[music]

President Joe Biden: One year ago, the world was bracing for the fall of Kyiv. I just come from a visit to Kyiv and I can report, Kyiv stands strong.

[applause]

Kyiv stands proud. It stands tall and most important, it stands free.

Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning everyone. That of course was President Biden Tuesday in Warsaw. You know we all knew there would be declarations like that this week around the one-year anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, right?

It was one year ago tomorrow, but I think it's fair to say that Biden has gone further than most people expected him to, both for showing up in person in Kyiv and for seeming to promise endless support to help Ukraine survive. Russia, for all its failures in Ukraine, is playing its long game too, counting on the American right and the American left to become skeptical of another endless US war with its endless bloodshed and endless outlay of our tax dollars.

To some degree, that's beginning to happen, despite President Biden's language of resolve there. Russia is also counting on Europe to become divided. That's happening too to some degree. For China to see an advantage in allying itself with Putin as relations with the US deteriorate.

There are complex chapters of this war yet to come, to be sure, and President Biden may have just complicated them further. I don't know if you've even seen or heard this yet, but there's a report out this morning that he plans to send up to 200 US troops to Taiwan. We currently have only 30 there right now. Is that escalation daring China to invade Taiwan, smart?

Last week on the show, as many of you know, we did segments on the humanitarian crisis for Ukrainians a year into the war and the military state of the war. Now, we'll talk about the political and diplomatic state of affairs on the questions and tensions I just laid out. With us for this is Washington Post foreign affairs columnist, Ishaan Tharoor. His latest column is called Biden Rallies The West But What About The Rest? Ishaan, always good to have you. Welcome back to WNYC.

Ishan Tharoor: Great to be with you, Brian. Thanks for having me.

Brian Lehrer: I see that in your column you cited the same Biden clip I just played about Kyiv standing free. Did anything Biden said or did this week go further than you would have expected for the one-year anniversary week?

Ishaan Tharoor: Not quite. I think we were well aware that this administration saw this week, saw Biden's trip to Warsaw. Then, of course, it was quite clear when we learned that he was also going to Kyiv that this would be a real valedictory moment. This would be a moment to show the success of Biden's strategy, in their view, over the past year. They came off a pretty tough time with what happened in Afghanistan.

The war in Ukraine allowed the Biden administration to show what it thinks is a record of tremendous leadership, especially in the geopolitical West. What this year has done, it has really consolidated that geopolitical West. If you talk to diplomats in the city, especially European diplomats in the city, to a man or a woman, they will say that the Biden administration has been spectacular in coordinating the response, in building solidarity, in figuring out what Ukraine needs, in walking the diplomatic tightrope that comes with supporting another nation's defense of itself.

They did, they potentially say that if there was a different administration in the White House, we may not have seen this kind of cohesion and efficacy in support. Now, that's a different debate for a different time, but the Biden administration clearly sees itself having done something quite special and presiding over a real reinvigoration of, say, the transatlantic alliance. This week was the moment to trumpet that.

Brian Lehrer: We'll see if it's also good for his presumed reelection campaign for next year, which might be one of the goals here. Of course, there's a long time between now and next year for developments in the war. One thing I've been thinking about is that this might be the most morally uncontroversial US involvement in a war since World War II.

Yes, there's debate over how much financial sacrifice US taxpayers should make. We'll have that conversation in the segment. If you think about Korea and Vietnam and the wars in Iraq and deployments to Latin America, people in this country were divided over if we were warmongers or imperialists or even on the right side. Russia's invasion has revived the notion that there can be a morally unambiguous good war, this defending of Ukraine. Do you think that's true?

Ishaan Tharoor: Absolutely. I'm a New Yorker who lives in D.C. It has been astonishing to see the extent to which this war has been embraced by so many parts of D.C, across the political aisle. It plays into an American conception of self and a conception of America's place in the world that all these institutions, Think tanks, figures on the Hill, people who are close to the various lobbying groups in the city.

It really is the easy war. It's a just war. It's an obvious conflict. There's an obvious good, and there's an obvious evil. It really has reinvigorated Washington to a certain sense. I don't mean to be sarcastic about that, but it's a conflict, as you said, that is morally quite simple, at least to Americans and especially to Europeans.

