The world would have been completely different if at the same time as the Warsaw Pact had

been disbanded, NATO said, well right now is the time for a completely new look at security

in Europe.

Didn't happen, didn't happen for all sorts of reasons, but now we're looking at one very

large, very powerful alliance, which Russia has always seen as a tool of the United States.

NATO can say it's defensive, but absolutely as often and as loudly as it likes, Russia

doesn't accept that.

Hello and welcome to the Brendan O'Neal show with me, Brendan O'Neal.

This is a podcast in which an esteemed guest joins me to talk about the big ideas, the

bad ideas, the problems and the controversies of life in the early 21st century.

In this episode, I am delighted to be joined by Mary DeGefsky.

Mary is a writer and broadcaster with decades of experience.

She's a foreign affairs columnist for the independent and a frequent contributor to

spiked.

She's previously been a foreign correspondent in Moscow, Paris and Washington, and a special

correspondent in China.

She's often covered history in the making.

She was in Moscow during the collapse of communism, her five years reporting from Washington

led right up to the tense, tired election of 2000 and the eventual victory of George W. Bush,

and she was diplomatic correspondent for the independent before enduring the war in Iraq.

Mary, so we are over a month now into this war, and according to the coverage, it's

hard to tell in the fog of war, of course, but things do seem to be going quite badly

...