Trump Whistleblower Alexander Vindman on Why the U.S. Has Turned Its Back on Ukraine
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From GQED in San Francisco, this is Forum. I'm Mina Kim. The U.S. has a draft deal with Ukraine for the country's mineral assets, but so far we're not offering clear security guarantees against Russia in return. It's a reflection of the Trump administration's Russia-first policy and decades of administrations deluding themselves about Russia, says Alexander Vindman, an expert on Eastern Europe who drew national attention as Trump's impeachment whistleblower in 2019.

As Ukrainian President Zelensky prepares to meet with Trump tomorrow, we talk to Vindman about a different way forward that he lays out in his book, The Folly of Realism. Join us. Welcome to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. On Monday, the three-year mark of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, a U.N. General Assembly resolution condemned the war and called for Russia's withdrawal. The U.S., in a stunning reversal, voted against it.

This upending of the U.S. position on Ukraine under President Trump comes as Zelensky is expected at the White House tomorrow, seeking security guarantees in exchange for access to Ukraine's minerals. Joining me now is retired Army Lieutenant Colonel and former Director for European Affairs on the National Security Council, Alexander Vindman, who became a household name in 2019 when he testified about the infamous phone call between Trump and Zelensky in Trump's first impeachment hearing.

His new book is The Folly of Realism, How the West Deceived Itself About Russia and Betrayed Ukraine. Colonel Vindman, welcome to Forum.

Thank you for having me on, Mina. Looking forward to the conversation. Me too. I do want to ask you about Monday and your reaction to the U.S. voting against the U.N. resolution condemning the war. And I should add, we then offered our own resolution calling for an end to the war without mentioning Russia as the aggressor. And when that was amended by the General Assembly to make clear Russia's role, we abstained on that vote. How do you think about all this?

It doesn't fail to shock. There have been so many shocking moments for the American public paying attention closely to what's going on on the domestic scene.

Usually there's a famous line, politics end at the eight nations shores, and there's a continuity between administrations. There's really never been such a sharp break in policy, 180 degree reversal. Whether that becomes live and material is yet to be determined. Sometimes what Trump says, it doesn't pan out, doesn't really kind of

materialize. We'll learn some of that in the course of this conversation with this rare earth steel that we're talking about. Not the way it was billed that Ukrainians were going to deliver $500 billion to the U.S., but nevertheless...

Just the kind of superficial appearance of the U.S. siding with North Korea, with Russia, against our allies, against Ukraine, who we've been supporting for three years, is shocking and really a sharp break, signaling a sharp break in the kind of policy we're going to conduct that we are not reliable to our allies, that we are dangerous to our allies and an opportunity for enemies to exploit.

As you say, these resolutions are not binding per se, but they do signal very significant things. And then in addition to that vote, Trump has been making a series of false statements blaming Ukraine for the war, calling Zelensky a dictator, saying Zelensky can't find half the money the U.S. sent and that he has a 4% approval rating and things along those lines where it really feels like

there's a level of personal antipathy there towards Zelensky from Trump. Am I reading that right? You are. I think we should understand that he's all over the map. At one point, condemning Ukraine, lauding Russia, then saying Russia can't win. He's going to be inconsistent throughout. But there's a consistent vein in his behavior, which is that he has a proclivity to

strongmen. He has a like for Putin and he has an antipathy for Zelensky and Ukraine. And he's vindictive because of the fact that he was caught out

in a corrupt scheme to try to steal the 2020 election and blames Ukraine for that. Blames me for that too, to a certain extent, but Ukraine is more live and in his face regularly. So there's a consistency there, but in terms of the details matter here, he's at times damned Ukraine and then been wheeled back. We could see these rotations of European leaders. Zelensky's coming tomorrow to kind of

moderate some of his most excessive behaviors. And, you know, these things will play out repeatedly. It is still quite shocking that he flat out lies about, you know, the different roles of the different parties here, that Russia is the aggressor. Clearly, Russia attacked Ukraine. Ukraine did not attack Russia. That Zelensky is a dictator. He's not. He's democratically elected.

