The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - Margaret Macmillan On Whether We Are Already In A World War

Episode Date: March 22, 2022

One of the world's most celebrated historians, Margaret Macmillan, puts the Ukraine war in context -- is it already a world war?  And Brian Stewart drops by with his regular Tuesday commentary on what is missing in the coverage of the war.

And hello there, Peter Mansbridge here. You are just moments away from the latest episode of The Bridge and what an episode it will be. The historian's historian, Margaret Macmillan, puts Ukraine in context. And hello there from Stratford, Ontario. I'm Peter Mansbridge. This is the Tuesday episode of The Bridge. Before I get anywhere, a quick word on last night's news, which is today's news, which is going to be the news domestically for most of this week, I'm sure, which is the deal, it seems, between the NDP and the Liberals to keep the Liberals

in power until 2025. Now, this isn't a complete shocker, not a real surprise. We were talking about this shortly after the election last fall, thinking that something like this might be possible, and it seems like it has been. The details will come out, one assumes, over the next, you know, hours and days. And we will get to it for sure tomorrow on Smoke Mirrors and the Truth with Bruce. And then Friday, you can bet your house, if you got one, on the fact that Chantel and Bruce and I will be talking about this arrangement on the Friday program, because by then all the dribs and drabs of the deal will be out and the real analysis will

have an opportunity to begin. My initial analysis is this. Obviously, it works to both their advantages, the NDP and the Liberals, that there is some continuity here, and they have agreements in principle on certain policies that they want to push forward. But to me, the real signature in here is Justin Trudeau's, because it really allows him to comfortably make the decision that many think he's going to make this year at some point, which is to step down as leader of the Liberal Party and step down as Prime Minister. And if in fact he chooses to do that

and do it this year, he leaves a clear path for his successor, whoever she or he may be, to establish their own priorities and their own positioning with the government as the new prime minister, if that's what happens. One of the big criticisms of past leaders is who were planning to step down as they left it too late for their successor to establish themselves in that position before an election this would certainly allow a successor to justin trudeau that time a year and a half two years to set themselves up for an election campaign anyway we'll discuss all that both tomorrow and friday sure. Today, as promoted over the last couple of days, we've got a fantastic lineup.

Brian Stewart will be by later with his weekly Tuesday commentary on what we're kind of missing in our reporting on the war. But we're going to start with Margaret Macmillan, somebody who I know Canadians have a lot of affection for, not only as a great Canadian, but as a great writer and a great historian. You know, I could sit here and list all, you know, all the books going back to the one that's generally known just by a date, 1919, but the full title being Peacemakers, the Paris Peace Conference of 1919 and its attempt to end war. But there have been others, and the most recent one, War, How Conflict Shaped Us, just came out a year and a half ago. Margaret teaches both at the University of Toronto and at Oxford, so she's on either side of the Atlantic. And she has this deep understanding, not only of war, but of history

and how to place the conversation about current events with some sense of her lens of history, as I like to say, of the past. So let's get to this conversation because Ukraine is on everybody's mind trying to understand where it fits in the big picture is something that hopefully Margaret will help us try to understand.

So let's get to it. Margaret Macmillan. Here she is. The last time we sat down for a talk, we wondered if there could ever be another world war. Now, I know there's lots of differences between this, but there are a lot of countries involved, many of which have picked sides, many of which are supplying weapons. They may not be pulling the trigger, but they're helping put things in the trigger. How close are we, in fact, to a world war right now?

I think we're closer than I think most of us would like to think. The dangers of conflicts like this, when you begin to draw in outside interests, is that sooner or later those outside interests will come into conflict with each other. And I think the fact that Russian forces were bombing so close to the border with Poland, for example, what happens if a Russian rocket hits a target in Poland? That would be the trigger for a war for NATO. Under the Articles of NATO, Poland's partners would have to come to its defense. And so I think we're in a dangerous situation because there is fighting going on. We know that sometimes the distances involved are

very short. And we also know that mistakes can happen in war. And I think we are at a time of heightened tension. I think like most people, I'm sure you feel the same, I still can't quite believe it's happening. i think we hadn't got used as you said in your question to the idea that war wasn't going to happen again like this in in europe well let me ask you about that surprise uh because it was only a month ago that most of us thought no no you know we we heard the kind of stories that were coming out of that part of the world and we thought no no it couldn't turn into this. So you were truly surprised when it became what we are witnessing here.

