 2014 when the fact of Crimea annexation, as you might remember, created the so-called Teflon rating for Putin. So Putin's rating skyrocketed and stayed there for a while. Now, having said that, the unfortunate reality also underlying this rating dynamic is that in the Russian society, based on the very crude numbers, you've got 7% to 15% of people with liberal, more pro-Western beliefs. Maybe 20%, 30% of Moroccan imperialist status groups. But then there is 30% to 40% of something that's called swamp, maybe not the nicest term for Ohio. But essentially, people who go with the flow, right, they just would support anything that the state does, unfortunately, for now. This has been consistently the case under Putin's rule. And unfortunately, this group tend to quite critically align with most of what they perceive being the status quo. So it's not completely impossible to take the support away from Putin, but it's going to take a while. And without their support, the more pro-Western liberal groups, essentially, they remain a minority. And this has been the consistent problem throughout Putin's rule. Just to give you the example how it works, how propaganda crafts these minorities, this majority, I'm sorry. Back in 2015, when Putin enters Syria with military support for Assad, at first, the majority of the society say, we don't need this, we don't want another Afghanistan, what are we doing in Syria? And the ratings approximately like 60% are skeptical about this, 30% say, all right, let's do it. Afterwards, TV propaganda started brainwashing. Two weeks later, you've got absolute turnaround. You've got 60% of people saying, yes, sure, that's such a great idea. We need to back up Assad against the US, the West, and 30% remain skeptical. What happened in those two weeks? This kind of group of uncertain people who go with the flow essentially switched. And this is generally how usually the state propaganda crafts these majorities, and this is just a very important nature of the Russian society that's important to understand. Now, broadly speaking, the support for the war since Putin started it, despite all these underlying components, it remained at the level from, say, 60% to 70%. It varies by a pool. I'm not the one to say that you cannot fully trust the pools in Russia. I think with the degree of skepticism and adjusting to possible problems, you certainly can rely on certain numbers just to give you the general understanding of what things look like in Russia, especially given the fact that we don't really see the opposite. There's no major anti-war protests inside Russia. You could argue that's because of the repressions, but we also don't see similar anti-war movement emerging anywhere outside of Russia, unfortunately, which suggests that the society is generally okay. They're not very happy, they're anxious, but that's fine. Another interesting thing that emerged since the war started is this actually strife for normality. Strife for things to go back to normal. Now, throughout the last war, the major decline in support for this war was not, unfortunately, induced by the Western sanctions or developments in Ukraine as much as it was actually done by Putin himself when he announced mobilization. Mobilization was highly unpopular in the Russian society according to all the evidence that we have before, and once it was announced, indeed, Putin's approval, Kremlin's multiple ratings of the authorities and the vision of the country's direction, they all dropped. But only for a couple of weeks. Even in such a major development, when Russians can no longer pretend this is the war that happened somewhere else, right, where some of the people being literally caught in the streets of Moscow and taken to Ukraine, even in that situation, you see the public opinion reluctantly acknowledge that things are not okay, but only for a couple of weeks, only for them to go back to normal and say, yes, things are still fine. And this is something that's actually surprising even for long-term observers of Russian public opinion trends to what extent this demand for normality for things to go back to normal and an attempt to close your eyes and not see anything has been persistent in the public opinion trends over the last year. So that's another interesting characteristic. Right now, if you look at the polls, there's a lot of optimism about the future. People say Russia is going to be fine. The economy is going to go back to normal. Everything is great. Why are you even asking me this question? Is there something going on? Why? This is another unfortunate element of the public opinion which suggests that it will take for Russia to come to terms with what makes sense of the catastrophe Putin got it into. That's fascinating. It raises a lot of interesting questions about the future because whatever happens in this war, Russia is still going to be there and it's still going to be where it is. And countries are going to have to coexist with it at the very least. So it raises some questions about, you know, how do you deal? What does it mean for the future if you have an apathetic mass who just wants to return to normalcy? And we don't know which of the propaganda lines they believe. Do they believe Ukraine is not a state, as Putin keeps saying, that it's not distinct from Russia? Or do they believe that Ukraine is a mere puppet of NATO in the West? Or do they just not care as long as they personally are not affected? And what does that mean going forward for relations with Russia? Yeah, as I said, again, broadly, I constitute these three