And he was elected, mind you, by a much larger margin than Trump has ever enjoyed in any of his elections. He won 73% of the vote when he had his election. And then he created a brand new party and that party that he created won a mandate for the first time, had a...

not just a plurality in the parliament. So he's popular. He doesn't have 4% approval rating. That's a lie also. All sorts of things that, you know, are not ground in fact at all, but somehow, somewhere in the conspiracy environment that, you know, of news that he follows and favors, he's seeing some of these things and picking up on these moments and manipulating them and screwing them. But, you know,

Again, we should understand that it doesn't necessarily mean that things are going to play out in this worst case scenario. I think the deal that we see unfolding for tomorrow is not a bad deal. It started in the worst possible place. It started with an extortion of Ukraine, but it's settling in on something far more

frankly, far more functional and beneficial to Ukraine and the U.S. So some of this is just, you know, extreme showmanship that we see from Donald Trump on a habitual basis. And I want to get into that. Well, let me remind listeners, we're talking with Alexander Vindman and you can join the conversation. What do you want to ask or tell Colonel Vindman about

What are your thoughts on how the Trump administration is handling the war in Ukraine about our posture toward Ukraine and Russia now? The email address is forum at kqed.org. You can find us on Blue Sky, Facebook, Instagram and threads at KQED Forum. You can call us at 866-733-6786, 866-733-6786.

Peggy on Blue Sky writes, thank you for your service and standing up to Trump. I think you would be amazing at training soldiers. I know you're retired, but are you still involved in the military? Thank you, Colonel Vindman. You are admired and appreciated by legions of Americans.

You mentioned, Colonel Vindman, that some of his personal dislike of Zelensky goes back to that phone call where he essentially asked Zelensky to do us a favor. A phone call that you listened in on as the director of European affairs on the White House's National Security Council during Trump's first visit.

administration. Can you just remind us of what happened, what Peggy is referring to? Sure, of course. You know, I guess at first it has to be noted because I keep, you know, marveling at how the subtitle that I settled on, you know, some time ago is just consistently, couldn't be more accurate, couldn't be more timely. It's about

Russia deceiving itself or the U S is deceiving itself about Russia West deceiving itself about Russia and betraying Ukraine. You see that playing out constantly. The phone call that, um, the caller was referring to was, is something, uh, one of the roles I had in the white house was coordinating all policy between the white house and, um, my, the countries in my portfolio that included Ukraine and Russia. And that included, uh, heads of state calls, uh,

This was a phone call in which President Trump was looking to congratulate President Zelensky on an election victory. I recommended the call. I put together the background material for the call. I was a little bit concerned about where this call could lead because the scheme was

This environment that the phone call occurred in was one in which the president and his henchmen were scheming to steal an election to tip the scales in their favor. Nevertheless, on the merits, I wanted to give the two presidents an opportunity to talk and recommend to this call. The president accepted it, did congratulate President Zelensky, but in the course of President Zelensky asking for additional help with weapons that they were going to buy, these were not gifts.

to help defend themselves. Ukraine had already been facing five years of war. President Trump decided this was the moment to attempt to extort him and asked Ukraine

Zelensky for a favor. That moment, I immediately recognized that my role and my responsibility was to try to counsel the president to reverse course that this was wrong and potentially illegal. And I reported to my chain of command. These are all very, very senior. I was serving in a senior role. These are all very senior officials.

folks I was communicating to. And this ultimately unfolded into a congressional inquiry that resulted in Trump's first impeachment. Yeah. And the favor he wanted was essentially for Zelensky to investigate Joe Biden over the false allegation that he halted the prosecution of Hunter Biden. So you're listening to this and you have called this the phone call that changed your life. I have to ask you, you know, at the time you say there was a bright line between

What was wrong and right and that what the president was doing was wrong. But when you look at what Trump and Elon Musk have been doing now, does that attempt at corruption that Trump made in that phone call feel like it almost pales in comparison? Yeah.

In many ways, it does. We are in a far more dangerous spot here with regards to the domestic picture for the United States. We're under assault democracy and the institutions that undergird democracy under are under assault. The rules that may have governed or constrained some of Trump's actions back then, the the

His senior staff, his cabinet were still at the time professionals. None of those guardrails exist. We're in a far more dangerous place. And we're in the midst of a very, very large war in Europe, a very dangerous war that has every possibility of spilling over. And the way it's being managed or mismanaged by Trump is actually...

not only delaying the prospect of peace, it's also potentially setting the mixture for a potential broader escalation with the Europeans thinking that in the absence of the United States, they may have to put troops on the ground in Ukraine. So it's a dangerous mix, far more dangerous than it was back then.

It's shocking how we keep repeating or even amplifying the same mistakes. I mean, the folly of realism fundamentally is about repeated mistakes across 30 plus years and six administrations. And we've graduated from, you know, misplaced hopes and fears on what we could accomplish with Russia to outright just a Russia first policy under Donald Trump. That's very, very dangerous.

