Carlson and Putin

Some Quick Notes and Reflections

Before getting into the points that I want to discuss, I should state that this post was made post-haste, to get the analysis out there before the interview becomes irrelevant. Please excuse any proofreading errors and enjoy the brevity of my points. I decided to organize this with my broad takeaways followed by specific subject headings.

Here are some broad takeaways:

a.     Liberal critics of Carlson and Putin have been pointing out that Carlson is a puppet of Putin, providing him a platform to spread disinformation and his point of view. There were various moments in the interview where it seemed undoubtedly true that Putin understood his superiority and made some intimidating remarks to Carlson just to keep him in place. The first and funniest was Putin’s mention that Carlson once wanted to join the CIA “and we should thank God they didn’t [let Carlson in]” knowing full well that Putin was a member of the Soviet Union’s secret services. There was an obvious power dynamic at play here, which confirms the liberal suspicion that Putin believed Carlson to be a malleable dummy. Putin’s first response was “Are we having a talk show or serious conversation?”

b.     Despite that, I agree with Carlson that the interview is important, even if we consider it as a pulpit for Putin. The liberal media has done a great job of promoting Zelensky to the role of celebrity-and-chief, and as such the information that most of the world gets is informed by this glorified view of the victimized leader. We often say history is written by the victors as a point of criticism because we understand that both sides should be studied and understood.

c.     A lot of liberal criticism of Putin rests on equating him to Hitler or framing the Western view about the Ukraine war and other conflicts as morally superior. In that case, it was interesting that Putin referred repeatedly to economic reality. He cites GDP, purchasing power parity, and productive power to make his arguments, particularly on China and America’s diminishing economic dominance, demonstrating that he was—like all soviet citizens—trained to view the world materially. But his materialism is devoid of Marxism. Like most post-soviet citizens, Putin’s worldview is more spiritualistic, referring to the “Russian soul” and other non-material forms of analysis.

d.     When talking about the early years of his presidency, Putin frames himself as a leader who tried multiple times to reconcile with the United States. He was pushed around by US leaders, not taken seriously, and thus marginalized from the ‘brotherhood of nations.’ That presents him as a vindictive leader who enjoys being in the driver’s seat.

The Ethnic History of Ukrainians and Russians

As most memes rightly ridicule, the interview begins with a 30+ minute tirade about the deep history of Russian and Ukrainian brotherhood. The history is tedious but probably necessary. Putin understood who his audience was, and that most Americans do not know or understand Russian history. What is more, and probably most important, is that Putin believes that the bond between Russians and Ukrainians is cemented through their adherence to Christian Orthodoxy, which was bestowed on the people in the 900s by Prince Vladimir. At the time there was no such thing as “nationality” and people who spoke the same language did not conceive of difference in terms of ethnicity—religion was the bonding agent, a shared sense of culture.

            Through the line of succession, the descendants of Rurik broke up into different factions, leaving the Western faction open and vulnerable to influence from the West, and the Eastern part open to assimilation with the emerging city of Moscow.

            In the West, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, a Catholic state, did exert influence on the people in present-day western Ukraine, seeking to separate them from the Russian (read Moscow, Orthodox) sphere of influence.

            What Putin is doing here is establishing a long history of Western interference in Ukrainian identity and belonging, suggesting that it has historically been in the interest of the West to dissuade Ukrainians from fraternity with Russia. There is some truth to this from a strictly geopolitical standpoint, but it is hard to tell how “Ukrainians” felt about it at the time because most of them were illiterate peasants. Whether or not the early modern state was powerful enough to affect cultural change remains to be seen.

            The liberal rebuttal so far has been to brand Putin’s history as a “state-centered narrative” that places Russia at the center. One historian responded, “You could equally say that Ukraine as a state began its development in the 9th Century, exactly with the same kind of evidence and documents.” But this doesn’t disprove the claims Putin is making, it merely reinforces the idea that Ukraine and Russia share a common ancestry that both can claim.

The Soviet Union and Poland’s Collaboration with Hitler

Putin then discusses the pre-World War One process of nationalization that happened among the Ukrainian elite. I don’t think it’s a very contentious claim that on the eve of World War One, Ukrainian elites and intelligentsia began to articulate a sense of Ukrainian national identity, partially influenced by Austria, Russia’s enemy, but also partially informed by necessity. The truth is that even if Ukrainians considered themselves different than Russians, their separation was understood as of the same family. Ukrainian was articulated in relation to Russia, not in opposition to it.

