Should the West Engage Putin's Russia?

ANNE APPLEBAUM IN CONVERSATION WITH RUDYARD GRIFFITHS

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: A great pleasure to have Anne Applebaum with me. She will be arguing against tonight’s motion, “Be it resolved the West should engage not isolate Russia.” She is a Pulitzer Prize–winning author, columnist for the Washington Post, and someone who has thought long and hard about eastern Europe, Soviet Russia, and now post-Soviet Russia. Anne, you have come all the way from Warsaw to be a part of this debate, and we really appreciate that. What is the mood in periphery countries such as Poland at the moment, looking at the events that are unfolding in Ukraine?

ANNE APPLEBAUM: They are frightened. There is a bit of a “we told you so” mood. This is what we have been afraid of for a long time. Some of them have been talking about it — worrying about it — for many years. Even though some of these countries are in NATO, and part of the Western alliance, there is still fear because people are wondering if the Western alliance still exists. Is it still strong enough to protect us? People are nervous about invasion. They are also nervous that their political system is being undermined in other ways. Russians are famous for using disinformation and support for radical political parties to undermine democracies. And they are afraid this could happen to them or in what we used to call western Europe, which could weaken them.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: From your perspective, I know isolating Russia is the answer. But what does that look like? More specifically, do you think the current sanctions against Russia are sufficient in the aftermath of Crimea and Ukraine, or do you have a broader, more expansive, idea for isolation?

ANNE APPLEBAUM: Let’s be clear that “isolation” is your word and is not the word that I would ever have used to discuss this topic. It’s an awkward word to have to defend in this context. And I’m sorry that I have to do it, because of course I am somebody who has been arguing for engagement and for the integration of eastern Europe with western Europe for twenty-five years. I initially hoped that we would have engaged Russia too. I was a part of a lot of different groups and initiatives that were designed to do just that at school. We promoted civic education and democracy in Russia and I have been in favour of that my whole adult life.

Unfortunately, we are now at a stage where the nature of this particular Russian regime has become so dangerous and so toxic, not only to its own citizens, which is a whole separate subject, but also to its immediate neighbours, and to all of Europe, and to the Western alliance, that engagement is not possible. I think we really need to think in terms of getting Russian influence out of our societies. This is just a first step, but it means getting corrupt Russian money out of our financial systems and getting rid of money that Russia pays to Western politicians. Russia buys politicians all over Europe: they bought Gerhard Schröder, who is a former German chancellor who now works for Gazprom. They pay influencers and former politicians, and even current political leaders in order to support their line.

We need to be much more conscious of this type of behaviour and get it out of our system. We need to make sure that influence is not part of our political debates. The Russian attempt to flirt with and enhance the power of the far right parties in Europe is part of what I’m talking about. So we need to disengage with Russia to make sure it’s not influencing us.

And finally, we need to ensure that Russia’s influence on Ukraine and its influence on eastern Europe is understood not only as political influence but also as a kind of disinformation. We need to understand that Russia uses false information and phony stories in order to create false images of what is happening. We need to also disengage from Russian media. We need to make sure that we understand there is a difference between true and false, because it is becoming harder and harder to distinguish.

One of the really strange and surprising things about the Ukraine debate over the last year and a half is how effective Russian propaganda has been and how Russian lies appear even in the West. Sometimes they create fake web sites, which sell fake stories that manage to get into the mainstream media. Sometimes it’s more direct, and sometimes it’s just Russia Today or many of the other Russian disinformation channels.

But it is really effective, and we need to understand how weak our media is, particularly in the era of budget cuts. We need to start thinking about how to keep that kind of negative influence out of our media space so at least we know what’s going on in the world and we are not affected by this kind of systematic lying that the Russian regime produces.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Your opponents are probably going to say tonight that by taking a stance of isolation versus engagement or by pushing back against Russia as opposed to reaching out, you’re empowering very hard-liners around Putin and maybe even Putin himself. Putin and his cronies want Russia isolated to the degree that it enhances their own control over that society. How do you respond to that line of thinking?