For Europeans, it's this existential thing. This is a vast open war on the European continent, something we haven't seen in many, many years. Something that resurrects all sorts of hideous memories. Here the West is coming together, holding the line.

Ukraine in the administration's rhetoric, in the rhetoric of many other European governments, is this crucible of freedom. It's not just a nation. It's an ideal that that's being defended against the tyranny, an autocracy, and rule of law, smashing the proclivities of the Kremlin. This is a fight that needs to be sustained, because in their view, if we fail in Ukraine, if Ukraine falls to Russia in some way or the other, or if we allow Russia to get away with some theft of Ukrainian land, then we're setting supposed precedents elsewhere. That at that point, the narrative gets tricky to tell to other people, other parts of the world.

Brian Lehrer: We'll get into those non-Europe parts of the world, which you write about so interestingly, in your piece. Let me bring the listeners in on these various aspects that we've already touched on and some we will. Listeners, first of all, how much do you support continued US financial support for the war in Ukraine?

212-433-WNYC. Is this the most unambiguously good war in your lifetime? Those of you who didn't live through World War II? Or do you feel differently from that? 212-433-9692. We can say it's pure defense against pure aggression by basically one man, Vladimir Putin. No debate about right and wrong like in Vietnam or Iraq or other US military engagements, yes? How far should the US go for Taiwan's independence, which seems to be up next with this deployment?

I don't think it's been announced. I think it's been leaked today. 212-433-WNYC with Ishaan Tharoor, foreign affairs columnist for The Washington Post. 212-433-9692 or tweet @BrianLehrer. I want to play another Biden clip, Ishaan, and it goes to the question you were just addressing of how much Biden has rallied the West. Here again, Biden in Warsaw on Tuesday.

President Joe Biden: We also face fundamental questions about the commitment to the most basic of principles. Would we stand up for the sovereignty of nations? Would we stand up for the right of people to live free from naked aggression? Would we stand up for democracy? One year later, we know the answers. Yes, we would stand up for sovereignty, and we did.

Yes, we would stand up for the right of people to live free from aggression, and we did. We would stand up for democracy, and we did. Yesterday, I had the honor to stand with President Zelensky in Kyiv to declare that we will keep standing up for these same things, no matter what.

[applause]

Brian Lehrer: Ishaan, you cite polling in your article in Europe on public attitudes that you say reinforce Biden's rhetoric. Who asked whom what?

Ishaan Tharoor: This is a poll put up by the European Council on Foreign Relations. It's a poll of the US, of respondents in nine EU countries, and then in Russia, China, India, and Turkey. The methodology is a bit different in some of these different places, but broadly speaking, what the poll shows is a pretty interesting geopolitical split between the West and the non-West.

Let's talk about what we're seeing in the West. What it shows is that by and large, publics in these countries, in the EU and in America see Putin's invasion as a real threat that has to be countered. They see Russia as a genuine adversary that has to be countered and they're willing to accommodate the sacrifices that supporting Ukraine in the long run or even in the near to medium term will entail. Including say what Europe has already endured in terms of inflation and rising energy prices, but we'll see what that means going forward.

In truth towards the end of last year, there were a lot of fears about-- or what will happen this winter when Europeans really feel the pinch in their wallets and the cold. Those fears have not particularly borne out. I think there's a confidence when you talk to European diplomats and politicians that their governments can sustain this and their publics are onside. That cohesion is still there and maybe there for quite some time to come, we don't know.

Of course, on the other dimension, there's real skepticism. One of the things that people are skeptical about in this poll in China, Turkey, and India is the rhetorical arguments around this war. People don't necessarily see it as something about the values that Biden was talking about. They don't see it as some defense of democracy. They see it as perhaps a reflection of a greater power struggle involving two powers that have a long history of exerting themselves on the world stage over the last decades.

Brian Lehrer: Against each other. Interesting to me, you quote the surveys report saying these findings outside of Europe, like in Turkey and India, reflect the disappointment that Western countries have neglected existential crises elsewhere while defending Ukraine to the max. Do they have an example of that?

