The Dispatch Podcast - On the Ground in Ukraine

Episode Date: March 11, 2022

On today’s episode, Steve has a conversation with Taras Byk, a political consultant and former journalist now working with the Territorial Defense Forces in Kyiv, Ukraine. What’s he seeing on the ground? How are the people of Ukraine holding up as we pass the second week of Russia’s invasion? Plus, Sarah, Steve, and Jonah are here to discuss the latest fallout around the world and here at home.   Show Notes: -The Dispatch: “The Past Offers a Way Forward on Foreign Policy” -Uphill: “The Tug of War Over America’s Russia Response” -The Current: “School’s in Session” -The Dispatch: “Why Did Russia Invade Ukraine Now?” Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to the Dispatch podcast. I'm your host, Sarah Isger, joined by Steve Hayes and Jonah Goldberg. And we've got a special episode for you today. Steve Hayes is going to start off our show talking to Taras Bek, political consultant now working with territorial defense forces in Kiev, Ukraine. And then Jonah, Steve and I will talk more about what's going on in Ukraine and some of the domestic effects in our politics and the Republican Party. Let's dive right in. Steve, set up this interview for us. Yeah, Taras is a political consultant and former journalist working in Kiev. He has been working for the past two weeks near the front lines with the territorial defense forces. You'll hear him explain the messages he's delivered, the people he's hosted, the people he's helped get out of Kyiv. A fascinating interview with Taras that I think gives us a good kind of on the ground perspective of what's going on and what he worries about coming ahead.

Taras, welcome to the dispatch podcast. Thanks so much for taking the time to join us. Hello, hello everyone. Thank you for having me. Maybe the best place to start is for you to just tell us where you, you are as we're having this conversation. Obviously, we don't want to say anything that would put you at any risk, but to the extent that you can tell us where you are and what you've been doing today, be very interested.

So at the moment, I am at home on the western suburbs of Kiev. So this is one of the areas where Russians have tried to invade. And my daily routine is actually quite simple, quite regular for the last 15 days. So during the daylight, basically, I'm just traveling around Kiev, organizing different volunteering support for the army, for evacuation, for territorial defense units. And by 8 o'clock, I return home because they have the martial law. And so basically after 8 o'clock, everyone has to be at home. So after 8, I usually try to communicate with an international community, with different,

our partners to deliver to disseminate messages about what's happening in Ukraine. And when you say you travel around Kyiv to communicate and help organize these various groups, what does that mean? What are you organizing? Is this all in preparation for the, you know, a deeper Russian assault on Kiev that everyone seems to be anticipating? This was actually the case during the first days of the war when we have not expected that our army is that strong. And there was a real threat. that Russians would invade the city. So what we relied on were so-called territorial defense units. Basically, those are kind of volunteers who signed up to who would be ready to resist Russian invasion in the city. But the interesting story is that even though we had a huge number of rifles delivered

to Kiev, according to official report, I think it's like 25,000 rivals which were delivered to Kiev, I mean, beyond the... armed forces. On the second day of the war, when I came to sign up to the one of the territorial defense units, they did not have a rifle for me. So there are so many people volunteering to defend the city. Obviously, they, first of all, they took people with some military experience, which I do not have. And so immediately, like in two days, two, three days, all places in the territorial defense units were filled. So my working days, basically, consists of helping, well, I just travel between different territorial defense units,

asking what they need. Sometimes, you know, they need some products. Sometimes they need some clothes, and that's what I'm organizing from my neighborhood. I started from collecting around my neighborhood. And actually, now I systemized my activities, and we have some small factory producing different products. I mean, different items from SOX to tactical vests, and which are delivered to Kiev, and I distribute among territorial defense units.

In addition, I have direct links with my friends who are actually in the armed forces, so they are fighting on the front lines, and quite often they have some requests as well. Plus, I work with international legions. For example, today we had several Georgian guys who arrived to Ukraine with good military experience to defend Ukraine, and they did not have enough equipment like tactical vests and other stuff. So today I was actually traveling to them, organized those. equipment they need and deliver to them. In addition, we still have many people who get evacuated from Kiev. Yes, of course, we have many people evacuated on the first day of the war. But even until

today, there are people who are still running from Kiev. And, you know, I have often friends who ask me to come to some of a metro station and take people out of Kiev, where they usually are met by buses which go to the Western Ukraine. And yes, and actually yesterday I met people, and two persons, One lady is a successful consultant in one of the leading consultancy agencies in Ukraine. And she, along with her mother and two dogs, she had to spend two weeks in the underground station. Just imagine, like, you have normal, Western style, successful life. And suddenly you have to go to the deepest underground station in the world and spend, like, two weeks there. You helped them get out of Kiev?

Yes, yes. I took her to the suburbs of Kiev, to the southern part of Kiev, where there are no rights. And so there are buses which travel regularly to the western Ukraine, and they travel to west sports. How do you make the decision when is the best time to go? I mean, if she'd spent two weeks underground, presumably she did that because she didn't think it was safe above ground. But then she made a decision to go. Did you talk to her about how she made that decision or why? I think, well, during first days of the war, there was still some expectations.

that it will end soon. And so they are going there like for, well, okay, one, two, three, maybe four nights. But then they realized it's going to last for quite a while. And probably that's why they made decision to evocate themselves for quite a while. And when you travel around Keev, what is that like? Is it, does it feel empty or have people fled and the city feels empty or much less active? Are you able to get around without worrying that you're going to have a confrontation with the Russians right on the street, right around the corner? How does that work?

To those people who have never visited Kiev, I should say that before the war, Kiev was extremely vivid, extremely lively city. So, I mean, it was a city that was alive 24-7. During the daylight, we used to do some business communication, business meetings, like making contracts, contacts, and so on. During the evening, night time, it was a party city, so it was extremely lively and vivid city. Now the city is absolutely different. It's totally lifeless.

