Julia Ioffe on What Putin Really Wants and Fears
The Lawfare Podcast
The Lawfare Institute
4.7 • 6.4K Ratings
🗓️ 9 January 2018
⏱️ 48 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Behind the legend of Vladimir Putin, which America’s obsession with Russia’s meddling in the 2016 elections has only bolstered, hides a complex political landscape, history and—of course—president. To dispel the myth behind Russia’s president and explore the man underneath the facade, Russia expert and staff writer for The Atlantic Julia Ioffe recently published an essay titled “What Putin Really Wants.” Last week, Ioffe joined guest host Alina Polyakova to discuss her piece, and what young Russians actually think about America’s fixation on their country.
Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | The following podcast contains advertising. |
| 0:04.0 | To access an ad-free version of the LawFair podcast, |
| 0:08.0 | become a material supporter of LawFair at patreon.com slash law fair. |
| 0:14.0 | That's patreon.com slash law fair. |
| 0:18.0 | Also, check out LawFair's other podcast offerings, |
| 0:22.0 | rational security, chatter, law fair no bull, and the aftermath. |
| 0:30.0 | The answer to what Putin really wants is quite simple, |
| 0:36.0 | and what he wants is to stay in power. |
| 0:39.0 | He wants to stay in power another day, another week, another year, |
| 0:42.0 | maybe another decade. |
| 0:44.0 | But the longer that time horizon becomes, |
| 0:47.0 | the more naturally fearful he becomes. |
| 0:50.0 | One, because to stay in power that long, you need to exercise certain autocratic tactics, |
| 0:56.0 | and he definitely has those tendencies kind of hardwired into him from his Soviet past, |
| 1:03.0 | which then draws the attention of the US and presidents like George W. Bush, |
| 1:08.0 | who was all about democracy, promotion abroad. |
| 1:11.0 | That's the thing is, he doesn't differentiate necessarily between Trump and Obama and George W. Bush. |
| 1:18.0 | He's on his third American president, and he sees a continuum of American foreign policy, |
| 1:23.0 | which is about promoting American values abroad, |
| 1:26.0 | which to him is just a Trojan horse for hard American power abroad. |
| 1:33.0 | I'm Alina Poyakova, and this is the LawFair podcast, January 9th, 2018. |
| 1:39.0 | In this installment of the special series on Russia, |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Lawfare Institute, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Lawfare Institute and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.