The Munk Debates Podcast - Munk Members-Only Pod: Season 2, Episode 21

Episode Date: May 13, 2022

This program provides listeners with a focused, half-hour masterclass on the big issues, events and trends driving news and current events. The show features Janice Gross Stein, the founding director of the Munk School of Global Affairs and bestselling author, in conversation with Rudyard Griffiths, Chair and moderator of the Munk Debates. This special episode of the Munk Members podcast provides a recap of the live and in person Munk Debate on the Russia-Ukraine war that took place in Toronto on May 12. The first part of the program features Janice Stein in conversation with Rudyard Griffiths immediately after the debate. What did we learn from this debate? Janice and Rudyard share their thoughts on what viewers and listeners should take away from evening. The second part of the program features a post-debate Q&A with all four debaters and Munk donors recorded immediately after the event. To access the full length episode consider becoming a Munk Member. Membership is free. Simply log on to www.munkdebates.com/membership to register. Under your membership profile page you will find a link to listen to the full length editions of Munk Members Podcast. If you like what the Munk Debates is all about consider becoming a Supporting Member. For as little as $9.99 monthly you receive unlimited access to our 10+ year library of great debates in HD video, a free Munk Debates book, monthly newsletter, ticketing privileges at our live and online events and a charitable tax receipt (for Canadian residents). To explore you Munk Membership options visit www.munkdebates.com/membership. This podcast is a project of the Munk Debates, a Canadian charitable organization dedicated to fostering civil and substantive public dialogue. More information at www.munkdebates.com.Become a Munk Donor ($50 annually) to get 72-hour advanced access to the full length editions of Friday Focus and Munk Dialogues. Go to www.munkdebates.com to sign up. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hi, Monk podcast listeners. The following is a sample of the Monk members-only podcast. To access the full-length edition of this episode and all of our regular Monk members-only podcasts, go to our website, www.com, and register for membership. Membership is free, and it's available for you right now at www. Monk Debates.com. Hope you enjoy the program. Hello, Monk members. Roger Griffiths here, your host and moderator. Welcome to this, our regular monk members only podcast. I am here in the lounge of the Roy Thompson Hall post the monk debate.

We're having a debrief with Janice Gross Stein, the founding director of the Monk School of Global Affairs, internationally renowned author and scholar. We've just wrapped up our monk debate on the Russia-Ukraine war. Janice, a feisty debate. A lot of two and three and three. fro, but I want to know what did you learn? I always think it's an interesting thing to kind of go to these events and walk away from them and say, you know, what was new here that I can

extract from this to better understand this war in Ukraine and what it all means? Roger, that was a great, feisty debate about a serious topic. Two issues came up that really made me think. First of all, escalation, which is something. he had I worry about, and I think you worry about, really hard to get the con side to focus on what would that look like. And every time we came in close, what happens if this war escalates and spins out of control? So let's just remind people the con side here is Radick Sikorsky, the former Foreign Minister of Poland, defense minister, sitting member of the MEP, and Michael McFaul, the former U.S. ambassador to the

United States. So what do you think is the dynamic there, Janice, in terms of, I don't know, maybe a hesitancy on the side of this debate that was less concerned about Russian interests and more concerned, legitimately so, about Ukraine's interests, about the interests of a liberal international order in a time of increasing competition with autocratic states. I think you put your finger right on it that both Mike McCall and Radick-Sikorsky obviously overwhelmingly concerned with the horrific damage that is being done to Ukraine, not buying at all the argument that great powers have any special rights, very concerned

that great powers can trample over smaller countries, but Because they were so concerned, they simply would not focus on the issue of, oh, my goodness, what happens if you corner Putin? And he becomes desperate and he escalates. Tried hard when I was in my section to get them to focus on it. They really would not, which actually makes me worry that they wouldn't. Second takeaway is very similar. the pro side, which was Stephen Walt, led that conversation. And saying to him, well, does that mean you recognize Russia's conquest by force?

Right, just might make right. Yeah, just might make right. He said, well, yeah, I don't really like that world. I don't really like that. But big powers behave the way. big powers do and they do stupid things. The United States has done stupid things. Right. He gave a lot of examples. A lot of examples where the United States misbehaved globally. So this wasn't about making allowance for Russia. It was my making allowance for great powers. That's what realists do.

And so sad, too bad for Ukraine. But that's where they went. Yeah. The fourth debater here was John Mearsheimer, I guess, a kind of icon in the U.S. conservative realist. In one wing of it. In one wing of it in the International Affairs community. And again, to remind our monk members that you can log on to the monk debate website right now, triplew monkdebates.com and actually watch an archived version of this debate. It'll be up on our site.

You just need to log on with your membership credentials. One thing that John said that got me thinking in terms of something new was the analog to the Cuban missile crisis. He had a tongue-and-cheek line at his closing statement, you know, that we should all aspire to be John F. Kennedy, not Joe Biden. And his argument there was that Kennedy made a deal with Chris Jev to pull the Jupiter missiles out of Turkey. He knew it was going to be so unpopular with Americans. He had to tell Khrushchev that he was basically going to lie to them about these missiles not being removed from Turkey in order to reach some agreement with Khrushchev on the de-escalation around the Cuban missile crisis. And we know how close the world came,

unfortunately, at that moment to a bigger superpower conflict. What do you think about that historical analogy of Ukraine versus the Cuban missile crisis? I thought that was a great argument, really. It was John's best argument of the night. And let's take just a minute, Reddier, to unpack that. The world came much closer to nuclear war in 1962 than we thought at the time. And why was that? Largely because lower-level officers way down the chain of command had control of these weapons, they didn't get the bigger picture. And at least twice during that crisis, there was a real possibility.

some lower level officer was going to launch a tactical nuclear weapon. And had that happen, we would have gone right up the ladder. And the two at that time, the Soviet Union and the United States would have gone all out at each other. So I agree with John, but for very different reasons that he brought up. I can assure you that the Biden White House is looking at that history and trying its best. to put circuit breakers into the system because there's no one and interestingly enough not Mike McFaul, the ambassador who as he told us is in daily contact with Zelensky's team, talks to the Biden White House all the time.

