Putin and the Presidents: William Taylor (interview) | FRONTLINE

I'm going to take you way back to the early days but before I do I want to just start with something that's a little bit more recent which is the moment when President Biden is briefed that it looks like an invasion of Ukraine is serious and the intelligence agencies are saying that this is going to happen or it's very very likely that it's going to happen what are the stakes at that moment how important a moment is that for President Biden for the United States for the world so I think that was a key moment um as you say that briefing probably was more definitive than President Biden had heard certainly then the rest of the world had heard before um and when he was briefed that this could happen soon so now we're probably talking about you know January or even December of last year January of 2022 when it was clearer and clearer to our intelligence agencies that that the capability was there the Russian capability to invade Ukraine was there and the key question is always intent the key question is he's got the capability will he do it and and in order to answer that question uh one has to then the intelligence Community tries to get in the head of the of the one person that it depends on and that's Vladimir Putin so when President Biden is getting this briefing several days probably weeks before it actually happened on the 24th of February when the intelligence Community was sure and surer more and more certain that this could really happen President Biden had to think through all that he knew about both Russia but in particular about Ukraine and President Biden as we know knew a lot about Ukraine as vice president he had been to Ukraine many times he knew the personalities he knew the politics and the important part there is I think President Biden understood in ways that many people didn't the importance of Ukrainian Independence he knew the history that Ukraine had been under the thumb of of Russia for 300 years and for the past 30 years it was independent it was free and and and he saw President Biden saw on every visit how important that was to ukrainians so he he understood better than most the significance of the threat that President Putin posed to an independent Ukraine so that uh that briefing undoubtedly troubled him a lot because he knew the importance of Ukraine as well or better than most and he then launches a furious period of trying to convince Putin not to do it there's video conferences phone calls shuttle diplomacy there are public warnings there is rallying there's releasing intelligence yet it doesn't dissuade Vladimir Putin what was Biden trying to do and why did it not work well you know at one point actually it seemed to work one point in the spring of 2021 there was this build up this initial build up of Russian forces around Ukraine which caused a lot of concern on the part of the United States government and under part of the Ukrainian government and part of European governments and President Biden surprised a lot of people by placing a phone call to President Putin again this is the spring of 2021 there was a threat not as big as the subsequent threat that we now focus on but this phone call that President Biden put in had three components had three messages first message was back off of Ukraine do not invade Ukraine stop the threat to Ukraine that is posed by your forces Mr Putin the second message and again we remember that this was shortly after President Biden was in office I mean so this was I think this was in like March he's been inaugurated in in January so he hadn't been in office more than a couple of months so so for him to call Putin and tell him back off of Ukraine and to tell President Putin that the United States is going to put sanctions on you for what you did during the election in our our election uh and and those sanctions are coming President Biden told President Putin in this phone call the third thing he said was and I'm willing to meet you I'm willing to have a meeting a summit to talk these things through so he had both threatened is too strong but had warned President Putin not to invade he had told President Putin he was going to put sanctions on and it turns out two days later after that phone call sure enough those sanctions were imposed announced and imposed and then he also said but I'm willing to talk so President Biden did go out of his way he got some criticism for this he got some criticism for talking to President Putin but in particular for offering to sit down and talk with him person to person face to face but he did it anyway President Biden and and it turned out interestingly that President Putin did to some degree backed out from Ukraine we should be clear he didn't pull all those forces back from around the borders of Ukraine but he did pull a lot of the soldiers those Russian soldiers back off of that equipment he left a lot of the equipment on the border of with Ukraine but he pulled a lot of the soldiers back so that was less of a threat it was a it was a backdown in some real sense and as we remember they did have that meeting in Geneva uh didn't go particularly well but didn't go terribly they agreed to a couple of interesting things they agreed the President Biden President Putin agreed in Geneva in about this must have been about June now of 2021 they agreed to have their experts get together and talk about an issue that was important is important to both countries and that strategic stability and so these are the so-called strategic stability talks and strategic stability is what the experts refer to how the experts refer to discussions about nuclear arms control it's broader than just nuclear arms because it includes some of these new weapons it includes you know cyber includes uh hypersonics it recognizes that there are other things going on in the world that affects strategic stability like the rise of China for example so these strategic stability talks are are broader than just nuclear arms control but they focus on nuclear arms control there's no no doubt about it and the two presidents agreed to have their experts sit down and do that and it turns out over the next about six months so last fall year ago the Russian and American experts did get together I think three times and had these conversations about nuclear arms control there's an issue there that is important for the United States important for Russia important for the rest of the world indeed that is the new start treaty which President Biden extended as soon as he was in office expires in five years and so the question for the Russians and the Americans and the Strategic stability expert Community is what happens after the new start treaty expires is there something to follow on is there something to expand is there something to continue do the Chinese play these questions are really important ones for the big issues of nuclear stability strategic stability and so at that meeting in Geneva prompted by President Biden's phone call that got President Putin to pull back from Ukraine warned him about the sanctions but also agreed to talk these strategic stability talks got underway so there was some hope that the conversation that the attempt by President Biden to deal with President Putin could lead to some kind of results all that said later on in the fall so a year ago now so in the fall of 2021 sure enough these Russian forces start moving back toward Ukraine's borders not just the eastern border but no the all three borders the Ukraine border with Belarus grain border with Russia grain border with occupied Crimea even the Ukraine border with Russian forces that are still in Moldova in Ukraine's Southwest so these forces started the Menace Ukraine again even while these other conversations were going on this is all to say that there was some progress in attempting to Defuse The Situation early that gave some reason to think that this could happen so going back to your question about the briefing um that hope that had been generated by some series of conversations about other things