groups, right? And depending on who you ask, they'll probably get slightly different responses. So the Harkish group will say Ukraine is not a state or Ukraine is just a Russian puppet. I think this is more perhaps typical of the younger generation. The fact that Ukraine is not a state is something I would imagine all the groups tend to believe, right? The ones who remember the Soviet times and like Putin himself, right? They're sort of used to this concept of Russia being the Soviet Union, being disempowered. For younger groups, Ukraine is a state, very much a state. But there, of course, they still can be brainwashed by this idea that Ukraine essentially is. It's not the war with Ukraine, it's the war with NATO or the United States. Different groups, yeah. And the propaganda works also in this way, you know, of course, right? The way it actually also does in the West. They throw different narratives at the public, and it's honestly, when you turn on Russian TV, it actually gives you false impression that there is a variation of opinions, except that the variation of opinions goes all the way, as it's been said before, from red to dark brown, right? In the sense that it's from, essentially, some crazy proto-communist ideas to all the way complete Nazism. But there's no liberalism, it's lacking there, right? So yes, for some groups, some ideas work, for others, something else works. And this is one of the reasons why people can't really give you a straightforward answer. What is it that Russia is actually doing in Ukraine? What are we trying to achieve there? And the other point I wanted to mention is there's also this group, as I said, which so-called swamp, which just changes, goes with the flow, and it's going to be probably communicating the last line that they've heard over TV channels the day before. So their opinions actually tends to fluctuate. And then, of course, there's liberals, but they're a minority. In the recent months, there was this trend that when asked for possible solutions of this problem, of this conflict, increasing number of Russians actually emphasized the importance of peace negotiations, over 50% at some point. But unfortunately, it also varies. When you ask them, like, this is what President Putin wants to do, what do you think? They tend to go with Putin, whatever Putin wants. So these, you know, the importance of the state, the Putin knows better. I'm just an ordinary small man, let the big adults in the Kremlin decide. This, unfortunately, is still there, which suggests that the impact, I would say, the impact of the economic sanctions just has not been fully felt by the society as yet. So they still have this, can afford this flexibility to delegate this authority to decide to the Kremlin. I would venture a guess that this might change as they personally experience the consequences of the war and subsequent crisis. Thank you. It's all very fascinating, I'll have to think about. Dr. Howard, I've enjoyed working with you the past year and your thoughts on the international system, which is something that Ambassador Yovanovich referenced, was the impact of this war on that. So it would be great if you could talk about how the war in Ukraine has impacted the international system, especially the foundational principles of the UN Charter and international norms, and what challenges it's presented going forward. Thanks so much, Mary. Yeah, you mentioned in your very generous introduction that I started my career in Soviet studies and then studied Soviet constitutional law from 91 to 92 when it was pretty challenging to study a constitution in a country that no longer had a constitutional system. And then since then, you know, I've built a career in academia and especially studying how wars end, how people try to make them end peacekeeping. And so these two bookends in my career are coming together here at USIP this year. Well, I've been working with Mary and everyone on the Russia-Ukraine team and it's been a tremendous privilege. So thank you so much. It's been a great year. Yes, so we have, you referenced norms, international law and institutions and I've been teaching at Georgetown for 19 years so I have to put my professorial cap on for a moment and talk about those different categories. So we have norms which are expectations of how things ought to be and then we have international law and then we have the institutions that help uphold the law but so they're sort of different stages. We have here an international norm of non-aggression that arose really after World War I abolished during World War II essentially but strengthened after World War II that states ought not to use force to change borders. So there's this norm, this idea that that should be this way. We and the rest of the world built this system of international law and that is upheld by international institutions to make sure that states don't go to war with one another and when they do that they end quickly. And one thing I've, during my research over the course of this year I've noted that there is no state in the world that has had its borders that it has now forever. Every state has had different borders and many states in the international system have border disputes. So since World War II when there's a border dispute 50 times, 5-0 times when we have a militarized interstate dispute that started to move to aggression it's gone to the UN Security Council and de-escalated. So we could have had about 50 more interstate wars since World War II than we've had. Why it's so important to uphold the norms, the laws and the institutions