Yes, I was. Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you, but I thought Putin was bluffing. I thought his moving his troops up was a way of putting pressure on. I think I just couldn't believe that he was going to do it. And I think looking back in retrospect, it's always so much easier to see things when you look back. We should all have believed him because he's been talking about this for a long time. I mean, this is not new, this idea that he has that Ukraine is rightly part of Russia, that it should never be an independent country. It has no legitimacy as a country.

And the ways in which he's used his armed forces in Chechnya, for example, or against Georgia, or the way he's used his forces in Syria, should have given us warning that he was prepared to use military force. But I'm a historian, so I can't help but make comparisons, and I'm really struck by how a lot of our attitudes were like those of Europeans in 1914, that war was something that we don't do anymore. You know, it may be something other people do in other parts of the world, but we don't. You know, we Canadians, we Americans, we Germans, we British, we don't do war anymore against another European power. I mean, it's absolutely, I think, taken most of us by surprise.

And I think we were perhaps unreasonably confident that we wouldn't have another war. And I think we didn't look properly at what President Putin was saying. That is what I was going to ask you, to put the Margaret Macmillan lens of history on this to try to to see where there were comparisons and so you see it as the those those months years before the first world war uh that was sparked as we know by um you know one particular incident that as a result of a lot of other things that were happening turned into a world war is is that the the main point of comparison that you see

i think so although i mean you know none of the comparisons are ever completely matching because times are different circumstances are different i mean there is another point of comparison and that is with the outbreak of the second World War, which was very much Hitler's war in Europe. I mean, Hitler wanted that war. He was actually disappointed when he didn't get a war in 1938, because at Munich, he got most of Czechoslovakia without a war, and he was disappointed. He said later on, it was the biggest mistake that he'd ever made. And he wanted and willed war and brought about war in 1939. And I think very much this is Putin's war. Now, Putin is in some ways very different from Hitler.

But I think you have a situation in two countries with a highly authoritarian regime where the man at the top has the power to take that country to war or not. And I think in both cases, with Germany in 1939 and Russia in 2022, the man at the top wanted the war and was prepared to take the risk and prepared, I think, to suffer. I don't think either man realized how much their own countries were going to suffer. I think they had great confidence in their armed forces, but I'm not sure that that would have stopped them anyway. How many people they lost, how many soldiers they lost, I don't think that really was going to stop them.

Well, you're not helping those of us who are hoping that this can't turn into a first or another world war when when you point to the two points of comparison is the two greatest Wars have ever been inflicted on the world uh that that's not a good place to be um right now we're we are witnessing the attempts at trying to resolve this diplomatically, trying to find peace. And it just seems to me, I don't see how that could ever happen in a situation where both sides basically remain standing at the end of it. I mean, if they come up with some, you know, we'll let you have this, we'll let you have that, but you'll still keep this. That doesn't sound like a long-term solution

to what are clearly his aims, Putin's aims. I think the real problem is that, yes, I think it's partly his aims and partly can you trust his word. You know, Russia signed the Budapest Agreement in the mid-1990s, which guaranteed the independence and security of Ukraine. Ukraine agreed to give up its nuclear weapons because a lot of the Soviet Union's nuclear arsenal had been based on Ukrainian soil. And Ukraine agreed to give up nuclear weapons in return for this guarantee by, I it was britain france and the soviet union and the soviet union or russia that's sorry it was russia not the soviet union by this point russia has clearly broken an agreement that undertook so if i were ukrainian would i believe

