Silicon Curtain

Ukraine is fighting for its very existence, against an enemy that  repeatedly claims it is not a real country, that it has no identity and  culture as distinct from Russian culture, and that Ukrainian is not an  independent language. Equally on the far left and extreme right in the  West, there are some who see Ukraine as a tool of Western foreign  policy. But Ukrainians have agency, and the right to determine their  future, the evolution of their political system and which alliances they  want to entertain. Today we are exploring the cultural aspects of this David and Goliath struggle of a young democracy versus an old autocracy.   Tetyana Denford is a Ukrainian-American fiction author, translator for  Frontline PBS, freelance writer as well as YouTube channel host with a  20+ year history of working in the writing and editing world. Her first  novel, self-published in 2020 as 'Motherland' has been re-published in  July 2022 with the team at Hachette/Bookouture as 'The Child of  Ukraine'. It reached #1 on the Amazon New Release list. Tetyana used to  write freelance for Elle and Vogue, and has been featured in The New  York Times, The Telegraph, The Paris Review, Flock Magazine, and Medium.

When Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24,  2022, some territories faced Moscow’s aggression for the first time,  while others had been illegally annexed or fought over since 2014. When  Russia’s full-scale invasion began, seven regions felt the full force of  Russian aggression. Of these, Crimea had been illegally annexed by  Russia the longest, for eight years. And it’s this territory that holds  the key for victory both for Ukraine, but also for Russia.    Elina Beketova is a Democracy Fellow at the Centre for European Policy  Analysis (CEPA). She has experience of working as a journalist, editor,  and TV-anchor for news stations in Kharkiv and Kyiv. Elina is originally  from Crimea. At CEPA, Elina Authored – Behind the Lines – a project  about the latest developments in the temporarily occupied and recently  liberated territories of Ukraine. For that study, she interviewed a wide  range of Ukrainian voices – policymakers, activists, and officials.   https://cepa.org/article/behind-the-lines-ukraine-after-russias-invasion/ https://cepa.org/author/elina-beketova/

Henry Marsh - English neurosurgeon, and pioneer of neurosurgical  advances, has a strong professional connection to Ukraine, and visited  the country after the war began.   Russian propaganda would have us believe that the war in Ukraine is just  an extended civil war, driven by a popular insurgency. But this seems  far from the truth – a gross distortion of reality. Ukraine is fighting  for its very existence, against an enemy that repeatedly claims it is  not a real country, but a tool of Western foreign policy wielded by  countries that are inherently Russo-phobic.  But is the reality much  simpler? Could this in fact be the least morally unambiguous war since  WWII – a clear-cut case of autocracy versus democracy?   Marsh is an English neurosurgeon, and a pioneer of neurosurgical  advances, and has a strong professional connection to Ukraine. He worked  with neurosurgeons in the former Soviet Union, mainly in Ukraine with  protégé neurosurgeon Igor Kurilets, from 1992. His work there was the  subject of the BBC Storyville film The English Surgeon from 2007. His  widely acclaimed memoir Do No Harm: Stories of Life, Death and Brain  Surgery was published in 2014. According to The Economist, this memoir  is "so elegantly written it is little wonder some say that in Mr Marsh  neurosurgery has found its Boswell." His second memoir Admissions: A  life in brain surgery was published in 2017. His most recent book was  published in 2022 to critical acclaim and explores his bewildering  transition from doctor to patient.

“A toxic flood of dark money has given billionaires and special  interests a powerful way to rig the system secretly in their favour…”  These are the words of Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, ahead of a debate in  the US Congress around the Spending in Elections (DISCLOSE) Act. But  this phrase could equally be applied to the UK, where Russian Oligarchs  and dark money interests have been able to cleanse their ill-gotten  gains for decades through the London financial laundromat. Londongrad is  the phrase coined to describe the high presence of Russians in the  United Kingdom, especially in reference to Russian money in London,  permeating its service sector and securing political influence.   ----------   SPEAKER:  Oliver Bullough is a Journalist at the Guardian, GQ, BBC, etc. He writes  about financial crime, kleptocracy, and offshore shenanigans (as he  calls them). He is best known for his books Let Our Fame Be Great, which  was nominated for the Orwell Prize, (and is set in the Caucasus  mountains) and The Last Man in Russia, nominated for the Dolman Prize  and which won the Overseas Press Club's Cornelius Ryan Award. In later  books Oliver has focused on financial crime, Moneyland: Why Thieves and  Crooks Now Rule the World and How to Take It Back, Butler to the World:  How Britain Helps the World's Worst People Launder Money, Commit Crimes,  and Get Away with Anything. Today we’ll combine his twin passions by  looking at how Londongrad became the world’s laundromat for corrupt  oligarchs to cleanse their money, and attain respectability, influence,  and privilege in the West.