Ishaan Tharoor: Not in that report, but I think there's so many you could point to. There's quite a dissonance. One thing they do mention in the report is the gap between the way Europe has embraced, really bent its whole legal systems, its protections. Invoked all these special emergency laws to accommodate Ukrainian refugees, and what it did when they faced the influx of Syrians and Afghans more than half a decade ago. People noticed that in other parts of the world.

Brian Lehrer: Still, and at US southern border for that matter.

Ishaan Tharoor: For sure.

Brian Lehrer: All these refugees from Central America, et cetera.

Ishaan Tharoor: Then, of course, when you talk about the moral wrong of Russia's invasion when you talk about its willful disregard of international law. Its infringement of the sovereignty of a neighbor and the precedents that it supposedly sets. I'm not hardly the first person to point this out, but you do hear this in other parts of the world among the media, especially, when people talk to the American legacy not just during the Cold War, but in more recent decades.

We're coming to the 20th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, and what was that, but a unilateral act that infringed the sovereignty of another nation and triggered a whole series of chaotic geopolitical events thereafter. I think there is an inbuilt skepticism of American moralism that is quite real and has quite significant implications when America tries to communicate and bring other allies onside who are not part of the West.

Brian Lehrer: We're already getting some really some interesting looking calls on all this. I want to take two back-to-back here first who I think are going to have contrasting observations. Pepi in Morris Plains, you're on WNYC. Hello, Pepi.

Pepi: Good morning, Brian. I'm very interested in this segment, and I must tell you that my feeling is that we as Americans have others who are fighting our war, what will be another world war unless they are-- we are supporting with material and with money the Ukrainians, but they are fighting our battle. It's a battle for democracy around the world, and I feel very strongly that the president's speech was very effective, and we have to continue to do this.

Brian Lehrer: Would you like, if you feel that strongly, to see the US give them even more help in the form of US troops?

Pepi: No, I would like them to provide them with people to train the Ukrainian forces, but that's where the dilemma is.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, that's where the dilemma is exactly. You understood my aha. That's how we started in Vietnam with people to train the South Vietnamese forces. All right. Pepi, thank you very much for putting that on the table. I think we're going to hear something different from Earl in Brooklyn. Earl, you're on WNYC. Thank you for calling in.

Earl: Good morning. What are you training? Do you people understand that Russia is a nuclear power? You're starting World War III. I heard the same thing when I registered for the draft for Vietnam that, if we don't stop them in Vietnam, we're going to have to fight them here on our shore.

Now we got people building factories in Vietnam. You people have to understand that this is not just a little skirmish. You're talking about trying to build up against a superpower with enough nukes to destroy the world. You guys have to stop fighting Russia. You got to make peace. Nobody's talking peace. What about peace? Where is this going to end? In a nuclear war?

Brian Lehrer: What do you do? Do you just let Russia overrun Ukraine? One could argue that in Vietnam there really were two sides fighting each other. There really was a civil war of millions of Vietnamese on either side. It's not the case in Ukraine. Should we just let Russia overtake Ukraine?

Earl: No, Russia never wanted to take Ukraine. Russia didn't want nuclear missiles on its doorstep from what I understand. Maybe I'm 100% wrong. All they said was don't join NATO. That's all they asked from what I know.

Brian, maybe I'm 100% wrong, but I listen to your show for the other point of view, but the other point of view is we got to annihilate Russia. That's not going to happen. You're not going to get Russia from where they are. A compromise, an agreement, a truce, that's what's going to happen, not nuclear war. That's talking crazy stuff here.

Brian Lehrer: Earl, thank you. Thank you very much. Interesting two contrasting views, right, Ishaan, from the two callers?

Ishaan Tharoor: Yes. They touch on two very important things. Look, I'll just immediately say that the narrative that Ukraine was about to join NATO, and that therefore prompted Putin to carry out this invasion, that is a false one. Ukraine was not about to join NATO.

That was not anywhere practically in the cards. Now, because of the invasion, there's a much more real discussion about getting Ukraine into NATO. At the end of the day, we do have to recognize that there's one person who could easily stop all this, and that is Vladimir Putin. At the same time, yes, you're hearing from a lot of very serious scholars, including some people in think tanks here in D.C, who recognize that for whatever the wrongness, to use a very crass, simple, crude word of this invasion, we are by stoking the war further, by pushing Russia further into the corner, creating a set of risks.

