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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. We have an opportunity to speak for about 10 minutes now with the US State Department official on US policy toward the war in Ukraine. He is Derek Chollet, whose title is Counselor or Undersecretary of State. He served in the Obama administration, too, as Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs, where he managed US defense policy toward Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Western hemisphere.

He was last on this show in 2016 to talk about President Obama's foreign policy legacy. He is co-author of a book that came out back in 2008 but it's actually very relevant right now about the period after the cold war ended called America Between the Wars: From 11/9, which is a Berlin wall falling reference 11/9 to 9/11. Secretary Chollet, thank you for coming on. Welcome back to WNYC.

Derek Chollet: Hey, thank you. It's great to be back with you. Thanks so much.

Brian Lehrer: Since we have just 10 minutes, I'll dive right in on the hard parts.

Derek Chollet: Sure. Sounds good.

Brian Lehrer: On yesterday's show, we had Slate Magazine's Military Affairs Columnist, Fred Kaplan, who wrote an article outlining a potential peace agreement to end the war when both sides are exhausted enough to be ready. If you know Fred's work, you know he is not at all a Putin apologist. His goal, he says, is to allow Putin to save face by declaring victory while not actually giving him anything.

It involves recognizing Russia's annexation of Crimea from 2014 because we're not reversing it anyway and the people there seem mostly okay with it, he said. It involves setting up a referendum in the Eastern areas with the pro-Russia separatists, let people vote whether to stay in Ukraine, supervised by the UN so it's a real election, and agree that Ukraine will not join NATO, which he says doesn't stop Ukraine from forming military alliances with the United States or anyone else separately. In exchange, of course, Russia has to pull back all its troops and there we go. Could that be a good deal diplomatically, in your opinion, to end the bloodshed?

Derek Chollet: Well, look, first, thanks again for having me on. There's no shortage of ideas of how we might use diplomacy to end this completely unjustified, unwarranted, but premeditated war. The United States Secretary of State Blinken, my boss, worked tirelessly in the months leading up to this conflict that started 16 days ago to try to find a diplomatic way forward and to show Russia that there was a path for diplomacy while making very clear at the same time that if they chose the other path, that if they chose the path of invasion and confrontation and escalation, that they would face swift and severe consequences.

Unfortunately, they chose that latter path, and therefore what we watched unfold the last 16 days, which we had been quite worried about for some time prior to the invasion as we watched evidence of Russia's buildup grow. We are watching the devastation of Ukraine. It's completely unacceptable what is happening and Russia has to pay a very, very high price.

Now, just yesterday, you had Fred Kaplan on, but at the same time, the Ukrainian foreign minister was sitting down in Turkey to meet with the Russian foreign minister. The Russians and the Ukrainians have had several other conversations over the last 16 days. Unfortunately, there is no evidence to suggest that the Russian side is interested in much of anything beyond the complete subjugation of Ukraine. Therefore, Putin seems intent on continuing this violent course that he is on and, of course-- [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: What's been offered diplomatically?

Derek Chollet: Well, so again, this is the Ukrainian's negotiation here. I can't speak to what they're talking about, but I think what's quite clear is that Russia cannot be allowed to be rewarded for what is, again, an unwarranted, unprovoked attack on a sovereign country. This is going at the very heart of the international system itself. The idea that states can choose their own destiny and would not be-- smaller, weaker states do not get gobbled up by larger, stronger states. That is what we see Russia attempting to do right now.

Brian Lehrer: As it stands, Putin is just bombarding Ukrainian city after Ukrainian city and committing war crime after war crime against civilians, but there's no structure for him to back down without total defeat, which could mean this goes on for years. For you as the State Department official, the State Department does diplomacy, Pentagon does the war, do you have anything in the works?

Derek Chollet: Well, again, Russia could choose to end its invasion of Ukraine. It could withdraw its troops. Obviously, it's going to have to sign up now for helping to rebuild a Ukraine once this war ends. For the United States, what we are doing now is doing everything in our power to support the Ukrainians whose bravery, whose patriotism, whose resilience is all-inspiring to all of us and we are doing whatever we can to help them, whether that's in terms of security assistance or humanitarian needs.

Brian Lehrer: Well, from that, and I'm going to jump in just because of our time constraints, but from the Ukrainian perspective, and to flip the script from what I was asking you before, the US is not doing all it can. Ukrainians want a no-fly zone over all or parts of Ukraine and for us to allow Polish MIG fighters to fly to Ukraine from the US-NATO airbase in Ramstein, Germany. The US is saying no to both of those because they make the US a party to the war. I'm going to ask you to play that out for us. What do you think that would precipitate, that would be worse than the murderous status quo?

Derek Chollet: What we are looking to do is do everything in our power to support Ukraine while at the same time, not start a wider war in Europe and particularly a conflict between NATO and Russia. President Biden has been very clear, the United States will defend every inch of NATO territory. We will do everything in our power to support Ukraine. We provided, just this year, over a billion dollars of security assistance.

Actually, in the last 16 days, we've provided over $250 million of security assistance to Ukraine and that's anti-armor, anti-tank weaponry, it's shoulder-fired air defense. That's not just the United States, by the way, it's the United States working with 14 other countries, at least, to provide assistance to Ukraine.

