The Daily Signal - What Are Vladimir Putin’s Intentions in Ukraine?

Episode Date: December 16, 2021

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s troops continue to amass at Ukraine’s snowy border. A tense atmosphere permeates the cold. And one question is on many minds: Will Russia invade again? Alexis Mrachek, research associate for Russia and Eurasia at The Heritage Foundation, says she thinks it’s quite possible. (The Daily Signal is Heritage’s multimedia news organization.) “I think in looking at a potential second invasion of Ukraine versus not another invasion, I think it’s more likely that Russia would invade Ukraine,” Mrachek explains. “I think it is more likely just looking at the tensions building up, and Russia is now demanding that NATO retract its pledge to admit Ukraine and Georgia one day.” “And so Russia and the U.S. and Western players keep going back and forth,” she says. “It seems more likely that Russia would invade.” Mrachek joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to detail the history of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, lay out the consequences of another Russian invasion, and explain how America and the world should respond to Russian aggression. We also cover these stories:  The House votes to hold former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows in contempt of Congress. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., says she supports expanding the Supreme Court from the current nine justices. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, introduces a bill targeting critical race theory in K-12 classrooms. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Commissions fees and expenses may apply. Read the funds or ETF's prospectus before investing. Funds and ETFs are not guaranteed. Their values change and past performance may not be repeated. This is the Daily Signal podcast for Thursday, December 16th. I'm Kate Trinco. And I'm Doug Blair. Vladimir Putin's Russian troops continue to amass at Ukraine's snowy border.

A tense atmosphere permeates the cold and one question is on everyone's mind. Will Russia invade? Research Associate for Russia and Eurasia at the Heritage Foundation, Alexis Marachic, thinks it's very possible. She joins the show to detail the history of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, explain the consequences of a potential Russian invasion and explain how America and the world should respond to Russian aggression. But before we get to Doug's conversation, let's hit the top news stories of the day. In response to a Tuesday vote holding former President Trump's chief of staff

and former congressman from North Carolina, Mark Meadows, in contempt of Congress, President Biden told a group of gathered reporters Wednesday that he thought Meadows was worthy of being held in contempt. In a late night session on Tuesday, the House of Vote. voted 222 to 208 to hold Meadows in contempt for defying a subpoena and refusing to testify to the select committee. The vote marks the second Trump associate who has been found in contempt of Congress, along with former White House chief strategist and senior counselor to the president, Steve Bannon. But Meadows received support from some of his former Republican colleagues. Congressman Jim Jordan of Ohio said, make no mistake, when Democrats vote in favor of this resolution,

it is a vote to put a good man in prison. from where President Trump weighed in as well, saying, I think Mark should do what's right. He's an honorable man. He shouldn't be put through this. Democrat Senator Elizabeth Warren wants to expand the number of Supreme Court justices by adding at least four more justices. In an op-ed for the Boston Globe published Wednesday,

the Massachusetts senator wrote, First, it was Mitch McConnell, along with Donald Trump, who used two stolen seats to pack the court. Warren cited her concerns, about recent decisions made by the Supreme Court and also complained about how the court might overturn Roe v. Wade in the upcoming Dobbs decision. Warren further wrote, I believe in an independent judiciary. I also believe in a judiciary that upholds the rule of law, not one that ignores it to promote a deeply unpopular and partisan agenda at odds with the Constitution

and the settled rights of our citizens. And when a court consistently shows that it no longer is bound by the rule of law, Congress must exercise its constitutional authority to fix that court. During a live-streamed event on Wednesday, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis announced the stop wrongs against our kids and employees, or Woke Act, a new bill opposing the critical race theory in the state's K-12 classrooms. DeSantis first spoke to the rise of wokeism in the United States. Here's DeSantis via the Hill. And I think what you see now with the rise of this woke ideology, is an attempt to really de-legitimize our history and to de-legitimize our institutions.

And I view the wokeness as a form of cultural Marxism. They want to tear... They want to just... It's not just, you know, people say, oh, you know, their leftist or socialists. It's not just like taxes and all that. Yeah, they do want that, and that's not good. But they really want to tear at the fabric of our society and our culture

and things that really we've taken for granted, like the ability of parents to direct the upbringing of their kids. DeSantis then moved on to introduce the bill, saying that the state needed to do more and build on the work it is already done in getting critical race theory out of the classroom. This is something that you see all across the country, and we have a responsibility in Florida to say we're not going to do it.

So we did do that. So it violates Florida standards to scapegoat someone based on their rights. race, to say that they're inherently racist, to say that they're an oppressor or oppressed or any of that. And that's good and that's important. But we also have to realize that we've got to do more to make sure that that actually carries the day in the classrooms and in our society. So today, we are going to be introducing to the public and we have legislators who are going to help us with this, a new piece of legislation for the upcoming legislative session called stop wrongs against our Kids and Employees Act, the Stop Woke Act.