We're talking with Colonel Alexander Vindman about his new book, The Folly of Realism, How the West Deceived Itself About Russia and Betrayed Ukraine.

He's well known for being a whistleblower in the Trump first, Trump's first administration, forming the basis of his first impeachment hearing. He was former director of European affairs for the White House's National Security Council at the time. What do you want to ask or tell Alexander bin bin? What questions do you have about being a whistleblower under the first Trump administration? What are your thoughts on how the Trump administration is handling the war in Ukraine or about its posture toward Ukraine and Russia? And looking back, what do you think of the Biden administration's approach to the war?

The email address, forum at kqed.org. The phone number, 866-733-6786. Our social channels are on Blue Sky Facebook, Instagram, and threads at KQED Forum. More after the break. I'm Mina Kim.

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Welcome back to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. We're talking about the war in Ukraine this hour and the Trump administration's approach to it. We're with Alexander Vindman, retired Army Lieutenant Colonel, author of the new book, The Folly of Realism, How the West Deceived Itself About Russia and Betrayed Ukraine. And you, our listeners, are joining the conversation with your questions and comments for Colonel Vindman at 866-733-6786 at the email address forum at kqed.org.

Find us on Blue Sky Facebook, Instagram, and threads at kqedforum. Ron writes, is Trump Putin's puppet?

So I want to ask you about how we got to this point with Ukraine, because even before that, that fateful phone call in 2019 that we were just talking about before the break, you and others in the foreign policy community were attuned to Trump's appeasement of Russia and growing hostility to Ukraine. So, you know, this in some ways is sort of a long time coming. And then of course, to Ron's point, how far do you think Russian influence over Trump goes? It's interesting. These, um,

We have to go way back to understand the context in which I joined the White House. I joined in 2018, just in the midst of the Mueller investigations and these efforts to

Work with the Russians to interfere in the US elections, you know many of those validated even though they didn't lead to any prosecutions or any accountability so there's a there's a record a deep record of Russian influence Russian ties between Trump and the Russian security apparatus the Russian elites This I was

apprehensive to say the least about joining the administration in that moment, but I did so because

We were in a lot of ways, you know, it's a pretty big bureaucracy. Things are pretty well organized. They come from the military. We have strategies and plans. One of the things that was developed was a national security strategy at the time that looked to focus on countering Russian malign influence, Russian aggression. And I played a role and I actually drafted the military strategy for how we were going to contend with Russia. And I was invited to be able to amplify this approach for the military.

whole of nation. So there were these different, just like we discussed earlier, there were these different tensions between what was said and what was really going on. In that first administration, there was a lot of chaos also, and a lot of, you know, pandering to Russia. But the things that were done, we did manage to ratchet up sanctions. We did manage to do some things where we proceeded to arm Ukraine on the, you know, kind of working level.

Now we're in a different kind of administration where none of these guardrails, none of these governing documents, these strategies are all out the window. And it's really a sharp reorientation towards Russia. What does that mean? Does that mean that somehow...

the Russians have some dirt on Trump or that, you know, Trump is Putin's poodle is one funny way I've heard somebody describe it as. Um...

I don't believe in conspiracy theories. I haven't seen the evidence that is such a high bar. But at the same time, I do have to question in my mind how we could absolutely completely about face, condemn Ukraine, embrace Russia, vote against our allies, vote for Russia. It makes me wonder, what is it? What more can there possibly be?

Because it's not logical. It doesn't advance Trump's own agenda. Trump wants to be the winner. He wants to be successful. He wants to, you know, demonstrate that he's popular. He's ending the war. And these types of appeasement approaches don't do that. It is the same kind of mistakes that we made throughout the preceding 30 years when we

when we worked with the Russians to help denuclearize Ukraine, when we were very, very soft touch in condemning Russia's

mucking around in Ukraine's elections in the Orange Revolution when they first made their hard pivot to the West, or 2014 when they started the war and we were largely hands-off because we didn't want to have the relationship spiral. Now we're in this, what I've been referring to as a kind of poison Kool-Aid stage of this cult of realism making these same mistakes over and over, putting Russia first. And it's

There's not a lot of logic to it. You could see some of the establishment, the national security establishment, attempt to add some rationality to it. Moving these outrageous demands, for instance, for $500 billion in money from Ukraine into this deal that's about to be signed tomorrow that looks like it's going to be serving both parties' interests. But the pronouncements themselves are shocking enough

And really the most extreme positions we've taken. This soft touch with Russia that you criticize, isn't it in part understandable because they're a nuclear power? Yeah, so this is an interesting feature. There is a theory around...