            This explains why, when the Bolsheviks took over, they were willing to allow Ukrainians national sovereignty. Another reason is that the Soviet Union was supposed to be a Union of peoples, ‘de-colonizing’ the Russian empire and giving the titular nationalities of the former empire the right to self-determination. The composition of the Soviet Government up until the Second World War reflects, in large part, the Soviet Union’s aspiration to empower non-Russian nations within the Union. In theory, this is what Lenin wanted, but in practice, Stalin understood that allowing smaller nations (like Georgia or Ukraine) to float freely without Russian support would open them up to Western infiltration of influence. Indeed, Stalin’s invasion of Georgia happened mostly because he feared British influence in the region, and a similar defense could be mounted for Ukraine, on the borderlands of the capitalist west.

            Indeed the region—central and eastern Europe—remained insecure, and the Soviet Union under Stalin retained its (justified) fear of capitalist encirclement. One of the most contentious claims Putin made in the interview was that Poland’s non-aggression pact with Hitler in 1934 was a catalyst for World War Two in the sense that Poland was unwilling to appease Hitler. Many liberals have skewed Putin’s words to make it sound like he is saying Poland caused the war—this isn’t true. The claim here, and it is partially true, is that after 1938, when Poland refused to allow Hitler to annex the Free City of Danzig, in response the German leader denounced the non-aggression pact and began preparations for war by planning to annex Poland with the Soviet Union in a new non-aggression pact with the USSR (Putin conflates Russia with the USSR repeatedly, which reveals something of his Russian chauvinism).

            All of this is true, and it’s important to not bend or skew Putin’s words here because he does not say Poland is responsible for the war—he says that Poland collaborated with Hitler in 1934, and this is true, as did Britain and France appease, but that appeasement only went so far before German ambitions met a brick wall. Unlike those other cases, it is clear that Stalin’s intention in the non-aggression pact was not appeasement, but to buy time.

            Finally, this history is important because it explains the origins of World War Two according to Putin, and accounts for the Nazi invasion of Ukraine as a mostly Western-caused tragedy. As the Nazis marched through Soviet Ukraine, they recruited local nationalists to collaborate with them (people like Stepan Bandera who are hailed as heroes in today’s Ukraine). The horrors of the war led states to agree to bar the perpetuation of Nazi ideology, so Putin wonders – why is Nazism tolerated in Ukraine? The answer he gives is that Nazi sympathizers in Ukraine today are useful allies for the United States against Russia. There may be some truth to this—the United States does historically back forces that oppose a bigger threat, and if the Russian state is viewed as a bigger threat, they will boost neo-Nazis.

            The problem is defining what a neo-Nazi is, and there’s even a moment in the interview where Putin hails the patriotism of the Russian people. There seems to be an unclear distinction between patriotism and nationalism for Putin. Patriotism is a love for one’s motherland, and nationalism is separatist, neo-nazi, and vulnerable to Western manipulation.

NATO Expansion and the Post-Soviet Predicament

The post-Soviet expansion of NATO and the anxiety that caused is a fair point no matter how it is approached. Russia feeling “tricked” is probably a reasonable summation of how Russians felt by the mid-1990s, particularly after the Serbian conflict. Russia’s support of Serbs, as a “orthodox nation” seems to be the turning point for Putin, and this is something I’ve experienced in popular Russian opinion.

Putin claims there are three moments when Russia changed its geostrategic interests for reconciliation with the United States. 

1.     When Yeltsin was branded as a fool, and in the early years of Putin’s presidency when the United States made it clear to him that Russia could not join NATO as that would threaten US supremacy in the organization.

2.     The CIA’s involvement in the wars in the Caucuses—Putin claims he has archival sources of the United States trying to overthrow Russia’s influence in the region.

3.     The third moment was the US missile defense system. Putin wanted to create a joint defense system, but the proposal was shot down. There’s an interesting point here that Carlson highlights, that Putin is claiming that US presidents say one thing, but their cabinet members say and do another thing. This, according to Putin, is a flaw in the US electoral system.

Putin considers 2014 and the invasion of Donbas as the beginning of the war, and that as Western powers were involved, Russia could not leave “brothers of faith.” We would not have lifted a figure if not for Maidan because we agreed to borders at the end of the USSR, but we never agreed to NATO expansion and Ukraine in NATO.

There realistically is no way to prove this because both sides are arguing different points. Carlson does ask if Putin has evidence of CIA involvement in Maidan, but Putin skirts around the question and eventually says that, essentially, even if he did it would serve no purpose to publish them because the United States controls the world’s media.