because interstate wars kill a lot of people. We know that's from history and that's why all states decided together that when we want to change borders we're going to do it not using a military aggression. So what Russia has done now is violated the norms, the laws and undermine the institutions that uphold these principles. So Russia has committed not only the crime of aggression Putin's Russia I should say it's not all of Russia and you can't blame all Russians, right? This is Putin's imperial kleptocratic Russia. It's his decision to violate the norm and the law of aggression. We also have violations of the laws of war how you conduct yourself during war, right? So he had war crimes, crimes against humanity and then also significant charges of genocide. So we have serious undermining of all of these principles of international law and how states ought to behave and it's not to say that all states have behaved perfectly in the US, you know, there's a lot of what aboutism but the point is that Russia has gone all out defying all of them at the same time and there's no stopping it really other than through military force. So part of what we've been trying to talk about this year is there a way to stop Russia without using military force and it's very hard at the US Institute of Peace to come to the realization that it is almost inconceivable to figure out how to end this without militarily removing Russian forces from Ukraine. So we have, this is mainly the negative impacts on the international system is what we're talking about. There are a couple of other negative impacts and then I want to talk about some inklings of positive impacts. We want to hear those. We saw at the G20 and G7 meetings last week in India that as both of you referenced we don't have very much support for the international sanctions. 32 countries have signed on to the US and EU sanctions and this, so we have this emerging divide in the international political economy. The sanctions aren't really working. So this is another instrument of foreign policy to try to figure out how to change a country's behavior the sanctions aren't really working. We moved from military to sanctions to shaming and in that sense moving on to something of a silver lining shaming is the main mechanism the UN can use right now. So because Russia has a veto on the UN Security Council the UN Security Council's hands are tied and so the decision making on Russia has shifted to the general assembly to the world parliament. It's not really a world parliament it's a vote in the general assembly. And last year around this time the general assembly took a vote and 141 countries condemned Russia for its aggression in Ukraine. And on the first anniversary of the war again we had 141 countries in the world condemning Russia for its aggression in Ukraine. So in that sense we have that is the real world material evidence of a norm that states should not use force against each other. That most countries in the world agree that Russia should not be doing this in Ukraine. Now when it comes to actually imposing costs on Russia that's where we see less agreement about how to impose costs and there is a divide as we all know. But Russia still doesn't have that much support six countries voted with Russia five countries voted last time six countries voted this time and it's a collection of prior states but I noted that even Cuba and Iran didn't vote with Russia this time. There is a sense that the norm still holds that you shouldn't use force. Mary you've also written for the USIP website that in order for this to change and Marie you reference this also to a certain extent in order for this situation to change Russia has to give up the imperial mindset the way that every European power has done over the past seven years. So if you think of all the European land empires from the Ottoman Empire to the Swedish Empire the Bulgarian Empire, Austro-Hungary the French Empire, the Prussian United Kingdom so many countries in Europe had land empires and they were forced to a certain extent through military but also through the emergence of this norm that one ought not to have imperial ambitions and that is the mindset of the norm that would be the basis of the change of Russia's behavior and so it's a question of how to convince probably not Putin and his collection of friends but the next leaders of Russia to give up the imperial mindset as every other European power has done that you can't take your neighbor's territory. You've also pointed out that Putin has a history of backing down so that might also be a possibility but I think just to conclude I think that it's possible to envision a day when Russia's ambitions will fade and that we could come back to a normal way of life both internally for Russia and in the international system because it's in everyone's interest to have a rogue Russia as you've pointed out in your book Ambassador Ivanovich that this is a rogue Russia threatens not only Russia and its neighbors but also us internally anyone Russia seeks to disrupt so how to shift that mindset and then bring Russia in that's the question I'm interested in figuring out how to answer, thanks. I think I have two interrelated and probably unanswerable questions but I'll throw them at you anyway. First, so you mentioned the imperial mindset and one of the things that I've thought is that this war between Ukraine and this war of Russia against Ukraine really reminds me of a colonial power with its colonies wanting to assert itself as an independent state and that is what I see Ukraine as sort