One of those risks is indeed Russia considering that it has no other option, but to escalate and use these nuclear weapons. Now, if you talk to American officials, if you talk to Ukrainian officials, especially, that threat is not one they take seriously. They don't believe right now that Russia will actually do this because in their view it will be the suicide note of the Kremlin to consider this option.

The Kremlin would lose support it has from other countries in the world. It would lead to all sorts of responses that would be catastrophic for not just Russia, but for the political dispensation in power. Even then, there are some people who say, "Why court the risk of that kind of Russian escalation?" That is a complicated question to unpack, and it dovetails with the question you asked.

If we are going to be so scared of the implicit threat of a Russian nuclear response, are we letting Russia bully us, are we letting Russia dictate the rules of the game? I think there are a lot of people in Europe who refuse to let that happen. There are a lot of people here in Washington who don't want to let that happen either.

Brian Lehrer: Can you play out for us the scenario that you just alluded to where if Russia were to use any kind of nuclear weapon, and there are different degrees of nuclear weapons, but even the smallest, what they call, I think, tactical nuclear weapon, would be devastating for many civilians. If Russia were to do that, you say Putin is probably not going to do that because the consequences for him would be so dire.

Lay that out for us, the way people describe it to you. What would those consequences be? It's not so simple as the world community then goes in and gets Putin because he's committed such an international crime. What is it?

Ishaan Tharoor: That's a pretty complicated question, and I don't have a very clear tick-tock of what the response would look like, but you would see certainly significant international military action, not necessarily perhaps on Russian forces in Russia but certainly on Russian physicians in Ukraine. You would see a major diplomatic response by the world community. You'd probably see countries like China and India and other nations pressure to also take serious actions on Russia.

Unclear what those would be but I think there would be a pretty strong sense that it would rupture Russia's ties with many other parts of the world. Depending on the scale of the nuclear option, I don't think you would necessarily immediately see a nuclear response to Russia but you would see a pretty hard conventional response.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take two more calls that may also be somewhat of a contrast. Bruce, in Somerset, New Jersey, you're on WNYC. Hi, Bruce.

Bruce: How are you? I was just calling because I actually lived in Ukraine, got out of Ukraine after the war, lost property in Ukraine. I've seen the economic toll on that end. Then being back here in the US having a property with the mortgage rates, interest rates going up, and now getting hit here, having your mortgage be higher. At some point, you get to a point where you feel the war fatigue.

Another point I wanted to make, I hear a lot of people talking about Russia and Ukraine. I lived under Putin and I lived under the Zelensky, both countries, if you want to talk about me being African-American, both countries are racist. In a sense like I say, getting my daughter out, me personally I want to support Ukraine too but then on the other side, me being Black, all the inequality that you hear people talk about, the corruption in Russia, you have the same thing in Ukraine.

You have the same discrimination in Russia, the same thing in Ukraine and most people aren't talking about it. Most people that are talking about it and my point of view, a lot of political pundits are talking about Ukraine, never lived there, or Russia. Don't speak the language. Now always given that theoretical point of view to what's actually happened in Ukraine and even around the world.

Russian oil is still being sold, still being bought. Russia's not having a problem. Other countries are still buying oil to third parties but people aren't having these real-life conversations when we talk about how are we going to hurt Russia, Russia's doing fine after the economy.

Brian Lehrer: Bruce, I hear you on all those things. Thank you very much. Actually, after hearing Bruce's details maybe these two callers aren't going to be as contrasting as I originally thought they would be, but let's find out. Joshua, in Manhattan, you're on WNYC. Hi, Joshua. Thanks for calling in.

Joshua: Hi, Brian. Thanks for taking this call. My sense is that where else can this system go? This world system when all these countries are vying with each other over power and control, whether it's Russia, China, the United States, or all these other groups. We know that much of the world is suffering terribly, literally starving. We do it in the name of democracy but when it comes down to it, we are really not on the side of democracy.

It's more hypocrisy. It's just whatever works for us because we did the same thing. Understandably, when Russia was going to put missiles in Cuba, we said no, and that was a sovereign country. We didn't respect the sovereignty of Cuba at that time. We are playing this game but where else can it go but to a situation of war? Unless there's a totally different system, I don't see where else it can go.