DeSantis discussed how the bill would prevent tax dollars from funding divisive concepts like critical race theory. And this will do a number of things that are very important. One, it will put into statute the Department of Education's prohibition on CRT in K-12 schools. No taxpayer dollars should be used to teach our kids to hate our country or to hate each other. DeSantis finally said that the bill will be debated in the next legislative session. Now stay tuned for my conversation with Alexis Marachic as we discuss the ongoing tension between Russia and Ukraine. We all know the legacy media isn't reporting the real news.

But if we're going to improve our country, Americans need to know what's really going on. The Daily Signal is committed to covering the news that matters. We cover how radical leftist prosecutors whose campaigns were funded by George Soros, and his friends are destroying American cities. We look at huge government bills like Build Back Better and unpack what's actually in them. And we're here to help parents know what's really going on in the public schools that their kids attend. But we need your help to keep doing this important reporting. Thank you for your continued support and please consider making a gift to the daily signal so we can continue this work.

You can donate at heritage.org slash TDS. Our guest today is Alexis Marachik, a research associate for Russia and Eurasia at the Heritage Foundation. Alexis, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me on. Of course. Let's talk about something that's in the news a little bit recently, Russia and Ukraine. So they have been in the news a lot recently because Russia has started to increase numbers of troops that are stationed on the Ukrainian border. Can you break down for our listeners the most recent developments?

on this issue. Yeah. So what has been happening over the past few weeks is Russia has been increasing its troop numbers along the Ukrainian border. And this has actually been going on most of this year. Beginning in April, Russia stationed about 100,000 Russian troops along Ukraine's eastern border and then removed only a few thousand. And then over time, there wasn't much in the news, but Russia kept troops and equipment

there. And now it's building its numbers back up. And currently its numbers sit at around 95,000. And they could increase to 100,000. $75,000 within the next month or two, which is extremely alarming. So what does Russia claim it needs to have these troops? Like, why is Russia justifying these troops at the border? Russia is justifying these troops at the border because it, I think, feels very threatened

by the NATO alliance because in 2008 NATO promised Ukraine future NATO membership. Of course, this hasn't been a recent issue. It was promised NATO membership in 2008. but the fact of it actually getting membership has not come up recently. So it seems like Russia is still hiding a little bit of its intentions, but I know that it has to do something with that. And Ukraine does border some NATO members. So this is also part of it.

And I think also, though, that zooming out, this is a way for Putin to test President Biden, to see how he will react, to see if he will be very tough on Russia. And just to kind of see, because this is still Biden's first year in office. So he wants to see how this plays out. So two things that I want to follow up on about what you just said.

So in the past, you've said that Ukraine was considered for NATO membership, but it's not been an issue for a little while. Is Russia then just sort of using this as an excuse that in the past Ukraine has said it might be eligible for NATO membership? Or is there discussion maybe recently about putting Ukraine back into NATO? I would say it's probably the first option. It's more of an excuse because, I mean, it doesn't seem like President Biden wants to push NATO to admit Ukraine anytime soon because President Biden has explicitly stated that there are corruption issues in Ukraine and Ukraine needs to work on its reforms. And of course, there's still a war that's going on in eastern Ukraine. We can't forget that. That's been going on for seven and a half years plus now, as well as Russia's occupation of the Crimean Peninsula. And so I think Russia is honestly, yeah, again, you're just using the excuse of future NATO membership as reason for this troop buildup and a potential second invasion of Ukraine. So the second thing I wanted to mention about that is you said that this was a test for President Biden.

Is this a test that you would say President Biden is maybe passing or failing? I would say personally that President Biden is failing this test. He so far in his presidency has not been as tough on Russia as he needs to be. He has not been a world leader. He's been leading from behind, which does not make sense because when you're a leader, you're leading from the front. And so, yeah, he, I mean, he's imposed some sanctions on Russia and done a few other actions, and he's met with Putin a couple of times.

But overall, he is not as tough on Putin as he needs to be. And Putin views Biden as a weak presidential leader. Putin is very into the strongman image, and he likes to play off of other strongman images And I think that Putin is honestly taking advantage of President Biden and the United States right now. So given that we have this massive buildup of troops at the Ukrainian border, the immediate assumption would be that the Russians are preparing to invade. In your estimation, is this a likely result that there will be a full-scale invasion of Ukraine? I think in looking at a potential second invasion of Ukraine versus not another invasion. I think it's more likely that Russia would invade Ukraine.