when President Biden heard from his intelligence community that there was a strong likelihood of an invasion of Ukraine must have come as a disappointment um surprise is probably not it probably not surprised because he had seen the build up but he had gone out of his way you mentioned other phone calls there was another phone call that President Biden put in to President Putin in what December of 2021 in order to lay out in some detail what would happen if President Putin followed through on what the intelligence Community was telling the President Biden that Russia was going to do and President Biden laid out for President Putin in some specificity the kinds of sanctions that he would put on he what he told the world was these sanctions are going to be unlike anything you've ever seen they'll be harsher than any sanctions that have been put on any other Nation and I'm sure he told President Putin more detail than that exactly what to expect so he President Biden had gone to some length both in the previous spring and in the winter and even into January to try to convince President Putin that it wasn't worth it President Biden knew the importance of Ukraine he went to Great Lengths to try to deter President Putin from the invasion in the end we know that failed and on February 24th Vladimir Putin comes out and he gives a speech and one of the remarkable things looking back at that speech which is sometimes called the Empire of live speech is that the first I don't know the first third first half is about the United States and he's invading Ukraine he's announcing a war that he calls a special military operation and yet his speech is about the United States what does that reveal so President Putin thinks that the United States is behind all his problems is the cause of all his problems so President Putin thinks apparently that the United States sponsored Ukrainian Independence Ukrainian opposition to Russia he goes back to 2014 when the pro-russian Ukrainian president Victor Yanukovych decides to crack down on innocent protesters peaceful protesters and try to clear the streets of cave of these protesters and that generated what we now know as the revolution of dignity Euro maidan in Ukraine this was this great outpouring of Ukrainian outrage at the insult of their dignity represented by their president Victor Yanukovych being so beholden to Putin and the Ukrainian people ran this President out of the country and President Putin was sure that the Americans were behind that he didn't give President Putin didn't give the credit to the Ukrainian people he didn't think the Ukrainian people would do that this is a common this is going to be a common theme of of Putin's misunderstanding colossal misunderstanding of Ukraine of Ukrainian people of Ukrainian history of Ukrainian determination to maintain their independence from Russia President Putin doesn't get that still doesn't get that and and that has manifest in this horrible War that he is convinced the Americans have put the ukrainians up to because the ukrainians and President Putin's mind not really a country not really a nation not really a people they're really just part of Russia they're little Russians and if it weren't for the Americans then they would be part of Russia I mean somebody told us in a way that's a war against the United States that Ukraine he doesn't see as a real country and his real enemy here is the United States do you think that's overstating President Putin wants to make the case to the Russian people that this war as you say special military operation is really against the West it's really against the Americans against NATO it's against the West that Russia is Under Siege from these Western forces these liberal forces these anti-family forces these President Putin wants to make the case it's not just against Ukraine it's against this broader cultural historical wrong that the that the Americans and others have have foisted on on Ukraine and and indeed are is affecting Russia so that allows him to say to the Russian people we need to reabsorb Ukraine we need to pull Ukraine back into the fold where they really want to be anyway so this shouldn't be hard he will say we need to we need the ukrainians are straying from the motherland and they're being pulled away from the Russian motherland by the Americans and so we need to take military action President Putin has convinced himself and is trying to convince the Russians so far unsuccessfully that this military action is necessary in order to confront that battle and front that battle with the west and and Ukraine's key to that battle so let's go back for a second to that period when the Soviet Union is falling apart and these countries Ukraine Georgia the quote-unquote near abroad are going out on their own was that a syring experience for Vladimir Putin How did he see that the collapse of the Soviet Union and in particular these countries going out and becoming independent so he famously said that the dissolution of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the previous century we can think of some pretty bad geopolitical catastrophes in the previous Century but but he would pick out the fall of the Soviet Union for that category so he sees that as an injustice indeed as an insult as we know he was in Germany at the time he saw the threats to Soviet officials again as an insult to the great Soviet and he would say now Russian Empire so he saw this as a catastrophe and he's making it clear that he wants to reassemble that he wants to be start to bring those Nations back starting with Ukraine but really with the attempt in smaller ways in other countries earlier on you you mentioned Georgia um where he invaded in 2008 he got the Georgians um to take the bait to be provoked if you will um and then Putin took advantage of that of that uh that provocation to invade Georgia and that was in 2008 a couple of months after Ukraine and Georgia applied to Nato for membership and this must have horrified President Putin there's one thing to have the Soviet Union dissolve and these 15 Nations that were part of the Soviet Union to emerge as independent nations going their own way President Putin liked to think that they were be going their own way but they would be going in concert with Russia Russia would maintain some leadership role well that didn't happen the Georgians did not want to see the Russians in her leadership role the ukrainians didn't want to see Russians and leaders they wanted to be independent and when Georgia and Ukraine in 2008 applied to Nato at a NATO Summit in Bucharest Romania that was a threat to President Putin that he couldn't abide unfortunately in my view NATO said no to both Georgia and Ukraine at that time said no you can't start the process of joining NATO there's something called a membership action plan that the Georgians and ukrainians had proposed to the to the NATO leaders to to start the process toward membership and in particular the Europeans said no President Bush was in favor and the US government was in favor of saying yes to Ukraine and Georgia to begin the process of joining NATO President Bush in particular wanted to be able to make a convincing case to his European leader colleagues when he got to Bucharest that Ukraine was worthy of membership Ukraine wanted membership Ukraine would do what was necessary to join the alliance in and would bring capabilities to the alliance that would make the alliance stronger so President Bush on his way to the summit visited cave I was there at the time anytime a president visits the country where you're the Ambassador it's a big deal it is a big deal and for President Bush and his whole Entourage to landed cave to sit down with the president sit down with all the leaders just sit down with the military sit down with civilians Civil Society a big part of Ukrainian culture and sit down and talk to ukrainians about their future and about what they wanted in terms of their independence in particular from Russia and the way the ukrainians thought they could keep that Independence that's security that