Brian Lehrer: We're arming them a lot, which maybe is in its way being a party to the war. What do you think would happen if we took President Zelenskyy's request and enforced, at least, what he calls a humanitarian no-fly zone where the corridors are that supposedly Russia is letting people leave through, but it isn't really? Nobody wants a wider war, but do you think if we're in there with planes or Polish planes that we help leave enforcing a no-fly zone, does that mean Putin's going to attack Poland? Does that mean he's going to attack NATO nations? Why wouldn't that be suicide for him?

Derek Chollet: Well, he's been very clear that, A, he's willing to take tremendous risks to achieve his goals. Again, we need to stay very focused on not creating a wider war here while, at the same time, doing everything we can to support Ukraine. A no-fly zone, which we have experience doing, whether it's in Libya, in particular, or in the Balkans back 20-some years ago, that is war. That is US planes enforcing a no-fly zone, prepared to take out enemy planes and also to take out enemy air defense wherever that air defense may be.

In Ukraine's case, Russian air defenses over Ukraine exist in Russia. A no-fly zone is a euphemism for something that is direct combat. Now, there is a threat from the air to Ukraine and that can be addressed, we believe, by air defense systems for Ukraine, and that's what we have been working very hard to provide them. They've got a significant amount of them from us already, but we are working to provide more, including with partners who have systems that they can operate. Because the other issue is these air defense assets aren't like Amazon Prime where you can just get them on a moment's notice to your doorstep.

It takes a while to get them there and then, of course, there's many systems they need to get trained on. We need to get them systems that they know how to operate right now because they don't have the time to get trained.

Brian Lehrer: We have just a couple of minutes left with US Undersecretary of State, Derek Chollet. You'll tell me when we're actually out of time, I'm going to try to get two more questions in here.

Derek Chollet: No. I got time. It's great to be with you, so I got time.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you. Well, one is of historical interest and then I want to ask you about China. I was looking you up this morning and reading an article that you wrote on the Brookings Institution website in 2001 before 9/11. You wrote the real point of the NATO Alliance in the 21st century is what we can do together outside of Europe. That's why the United States pushed its allies before NATO's 50th Aniversary Summit in 1999 to agree to a role for NATO beyond Europe, the Europeans refused. That was from you in 2001. My question is, why shouldn't my listeners think that it was exactly this kind of US expansionism after the cold war that fed Putin's paranoid nationalism and set the stage for this horror we're seeing today?

Derek Chollet: Again, to be clear, NATO is a defensive Alliance. It's an Alliance that countries on their own choose to join and it's telling and listeners should ask themselves, why is it that so many countries at the end of the cold war were asking to join NATO and willing to take very, very serious steps in terms of reform and their military capabilities to be eligible to join NATO? Which required a lot of money and sacrifice.

There's a reason why many of those countries wanted to join, in part, because they were so worried about Russia, but we've been very clear that NATO is a defensive alliance. NATO has shown through whether it was the Balkans 25 years ago or NATO's operations in Afghanistan in the 20 years after 9/11 that it can work out of area. Fundamentally, it is about protecting NATO allies from external threats and that's the basic purpose of NATO.

What we're seeing in Ukraine, by the way, it's quite clear. If you've listened to Putin's speeches, if you see what he's doing, this is not about NATO. This is about Putin's desire to subjugate and control Ukraine. Everyone should remember, this actually started eight years ago when they had the Maidan protests in Kyiv that led to the overthrow, the removal of a Putin stooge, and a democratic government taking office in Kyiv. Those protests were about Ukraine's relationship with the EU, the European Union. It wasn't about NATO.

What Putin wants is a sphere of influence. He wants to be able to control and subjugate Ukraine. He's using NATO as a convenient excuse to try to shift the blame to someone else, but I think it's quite clear what his motives are.

Brian Lehrer: Last thing about China, they were neutral in the recent UN vote, meaning they didn't side with Russia like North Korea did, but they didn't side with the vast majority of the world, either, that was condemning the invasion. I saw a criticism by the head of the council on foreign relations on MSNBC's Morning Joe today, criticism of US policy alienating China when we should be cultivating them right now. What are you doing? What is the government doing to cultivate China, seeing it in their interest, not to circle the wagons with Putin?

Derek Chollet: We have been talking to the Chinese as most other countries around the world, but we've been talking to the Chinese in particular in the last several months about the Ukraine crisis. Secretary Blinken, Secretary of State Blinken spoke with the Chinese foreign minister, once again, just a few days ago about this crisis. We're making very clear to China that Russia's actions are an assault on the international system. It's an international system that China itself is invested in and that they need to, A, as much as possible and as much as they have any influence over Russia, to get Putin to change course and end this war and withdraw his troops.

That, B, making very clear to them that if they were to take Russia's side or take steps to try to support Russia through this, or try to evade our sanctions, that there would be consequences for China as well. That if they involve themselves in sanctionable activity, there would be sanctions. I think, for China, this has put them in a very difficult position because this war is not going well for Putin. This war is not going well for Russia and China does want to own this problem.

We are committed, though, to try to stay in very close touch with them as we have through our engagements to try to get them to be part of the solution here rather than compounding the problem.

Brian Lehrer: Of course, China's such a big market. If they join the sanctions then it would put that much more pressure on Russia. Well, you're obviously not in an easy position there. The United States isn't in an easy position there, figuring out what to do next that can have any impact without widening the war. Derek Chollet, Undersecretary of State at the US State Department, thank you for giving us some time today. We hope you'll come back again.

Derek Chollet: Thanks so much for having me, and I appreciate it and look forward to coming back.

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