Don’t see why US and Saudi can’t agree to a Defence treaty notwithstanding Israel or Gaza

Putin wins the NATO recruitment award.

Amos Hawkin was not successful ! Hezbollah did not back away from the border. To the relations with Egypt- They lied all along.israel can't trust Egypt anymore.1.) They made up they own Peace Plan with Hamas and tried to deliver that to Israel. 2.) at least 20 tunnels were still open to Egypt all the time,Thats why Egypt was against The Rafah Operation.

Kotkin fails to understand that by wanting to avoid war with Russia, he guarantees war with Russia. This is what all Russian appeasers like him fail to understand.

As described, the west is an engine of development and prosperity. The U.S. may have done a lot of heavy lifting to spread the western way of life but others can also carry the flag

The Ukraine conflict is about security The Middle East conflict is about security The South China Sea conflict is about security Who is supplying arms to each conflict?

Russia has turned into a private gangland for Putin & his gangsters. As a Finn I can only hope that the coming upheaval will produce a different, less antagonistic & militarist Russia.

Kotkin should debate Mearsheimer

I dont agree with Kotkin point of view about Russia turning into North Korea. Russia is Europe, genetically, culturally and historically. The North Korean regime is built on the ideas of social equality, leaderism, which they wanted in the 50s. Russian autocracy is built on resentment and imperial grandeur. Even if we compare Russia with all dictatorships, such as China, Iran, Somalia, and North Korea, Russia remains the most liberal of them, simply because of the availability of free access to the Internet. In addition, it is worth noting that even hardcore supporter of Putin in Russia is well aware of corruption and theft, plus he would never live like a North Korean eating three bowls of rice and corn a day.

A great episode! The future is unpredictable, and I will definitely stay tuned to Foreign Affairs to keep abreast with what is going on!

A great detail , informative and unbiased interview .

What are the Russians, with a population of 145 million, going to do when China, with a population of 1,500 millions, invades?

Taiwan has paid for military weaponry from the USA that hasn’t even arrived so how do they bulk up their military weaponry?

Big fan of Ms. Zoe Liu. Brilliant, and cute at same time. Will read her books.

I wonder how seriously US administrations take Prof Nasr's words.

I actually think Russia made a large mistake making major counterattacks. The rope Russia had to win was that the west would forget the war. The distraction in Gaza really helped with that. But Putin had to attack until he actually took some land ad got some victories, at least enough to get into the press. And the west woke up again.

Very good. I think one thing wasn't looked at. The active role of Netanyahu on the on the strengthening and radicalization of Hamas, in order to radicalize and bring Israel to a more right wing position.

Planning terror in GAZA has been going on for 18 years, and Israel and the USA know the daily situation. The problem Biden Obama keeps under the rug and dictates Israel manipulates Israel's public and American public opinion and works with terror in negotiations. Blinken should resign.

Very interesting thanks. Never forget all of the Russians who abused children and their families in Ukraine. From the mass graves (in Izium) to the stolen children. Now if Ukrainian parents don't become Russian citizens and go to flight against their brothers and cousins Russia will take their newborn children at birth. Speaking of Izium. What did those 414 people see? The Russians thought it was better to murder them and bury them all in a mass grave instead of letting them testify. Whatever they saw must have been truly horrific. If Russia want's to sign a treaty they must first prove they will stand by one. If Russia wants to negotiate, start with your original written agreement. Pull back all of their troops back behind their original boarder and then you can start negotiations. If they don't show they will honor the original agreement how can you expect them to honor any further agreements. It's our war to lose. Russia can NOT win. Unless we choose to not support Ukraine of course. It is on us in the global West to pick the world we want to live in. Choose wisely. Thanks. Glory to Ukraine. God Bless Ukraine and her people. 🇺🇦🇺🇸

Its interesting listen this from Russian side.

From this it sounds like Hamas using Gaza civilians as human shields is a legally defendable tactic? - surely not - that in itself has to be a war crime? - it was enlightening & sobering to hear the ins & outs of this horrendous situation - I'll listen again but I'm pretty sure I heard that: - Hamas murder 1200+ civilians & take 200+ hostages in a raid into Israel on Oct-6 - then retreat & hide in their fortified tunnel network beneath the densely populated cities of the Gaza strip. These are inhabited by the people that Hamas govern - but with what support? - the last election was 2007. - that has to make it impossible for Israel to rescue the hostages & remove the existential threat Hamas poses to their population without injuring / killing some (a lot) of Gaza's civillians. - that is human shielding - Hamas is hiding beneath their own civilians in their homes - deliberately putting them in harms way in the middle of a war that they started. - that has to be a war crime in itself as well as the murderous raid & the kidnapping.

Sure, pressure Ukrainians to sign the Armistice, so that Russia can re-arm, regroup and attack again in a couple of years. What a terrible terrible idea

He should write another book.

The euphemism for the cold war that's going on right now is "de-risking" ;)

I modestly disagree that Ukraine-Russian war will end. It will not end, it will freeze that is when neither side thinks can gain more with tolerable cost or, worse, risking its current position.

Actually a great analysis! I am positively surprised!

