Serhii Plokhy: History of Ukraine, Russia, Soviet Union, KGB, Nazis & War | Lex Fridman Podcast #415

1. 0:00 – 1:18

   Introduction

   1. SPSerhii Plokhy0:00

      What happened during World War II was that once the Germans started to run out of, uh, of manpower, they created foreign legion groups. But because those people were not Aryans, they couldn't be trusted, so they were put under the command of Heinrich Himmler, uh, under command of SS, and became known as SS Waffen units. And, uh, one of such units was created in Ukraine.

   2. LFLex Fridman0:33

      The following is a conversation with Serhii Plokhy, a historian at Harvard University, and the director of the Ukrainian Research Institute, also at Harvard. As a historian, he specializes in the history of Eastern Europe, with an emphasis on Ukraine. He wrote a lot of great books on Ukraine and Russia, the Soviet Union, on Slavic peoples in general across centuries, on Chernobyl and nuclear disasters, and on the current war in Ukraine. A book titled the Ruso-Ukrainian War: The Return of History. This is the Lex Fridman Podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here's Serhii Plokhy.

2. 1:18 – 17:27

   Collapse of the Soviet Union

   1. LFLex Fridman1:18

      What are the major explanations for the collapse of the Soviet Union? Maybe ones you agree with and ones you disagree with.

   2. SPSerhii Plokhy1:25

      Very often, people confuse three different processes that were taking place in the late '80s early '90s, and the one was the collapse of communism as ideology, another was the end of the Cold War, and the third one was the end of the Soviet Union. Uh, all of these processes were inter-related, interconnected, but when people provide ideology as the explanation for all of these processes, that's where I disagree, because ideological collapse, uh, happened on the territory of the Soviet Union in general. The Soviet Union lost the Cold War, whether we are talking about Moscow, Leningrad, or Saint Petersburg now, or Vladivostok. But the fall of the Soviet Union is about a story in which Vladivostok and Saint Petersburg ended up in one country, and Kiev, Minsk, and Əməkdaşı ended in different countries. So, the theories and explanations about how did that happen, for me, these are really very helpful theories for understanding the Soviet collapse. So, the mobilization from below, the collapse of the center, against the background of economic collapse, against the background of ideological, uh, ideological implosion, that's, that's how I look at the, at the fall of the Soviet Union, and that's how I look at the theories that explain that collapse.

   3. LFLex Fridman3:03

      So, it's a story of geography, ideology, economics. Which are the most important to understand of what made the collapse of the Soviet Union happen?

   4. SPSerhii Plokhy3:14

      The Soviet collapse was unique, but not more unique than collapse of any other empire. So, what we really witnessed, uh, or the, the, the world witnessed back in 1991, and we continue to witness today with the Russian aggression against Ukraine, is a collapse of one of the largest world empires. We talk about, or talked about the Soviet Union, and now talk about Russia as possessing plus/minus one-sixth of the surface of the Earth. You don't get in possession of one-sixth of the Earth by being a nation-state. You get that sort of size as an empire. And, uh, the Soviet collapse is continuation of the disintegration of the Russian Empire that, uh, started back in 1917, that was arrested for some period of time by the Bolsheviks, by the communist ideology, which w- which was internationalist ideology, and then came back in full force in the late '80s and early '90s. So, the most important story for me, this is the story of the continuing collapse of the Russian Empire and the rise of, uh, not just local nationalism, but also rise of Russian nationalism that turned out to be as destructive force for the imperial or multi, multiethnic, multinational state as was, mm, Ukrainian nationalism, or Georgian, or, or, mm, Estonian for that matter.

   5. LFLex Fridman4:49

      Well, you said a lot of interesting stuff there, 1917, Bolsheviks, internationalists, how that plays with the idea of Russian Empire and so on. But first, let me ask about US influence on this. So, one of the ideas is that, you know, through the Cold War, that mechanism, US had major interests to weaken the Soviet Union, and therefore, it, the collapse could be attributed to pressure and manipulation from the United States. Is there truth to that?

   6. SPSerhii Plokhy5:18

      The pressure from the United States, this is part of the Cold War. And Cold War, part of that story, but it's, it, it doesn't, it doesn't explain the Soviet collapse, and, uh, the reason is quite simple. The United States of America didn't want the Soviet Union to collapse and disintegrate. They didn't want that at the start of the Cold War in 1948. We now have the strategic documents. They were concerned about that, they didn't want to do that, and certainly they didn't want to do that in the year 1990, 1991. As late as August of 1991, the day of coup, the, the month of the coup in Moscow-... President Bush, George H. W. Bush, travels from Moscow to Kiev and gives famous, so infamous speech called Chicken Kiev speech, basically warning Ukrainians against going for independence. The Soviet collapse was a huge headache for the administration in the White House for a number of reasons. They liked to work with Gorbachev. The Soviet Union was emerging as a junior partner of the United States on the international arena. Collapse dis- was destroying all of that, and on the top of that, there was a que- uh, question of the nuclear weapons, unaccounted nuclear weapons. So the United States was doing everything humanly possible to keep the Soviet Union together, in one piece, until really late November of 1991, when it became clear that it was, it was a lost cause and they had to say goodbye to, to Gorbachev and to the project that he, he introduced. Uh, m- a few months later, uh, or year later, there was a presidential campaign and, uh, Bush was running for the second term, and was looking for, for achievements, and there were many achievements. I- I- I basically treat him with great respect. Uh, but destruction of- uh, destruction of the Soviet Union was not one of those achievements. He was on the, on the other side of the, o- of that divide, but the- the- the- the politics, the political campaign, of course, have their own rules, and they produce and give birth to mythology which, which we, uh, we still, at least in this country, we live till now, till today.

   7. LFLex Fridman7:44

      So Gorbachev is an interesting figure in all of this. Is there a possible history where the Soviet Union did not collapse and some of the ideas that Gorbachev had for the future of the Soviet Union came to life?

   8. SPSerhii Plokhy7:58

      Of course, history, on the one hand there is a statement it, it doesn't, uh, allow for what ifs. On the other hand, in my opinion, history is full of what if.

   9. LFLex Fridman8:09

      (laughs)

   10. SPSerhii Plokhy8:09

       That's what history is about, and certainly, certainly there, there are scenarios how the Soviet Union would, w- w- would, uh, continue, uh, would continue beyond, let's say, Gorbachev's tenure.

   11. LFLex Fridman8:21

       Mm-hmm.

   12. SPSerhii Plokhy8:23

       And the argument has been made that the reforms that he introduced, that they were mismanaged and they could be managed differently, or there could be no reforms and there could be continuing stagnation. So that is all possible. What I think would happen one way or another is the Soviet collapse in a different form on d- on, on somebody else's watch at some later period in time because we, we're dealing with not just processes that were happening in the Soviet Union. We are dealing with global processes, and the 20th century turned out to be the century of the disintegration of the empires.

   13. LFLex Fridman9:03

       Mm-hmm.

   14. SPSerhii Plokhy9:03

       You look at the globe, at the map of the world in 1914 and you compare it to, to the map at the end of the 20th century, in 1991, 1992, and suddenly you realize that there are many candidates for being the most important event, the most important process in the 20th century. But the biggest, the biggest global thing that happened was redrawing the map of the world and producing dozens, if not hundreds, of new states. That's the outcome of the different processes of the 20th century. Look, Yugoslavia is falling apart around the same time. Czechoslovakia, uh, goes through what can be called a civilized divorce, a very, very rare occurrence in the, in the fall of multi- multinational states. So yeah, the writing was on the wall whether it would happen under Gorbachev or later, whether it would happen as the result of reforms or as the result of no reforms. But I- I- I- I think that sooner or later that, that would happen.

   15. LFLex Fridman10:11

       Yeah, it's very possible hundreds of years from now the way the 20th century is written about, as the century defined by the collapse of empires. You call the Soviet Union the Last Empire. The book is called The Last Empire. So is there something fundamental about the way the world is that means it's not conducive to the formation of empires?

   16. SPSerhii Plokhy10:35

       The meaning that I was putting in the term, uh, uh, the Soviet Union as the Last Empire was that that was the Soviet collapse was the collapse of the last major European empires, traditional empires. That was the, in the 18th century, 19th century, and through most of the 20th century. Uh, the, the Austria-Hungary died, uh, in, in the midst of World War I. The Ottoman Empire disintegrated. The Brits were gone and, and left India. And there was the, the, the successor to the Russian Empire called the Soviet Union was still hanging, hanging on there. And then came 1991, and what we see i- even with today's Russia it's, it's, it's a very different, it's a very different sort of policies. Uh, the, the, uh, Russia, uh, or Russian leadership tried to, uh, learn a lesson from 1991 so there is no national republics, uh, in the, in the Russian Federation that would have more rights than, uh, the, the Russian administrative units. Uh, so the, the structure is different. The, uh, nationality policies, uh, are different. The, the level of Russification is much higher. So it is, it is in many ways, uh, already a post, post-imperial formation.

   17. LFLex Fridman11:59

       And you write about the, that moment, 1991, the role that Ukraine played in that seems to be a very critical role. Can you describe...... just that, what role Ukraine played in the collapse of the Soviet Union.

   18. SPSerhii Plokhy12:15

       History is many things, but it started, uh, in a very simple way of, uh, making notes about m- on the yearly basis, what happened this year or that, so it's about chronology. Chronology in the history of the collapse of the Soviet Union is very important. You have Ukrainian referendum on December 1st, 1991, and you have dissolution of the Soviet Union by the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus one week later.

   19. LFLex Fridman12:41

       Mm-hmm.

   20. SPSerhii Plokhy12:43

       And the question is, why? Uh, Ukrainian referendum is, is the answer, but Ukrainians didn't, didn't answer at their referendum question whether they want the Soviet Union to be dissolved or not. They answered very limited in terms of, uh, it's- it's- i- i- it's been in question, whether you support the decision of Verkhovna Rada, of your parliament, for Ukraine to go independent. And the rest was not, was not on the ballot.