We've developed more and more powerful weapons, including the technology of the information, we're trying to see who can control outer space, where else can this world system go but to this destructive end?

Brian Lehrer: Because of the Cuba analogy, Cuban missile crisis, should we allow Russia to dominate Ukraine as that's on its doorstep, its fear of influence?

Joshua: No, it's not what we should do. It's that the whole thing is rotten. This talk of democracy is just for domestic consumption. The world knows we don't really believe in democracy. We don't hold it, Saudi Arabia, to it when we over through, let's say, a democratically elected government in other countries for our convenience. What do we really believe in? It's power.

The whole world is based on that. It's not really on democracy, it's not really on national sovereignty. It's power. I think I would be surprised if anybody really disagrees with that. If they thought about it, what we actually do, not what we say-

Brian Lehrer: Over the many decades.

Joshua: -but what we actually do.

Brian Lehrer: In foreign policy. Joshua, thank you so much. What would people in Washington, either in the Biden administration or outside of it Ishaan, say to that? Because certainly if you pull back and take the decades-long, let's say Cold War, long as well as post Cold war, long view, what Joshua was just articulating is probably the most common foreign policy call we've gotten on this show over the many, many years.

That we say we're for democracy when it's in our interest, but when dictators support US power, we look the other way or we even intervene against democracy. In Chile with Allende, in Iran with Mosaddegh. All these examples, when we actually thwarted democracy, if it was in our interest.

Ishaan Tharoor: Absolutely. Henry Kissinger, who is still a very talkative eminence here in Washington would absolutely agree with Joshua and has said similar things about what the stakes of this Ukraine conflict are. Yesterday or two days ago, I received an email from the Chinese embassy here in Washington with this five-chapter pamphlet that they're now circulating to lots of people on US hegemony and its perils.

Basically offering a kind of firmer history on all the abuses of the US carried out around the world during the Cold War. It's hypocrisy on various fronts. The falseness of its idealistic rhetoric and the ways in which it manipulates the global system to its advantage. Now, you could take all this on one side and say, "Yes, there's an element of truth to that." Even if it's not necessarily helpful for the Chinese to be the ones telling you about it but recognize that there are certain values genuinely at stake in this Ukraine conflict, or because of the conflict, it has provoked a certain embrace of these values that perhaps wasn't as firmly felt before.

I've been in contact with a bunch of Ukrainian MPs in Kyiv over the course of the conflict and their belief in what this war means, what it means for democracy, what it means for certain liberal values is real. I don't want to ascribe cynical views to that. They really believe that this is the war that invents the new liberal Ukrainian democratic nation. In their sacrifice, they're making the dividend, the payoff will have to be that they will become a proper EU nation.

They may even join NATO, they will strengthen the democracy, they'll get a lot of Western support as a result, and this is their view. They firmly believe in the idealism spouted by Biden and many others about what this war means. Who am I to discount that?

Brian Lehrer: We'll get to the Taiwan news shortly but we've been talking about the West being united around Ukraine but let me play an exchange from yesterday, from All Things Considered on NPR, between us Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, and the host, Ari Shapiro. Austin speaks first.

Lloyd Austin: By the way all of our allies and partners that are a part of the Ukraine defense contact group, and there's some 50 countries that participate in that. They're bellying up to the bar and they're providing support in every way possible.

Ari Shapiro: You say that the contact group is holding United front but the Spanish Prime Minister says it's time for Ukraine to negotiate with Russia. If Ukraine does not achieve remarkable success on the battlefield, do you anticipate those calls to negotiate growing?

Lloyd Austin: Again I can't predict one way or the other. Our countries are going to view this post as offensive. If there is some negotiation in the future, Ukraine will have a strong hand at the negotiating table.

Brian Lehrer: US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on All Things Considered yesterday. Ishaan, what do you make of the Prime Minister of Spain, as Ari Shapiro referenced, urging Ukraine to negotiate, and Austin acknowledging, "Maybe the result we're supporting Ukraine for is not to completely expel Russia but just so Ukraine is in as strong a negotiating position as possible if that time comes." Did he just say the quiet part out loud?