of trying to decolonize Russia an extension of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Russian Empire and that tracks what you said about the history of imperial powers in Europe why then is it so hard for why does it seem so hard for us to convince the global south that not so much to support Russia but it seems Russia is very heavily courting the global south and a lot of their messages resonate with the global south with this anti-imperial and anti-colonialist and venture, why is it that they're not supporting Ukraine more? It's complicated. Yeah, I don't think there are easy answers. Russia is very good at disinformation I think we all know that and the early images coming out of the war from Kharkiv of non-white students especially from the global south not being allowed to board trains to leave Kharkiv even though they're leaving trains because of the Russian invasion the image spoke to a different issue which is bigotry that exists in all societies and also in Ukraine so that image I think set a lot of people's minds about Ukraine people who haven't heard about Ukraine and frankly I think it's been hard to shake that first exposure to the war and I don't know how I think talking about abstract concepts of international law sound very disingenuous especially coming from the former colonizers so in my mind it's almost a matter of reframing the conversation I mean I see this war in terms of David and Goliath but in this case as Zelinsky was saying just a couple of weeks ago in this case David needs more than a slingshot Yeah, absolutely, did you want to? Yeah, sure I agree, Russia is great at disinformation and one example is that in much of Africa Russia has successfully planted the notion that the wheat shortages, etc are because of U.S. sanctions not because Russia invaded Ukraine and did everything that we saw and blockaded the grain shipments because of U.S. actions and we, I mean we're trying but we are just not as successful at planting, not planting but sharing the truth and sharing our own narrative and as studies have shown once somebody has heard something that this is because of U.S. action and Western sanctions it's very hard to turn that around and even if you can turn it around in the short term, six months later they're back to it's the fault of the U.S. I do think though that there are and I agree the images of people from other countries being turned away, it looked like racism and that was hard and it was hard here in the United States I had a lot of people asking me about that to their credit the Ukrainian government turned that around relatively quickly but the damage was done but more broadly I think that countries in the global south wonder why this war is different from every other war because as we know there are all sorts of conflicts all over the world but yet there hasn't been the same kind of response and so I think probably not enough time to go into why this one is different but I think that people just kind of wonder whether we care about them at all and it's closer to the former Soviet Union as well my friends in Armenia want to know why the U.S. didn't intervene in the same way surely Azerbaijan was the aggressor, etc I know there's a different side to the story as well but I hear from the Armenian side so I think that's something that we need to address and address head on and I think that there's a general lament about the lack of diplomacy but actually there's a lot of diplomacy going on and I think we can see it in some of the high level visits of U.S. leaders including Dr. Jill Biden going to Africa last week I think Secretary Blinken's travel to Central Asia etc, etc, etc that we are present we are partners with much of the world and we want to be there and be supportive yeah that's a really good point and with Putin essentially trying to blow up the international system and our belief or correct belief that the international system is good for the world maybe we need to examine how to make sure that it really is good for everybody in the world maybe advance that like you said, show our understanding of ways that we might need to reform it a bit but blowing it up is definitely I think not the way to go do we have any questions from the online audience yet? we have a couple hello? yeah thanks yeah so we have a couple of questions so the first one is what does a victory look like for Ukraine in other words for Ukraine to win any of you can answer that or all I could try and then we'll see what the rest of us think I think a victory for Ukraine is simply to to have the Russian troops leave that's kind of the to restore the 1991 borders recall that Ukraine has had voting status in the UN General Assembly since its founding so those borders have been recognized for an awfully long time Crimea came a little bit later but that is an internationally recognized territory and if we're talking about the principle of sovereignty our main mind would be victory for Ukraine so victory for Russia as we said as Ambassador Yovanovich said is Russifying or killing Ukrainians taking over Ukraine so victory on either side looks a little bit different what happens next so there's victory for Ukraine and then there's winning the peace so if we have a forever hostile Russia trying to take over Ukraine and its neighbors forever then that victory will be it won't be hollow it would be incredibly important but it wouldn't guarantee a longer term peace and so that is the question how to ensure a longer term peace which I'm not going to take the floor forever I have some ideas about that but