   21. LFLex Fridman13:13

       Mm-hmm.

   22. SPSerhii Plokhy13:14

       So why then one week later the Soviet Union is gone? And, uh, President Yeltsin explained to President Bush around that time the reason why, why Ukraine was so important. He said that, well, if Ukraine is gone, Russia is not interested in this, uh, Soviet project because Russia would be outnumbered and outvoted by the Muslim republics. So there was, there was a cultural element.

   23. LFLex Fridman13:41

       Mm-hmm.

   24. SPSerhii Plokhy13:42

       There was also another one. Ukraine happened to be the second-largest Soviet republic and then post-Soviet state, in terms of population, in terms of the economy, economic potential, and so on and so forth, and as Yeltsin suggested, close culturally, linguistically, and otherwise to Russia. So with the second, uh, largest republic gone, Russia didn't think that it was in Russia's interest to continue with, with the Soviet Union. And around that time, Yegor Gaidar, who was the chief economic advisor of Yeltsin, was telling him, "Well, we just don't have money anymore to support other republics. We have to focus on Russia. We have to use oil and gas money within the Russian Federation." So th- the state was bankrupt. Uh, imperial projects, at least, uh, in the context of the late 20th century, they costed money. It- it- it wasn't a, a moneymaking machine as it was back in the 18th or 19th century. And, uh, um, the combination of all those factors led to the, to the, uh, processes in which Ukraine's decision to go independent spelled the end to the Soviet Union. And if today anybody wants to restore not the Soviet Union, but some form of Russian control over the post-Soviet space, Ukraine is as important today as it was back in December of 1991.

   25. LFLex Fridman15:14

       Let me ask you about Vladimir Putin's statement that the collapse of the Soviet Union is one of the great tragedies of history. To what degree does he have a point? To what degree is he wrong?

   26. SPSerhii Plokhy15:30

       His formulation was that this is the greatest, uh, the- the greatest geopolitical catastrophe or tragedy of the 20th century. And I specifically went and, and looked at the text and, and put it in, in specific time when it was happening, and it was interesting that the statement was made a few weeks before the, uh, May 9 parade and, and celebrations of the, of the, uh, victory, a key part of, of, of the mythology of the current- of- of the current Russian state. So why say things about the, uh, mm, Soviet collapse being the- the largest geo-political strategy and not in that particular context, the Second World War? Uh, my explanation at least is that the World War II, the price was enormous, but the Soviet Union emerged as a great victor and captured half of Europe. 1991, the- the- the- in terms of the- of the lives lost at that point, the price was, was actually very, very low. But for Putin what was important that, uh, the state was lost, and he in particular was concerned about the division of the Russian- of the Russian people, which he understood back then like he understands now in very, very broad terms. So for him, for him, the biggest tragedy is not the loss of life. The biggest, uh, tragedy is the loss of the great power status or- or the unity of those whom he considered to be Russian, Russian nation. So at least this is my reading, this is my understanding of what, what, what, what is there, what is on, on, on, on the paper and what is between the lines.

   27. LFLex Fridman17:17

       So both the unity of the sort of, quote, "Russian empire" and the status of the superpower.

   28. SPSerhii Plokhy17:25

       That's how I read it.

3. 17:27 – 30:30

   Origins of Russia and Ukraine

   1. SPSerhii Plokhy17:27

   2. LFLex Fridman17:27

      You wrote a book, The Origins of the Slavic Nations. So let's go back into history. What is the origin of, uh, Slavic nations?

   3. SPSerhii Plokhy17:37

      We can look at that- at th- at that from different perspectives. And we are now making, uh, major breakthroughs in- in answering this question with the, uh, very interesting innovative linguistic analysis, the study of DNA. So that's- that's- that's really the new frontier. We- we are getting into a pre-historical period where there is no historical sources. And from what we can understand today, and that can, of course, change tomorrow with all these breakthroughs, um, uh, in- in sciences is that, uh, th- the- the Slavs came into existence somewhere in the area of, um, marshes, Pripyat marshes, northwestern part of Ukraine, uh, southwestern part of Belarus, eastern part of Poland.... and that's, it's considered to be a historical homeland of Slavs, and then, and then they spread. And they spread all the way to the Adriatic, so we have Croats, we have Russians spreading all the way to the Pacific, we have Ukrainians, we have Belarusians, Poles. Once we had Czechoslovaks, now we have, we have Czechs and Slovaks. So that's the story of starting with the 8th and 9th century, we can, even a little bit earlier, we can already follow that story with the help of the, of the written sources, mostly from Byzantine, then, then, then later from Western, from Western, um, Europe. But what, uh, I was trying to do, n- not being a scientist, not being an expert in, in linguistics or not being an expert in, in, in DNA analysis, I was trying to see what was happening in the minds of those peoples and the elites in particular, whom we call today not Slavs but Eastern Slavs, which means Russians, Ukrainians, and Belarusians, how they imagined themselves, how they imagined their world, and eventually, I look at the so-called nation-building projects. So trying to answer the question of how we arrived, uh, to the situation in which we are today where there are not just three East Slavic nations, but there are also three East Slavic states, uh, Russian, Ukrainian, and Belarusian. So this is, this is the focus of my, of my book. I end, admittedly, in that particular book, I end, uh, on the 18th century before the era of nationalism, but then there are other books like Lost, uh, Lost Kingdom that, where I, I bring the story all the way up to today.

   4. LFLex Fridman20:14

      So what aspects of the 8th and 9th century, uh, the East Slavic states permeates to, to today that we should understand?

   5. SPSerhii Plokhy20:25

      Well, the, the most important one is that the existence of the state of Kievan Rus back during the medieval period, uh, created the foundations, uh, for, um, historical mythology, common historical mythology, and there are just wars and battles over who has the right-

   6. LFLex Fridman20:44

      Mm-hmm.

   7. SPSerhii Plokhy20:45

      ... or more right for Kievan Rus. Uh, the legal code that was created at that time existed for a long period of time. The acceptance of Christianity from Byzantium, that became a big issue that separated the Eastern Slavs from their Western neighbors, including Czechs and, and, and, and Poles, uh, but, uh, um, united in that way to, let's say, Bulgarians or Serbs, and, uh, the beginning of the written literature, uh, beginning, beginning in Kiev. So all of that is, uh, considered to be part of heritage. All of that is being contested, uh, and, uh, this, this debates that were academic for a long period of time, what we see now tragically are being, being continued on the, on the battlefield.

   8. LFLex Fridman21:38

      What is Kiev? What is Rus that you mentioned? What's the importance of these? Y- you mention them as sort of defining places and, uh, terms, labels at the beginning of all this. So w- what is Kiev?

   9. SPSerhii Plokhy21:54

      Uh, Kiev, uh, became a capital, uh, or, or the outpost of the, uh, Vikings who were try- trying to establish control over the, um, trade route between, um, mm, what, what is today's, uh, Western Russia and, and, and Belarus and Northern Ukraine, so the forest areas and the biggest and the richest market in the world that existed at that time, which was in Constantinople, in Byzantium. So the idea, it was, the idea was to get whatever goods you can get in that part of Eastern Europe, and most of those goods were slaves, local population, put them on the ships, uh, in Kiev because Kiev was on the border with the steppe zones. Steppe zones were controlled by other pe- uh, other groups. Uh, Scythians, Sarmatians, uh, Polovtsians, Pechenegs, and so on and s- you, you, you name it. And then staying on the, on the river, being protected from attacks of the nomads to come to the Black Sea and, and sell those products in Constantinople. That was, that was the idea. That was the model. Uh, Vikings, Vikings tried to practice that sort of, of, um, business model also in other parts of Europe, and like in other parts of Europe, they turned out to be by, by default creators of new politics, of new states. And that was, that was the story of the first, of the first Kievan dynasty. And Kiev as the capital of that huge empire that was going from the Baltics to today's central Ukraine and then was trying to get through the southern Ukraine to, to the Black Sea, that was a major, major European state, kingdom if you, if you want to call it, of medieval Europe with a lot, uh, creating a lot of tradition in terms of dynasty, in terms of language, in terms of religion, in terms of, again, historical mythology. So Kiev is central for, uh, for the, uh, uh, nation, um, n- nation-building myth of a number, a number of groups in the region.

   10. LFLex Fridman24:19

       (inhales deeply) So in one perspective and narrative, Kiev is at the center of this Russian Empire. At which point does Moscow become, come to prominence as the center of the Russian Empire?

   11. SPSerhii Plokhy24:36

       Well, the Russian Empire is a term and really creation of the 18th century. Uh, what we, what we have for the Kievan, we call it Kievan Rus. Again, this is a term of the 19th century. They called themselves Rus.

   12. LFLex Fridman24:50

       Rus.

   13. SPSerhii Plokhy24:51

       And there was Metropolitanate of Rus and there was Rus principalities. Uh, so very important to keep in mind that Rus is not Russia, because that was a self-name for all multiple groups on that, on that territory. And, um, Moscow, uh, doesn't exist at the time when Kiev emerges as, as the capital.

   14. LFLex Fridman25:13

       Mm-hmm.

   15. SPSerhii Plokhy25:14

       Uh, mm, the first, the first reference to Moscow, uh, comes from the 12th century when it was founded by one of the Kievan, one of the Kievan princes. And, uh, Moscow comes to prominence really in a very different context and was a very different empire running the show in the region. The story of Moscow and the rise of Moscow, this is the story of the Mongol rule over, over former Rus lands and former Rus territories. Um, uh, the, the part of the former Rus eventually overthrows the, the Mongol control with the help of the small group of people called Lithuanians.

   16. LFLex Fridman26:00

       Mm-hmm.