Ishaan Tharoor: They've been saying the quiet part for quite some time. There is realism, and we probably should have said this at the top, that the Biden administration we know has been in various private contacts with their Ukrainian counterparts, been messaging repeatedly that, "Look, we are going to support you as best we can and as rapidly as we can but you need to start recognizing that the support is not indefinite. We may politically find it difficult to maintain the same level in the months to come."

That message has been delivered to the Ukrainians. The Ukrainians are well aware of it, which is why the Ukrainians and public say, "Please, give us more now quickly so we can get this over with." I think a lot will happen in the coming months. The Russians from what we can tell launching some offensive in the Ukrainian Southeast Donbas right now. The Ukrainians are preparing by late March or early April for a major counter-offensive driven in part by new shipments of tanks from Europe and the West.

Those actions that those campaigns will dictate a lot of what may be there. We've known for quite some time that very few officials in this administration in the US believe the Ukrainians have the capacity to reclaim all the territory they've lost to Russia, including Crimea, and that they just want right now to give the Ukrainians as strong a hand as possible whenever there are future negotiations. It should be said that we have no idea when there'll be future negotiations because the Russians have made it very clear that they want to have negotiations.

There is still one person who really could end this, and that's Vladimir Putin, we have no clear sense that he is willing to engage right now in any kind of good faith dramatic process.

Brian Lehrer: Do you see the outlines of a Russia-Ukraine negotiated settlement? Is this one of those situations where the deal to be struck has always been clear, but both sides had to lose a lot of lives in a way to save face before they were ready to get there?

Ishaan Tharoor: I think that would the Ukrainians, a very tragic reality to have to accept given what they've sacrificed and what they've gone through and what Russia has done to their country. It's hard to tell you what those outlines are now. I think we're still trying to get into a stage where we can even talk about talks and what those could be. There is such a gap right now between both sides.

There are very few channels of communication directly between the West and the Kremlin. We're really in a wait-and-see stage. In that stage, the emphasis is entirely on aiding Ukraine's military efforts in the months to come.

Brian Lehrer: Our next caller is Jasper, who it's listed here as in Central Park. Jasper, are you in Central Park?

Jasper: Oh, yes, I am right now, Brian. I actually work here.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, you work in Central Park. That's cool and cool that you listen to us on the job there. What's you got?

Jasper: Oh, I'm on break. I'm not slacking off. Don't worry. Your guest disputes the claim of NATO expansionism being the reason for Putin's invasion. I'd love to hear his reasoning then because at the beginning of the war, the idea was Putin's a madman. He's going to invade Poland and the Czech Republic, and then that just turned out to not be true. I'd be interested to hear what his reasoning is for that.

Brian Lehrer: Did you want to bring up Taiwan also?

Jasper: I did. I'll get to that. My main point is that I think that the goal in it, the past 30 years in native expansion is, and we've put Russia in the corner. I think at this point, obviously, it's a terrible invasion. It's brutal but the war of attrition is in a way benefits the West in NATO. Either Ukraine was going to join NATO or Russia would invade, and now it's depleting its entire military.

I think that was a goal to stabilize Russia's military and economy. I think it parallels what's happening in Taiwan and the way that Biden's building once again, China, and they keep saying, stop, stop, stop, stop in Vietnam stop. They're screwing with us. I don't think that there will be a war of attrition in Taiwan like it is in Ukraine.

I think that China would quickly invade and otherwise, it would be a hot war, or they would just take over. I just want to make one quick point that Lloyd Austin-- any day is not that there's another negotiated settlement in Ukraine, more Ukrainians are dying. I think it's not the goal of depleting the Russian military through the war of attrition. Then, there's something that he said about [crosstalk] Austin's. He worked for Raytheon. A major arms manufacturer. That's another interesting point about it.

Brian Lehrer: Jasper, who works in Central Park paying close attention to world affairs and corporate ties. Let's take both or two or three of his points there briefly, each Ishaan. First that maybe one of the US goals here is what he called the war of attrition to degrade Russia's military and therefore weaken Russia in the ongoing global competition between the two powers.

Ishaan Tharoor: I think that's certainly been an effect of what's happened in this conflict. Russia embarked on a campaign that was unprovoked. There was no legal technical political process in place that was getting Ukraine and NATO anytime soon. It launched a war that was unprovoked, and that was quite a full scale.