putin's russia when it said no no that's the last thing we want you know i mean presumably the minimum of what putin would want was would be the two republics, which he's recognized in the Donbass, would become either independent or part of Russia. But would you believe if you were Ukrainian, that's the end of his territorial demands on Ukraine? I'm not sure I would. And I'm not sure any of the powers in Europe that might be prepared to try and broker an agreement wouldn't be prepared to believe that either. And so I think there's a real problem here that with Putin in office, it's very hard to believe that he will carry out commitments, solemn commitments that he's made. I mean, Russia's a member of the UN Security Council. It signed the UN Charter, or the Soviet Union did, and it's violating the Charter. That doesn't seem to concern them in the slightest. So I think, you know, I hope, above hope,

that there will be a diplomatic solution. I hope there'll be some sort of agreement. And I think we all have to hope that. I mean, the one thing that is different from the past, I think, is that both sides presumably realize that if they escalate, if there is a war between NATO and Russia, the dangers of escalation are enormous. And the possession that both sides have of nuclear weapons promises or threatens rather far more

destruction, even than the destruction of the First and Second World Wars. And so I think there is an inhibition, a recognition that if we go over that edge, then it is very difficult to tell what will happen and probably very difficult to stop massive destruction. And so I think we have to hope that there will be a pulling back from the brink. And I think, you know, certainly in the West, I think there is a very, very serious effort to get a diplomatic solution. I think President Zelensky in Ukraine has indicated that he'd be open to some sort of compromise. And at least, you know, we're still talking, the negotiations are still going on. And it may be that President Putin and the Russians decide that they simply don't want to go on facing the

humiliation they're facing over the performance of their armed forces and the costs that are now being incurred by Russia. They may decide to settle for what they can get, which I think will probably be part of Ukraine if such a deal is brokered. As you well know, because you've written so eloquently and in such an award-winning fashion of it in the past, you know, in 1919 brought us the League of Nations, 1945, 1946 brought us the United Nations. In both cases, these bodies were you know were

established to prevent these kind of horrors from ever happening again when you watch the UN today on this issue does it seem like the the body is is worth anything anymore well it's a good question and I'm not sure I mean I don't want to answer no it's you know it's not worth anything anymore? Well, it's a good question. And I'm not sure. I mean, I don't want to answer no, it's not worth anything, because I'd like to think the UN can do something. But it strikes me, I was talking to a friend earlier today who knows a lot about the Cuban Missile Crisis, and he said in the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, the UN was central. You know, the UN was really important. The UN was not just a forum, the UN was putting real pressure on both sides to come together. The UN is, as far as I know, not UN was really important. The UN was not just a forum. The UN was putting real pressure on both sides to come together.

The UN is, as far as I know, not that important in what's going on at the moment. It's not a major player in a way that it would have been in 1962 or 1956 in Suez. I, you know, it's funny you mentioned the Cuban Missile Crisis, because I was trying to make the point the other day that here we are, whatever it is now, 60 years later, and we're still finding out things that happened during the scenes things that are happening and you have to wonder whether the same kind of thing is happening at any number of different levels right now with the hopes of preventing something like that i guess i guess we'll have to wait for the history books the margaret mcmillan's of 60 years from now to tell us what was really going on um here's the other question that that a lot of people are wondering about in terms of what we're witnessing, whether the stakes are in a way much higher than we tend to think they are,

that what we're witnessing here is a conflict between the future of totalitarianism, authoritarianism, and the future of democracy. Is that putting too high a stake at it, or is that in fact what we're looking at here? Well, I think, honestly, Peter, I don't think you are putting it in too dramatic terms. I think we are seeing a real shift, a very important moment in the history of the 21st century. And I think if Putin's Russia gets away with doing this, it will try again elsewhere. You know, there's still the Baltic states, there's still Kazakhstan, which Putin sees as properly being part of a greater Russia. And I think if he gets away with that will encourage others

who want to do the same sort of thing, who want to use armed force to seize territory, and who don't really care what the costs are, and don't really care what international opinion thinks. And so yes, I think we're seeing a very important moment for the international order. It's going to be different after this. And I think we're also seeing, and how permanent a shift that is, I don't know, we're also seeing a recognition, certainly in Western countries, that there is actually something called the West. And it's not a geographical expression, it's really more a system of values, democracy, liberalism, belief in the rule of law, and so on. And I think those of us in western countries are really feeling there is a real