   17. SPSerhii Plokhy26:01

       Which, which had a young, young state and young dynasty and, and united th- these lands which were mostly, in today's terms, Ukrainian and Belarusian. So they separate early. And what is today's Russia, mostly Western Russia, Central Russia, stays under the Mongol control up until late 15th century. And that was the story when Moscow, Moscow rises as the new capital of that realm, replacing the city of Vladimir, uh, as, as that capital. Uh, for those who ever went to Russia, uh, they, they're familiar with the, with, of course, Vladimir as the place of the m- uh, oldest, uh, uh, architectural monuments, uh, the so-called The Golden Ring of Russia and so on and so forth. Vladimir is central, and there were so many architectural monuments there, because before there was Moscow, there was Vladimir. Eventually in this, in this struggle over, over control of the territory, struggle for favors, uh, from, from the Mongols a- and, and the Tatar horde, Moscow emerges as, as the center of that particular realm under Mongols. After the Mongol rule is, uh, removed, Moscow embarks on the project that historians, Russian historians of the 19th century called The Gathering of the Russian Lands. Uh, using Russian now for Rus and, and, and trying to, to, uh, bring back the m- th- the lands of, of former Kievan Rus, but also the lands of the former Mongol Empire. Uh, the Russians get to the, uh, Pacific before they get to Kiev, uh, historically. Uh, and, uh, m- really, the, the, the, uh, quo- quote, unquote, "gathering of the, uh, uh," quote, unquote, "Russian Lands" ends only in 1945 when, uh, the Soviet Union, uh, uh, bullies the Czechoslovak government into turning what is today's Transcarpathian Ukraine to the Soviet Union. It is included in the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. So that's, that's the moment when that d- destiny, the way how it was imagined, uh, by the 19th century Russian historian was eventually fulfilled. Moscow was in control of all those lands.

   18. LFLex Fridman28:30

       So to what degree are the Slavic people one people? And this is a theme that will continue throughout, I think. Versus a collection of multiple peoples, whether we're talking about the Kievan Rus or we're talking about the 19th century Russian Empire conception.

   19. SPSerhii Plokhy28:49

       Well, a number of ways to look at that. One, the most obvious, the most clear is language. And, um, mm, th- there is no question that, um, Poles speak a separate language than the Slavs. And there is no question for m- anyone, um, going to Ukraine and hearing Ukrainian, realizing that this is not Russian. The level of c- of comprehension can be different. You can understand certain words and you, you, you don't understand others. And the same would be with, with Polish and the same would be with Czech. So, uh, there is this linguistic, uh, linguistic, uh, history that is in common. But languages very clearly indicate that you're de- you're dealing with different, with different peoples. Um, uh, we, we know that language is not everything. Americans speak a particular way of English. Australians speak a particular variant of English. Uh, but for reasons of geography, history, mm, we, we pretty much believe that despite linguistic unity, these are different nations and different peoples, and, and there, there are, there are... Some parts of political tradition are in common, others, others are quite different. Uh, so the same, uh, wha- when it comes to language, the same when it comes to political tradition, to the loyalty to the political institution applies to Slavic, uh, nations. So that's, that's m- again, th- there is nothing particular unique about the Slavs in that regard.

4. 30:30 – 38:13

   Ukrainian nationalism

   1. SPSerhii Plokhy30:30

   2. LFLex Fridman30:30

      You wrote the book The Cossack Myth: History and Nationhood in the Age of Empires. It tells the story of an, an anonymous manuscript called The History of the Rus.... it started being circulated in the 1820s. I would, I would love it if you can tell the story of this. Um, this is supposedly one of the most impactful texts in history, modern history. So what's the importance of this text? What did it contain? How did it define the future of the region?

   3. SPSerhii Plokhy30:56

      In the first decades of the 19th Century, after Napoleonic Wars, a mysterious text emerged that was attributed to a Orthodox archbishop that was long dead, which was claiming that the, uh, Kazakhs of Ukraine were in fact the, uh, original Rus' people, and that they, they, uh, had the right for particular place, for central place, in, in the Russian Empire. And it tells the history of the Kazakhs, full... It's, it's the era of romanticism, full of all sorts of drama. There are heroes, there are villains. And the text captivates the attention of, um, uh, some key figures in the, in the Russian intellectual elite in Saint Petersburg. Um, um, uh, people, uh, like Andrey Ryleyev, who was, was executed for his participation in 1825 uprising, uh, writes, writes poetry on the basis of this text. Pushkin pays attention to it as well. And then comes along the, the, um, key figure in Ukrainian national, um, uh, revival of the, uh, 19th Century, Uh, Ukranian National Project, Taras Shevchenko, and, and reads it as well, and they all read them, it very differently. Uh, eventually, by the, by the beginning of the, uh, uh, in the mid-20th Century, some of the Russian, um, m- mostly nationalist writers call this text the Koran of Ukrainian nationalism. So what is, w- what is there? The story, it's, it's, it's very important in a sense that what the authors... And that's what I claim in the book, what the authors of the text were trying to say, they were trying to say that the Kazakh elite should have the same rights as the Russian nobility, and brings the long historical records to prove how cool the Kazakhs were over the period of time. But in, at the beginning of the 19th Century, they put this claim already, they used new, new arguments, and these arguments are about nation and nationalism, and they're saying that the Kazakhs are a separate nation, and that's, that's a big, big, big claim. Uh, the Russian Empire... And this is a very, very good argument, uh, in historiography, that Russian Empire grew and acquired this 1/6th of the Earth by using one very specific way of integrating those lands. It integrated elites. It was making deals with the elites. Whether the elites were Muslim or the elites were Roman Catholic, as the case with the Poles, they would be, elites would be integrated, and the empire was bad- uh, based on that, a state, uh, uh, uh, uh, the, the, the estate loyalty and the state integration. But once you bring in the factor of nation and nationalism and language, then once in a sudden, the whole model of the integration of the elites, irrespective of their language, religion, and culture, starts falling apart. And the Poles were the first who really, uh, uh, produced, produced this, this, sort of a challenge to the Russian Empire by uprisings, two uprisings in the 19th Century, and Ukrainians then followed in their, uh, uh, footsteps. So the text, the importance of the text is that it was making claim on the part of a particular estate, the Kazakh officer class, which was that empire could survive, but it turned it, given the conditions of the time, into the claim for the special role, uh, of, uh, Kazakhs as a nation, creating that this is a separate nation, a Rus' nation. And that is the challenge of nationalism, that no empire really survived, and, and the Russian Empire was not an exception. So there's a turning point when the discourse switches from loyalty based on the integration of the elites to the loyalty based on attachment to your nation, to your language, and to your culture, and to your history.

   4. LFLex Fridman35:43

      So that was, like, the initial spark, the flame that led to nationalist movements.

   5. SPSerhii Plokhy35:50

      That was the beginning and the beginning that was, uh, building a bridge between the existence of the Kazakh state in the 17th and 18th Century that was used as a foundation for the Kazakh mythology, Ukrainian national mythology, went into the Ukrainian national anthem, and the new age and the new stage where the Kazakhs were not there anymore, whether professors, intellectuals, students, members of the, of the, uh, uh, n- national and, and organizations. And that started, of course, with romantic poetry. It was started with collecting folklore, and then later goes to the, to the political stage and eventually the stage of mass politics.

   6. LFLex Fridman36:33

      So to you, even throughout the 20th Century, under Stalin, there was always a force within Ukraine that wanted to be independent.

   7. SPSerhii Plokhy36:43

      There were five attempts, uh, mm, for, uh, Ukraine to declare its independence and to, to maintain it in the, in the 20th century. Only one succeeded in, in 1991, but there were four, four different attempts at times before. And you see the Ukrainian, uh, national identity, uh, manifesting itself in two different, two different ways. In the form of National Communism, uh, after, after the Bolshevik victory, uh, in the, in, uh, Bolshevik-controlled Ukraine, and in the form of Radical Nationalism in the parts of Ukraine that were controlled by Poland, um, uh, and, and Romania, and, uh, part of that was also controlled by Czechoslovakia and, and later Hungary. So in those parts outside of the, of the Soviet Union, the, the form of the national mobilization, the key form of national mobilization became Radical Nationalism. In, in, um, uh, Soviet Ukraine, it was National Communism that came back in the 1960s and 1970s. And then in the 1991, the, the majority of, uh, the members of the Ukrainian Parliament who voted for independence were members of the Communist Party. So that, that spirit on, on, uh, on certain level never died.

   8. LFLex Fridman38:08

      So there's National Communism and Radical Nationalism.

5. 38:13 – 1:07:13

   Stepan Bandera

   1. LFLex Fridman38:13

      Well, let me ask you about the Radical Nationalism because that is a topic that comes up in the discussion of the war in Ukraine today. Uh, can you tell me about Stepan Bandera? Who was he, this controversial far-right Ukrainian revolutionary?