ANNE APPLEBAUM: We have created Putin. Our policy of engagement for the last ten years — as well-intentioned as it was — created Putin. Allowing Russian companies access to our financial markets and our tax havens and our money laundering schemes have created the Russian oligarchy. The Russian oligarchy wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for the Western banking system that supports it. We helped create Putin. We gave Russia its post-Soviet status. We gave Russia a seat at the UN. We invited Russia to join the G8. We allowed Putin to grow even when it was already clear which way his regime was going from the mid-2000s.

We let him hold an enormous G8 summit in St. Petersburg, where he was lionized and surrounded by all the leaders of the democratic world. He was able to use the summit to say to his people, Look, you say I’m not a democrat, but all these democratic countries here think I am. And in that way, we supported him. We allowed him to do what he’s done.

The other problem is that the West is so nervous about Russia. I once went and looked up the obituaries that were written about Russian leaders after they had died, or, in the case of Khrushchev, when he resigned. At the time of Stalin’s death in 1953, the Times of London wrote a long article, and the thrust of it was, now that Stalin is gone, the hard-liners in the wings will take over. Who is more of a hard-liner than Stalin? Stalin was a mass murderer. But we wrote the same thing when Brezhnev died and when Khrushchev resigned.

We have always been afraid that it will always get worse. Whatever we are doing, we really have to be careful of enhancing the hard-liners. But who knows, maybe Putin is the worst and maybe we’ll get somebody better next.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Some people tonight will probably be thinking about Putin’s nuclear arsenal of 3,000-plus warheads and how that fundamentally changes the conversation, in the sense that accommodation and engagement really is the only course of action in the face of the potentially existential threat that the arsenal represents. Do you agree?

ANNE APPLEBAUM: There is a different response. I agree with you that this is all about nuclear weapons. I mean, we could help Ukraine if it had been invaded by Belarus. It wouldn’t be that difficult. They would only need a couple of radars or something and some anti-tank weapons. The reason we don’t help is because we are afraid of Putin’s nuclear weapons. The reason diplomacy unfolds the way that it does in Europe is because we are afraid of Putin’s nuclear weapons.

But the lessons of history show us that the way to cope with a country that has nuclear weapons is to deter it, and deterrence is not the same thing as engagement. Deterrence means building up your own credibility, building up your own forces, and making sure that the other person with nuclear weapons understands that if he uses them so will you. It’s an unpleasant truth and it is one that I wish didn’t exist. I am one of those people who would happily wish away nuclear weapons. But if somebody like Putin has them, the only way we can cope with that is by saying, If you use them, so will we. And that has to be a believable threat.

This is actually a different issue from engagement versus isolation: it is a question of making sure Putin understands that the use of nuclear weapons is totally unacceptable and that if he does use them, he will pay a huge price. That’s it. It’s not a nice solution. It’s not a sort of solution that most Canadians or Americans feel happy with, or most human beings, for that matter, but that’s the reality. There isn’t another solution. Engaging Putin does not stop him from using his nuclear arsenal — only deterrence does.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: In that context, are you concerned about NATO’s credibility? Do you think that Putin will test Article 5 of NATO — that says that an attack on one of them is an attack on all of them — somewhere in the Baltic States? If NATO didn’t enforce Article 5, how would this affect Putin’s larger feelings about deterrence on the nuclear front?

ANNE APPLEBAUM: Putin is already testing NATO. He kidnapped an Estonian officer. He captured a Lithuanian ship. He just conducted an enormous military exercise in the Arctic, which tested Canada. He sends these nuclear bombers to kind of buzz around British airspace. That’s what he is doing now. It’s a test of NATO and he is gauging our responses. Are we taking him seriously? Do Swedish planes scramble when he flies over Sweden? He is testing us all the time. He is looking to find out how weak or strong NATO threats are, and how far he can push us. It could be extremely dangerous for us not to take him seriously.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Should NATO membership be extended to Ukraine at the appropriate time?

ANNE APPLEBAUM: First of all, that’s not a question. It was turned down in 2009 and is not on the table now. It’s not going to be on the table anytime soon. It’s an irrelevance that keeps coming into the conversation. My more fundamental concern is whether we are sure we can defend existing NATO members. Can we defend the Baltic States? Are we ready to defend Poland or Canada in cases of incursions from the Arctic? Let’s think about it. We need to make sure that what we already have is defendable. Remember that since NATO enlargement there has been a Western assumption that there would never really be a Russian threat again. And actually, the whole time NATO was enlarging as an institution, the U.S. and others were building down their forces. In 2013, there were no U.S. tanks in Europe — the Americans took them all out. But American tanks are now back in Europe as of a few weeks ago because people are afraid again.

