Downstream: Putin’s War in Ukraine Has Ancient Roots w/ Serhii Plokhy
Novara Media
Novara Media
4.8 • 1.5K Ratings
🗓️ 3 November 2025
⏱️ 98 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In 1989, Francis Fukuyama, then a very young political scientist, declared that history was over. He wrote a book with the same title just a couple of years later. The Cold War had finished, the USSR had collapsed, liberal democracy and market capitalism reigned supreme, and it wasn’t going to change. And yet in the last few years, the script has moved quite significantly. History has returned. Emblematic of that has been the conflict between Russia and Ukraine which began in 2022, although of course, you can date that back to 2014 when Russia annexed Crimea.
On Downstream this week is Serhii Plokhy, professor of Ukrainian history at Harvard University. He offers a deep history of Russia and Ukraine, the conflict, where it comes from, and where it sits within the broader sweep of collapsing empires. He’s also got a new book out, about nuclear weapons and nuclear energy: The Nuclear Age. They discuss what is driving Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine, almost four years after it began. What does Putin’s stated aim of ‘de-Nazification’ really mean? What role does Russia’s nuclear arsenal play in determining the shape of the conflict? And, in an increasingly multipolar world where history has indeed come back, is nuclear proliferation within the next ten years likely?
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | In 1989, Francis Fukuyama, a then very young American political sciences declared that history was over. |
| 0:15.1 | It had come to an end. |
| 0:16.2 | He wrote a book with the same title just a couple of years later. |
| 0:19.4 | The Cold War had finished, the USSR had collapsed, |
| 0:21.9 | liberal democracy and market capitalism reigned supreme, and it wasn't going to change. |
| 0:28.1 | And yet in the last few years, the script has moved quite significantly. History, some say, |
| 0:34.5 | has come back. Emblematic of that has been the conflict between Russia and Ukraine |
| 0:39.2 | over the last three years, although of course you can date that all the way back to 2014. |
| 0:46.0 | Today's guest is going to offer a deep history of Russia, Ukraine, that conflict, where it comes |
| 0:52.7 | from and where it sits within the broader sweep of collapsing |
| 0:56.4 | empires. He's also got a new book out about nuclear weapons, nuclear energy, the nuclear age. |
| 1:03.8 | So we're going to talk about Russia, Ukraine, but also the possibility of proliferation. |
| 1:10.0 | Is an increasingly multipolar world |
| 1:12.2 | where history has indeed come back, |
| 1:14.8 | also a world where more and more countries |
| 1:17.4 | have nuclear weapons. |
| 1:20.1 | Sergei Plokky, welcome to downstream. |
| 1:22.7 | It's a pleasure. |
| 1:23.9 | Very happy to have you on. |
| 1:25.0 | We're talking about your most recent book, |
| 1:29.5 | The Nuclear Age, but also Russia, Ukraine. You've been one of the most similar voices in that conflict. You yourself are from |
| 1:34.3 | what is now Ukraine, but you were born in the USSR. Yes. Whereabouts are you from originally? |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Novara Media, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Novara Media and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.