   2. SPSerhii Plokhy38:31

      There are at least two Stepan Banderas. Uh, one is the real person, and another is mythology that, uh, really comes, uh, comes with this name. And, uh, uh, the real person was a young student, nationalistically oriented student in the late 1920s and early 1930s in the part of Ukraine that was controlled by Poland, who, uh, belonged to the generation who regretted that they were not born in time for the big struggles of the, of the, um, World War I, and, and revolution at that time. They believed that their fathers lost opportunity for Ukraine to become independent, and that, uh, a new ideology was needed, and that ideology was, uh, Radical Nationalism, and new tactics were n- needed. So Bandera becomes the leader of the, uh, organization of Ukrainian nationalists in Ukraine at the young age, and organizes a number of assassinations of the Polish officials, or, uh, members of the Ukrainian community who this young people in their s- 17, 18, 19 considered to be, uh, to be collaborators. He is arrested, uh, put on trial, and that's, that's where the myth of Bandera starts, starts to emerge, because he uses the trial to, uh, m- make statement about, about the, um, Ukrainian Nationalism, Radical Nationalism and its goals, and suddenly becomes, becomes a hero among the, in the youth, Ukrainian youth at that time. He is, uh, m- sentenced for, uh, for, uh, execution, for death. So when he delivers his speech, he, he knows that he, he probably would, would die soon. And then it was the sentence was commuted to life, to, to life in prison. Then World War II happens, the Polish state collapses under the, the pressure coming of course from, from, uh, Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. Uh, Bandera walks, walks away, and presides over the act of the split of the organization of Ukrainian nationalists into two groups. The most radical one u- used to call Revolutionary, they called themselves Revolutionary, is led by ma- by Bandera. They worked together with the Nazi Germany at that time with the hope that Nazi Germany would deliver them independent Ukraine. Uh, first days of the German attack, Nazi attack on the Soviet Union, the, um, units formed on the basis of organization of Ukrainian nationalists march into the city of Lviv and declare Ukrainian independence. That was not sanctioned by the German authorities. That was not in German plans. So they arrest Bandera, members of his family, his brothers, me- members of the, leaders, leaders of the organization. So his two brothers go to Auschwitz, die there. He was sent to Sachsenhausen for most d- duration of the, of the war until 1944, refusing to revoke declaration of Ukrainian independence, which, again, contributes, contributes further to his mythology. After the war, he never comes back to Ukraine. He lives in exile in Munich. Uh, so between 1930 and his death, uh, in 1959, he spent in Ukraine maybe, uh, uh, up to two years. Maybe a little bit more, but most of the time was either in the Polish prison or in the, in the German concentration camp or in exile. But the myth of Bandera lived, and all the members of the organization of Ukrainian nationalists and then the Ukrainian insurgent army...... that fought against the Soviets all the way into the early 1950s. They were called Banderites. They were called Banderites by the Soviet authorities. They were known also in that way to the local population. So there was a faraway leader that barely was there on the, on the spot, but whose, who, whose name was attached to this, to this movement for, really, liberation of Ukraine at that time. Again, the battle that failed.

   3. LFLex Fridman43:18

      The fact that he collaborated with the Nazis sticks. From one perspective, he's considered by many to be a hero of Ukraine for fighting for the independence of Ukraine. From another perspective, uh, coupled with the fact that there's this radical revolutionary extremist flavor to the way he sees the world, that label just stays, that he's a fascist, he's a Nazi. Uh, w- to what degrees it's true, to what degree is it not?

   4. SPSerhii Plokhy43:49

      Well, uh, um, th- th- this label is certainly promoted by the, first, by the Soviet propaganda and then by Russia propa- Russian propaganda. It's, it's, it works very nicely. Um, if you, if you focus on the, on the years of collaboration, uh, those were the same years when Joseph Stalin collaborated with Hitler, right? So, hm, we, we, we have, we have the same, the same reason to call, um, Stalin, Stalin Nazi collaborator, as we have, uh, the reason to call Bandera Nazi collaborator. We, we, uh, look at the, at the situation in the Pacific, in Indonesia, in other places, uh, the leaders who, uh, worked together with, uh, Japanese was the idea of promoting independence of their countries, after the Japanese collapsed, bec- become leaders of the empire. So the difference with Bandera is that he never becomes the leader, the leader of empire, and, and, and immunity (laughs) that, that comes with that, with that position certainly doesn't apply to him. Uh, hmm, but there, there are other parts of his life which certainly, certainly put this whole thing in, in, in question. The, the fate of his family, uh, his own time in the German concentration camp, uh, certainly don't fit, don't fit the, the propaganda one, one-sided image of Bandera. In terms of him being a hero, that's, that's a very, very interesting question, because he is perceived in Ukraine today by, not by, by, by all, and probably not by the majority, but by many people in Ukraine as a symbol of fighting against, against the, the, hmm, Soviet Union, and by extension, against Russia and Russian occupation. So his popularity grew after February 24th, 2022, as a symbol of that resistance. Again, we are talking here about myth and mythology. And of course, Bandera was not leading the fight against the Soviet, uh, the, the, uh, the Soviet occupation in, uh, in Ukraine, because at that time, he was just simply not in Ukraine. He was in Germany, and you can imagine that geography mattered at that time much more than it matters today.

   5. LFLex Fridman46:08

      Uh, there's a million questions to ask here. I think it's an, an important topic, because it is at the center of the claimed reason that the war continues in Ukraine. And so, I would like to explore that from, from different angles. But just to clarify, was there a moment where Bandera chose Nazi Germany over the Red Army when the war already began? So in the list of, uh, allegiances, is Ukraine's independence more important than fighting Nazi Germany, essentially?

   6. SPSerhii Plokhy46:43

      The Ukrainian independence was the- their goal. And they were there to, to work with anybody who would, who would support and, and, uh, in one way, or at least allow the Ukrainian independence. So there, there, there is no question that, uh, they, they are just classic nationalists. So the, the goal is, uh, the m- m- nationalism is the principle according to which the, or at least one definitions is, according to which the cultural boundaries coincide with political boundaries. So their goal was to create political boundaries that would coincide with the geographic boundaries in the conditions of the World War II, and certainly making, making deals with, with whoever would, would, uh, uh, uh, uh, would either support, as I said, or tolerate that, that project of theirs.

   7. LFLex Fridman47:39

      So I would love to find the line between nationalism, even extreme nationalism, and fascism, and Nazism. So for Bandera the myth and Bandera the person, to what degree, let's look at some of the ideology of Nazism. To which degree did he hate Jews? Was he anti-Semitic?

   8. SPSerhii Plokhy48:01

      Uh, we, uh, know that basically in his circle, there were people who were, hmm, a- anti-Semites, in a sense that, okay, we have the texts, right? We know that. We don't have that, that information about, about, uh, what, that, that sort of text, uh, that sort of e- evidence with regards to, to Bandera himself. Um, mm, uh, in terms of fascism, uh, well, m- there, there is very clear and there is research done that in particular, Italian fascists, fascism had influence, uh, on the, on the thinking of people in that organization, including people at the top. But it is also very important to, um, keep in mind that they call themselves nationalists and revolutionaries. And despite the fact...... that in 1939, in 1940, in 1941, it was very beneficial for them to declare themselves to be Ukrainian fascists and establish this bond with, uh, not just with, with Italy, but with, uh, uh, Nazi Germany. They refused to do that. And then they refused to recall their independence. So, um, uh, influences, yes, but, but clearly it's, it's, it's, it's, it's a different, it's, it's a different type of a political, uh, political project.

   9. LFLex Fridman49:29

      So let me fast-forward into the future and see to which degree the myth permeates. Uh, does Ukraine have a neo-Nazi problem?

   10. SPSerhii Plokhy49:38

       M- my understanding is there are Nazis in Ukraine. And, uh, there are, there are supporters of, uh, um, white supremacy theories. Uh, but also my understanding is that, um, they are extremely marginal, and they're more marginal than the same sort of groups are in Central Europe, maybe in the US as well. And for me, the question is not whether the- Ukraine has it, but why, even in the conditions of the war, the radical nationalism, and extremism, and, and, and white supremacists is such a marginal force? When in the countries that are not at the war, this is, this ... you, you look, you look at France, you look at, uh, again, it's, it's not aga- e- exactly Nazis, but really right, radical right, is, is becoming so important. Um, why, why Ukraine in the conditions of the war is the country that manages relations between different ethnic groups and languages, uh, in the way that strengthens political nation? So m- for me as a scholar, as, and a researcher, what I see is that, uh, in Ukraine, the, the influence of the far right in different, in different variations is much lower than it is among, among some of Ukraine's neighbors, and in Europe in general. And the question is, why? I, I don't know. I have guesses. I, I, I don't know answer, but that's a, that's the, the, the, the, the, that's the question that I think is interesting to answer. How, how Ukraine ended up to be the only country in the world outside of Israel who has a Jewish president, who is, uh, my at least understanding is, uh, the, the most popular president in history in terms of how long his popularity goes after the election. So this, uh, this, uh, the, the really from my point of view, interesting, interesting questions. And again, we, we can, we can certainly debate it.

   11. LFLex Fridman52:00

       So, uh, just for context, the, the, the most popular far-right party won 2.15% of the vote in 2019. This is before the war. So, that's where things stood. It's unclear where they stand now. It'd be an interesting question whether it escalated and how much. What you're saying is that war in general can serve as a catalyst for expansion of extremist groups. Of extremist nationalistic groups, especially, like the far right. And it's interesting to see to what degree they have or have not r- risen to power in the, sort of in the shadows.

   12. SPSerhii Plokhy52:38

       Mm-hmm. So no nationalist or nationalistic party actually crossed the, the barrier to get into the Parliament.

   13. LFLex Fridman52:45

       Yes.

   14. SPSerhii Plokhy52:45

       So Ukraine is the country where there is no right or far right in the Parliament. We, we can't say that about Germany, we can't say that about France. So that's, that just, uh, um, one, one more way to, to, to stress this unique u- u- unique place of Ukraine in that, in that sense. And the year 2019 is the year already of the war. The war started in 2014 with the annexation of the Crimea. The, the frontline was near Donbas. All these groups were fighting there. So Ukraine, maybe not to a degree that it is now, was already on the, on the war footing, and yet, and yet, the, the, the, the, the, the Right party couldn't, couldn't get more than 2%. So that's, that's the question that I have in mind. And yes, the war historically, historically, of course, puts forward and, and makes from, uh, um, the, the more nationalist views and forces turn them from marginal forces into more central ones. We talked about Bandera and we talked about Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists. They were the most marginal group in the political spectrum in Ukraine in, uh, the 1930s that one can only imagine. But World War II comes-

   15. LFLex Fridman54:02

       Mm-hmm.