existential challenge here now from from a different way of looking at the world a different way of ordering society and this is very important and that we're recognizing i think perhaps in a way that we haven't been needed to recognize been made to recognize in the past 20 years there are certain things that are really worth defending. You know, the Ukrainians are showing that. The Ukrainians don't want to live under Russian rule, and I think for very clear reasons. They don't like to live in that sort of state, that sort of authoritarian state where you have a police state, effectively, where you have very little freedom of expression, where your property isn't safe because there's no rule of law. The government basically can take whatever it wants, a high level of corruption. And I think, you know, I think there is really a very important struggle here between that sort of

world and the sort of world that the Ukrainians actually want, a world that we in Canada are used to. And so I do think it is a very important moment. And I think we have to think about what it is we think is really important and how we defend it. And I know it's not a popular thought in Canada, but I think we're going to have to really think of upping our defense spending. You know, we have cut our defense forces. I mean, we've expected an awful lot of them on very, very slim rations. And I think we really need to think now what we need to defend ourselves and how we can contribute. It's not just military power, but how do we reinforce the values of democracy and reinforce the values we want and how do we try and persuade other people and i think we can't do

it through force but how do we try and persuade other people that these are actually values worth having and worth preserving but i do think there is and i think you know this is that we've seen you know authoritarian states are banding together or tending to band together and support each other i mean so far china's is supporting russia although it's a very different sort of society but you know i think i think there is a confrontation happening um and i think it's going to go on marking the 21st century you seem to to make it clear that you feel force has to be set aside here that it has to be diplomacy it has to be support uh monetarily has to be to support arms wise do you think there's a situation in which it would be justified for countries like canada

led one presumes by the united states uh to you know to take a battle to actually go into the fight here because they you know it's getting harder and harder to look at these pictures coming out of ukraine especially if you know women and children and the elderly uh being basically massacred uh and doing nothing other than saying we're giving as much money as we can well i think diplomacy without force is only partial diplomacy. I mean, you know, you can have all the nice ideas and you can say, let's talk and let's be peaceful. But at a certain point, if you're dealing with people who are prepared to use force, you have to use counterforce. And that's what makes this present situation so tricky. And I'm

not, I don't have any very clear idea of what we should do and i think it is a very difficult situation i wouldn't want to be in a position of having to make the decisions i think things would become a lot clearer if the russians were foolish enough to attack a member of nato um because there is a treaty i think it would have to come into operation and i think you know this is the decision that people i'm thinking a lot about 1939 this is the decision that people faced I'm thinking a lot about 1939, this is the decision that people faced in 1939. Do we let Hitler and his lesser ally Mussolini go on doing what they want to do? Do we let them go on tearing up nations? Do we tearing up treaties? Do we let them go on seizing territory? Do we let them go on killing people, you know, willy-nilly? And I think at a certain point, we have to decide what we want to do about this. And so so i'm not i don't want war i mean i i wish there was not a war happening in ukraine but it is and as you point

out as so often it's the innocent who are suffering it's the helpless civilians and the methods that the russians use um are the same methods they used in places like aleppo i mean it's brute force in 39 of course they drew the red line at poland and after having not drawn a red line the year before as you'd mentioned earlier um but they drew the red line at poland and then they literally moved within hours to uh support their position and go and declare war uh here we're into our fourth week of witnessing this and and no red lines as such have been drawn, with the exception of the one you mentioned, you can't go an inch inside a NATO country.

So it's difficult, as you said. This is a very difficult situation. If you put Putin aside and Zelensky aside, when you're looking at the other leaders who are involved in the big picture of this story, who is performing well? Well, I would say President Biden is performing well. You know, there are still Republicans who say he's not. There's still some Republicans who say if Trump had been president, this never would have happened. I mean, you know, it seems to me that's fantasy land.

But I do think the Biden administration has actually moved pretty carefully. They're obviously trying to keep channels of communication open with China, for example. President Biden had a two-hour phone conversation with him. But they are making it clear that they're going to supply aid to Russia. And they've also taken the lead in imposing sanctions. So, I mean, I think the United States is showing leadership here. I think among the European powers, I would say that the German chancellor has really, in a sense, revolutionized German foreign policy.