Even he is not willing to take off the table that there could be an escalation and that there could be some use of tactical nuclear weapons. So the big question becomes, what do we do after that? Biden-Wa is really smart on this. They're not saying, and they're right to leave it ambiguous because better for Putin to worry than to know. Better deterrence. Yeah, it's better deterrence. So I think that is the closest crisis to look back at.

and it's really important. What I learned from tonight, put circuit breakers into this system. Put circuit breakers in where you stop that escalatory spiral if it happens. Another takeaway for me from this debate was Radix Sikorsky. I think he was one of the stronger debaters tonight. Terrific. Yeah, foreign minister, Poland, defense secretary. speaking from that Polish perspective of having been a country historically that had been partitioned, invaded by the Soviet Union, by Nazi Germany, going back through its past a sense of the smaller power saying, come on, you know, the world doesn't have to be simply, you know, a tale of tragedy of great powers clashing with each other, slicing and device.

slicing and dividing up the rest of these, quote, smaller powers. We have principles. We have a moral imperative here. I thought that was a strong argument. It clearly resonated with the audience because we saw, for the first time, Janice, and a number of years of the Monk Debates, saw a really big switch in the vote. So we went into the debate with a, I'd say, 50-50 split here and opinion for and against our resolution that we need to acknowledge Russia's security interest to end this war.

and we came out the other end with... On the other side? Yeah, I mean, almost like 70-30. We'll see what the final numbers are, but a really strong swing towards the idea that, no, Russia's security interests should not be paramount here. Is the liberal world kind of feeling its oats right now? Are we feeling a bit emboldened by the fact that Russia has performed so badly

and that maybe this war is about more than just Ukraine? Taiwan. It's about our own values. It's about the kind of world we think it should be, as opposed to simply accepting the world as it is. So let's unpack Radik, too, who was fabulous, I thought. Such an important voice, Roger, to hear, he's a poll. Poles have had the most bitter history in Europe of almost anybody, you know, invaded by the Russians and the Germans together. as a result of a pact that the two great powers made together. If there's any country in Europe that is going to fight strongly against special rules for big powers, it's polls. And Rana gave voice to that.

All our members, go listen to that because it will give you this gutsy feeling that smaller countries have when they say enough, enough. We are not going to knuckle under to what big powers. We're not going to follow anybody else's rulebook but our own. But when talking to him privately afterwards, and we did have the chance to do that, there is a sober recognition here that Ukraine is paying just a huge price. The cities are being devastated. On the ground, and we don't talk about this enough,

Russia's achieved most of its basic war aims. It did not decapitate the government and take all of Ukraine, but it controls the Donbos now, much more of it. It's built its land bridge to Crimea. Ukraine is a partition country. And how far Zelensky can fight? Is he going to fight to the last Ukrainian? and so there is a raw reality of power here

that much as we all wish, and there's a sadness to this one here and you hear it and see it, much as we all wish it were different. Ukraine is the victim here. So yes, inflict as much damage as you can on Putin's army. And yes, it could have been much worse and thank goodness it isn't, but Ukraine has just paid an enormous price. And its future will be different.

It's lost five million people. Yeah, amazing. Yeah. So that noise, that patter we hear in the background is the post-debate reception. We're here at Roy Thompson Hall in downtown Toronto. Janice, I think you and I deserve a drink to an evening well spent. You moderated the middle portion of the debate. I really appreciate that.

You did a fantastic job. It is always great working with you, Roger. It's just a treat. And we're now going to segue into the second half of this Monk members only pod into an exclusive conversation that we had in our post-debate reception with our four debaters. So we did some Q&A with Monk members who are here in person and took their questions for Radick-Sikorski, Michael McFaul, Stephen Walt, and John Mearsheimer. So the next voice you'll hear is me teeing up that four-way conversation along with those audience Q&A. And we'll be back to our regular podcast format next week. So thanks again for listening.

And I hope you enjoy this additional bonus segment. And do listen to the segment because it was off the record. Emotions were running high and as good as the debate was. You will get an even better feel for the issues we were talking about. Absolutely. If you want to catch the debate, just go to. our website, triple W monk debates.com forward slash live stream. You can check out all of last night's debate if you are a monk supporter or curator. So please consider upgrading your membership,

making a donation to the monk debates. It allows us to have these events and produce this weekly podcast for you. I'm Rudyard Griffiths, chair of the monk debates. We'll talk to you next Friday. Have a great weekend. Bye-bye. You've been listening to a sample of the Monk Members-only podcast. To access the rest of the episode, consider becoming a member. Membership is free and available at www. Wunk Debates.com. Once you've joined as a member, go to your membership profile to access the rest of this episode and all of our Monk members' podcasts. Thanks for listening.