   16. SPSerhii Plokhy54:03

       ... and they become the most central group because they also were from the start go, they knew, they, they had their organization. They, they, the violence was basically one of their means. They knew how to fight. So historically, historically wars indeed produce tho- those results. So we are, we are looking at Ukraine, we are, we are trying to see what is happening there.

   17. LFLex Fridman54:25

       So Vladimir Putin in his interview with Tucker Carlson, but many times before, said that the current goal for the war in Ukraine is denazification. That the purpose of the war is denazification. Can you explain this concept of denazification as Putin sees it?

   18. SPSerhii Plokhy54:45

       Denazification is the trope that is accepted quite well by the, by the former Soviet population, and Russian population in particular.... the, the most powerful mythology, Soviet mythology that then was basically passed, uh, uh, as, as, as part of heritage to the, to the Russian Federation, was World War II, was fighting against fascism. So once you use terms fascism and Nazi and denazification, suddenly, suddenly people not just start listening, they just stop analyzing. And, uh, as a, as a propaganda tool, this is, this is, of course, very, very powerful tool. Um, in, in terms of to what degree this is th- this is the real goal or not, we discussed the, the importance of the far right in, in, in Europe and, and in Ukraine. So if that's the real goal of the war, probably the war would have to start not against Ukraine, but probably against France or some other country, if you take this at face value.

   19. LFLex Fridman55:48

       Well, there's something really interesting here, as you mentioned. 'Cause I've spoken to a lot of people in Russia, and, uh, you said analysis stops. In the West, people look at the word denazification and look at the things we've just discussed, and kind of, uh, almost think this, this is absurd. But when you talk to people in Russia, maybe it's deep in there somewhere, the history of World War II still reverberates through the f- maybe the fears, um, maybe the pride, whatever the deep emotional, uh, history is there. It seems that the goal of denazification appears to be reasonable for people in Russia. They don't seem to see the absurdity or the complexity or the, or even the need for analysis, I guess, in this kind of statement, word of denazification.

   20. SPSerhii Plokhy56:46

       Uh, I would say this is broader. This is broader. Um, mm- e- th- the war that started under the banner that Russians and Ukrainians were one and the same people, and produces that sort of casualty, uh, really goes against also, mm, s- some, any sort of logical, of, of logical thinking. But, uh, the, uh, Russia is a place where the free press doesn't exist already for a long period of time. Russia is the place where there is, uh, mm- u- uh, m- an echo chamber, to a degree. And as war started first in 2014, and then all-out war in 2022, I came across a lot of people, on the personal level, but also in the media report, and that they really can't find common language with their close relatives in, in Russia. People who visited Ukraine, who know that it is not taken over by, by nationalists, and is not taken over by Nazis. Uh, but the, the media around them, the neighbors around them, the people at their work basically say one and the same thing. And we as humans in general, what- whatever our background, we are very, very... Uh, uh, our mind is, is really s- s- m- it's, it's relatively easy to manipulate it. And, uh, um, to a degree that em- even family connections and e- even family ties don't sometimes help to, to maintain that, that, uh, uh, ability to, to think and, and to analyze on your own, to look at, at the facts.

   21. LFLex Fridman58:30

       So Putin has alluded to the Yaroslav Hanka incident in the Canadian Parliament, September 2023. This man is a, uh, veteran of World War II on the Ukrainian side, and he got two standing ovations in the Canadian Parliament. Uh, but they later found out that he was part of the SS. So can you explain on this? What are your thoughts on this? This had a very big effect on the narrative, I guess, propagated throughout the region.

   22. SPSerhii Plokhy59:04

       Yes. Uh, what, uh, what happened during World War II was that, uh, once the Germans started to run out of, uh, of manpower, uh, they created, uh, mm, sort of foreign legion groups. But because those people were not Aryans, um, they, they were created for fighting on the, on the, on the battleground. Because they were not Aryans, they couldn't be trusted. So they were put under the command of Heinrich Himmler, uh, under command of SS, and became known as SS Waffen units. And, uh, one of such units was created in Ukraine with great difficulties, because Nazis didn't consider Slavs to be generally worthy of even, e- even that sort of foreign legion formations. Uh, but they made an exception, because those people were coming from Galicia, which was part of Austria-Hungary, which means part of Austria, which means somehow were open to the benevolent influence of the, of the Germanic, of the Germanic race. And called, called the, the division Galicia, or Galicia. Mm, uh, part of, of Ukrainian youth joined the Galicia, uh, the, the division. The, one of the explanations was that they were looking at the experience of World War I, and, uh, seeing that the units, the Ukrainian units in the Austrian army then played a very important role in the fight for independence. So that is one of the explanations. You can't just, uh, m- use one explanation to, to, to describe motivations of everyone and every single person who, who was joining there. So they were sent to the front. They were defeated within a few, few short days.... by the, uh, by the, by the Red Army, and then were, were, uh, retreating through, uh, through, um, Slovakia, where they were used to fight with the Partisan movement there, and eventually surrendered to the British. So that's, that's the story. You can personally maybe understand what, what, what the, the good motivations were of this person or that person, but, uh, that is one of the, uh, uh, at the best, one of the very tragic and a- and unfortunate pages in, in, in, in, in Ukrainian history. You, you can't, you can't justify that as, as a, as, as a, as, as a phenomenon. So from that point of view, the, the, um, mm, celebration of that experience, as opposed to looking at that, okay, that, that happened, and, uh, uh, we, we wish that tho- those young men who were idealistic or joined the division for idealistic purposes had, had, had better understanding of things or made other choices. But you can't, you can't certainly- certainly celebrate it. And, and once that happened, that of course became a big, a big propaganda, propaganda item in, in, in, in, in the current war. Uh, we are talking about, about, uh, um, 10 to 20,000 people in the division, and we are talking about, uh, two to three million Ukrainians fighting in the Red Army. Uh, and again, it's, it's not like Red Army is, is, is, is, is completely blameless in the way how it behaved in, in, in Prussia or in Germany and so on and so forth. But it's basically, it's, it's ... again, we, we are going back to the story of Bandera. So the- there is a period of collaboration, and that's, that's what propaganda tries to define him by, or there is a division ............................ by 20,000 people, and somehow, it makes irrelevant the experience of two to three million people.

   23. LFLex Fridman1:03:01

       I mean, just to clarify, I think there is just a blunder on the Canadian Parliament side, the Canadian side, of not doing research, of ... maybe correct me if I'm wrong, but from my understanding, they were just doing stupid, shallow political stuff, let's applaud, you know, when Zelensky shows up, let's have a Ukrainian veteran, let's applaud a veteran of World War II, and then all of a sudden, you realize, well, there's actually complexities to wars. We can talk about, for example, a lot of dark aspects on all sides of World War II, the mass rape at the end of World War II by the, the Red Army ............................ German. There's a lot of really dark complexity in it on all sides. So, you know, that could be an opportunity to explore the dark complexity that some of the Ukrainians were in the SS, uh, or Bandera, the- the complexities there. But I think they were doing not a complex thing. They were doing a very shallow applaud. And we should applaud veterans, of course, but i- in that case, they were doing it for show, for Zelensky and so on. So we should clarify that the applause wasn't knowing ... it wasn't for the SS. (laughs) It was for a Ukrainian ... no, it was for World War II veterans, but the propaganda, or at least, (sighs) an interpretation from the Russian side, from whatever side is that they were applauding the full person standing before them, which wasn't just a Ukrainian veteran, but a Ukrainian veteran that fought for the SS.

   24. SPSerhii Plokhy1:04:36

       I don't have an- any particular insights, but I would be very much surprised if even one person in the Parliament, I mean, the members of the Parliament actually knew the whole story. I would be very surprised.

   25. LFLex Fridman1:04:50

       Yeah. The whole story of this person, and frankly, the whole story of, um, Ukraine and Russia and World War II, period.

   26. SPSerhii Plokhy1:04:58

       Yes. Yes.

   27. LFLex Fridman1:05:00

       Uh, nevertheless, it had a lot of power and really reverberated in support of the narrative that there is a neo-Nazi, a Nazi problem in Ukraine.

   28. SPSerhii Plokhy1:05:09

       This is the- the- the narrative that is out there. Um, and, uh, it's especially powerful in Russia. It's especially powerful in Russia, given that there are, um, mm, really the- the- the- the, uh, mm, the- the atmosphere that- that is created really is not conducive to any- to any independent analysis.

   29. LFLex Fridman1:05:32

       Well, I wonder what is the most effective way to respond to that particular claim, because there could be a discussion about nationalism and extreme nationalism, and the fight for independence, and whether it isn't, like Putin wrote, one people, but the question of are there Nazis in Ukraine seems to be a question that could be, uh, analyzed rigorously with data.

   30. SPSerhii Plokhy1:06:03

       That is being done on the academic level. But, uh, in terms of the, of the public response and public discourse, uh, the, the only response that I see is, uh, not to focus on the, on the questions raised and- and put by the propaganda, because you have already become victim of that propaganda by definition, but talk about that much broadly and- and talk about, about diff- different aspects of ... or if it is World War II, about different aspects of World War II. If it's about issue of the far right in Ukraine, let's talk about, uh, US, let's talk about Russia, let's talk about France, let's compare. That's the only way how you deal with propaganda, because propaganda is not necessarily something that, uh, is, is an outright lie. It can be just one factor that's taken out of the context and, and is, is blown out of proportion, and that's ... th- th- that is good enough.
6. 1:07:13 – 1:22:11

   KGB

   1. LFLex Fridman1:07:13

      Let us move gracefully throughout, back and forth through history, back to Bandera. You wrote a book on the KGB spy, Bogdan Stashinsky. Can you tell his story?

   2. SPSerhii Plokhy1:07:28

      This is a story of the history of the organization of Ukrainian nationalists and, and Bandera as well, already after the end of the Second World War.