You know, the Germans had hoped for a long time to be able to deal with the former Eastern Europe and Russia, and they hoped that diplomacy would work. The Germans are now upping their defense budget, I think by 2%, probably more. They are prepared to cut off the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines from Russia, in other words, you know, to really hurt themselves by not getting the gas and oil they need from Russia. And so I think that in a number of countries, there's been quite a surprising reaction. And so far, I've been really impressed by the way in which Western powers have come together. And even those that were flirting with Russia, like Viktor Orban's Hungary, very different tune in Hungary today. You know, he has condemned the war. I mean, it may be a bit late for him. He's facing an election, but he's certainly come round.

And so I think, you know, that I think on the whole, what the West has been doing is very sensible. And I think they are right to be cautious. I mean, it's it's awful to watch what's happening in Ukraine. And I know a lot of us would probably think, you know, we ought to be doing more. But I think Western powers are right to try and avoid this war spreading anymore, but to do what they can to help Ukraine. And I myself think, you know, it's always very dangerous to give a red line, because if you don't do anything, President Obama said, you know, use of chemical weapons in Syria by the Russians was, and the Assad regime was a red line, and they used them and he did nothing. And if you don't really stick to it, then people aren't going to believe you the next time. And so I think it's been wise not to give firm definitions of what a red line would be. But I remain confident. I mean,

I think what may tell is what's happening to Russia's armed forces. I mean, this war was meant to be over in two days. You know, the story is about finding in the captured luggage of Russian officers their dress uniforms so they could have victory parades. Well, they're not having that. And the Russian armed forces are being not just humiliated, they're being very badly damaged and they're losing an awful lot of equipment. Let me just ask one last question.

Let's assume, hopefully so, that there can be some agreement reached to end this within the next week or two. Can you see a world in which a year from now, Putin is still the leader of Russia? And what would that say if that was the case? I think I can see it. I would say that it's probably because he's extremely well protected. You know, he sees only a very small circle of people. He has his own hand-picked sort of Praetorian guard, and he's like a Caesar in the old days around him. How much opinion among those around him is changing?

I mean, there's clearly some dissent. He's, I think, arrested the head of one of his intelligence services and a number of others have sort of been questioned. And it may be that his position is shakier than it appears. But as we know with Hitler, you know, the generals, there were generals in the German army who kept on saying, we're going to get rid of him. And they had a lot of experience and they had a lot of force at their disposal

and they weren't able to do it. So I think very, very difficult to predict. I mean, I think a lot of us are probably hoping that the guard around Putin will do what Praetorian guards have done in previous history and turn on the turn on the boss, but we can't tell, I think. So, you know, I don't know what's going to happen in a year. I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow, think no i guess if any of us knew that um we'd be uh we'd be standing up and saying it pretty loudly but uh it doesn't appear to be the case um thank you for this it's you know it's always a treat to talk to you um have you already started writing the next book and is it on this well funnily enough it's it's it's reflecting this um i'm writing i have started

writing i'm writing a book on the second world war and the relations among the allies um after the fall of france britain the united states and and the soviet union so a lot of the issues that were discussed then on the territories that were discussed then are the ones where the war is happening today well um there'll be a lot of anxious readers to it and especially seeing as we don't know how this one's going to end up um margaret mcmillan it as i said it's always a treat to talk to you and i thank you very much for this well thank you it's always a pleasure to talk to you i just wish we were talking on a happier subject well maybe that time will come. I hope

so. Margaret Macmillan, talking to the bridge from her home in the United Kingdom, where she, as I said, teaches not only at Oxford on that side of the Atlantic, but here at the University of Toronto and elsewhere here in Canada. Great to have her thoughts and her sense of history in placing this situation that we are witnessing in real time right now in the history books. Give us some sense of comparison. All right, we're going to take a short pause, and when we come back, we'll hear from my good friend and colleague,