But we have been building down. We have been pulling out. We never even put NATO bases in eastern Europe. We never moved them anywhere east at the time of expansion, and those are all policies we now need to rethink.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Anne Applebaum, always insightful. We look forward to hearing you at the debate tonight.

ANNE APPLEBAUM: Thank you.

GARRY KASPAROV IN CONVERSATION WITH RUDYARD GRIFFITHS

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Speaking against the motion tonight is Garry Kasparov, well known in the world of chess. More importantly, this is a man who has acted as a dissident in his own country of Russia. He has helped lead a political opposition, both in Russia and abroad, to the regime of Vladimir Putin. He is the chair of the Human Rights Foundation, among his many accolades and hats that he wears today. Garry, great to have you in Toronto.

GARRY KASPAROV: Thanks for inviting me.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Tell us, what is the mood in Russia like? How are average Russians looking at what we are going to debate this evening in Toronto? If this debate were going to take place in downtown Moscow, how would that conversation unfold?

GARRY KASPAROV: If this debate had the chance of taking place in downtown Moscow, I have a feeling my countrymen would act very differently. Russia didn’t have any meaningful debates for many years. Russia doesn’t have live television, so everything is pre-recorded. The very idea of debate could change a lot. Because today, average Russians are swarmed by this 24/7 propaganda that has been seeding hatred for every neighbour of Russia, for the rest of the world, and has created an image of Vladimir Putin as the saviour of Russia from endless enemies.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Are you concerned that by being so critical of Putin — critical of the current Russian regime — you are playing into that propaganda? You are, in a sense, exhibit A for the negative critique of Russia abroad, to the degree that Russia isn’t being respected or acknowledged as a proper global power.

GARRY KASPAROV: Look, I have been advocating for the West’s engagement with Russia, which is my country, but I believe that Putin’s regime is the greatest enemy for the future of Russia. And I am fighting Putin’s regime. I don’t feel very comfortable arguing against engagement and for isolation today. For me, it’s more about appeasement versus containment. Putin’s regime is a virus and you don’t engage a virus. Russia threatens every neighbouring country. But also by his brazen actions in Crimea, Ukraine, and Georgia, Putin has created a very different international atmosphere, one that could jeopardize the entire global order.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Your opponents tonight are probably going to bring up some examples where Russians have been constructive. They have been productive as part of the P5+1 in terms of negotiations with Iran, offering to take the enriched uranium from Iran to Russia and control its release back to Iran. Let’s face it; they got Obama out of some hot water in Syria over his red line and chemical weapons.

How do you synch those examples of Russia acting in a broader interest? Or maybe you don’t think they have been, with your staunch critique of Mr. Putin and his regime?

GARRY KASPAROV: The two cases that you mentioned definitely play straight into Putin’s hands, because a dictator’s logic is different from the logic of a democratic president or prime minister. It is all about surviving. They pursue activities that allow them to maintain their grip on power.

Russia was delighted to play this pivotal role in negotiations with Iran. By the way, the negotiation was endless and it helped to maintain the tension in the Middle East, and to keep oil prices quite high. But also, Russia is indispensable now. So that is another bargaining chip for Putin.

Now, as for Syria, Putin always wanted Bashar al-Assad to survive because a new government in Syria could potentially mean that parts of Iraq could become very unstable. The gas from the Gulf could ultimately go to Europe, which would jeopardize Putin’s grip on power via the pipeline. With a Russian gas supply, he can hold Europeans hostage.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Do you think low energy prices globally are going to be the best solution to bringing Putin’s regime to heel, forcing it to compromise and engage? Or do you think he has a strategy that is going to allow him to dodge that issue?

GARRY KASPAROV: The low energy prices definitely help to curb the dangerous ambitions of Putin’s regime. But let’s not forget it’s a one-man dictatorship. This is not a regime that will be looking for compromise. So that is why we should look for a more combined approach to make sure that people surrounding Putin, including the Russian bureaucracy and middle class, recognize the evils of Putin’s rule. That is our best hope. Moreover, it could strengthen the very existence of humanity, because unlike dictators of the past, Putin has his fingertips on the nuclear button.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: But is what comes after Putin worse? Should we be careful what we wish for?