It's totally gray. And, you know, it's really painful to see like this different city that you used to see compared to what you used to see. Yes, now it's, I mean, it's quite. safe to walk during the daylight, quite safe to travel. Of course, we have checkpoints on, like, every, I would say, like, five kilometers on every bridges on the outskirts of Kiev. Ukrainian officials, police, they check your documents, they can inspect your car, which is, like, natural in times

of war, because we know that there were attempts, like, several successful attempts of Russians to get into Kiev. Those were only like two or three cars, which were immediately liquidated, but we know that there are so-called clandestine groups which reportedly were came to Kiev like two, three or even more months before the war. So we know that this was well-prepared operation, and that's why we have this martial law in the city from 8 p.m. to I think 8 a.m., during which nobody is allowed to go out because this is dangerous, and during which Ukrainian officials, well, official forces try to find those Russian clandestine groups. You mentioned the territorial defense forces, and it's this mix of people with military training

and volunteers, 100,000 plus volunteers, most of whom have no military experience. How has that been watching the coordination between military professionals and volunteers who bring enthusiasm and commitment and determination, but not the kind of skills that military professionals have. I would say that most of those territorial defense units consist of people who do have some either military experience or at least some preparations, like who did some training in shootings, in the military tactics and so on. They are coordinated by some people who used to fight since 2014 on the Donbass,

either by some official forces or by military, by just people who have some experience. So, yes, I mean, this is the problem, but they are not sent directly to, like, to fight Russians in the, like, conflict areas, except for the cities where Russians have already invaded. So basically the tasks of those groups is to defend the city after the invasion. Obviously, they do not have heavy artillery, and they are getting prepared for, like, you know, urban warfare. Urban warfare. You mentioned that you worked with a group of Georgians who had come to fight alongside Ukrainians. How does that work? Are there many such groups that have come from outside the country to help?

official Kiev announced establishment of so-called international legion for volunteers who are coming to fight for Ukraine. Obviously, they do not represent their states. They are volunteers. But from what I heard lately, the latest number is 16,000 people who volunteered to fight in Ukraine, from the United States, United Kingdom, Georgia, to India, and basically all over the world.

Obviously, first, they have to go some security checks, They have to, well, usually they do not have to go, undergo any military training because they are like really professionals. And, yes, and they just come to Ukraine to defend not only Ukraine, but in general, Western values. Talking about those Georgians, for example, they were fighting against Russia in 2008 when Russia invaded Georgia. They were fighting actually in Ukraine in 2014.

And they came back once again to defend our values. And your sense that that's why most of the people, who have come, have come. They want to fight to defend those values. From what I have seen personally and as well as on interviews when those different people arrived, I would say yes. And, well, in addition, I mean, they are professional military men. And, well, they want to use their experience both for the benefit of Ukraine, of Western values, and obviously to improve their skills, probably. Taras, where were you two weeks ago when you first learned that Russia had launched its attack into Ukraine?

You know, I'm a political consultant, political analyst, and from what I had seen before, that there were some clear preparations of Russia to invade. I still could not believe it that something like this is still possible in the Europe of 21st century. Yeah. But, I mean, the preparations were clear. I mean, the U.S. reconnaissance perfectly predicted the war, and unfortunately, like, not so many people believed in it. So I took my family out of Kiev, like 10 days before the war, to the Western Ukraine, and made them stay there. And, yes, on the night when the war began, I was in Kiev and my home. It was my friend who called me at 6.01 and said, Taras, it has begun.

And, yes, and we had, like, actually, network of friends. We, we, nobody, like, really expected the scenario to happen, but everyone was preparing for this scenario. So we had the network of friends. We knew what to do. We had physical addresses of one another in case, you know, that the Russians invited, for example, eastern side of Kiev so that they can come to me. So we communicated a lot.

We bought walkie topies in case communication is cut. So even though we did not believe. this is something that could happen. We were prepared for this. And it sounds like you made a, was this an evacuation plan in advance? If the city was taken or assaulted in that first wave, you would find each other and get out? What kind of plans did you make? Friendly speaking, my plan was to stay, I mean, until, to stay and fight. I know, I knew. moods in Kiev, I mean, as well as in many other cities in Ukraine, I realized that Russians cannot take 50 that easy.

I mean, even if Ukrainian armed forces failed, which they did not, and Russians somehow physically invaded Kiev, I mean, I don't know what did they expect. Like, almost 100% of population are against Russian invasion, against Russians, against occupation, and I'm sure that we would have such a guerrilla war that, like, everyone, including myself, without military experience, would take a rifle and fight. And you knew that in advance. If Russia invaded the way that Russia invaded, you had confidence that Ukrainians would stay in fight and that this would be, that they would, I mean, maybe the best way to ask you is,

are you surprised by the difficulties that the Russians have had? I am, you know, I am actually, this is something that I expected, but still I am positively surprised, not even about Kiev, because, I mean, I live here, I know Kiev moods, and I mean, it's impossible for Russians to come here and take to stay in Kiev, even if they take it. But I'm positively surprised by population in the southern and eastern Ukraine, because we see that in those cities, well, rather towns, because Russians have failed to take under control any regional center, any big city in Ukraine. They invaded one city, but even there they do not have spawn control. So they took under control

several small towns, but actually this is in eastern and southern Ukraine, where population is most per Russian. And even in those cities, we see huge rallies of people where brave, courageous people, just take Ukrainian flags,

they have no arms, and they go rally against heavily armed Russians. And I mean, this is something that I expected, but still I am positively surprised how many people are standing for their cities. It's amazing to watch the videos that make their way back here, where you'll see Russian forces confronted by, you know, sometimes massive groups of Ukrainians, standing up for somebody who's being, you know, beaten or who's been attacked by Russian forces.