sovereignty was by joining NATO they made that case to President Bush President Bush was there to hear that case he went on to Bucharest to the summit where he tried to make that case on on Ukrainian behalf and Georgia and again several of the European nations said no some of the Western European nations said you know there were as you would imagine some nations in Eastern Europe there were already members of NATO who were strongly supportive of Ukraine joining because that would make them more secure so this was uh this was something that President Putin was horrified and he invaded Georgia a couple of months later and a couple of years later he invaded Ukraine we will have you eventually but without a commitment what did you think of that at the time what do you think of that now so at the time I thought it was a compromise that at least gave a nod to the ukrainians and the Georgians aspirations to join NATO it was probably the best that uh that President Bush and other East European leaders could have gotten out of the West European leaders and the language was basically we're not giving you this membership action plan approval today but you will be in NATO they didn't say when they didn't see they didn't say how this exactly would happen but they made the statement that Ukraine and Georgia will be in NATO now at the time as I say sounded like a compromise sound like the best you could get it was a it was a little bit of a kind of throwaway to just to make it clear that there was a respect for Ukraine and Georgia and their desires however the ukrainians didn't forget that ukrainians remembered that promise but also President Putin remembered that promise President Putin heard that and again for Ukraine and Georgia to join NATO would mean that his plan to reabsorb Ukraine and Georgia would fail would be impossible if Ukraine were in NATO then President Putin could not reabsorb Ukraine into a revised an expanded Russian Empire it couldn't Ukraine would be able to defend itself with all the support of the other NATO Nations so President Putin listened he heard that promise and he worried about it the ukrainians heard that promise and they kept that hope alive but they've made Putin worried and they haven't given a guarantee as you say it's only months later that he invades Georgia I mean so in that sense was it a mistake to not go one way or the other on NATO I think it was a mistake I think that decision in Bucharest uh by the NATO heads of state and again NATO is a consensus organization you have to have everybody agree to a big decision big policy changes or a big policy decision so if there were a couple of Nations as there were Western European nations who said no then that meant that the NATO Summit could not invite Ukraine and Georgia to start the process and I I think that was a mistake fact is I I would say we'll never know this but if the decision had been to start the the process of joining NATO Putin was not in the position at that time he wasn't strong enough at that time to do what he is now doing in terms of the invasion of Ukraine and we wouldn't be fighting today my bet is the ukrainians wouldn't be fighting with our support against the Russian army had they been offered the membership action plan um in in 2008. so what what Putin learned in his invasion of Georgia in August of 2008 so a couple months after the Bucharest Summit his military was not in very good shape he had to struggle against Georgia so Georgia probably has five million people Russia has 140 million people Ukraine has 40 million people so Ukraine is much much larger than Georgia Russia is much much larger than either Ukraine or Georgia and his military had a struggle in Georgia they eventually pulled back they didn't go all the way to tbliese they eventually occupied 20 percent of Georgian territory where they still are they continued to occupy abkazia and North assetia that are part of Georgia uh but he President Putin realized that his military was not in good shape and that prompted an enormous military buildup on the part of the Russians he said we are going we need to have a strong military it if we are going to have to use military force to bring the Georgians or eventually the ukrainians back into the Empire we're going to need a bigger stronger military and so he spent a lot of money many rubles um on that on that military says we stand by our friends yet he goes into Georgia and what happens was it a test of America so the response to the Russian invasion of Georgia in 2008 August 2008 was outrage the Europeans were outraged French president got involved in some of the discussions the United States put some sanctions uh on the Georgians this is in 2008 United States made some show of force in terms of Naval presence in the Black Sea and of humanitarian supplies being flown in to Georgia in support of the Georgians but it was not the response that would have sent the message to President Putin that the West Was going to do anything really serious about his invasion and as we know uh there was an election in 2008 the United States President Obama came into office we remember now looking back on what we now see as probably a mistake that President Obama decided he was going to have a reset with President Putin and Russia that these arguments even about such a thing as Georgian sovereignty were something that you know we could Overlook in some in some sense and this reset to which credit got a couple of good things done there were some agreements with the Russians that probably would not have been possible without a reset the Russians agreed to allow supplies military supplies to go into Afghanistan which of course we needed the United States needed we were having some difficulty over land supplies to Afghanistan through Pakistan so the reset had a couple of successes however it didn't address the real problem and the real problem that we probably should have seen was President Putin's determination to dominate those Nations now independent that used to be part of the Soviet Union in particular Ukraine Ukraine was always the the jewel in the crown for for President Putin and when the United States pushed back a little bit after the invasion of Georgia but then with the new Administration decided to proceed with a reset that suggested to President Putin that she didn't have to worry that much about the American reaction that he could do what he eventually did in in 2014 was invade his neighbor he invaded Crimea in 2014 and again at that point not a big reaction he went further invaded dombas a little bit later in 2014. that started to prompt some real concerns which then built up because by that time based on that that action the United States took seriously the fact that President Putin is ready to overturn a rules-based order that had kept the piece for so long by invading its neighbor so that Invasion made it crystal clear where President Putin was going let me ask one last question about the NATO expansion because I know you were an advocate of it you were the Ambassador from Ukraine but it was controversial inside the administration looking back on it what was that debate like what were the warnings why did you feel the way you did the debate about admitting Georgia and Ukraine within the administration was was a lively one as I say uh President Bush was clear that he supported it his Security Council his secretary so Connie rice Steve Hadley the Pentagon strong supporters of this there were other voices though you're exactly right um that said in both within the administration but more outside of the administration that this is going to be intolerable for President Putin and that if we wanted to try to get things done we want to have relationship we want to have arms control treatment we've got other kinds of interactions with the Russians then we we should be careful not to provoke but the debate about Georgia and Ukraine President Bush was very clear about the importance of sovereignty and the importance of Ukraine for NATO security and thus for United States security we talked earlier about how