   3. LFLex Fridman1:07:37

      Mm-hmm.

   4. SPSerhii Plokhy1:07:38

      Uh, because what you got, uh, after the Second World War, so imagine, um, May of 1945. The red banner is all over Riksdag. The Red Army is in control of half of Europe, but the units of the Red Army are still fighting the war, and not just behind the Soviet lines, but within the borders of the Soviet Union. And this war continues all the way into the early 1950s, up to, almost up to Stalin's death. Um, m- the war is conducted by the organization of Ukrainian nationalists, which have a Ukrainian insurgent army, and the government tries to crush that resistance. So what it does is basically recruits local people to, to spy on the partisans, on the underground, and Bogdan Stashinsky is one of those people. His family is supporting the resistance. They provide food. His, his, uh, sister is engaged with one of the local, uh, uh, commanders of the, of this underground unit, and, uh, uh, they know everything about Stashinsky's family and they know everything about him, because he is also collecting funds for the underground. So they have a conversation with him, saying that, "Okay, that's, that's what we got, and you and your family can go to, to prison, or you help us a little bit. We, we are interested in the, uh, fiance of your sister and we want to get him." And Stashinsky says yes. And once, once they round up the, the fiance, he basically betrayed a member, or almost member of his family, he's, he's done. He can't go back to, to, to his village. He can't go back to his study. He was studying in Lviv at that time. So he becomes, uh, uh, as I write in my book, the, the secret police becomes his family, and he is sent to Kyiv. He is trained for two years. Sent to East Germany and to Berlin, and becomes, uh, becomes, uh, an assassin. So they sent him across the, m- across the, uh, m- border to, to Western Germany, to Munich, which was the headquarter of different, different, um, organizations, anti-Soviet organizations, Ukrainian and, and Russian and, and Georgian and so on and so forth. And he kills, he kills two leaders of the, of the organization, uh, of Ukrainian nationalists, one editor of the newspaper, and eventually he kills Bandera. He does that with the new weapon, a spray pistol, that eventually makes it into the Bond, uh, novel The Man With the Golden Gun! And that whole episode is a little bit reshaped, but it is, it, it is not in the film, but it is in the, in the novel itself, and then later has a change of mind under the influence of his German, uh, German fiance and then, and then wife. Uh, they decide to escape to the West. Uh, and while they're doing that, they discover that their apartment was bugged, and probably the KGB knows all of that. So, mm, a long story short, his son dies in, in Berlin. Uh, the KGB doesn't allow him to go there, but his wife has a nervous breakdown, so they allow him to go there to just calm her so that there would be no scandal, and two of them, one day before their son's burial, because that's after, after that they will be sent to Moscow, they jump the ship and go to West Berlin two hours before the Berlin Wall was being built. So they, they, they... If, if they would stay for the funeral, probably they would, the KGB would not let them go. But also if they would stay, the, the, the border would be there. And he goes, he goes to the American intelligence and says, "Okay, that's, that's who I am, and that's what I did." And they look at him and they say, (laughs) "We don't trust you." (laughs) "We don't know who you are. You have documents in five names. You say you killed Bandera? Well, we have a different information. He was, he was, uh, poisoned and probably by someone in his, in, in hi- in his close, in his close circle. A spray pistol? Did, did, did you read too much Ian Fleming?"

   5. LFLex Fridman1:12:41

      Mm-hmm.

   6. SPSerhii Plokhy1:12:41

      "Where does this come from?"

   7. LFLex Fridman1:12:42

      Mm-hmm.

   8. SPSerhii Plokhy1:12:43

      He insists. They say, "Okay, you insist? If you committed all those crimes, we're giving you to the German police and German police will be, will be investigating you." And then the trial comes, and if he says... If he takes back his testimony, the whole case against him collapses. He can go free. But he knows that if he goes free, he is a target of his colleagues from, from, fr- from the same department. So his task at the trial is to prove that he is guilty.... that he's did that.

   9. LFLex Fridman1:13:19

      Mm-hmm.

   10. SPSerhii Plokhy1:13:20

       And then he disappears, and nobody knows where he goes, and there are all sorts of cover stories. And I was lucky to interview a commander, f- former chief of the, of the South African police, who confirmed to me that Stashinsky was in South Africa.

   11. LFLex Fridman1:13:41

       He fled?

   12. SPSerhii Plokhy1:13:41

       The, the West German intelligence thought that it was too dangerous for him to stay in Germany. They sent him under, under a different name to, to South Africa. So, that's, uh, that's, that's, uh, the story of Stashinsky himself. But, uh, going back to Bandera, of course, the fact that, uh, m- he confessed and it became known that KGB assassinated Bandera, that added to the, to the, uh, um, uh, image and to, to general mythology about Bandera.

   13. LFLex Fridman1:14:12

       What a fascinating story of a village boy becoming an assassin who killed one of the most influential revolutionaries of the region, uh, in the 20th century. Uh, so what ... just zooming out broadly on the KGB, how powerful was the KGB? What role did it play in this whole story of the Soviet Union?

   14. SPSerhii Plokhy1:14:34

       It depends on the period. At the time that we just described, late 50s and early 60s, they were not powerful at all. And, uh, the reasons for that was that, uh, people like Krushchev were really concerned about the secret police becoming too powerful. It became too powerful, in their mind, under Stalin, under Beria, and it was concern about the ... Beria's power as a secret police chief that led to the m- coup against Beria, and, uh, um, Krushchev com- came into power, and Beria was arrested and executed. And what, what Krushchev was trying to do after that was trying to put, uh, m- m- m- a ... since 54, the name was already KGB, KGB under his control. So he was appointing the former Komsomol leaders as the heads of the KGB, so the people who really, uh, m- m- um, really owed everything to him. The, th- that sort of position. And the heads of the KGB were not members of Politburo. It changed, it changed in the 70s with Andropov where KGB started, started to play again very important role in the, in the Soviet history. And, um, let's say decisions on Afghanistan and the Soviet troops marching into Afghanistan were made by the, um, m- m- apart from Brezhnev, by the trio of the people who are not ... would be called today Siloviki maybe, or not all of them were Siloviki, but one of course was Andropov, the head of the KGB, another was the Minister of Defense, and, and then there was secretary in charge of the military industrial complex, the Ministry of Foreign... Minister of Foreign Affairs. So but, but, uh, m- the head of the KGB became really not just a member of Politburo, but the, the, th- the member of that inner circle. And then the fact that Andropov succeeds Brezhnev is also a manifestation of, of the power that KGB acquired really after, after Krushchev in the, in the 1970s, and then going into the 1980s.

   15. LFLex Fridman1:16:53

       Who was more powerful, the KGB or the CIA during the Soviet Union?

   16. SPSerhii Plokhy1:16:58

       The CIA, it's, uh, it's, uh, uh, the organization that, uh, is charged with the, uh, m- intri- information gathering and all sorts of operations, in- including assassinations in the, in the 50s and 60s abroad. The KGB was the organization that really m- had both the surveillance o- over the population within the Soviet Union and, and, and also the, the operations abroad. And its members, m- well, its, its leaders were members of the inner circle for, for making decisions. I, again, f- from what I understand about the way how, how politics and decision work and decisions are made in the, in the United States, the, the CIA, the chief of the CIA is not, is, is not one of the decision-making group that, that providing information. Yeah. So, so I would say it's not day and night, but their power, political influence, political significance, very different.

   17. LFLex Fridman1:18:04

       Is it understood how big the KGB was, how widespread it was, given its secretive and distributive nature?

   18. SPSerhii Plokhy1:18:13

       Certain things we know, others we don't because the Stasi archives are open and, and, uh, um, most of the KGB, especially in Moscow, they're not. Uh, but we know that, uh, m- the KGB combined not only the, uh, internal, m- m- uh, s- sort of, uh, secret police functions at home and counter, uh, counterintelligence branch and, uh, intelligence branch abroad, but also the, the border troops, for example. Right? So, m- really, institutionally, it was, it wa- it was a huge, huge mammoth. And another thing that we know, we can sort of extrapolate from what we know from the Stasi, from the Stasi archives, that the surveillance, at home, the surveillance was, uh, really massive. Um, the guess is the, the, the Soviets were not as, as effective and as, m- as meticulous and as scrupulous and as methodical as probably the Germans were. But that, that gives you, that, that gives you a basic idea of how, how penetrated the entire society was.

   19. LFLex Fridman1:19:21

       What do you think is important to understand about the KGB if we want to also understand, uh, Vladimir Putin, since he was a KGB foreign intelligence officer for 16 years?

   20. SPSerhii Plokhy1:19:33

       From my research, including on, on the, on the Stashinsky, uh, what, what I understand is that, um, in KGB, man, it was a powerful organization. Again, less powerful than 50s and 60s, but still very powerful organization. There was, uh, there was, on the one hand, the understanding of the situation in the country and abroad that probably other, other organizations didn't have. They had also first pick in terms of the, uh, selecting cadres. The, the, the work in the KGB was well-paid and considered to be very prestigious. So that's, tha- so that was part, to a degree, of the Soviet elite, in terms of whom they, whom they recruited. And they had a resentment toward the party leadership that didn't allow them to do, um, James Bond kind of things that they would want to do, because there were political risks. After this, uh, scandal with Stashinsky, um, the m- uh, at least on, on many levels, the KGB stopped the, the practice of the, uh, assassinations, uh, political assassinations abroad, because it was considered politically to be extremely, extremely dangerous. The person who was in charge of the KGB at the time of Bandera assassination, Shelepin was one of the candidates to, uh, replace Khrushchev. And, uh, Brezhnev used against him that scandal abroad eventually to remove him from Politburo. So the KGB was really, was really looking at the party leadership as, to a degree, ineffective, corrupt, and who was on their way. And, uh, from what I understand, that's, that's exactly the, the, the, m- the attitudes that, um, people like, uh, like Putin and, and, and people of his circle brought, brought to, to power in Kremlin. So the methods that KGB use, they can use now, and there is no, no party or no, no other, other institution actually stopping them from doing that. And, um, they think about, my understanding, the, the operations abroad, about foreign policy in general, in terms of the KGB mindset of, of planning operations and executing particular operations and so on and so forth. So I think a lot o- a lot of culture that came into existence in the Soviet KGB now became part of the culture of the, of the, m- Russian, uh, Russian establishment.