Many of them unarmed, as you say, and they are willing to sort of walk up and confront challenge the Russians. How much of that comes from, you know, the last decade of watching Russian influence in Ukraine, of what happened in 2014, both with the, both with what happened at Maidan and also what happened with the Crimean Peninsula? Since 2014, we had really successful development of Ukraine. So we had changed, like, not only we got like real freedom, real, you know, the real possibility to develop, but actually, you know, economically, like from infrastructure point of view, we had over, like, eight, nine years of successful development, eight years of successful development. I mean, roads were being built, schools, kindergarten, we had successful decentralization reform, which was very useful because, you know, we still had this Soviet legacy. when all decisions used to be taking in Kiev. So, like, for example, Kiev decided which, like,

sub-road to build in, like, very remote city, which park to approve and so on and so on. And this is basically, it was very corrupt system because most of the money would go to Kiev, and then Kiev decided through different middlemen, how much money to allocate for each region and for each city. And, of course, every middleman would take, you know, is part of drive. So the decentralization reform was extended,

extremely successful. Basically, it gave more money, more finances, more competences for local authorities to develop. And that's why cities, local communities, were developing extremely successfully, unlike those territories which were occupied by the Russian Federation. And obviously, citizens saw this, and they did not want to become their cities now, to become like another part of the Russian Empire. One of the greatest example here is the southern city of Mariupol. It just, I mean, I had never been there earlier, but when I came, like, after 2014, I saw very successful developments, and citizens said, like, well, we cannot compare our city

to what it was, like, five years ago. So Mariupil became, like, really great example of development. And today, Mariupil is a key target for Russians. Because one of their key targets is to have, you know, this land access from Russia to the Crimea, and that's why they are fighting so hard to get Mariupil. But Mariupo, for 15 days, even though it's isolated, it's under full siege, it's being bombarded by Russians, it still resists for 15 consecutive days. It's like the mayor, the population, people there, they are still resisting because they

want to stay as part of Ukraine, not as part of occupied territories by the Russian Federation. Right. Yeah, the images coming from Mariupol are heartbreaking, and even more so if it comes on the heels of that kind of successful development. What, what, you mentioned earlier, playing a role in helping to deliver supplies. What do you need most from the rest of the world? Well, we are very, very happy and we really appreciate the fact that all civilized world basically got united around Ukraine.

You know, whether it's like huge multibillion assistance package or if this is just, you know, a rally by local people organized in some remote town. We do feel this support and we do appreciate this support. We have, you know, money donated from everywhere. We have different, you know, products, items, everything delivered to Ukraine. We have like even military equipment, well, of course, on official level, delivered to Ukraine. And what we lack is closing the sky. Because, you know, Ukrainian army is very successful on the land, but still, you know,

we are behind, well, quite behind Russia on air. They have, they have, like, really many missiles. They have planes, jets, helicopters, which are, like, their number is well over Ukrainian number. So what we ask the entire world to have, to introduce the no-fly zone, or at least to close the sky to extend possible, by providing jets, by providing air defense. Because in that case, I mean, we are sure to win anyway, but, The sooner we are provided with this assistance, the cheaper we price we are going to pay for this war.

I mean, price in terms of lives, including lives of our children, lose. Well, look, it looked over the weekend as if the United States had agreed to this three-country deal with Poland, where Poland would supply some Soviet-era migs. The United States would then supply F-16s to Poland, and Secretary of State Anthony Blinken. sounded like he was giving a green light to that in interviews that he gave on Sunday morning. And then within 24 hours, 36 hours, apparently President Biden made a decision acting in part on the advice that he was getting from the Defense Department that that was not going to happen. Were people on the ground following that debate closely?

And what did you think when you heard that you'd not be getting the migs that you thought you might be getting? yes people do follow everything and i would say there is strong disappointment in those decisions because well what the west has to understand that this is not some local conflict this is not conflict between two states this is the clash of civilizations everyone was talking about for years and ukraine is not just fighting for just ukraine for our own country Ukraine is fighting to defend Western values. Ukraine is fighting, fighting to defend the best, basically, because believe me, if Russia invades Ukraine,

if Russian war was successful in Ukraine, Russia would never stop on Ukraine. I mean, you can be sure that Russia will go further, further and further. So we are trying to stop Russia on our borders. We are not telling, even now, to deploy soldiers, to fight together against Russia, but at least try to provide as much assistance as possible. And, yes, unfortunately, this lack of support results in, you know, lower expectations from the West.

You know, we have very high approval ratings of the European Union, NATO. But what I see now, many people are disappointed by the fact that not full assistance has been provided by the West. Do you think the West underestimated Vladimir Putin, you mentioned earlier that you were surprised that the invasion actually happened, but not really surprised. and it looked like it was about to happen. And you, of course, mentioned what happened in 2014, the Crimean Peninsula, Georgia in 2008, go back. And Vladimir Putin seems to have had this expansionist aggressive worldview and has said in speeches, in effect, I'm not going to sit back.

I would say that a lot of people in the foreign policy establishment in the West didn't pay careful enough attention to that. That seems obvious now. Did you think back as you're watching those developments in real time, the West doesn't get Vladimir Putin? Yes, the problem of the West is that, you know, they try to use, you know, this Western approach of thinking to the way Putin things. While it doesn't work this way, he doesn't think in a civilized way, he thinks illogically. I mean, even for Putin himself with his worldview, I understand why he wanted this. war. I understand

why he saw this war as beneficial for him, but even for him, it's totally illogical and totally insane because well, this war was a nightmare for him from very beginning. But still, even

today, Western countries have used only this Western approach to Putin, not approach like it should be. They should approach him like a Russian, like typical thug. The worst part is that, you know, we are repeating the history, the history of the Second World War, and the West still tried to use this appeasement policy.