later President Biden would have gone through the same thought process of the importance of Ukraine so when when the discussion in 2008 about admitting Georgia and Ukraine the government was United the government was United that despite concerns some voices from Moscow both from the embassy and other places that the Russians would not be happy nonetheless President Bush moved forward on this attempt my one question on the Bush Administration is it starts out and as it's known Bush says he looks into Putin's eyes and he sees its soul and we know that Putin calls Bush after 9 11 and offers to help after a rock happens after the Kola revolutions happen by the time you get to 2007 there's this famous speech in Munich which sounds so much like the speech that he gives in February 24th of this year what happened to those early hopes or whatever they were between those two time periods there always is I hope an interest they're probably find a rationale for trying to have better relations with the Russians if if possible and so as you say one president looks into the eyes finds a soul another president goes for a reset nonetheless as you say President Putin was pretty clear in Munich in 2007. his actions in 2008 both at that Summit and with the invasion of Georgia so at that NATO Summit in Bucharest in the spring of 2008 where the ukrainians and Georgians applied for membership President Putin visited he was a guest at one part of that Summit and he famously leaned over to President Bush at that Summit and said George you know Ukraine's not really a country that was clear to President Bush it was clear to the administration what President Putin really thought about Ukraine that was one of the reasons that President Bush felt strongly about Ukraine in in NATO and so that was in the spring of 2008 and then we know what happened in August of 2008 with the invasion of Georgia and then we know what happened in 2014. so you're right there were signals there were indications from President Putin of his anger at maybe even humiliation his conviction that the dissolution of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the previous century this all came out it came out in 2007 came out in action since 2008 it reinforced itself of course in 2014 and you're right it was the driver in in February of of this year of 2022 where he in an angry speech before invading Ukraine made it clear his views about Ukraine same views it expressed to President Bush in 2008 when he leaned over and said it's not a real country he had no respect for the sovereignty of the Ukrainian people so you're right we should have seen it earlier and it was it was at that time in the 2007-2008 time frame that it was clear if we wanted to see it maybe we didn't want to see it but if we it was clear if we had wanted to see it the direction that President Putin was going why didn't we take it more seriously I mean we've talked to people who are there in Munich and the reaction was shocked startled like one of those I remember where I was when it happened moments it was shocking but did we take it seriously did we take Russia seriously not seriously enough we didn't take Russia seriously enough at that time this was a surprise it was a shock I was not in Munich but I read the same same accounts and to hear from President Putin this belligerent statements about where he intended to go and and how he felt aggrieved by the treatment of of of Russia how aggrieved he was that the West had treated Russia so badly and disrespected this great nation of his and that anger and the intention of moving in the direction that he did and we didn't want to see it and again we were in where there was a political process here of course and there was an election and the new Administration as you've pointed out like other administrations wants to see if maybe they can do it better maybe maybe it's possible to get along um with with Russia turned out not so the Obama Administration comes in they do the reset which we've talked about and there's also a public side of how Barack Obama talks about Russia as a regional power he famously said to Mitt Romney the 1980 called they want their foreign policy back what's represented in those comments about how President Obama was dealing with Russia so President Obama's comment that Russia was a problem but not a big problem not it's a regional power it's not a superpower it has nuclear weapons he of course acknowledged but it had nothing really Russia had nothing really else going for it didn't have a political model an economic model it didn't uh have uh any soft power that would attract other nations to to Ally with it and President Obama like other presidents saw Asia as a problem that needed attention and so he didn't focus on on Russia as he probably should have um and it was clear by 2014 the problem that the world had with President Putin President Putin invaded his neighbor in 2014. first time since World War II that one nation in Europe had invaded another and tried to change borders a just a direct violation of the principles that had kept the peace to a great extent certainly among big powers in Europe and President Putin violated all of those and and president Obama belatedly recognized the problem but at that time there's a lot of confusion about what's going on I don't know what was known by the intelligence agencies but at the time there's a lot of confusion about the little green men and what exactly is going on and how are we going to respond to this did that complicate the response there's a moment that we've heard that Putin liked to Obama who'd been told these were Russian soldiers and he said you've got your guys in Crimea and Putin just lied to you did that complicate the situation of course it did and and that Invasion uh sending these little green men sending these Russian soldiers without insignia into a neighboring country into Crimea was such a shock and again this hadn't happened since World War II so it was such a shock the ukrainians were not in a position to expel these Russian soldiers they were not in a position to use Force of Arms of their of their military to defend Crimea from this invasion president janakovich the the kind of Russia leaning president of Ukraine at that time had allowed the Ukrainian Army to deteriorate to be hollowed out to be corrupted and was unable to to mount any kind of a defense and again he was run out of the country but even the new president president poroshenko when he came into office was not able militarily at that time to push the Russians out of Crimea or dambas at that time and the suddenness with which the the the shock of the invasion of Crimea meant that the West was not prepared the West had not made contingency plans for this so the Obama administration had to make it up on the Fly and they knew they had to press back they knew they had to resist and they began that process in 2014 it took some time to build up the ability and the support from Europeans as well as in the United States to mount a a pressure campaign sanctions new weapons new support for the Ukrainian military that would eventually allow them the Ukrainian military to begin the defense to get to begin to push the Russians back out of their country but that took time it was it was slow in starting the Obama Administration with President Vice President Biden to its credit began this effort to bring the Europeans on board you need to have a an international effort to impose sanctions on a nation individual just U.S Russian sanctions that's not going to work you need to have the Europeans you need to have the Japanese you need to have South Koreans the Australians you need to have the Canadians you need an international effort and two the Obama administration's credit they cranked up that effort it took however the Russians shooting down a civilian Airline the Malaysia airline that killed 298 civilians it took that Massacre it took that Russian action to kill most the Europeans over occupied russian-occupied territory for the Europeans to come on board with these sanctions but they did and