nuclear extortion that really kind of should be forefront of mind here. It's that once you achieve nuclear status, that you are unassailable, untouchable, and that you could get away with whatever you want, including military aggression. And by believing that any nuclear power necessitates a soft touch,

You're not just emboldening those powers to push harder, push more, be more aggressive. You're also emboldening other regimes to eye the potential for a nuclear capability. And if history tells us anything about these last 30 plus years, our appeasement of Russia

hasn't gotten us that much further. What we've managed to do is initially, you know, again, when Ukraine was looking for independence, George H.W. Bush gave this famous speech, said, you don't need independence. Take it easy. Take it slow. Of course, the Ukrainians rejected it and voted 90 percent of the population voted in 1991 to leave, resulting in the collapse of the Soviet Union and Ukraine's independence.

But that was one turn. And due to denuclearization, we initially also kind of had this coercive approach in partnership with the Russians. That didn't work out. We had a relook and the Clinton administration then became far more kind of carrot and stick with enticements to help bring Ukraine towards denuclearization. But

had to be convinced of this folly of only being serving Russia's interests. You see this pattern play out repeatedly. And what you see from the Russian side is a graduation from just what was referred to as malign influence, messing around, being a spoiler, to hybrid warfare, interfering elections, including our own, to ultimately military aggression. Instead of

of what we probably could have avoided at various points along the way if we had some conditionality in the way we engaged with Russia, that we held their feet to the fire. They wanted things from us. They wanted trade. They wanted a normalization. We needed to see some transformation and reform or condemnation when they start to graduate into these more aggressive postures.

Or somewhere along the way, recognizing that we couldn't accomplish that much with Russia, shifting to a posture in which we then helped harden Ukraine. There were plenty of opportunities to do that. In 2005, when you had a brand new Ukrainian president that was very, very pro-Western come in, that was an opportunity for us to really invest in Ukraine, both in security and economics. And we didn't do that because we didn't want to burn a bridge with Russia. So it wasn't just about...

appeasing Russia, we also stayed our hand on the things that we knew were the right things to do. And the approach that I guess I call for is a rebalance because we've been so wrong. We should learn the lessons of the past that we need to not just discount

not be appeasing towards Russia, but need to shift the posture to advancing U.S. interests. And the way we do that is by shifting towards priorities like values, recognizing that the values here drive partnerships with democracies. The values here drive partnerships with democracies because they help drive economic growth, economic prosperity, security, so that we're a team when we're facing challenges from around the world.

And that's really the fundamental notion that I'm trying to drive, not just a condemnation of what happened wrong in the past, but a prescription that allows us to rebalance and take a different approach going forward. And this is what you mean by neo-idealism. You call this neo-idealism as an approach. Am I right?

Correct. That is the idea. So, you know, when you start to talk about kind of IR theory, you know, people's eyes start to glaze over. But I would just think about it in the simplest terms that we've been wrong so much in this very conciliatory approach to

succumbing to hopes and fears, putting Russia first, that we really, it's more pragmatic than ideological, that we need to rebalance the scales. We need to recognize that those types of behavior in the past were very, very transactional. What was immediately in front of us, whether it was risks or rewards, and just grabbing at those things immediately in front of us, instead of being more long-sighted. Neo-idealism points to a more long-sighted approach, something that allows us to navigate past things

these short-term transactional approaches. It's just a pragmatic recognition that what has happened wrong in the past, there's an alternative way that allows us to bypass shiny bright objects and look at something that's going to really enhance security and prosperity long-term.

Well, Steve on Discord writes,

Stephen writes, my inclination is that Biden should have been more aggressive in the Ukraine situation by calling Russia's bluff and bringing Ukraine into NATO. What does Colonel Vindman think about that? I think Ukraine in NATO would have forestalled Russian aggression. The question is how you do when and how you do that. In 2008, when we first started,

pledged to bring Ukraine into NATO, it was a distant notion. If sometime between 2008 in this hypothetical world and 2014 when the Russians were eyeing military aggression, if Ukraine was in NATO, Russia's aggression would have never happened. Russia was not the least bit interested in tangling with NATO, with the US. They're deathly afraid of our economic and military power.

So the question then became after 2014, because that didn't happen, is was there a reasonable path to bring Ukraine into NATO without provoking a kind of a more aggressive response from Russia? Because the Russians warned that if Ukraine was going to be brought in, it was going to be the trigger for war.

