A conversation with Catherine Belton, of the Washington Post, and Shaun Walker, of The Guardian, on the origins of the war. This conversation looks into the role intelligence played prior the war, the U.S. assessmeent that Russia would invade and the divergent assessments of other countries, including Ukraine, about when or whether the war would take place.

A conversation with Alexander Bick, a professor at the University of Virginia who served on the National Security Council in 2022, about the origins of the war, about policy choices made by the United States and about assessments of Russian actions and motivations in the lead-up to Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

A conversation with the historian Margaret MacMillan, emeritus professor of history at the University of Toronto and at Oxford University, and author of many books on the history of war. This conversation will place a special emphasis on the evolution of the nation state in the eighteenth century, the role of the nation state in European history before and after World War I and the ways in which this "deep history" have shaped Russia's serial invasions of Ukraine since 2014.

A conversation with Ivan Krastev, chair of the Centre for Liberal Strategies in Sofia, on the origins of the war in Urkaine, with special attention to paid to the European dimensions, to the growth of the European Union in the 2000s, to the evolving relationship between Ukraine and Europe in 2013-2014 and to Europe's relations with Russia prior to Russia's 2022 invasion.

A conversation with Odd Arne Westad, a historian of the Cold War at Yale University, that focuses on the end of the Cold War, on the many ways that the Cold War did not end between 1989 and 1991 and on the deep historical origins of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, with an emphasis on the global factors that have shaped Vladimir Putin's decision making.

A conversation with Gwendolyn Sasse, Director of the Centre for East European and International Studies, and author of Russia's War against Ukraine, a book published by Polity Press in 2023. This conversation explores the history behind Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

The recent defeat of Viktor Orban will have implications felt across Europe and in Ukraine. This conversation explores the configurations of European politics, as reshaped by this election, from the foreign policy of the European Union to the structures of European support for Ukraine. It also examines attitudes in Moscow, which had openly backed Prime Minister Orban's re-election bid and had construed Hungary under Orban as a relatively friendly European country. This conversation looks at Vladimir Putin's likely response to this election and to a Europe that will be less amenable to Russian influence in the future.

This conversation with Ian Buruma, of Bard College, focuses on his recent book, Stay Alive: Berlin, 1939-1945. On one level, this conversation concentrates on the story told in the book and on the German-Soviet interactions documented in this book. On another level, it looks at the dynamic of wartime writing and of writing about war after the fact, expanding beyond the subject of World War II.

A conversation with Pavlo Klimkin, former Foreign Minister of Ukraine and a member of the Kennan Institute Advisory Council, on the diplomatic backdrop to Russia's serial invasions of Ukraine, starting with the events of 2013/2014, continuing through the long phase of "Minsk" diplomacy and looking in detail at the events of 2021 in Ukraine-Russian relations.

A conversation with Angela Stent, of the American Enterprise Institute and Georgetown University, on the origins of the war, with an emphasis on U.S.-Russian relations since the end of the Cold War, the open-ended 1990s, the rise of Vladimir Putin, the crisis caused by Russia's annexation of Crimea and the lead-up to Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

A conversation with Serhii Plokhy, renowned historian at Harvard University and author of several books on the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This conversation will explore Professor Plokhy's new book, David and Goliath: Commentaries on the Russo-Ukrainian War, and the historiographical questions in involved in understanding the origins of Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

A conversation with German Ambassador to Italy, Thomas Bagger, on the origins of the war with a focus on the European dimensions to this conflict. This conversation will review policy thinking and choices from the 1990s to 2022, looking carefully at assessments of Russian strategy and decision making.

A conversation with Tom Graham, a Distinguished Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and author of the book Getting Russia Right, on the long history of the war in Ukraine, starting with the fall of the Soviet Union and moving on to various chapters in U.S. policy toward Russia and Ukraine.

A conversation with Lana Estemirova, journalist, human rights activist, and author of the memoir Please Live: The Chechen Wars, My Mother and Me. This new book provides readers an intimate glimpse into Ms. Estemirova's childhood, lived amidst the brutality of the Chechen Wars and made remarkable by the work of her mother, legendary Memorial human rights activst Natalia Estemirova. The discussion will explore the implications of the events of the 1990s and 2000s on Chechnya's political trajectory and the essential role citizens can play when they take up the call of activism.

A conversation with Michael Kofman of the Carnegie Endowment on the origns of the war, looking in particular at the military dynamics behind this conflict and at Russian notions of security and strategy, starting with the Russia-Georgia War of 2008, continuing with the first Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2014 and exploring in detail the reasons behind Russian President Vladimir Putin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

A conversation with Serhii Plokhy, of Harvard University, and Oxana Shevel, of Tufts University, on the state of Ukrainian studies today, exploring questions of sources and archives as well as new directions in research.