they came on board with these sanctions in in a strong way Europeans responded the United States pushed hard the sanctions went into place and then were re-imposed re-upped if you will every six months on the part of the Europeans they had to unanimously agree to keep these sanctions in place every six months hard to do but the Europeans did it so it took some time the world was not ready for this Invasion the Europeans were not ready the Americans were not ready the ukrainians were not ready and it took time to develop the mechanisms the tools the weapons to push back and it gradually built and it did help to rebuild the Ukrainian Army but at the same time people have told us that one of the things Putin Learned was sanctions are a cut of doing business we can build up you know as he's going to be contemplating further action and at that time there's a debate inside the administration you're not in the administration but I think you are feeding into this debate about javelins about what kind of weapons are being provided what was that debate about what were you pushing for there was a debate within the Obama Administration about uh what kinds of weapons to provide to the ukrainians and there were a range of weapons that were being discussed the javelin anti-tank weapon shoulder file or individual Soldier fired was kind of the main issue was the highlighted issue but the uh the anti-aircraft Stingers were also part of this as you say I was not in the administration but two friends of mine former ambassadors to Nato and I were convinced that in order for the ukrainians to Prevail they needed these javelins and stingers and so we made it we made the case uh to the Obama Administration from the outside as former officials not current officials for these weapons there was a debate in within the Obama Administration and the concern was that if we provide these weapons somehow the Russians would be provoked and they might do things that we didn't want them to do was the argument from the Obama Administration I say the Obama Administration but it really was it was really opposed the provision of javelins was opposed at the top the state department when we went in to see officials at the state department we went in to see officials in the defense department we went in to see officials at the National Security Council and these officials supported the provision of javelins but they said the argument had not succeeded at the very top of the administration not just the president but but the very top officials National Security officials in the White House were not convinced that it was worth providing these jobs so the Obama Administration to the end of of that Administration did not provide javelins to the ukrainians we now know that then Vice President Biden says that he was advocating for javelins inside that Administration there was a pretty strong argument for it there was a very strong argument we thought and again it was this argument was shared by many on in the Congress by many in the state department defense department National Security Council apparently including Vice President Biden that these would be used these weapons would enable the ukrainians to push the Russians back and the the Russians had tanks and ukrainians had some tanks but not the same quality they had old tanks those Soviet tanks these weapons would enable the ukrainians to push the Russians back and so it was it was a strong debate it was a lively debate um uh in in the administration I remember having conversations with very senior officials where they asked us and they were a couple of people in the senior official's office having this conversation and they asked what do you think about javelins and we told them um and so and they kind of agreed but they couldn't bring the decision to the end he's talking about the military reality of the battlefield but what about the other part of it which is how Vladimir Putin perceives it and and how vadera Putin perceives what he can get away with because in our story we've had now the talk of Georgie Ukraine entering NATO he invades Georgia and practically blocks them from joining NATO now he's doing this in Ukraine what is he learning by this point what is he testing what is he concluding so Putin has seen that there is a wavering or a debate or uncertainty about how strong the United States should should push back against him when President Putin saw how the United States ended its involvement in Afghanistan under the Biden Administration President Putin probably thought that the United States was not willing to stand up to challenges on the international stage that that they might have in the in the in the past that is President Putin probably thought based on the withdrawal of Afghanistan from Afghanistan by the United States that that the U.S government and maybe even the American people didn't have the stomach to resist him and he may have thought that the withdrawal demonstrated that the Americans would not support their allies would not support Nations like Afghanistan maybe like Ukraine that the United States had indicated we're important allies we're important partners and President Putin could have taken that withdrawal as an indication that he could get away with something in Ukraine this may have encouraged him maybe emboldened him to make this faithful step that that he then took in February of 2022. there's one more president before we get to Biden that you experience firsthand and that's Donald Trump and when he's elected first how is Putin perceiving the election of Donald Trump and what it does to his relationship with America so it's a very good question I don't have any particular insights into what President Putin thought about President Trump we all know um the statements that President Trump made we all know the assertions that President Trump made that he could both deal with President Putin and indeed might even be friendly with President Putin he famously said why not have good relations with the Russians that's a good thing so President Putin probably thought that he would not encounter resistance to this effort that was clearly still in his mind from 2007 2000 the speech in Munich the the invasion of Georgia in 2008 the invasion of Ukraine in 2014 all that indicated where President Putin wanted to go he must have concluded that he would not get resistance from president Trump um to that plan to reabsorb First Ukraine and and then other nations that had become independent President Putin had the the domination of Ukraine in mind all along and he undoubtedly had conversations with President Trump about this goal and must have concluded that the Americans would not oppose this there are reports that Donald Trump would mirror some of the comments even about a creamy doesn't everybody speak Russian and Crimea that it's a corrupt country I mean was he mirroring a view of whether he even even knew it or not himself a view of Ukraine that was Vladimir Putin's president Trump did have this view of Ukraine that was not true to reality but that he heard from some of his own political advisors but he also heard it from Victor Orban in Hungary Victor Orban was in president Trump's office and told president Trump exactly the Putin line that is Ukraine not really a nation it's corrupt it it can't resist so president Trump had this in his mind his domestic advisors had told him some stories about how Ukraine had opposed him during his election in 2016. again totally incorrect uh but that was in president Trump's mind apparently so when secretary Pompeo asked me to go out to Ukraine in 2019. after he had pulled ambassador yovanovic out of Kiev she was our ambassador there and president Trump had indicated to secretary Pompeo that he wanted her out and secretary Pompeo too his credit resisted that for some time but in the end succumbed and pulled Ambassador Ivanovic out of Kiev and they wanted someone to go back out there because they needed the Americans the American Voice in this new Administration the new zelinski Administration and they needed someone to kind of steady