Because since 2014, what we heard from the West, do not try to return your territories, I mean, the Crimea and Donvas by military forces. Do not provoke Russia, because Russia will attack you if you provoke Russia. So that's what we did. For eight years, we did not do any military activities. We did not try to return those territories by force, and Russia still attacked. Why? Because Russia saw weakness of the West, weakness of Ukraine, and as soon as they saw it, it's like typically an approach of the attack.

When they see weakness, they attack you. And the same situation we see now. Putin is threatening him with nuclear weapons with the Third World War, basically. But as long as we appease him, as long as we keep silent and do not counter-attack, in that case, he will definitely use nuclear weapons. As soon as we stop him, with radical strong steps, this is the only reason not to have, and this is the only reason we can avoid third world war and nuclear attacks. Well, Taras, thank you so much for your time today.

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Protect your family with life insurance from Ethos. Get your free quote at ethos.com slash dispatch. That's E-T-H-O-S dot com slash dispatch. Application times may vary. Rates may vary. Steve, fantastic interview, incredible insight. When we look at the United States, according to polling that we have, internet search data that we have a very high number of Americans paying close attention to what's happening in Ukraine. Why? Why? Why this? Yeah, it's a great question. I mean, I think people came quickly to understand the magnitude of what we're seeing. How significant this could be. I mean, you can't say it's unprecedented, but it's certainly something that we haven't seen for decades, an unprovoked attack, an unprovoked attack by a world power in Europe.

And I think people understand that the implications are obviously gravest for Ukraine, but go well beyond Ukraine. if Vladimir Putin is allowed to do this unchecked as he was with, you know, sort of the first probe in 2014 and the annexation of the Crimean Peninsula, it does seem unlikely that he would stop at the borders of Ukraine. So I think people kind of understand that. It's also, I mean, if you think about it in terms of politics, there's some really interesting polling that we can get into if you all want to about, you know, Vladimir Putin's approval ratings and. And what this means for domestic politics, what it means potentially for the Republican Party. But pulling out in the last 24 hours, 89% of Americans are paying close attention to the war in Ukraine and 90% have a negative view of Vladimir Putin. And the thing that I think jumps out at you when you see those results, and they are like results of pulling that we've seen over the past couple weeks, is just how much of an island

Donald Trump is in this. You know, he did another interview with Sean Hannity last night where Sean Hannity pushed him on Vladimir Putin and sort of seemed to serve up these questions that it allowed Trump to intellectualize his support for Putin to talk about. you know, how he's playing these strong men around the world, but he doesn't really admire him the way that it seems like he does. And Trump didn't take any of it. So I said, nah, I kind of like him. I know them. I like what they're doing. He's almost alone in that. You get Madison Cawthorne, this young Republican member of Congress from North Carolina, call Voldemiers Zelensky a thug

and say that the government in Ukraine is evil. You've had Parker Carlson creates some distance between himself and the kind of open and aggressive Putin shilling that he did for so long to a subtler, just simply recitation of Russian propaganda. But you don't have many people embracing Vladimir Putin right now. Jonah, you know, it's interesting to me. There's a controversy right now where the Duke of King, Cambridge, Prince William. See, the Duke of Cambridge? Feels like what he's the Duke of.

You know, saying that a war in Europe was alien to him. Initial report saying he was comparing it to Africa or Asia, although actually the video doesn't show that at all, but nevertheless, causing a huge, you know, backlash. And we've seen this with others in the last few weeks of people trying to explain why this feels different and then making comparisons of why it's different than other wars from the last 30, 40, 50 years post-World War II and then getting accused of racism

or, you know, Eurocentric thinking, et cetera. And yet all the numbers bear out that something is different about this. And when people try to explain it, they're attacked for being Eurocentric, but maybe sometimes the truth is just offensive? Maybe America is Eurocentric? I definitely think that's part of it, right? So I am open to some of the soft versions of these criticisms, right?

I mean, we're all supposed to believe that all human beings are of equal dignity, and the slaughter of Syrian families should, on some level, offend us as much as the slaughter of Ukrainian families. And I think that's a fair point to make. At the same time, it is a natural human thing to feel more passion, sympathy, empathy for people that are easier for you to see yourself as, right, to empathize with. And I don't mean this as a racist argument at all. Look, there are a lot of, I, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my late brother's, uh, wife was Haitian.

I know a bunch of people in the Haitian American community when bad things happened in Haiti, like my brother and her family and his wife's family felt it more passionately than they would have felt, you know, something happening in, in Armenia. And it's not to say that they hated Armenians or anything like that. It's just those connections mean something. And so then there's like a broader level, which is that it has less to do with the white skin or the Eurocentrism stuff, then it has to do with the fact that Kiev looks like it could be Chicago or Cleveland or certainly any one of three dozen NATO capitals, you know?