Excellent analysis, but like other listeners, I only disagree with one point: I recall the outcomes of various meetings that Ukrainian diplomats had with Russia, formally in Turkey and informally elsewhere in 2022. The Russians were never serious about an agreement (not that their word means anything - another issue) and each time Putin demanded in effect full capitulation with the aim of turning the country into Belarus - the non-annexed rump being independent on paper only. I don't for a moment believe that there was any opportunity for a settlement in 2022 that would not have seen Ukrainian sovereignty annihilated.

Russia held out its hand to the west and got rejected. The same is happening to China

Both parts one and two are truly excellent discussions on some of the most urgent and pressing topics in the international sphere. Thank you so much for organising this. A must listen to anybody with an interest in current affairs.

Insightful instructive and clear. Thanks!

Russia's murky present. The future is beyond "murky". Putin is laying the foundations for the first (and possibly last) nuclear civil war in History.

Russia/Putin is still playing from the old archaic "Its Easier To Steal From Your Neighbor Than To Develop Yourself" playbook.

Putin has been acting like a weasel ever since he let the Baltic States join NATO. Then he got fooled by the West again and again and again. In 2013, in 2014, in 2015, in Syria, in 2022 in Istambul... He should already have drawn a red line in 2004. Stop an no further. Or after the Maidan coup, he would have had just rolled in his tanks all the way to the Polish border. Or at least blown up the Dniepr bridges. May be he played this 'slow, naive' game on purpose and let the West believe Russia was nothing but a weakling? As we have seen over the last 2 years, Russia has completely turned the tables, the West is in a deep swamp it can't get out of and it has depleted all of its arsenals and exposed itself as a non-power. The only thing the West has left is creating narratives, while the Rest is lining up to join Brics and get rid of the dollar hegemony.

The ancient world had a profound understanding of contingency. That is, the more you try to do, the more things have a tendency to go wrong. We must move away from discredited enlightenment ideas about force at a distance.

Great guest; I always learn from Kotkin

Great Stuff w/o all the typical academia BS (more pls ;)

Clarity!! And the administration’s lack of it. So true. Very important observation!

Kotkin’s ironic ( or is it sarcastic) sense of humor is always a delightful surprise. Not having dinner with Putin these days? Unlike all those public commentators who claim to know Putin’s thinking. 🥹

47:60 Nailed it. If you can't be bothered to listen to the whole thing, listen to the 5 minutes around this and you'll understand why we need to be listening to this guy and why it is so damaging that politicians on both sides of the Atlantic are deaf to this message and how tragic this is going to be to us all over the next 5 to 10 years. Again, thank you Stephen.

This is the best opinion yet on world affairs so far. How Russia can win in Ukraine is obvious now. They're making money on it. Period! Why stop, when everyone is getting rich. And they have unlimited manpower. Etc.

22:41 Thank you Stephen Kotkin for sharing your grasp of affairs and your innate intelligence with us. Listening to you is a privilege.

People disagreeing with Kotkin on the treaty/armistice question are missing the point entirely - yes, Russia is not trustworthy and will strive all they can to renege on any deals, but at least creating a temporary deal where the accession of Ukraine into NATO and the EU occurs would make any Russian gains or trickery meaningless. This why the definition of "victory" is so important; a situation where Ukraine takes back land and is locked in a forever war is not better than one where the voluntarily sign away land but gain the protections and prosperity required to rebuild in the West that Putin wants to move Ukraine away from.

I'd caution against romanticizing the post WWII era. Rolling Thunder alone cost the lives of at least 30 000 civilians, with targeting that does not fulfill today's standards.

Informative and dispassionate discussion of the international law of war and civilians. I don’t know about other countries, but there is NOTHING like this analysis in the mainstream media in the UK.

Here’s my take. 1. The problem with a 2022 armistice is that Putin has to agree with it. Any peace treaty Putin would agree to would hand over so much of Ukraine that it would be, as Mr. Kotkin says, a capitulation. 3. The Pygmalion option has failed in the Middle East. But it has worked in Japan, Germany, Italy, Spain, and other places. Rather than writing it off entirely, we should study examples of when it has and hasn’t worked to decide whether it’s a feasible option. That said, it isn’t happening with Russia. 3. Kotkin is correct in his claim that most of the people fighting and building munitions for the war are economically incentivized to continue the war. But that money doesn’t come free. It’s drawn from the finite, decreasing oil revenue, finite reserves, and the civilian population. Expect the civilian population to crack before the war machine.

It’s remarkable mr. Kotkin lays out why Biden is losing in the polls. Not succinctly laying out why we are doing things regardless if it’s Ukraine, border, infrastructure, etc.

Saving Ukrainian sovereignty requires Ukraine admission to NATO.

I'm not sure anyone us agree with his bizarre definition of "Western", or that dodgy parallel with France (every country with an imperial past had absolutism) but he's an interesting commentator otherwise who has a sound definition of victory the politicians could learn from.

Wonderful to hear such insightful commentary from genuine expert. Pity it’s not more common

when Netanyahu says that 50% of the people killed are terrorists that is a pre-emptive statement about proprotionality. Hadn't she noticed that?