the the embassy that had been rocked by this withdrawal of a of a of a great Ambassador for no reason that that the embassy could understand secretary Pompeo asked me to go out and and and be the acting Ambassador after Ambassador Ivanovich when he asked me that I told him I was probably not inclined to say yes um and he asked me why and I said Mr secretary your boss does not like Ukraine and I expected that to kind of end the interview it didn't secretary Pompeo said you know Bill you're right he doesn't like Ukraine but it's my job as Secretary of State to change that and I said the reason I'm not inclined to accept your request to go out to cave is that since your boss does not like Ukraine the strong support for Ukraine which had characterized every Administration since Ukrainian Independence but in particular during the time from 2014 to 2019 when the Russians had invaded that strong support was bipartisan was Administration after Administration the strong support for Ukraine was there was was established was supported by the Congress by the state department by the defense department but was not supported by the president and so I said I was worried the reason I was not inclined to go out there because I thought the president might change that support might reduce that by change the policy of strong support and in which case I was not the person they wanted out there I would not do it in that case so so secretary Pompeo said I will change his mind and I believe Secretary of Pompeo thought he could do that and he took a couple of steps that indicated that he would be able to do that he got president Trump to sign a letter to the newly inaugurated Ukrainian president which president Trump had refused to do earlier and so I took that as a reason to indicate that that the secretary Pompeo could indeed turn president Trump around and that what he would continue to support Ukraine and I agreed to go out there but I told them if that's support for Ukraine if that strong support for Ukraine changes because of President Trump or whatever for whatever reason I would have to resign and secretary Pompeo understood that and he endeavored I believe to keep that support for Ukraine going did you ever talk to Trump directly I didn't how big did you at that point see the stakes I mean now people talk about Ukraine as being in the front line of democracy and the world order and all of these things at that point how big did the stakes seem to be in Ukraine so for many of us who had studied and worked in Ukraine had had contributed to U.S policy toward that part of the world and to Ukraine in particular it was very important and as I say the the support for Ukraine since Independence since 1991 but in particular since 2014 had been bipartisan but it was more it was kind of a narrow bipartisanship there were Republicans and Democrats who cared about Ukraine like the other community uh the you know the diplomats and the think tankers and the policy Community um that recognized the importance of Ukraine for the reasons that you said that is how important it is to the rules-based order or for security of Europe because of its location because of its strategic value but that was it was not a broad understanding of of the importance of Ukraine um in in 2014 or even into 2019 um that understanding was clear to many of us but not clear as broadly as it is today today we understand that today we now see that Ukraine is a linchpin um in this order and that if the Russians are allowed to stay in Ukraine that that order that kept the peace and allowed for Prosperity over many many years after World War II the only way to re-establish that is is for the Russians to get out of Ukraine so people began to understand the importance of Ukraine for U.S policy and for International Security and and then reinforced by the atrocities that the Russians perpetrated in Ukraine the war crimes the just appealed to a broad much broader sense than just the policy community it appealed to people's Humanity it appealed it appealed to the humanitarian instincts not just of Americans but of of Europeans of people around the world to see what the Russians were doing to Ukraine so the combination of the understanding of the Strategic value the Strategic importance of Ukraine to International Security to European security to U.S security there was that but then there was the emotional response to support Ukraine as a democracy people who were willing to fight and and indeed die in incredible numbers for values that we hold dear values that we haven't had to fight for in a long time and the ukrainians were fighting for these so that emotional response has translated into a political support for Ukraine that is Broad that is deep that is shared by the Congress the administration but the more importantly by the American people and we we've seen how that has translated into unprecedented support for this country let's go back though to 2019 were the ukrainians nervous about the Trump presidency about the support that they were getting I mean they must be hearing the same things this is even before we'll ask you about the aid in a second but were they nervous about Donald Trump and the messages he'd be sending to Putin so the ukrainians were were uncertain the ukrainians were kind of confused so the ukrainians we're talking about here now is the government so we're talking about President zielinski and his administration and here they've been fighting in 2019 they've been fighting the Russians for five years in donbass they'd lost 14 000 ukrainians already in that fight so there's a serious fight between the Russians and Ukraine the Ukraine is defending their own territory from a Russian invasion and a new Administration comes into cave president zielinski um he knew and his team knew that in order to Prevail against the Russians to get the Russians out of their country they needed the United States and they knew that there was a president in Washington that was influential and that they needed to they needed the president of the United States to support them and so they tried to figure out a way to make their case to president Trump and so they were asked to do various things as we know president Trump asked them to pursue some investigations political investigations that the ukrainians didn't understand that they didn't want to understand that and they didn't understand what they were being asked to do or why the ukrainians knew they needed support from The Americans they needed Military Support they needed political support they needed financial support they needed support in the U.N they need support with Europe they needed the Americans and so when they got these odd requests to do some things unrelated to their political situation their their military situation they were uncertain confused uh by this and they didn't want to jeopardize this bipartisan support that they knew was important for them the bipartisan support in Washington for Ukraine was as valuable as any asset they had anywhere that was what they needed and they needed the president they needed the Congress they needed the American people they needed to have the support of the Americans so they went out of their way to try to figure out how to get that support and it was confusing let me just break down what happened there at first how important was the aid we've been told there was also a deadline involved with allocating the aid I mean how important was what was going to be held up how important was that Aid to Ukraine so it's very important as I say in 2019 the ukrainians had been fighting the Russians for five years by this time to the Trump administration's credit they had approved the provision of javelins which the Obama Administration never did so the Trump Administration finally agreed with the State Department of Defense department and the National Security Council and provided these weapons so the ukrainians were appreciative of this kind of support they knew that they needed that support to continue they knew that that this was uh was going to be important for for them