I'd like to hear from the rest of us I will completely echo everything that you've said except that one concerning point I wanted to add is that there appears to be some strategic ambiguity I'd say on this part of the west when defining the victory for Ukraine right everybody would answer typically it's for Ukraine to decide it's not our place to make that decision but unfortunately it is because we all understand that the Western support plays an incredibly important role in how this war unravels further and I think having a clear vision and goals in this war which define exactly what it means for Ukraine to win going back to the borders of say February 23 last year or maybe 1991 borders I think it would have helped a lot to make the policies towards Ukraine more effective in the sense of provision of the necessary help that's already been done on unprecedented levels but unfortunately still as Mashi mentioned before not enough to fully sustain Ukraine's Ukraine's success so from that perspective I think a lot depends on how the West acts and what it is and how the West defines the victory it's very important that these definitions are clear I agree I had to debate a Russian Sky News Arabic and they were just expressing this nonsense that the goal was to destroy Russia and that's not the goal I think victory for Ukraine and from the US perspective victory for Ukraine would be that that Ukraine gets back its territorial integrity and its sovereignty and that's it it's very defensive but important and it's security because I don't think anyone wants a situation where Ukraine has to remain armed like a porcupine forever to defend itself there has to be some sort of way that it can live peacefully and prosperously and securely in the future and that may unfortunately involve a porcupine for a while but security is absolutely key Do you have any questions from the audience? Hi, thank you Michelle Kellerman with NPR When China has some proposals about a peace plan or peace proposals whatever you want to call them the US response was basically that China is not an honest broker I wonder if you see any honest brokers out there could other countries play more of a role and convince Russia to give up its imperial ambitions as you say it could be countries like India or the UN do you see anybody that could be more honest? I can take a stab at it it's hard to see right now because I think the sides are so polarized and there's not a lot of mutual trust going on or even confidence and so I think that as this as developments occur it will probably become clearer I would also note that at least initially Zelensky didn't dismiss the Chinese peace proposal out of hand he said interesting I want to see the whole plan I want to talk to the Chinese about it and latched on to the issue of territorial integrity seeing that which was in the peace plan which he had not yet seen but had heard about and he said clearly that means that the Chinese are open to our position which is that Ukraine needs to have its legal borders observed by all countries including Russia I think as neither Russia nor Ukraine is ready for peace talks right now but as we see developments on the ground as hopefully Ukraine gets a stronger position militarily I think we'll also see evolving what various states propose and how that might come together and what is hopefully a constructive mix of negotiations when Ukraine is ready sorry I just have to say that apologies so one more thing I want to talk to that is that I'm going back to the discussion of the role of the global south we see consistently that one of the reasons why sanctions are not as effective as they could have been right I wouldn't say they don't work, they just not work as effectively as we hoped is of course the help of the major countries in avoiding them China, Turkey, India the crucial players on the international stage that actually helped Russia sustain decent status quo especially by purchasing energy resources but also by providing routes to smuggle the products articles that otherwise sanctions by the west that's by the way one of the reasons why I would argue global south is also not very eager to side with Ukraine because why abandon all these prolific opportunities in the post-soviet space for example you see almost a competition emerging among all these different countries like Kazakhstan, Armenia, Georgia and others competing of who is going to be the main experts for all these articles and you're offering for them to give up all these lucrative opportunities like for what so from that perspective working with these countries obviously becomes the key issue for the US foreign policymaking it's also good to see that the administration actually is on board with that right based on the trips of the US administration so I would just say I'm not a sanctions expert I'm only Dan Fried or somebody like that here you know clearly sanctions you know I think everybody hoped that sanctions would be a magic bullet and we would see you know real effects on the Russian economy that would lead to peace sooner rather than later I think there are effects on the Russian economy including you know on the important energy sector in terms of you know the amount they're selling the amount they're getting for those products and you know how much they're getting in taxes etc etc etc etc I think that sanctions are always a long term tool you know we are Americans and so we want you know results yesterday that's not the way sanctions work and especially I mean the steps that the international community has taken