GARRY KASPAROV: Putin has been in power for so long that he has succeeded in eliminating decent opposition. In order to stay in power, he has eliminated elections, public debate, and all democratic procedures. He has definitely created an atmosphere that is quite alien to democracy. But the problem is that every day he stays in power, he makes the outcome for the future worse. I wish I could tell you that if Putin left today Russia would be a democracy, but that would be a mistake. And I wouldn’t be honest with myself.

If he stays in power one more year, there will be more blood. There will be more tragic events, and eventually there will be less of a chance for Russia to remain in one piece as a state within its current borders, and to recover.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Another thing that is sure to come up tonight is the whole question of NATO’s involvement in this crisis, both as a potential bulwark against any tendency Putin might have to expand his ambitions beyond Ukraine and the Baltic States, but also — as Stephen F. Cohen and Vladimir Pozner will likely say — in the sense that we brought this upon ourselves. We didn’t treat Russia with respect after the collapse of the Soviet Union. We deployed NATO troops right up to the Russian homeland, and all of this is a reaction to our provocation.

GARRY KASPAROV: There is a difference between invading other countries and understanding the intentions of your potential enemies. This argument falls flat because it means that we do not believe that a hundred million eastern Europeans have the right to decide how they should build their lives or determine what kind of political or economic affiliations they would like to see for their countries. I think that goes against the mentality of the twenty-first century. We are not living in the nineteenth or twentieth centuries. Also, when we look at the facts, NATO expansion was very much on paper. By the year 2013, there was not a single American tank unit in Europe. How can you invade anybody with no tanks?

We also understand the history and read about it in books, but for Baltic nations and Estonians, this is not merely the past — it’s a reality. The Baltic nations were always suspicious of Russia, so we have to give them credit. They had rights and a genetic fear of a potential Russian invasion. And unfortunately, Putin’s actions have created a lot of unease. They don’t forget the invasion of Georgia.

And look at Ukraine. Only about 15 to 17 percent of the country’s citizens were NATO sympathizers, mainly people living in the western part. Ukraine and Georgia were flatly denied NATO membership in 2009. Today, you have two-thirds or more of Ukrainians supporting NATO membership. Why? Because they saw what could happen if their country remains defenceless against a powerful neighbour.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Your opponents tonight will probably use Kosovo as an example to respond to Georgia and say, Look, NATO forced the partition of Serbia, and the independence of Kosovo through the bombing of Serbia. Why did NATO get to do that, led by the United States, whereas Russia doesn’t get to do the same in Crimea?

GARRY KASPAROV: The partition of Yugoslavia involved many countries. There was a general consensus that this was the right thing to do, based on facts accumulated over years about potential genocide. Europe did not want to see that continue. We should not forget that the partitioning of Yugoslavia has given us seven republics, including Kosovo.

It would be intellectually dishonest to say that every border that was created is perfect. It’s the same with the Soviet Union. But the only way to avoid massive bloodshed is to accept these borders. The best way to move forward is to co-operate and find a way for all of these countries to join the European Union, or at least play by the rules to encourage co-operation. Russia acted unilaterally in Georgia. And it was an invasion that had no grounds because there was not a genocide or a potential threat. What is happening in Crimea is the exact opposite of what happened in Kosovo.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: And finally, where do you think this tension between East and West goes from here? Are we into the early phases of an extended kind of Cold War? Or is this something that could resolve itself sooner rather than later?

GARRY KASPAROV: Something you just said caught my attention; you said East and West, which was the Cold War. Today, we are no longer dealing with East and West. Who is this East? Russia? Even Ukraine is now fighting Russian invasion. So it is no longer the same lines dividing the world like the Berlin Wall. We now have guys — including Putin — who are fighting the very core values of the free world. The North Korean family dictatorship, ISIS, al Qaeda, and the Venezuelan dictatorship would also fit into this category.