Brian Stewart, on what he's seeing this week in terms of the Ukraine war and what we should know about what he's seeing. That's when we come back. All right. That's enough with the music. Peter Mansbridge here in Stratford, Ontario. You're listening to The Bridge, the Tuesday episode. You're listening on Sirius XM, Channel 167, Canada Talks,

or on your favorite podcast platform. Well, for the last month during this war in Ukraine, we have each Tuesday brought in my good friend, colleague, a great former foreign correspondent. Well, I guess you're never a former foreign correspondent. You're always a foreign correspondent. Once you've been one, you're always thinking in those terms. Brian has covered enough wars on the ground in real time in his past

to be able to draw some conclusions about what he's witnessing wars on the ground in real time in his past, to be able to draw some conclusions about what he's witnessing and to do the research he studies, he reads a lot. And he reads the stuff we rarely see in terms of the background to these conflicts, a sense from some of the great military experts around the world about what they're seeing and what they're witnessing and quite often it's not quite the same as what you see on on television or read in the daily newspapers that's not to um that's not to say anything bad about what uh what we're getting served up on a daily basis because there's been some terrific, heroic journalism,

as we well know, that's come at a price. Anyway, I've asked Brian to drop by once a week on Tuesdays to give us his take on what we're witnessing. So here's our conversation for this week. All right, Brian, let's talk numbers here for a minute because, you know, the most commonly used number on troop force is around 200,000 for the Russians that are either already in Ukraine or surrounding Ukraine. And that seems like a huge number. It is, but everything's relative. And we seem to be missing in this discussion about numbers that the Ukrainians have numbers on their side, too.

Very big numbers, Peter. Once again, I'm afraid the world tends to underestimate Ukraine until it shows off its strength. cases, it's a country of 44 million people, clearly highly patriotic people who are fighting for the life of their nation, which puts it on a different field altogether than the Russian experience. With 44 million people, they would normally estimate that those of military age would be about 11 million, and of those really fit for military service would be 6 million. So really, the Ukrainians have an almost unlimited field to pick from if this war turns into a war of attrition that goes on for any length of time. And it has already probably 500,000 at least already either full-time military or the reserves that it's called up

reserves that'll be training pretty heavily the last few years so they're very fit to serve uh and that's five probably five hundred thousand already we see very little of the main ukrainian force the government doesn't want to show them off. They're moving around the countryside. Many of them have not been involved at all in the fighting yet. But there's a big, long number. But people might say, OK, well, say the Ukrainians say that Russians need to bring in to a war like this, which surprises many people because, of course, it's a vast country, the largest country on Earth. But it borders about 12 countries, 12 or 16. I almost forget the number of countries. It has a large military, but it has to guard several different military districts. And the actual infantry that can be used by Russia is much smaller than people think. We tend often to refer back to those great masses of troops and tanks and armor and soldiers of the Soviet era. But it's very different.

Reforms were brought in in recent years by Putin himself and a small military clique, which put a lot of the emphasis into making basic fighting groups, the Russian battlefield armored, very heavily armored with tanks, armored vehicles of all kinds, anti-aircraft, missile launchers. And they have a very small number of actual infantry in them. So already a large number of those have been used in Ukraine. Bringing new ones in from other areas is going to be very difficult. And they're finding that when they do bring them in, they're not suited for the kind of war they're finding in Ukraine, because they're so heavily armored, their actual numbers of troops are really quite small, down to about 200 for every formation, which is not nearly enough to guard the long convoys of supplies and armor and tanks they have rolling down the highways. And this is what has been one of the great weaknesses of the Russians. They don't really

have enough professional fighting soldiers. They are calling up a lot of draftees, which is a very unpopular step for any government to do when a war is underway. It's okay at peacetime, but once war is underway, when you go for conscription, that war can become very unpopular very fast, as we've seen in almost all the major countries. So they're finding units really watered down a lot. You paint a very clear picture of what it might be like on the ground in terms of numbers here's the question though uh if the ukrainians have in a sense the advantage on numbers why aren't they using it why aren't they uh putting the russians on the defensive