In fact, we didn't do that. We didn't attempt to bring Ukraine into NATO. And there was still an opportunity for the Russians to seize, to attack Ukraine and subdue it. So the answer to me is this. If you work through the logic of these steps...

If you bring Ukraine into NATO, as hard as it is, as hard as it is to conceive of a way that mitigates risks, that is the only thing that really forestalls Russian aggression long term. Because again, Russia is not suicidal. It does not wish to have its military completely obliterated by NATO conventionally and knows, therefore, that there's a risk

that mutually assured destruction if we graduate to nuclear war would be the end of everybody. And that's not something they're interested in. So there are different thoughts on potentially how to do this, whether it's the Ukrainian-controlled territory that's brought into NATO, recognizing that the parts that are occupied by Russia, there is no interest in a direct confrontation between Russian and NATO forces. There are different thoughts on potentially how you...

Ukraine, graduate Ukraine through the preliminary steps of

of getting into NATO. There's a whole series of reforms. You're looking at fundamentally, it's a military relationship. So you're looking to build interoperability and transform the Ukrainian military so it could work with the NATO and US military seamlessly. So you could make steps, strides in that direction and also warn off Russia that it's actually precipitating some of the things it doesn't want to do.

Fundamentally, I think Ukraine will join NATO. It's hard to see how to do that now. Potentially smarter people than I could conceive of a path in which you bring Ukraine into NATO, forestall future war forever, again, with Russia now being suicidal. That has to happen, I think, as a security guarantee eventually.

And then we go to caller Ken in Riverside. Hi, Ken, you're on. Oh, my gosh. Oh, thank you so much. The colonel has already answered my original question. I was along the lines of the Biden administration of taking it slow so Russia didn't pull out their nukes. But what I'm wondering is what the colonel was seeing there.

and thinking that I didn't in the first months of the war. Because the colonel did what in those first months of the war? The colonel was much more aggressive in wanting to send U.S. arms to Ukraine. Thank you, Ken.

Colonel Vindman. Thanks. Sorry to jump on, Mina. No, no. Not at all. So I guess the thing is, to me, it was clear in the fall of 21, months before, that the war was coming. And I had already started to undertake my studies. This book actually is a revision of a doctoral dissertation to get my doctorate in international affairs from Johns Hopkins. So

I was already undertaking the study and understanding the kinds of mistakes that we had been making along the way. And between that and my 22 years of military experience, having served in Moscow and Kiev and the Pentagon, writing the strategy and in the White House, these experiences made it crystal clear to me that Russia's buildup over the course of 2021, starting in the

early days really in the March of 2021 and graduating through 150,000 almost 200,000 troops all around Ukraine was not posturing this was not a demonstration it was the fact that the Russians were clearly arraying their forces for a big strike to seize all Ukraine with their chauvinism believing that they could succeed very very quickly

So the approach then became, is there something we could do to avoid this catastrophic outcome of a major, major war in Europe, a one that threatens to spill over somewhere along the way and potentially implicate the U.S. directly? And there are things I settled on pretty quickly. We needed to signal the Russians that the West was going to be there, that the West was going to impose costs directly.

So I wrote an article, and I think it was the New York Times in December, suggesting that we start sanctioning Russia to indicate that they're clear that this was just the leading end of a large tale of sanctions, that we start to arm Ukraine in a robust manner so that it does not look like a cakewalk to Russia, that there will be high costs, that we position troops in Ukraine

in the Eastern flank on the very frontiers, something that we refused to do for decades in response to the increasing threat. And I talked, it wasn't just me writing these things, I was actually communicating with the White House. They brought in a bunch of former seniors as kind of advisors so they could tell us all the things that they're doing, solicit some advice, try to keep us on side so we weren't overly critical.

And I recommend this course of action. And my sense of it from administration was that they were not as confident that war was coming. It wasn't until significantly later, really, frankly, late December, January, that they finally came around to it. And the other thing is that they didn't want to be the pretext. They didn't want to be the trigger for something that they knew was going to be really awful.

which was a large-scale war in Europe, not recognizing that this was weakness that emboldened Putin. And that's what I was seeing. That's why I was very, very adamant that the Biden administration could have done a lot more even before the war started and really early on in the war. I vividly remember a conversation with the White House in which I said, "All the things that you think are impossible, you will do. And when you do them, they'll be the easy things."

So why don't you do them now before you have to really start making tough decisions? And there were maybe even were a couple of times where I said, I told you so to the senior White House staff, because it played out, unfortunately, very much like I thought it was going to. We're talking with Alexander Vindman. And so are you, Ross writes, will a mineral deal with the U.S. represent a degree of security for Ukraine? And will it cause a faceoff between Trump and Putin over minerals in the Donbass region?