7. 1:22:11 – 1:58:27

   War in Ukraine

   1. SPSerhii Plokhy1:22:12

   2. LFLex Fridman1:22:12

      You wrote the book The Russo-Ukrainian War: The Return of History that gives the full context leading up to the invasion of Ukraine by Russia in February 2022. So can you, uh, take me through the key moments in history that led up to this war? So we mentioned the collapse of the Soviet Union. We could probably go much farther back. But the collapse of the Soviet Union, mentioned 2014. Um, maybe you can highlight key moments that led up to the... to 2022.

   3. SPSerhii Plokhy1:22:54

      The key moments would be first the year 2004, known for Orange Revolution in, in Ukraine, and then the year 2013, known as the Revolution of Dignity. Both were the revolts against the something that by significant part of Ukrainian population was considered to be, uh, m- completely, completely unacceptable actions on the part of the government and people in the government at that time. So the Orange Revolution of 2004 was a protest against falsified presidential elections and, uh, um, rejection of a candidate that was supported by Russia, publicly supported by Russia. I remember being in Moscow at that time and couldn't believe my eyes when, in the center of Russia, I saw a billboard with Yanukovych. Uh, the, the trick was that there were a lot of Ukrainians in, in Russia and in Moscow in particular, and they, they had the right to vote. Um, so... And, um, it led to the election of, uh, m- Ukrain- as Ukrainian President, Viktor Yushchenko who put on the, on the agenda, um, the issue of Ukraine's membership in NATO. So it was very clear pro-Western orientation. And, um, the second, um, case was the Revolution of Dignity, 2013 with some of the same characters, m- including Yanukovych, who at that time was already president of Ukraine. And, uh, there the question was of, uh, the, m- government promising the people for one year at least to sign association agreement with European Union, and then turning over almost overnight and saying that they were not going to do that. And that's, that's how things started. But then when they became really massive and why something that was called Revolution... uh, Eurorevolution became Revolution of Dignity was when the, um, government police, uh, m- beat up students in downtown Kyiv, uh, who, m- judging by the reports were basically already almost ready to, to disperse, almost ready to go home. And that's when roughly half of Kyiv showed up on the streets. That sort of the police behavior, that sort of the... was absolutely unacceptable in Ukraine.... uh, the, the stealing elections and falsification of elections was unacceptable. That's where around that time and around 2004, the president of Ukraine at that time, Leonid Kuchma writes a book called, uh, Ukraine is Not Russia. And apparently, the term comes from his, uh, con- uh, his discussion with Putin when, uh, Putin was, uh, suggesting to him quite strongly to use force against people on the Maidan, on the square in Kyiv. And, uh, Kuchma allegedly said him, uh, "You don't understand. Ukraine is not Russia. Uh, you can't, you can't do things like that. You get, you get pushback." And, uh, that's, that's the- this two events to foreign then, uh, uh, 2013 became really crucial point in terms of the, uh, UK- Ukraine direction, the, the survival of Ukrainian democracy, which is one of very few countries in the post-Soviet space where democracy survived the original flirt, uh, with between the, um, government, uh, leaders and, and democracy, uh, of the 1990s. It was the all-Soviet story in, in Russia. Everywhere else, there was high democratic expectations. But they came pretty much to an end by the end of the decade. Ukraine, Ukraine preserved the democracy. And, um, uh, the orientation of Ukraine toward, uh, toward integration into, in some form, into Western and European structures, that, uh, that, uh, Ukrainian democracy plus Western orientation was something. And in Russia, we see the strengthening of the autocratic regime under Vladimir Putin. That, if you look deeper, the- the- these are the processes that put the two countries on the collision course.

   4. LFLex Fridman1:27:40

      So there is a division, a push and pull, inside Ukraine on identity of whether they're part of Russia or part of Europe. And you highlighted two moments in Ukrainian history that there's a big flare-up where this, the statement was first, Ukraine is not Russia, and essentially Ukraine is part of Europe. But there's other moments.

   5. SPSerhii Plokhy1:28:06

      Mm-hmm.

   6. LFLex Fridman1:28:07

      What were the defining moments that began an actual war in the Donbass?

   7. SPSerhii Plokhy1:28:10

      The, the, the, the war started in February of 2014 with the Russian takeover of, uh, Crimea by military force, right? The, the so-called Green Man. Um, and, uh, um, the big question is, is why? And it's, it's very important to go back to the year 2013 and, uh, the, the start of the, of the protests and the, the story of the Ukraine signing association agreement with European Union. So from what we understand today, the Ukrainian Government under President Yanukovych did this suicidal sharp turn after one year of promise an association agreement saying that, "Okay, we changed our mind," under pressure from Moscow. And, uh, uh, Moscow applied that pressure, uh, for one, uh, reason, at least in my opinion. Uh, the, uh, Ukraine signing association agreement with European Union would mean that Ukraine would not be able to sign association agreement with any Eurasian union in any shape or form that, uh, that, uh, was at that time in the process of making. And for Vladimir Putin, that was the beginning of his, or part of h- of his third term. One of his, uh, uh, agenda items for the third term was really, uh, consolidation of the, of the post-Soviet space and Eurasian space, and, uh, um, not membership in NATO, not membership in European Union. But association agreement with European Union meant that that post-Soviet space would have to exist under Moscow's control, but without Ukraine, the second-largest post-Soviet republic, the republic on whose vote depended the, uh, continuing existence of the Soviet Union and whose vote ended, in, in many ways, the existence of the Soviet Union. So that is, that is broadly background, but, but also there are, of course, personalities. There are als- also the beliefs, the, the, the readings of history, and, and, and, um, all of that became, became part of the story. But if, if you look at that geopolitically, the, the association agreement is, uh, uh, Putin putting Ukraine outside of the Russian sphere of influence. And the, the, the response was, uh, an attempt to, um, uh, topple, topple the government in Kyiv that clearly was, uh, going to, to sign that, that agreement, uh, to, um, uh, take over Crimea and to help to deal with a lot of issues within Russia itself and boost the, the popularity of, of, uh, uh, the president, and it certainly, certainly worked in that, in that way as well. And, uh, um, the... Once, once Ukraine still after Crimea continued on its path, then the next step started, the so-called hybrid warfare in Donbas. But, um, again, the, the, unlike, unlike Crimea, um, from what, from what I understand, Russia was not really looking forward to taking possession of, uh, Donbas. Donbas was viewed as the way how to influence Ukraine to stop it from...... a drift toward the West.

   8. LFLex Fridman1:31:49

      Maybe you can tell me about the region of Donbas.

   9. SPSerhii Plokhy1:31:52

      I mentioned that nationalism and, and principle of nationalism is the principle of, uh, w- making the political borders to coincide with ethnic and cultural borders.

   10. LFLex Fridman1:32:02

       Hmm.

   11. SPSerhii Plokhy1:32:03

       And that's, that's how the maps of, of, uh, m- many East European countries had been drawn in the 19th and 20th century. On that, on that principle, uh, Donbas, where the majority constituted, uh, by the beginning of the 20th century were Ukrainians, was considered to be Ukrainian, and was claimed in the middle... in, in the middle of this revolution, and revolutionary wars and civil wars by, uh, Ukrainian government.

   12. LFLex Fridman1:32:35

       Mm-hmm.

   13. SPSerhii Plokhy1:32:36

       But Donbas became a site, one of the key sites in the Russian emp- empire of early industrialization. And it's... with its mining industry, with its metallurgical industry. So what that meant was that people from other parts of, not Ukraine, but other parts of the Russian empire congregated there. That's, that's where jobs were.

   14. LFLex Fridman1:32:58

       Right.

   15. SPSerhii Plokhy1:32:58

       That's how Khrushchev and his family came, came to Donbas. The family of Brezhnev overshoot a little bit, they got to the industrial enterprises in, in, in the city of, uh, uh, Kamenske, near, near, uh, Dnipro, the, the place... the city that was called Dnipropetrovsk. So those were Russian peasants moving into the area in, in, uh, looking for, for their, for their job. And, um, by the... the, the, the population became quite mixed. Ukrainians still constituted the majority of the population, but not necessarily in the towns and in the cities. And culturally, the place was becoming more and more Russian as the result of that, of that moment. So, uh, apart from the Crimea, uh, Donbas was the part of Ukraine where the ethnic Russians were, uh, the, mm-mm, th- the biggest group. They were not the majority, but they were very, very big and significant group. For example, in the city of Mariupol, that was all but destroyed in the course of the last, of the last two years, um, the, uh, ethnic Russians constituted, uh, over 40% of the population, right? So th- m- that's not exactly part of Donbas, but that gives you... that, that, that gives you general idea. Now, the story of Donbas, uh, and what happened now is, is multidimensional, and this ethnic composition is just one part of the story. Another very important part of the story is, uh, uh, economy. And, uh, um Donbas is a classical rust belt, and we know what happens with the cities that were part of the first or second wave of industrialization in the United States and globally. We know about social problems that exist in those places. So Donbas is probably the most dramatic and tragic case of implosion of the rust belt, with the mines not anymore producing the sort of the... uh, and at the acceptable price, the coal that they used to produce, with people loo- uh, losing jobs, with the politicians looking for subsidies as opposed to trying very unpopular, unpopular measures of, uh, m- dealing something and, and bring, bring new money and new investment into the region. So all of that, all of that become part, uh, of, of the story that made, made it easy for, uh, Russia, for the Russian Federation, to destabilize the situation. Um, we have interviews with Mr. Girkin, who is saying that he was the first to pull the trigger and, and fire the shot in, in that war. He became the Minister of Defense in the, in the, uh, Donetsk People's Republic. You look at the prime minister, m- he is another person with, uh, a Moscow residency permit. Um, mm- um, so m- you, you see key figures in th- in those positions, uh, at the start and the beginning, not being, uh, Russians from Ukraine, but being, be- being Russians from Russia and Russians, Russians from Moscow closely connected to the, to the government structure and intelligence structure and so on. So that is, that is the start and the beginning, but, uh, the, the way how, how it exploded, the way it did was also a combination of, of the economic and, and ethno-cultural, and, and linguistic factors.