I think we could potentially see this maybe in late January or in February. Of course, I hope that Russia does not do this. But I think it is more likely just looking at the tensions building up. And Russia is now demanding that NATO retract its pledge to admit Ukraine and Georgia one day. And so Russia and the U.S. and Western players keep going back and forth. And it just seems more likely that Russia would invade. So what would the objective be if Russia was to invade? Would this be similar to what we saw back in 2014 with the annexation of Crimea?

Or would this be a full takeover of the country to install a puppet government? What is the end goal here? To be honest, I'm not sure except that I know that Putin has imperial ambitions and he acts as a czar in a way. And he wants to expand Russia's territory because Ukraine was once part of the Russian Empire and then the Soviet Union. And I think Putin would love to see Ukraine as part of Russia one day. if Russia were to invade again, I don't think that the whole country of Ukraine would be taken over, but I do think there would be, Ukraine would have to come back with a lot of military force against Russia and that it would be a full-blown war.

But I do think that it would be a lot different from what happened in 2014 because the Ukraine today is not the same as it was in 2014. It just acts a lot differently. Its military is much more prepared now. It has more resources. The U.S. has been giving financial assistance to its military the past several years. It's sold javelin anti-missile weapons to Ukraine. And so it would be a different situation than what happened in 2014. Why Ukraine? Why not one of the other countries that used to be in the Soviet sphere of influence?

You've mentioned that Putin has sort of Tsarist ambitions or Soviet ambitions. But why specifically Ukraine? I would say that Russia is targeting Ukraine because Ukraine has proven that it is a Democratic nation and it's a lot more open to Western ideals and it wants to join the West. It, you know, of course, would love to join NATO one day. And just the way that Ukraine operates with its government and just the various, I don't know, the ways that it operates. It favors its people, the people vote. And of course, there's still some corruption in the country, but it's gotten a lot better over time and really improved. And I think Putin feels threatened by this, honestly. And he does not want to

see the same situation happen in his country because that would mean that he would lose some power and he would lose a strong man image, which he greatly treasures. So let's say that there is a invasion of Ukraine. There is a full-fledged war between Ukraine and Russia. In your opinion, would Ukraine be able to possibly regain the territory that it lost in Crimea if this was to be a thing? I think it would be more likely for it to gain the Donbos back rather than Crimea. The whole Crimean Peninsula has been taken over completely since 2014. I mean, it's very hard to get in there even for Ukrainian citizens who used to live there, who's still a family there.

I believe they still have to have a Russian passport to get into that area. And so I feel, but the Donbos, the eastern region of Ukraine, I think that part is still part of Ukraine. And yes, there is trench warfare going on there, but I think it would be more likely for Ukraine to gain that back than Crimea. But it's still likely that the Donbos situation would be resolved anytime soon. Interesting. One of the things that struck me, I've had this conversation with a bunch of different people

about what the Ukrainian people want. I've heard in certain reporting and I've talked with certain people that have said the Ukrainian people might prefer to be back under Russian control or Soviet control or something similar to how it used to be in the past. Is there any truth to that narrative? I would say maybe there's a small percentage of Ukrainians who would like to be back under Russian rule. Perhaps this is part of the older generation who are used to living under the Soviet Union and then would be fine with that being the case again. I think that would give them a false sense of security, though, just because they feel like the government would be in control and it would be. quote unquote provide all their needs and such, but it's been proven, obviously, that communism

doesn't work. And I know truly that they would not like to be standing in lines again for food and have there all be all these shortages. And so, yeah, maybe a small percentage, but of all the Ukrainians, I've talked to you in the vast majority, I've talked with people who work in think tanks within the government there, also citizens I keep up with there on the ground. And they want Ukraine to be its own nation, its independent nation, apart from Russia, and see hope for Ukraine's future. We've talked about how Ukraine, and you just mentioned, wants to be more democratic, it wants to be more independent, probably more aligned with the West than with, you know, the former, you know, Soviet Union. Obviously, America would much rather that Ukraine was its own independent country. How of our allies responded to this situation in the West or across the globe to?

Russia's aggression towards Ukraine? Yeah, I would say NATO has come to Ukraine's defense, just more in speech rather than in practicality terms. And then I would say the EU maybe has been a little bit weaker than NATO regarding Ukraine. But I would say the NATO members bordering Ukraine have come to Ukraine's defense. And I'm sure, I don't know the, I guess the full details of it, but I'm sure that they help with Ukraine's intelligence and just their security against Russia and such.

So Western nations, though, on the whole, have been very supportive of Ukraine over the last seven and a half years or so. One of the things that has come to, like, as Americans' attention is that President Joe Biden announced earlier in December that the United States would not send troops unilaterally to defend Ukraine against Russia. Is that a proper response from America to the situation? To me, this is kind of a tertiary issue because that issue wasn't really on the ground. And then somehow it came up in the news.