to be able to succeed against the Russians again the the requests and the different signals coming from different parts of Washington confuse them I I've talked about the the regular channel and The Irregular channel the regular channel is the state department and the embassy and the defense department security and the policies put forward by the Congress and by the administration that's the regular that's how foreign policy is made and they heard that for me as the acting Ambassador out there they heard it from Ambassador Ivanovich my predecessor um they they knew the regular channel but they were hearing something else they were hearing from The Irregular Channel they were hearing from Rudy Giuliani and Rudy Giuliani was able to talk to the Ukrainian President's chief of staff and so the so the the ukrainians again were getting these mixed signals on the one hand in the regular channel there's this strong support for Ukraine bipartisan support in Washington weapons are coming others support training intelligence support this is coming in this regular channel which which is to support them against the Russians then they hear this other voice the other voices coming from outside the the regular channel and it was a confusion one and since some of the people in this regular channel were close to the president they the ukrainians felt like they had to at least listen to this they needed support from the American president how do you learn that Aid is being conditioned and what's your reaction when you learn that so the assistance the the military assistance that is now flowing the Congress has appropriated ever larger volumes ever more money for Ukrainian military assistance and it's flowing well in 2019. there was a normal meeting of the National Security Council staff which was other participants of course State Defense NSC Embassy normal agenda at the end of this meeting mid-july 2019 a person from The Office of Management and budget in the White House offices raised her hand and said I've Been Told that the security assistance to Ukraine should be put on hold now this was a shock this was an answer to your question about how did you hear about it no one could believe what they heard no one where I was in cave we were watching this on the screen from Washington could believe it no one in Washington who was there in person could believe it it was it was out of the blue it was not the result of any decision that anybody had heard of and so this caused Great confusion and this security assistance was coming to Ukraine when they were fighting the Russians so this was important for the ukrainians so we knew how important this decision was we knew how important it was for that for that security assistance to continue and when when this staffer from the from the Office of Management budget said that the chief of staff of the White House on orders of the president has said that this assistance has to be paused it was a shock we thought it must be a mistake we thought there must be it must be a garble someone was not understanding what they were actually saying or what they were actually doing so this led to a series of meetings at ever higher levels within the U.S government chaired by the National Security Council and again higher levels higher levels all the way up to the principal's meeting which means the Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense and the National Security adviser and the and the director of the CIA were in these meetings and there was consensus at every level up to that level of the principles that this assistance should be provided should not be paused should not be on hold where was this decision coming from and we never got an answer we we continued to believe out in cave that it was a mistake that it was a that someone just didn't understand how important this assistance was so that's where we were in July and August of of 2019. um in the end as we know in September 2019 a whistleblower finally came forward with an account of the phone call between President Trump and president zolinski back in July when President Trump asked president zielinski to do a political investigation that would help president Trump in his election campaign and that whistleblower opened up the discussion and opened up the issue to people like senators who were again very supportive of providing these weapons to the ukrainians and they got on the phone to president Trump and in the end president Trump allowed the assistance to go forward while it was a while it was on hold I was very concerned that the very thing that I said might happen had been did happen that is I was concerned that the strong support for Ukraine would be reversed changed by a decision from president Trump I was worried that that's what had happened and I told secretary Pompeo and I told National Security advisor John Bolton who was visiting cave that I would have to resign that I would have to come back to Washington I would have to quit because I couldn't go along with that change of strong support and in the end a week later whistleblower a week after that pressure on on President Trump and he allowed the assistance to go forward until the transcript was released so the transcript was not exactly right a transcript was fine of that July phone call between President Trump and president that transcript was released during that right the end of September during the United Nations General Assembly meetings and president zielinski finally had a meeting in New York not in the Oval Office as promised with President Trump and president Trump said I'm going to release the transcript to that uh of that phone call and that's when we all it was the first time that we all saw what what had been discussed in that in that phone call you read that transcript and what does it reveal that that part of the transcript and again uh this was what the Whistleblower had objected to that's what the Whistleblower had had blown the whistle on was when President Trump um when he was talking with President zielinski about these weapons indeed about javelins president zielinski had raised and had thanked president Trump for providing these javelins in this phone call and that allowed president Trump to say yes but we need you to do us a favor in the context of these weapons and the favor of course was to to do a political investigation of what would turn out to be president Trump's rival in the upcoming election so that's what the Whistleblower heard at the time in July but the world including the embassy in cave and myself didn't hear about that until the end of September I've been talking about democracy and about independence and all of these high ideal that Putin had been saying it's all just talk and Ukraine's not even a country and here in black and white is this description is Trump really just using it as a tool for a political end I mean what is the foreign policy impact of that what's the impact on the world fortunately the regular channel the establishment of U.S foreign policy that is created and executed by the state department by the defense department governed by laws passed by the Congress supported by the American people that foreign policy that regular channel prevailed in the end in the end it got a bad decision overturned a political decision overturned so in the end the ukrainians got the assistance the ukrainians did not succumb to that illegitimate request the ukrainians were reassured that the U.S system worked and they got the assistance they were able to move forward so it it shook a lot of people's confidence I'm sure it shook a lot of Ukrainian confidence but they were reassured in the end that that the U.S system was able to continue the strong support which is what they needed I mean they got the support but did America's moral Authority take a hit the ukrainians need the United States to support them other nations need the United States to support them as well and Nations other nations International actors evaluate U.S government daily all the time and constantly and they understand that things can go wrong they