Gahy humans, welcome to safe space for dangerous ideas.

Here's a dangerous idea.

Is Vladimir Putin on the brink of finally achieving what he's been trying to do for two years,

which is essentially wait us out and create a situation in which we get tired enough and cautious enough that by default,

he cares more about Ukraine than we do, and he's able to pivot, stay the course, and

defeat Ukraine.

There are concerns that we are reaching a tipping point

and that the Ukraine war is descending badly.

What does that mean not for Ukraine,

but for the stability of Europe,

for the citizens of Eastern and Central Europe, and most importantly for the liberal

world order that we all have an interest in seeing sustained today, a fascinating conversation

from someone who's been to Ukraine a number of times and can tell us both what it's like

on the ground and what the implications are for the globe

at this pivotal moment and why this moment is so pivotal.

Marcus Walker is a fantastic journalist, an old friend of mine.

He is ostensibly the South Europe bureau chief for the Wall Street Journal, which means

that he's stationed in Rome and he covers

all the stories coming out of Italy, Spain and Portugal.

But because there aren't always earth-shattering stories coming out of that part of the world,

and he has previously had more senior positions at the journal, for example, he was the

chief European economics correspondent during the global financial crisis and lived in Athens when

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