And so I guess President Biden felt the need to address it. But Ukraine, I think, could fully defend itself against a Russian invasion. I don't think that U.S. troops would necessarily be needed on the ground there. I think it would be more useful for the U.S. military to provide training to the Ukrainian military to provide weaponry, to provide financial assistance for its military, then necessarily providing troops on the ground. Because Ukraine is a sovereign nation, and the U.S. does want to support its territorial integrity, of course,

and wants to help protect it. But I don't think that troops are needed on the ground there. So this would be something that would be a – it's sort of distracting from the main issue of, well, Ukraine can defend itself. We should support them, but not with troops. Exactly. I totally agree. Okay. As America begins to pivot towards other foes, namely China, Iran, some of these other places that are our enemies sort of in the modern age, it's not the USSR. How much of our resources should we continue to focus towards Russia, especially given the situation in Ukraine?

I would say that China would be the number one threat against the United States, but Russia is definitely still in the number two spot. We cannot forget that Russia is a threat. So I think that President Biden needs to take the Russian threat more seriously, to be honest, and not just focus a lot of his attention on China. I think that we need to still make Ukraine a huge priority because it does border these NATO members, these allies of the United States. It is right there in the thick of it. And we need Ukraine. We need to be able to work with their intelligence. And so we need to work with them.

And so I think that, yeah, just zooming out again, we can't forget that Russia is a threat and it needs to be addressed and we can't be just showing weakness regarding Russia. Now, I guess why is Russia still a threat? I know a lot of people focus on China, but what about Russia still makes it a threat? It's a threat in multiple ways. I would say particularly regarding hybrid warfare. So Russian disinformation is a threat. Russian propaganda. it has influenced in our elections.

The intelligence community in the United States has proven this. And then, you know, of course it doesn't pose a direct military threat to us, but because we are part of the NATO alliance, it does physically threaten some of the NATO allies, such as the Baltic states. Another NATO partner, but not a member, would be the Republic of Georgia in the South Caucasus region. 20% of their territory is still occupied by Russia. And so Russia poses a threat in multiple ways. Okay.

One of the things that I also wanted to ask you about is in response to these ongoing problems in Ukraine with the Russian troops, President Biden took a virtual call with Vladimir Putin, then released a readout of the call. And that readout stated the U.S. and our allies would respond with strong economic and other measures in the event of military escalation. did that readout give you any indication sort of of how America is going to respond to this if things get worse? Yeah. So if things escalate, I think that the United States would impose sanctions. To be honest, I'm not sure what else we could sanction on Russia because we already have tons of sanctions in place.

And I don't think that's necessarily the most effective way to respond in this case. But that has been what President Biden has threatened most is economic sanctions. Another thing could be selling weapons to Ukraine. It could be financial assistance. It could be the U.S. military providing training to Ukrainian troops. But it's unsure exactly what those quote unquote other measures mean that President Biden was referring to in the readout of that call. So given that we've sort of discussed what the American response should be, not necessarily troops on the ground, but economic support and weaponry support. and we've discussed sort of how maybe NATO should be responding and Europe is not responding as well as they should be.

What does a unified global response look like to Russian aggression in Ukraine? I would say it would be great if the EU and NATO allies in the United States could provide economic assistance to Ukraine, provide help with intelligence. I'm not sure all the ways that it could help exactly, but it would be great if we could. come as a united front to support Ukraine because Ukraine deserves our help. It needs our help. And we can't just let it off to the wolves, which would be Russia in this case. As we wrap up this interview, I wanted to give you this opportunity to maybe if our listeners want to learn more about this topic, where do you recommend that they go? Yeah. So I would recommend going to heritage.org and going to my personal page, which

to be Alexis Maracek, and I have some publications there focused on Ukraine. I would also recommend going to Luke Coffey's page on Heritage.org. He also has many publications. And then you could also go to our Twitter profiles because we're keeping up with these issues, particularly on Twitter and seeing the breaking news come out on there. Excellent. That was Alexis Marachik, a research associate for Russia and Eurasia here at the Heritage Foundation. Alexis, thank you so much for your time.

Thanks for having me. And that'll do it for today's episode. Thanks so much for listening to The Daily Signal podcast. You can find the Daily Signal podcast on Google Play, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and IHeartRadio. Please be sure to leave us a review and a five-star rating on Apple Podcasts, and please encourage others to subscribe. Thanks so much for listening, and we'll be back with you all tomorrow. The Daily Signal podcast is brought to you by more than half a million members of the Heritage Foundation. It is executive produced by Virginia Allen and Kate Trinko, sound design by Lauren Evans,

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