And there is a, they have these subway systems. It's like we have had in our culture for a very long time this, you know, David and I geek out on it all of the time, this apocalyptic streak where we talk about like the zombie apocalypse or the Red Dawn scenario and all these kinds of things. And there's just a simple human fascination with it, particularly in our culture for the last couple decades. And then you see like this children of men scenario, you know, this scenario that Hollywood has been trying to replicate.

in real time, and it's not aliens invading, it's not, you know, Battleground, L.A. It's not, you know, Independence Day. It also looks like a World War II movie. And so the idea that it's not going to be compelling to people when there's clearly a good guy and a bad guy, when there are clearly victims who are also heroes and, you know, and bad guys who are doing bad things, you know, cut everybody a little sly. lack for being interested in finding this compelling. And then the last part is there is a tendency. So there are jerks on the right who really want to change the narrative and talk

about something else because they want to protect what's left of their investment in Putin and all that nonsense. But the broader group on the, there's a broader group on the left that has nothing really interesting to say about the actual facts as they are unfolding. And so they want to change the narrative to something where they are experts, right? These are like guys who go on CNBC and talk up their own portfolios because that's why they're on TV. If all you know how to talk about is identity politics and white supremacy and racism and Eurocentrism and all that stuff, you're going to figure out how to shoehorn that into the dialogue because that's your Ballywick. That's why you get invited on TV. And so you have, it's very

similar. Sam Tannenhouse, who I've got major problems with in all sorts of ways, but he wrote a really good essay for the New Republic right after 9-11, and he pointed out how instantaneously vast swaths of the left started talking about censorship in America

because they didn't have any vocabulary, any concepts to deal with the actual nature of the 9-11 attack on America and what it meant and what it was going to do to our politics. And they, so like, the drunk looking for his car keys where the light is good,

they turned it into an argument about why America is going to do bad things because of this rather than what the bad guys did to us. And I think there's an aspect of that among a lot of these people who are professional identity, politics, prattlers to turn on that conversation. Because otherwise, they have nothing of interest to offer anybody. And I don't think the stuff that they're offering is generally all that interesting to begin with. Steve, let's stay on this for just a second. and, I guess, because what Jonah has said to me,

No, the last part about what you said is interesting because I think what I am witnessing on the right, but I haven't thought about it on the left. And I think what Jonah's saying actually could apply equally to the sort of partisan extremes of both sides is that what's happening in Ukraine is isolating those. partisan extremes that were becoming dominant voices within their side, and they're now being isolated, and they're not the center of attention anymore. And it'll be interesting to me to see how long that continues and whether it'll have long-lasting effects as to whether those voices can come back as quasi-dominate forces within either side of the political spectrum. When, as

Jonah pointed out right now they don't have anything particularly interesting to say because they were so domestically focused on these internecine culture war battles. If the culture war is between Putin and Zelensky, then, you know, who said what about CRT in the 1619 project just isn't going to be relevant? Yeah, or it's just, it just makes it all feel smaller, you know? I mean, I have huge problems with the 1619 project. I think what they did and some of the journalism there and the willingness of the New York Times to stand behind the author in light of things that she said that are misleading, it's a problem. It's a problem for journalism. It's a problem for her argument. But Vladimir Putin is slaughtering Ukraine. I mean, you know, this is a

huge campaign of death and destruction. You look at the images coming out of places like Mario Pol and Harkiv, and you think about those debates that you're talking with, the debates that have animated the rest of it, you know, the M&M's debate, the, the, oh, I forgot about the Sesame Street debate, you know? Dr. Seuss's reminiscent. It's reminiscent. It's reminiscent. No longer wearing knee-high white boots and moving to sneakers.

Right. And some very talented writers got a lot of mileage out of that in very smart, smart and intellectual ways. Let me be clear. I like my peanut com. I'm not taking a veiled shot at our colleague here, but those things just feel very small in light of what we're seeing. And, you know, there seems to be almost universal agreement with the exception of those fringes on the left and the right, that this is a tremendously meaningful historical moment. What happens today matters in terms of what we're seeing on the ground, but it also matters in terms of what we expect to be probably some dramatic realignments of global geopolitics. And I think that's inescapable. We're seeing a lot of that

right now. Just wait, one quick point, and then I'll pass back to you. The other thing is it is the case that you're seeing this on the left and the right. And in some cases, the arguments almost mirror one another or echo one another almost precisely. And it was so interesting to see at the beginning of this, when you, when you're on the left and you've been saying for decades, the problem is America. The problem here is not America. We are at best incidental to this. And I would argue that it's become clearer as we've seen Vladimir Putin and Russian forces destroy the country, destroy Ukraine, that he was going to do this regardless of whatever the United States did. We have that document that was mistakenly published where he lays out his reasoning. The United States is

incidental to his to his main argument. You had people on the left and the right in the beginning stages of this trot out the argument that this was all a result of NATO provocation. And if only we hadn't greenlighted potential NATO membership to Ukraine a decade plus ago, Vladimir Putin wouldn't be doing these things. Well, those arguments didn't really stand up to scrutiny. Vladimir Putin was going to do this because he's aggressive because he wants to either reconstitute Soviet Empire or Russian Empire or some combination of the two. He wants more territory and he wants Russia to be strong and he's willing to kill a lot of people to do it. That's what this is about. And you can't make that America's fault. If anything, America has been too late and too reluctant to step in

when Vladimir Putin has showed us again and again and again what he wants to do. Yeah, so I just to echo just one quick point, like, if you think about in a sort of vulgar Marxist way, if you think about the line of, the business model of a lot of people in our line of work, not us, because this match is truthful and glorious and truth is beauty and beauty is truth but um if you look at like a lot of where the discourse goes the business model of it is it's the monetizing of anger right and the at the beginning of this two weeks ago remember it was Lauren Bovert who all the conversation was about sanctions on oligarchs and sanctions on businesses and sanctions on the regime and she was like we must sanction the Canadian regime for what they

have done. We must force these people out from power because she want like that was something like the rage against the Canadian mandates was the thing that was really revving people up. And similarly like the desperation, you know, Ted Cruz was driving around in the, the freedom convoy around the beltway, which has been subsumed into a rounding error of the normal beltway traffic. Um, uh, like the desire to say, no, no, no, no, still be angry at this stuff. right don't be angry at like you know maternity hospitals being bombed and pregnant women being pulled out on stretchers you must be angry at these things that we have got you know 45 more segments in prime time lined up to talk about and and it's the same thing it's sort of the same thing

with the left wing guys who are like no no no no no no remember white supremacy and that's like like it's so funny to watch people like hona Nicole Jones try to make this you know try to make this about white supremacy stuff. Like she's talking about how Western, how the concept of Europe was to protect white civilization and the concept of whiteness, and that's why it was created. And I'm willing, again,

the soft versions of some of these arguments, I'm willing to engage, but not when it's just like this nakedly cravenly, I have nothing interesting to say about what you're talking about and what everyone cares about. So I'm going to try and redefine it so that I'm an authority again on something I know how to talk about.