Let's get to that right after the break. Stay with us, listeners. This is Forum. I'm Mina Kim. Welcome back to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. We're talking this hour with Alexander Vindman, retired Army Lieutenant Colonel, former Director of European Affairs for the National Security Council under the first Trump administration. And of course, he's a member of the U.S. Army.

became well known across the nation as a whistleblower in the Trump impeachment. He has a book about the history of U.S. foreign policy toward Ukraine and Russia since the collapse of the Soviet Union and its flaws. It's called The Folly of Realism, How the West Deceived Itself About Russia and Betrayed Ukraine. What do you want to ask or tell Alexander Bimin? What are your thoughts on how the Trump administration is handling the war in Ukraine about a minerals deal that it's saying is

imminent, as President Zelensky is expected at the White House tomorrow. The email address is forum at kqed.org. Find us on our social channels at KQED Forum or call us at 866-733-6786, 866-733-6786. Yesterday, President Trump said that it's

quote, confirmed that Zelensky will visit Washington to sign an agreement allowing the U.S. to share in revenues from its mineral resources. But the U.S. has not made clear security guarantees, guarantees that Ukraine is seeking. Just a vague reference to one, I think, is the latest in the latest version. How do you think about this agreement? Ross was asking the question of whether this does have some hope for Ukraine. Would or should Ukraine sign it, Colonel?

I think this is, I would applaud the Zelensky team and I would applaud, frankly, the Trump team in settling on this agreement. The version that I saw, I think, was mutually beneficial. The effort there is to add a interest tether to keep the Trump administration, to keep Donald Trump himself interested in Ukraine and not keep flying away towards these agreements

his affinity for Putin. Why does this make sense? Because the U.S. needs those commodities, needs those metals. Titanium, Ukraine has very massive stockpiles. The U.S. still relies on Russia for some titanium, an adversary. There are rare earths that the Ukrainians have access to that we need for our economy, our technical economy, obviously critical to your neck of the

I think this is a good deal. From my perspective, the times that we've had the best relationship between Russia, well, with any country, but between the U.S. and Ukraine in particular, is when there have been both interest and values driving it.

The value here, of course, is something that I've talked about many times, that Ukraine is a democracy. It's a bulwark against Russian aggression. It's really protecting, it's absorbing the blows and protecting Europe. And Europe is the U.S.'s most important partner, economic and security.

But now there's a interest component to this. I think you could argue that the former was also interest, but this one's more transactional and appeals to Donald Trump, which is that he wants, he's been talking about rare earths, he's been talking about Greenland and these other opportunities to secure precious metals for the U.S. And this gives him that, gives him a win here.

So I think that both having interest and values is important. The nuts and bolts of this deal,

They also help Ukraine in a big way. Ukrainians need investment to rebuild. They want to develop this particular sector, and U.S. investment is critical. So I think this is a win-win from what I'm seeing thus far, and I applaud the Trump administration and the Zelensky administration for managing to...

to develop something that actually works for both parties. You've talked, though, about the volatility of this president and this administration. So if the countries finalize an agreement with tangible benefits for Ukraine, do you think this administration would keep its end of the bargain? Well, the way the agreement is written is if the U.S. doesn't keep its side of the bargain, then Ukrainians won't keep their side of the bargain. So I think it's written...

by very sophisticated actors that understand that the way they potentially keep the U.S. on sides is that the U.S. has to fulfill its side of the bargain if it wants access to these rare earths and these metals. So I think this is a fine deal. The U.S. doesn't really offer much in the way of security guarantees, tangential reference.

I think it's a high bar to expect at this point in time. The Europeans are going to have to play a much, much more robust role in Ukraine security. But if the U.S. doesn't burn its bridges with Ukraine, doesn't completely throw in with Russia, then

That is maybe the best out of the worst series of options. That is not a particularly bad one. The U.S. hasn't cut off all support. It hasn't lifted sanctions on Russia. If we could manage to preserve much of the kind of preceding support, that's okay. But there are risks, though. I mean, it's still very unclear the value of Ukraine's rare earth minerals. But...

It's heartening to hear you say that. This is for Mike writes, my grandparents immigrated from Ukraine in the 20s. When my dad started kindergarten in Clifton, New Jersey, he spoke only Ukrainian. He went on to teach at the Air Force Academy and was a nuclear engineer. I'm a Gold Star sibling. My brother was killed in 2007 while serving in the army in Iraq.