So it is a much broader picture, and it doesn’t necessarily have the same geographical division as before. A huge success of global democracy is that Russian is still the dominant language in many of the eastern European nations, including Ukraine. Ethnic Russians living in Ukraine are now fighting and willing to die to secure their right to live in the free world. This is the future I want to see. I believe that many Russians on the other side of the Ukrainian border will eventually have the same desires as Ukrainians. And then I will be the happiest man to talk about the engagement of my country. I want to make sure that the great culture of Russia, including science and other important traditions, will be able to benefit everybody on the planet.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Great. Well, Garry, that is an optimistic note for us to end on. We look forward to hearing more from you in the debate tonight. Thank you for coming to Toronto.

STEPHEN F. COHEN IN CONVERSATION WITH RUDYARD GRIFFITHS

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Stephen F. Cohen, the celebrated American scholar of Soviet and post-Soviet Russia, is with me now. He is also a contributing editor at The Nation magazine. Stephen, great to have you in Toronto.

STEPHEN F. COHEN: I don’t think anybody has ever called me celebrated.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Well, I certainly would, based on the books you’ve published.

STEPHEN F. COHEN: There are a lot of adjectives floating around about me, but “celebrated” I have not heard yet. Thank you for having me.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Well, you are celebrated here in Canada. Let’s talk about tonight’s debate. The audience is no doubt going to hear from your opponents that the actions of this regime are beyond the pale and that the world should respond aggressively and assertively to Russian actions in Crimea and eastern Ukraine. How do you respond to their hardline stance?

STEPHEN F. COHEN: It’s beyond hardline — it’s reckless. To respond to this crisis, which was created by the West — not Russia — would flirt with nuclear war. The Russians have made this clear. This is the first time I have heard that kind of talk since the Cuban Missile Crisis, and I have been around for a long time. So that tells us where we’re at right now.

The Putin regime, as it has been referred to, has been preposterously demonized in the West, particularly in the United States. I think they are a little calmer about him in Europe, with the exception of maybe in Poland, or half of Poland, I should say. The regime in Moscow is not monstrous; this is a traditional Russian regime. Anybody who thinks that the Putin regime is beyond the pale evidently came to adulthood during the Gorbachev period — the only period of real democratization in Russia. Ms. Applebaum and Mr. Kasparov were born in and lived through the Soviet period, so why would they think this regime is beyond the pale? This is something they have conjured up out of their own misreading of history, and their own ideology. Mr. Kasparov likely has resentments, which I understand, because he is a Russian. He is a very disappointed man. Things in Russia didn’t go the way he thought they would in the 1990s.

But I think any rational person understands that the crisis in Ukraine, which is mainly what we’re talking about, though there are other resentments against Putin, is something that both Russia and the West are responsible for. And that means that if both sides are responsible, there is territory to negotiate this crisis. But my opponents don’t want to negotiate. If we follow the logic of what they say, it sounds like they want to go to war; it’s almost as though they want a showdown — military or otherwise — with this hated Putin. That worries me, because we should not be thinking about conflict in the world today in such a way.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: How do you see that showdown potentially happening? Is this about the Baltic States? Is it about the situation in Ukraine right now? Or is it something else entirely?

STEPHEN F. COHEN: So as far as I can empirically tell, Russia represents no threat to the Baltic States whatsoever. This notion that somehow Ukraine is also about the Baltics was conjured up by those members of NATO that have wanted to move front-line, permanent NATO military infrastructure and bases to the Baltics right on Russia’s borders for fifteen years, but have been prohibited from doing so by an agreement with Russia. The West signed an agreement when NATO was expanded that there would be no such bases that close to Russia.

And we know who these people are, and what countries they live in. We can name names; it’s not a secret. The three Baltic countries themselves would love to have NATO bases; everybody wants NATO bases. It’s great for the economy — you don’t have to pay for your own defence, since lots of Americans come and spend money. Merchants do well. It’s a windfall, but it’s reckless militarily. However, the Baltics, Poland, and now Sweden, which is not a member of NATO, all want NATO’s protection. There is a strong faction in Sweden that wants to be a member of NATO so that they can show that the threat to the Baltics is real, because it’s kind of hard to demonstrate right now.

Remember when they thought they saw a submarine in the lagoon and never found it? They are running these fictitious threat operations that the Russians are coming, but it simply isn’t true. Now Ukraine is horribly serious. It’s a new Cold War right on Russia’s borders. So what sort of bad resolution do I see here? I think it could be some kind of war between the United States, NATO, and Russia.