They tried to take Kyiv themself. We believed in those first days of the conflict that Ukrainian President Zelenskyy was going to die and that his entire administration would have to be airlifted out. This was not some light little security operation to defend Russian separatists in the Donbas. This was a full-scale invasion of another country that was frankly unprovoked.

We can talk about NATO expansionism, but we have to also recognize that there are human beings who elect governments in these countries in Eastern and Central Europe that wanted to join NATO. We have to also recognize their agency in all this as well. Now, because of the Russian invasion, because Putin chose to do this, there are many more people in other European countries who also want to join NATO.

If that was the actual logic, it's a completely hopeless logic because it's completely backfired for Putin. Then yes, Russia has endured a really grievous toll. Its military is depleted its tank stocks. We believe it's lost half of all its tanks in this conflict so far. It's lost perhaps as many as 200,000 fighting men. Its economy has taken a hit, although not as major of a hit as perhaps western policymakers hoped.

It has been degraded to a certain extent, but it's also now being pushed into a direction where it's becoming China's defacto junior partner. That is necessarily a scenario that many in the West would welcome.

Brian Lehrer: That gets us to the question, what do you make of these reports this morning, citing unnamed US officials that the US will deploy its largest contingent of troops in decades to Taiwan 200 troops, or they're saying up to 200 troops when there are only 30 Americans there now. Do you find it relevant to Ukraine that that got leaked on the day before the anniversary of the Russian invasion?

Ishaan Tharoor: I don't want to guess the nature of how it was leaked or the reasons behind that. I think it is interesting that the cause of Taiwan in Washington has grown leaps and bounds in the shadow of the war in Ukraine. There are many who now-- Obviously, since the Trump administration, there has been a bipartisan hardening, anti-China consensus in the city.

Now that anti-China consensus has crystallized around the importance of defending Taiwanese democracy. Most Taiwanese citizens do not want to be part of China. There is a sense especially among American military officials, they're gaming out scenarios right now, are supposedly imminent or down the road the next four few years Chinese invasion of Taiwan. Whether we believe that's actually going to happen is a different question.

This is something that possesses many policymakers now in Washington. As your caller rightly said a Chinese invasion of Taiwan is a very different question. It's a very different thing to think about than Russia's invasion in Ukraine. Ukraine has a massive land border. You'll get bogged down in this war of attrition. You have means of checking the invasion. In Taiwan, when we're talking about Taiwan, we're basically talking about a couple of days where a Chinese amphibious invasion either works or it does not work.

What this trench of US troops is doing, they've been training Taiwanese forces for quite some time. The whole goal is to create what's been called a porcupine strategy. That the Taiwanese will have the defense capabilities necessary to deter China and to make China's second guess its ability to launch an amphibious invasion in the years to come. We know right now that American military officials, as well as Taiwanese officials, recognize that Taiwan does not have the necessary capacity yet to make China be afraid of an invasion.

The US and you'll see many officials on the hill as well really want to help Taiwan boost its defense capacity so that China will think again about some kind of invasion in the future.

Brian Lehrer: A dangerous game. Last question, why are they different in terms of troops? Specifically, if the US is drawing a line on no troops to Ukraine, we'll send a lot of military aid, but not American humans to risk their lives. Why are we doing so in Taiwan?

Ishaan Tharoor: These guys are not going there to be risking their lives. They're going there to be training Taiwanese forces. I think it's important to recognize that tens of thousands of Ukrainians have been trained by the US and by European governments as well. We're seeing right now in hundreds of Ukrainians in Germany and other places learning how to use these new tanks that they're getting. I think it's pretty much in line with that kind of exercise.

Brian Lehrer: Washington Post global affairs analyst, Ishaan Tharoor, he also anchors their daily foreign affairs newsletter called Today's Worldview. Ishaan, thanks for sharing your insights with us. We always appreciate it.

Ishaan Tharoor: Always. I love coming on. Thanks for having me, Brian.

 

Copyright © 2023 New York Public Radio. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use at www.wnyc.org for further information.

New York Public Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline, often by contractors. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of New York Public Radio’s programming is the audio record.