As for de-Nazification, Putin’s second major justification for the war, he seems to believe that the hyper-nationalism promoted in Ukraine after 1990 and particularly after 2014 when Russians were considered a non-titular nationality and the language was restricted, posed a direct threat to ethnic Russians. This amounts to Nazism, and he claims that Ukrainians are free to consider themselves independent but not based on Nazism.

Putin argues that there are forces outside of his sphere of power that are prohibiting peace.

1.     The Western sabotage of agreements that were supposedly reached in Istanbul—Ukraine and Russia wanted peace, but they were blocked by the West, in particular, Putin says Boris Johnson of Great Britain convinced the Ukranian delegation to continue fighting.

2.     Zelensky’s ban on negotiating with Russia.

3.     Putin talked to Biden before the full-scale invasion, but Biden didn’t listen. Putin keeps saying “Ask them” because he understands that the transparency of American politics is a farce.

Finally, to dispel Western war mongers, Putin reaffirms that Russia has no interest in conquering Poland, Latvia, or anywhere else. Considering the way that Putin explained Russian and Ukrainian history, and their unity through Orthodoxy, there’s no reason to not believe him. Poland, the Baltic States, and others, despite being former colonies of the empire and members of the USSR, do not share the same “spiritual” bond as Russians and Ukrainians.

Rhetorical Strategy, Nord stream, and the World Media

The part of the interview when Carlson asks Putin “Who blew up the Nord Stream pipeline” is another one of those moments where Putin seems to suggest that he has evidence but does not provide it. Instead, he tells Carson to “ask your leaders” and deflects the responsibility to produce evidence by saying that the US controls global media, so even if he did produce evidence, it would go nowhere.

            One major rhetorical strategy Putin employs is feigning ignorance in the face of complicated questions. For example, he asks why the United States blew up the pipeline, saying “Don’t you have anything better to do?” It is a good question, but it also reaffirms the fact that Putin knows his audience is mostly American, and he is prodding them to doubt their government. There’s another moment when Putin asks why Germans don’t allow gas from Russia, even though it is severely hurting their economy. He asks why the US keeps printing money despite inflation. It’s the main way the US uses its power across the world, but the US puts restrictions on states. Putin says it makes sense that states would withdraw from the dollar to protect themselves.

The Chinese “Boogyman”

Putin depicts not just the US government, but the US people as wholly ignorant to the economic transformations underway across the world, and nothing demonstrates that better than the way he talks about China. He says the Chinese economy surpassed the United States years ago, and that most of the world is getting into business with China because they recognize its economic power. The US attitude toward China, which is mostly hostile, reflects poorly on the US because “China’s foreign policy philosophy is not aggressive, but to look for compromise.”

            There is no reason to doubt Putin here—American commitments to Taiwan have amplified in recent years, seemingly tied to that island’s production of semiconductors. China merely reaffirms its historic right to the island, while the United States is already sending financial aid stoking animosity.

Evan Gershowitz

One of the final points brought up concerns Russia’s arrest of American journalist Evan Gershowitz under charges of espionage. Carlson maintains that he’s an innocent 31-year-old kid, while Putin says he actively engaged in espionage by gathering classified information. The issue here seems to be one of interpretation; what qualifies as espionage, and the simple fact that American and Russian law might define it differently. More importantly, it is unclear what Evan was gathering. Putin says, “I don’t know who he was working for, but getting classified information in secret qualifies as espionage.”

            It does seem like Evan is being used as leverage, but at the same time, that cannot negate the fact that he may be guilty. Ultimately, states capture and detain spies all the time, and they are frequently used as leverage for prisoner exchanges. To pretend like Russia is the only country engaging in this behavior is disingenuous.

Future of the Ukraine Conflict

Putin claims that the ability to make a settlement is in the hands of Ukraine. He says that despite being Jewish, Zelensky sided with neo-Nazis upon coming to power for two reasons:

1.        It was better not to clash with them because they are nationalists.

2.        The US supported them because they antagonized Russia.

He also makes the important point that eventually the war must end, and sooner or later it will result in agreement. He is right here—the war cannot drag on forever, and it does seem like there are external pressures on Ukraine to continue the fight.

            Because of their “eternal bond,” Putin is convinced that no amount of warfare can permanently break Russians and Ukrainians. It will take a long time, but he is convinced that their bond will be reaffirmed after the war is over.