There is very strong pressure on President Obama to send three billion dollars’ worth of weapons to Kiev to fight against the Russian-backed rebels in the east. Ukraine has no army; it has been defeated twice by rebels, so it is not clear who would use these weapons — probably the battalions. But the battalions are ultra nationalist, ideological fighters, and I’m not sure you want to give them weapons.

But Moscow perceives this escalation of arming Kiev as requiring a military response. Well, what would that military response be? If you read the Russian press, the generals are telling Putin if the Ukrainian military is rebuilt and rearmed to that degree, the defensible front line where the ceasefire is now is essentially no longer defensible. So they are saying to Putin: Mr. President, we need to help the rebels extend their defensible front line, at a minimum because it’s on the sea. And they would have the seaport.

The West would have to react to that action. So I’m guessing NATO would enter western Ukraine. So you now have NATO — the United States, in effect — paying and leading an occupation in Ukraine. It’s the Cuban Missile Crisis.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: The analogies of World War II are going to be brought up in this debate. People are going to say that this isn’t about isolation versus engagement. This is about appeasement versus containment. Anne Applebaum and Gary Kasparov are on the containment side; you’re arguing for appeasement.

STEPHEN F. COHEN: No, I’m arguing for détente. We have been through this before. We went through it with the Soviet Union. I was on a committee in the United States formed by CEOs of American corporations, big ones — IBM companies and PepsiCo. They wanted to trade with the Soviet Union and understood that trade required some kind of political buffer. We can’t constantly be getting so furious that we would resort to sanctions as we did back then.

And détente ultimately triumphed after a lot of defeats because Ronald Reagan, of all people, embraced it. And he and Gorbachev both thought, wrongly as it turns out, that they had ended the Cold War forever.

People who talk about appeasement and reference the analogy of Munich and Hitler make me think their brains froze in 1938. Can’t they think of some other historical analogy? This is a serious history. It’s not serious political analysis and it’s reckless foreign policy making. Putin is not expansive. He’s not Hitler, and it’s not clear what our political leaders think. But we know one thing: the chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel, and the president of France, François Hollande, went into an absolute panic in February when they realized that the Americans were serious about arming Kiev.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: John McCain.

STEPHEN F. COHEN: They thought it was just typical American rhetoric, that we talk a lot and we don’t do anything. And normally that is what we do. But they became convinced that it was going to happen and then flew quickly to Minsk and Washington, and all these other places, to sign the Minsk Accord.

Now Poroshenko, the president of Ukraine, signed it a few days ago, and then violated it by passing some laws that are completely contrary to what he signed. Merkel and Hollande are absolutely furious. But it is now political, if you see what I mean. We are now at the tipping point. All the parties involved have a chance to negotiate. The people who seem to want a showdown with Russia are the enemies of this agreement. They are very powerful and they are represented at your debate here in Toronto tonight. I don’t know how two grown-ups who have as much knowledge as our opponents have, and have lived the lives they have could work themselves into this really irrational anger about Putin.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Finally, talk to us about why you think there is a faction out there that wants this showdown. As you mentioned, nuclear weapons are involved here, so the risk seems very high. Where does this come from? What is the agenda that is pushing your opponents forward here?

STEPHEN F. COHEN: I don’t want to talk about Ms. Applebaum and Mr. Kasparov because I don’t know how they’ve talked themselves into this position. Everybody has an autobiography: Kasparov was once a Soviet hero. He was a legendary figure in the Soviet Union. Although he is not Russian by origin, he’s culturally Russian. And Applebaum is a very eminent figure with a long history of writing about Russia.

You asked me how I know there are people who want a showdown with Putin even if it involves the military. Because they say so. They talk about weapons being defensive, not offensive. I have no idea what a defensive weapon is, unless it is a tank cannon that can only shoot in one direction or a rifle without bullets — it’s nonsense, and everybody knows it. They want to escalate what is already a military crisis. And for what purpose? They think this will result in a defeat of Putin’s leadership and that he will just go away.