And it's a desperate business model play. But how long does this last? As in, do these voices stay marginalized because the world has shifted, regardless of when and how the Russia-Ukraine situation resolves? Or does this just go back to the pre-invasion status quo here in another couple weeks? Is this a break or is it a change? I mean, I would argue in terms of domestic politics and how. it affects things, let's say, going to into 2024, because Sarah and I, you've had this, we've had this kind of running disagreement about whether Trump is gaining strength or weakening. I think he was weakening before this. I think this accelerates that weakening. I mean, he was already, you were already seeing Republicans speak out against him much more forcefully

in the aftermath of sort of the continued propagation of the big lie, the RNC censure measure, which, you know, put him cross. rise with Mitch McConnell, virtually all of Republican leadership in the Senate, many other, many other Senate Republicans. And now he's out there, you know, it's important to remember, I've said this before, but I think it is worth recalling almost immediately before the invasion took place. Donald Trump not only praised Vladimir Putin again, he praised the invasion. he said this is genius this move is genius he's going in he's declaring himself a peacekeeper and he's going to take all this land the key word there by the way just because I wrote a comment about this

and it bothers me was he called it wonderful right wonderful yeah you can you can make a stretchy argument that he was just being analytical when he calls it genius and brilliant you can't call an unprovoked invasion wonderful you know right and and he's just not going to have Republicans come around to that view i think this This, you know, these numbers that we've seen in this poll that we talked about a moment ago and polling that we've seen over the past couple weeks, you know, Republicans are at 4% on their favorability of Putin. And Trump is not, he doesn't seem like he's budging. I think it could have serious effects in a way that's different from, say, January 6th than a way that's different from some of these other things that we thought might lead to this accelerated move away from Trump because it's an ongoing concern. This is a war that we're seeing all day, every day.

Vladimir Putin's brutality is on evidence anytime you turn on the television, it's leading the newspapers, it probably won't sustain that kind of blanket everywhere all the time coverage, but it will be prominent because it's such a big deal. And I don't think Trump's going to be able to explain away his past support for Putin. and I don't think he's going to try. So just so that listeners have some insight into the brain of me, there's this thing called loss aversion where people would rather avoid loss than actually have gains, et cetera, like a psychological effect that just humans, all humans have.

I would rather be wrong than surprised. So, Steve, I want nothing more than to lose my bet with you. you over Donald Trump. But I would rather win my bet than be surprised by Trump's ascendancy. So that's like, that's my psychology and all of that. Jonah, let's talk a little bit about this Quinnipiac poll. We talked about it on Dispatch Live, but neither of you two were there. And so I want to hear what y'all have to say, right? this, and this isn't going to, I don't think, come as news to anyone listening, but this Quinnipiac poll asks what people would do if the United States faced a similar Ukraine-esque

invasion, would they stay in fight or would they leave? And 57% of Americans said they would stay in fight, but there were some interesting divides. Obviously, there was a gender divide. 70% of men said they would stay in fight, whereas only 40% of women did. That's not surprising. However, there were other divides that were maybe a little more surprising, maybe not. There was a partisan divide. More Republicans said they would stay than Democrats. There was also an age divide. The age least likely to stay were the 18 to 34-year-olds, kind of the people you'd count on to stay.

Now, very important for those who consume polls. this poll does not tell you who will stay and fight if the United States is invaded. It's not even meant to tell you that. I understand a lot of the headlines thought that was a fun way to take it. But this poll is actually about how Americans view themselves. It has nothing to do with what would happen in an invasion because facts matter in such a thing. You know, we would then be asking questions about whether you have kids, what age your kids are, who's taking the kids? Like, we're not asking any of those.

A question like this is meant to get to how people view themselves, how attached they are to the concept of the United States of America, all of those things. And in that sense, I found those divisions quite interesting. Do y'all, Jonah, and I'll start with you, a theory on why 18 to 34-year-olds do not feel as either attached to the concept of the United States of America or personally. do not see themselves as someone who would want to stay. Yeah, so I'm going to disagree with you slightly. I mean, I agree with you that it doesn't predict who's going to fight and who's not. I guarantee you that if you could compare a similar poll in Ukraine from two months ago and line it up with the respondents and who's fighting and who's not, the poll would not be very predictive, right? People respond to events in all sorts of ways.