uh in a clear way with a with an offensive um in terms terms of the Ukrainians moving in against the Russians? I think that's one of the great questions of this war that is unanswered and isn't being even asked nearly enough. I mean, the Russians have battalions and brigades, 24 in all. They have hundreds of tanks, lots of heavy armor. They have precision missiles guided they have this is the ukrainians you're talking about right yes did i say russians yeah you did but that's okay i'm sorry peter i meant of course the ukrainians they have 24 brigade groups across the country. Again, as I say, very heavily unarmored

and with well-trained troops. Most of them have not been involved in the fighting at all yet. So why is to go to your question. Either they're holding them back because they fear they might be enveloped by the Russians in the east. So they're holding them back

sort of west of the Dnieper River, which is the big dividing river, east and west in Ukraine. Or they're preparing for some major counteroffensive. If this war tends to drag on, the theory might be that they will throw everything

into a major attack on one of the several Russian fronts, around Kiev or down in the the east and south that remains to be seen but what the world really would like to know i think is just what the ukrainian government is planning to do with this large military force that really hasn't shown up yet they still have a lot of aircraft too, which are not flying many missions. They've got horrific numbers of artillery and missiles that haven't been brought into play yet.

And that's a big question mark. Why are they holding them back? Or are they doing only the sensible thing, which is to hold them back on phase one of this war, which now seems to be coming to an end and preparing for phase two of the war if ceasefire talks break down. Well, you know, obviously, if they're able to keep the answer to that question secret, they're probably in a better position than if not only the other side

plus us knew what the answer was. So we'll have to watch for that. Now, you just mentioned ceasefire, and this is the last point i'd like to uh to look over that much talk about you know some form of settlement whether it's an actual ceasefire or whether it's a talks that lead to a peace settlement um that that seems to be the consistent talk over the last couple of weeks and yet no firm thing happens now as we've witnessed in the past ceasefires can be used simply to to reposition rearm right so i mean is there that kind of i don't want to call it a game but that kind of strategy going on here well i think so the second version uh in a campaign like this I always like to go back and check the military experts I really admire and see what they were predicting.

I'm struck by how many were saved. Week one, look, by week three or four, the Russians are going to need a break. They're going to be worn down, tired. Their casualties are going to be enormous. And they're simply going to have to get a breather to regroup and to realize that phase one was more or less a failure. They have to come up with phase two. So they will call for a ceasefire. That will be a strategic ceasefire meant to give them the time to get ready for phase two. And I fear that that's probably what we'll get if in the next week or two at the most there's

a ceasefire call that is not by any means the next step this big needed step to end the war but it may be just a step towards the second phase of this real big conventional war mind you a lot of people will say well why give the russians the time to regroup why not just keep hammering away at them well the other side of that question formation is that the ukrainians too probably need a breather they can regroup and reform they can perhaps empty some of those cities under siege of civilians and they can bring in supplies to be better defenses and the rest of it so both sides will try and make some use of that ceasefire we'd all love to see a peace instead

of the ceasefire but i fear a ceasefire is probably best we can expect at this moment brian it's a fascinating the insights you've been giving us each week i want you to know that listeners to this program have greatly appreciating it and, and writing in to make sure that I don't forget Brian Stewart on Tuesdays and we won't forgive me for saying Russia instead of Ukraine. Well, I don't know.

They may hold that against you. They'll be very impressed that I caught the mistake. You always did Peter in the 40 or 50 years we've known each other, you could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times. You've seen me many times. All right, Brian, thanks very much, and we'll talk again next week. Okay, Peter, thanks a lot. Brian Stewart.

Brian Stewart and Margaret McMillan, what a combination of voices to hear on this day to try and give us a better understanding of this war that we're watching and that has affected every one of us in such a tragic way, really, in terms of what we're seeing and what we're trying to come to grips with

on how to end it all. All right, that's going to wrap it up for this day. Tomorrow, Smoke Mirrors and the Truth. Bruce Anderson will be behind, as I said, at the top of today's program. No doubt we'll be talking about the deal between the Liberals and the NDP that would prevent an election before 2025. We'll have a chance to talk about that one. I'm Peter Mansbridge.

Thanks so much for listening today. You've been listening to The Bridge. We'll be back in 24 hours.