Kasparov said the other day, for example, that Putin is a cancer and, as with any cancer, you have to cut it out. Actually, medically that’s not true; many cancers are not cut out and treated. But to carry his metaphor forward, he means that Putin’s regime has to be removed by one means or another. If he were sitting here, I would ask Garry if he thought we should use NATO military action to remove Putin, and I’m sure he would say that if it’s possible then why not.

Applebaum has a different view, I think. My understanding is that she really believes Putin is somehow on the march and that if he prevails in Ukraine, he will hit elsewhere. But the showdown is in their minds. It certainly is in Senator McCain’s mind and the minds of the entire United States Congress. In both houses — in four votes over four or five months — only forty-eight members of the House voted against condemning Putin’s actions. No members of the Senate. There is no substantial political opposition on this topic in the United States. So it’s not just McCain who seems to want a showdown with Putin — it’s all of Washington.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Well, that is a sombre note to end on here, and on which to start what should be a fabulous debate this evening.

STEPHEN F. COHEN: To defend my own country, I hear that this point of view is quite strong in Canada as well. But since I don’t live here I can’t say that first-hand.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: You will get a definite flavour for it tonight. Stephen F. Cohen, thank you for coming to Toronto to be part of this debate.

STEPHEN F. COHEN: Thanks for having me.

VLADIMIR POZNER IN CONVERSATION WITH RUDYARD GRIFFITHS

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: I am joined by Vladimir Pozner, who will be arguing for the resolution tonight. He is an Emmy Award–winning journalist and host of the top-rated Russian current affairs show on Channel One, as well as a bestselling author. Vladimir, great to have you here in Toronto.

VLADIMIR POZNER: It is my pleasure.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: You’ve had a lifetime of engagement with this relationship between the Western world and Russia, sometimes good and sometimes bad. Where are we at right now? Are we at the beginnings of a new Cold War?

VLADIMIR POZNER: The answer to that is yes and no because the Cold War was really based on ideology. Two systems were fighting each other, each one believing that it was right. It wasn’t about geopolitics. It was about convincing the other that we have the right system; we have the right ideas; it was also about capitalism versus socialism — or versus communism — depending on how you look at it. That was the Cold War, and that is not happening now.

It is a different situation now, but it is just as dangerous — perhaps even more dangerous. At this point it’s a propaganda war — a media war — about geopolitical interests. It’s about whether or not a country feels threatened. Rightly or wrongly, Russia feels threatened by NATO. And it’s about whether or not the United States is concerned about nuclear weapons. Because back in the Cold War days, the Americans were very fearful of nuclear weapons, and I think MAD played a key role in preventing war. Kids were taught to hide under desks. There were movies like The Day After. People were very much aware of it. I don’t think it’s the same today. Somehow, the whole issue of nuclear war has kind of dissolved. And I think that’s dangerous.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Tonight you are putting forward the argument that the West should be engaging Russia not isolating it. Are you concerned about a nuclear threat here, or that a set of errors could happen if the West pursued a policy of isolation, or even something more hardline, against Russia?

VLADIMIR POZNER: I am very concerned, especially because to whose advantage is it really to isolate Russia? Who wins from that? And my argument is going to be that isolation makes countries worse off. The Soviet Union is a good example of that. Non-recognition and isolation allowed Stalin to do things that he would not have been able to do had there been engagement. And I want to make it very clear that engagement and appeasement are not at all the same thing.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Look at the relationship today from the lens of what’s happening in Ukraine. I’m sure your opponents tonight are going to say that the global community can’t support the Russian actions first in Crimea and now in the eastern regions of Ukraine. Russia has behaved in such a way that it has in fact labelled itself as a rogue state, and it should be treated as such. How are you going to respond to that line of criticism?

VLADIMIR POZNER: Well, if that line of thinking does come up, I would say that, first of all, Russia sees what is happening in Ukraine as a threat. It sees Ukraine becoming a member of NATO in the future, meaning that NATO would be on Russia’s southwestern border. And in the case of Crimea, had Crimea remained in Ukraine, its most important naval base, in Sevastopol, could have become a NATO or American naval base.

It sees all of this as a threat. Look back to 1962, when the United States did not allow the Soviet Union to base its missiles in Cuba, although the two countries had agreed to do it. The U.S. didn’t have jurisdiction in the area, but it said it wouldn’t permit the missiles nonetheless. The country threatened to sink the Soviet fleet because officials viewed the actions as a threat to their national security and thought, to hell with international law.