History is full of people who talk a big game. I wrote about this in the G-File last week, or this week, at some point in space and time. You know, history is full of examples of people who were not into the idea of fighting or defending their country, and then when actual events happen, become heroes. And also, history is full of people who talk a big game about being heroic and brave and courageous and who cut and run. People respond to these things differently in real life.

that said where I disagree with you a little bit is I think some of this is revealing about who these people are or how they feel as you put it but I think it also there's another way it's revealing which is it's revealing of what these people think the sophisticated thing to say is right the what the what the response they're supposed to give that makes them cool or smart or or or socialized within a certain cultural milieu and all this kind of stuff. And in the GVile, I compared it to sort of like the polling on racism. The polling on racism is a story of unmitigated progress in the United States. Fifty years ago, huge numbers of Americans said if, huge numbers of white Americans said that if a black American moved in next door to them,

they'd leave. And now the response is like four or two percent or something that, say something like that. Now, I don't think that that means the 97%, 96% who don't say they would move that none of them are lying, right? Some of those people are lying, but we have now as a society, we just do not admit to certain positions publicly. There's a social stigma on it. There's a psychological stigma on it. And the fact that there isn't a social or psychological stigma to talking about, yeah, no, I'd cut and run. I'm out of here. Who wants to defend this place? I mean, to me, it's sort of like, I don't know for sure. I like to think I know, but who knows for sure if my house were broken into by some horrible violent criminal, like would I, you know,

would I try to escape or would I, have I had the opportunity? Or would I stay and protect my wife and daughter, right? I would like to say I would stay and protect my wife and daughter. I sure is Shinola would answer the question in front of my wife, I would stay and protect my wife and daughter, right? And then I would hope it would be the truthful answer. The fact that, because it's just like you're not allowed to say the other answer, right? Even though we know. Certainly not in front of Jessica. Yeah, exactly, right? I know, it's like, imagine if the husband of the pod said in front of you, no, the briskets on his own, I'm out of there, right? He's like, that's just a non-starter. Even though, you know there's you know like people do weird things in panic and so that all said it is a

is a really sorry commentary on the sort of glib jaundiced mildly anti-American uh sort of attitude that this country isn't worth fighting for it's no good who's going to why would i bother with that that you think it's okay to say that is really depressing whether you mean it and whether it's true, I don't know. And it bums me out. But don't you think, I mean, Sarah, yeah, isn't this? I mean, there's so many things I want to pick up on there. I mean, Sarah, we talked about this with Todd Rose, right? In so many different ways, this, what Jonah describes may well be a collective illusion to use Todd Rose's phrase from the book and from the podcast a couple weeks ago. And, Jonah, it is the case that when you did the polling on racism 50 years ago

that many of the respondents were giving the answer they thought was socially acceptable then and skewing the results in the other way, interestingly, because they would be perfectly willing to live next to a black family, but white families thought that other white families thought it would be unacceptable for them to do that. So they lied to pollsters. And there's actually pretty good data to support that. So I'm not sure it's clear. I'm not sure our understanding of the polling is as clear as we would like it to be. In this case, I would actually suggest that the age gaps, I don't find the partisan gaps to be that interesting, honestly. You know, I don't, you've seen a lot of people say, ah, Democrats don't care about their country

as much as Republicans. I think it's, you could also say Democrats are, you know, give the reason that Jonah offered or say they're more realistic about the possibility that they'd run away. But I do think the 18 to 34 compared to the older age cohort difference is potentially interesting in that I think the older generations recognize very clearly that this is a huge geopolitical moment in a way that 18 to 30 or 4-year-olds may not appreciate it, particularly because we've seen fewer and fewer people taking history classes, majoring in history and colleges, studying in other disciplines that don't require them to take this kind of history. And I think they don't appreciate it as much as people who have in some cases actually

lived through that history. Yeah, and Steve, this is part of my question to you. So first of all, I think the number I found most fascinating out of all the cross tabs was the educational divide because one of the drivers of our current, big sort, partisan gaps that are moving across the country is an education divide. You know, it's overtaking gender in some respects. And do you know what the educational divide was on this question? I do not.

None. There was no statistical difference between college educated and non-college educated respondents when asked this question, which I just like, I could spend hours in my own thoughts about why that's the case when we then see a partisan divide, when we then see an age divide. But Steve, my question to you is, does this validate the fights over K through 12 curriculum that the idea that we're, well, that it's worth having a fight over how we teach what America is, what America's values are, how, whether we frame it as America has always failed to live up to its values or whether we frame it as American values are, you know, exceptional

and sometimes we have fallen short, but we continue to be exceptional. Does it validate at least that that's a fight worth having? I mean, I've always thought it's a fight worth having. I definitely think it's a fight worth having. And look, I mean, the kinds of things we teach our children should first and foremost reflect the reality of the situation. And while different people will have, Yeah, absolutely. They should be true in the purest sense of that word. No? Is that a debate? Well, they shouldn't be true. Actually, maybe. So let me push back on it. Let me push back on it. Well, there's all. I love your contrary. I love your contrarian impulse. I'm very interested to see where it takes you in this. Well, let me explain what I mean here because I don't want to say that I'm for alternative facts. But there's lots of things you can talk about American history.

that are all true. Right. The question is, if you're facing an imminent invasion from a foreign threat, maybe it would be smart to leave out all the bad things that are true and only talk about the exceptional things so that you ramp up a fighting force that really, really feels strongly about defending the homeland versus, you know, having, you know, kindergartners understand the nuance of, you know, the failures of the 1856 compromise.

that you want to teach patriotism or you want to teach even nationalism sometimes, even if that's at the expense of the whole truth or nothing but the truth. That was the question, the point I was pushing back on was maybe patriotism by itself is sometimes a good thing. I mean, look, I think if you believe, as I do, that we live in an exceptional country and that much of our history has been trying to live up to both the ideals and the principles of the founding, which itself was revolutionary, it's very, very important to teach that. Kids should understand the context, what they're living through and what their ancestors live

through in the context of that broader understanding of what we do. I don't, you know, I don't, I don't, I think what you're describing in some ways is closer to sort of wartime propaganda. And I just don't think that's that effective. If you look at like, that's happening in Russia right now. And the interesting, it was fascinating segment on This American Life, the NPR podcast, I think it was within the past several weeks, where they played clips of, uh, class from a high school class was surreptitiously recorded by the students. And the teachers were saying, you know, Vladimir Putin is right. This, you know, it was the, it was the all hail mother Russia line. And the students not only didn't buy it, but openly mocked it in class, uh, in, in this recording. Now, is that representative of the way that young people in Russia are seeing this, you know, what was this lead up to this, this aggression? I don't know. It was one classroom and there's a lot of context missing. But the attempts by the teachers to provide the