Throughout Colonel Bidman's courageous testimony during the first impeachment and since, I've thought about how Colonel Bidman seems from a bygone era these days, acting out of loyalty to the highest ideals versus acting out of loyalty to a strong man, a guy like my dad, my brother, and so many honorable others. Do you believe that NATO minus the U.S. can hold the line against Russia for the foreseeable future?

Thank you so much for those very, very kind words. And I'm terribly sorry about your loss of your brother and appreciate your family service. I think it's an enormous loss if the U.S. is no longer the backbone of NATO. The U.S.,

provided a disproportionate contribution to NATO and European security. I think that was something that frankly was out of whack and multiple administrations over the past two decades have been trying to nudge the Europeans to play a larger role in NATO and in their own security. To be clear, the Biden administration moved the needle the most. After the war started in 2022,

The U.S. graduated to get 24 countries out of the 32 members of NATO to contribute 2% of their GDP to growth. I think there's a path where the Europeans are now interested in spending maybe 3% or 3.5%, which puts them on par with what the U.S. spends, frankly, for our defense.

But you don't have to burn bridges in order to do that. I think the threat environment itself counsels that the Europeans should be doing more and they're ready to do more. And the U.S. signaling that it has to shift priorities to the Indo-Pacific because China is part of that forcing function. But again, you do not need to break the most important relationship that the U.S. has from a security standpoint, an ironclad agreement with our allies

closest allies, but also the countries of the world that have the most in common with us, that we're not going to be there for them like they have been there for us.

After we were attacked on 9/11, they were there for us. We don't want to do this, to take a team sport and be an individual facing off against all the threats that we face in the 21st century. And that's what worries me about this approach that Donald Trump is taking. He's had a significant antipathy towards NATO for decades, for whatever reason, doesn't understand it. He thinks it's a, you know, an association that has to, that everybody pays, it's a dues organization.

And that's not the case. The case is, yes, even if the U.S. was absorbing a larger share of the cost, the benefit was that it was stability in Europe that enabled U.S. prosperity and U.S. trade. Now we have to probably do a little bit of rebalancing, but there are ways to do this. And what Trump is doing and his team is doing now,

on that front is dangerous. We are no longer reliable to our European allies. They already are making the noises of going alone. And to the point where they're thinking that they may have to put troops and forces into Ukraine to bolster Ukraine with the absence of U.S. support. And that's a dangerous mix. I think it's

It makes sense to me, but it's a dangerous mix in that the Russians then will have to decide of how they respond. Will they attack European states? Will they attack NATO? And that's where we're headed because the U.S. is signaling its weakness and is signaling that we might not be there for collective defense. Deborah on Blue Sky asks a simple question. Deborah writes, do you feel safe? And of course, as we talked about, your testimony formed the basis of the first impeachment case against Trump. And then...

Shortly after, Trump removed you from the National Security Council, stalled your ability to become full colonel. And I know that was very challenging for you and your family. You had a very challenging time after that. Now he is back, Trump.

has made his drive for retribution apparent. You're also among the people, Kash Patel, now head of the FBI, names in the appendix of his book as a member of the deep state that's widely understood to be an enemy's list. So I guess Deborah's not far off right in that question to you, Colonel Vindman. Do you feel safe? Yeah. I guess I would say this. I'm not oblivious to the potential dangers of

I'm on the Russian sanctions list and I guess the Trump's enemies list. I don't know. I guess it's a badge of courage. But look, I'm going to continue to do what I think is right. I wrote this book timed for release on the third anniversary of the war, trying to counsel that we've made mistakes and we could do better going forward.

You won't stifle me from speaking out. If I see something that is in my lane to weigh in on and add to the conversation and discourse, I'm not going to

self-censor. This is not the moment to do that. We're in great peril. I swore an oath to defend the Constitution of the United States against enemies, foreign and domestic. I did that for 22 years almost in uniform. Just because I was forced to retire doesn't mean that I've given up on my oath and obligations. So I'm going to continue to serve. And I'm not saying this with just bluster. I'm not

inviting this. But if they want to pick this fight, it's going to get ugly. I'm not going to back down. It sounds like you will not change. But I wonder if you feel like, I mean, you famously said in your testimony, Dad, I will be all right for telling the truth. You told your father not to worry. This was back in 2019, because you live in a country that would allow for you to give public testimony against your president, unlike in Russia, where it could cost you your life. But

Do you think what you believed then about how safe you were for doing the right thing because you live in America still holds up in the same way today?