It’s pretty much the same thing today. I don’t think any of this would have happened if there had been some kind of guarantee that Ukraine would not become a member of NATO for the next thirty years. I think there is a real fear of NATO in Russia. Why does it exist now? There is no more Soviet Union; there is no Warsaw Pact. Who is NATO being used against? Who is the threat? If it’s Russia, then come out and say so. But they’re saying, Well, it’s about North Korea and Iran, and you know people don’t bite.

I want to make this very clear. I am not a Putin supporter at all. I think that some of the things that were done were completely wrong, but that doesn’t change my attitude about engagement. If you don’t engage, more of this is going to happen. On the other hand, you have examples like Kosovo. NATO bombed Yugoslavia but nobody allowed it, not even the UN. Kosovars, who had always been part of Serbia, suddenly became independent, and everybody started saying, That’s fine, but then why can’t others do the same thing?

The world has come to a point where might actually means right. Whoever is the strongest does whatever it wants. And today, the United States is the eight-hundred-pound gorilla, there is no doubt about that. And Russia is very concerned, correctly or incorrectly.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Talk to us about how the average Russian is looking at this situation. Is this feeling registering not just in the Kremlin, but also on the streets of towns and cities across Russia?

VLADIMIR POZNER: Of course. This has also been part of the propaganda. The major television outlets in Russia, the so-called federal channels, are either owned and operated, or just operated, by the government. And so the picture that people get of the world and what’s happening inside the country is a Kremlin-organized picture. That is the definition of propaganda, and it’s pretty effective.

But people are not stupid. Remember what Lincoln said: “You can fool some of the people but you can’t fool them all the time.” Reaction to this propaganda probably would have been different if the Russian people didn’t also have the feeling that the West kind of had it in for Russia; they said, You lost the Cold War. Shut up. Go back into your cave. You’re a second-rate power and we don’t care about you. It would have likely been different if there hadn’t been that feeling of being disrespected and disregarded as a great nation.

Today, anti-Americanism in Russia is far higher than during the Cold War. Anti-Americanism used to be against the American government and the American system — today it’s against Americans. They are seen as the enemy. And on the other side of the equation, you have over 80 percent of Russians supporting Putin. That poll was conducted by a very respectable independent organization called the Levada-Centre.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: And finally, where does this conflict go from here. Let’s say you’re right. And let’s say the West can find its way through to a new “engagement” with Russia. What would that look like? And are you optimistic that it could bear some results in the immediate or near future?

VLADIMIR POZNER: I’m not optimistic. I don’t think it can happen while Obama is president of the United States, because it would mean loss of face, among other things. I don’t think it can happen when Putin’s the president of Russia, because there is a profound distrust of him as a leader. He basically says you can’t trust the Americans. So I would be optimistic if there were a change in leadership in both countries. I think that would be the key to real change. Otherwise it’s going to be very slow and difficult. And as I said, I’m not optimistic. Maybe there is light at the end of the tunnel, but I’ll tell you what, it’s a heck of a long tunnel.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: We know that there is going to be a change in leadership in the United States in 2016. We’re not so sure about Russia.

VLADIMIR POZNER: We are pretty sure there won’t be. That’s the fact. He is playing his cards very close to his chest, as they say in poker. I mean, he’s not saying if he is going to run or not, but people feel that he will. In addition to that, sadly enough, there is no one else to turn to, as far as most people are concerned. The leader of the Communist party? That’s a joke. The leader of the so-called Just Russia party is even more of a joke. The leader of the Liberal Democrats is a clown, so there is nobody there. And the democratic opposition — the real opposition — has never been able to come together as allies and stand as a unified group.

So everyone is in his little corner with no options around. And, of course, a lot of people would say Putin has made sure that there would be nobody out there. I’d say yes and no. He has brought Russia back. Now you have to contend with Russia. You can’t just ignore her. So I am not optimistic, no.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Vladimir Pozner, we are going to leave it there, but you have got a great debate set for you tonight. Thank you for coming from Moscow directly to participate in this debate. It’s great to have you here in Canada.

VLADIMIR POZNER: Thank you so much.