understand that there are decisions sometimes made by the United States or by individuals in the U.S government that are at odds with the thrust with the basic rightness of U.S policy and the basic support of for these nations Ukraine but not just Ukraine for European nations in NATO who count on U.S support if the Russians were to challenge them to invade them or to threaten them European nations Asian Nations look to the United States for support so they all recognized the importance of having a strong Ally in the United States and by and large they see the United States as a reliable Ally this probably caused some problems in in these nations capitals thinking about what's going on there what's going on but in the end the United States righted itself did the right thing provided the weapons continued to support Ukraine against the Russians and move forward at the start of the interview we went up to the February 24th to the speech that Putin makes it and he decides despite the warnings from Biden that he's going to launch this war do you think that he had an understanding about how the West about how Biden would respond did he have a misconception about what the response would be again who knows what's in his head what was in his head he had seen Afghanistan and President Biden's withdrawal decision to withdraw from Afghanistan uh however he also had had a couple of phone calls with this new president with President Biden freshly in office where President Biden was pretty clear apparently very specific about what kinds of actions the United States would take what kind of support the United States would provide to the ukrainians in terms of weapons in terms of financial support in terms of political support so so President Putin disregarded that or was not was not convinced for some reason that he would pay a price for invading Ukraine so despite the warnings despite the phone calls despite the announcements both public and despite the the messages in private President Putin decided to go ahead with that with that invasion how do you evaluate the Biden administration's response I think they've done a very good job I think they have mobilized the International Community certainly the West in three ways certainly on the military side the amount of support Military Support to Ukraine from the United States and from NATO Nations has been extraordinary and I give the white Administration credit for that push uh for for that that amazing support the second thing that they did well which is hard to do and that is get agreement on sanctions get International agreement on economic sanctions International agreement to cut off supplies of of components electronic opponents microchips to the Russians which can only be done effectively if it's done by most of the International Community and the by Administration did that both the sanctions and the export bans so that's a second major accomplishment the third is rallying the International Community at in places like the UN places like the G7 the political support for Ukraine the condemnation of the Russian invasion was as concentrated a diplomatic and international effort as as most people in the state department or in the US government have seen probably since the gulf Wars but this was an extraordinary effort on the part of the administration to mount a military economic and political campaign to support the ukrainians and to oppose the Russians so I give them credit most recently the Administration has made it clear that they will not be cowed by irresponsible talk coming from Moscow about nuclear weapons they will not be cowed by irresponsible talk coming from Moscow about how after these sham referenda that the Russians have have conducted in parts of Ukraine that now give as the Russians say the ability the right for them to use all weapons at their disposal to defend Russian land no these Ukrainian territories are Ukrainian everybody in the world except the Russians recognize these are Ukrainian territories so the by demonstration has not been cowed the blind Administration has made it clear to the Russians coming from the National Security advisor that if they were to the Russians were to take any action along the lines of these threats that there would be catastrophic response catastrophic responses the word that that Jake Sullivan used to indicate to the Russians the kind of response to the use of these weapons no matter what the Russians say about Russian territory in inside of Ukraine based on these fake referenda we are not buying it and we're telling the Russians that we will respond what is this conflict that we're in now there was a cold war there was the speech in Munich where Putin says America is the enemy and they're after us and America really like we've got other things to worry about but where are we now I mean are we in a conflict with Russia in a very direct way we are supporting the ukrainians in their conflict with Russia there's no doubt about that we've made it very clear that we think the ukrainians must win must defeat the Russians we've made it clear that the Russian violation of any notion of a rules-based order any notion of principles of sovereignty that have guided international relations since World War II that the Russians shredding of those principles is a challenge to the United States and challenge to the West is a challenge to International Security it's challenged to the UN and the U.N system so yes we are definitely in a conflict with that Russia that has overturned these principles and that is fighting a horrible fight a horrible battle in Ukraine with tens of thousands of civilians killed tens of thousands of Ukrainian soldiers killed tens of thousands of Russian soldiers being killed why because of one man's desire to go down in Russian history as a great leader President Putin is failing in that but President Putin has challenged Ukraine challenged Europe and challenged the United States we are defending the system that has kept the peace and that is that has been important for International Security so yes we are in a war um that the Russians have started in Ukraine and we're supporting the ukrainians my last question is Vladimir Putin now he started this war he's now facing losses in the battlefield and domestic consequences at home he's mobilizing he's threatening nuclear weapons I mean based on how he has responded to what's happened and based on what you know about I mean how dangerous is this moment how dangerous is Vladimir Putin is this undoubtedly a dangerous moment and undoubtedly depends on what's in President Putin's mind throughout our whole conversation we've been trying to figure out what is in prison Putin's mind we don't know and we won't know but what we do know is what we have to do what we do know is we have to oppose him trying to impose his will on Ukraine and on Europe we have to oppose that we have to support the ukrainians when they fight against that president Putin will decide whether to use nuclear weapons President Putin will decide whether to ramp up the fight against the ukrainians with these partially partial mobilization that he has called we don't know what he's going to do what we do know is we can't be cowed by what he says he might do we have to do what we have to do and that is oppose him support the ukrainians the ukrainians are trying to push the Russians back out of their country we support that that will re-establish this rules-based order that we can use to go forward we can't figure out what's in his head we do know what we have to do in order to support the ukrainians we do know that we have to be able to respond with catastrophic consequences to the Russians no matter what they do if they take some decision to use some of these weapons they've been told they will bear catastrophic consequences and the United States is ready to do that in whatever whatever way

Channel: FRONTLINE PBS | Official

Views: 1,044,788

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Id: yOTx7HxVDsM

Length: 88min 30sec (5310 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 19 2023