It may not. But I think in that time, I was defending where we were back then. Now I think we have to be more aggressive in defending where we are now because we're sliding towards illiberalism. I don't think this is a time to cower in fear. This is a time to...

I think there's a desperate need for leadership and modeling the right behavior. I'm not saying that, you know, that's, I don't know if that's a role that I'm looking for, but I will not shirk from my responsibilities to stand up for what I think is right. We're talking with Colonel Vindman, and we're talking about Ukraine and the Trump administration and his new book, The Folly of Realism. This is a fundraising period for many public radio stations. You're listening to Forum. I'm Mina Kim.

Let me go to caller Ishan in Hayward. Hi, Ishan. You're on. Hello. Hi. Thanks for taking my call.

There's an old saying that friends can be changed but neighbors can't be. So given the situation that Ukraine will always be next to Russia, is it fair for the people of Ukraine to be the wall of the North? And is there another alternate solution instead of always instigating and fighting over this sort of dictatorial line versus democratic line? Is there a way that we can...

find a peaceful solution where people don't die on both sides and there is a long-term peace without having that human sacrifice to maintain democracy in Western Europe.

Thank you. That's a very interesting question. I'd say history suggests that a couple of different things. First of all, Ukraine's in a tough neighborhood. It's been fighting for its independence or for its national identity for centuries. And I think the Ukrainians would be willing to bend over backwards to figure out an accommodation. It's the Russians that are imperialist aggressive, and they haven't reconciled with the fact that the Ukrainians will defend themselves.

But if we go back deeper into European history, there is all sorts of evidence of tough neighborhoods and inveterate enemies, the French and the Germans. And they figured out how to live together. But they figured out how to live together based on some sort of...

Shared values Russia's not there yet so I think it's gonna be for the time being a muscular defense until Russia is the one that reconciles itself with the world as as it was developing for for quite some time with a major step back now with a surge of authoritarianism, so I don't know if the onus is on Ukraine to appease

They're willing to look at different types of examples. It's really on Europe to defend its interests, its values, its security. I don't think that this format, like the book points out, of catering to Russia...

allowing Russia to get its way is going to end with Ukraine. If Russia is successful there, it absorbs 40 million people, a massive country with all sorts of gifts.

And then it looks eyes other parts of the world, other parts of its neighborhood for continued empire building. So this is this is one that needs to be fought and worth fighting for. The Ukrainians are willing to do it. We should be there to support them. Let me go to Katie in Cordova. Katie, you're on.

Thank you so much. Colonel Vindman, first just to let you know that many of us recognize your service and your sacrifice and that of your family. And thank you very much. And we hope that we may have the same courage, too, if the need arises.

But my question pertains to the Belarusian people. And in the past, they have stood in the streets by hundreds of thousands to protest and iron fist. And I'm wondering where they stand now and what role Belarus might be playing in the near future. Unfortunately, not a lot of optimism there. They've been suppressed.

They've been suppressed by the security apparatus. They still actually have a KGB in Belarus. So the KGB is effectively weeding out opposition leaders and suppressing...

any resistance from the population bolstered by Russia's massive repressive machine and resources and I think the the hope for the bell Russian people is non-existent, especially if you end up in a situation where Ukraine loses its own sovereignty and independence and

If Ukraine is able to achieve a ceasefire, a peace, and Russia absorbs a loss, and it doesn't mean that it's maximally Ukraine liberating all territory, then there's hope for other countries in the region, including Belarus. But not at the moment, unfortunately. When do you think this war will end? Do you think it will end with this potential collapse?

I agree. I, you know, I'm just so curious because you open your book saying you don't think it'll end in 2025. Right. I don't think it's going to end in 2025 and it's going to go into 2026. And partially because the approach that Donald Trump is taking is really repeating the worst mistakes of the past. He is...

catering to a Russia first policy, alleviating the pressure on Russia. And Russia is feeling a lot of pressure. It is not one of these things. You look at the map and, you know, Russia dwarfs Ukraine. But the fight in the Ukrainian people, how effectively they've been defending on the battlefield, even as Russia takes tiny amounts of territory, they have been taking tiny amounts of territory, but at an exceptionally high cost. The Ukrainians could probably hold better than the Russians. And we can't alleviate the pressure on Russia. Colonel Bimman, thank you so much for talking with us.

Thank you. Thank you, listeners, for your questions for Colonel Vindman and for sharing your own experiences. Thank you, Susie Britton, for producing this segment. The book is The Folly of Realism, and you've been listening to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. Funds for the production of Forum are provided by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Generosity Foundation, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.