with regard to Russia and sanctions are unprecedented we've never sanctioned such a big economy and so we put in place a number of sanctions and we kept on putting in place sanctions and we are continuing to do so and Janet Yellen spoke about that when she was she was in Ukraine and now we are seeing the loopholes that you guys have mentioned and so we are trying to go after after those as well and we are learning you know just as you know people who are trying to avoid sanctions are learning we are learning as well and I think that you know the vice is going to get tighter and tighter and tighter over time and so that again you know we need to do these things as quickly as possible because the price Ukraine is paying for fighting for its freedom as well as ours is very high I'll take a stab at it also echoing to a certain extent what we've heard but also you know putting on my my professor had again we have like five or six major studies that show that with the promise of third party impartial monitoring that you're more likely to have a peace agreement so I think it's worth talking even though the goal now for the West and of course for Ukraine is to reestablish Ukrainian borders what happens then so with the promise of some kind of external monitoring it's more likely that you will have some kind of agreement that both sides will adhere to and that would mean as you suggested some kind of impartial leader to lead the mediation and then establish some kind of mechanism to oversee the keeping of the peace and you mentioned India India has significant ties with all of these parties India has a long tradition of UN peacekeeping it's often the number one sender of UN peacekeepers has an incredibly professional army well trained adept at these issues I'd note that India has the longest standing peacekeeping outpost on the border between Syria and Israel and Lebanon for example that's one of the oldest UN peacekeeping bases but so in my mind that would be a logical route noting also that India's second largest trading partner is the United States India has significant and building economic ties right now with Russia obviously a border dispute with China but there are still reasons why it's in everyone's interest to make sure that there's some kind of impartial observer of what comes next thank you you have any other questions my name is Hiro Patanabe I'm a correspondent of Japanese Newspaper Sankei Shinbun my question is maybe about the picture of victory so President Biden or Biden administration's official keep saying U.S. or West support Ukraine as long as it takes U.S. support Ukraine to defend itself but they look still reluctant to mention the victory of Ukraine why don't they say the U.S. West support help Ukraine win this war as soon as possible maybe they are still worried about some escalation or they are maybe seeking some possibility as Dr. said some impartial player will be involved but I just want to ask what the administration characterizes the picture of victory in this moment thank you really that's a question for the White House not so much for us but I will just share my own opinion that it's really important you mentioned several possible reasons why this might be so I think it's important not to self deter we need to decide what our own goals are we need to work with allies with our partner Ukraine on what this means and I think it's while I agree that we have a really serious stake in terms of what the outcome is on this including whether we stay the course with Ukraine because other countries are watching and other countries are taking lessons as is Russia because if Russia prevails if Russia wins Russia will keep on going so we have a huge stake in this and we have a huge stake in Ukraine prevailing but I also think that there are always rumors that countries are out there pressuring Ukraine to start negotiating to give in to various Russian demands and I was just reading an article this morning that Russia is like we're ready to negotiate Ukraine just has to concede that the territorial gains and then we're good well that's crazy it's as though a robber came to your house and stakes out the bedroom and the living room and the police come in and say you need to give the robber the bedroom and the living room because they're already here that just doesn't work and it's not going to work in the case of Ukraine where we've already seen with the Minsk agreements where there was two efforts at peace Russia torpedoed both of them and they did not turn out to be the forerunners of a lasting peace because they were not a true peace and so we need to make sure that the conditions are set for their once negotiations are in the right when the conditions are set for a negotiation that it is a successful negotiation that doesn't just lead to a ceasefire that we in theory at least had before but it leads to peace where Ukraine and Russia agree that this is the way it's going to be into the future I would only add that I don't believe that as long as it takes and as soon as possible are mutually exclusive we can win this as soon as possible and we will be there as long as it takes so I'm not speaking for the administration but I don't see those as contradictory unfortunately we're running out of time I see from the clock here but it's been a really fascinating conversation and really rewarding and fruitful and thank you all for your time and I want to thank the audience as well for their really thought-provoking questions and for participating and listening and I hope that we can do this again so thank you thank you