   16. LFLex Fridman1:36:42

       So for Putin, the war in Donbas, and even in 2022, is a defensive war against what the Ukrainian government is doing against ethnically Russian people of Donbas. Is that fair to say, how he describes it?

   17. SPSerhii Plokhy1:36:58

       The... what, what, uh, we see the- this is certain- this is certainly the argument. Right? Th- this is certainly the argument, and, um, a pretext, uh, because what, uh, we see there is that there would be no... and, and there was no independent mobilization in Crimea either, in Crimea or in Donbas, without Russian presence. Uh, w- without Russian occupation de facto of the Crimea, there would be no... and, and there was no before, uh, uh, m- m- at least in the previous five to six years, any mass mobilizations of Russians. There was none of such mobilizations in, in Donbas before, before Girkin and other people with military... w- w- with, with, um, parts of military units showed up there. So it is, it is, uh, m- it is an excuse.... you, you've been to Ukraine.

   18. LFLex Fridman1:37:57

       Mm-hmm.

   19. SPSerhii Plokhy1:37:59

       Y- you know that, uh, Russian language is not, uh, persecuted in Ukraine. And, um, if you've not been to Donbas, it would be diff- or to the Crimea, it would be difficult to find one single Ukrainian school. Not that they didn't exist at all, but it would take quite an effort-

   20. LFLex Fridman1:38:18

       Mm-hmm.

   21. SPSerhii Plokhy1:38:18

       ... for you to find it. Or sometimes even to hear Ukrainian language outside, either of the institutions or, or the, or the, uh, farmer's market. So, um, that's, that's, that's the reality. That, that's the reality that is clear, that is visible. So, uh, imagine, uh, under those conditions and contexts that someone is, is, uh, persecuting, um, uh, ethnic Russians or Russian speakers, um, w- want to believe in something like that. Uh, one important precondition is never to, uh, step, step your foot in Ukraine.

   22. LFLex Fridman1:38:57

       I should mention, maybe this is a good moment to mention. When I traveled to Ukraine, this is after the start of the war, I... You mentioned farmer's market, which is funny. Basically, every single person I talked to, uh, including the leadership, we spoke in Russian. For many of them, Russian is the more comfortable language even. Uh, and the people who spoke Ukrainian are more on the west s- uh, western side of Ukraine. And, you know, young people there kind of want to show that, um, in an activist way, that they want to fight for the independence of their country. So, I take your point. I wonder if you wanna comment about language, and maybe about the future of language in Ukraine. Is, is the future of language going to stabilize on Ukrainian? Or is it going to return to its traditional base of Russian language?

   23. SPSerhii Plokhy1:39:59

       Very roughly, before the start of the war in 2014, we can talk about parity between Russian and Ukrainian, and also with, as you said, clearly Ukraine being a dominant language in the West, and Russian being, being a dominant language, uh, on the streets certainly in the, in the east of the country. Um, m- and, um, then in between of that, two poles, a number of these transitional areas. And, um, Ukraine, uh, i- in my experience, and I, I visited a lot of countries, not all of them and probably may be, may be I will be still surprised. But in my experience, this is the only truly bilingual country that I ever visited. I lived in Canada for a long period of time. The risk went back in the rest.

   24. LFLex Fridman1:40:53

       Mm-hmm.

   25. SPSerhii Plokhy1:40:53

       And, and, and, and, um, in Ukraine, you, you can talk in either Russian or Ukrainian in any part of the, of the country, and you would be understood, and you would be, um, responded in, in a different language with the expectation that you would, would understand. And if you, if you don't understand, that means you don't come from Ukraine. That's the reality. The war and loss of the Crimea and, uh, partial loss of Donbas, of its ma- major, uh, major industrial, industrial areas really shifted the balance toward, uh, mostly Ukrainian-speaking, uh, re- regions, uh, regions. And, um, also, uh, what you see and you, you clearly pointed to that, starting with 2014, even e- little bit earlier, the younger generation chooses, chooses Ukrainian as, as a marker of its identity. And that started in 2014, but we, we have a dramatic, dramatic shift after 2022. And on the, um, um, anecdotal, anecdotal level, I can tell you that I, I would speak to people who, uh, be in, in, in Chernihiv at the time, this is, uh, east of, of Crimea, at the time of, of the Russian aggression and bombardment and so on and so forth, who had passive knowledge of Ukrainian, but spoke all their, all their life Russian. And they would speak Ukrainian to me and, uh, when I say, "Okay, why are you doing that? We, we know each other for, for decades and you used Russian." And he said, "Well, I don't want to have anything in common with people who did that to us." So, there is th- there is a big, big push, of course, with this, with this current war. Now, the question is whether this change is, is something that will stay or not, what is, what is the future? Linguistic practices are very, very conservative ones. And, uh, we at the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute have a, um, um, project called MAPA: Digital Atlas of Ukraine, and we were, um, documenting and mapping, um, different data in time. And what we noticed a spike in the people self-reporting of use of Ukrainian in 2014 and 2015 at the time of the start of the war when the, the, the, the threat was the most clear one. Uh, this is self-reporting.

   26. LFLex Fridman1:43:28

       Mm-hmm.

   27. SPSerhii Plokhy1:43:29

       That doesn't mean that people exactly do what, what, the, what, uh, but they believe that that's what, that they are supposed to do. And then return back to, to where it was by the, uh, 2016 and 2017. So, this, th- this dynamic can, can repeat itself. But given, given the- how long the war is going on, how big the impact is, how big the stress is, and that the, the wave, the wave of the future is probably associated with younger people who are switching to Ukrainian. So, I would, I would, uh, uh, m- my bet would be on, on, on, uh, Ukrainian language rising in prominence.

   28. LFLex Fridman1:44:11

       So, as we get closer to February of 2022...... there's a few other key moments. Maybe let's talk about in July 2021, uh, Putin publishing an essay titled On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians. Can you describe the ideas expressed in this essay?

   29. SPSerhii Plokhy1:44:34

       The idea is, is very conveniently presented already in the first paragraph, in the first sentences really of the article, where, uh, Putin says that, "For a long time I was saying that Russians and Ukrainians were one and the same people, and here is the proof." This is, this is the, the, the, the, the historical... He- he develops his historical argumentation apparently with the help of, of, of, of, of a lot of people around him. And, um, he started to talk about Russians and Ukrainians being one and the same people one year before the start of the war in 2014. So in 2013, he was together with Patriarch Kirill on visit to Kiev, and there was a conference specifically organized for him in the Kevin Caves Monastery, and that's, that's where he, he stated that. The- the- the fact that he was with Patriarch Kirill is, is very important, mm- mm, factor for understanding where the idea is coming from. Mm, this is the idea that was dominant in the Russian Empire of the 19ths and the beginning of the 20th Century that Russians, Ukrainians, and Belarusians are really Russian... Great Russians, Little Russians, and White Russians, and that they constitute one, one people. Well, yes, there are some dialectical differences. Yes, uh, Ukrainians sing well, yes, they- they- they dance funny, but overall, that's- that's- that- that doesn't matter. And, mm, the- that idea actually was, mm-mmm, um, really destroyed, mostly destroyed by the, uh, revolution of 1917 'cause it wasn't just social revolution. That's how it is understood in- in- in- in US and good part of the world. It was also national revolution. It was an empire. It was a revolution in the- in the Russian Empire. And, um, mm, to bring these pieces of empire back within the Soviet Union, the Bolsheviks had to make concessions. One of those concessions was to re- recognition of the existence of Ukrainians as a separate nation, Belarusians as a separate nations, Russians as separate nations, endowing them with their own territorial, um, m- maybe with borders, with institutions, and so on and so forth. But, there was one institution that was not reformed. That institution was called the Russian Orthodox Church because one of the ways that Bolsheviks dealt with it, they couldn't eradicate religion completely, but they arrested the development of the, of- of- of the religion, and thinking, and- and- and- and theology, uh, on the level as it existed before the revolution of 1917. So the, uh, Russian Orthodox Church of 1917 continued to be the Russian Orthodox Church in 19... in 1991, and in 2013, continuing the same imperial mantra of the existence of one big Russian nation, one unified people. And when you see the formation of, of the ideas about, about nations, about foreign policy in the Russian Empire after 1991, they're going back to the pre- pre-Bolshevik times. Ukrainians do that, uh, as well. Estonians do that as well. The difference is that when Ukrainians go back, they go back to the pre-1917, their- their intellectual fathers and- and writings of basically liberal nationalism. Or sometimes they go to the radical nationalism of Bandera, which would be, which would be not pre-1917, but pre-1945. When the Russians go to pre-Bolshevik past looking for the ideas, looking for inspiration, looking for the narratives, what they find there is empire. What they find there are imperial projects. And, and that's- that's- that's, uh, certainly the story of the, of the Putin's claim. That's the story of the argument, and to- to conclude, the argument that he lays out there, historical argument, comes also almost directly from the narratives of the late-19ths and the beginning of the 20th Century. So it's not only the argument is coming from that era, but also the argumentation is, is coming from that era as well.

Episode duration: 3:19:59