A converastion with the historian Jochen Hellbeck on his recent book, World Enemy No. 1: Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia and the Fate of the Jews. This major new history transforms our understanding of World War II — tracing the conflict and its most infamous crime, the Holocaust, to Germany’s implacable hostility toward Soviet Russia. Hellbeck plumbs newly declassified archives and previously undiscovered sources—testimonies, diaries, and dispatches from soldiers and civilians, Soviet and German—to offer a unique history that takes account of both sides. He reconstructs the years leading up to the war when “Europe against Bolshevism” was the Nazis’ most fervid rallying cry, and documents their annihilatory ambitions on the battlegrounds in the East.

A conversation with Ambassador Daniel Fried, Wesley Family Distinguished Fellow at the Atlantic Council and Assistant Secretary of State for Europe from 2005 to 2009. This conversation explores the deep origins of Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine, looking at U.S. policy choices and at patterns in the U.S.-Russian relationship.

The initiation of a major war against Iran raises many important questions about Russia’s role in the Middle East, about the war in Ukraine and about the future of nuclear nonproliferation. This event features two leading experts, Hanna Notte and Nicole Grajewski, to assess events on the ground and their broader implications.

A conversation with Jon Finer, an Advisory Council member of the Kennan Institute, and formerly the Deputy National Security Advisory on the U.S. policy choices and expectations in 2014/2015, when Ukraine was first invaded by Russia, and leading up to the massive Russian invasion in 2022, focusing on use of evidence and trying to understand decision making in Moscow.

A conversation with the historian Maurice Casey on his recent book, Hotel Lux: An Intimate History of Communism's Forgotten Radicals. Casey reveals the connections and disconnections of a group of forgotten communist activists whose lives collided in 1920s Moscow: a brilliant Irish translator, a maverick author, the rebel daughters of an East London Jewish family, and a family of determined German anti-fascists.

A conversation with Jake Sullivan, who was National Security Advisor in the Biden Administration and is currently a professor at the Harvard Kennedy School. This conversation explores key moments, such as the events of 2014-2015, when Russia annexed Crimea and invaded eastern Ukraine, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Sullivan examines key concepts in American foreign policy and the tools American policy makers use to understand and anticipate Russian decision making.

A conversation with literary scholar Sophie Pinkham at Cornell University on her recent book, The Oak and the Larch: A Forest History of Russia and Its Empires.

A conversation with Yaroslav Hrytsak, a historian at the Ukrainian Catholic University. This conversation explores the question of timing and in particular the question of when Russian President Vlaimir Putin decided to invade Ukraine, examining the evidentiary material available for analyzing and understanding Putin's decision making.

A conversation with historian Alissa Klots, a professor of history at the University of Pittsburgh, on her book Domestic Service in the Soviet Union: Women's Emancipation and the Gendered Hierarchy of Labor.

A conversation with Sergey Radchenko, a historian at Johns Hopkins SAIS, who is currently writing a book on the origins of the war in Ukraine. This conversation explores the end of the Cold War, the rise of U.S.-Russian tensions in the early twenty-first century and the patterns of decision making that explain Russian President Vladimir Putin's decision to invade Ukraine in February 2022.

In this edition of The Long View, we are joined by historian Susan Grunewald to discuss her new book, From Incarceration to Repatriation: German Prisoners of War in the Soviet Union. The conversation explores the experiences of German prisoners of war held in the Soviet Union, from captivity through repatriation, and examines how their treatment shaped postwar memory, state policy, and international relations.

On the eve of the full-scale invasion, Ambassador John Sullivan was on the diplomatic front lines in Moscow, representing a rapidly coalescing Western alliance. He and his staff witnessed first-hand the Kremlin’s attempts to sow uncertainty and eke out leverage in the runup to February 24, 2022. In this conversation, Ambassador Sullivan revisits his experience as the U.S.’s chief liaison to Russia at the most consequential moment since the fall of the Soviet Union. His insights provide a uniquely revealing picture of the Putin regime’s mentality and motivations for launching the most destructive war in Europe in eighty years.

Following a highly successful conversation last year, Thane Gustafson and Charles Hecker return to continue the discussion. This session examines how Western businesses have navigated Russia’s post-Soviet transformation and what the future may hold.

Hanna Notte, Kennan Institute Non-Resident Fellow, and Stephen Wertheim, Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, address the implications of the recent U.S. intervention in Venezuela, focusing on what they may be for Russia's global foreign policy and for Russia's approach to the war in Ukraine. What are these new notions of global order being ushered in by the Trump administration, and what opportunities and challenges will Russia derive from these new (or not-so-new) notions?