students with this version of, you know, what was happening that just cuts out all of the context and was highly misleading at best, it didn't work. And I think with so many information sources, even with a choked off internet in some respects in Russia then and certainly now students were getting good information so I don't think that that kind of wartime propaganda is likely to be as affected so can we talk about it for just two seconds because like I have a sort of a different take on this um like we've all got we don't have to name them but we've all got relatives or friends with relatives of the older generation who um believe certain narratives about the news in ways that drive us that that that that that that vex us from time to time right uh people

who uh you know by you know by the anti-vax thing or by the the you know that that whatever it is you know the sort of a hard Trumpy whatever kind of version of reality and at the same time, it's very easy to sort of make fun of some of that stuff and make light of it. I've now, I think like a lot of people, I've been listening and reading a lot of podcasts with people reporting from Ukraine, reading a lot of stuff from Ukraine. The number of stories I've encountered now where people call their own parents in Russia and talk about how, you know, their families may die. like there was one on this economist podcast I listened to where this woman sends a picture of a shell that landed right outside of her house

where her kids are where you know her dad's grandchildren are and said this is what Russia is doing to us and he responded that's Photoshopped and you think about the rage that would build in you I mean it's one thing when we argue about like oh the future of the GOP are we going to be this kind of burning

that's going to bring it's another thing thing when people are actively trying to kill you and your family and your kids. And then you talk to people who are your family and they don't believe you. And so for me, it is the best example in my lifetime in a lot of ways of how propaganda does work. I mean, at a really fundamental, like Orwellian fundamental level. And what's interesting, where I agree with you, is that it seems to work best on old people. Where I would have thought, going back to Plato and his theories about the Republic, that propaganda works best on young people because they're the easiest to socialize to something,

right? They're still flexible brainwise. And you would not think that it would be the other way around that old people are the ones who can become convinced that they're, They're not the bad guys, that their own children are making up stories about, you know, how their grandchildren might die tomorrow. It's a really humbling kind of thing when you actually imagine being in that position and having to like say, dad, I am just done with you.

You don't understand. Like, we're going to eat cat food tonight. And you're telling me I spent time to Photoshop a picture of a shell outside my house. I mean, it would, it would mess me up. that lasts. I'm not sure that lasts. I don't think we can come to the conclusion that it sounds like you're coming to, which is that propaganda doesn't work because of these stories. You're right about the stories. You're right about the power of them. You're right about all of the, all of the descriptive stuff that you pointed to. But I think we're likely to see its effects

wane. I think we're likely to find it to be less effective the longer this goes on. And that's what makes this different than, you know, something like January 6th. I mean, you know, you can, you You can look at the videos from January 6th and watch, you know, these, these protesters, these rioters literally beat police with Trump flags and then have people say, these are not Trump supporters. But they have more success because they can spin it because it was, you know, it was a one afternoon thing. It was a one-day thing.

And it's not sort of all day, every day. And I don't think the implications were as widely felt in some ways as this will be, certainly as this will be in Russia. I think the Russian, there are already cracks in the Russian propaganda operation. It seems very clear early that they have been outmaneuvered in many respects by, I'd say, the Biden administration's wisdom and making public real-time intelligence before the war in the Ukrainian masterful infrastructure. operation. But I don't think the kinds of things that you describe will continue with the frequency at which we've seen them in the first few weeks. All right. Well, we're going to leave it there, but let me leave with my own thoughts, which is I can provide some, at least explanations for some of the numbers that we saw that are pretty benign, which is 18 to 34-year-olds tend not to have

the attachments to their communities yet, as older people do. They don't necessarily have kids or marriages. And the partisan divide, you know, there's other things that predict you are a Democrat that might predict, for instance, that you fall into that 18 to 34 category, that you're not married that you don't have kids yet, that you live in a very urban environment that doesn't feel particularly American, you know, as you pointed out, Kiev looks like Chicago. So what's the difference, right? And so if we did like a regression analysis on those numbers, maybe partisanship would actually not be a leading indicator versus age, for instance.

I think that's a really good point. I also just like just thinking about it, if you grow up around guns, you think about how you would use guns, right? I mean, like it's just you're socialized into thinking it's a normal thing. And you think of scenarios where you would be justified to use a gun. I mean, I'm not saying, I'm not denigrating gun nuts as gun nuts or anything like that. I'm just saying it's the way you think about it, right? And if you're raised in an anti-gun culture where you think guns are evil and you never want to touch one, like you might think.

Where guns are predominantly used to kill people in urban environments. Yeah, I mean, it's not, yeah. You just, like, like, it doesn't open a whole, there's a whole cascading series of doors that opens when you see guns in a positive light versus when you see guns in a purely negative light. And you have no personal experience with guns. And then the very last thing I would add is that, and I think actually Steve and I are in violent agreement on a lot of this stuff, whether propaganda or not, I can assure you that the brisket will be force-fed any number of things about American exceptionalism for the next decade or so in my household, regardless of what his curriculum may be.

So thank you all so much for joining us on this little special edition of the Dispatch podcast. And thank you, Steve, for that incredible interview with Taras Bick. And we will see you all next week. Here you all. I know, whatever. And don't forget Dispatch Lives for members on Tuesday nights 8 p.m. Eastern every week. So become a member and join us. With Amnizabeth. Access to exclusive Amex pre-sale tickets can score you a spot trackside. So being a fan for life turns into the trip of a lifetime. That's the powerful backing of Amex.

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