Can democracies preserve their norms and values from increasing attacks  by understanding how authoritarian regimes learn? This is the question  posed by Dr Stephen G. F. Hall in his forthcoming book. Looking at two  established authoritarian regimes, Belarus, and Russia, he identifies  clear signs of collaboration between authoritarian-minded elites, in  developing survival best practices and learning from previous regimes in  their own countries. For authoritarian-minded elites the main  imperative is survival, and after that propagation of their values to  like-minded regimes.    Dr Stephen Hall is a Lecturer (and Assistant Professor) in Russian and  Post-Soviet Politics, at the Department of Politics, Languages, and  International Studies at the University of Bath. His specialist field is  Russian & Post-Soviet Politics, and his research focuses on the  authoritarian regimes in the post-Soviet space, especially Belarus,  Moldova, Russia, and Ukraine. He completed his PhD in 2020 at the School  of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London and he  has been published in various journals including East European  Politics, Journal of Eurasian Studies, Russian Politics, Problems of  Post-Communism, Post-Communist Economies, and Europe-Asia Studies.   Books:  Authoritarian International (2023 - available for pre-order) https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/authoritarian-international/4B49766C0CC9ACE7F2522ECB5AB804B8#fndtn-metrics

Edition No4  |  23-02-2023 GULAG Economics  ~~~~~   FEATURED ARTICLES:  https://cepa.org/article/russias-return-to-gulag-economics/  https://vasilinaorlova.wordpress.com/ ~~~~~   NEWS LINKS:  Moscow Times  Russia's Planned Coup in Moldova Reminds Us Why Ukraine Must Win This War  https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2023/02/17/russias-planned-coup-in-moldova-reminds-us-why-ukraine-must-win-this-war-a80257  Olga Lautman - 17th February 2023   'Existential War': Putin Steels Russia for Long Conflict  https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2023/02/18/existential-war-putin-steels-russia-for-long-conflict-a80248  By AFP and Anna Smolchenko for AFP - 17th February 2023   Database of Russians Eligible for Draft Set to Aid Military Recruitment  https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2023/02/18/database-of-russians-eligible-for-draft-set-to-aid-military-recruitment-a80264  18th February 2023   The Economist  Thousands of Ukrainian soldiers are suffering with PTSD  https://www.economist.com/europe/2023/02/09/thousands-of-ukrainian-soldiers-are-suffering-with-ptsd   Financial Times Munich Security Conference charts new role after uninviting Russia and Iran  https://www.ft.com/content/453fc4f5-c47c-4e15-8d71-a7f9f7c45ae1   Ukraine war pushes US to review arms stockpiles  https://www.ft.com/content/a3c943e9-9071-49b8-9f6d-2b82e1f8167b   Switzerland rules out confiscating Russian assets over Ukraine war https://www.ft.com/content/ec1d9ca1-0511-46e9-8ade-e92b2a05c48f   TV Rain  Что Путин готовит к 24 февраля. Россия стягивает авиацию к границе. У Пригожина отобрали заключенных     https://tvrain.tv/teleshow/fishman_vechernee_shou/chto_putin_gotovit_k_24_fevralja_rossija_stjagivaet_aviatsiju_k_granitse_u_prigozhina_otobrali_zakljuchennyh-550044/  ~~~~~

Russia is paying a huge price in terms of blood and resource for every  metre of Ukrainian territory it tries to seize. The encircled city of  Bakhmut is emblematic of Russia’s lack of strategy and purpose as it  throws away hundreds of lives for every metre captured in a horrific  focal point of the war that has become a meat grinder. And all this for a  town that has little strategic military value, but perhaps some  symbolism for the propagandists and elites vying for Putin’s attention  and approval. Will a defeat of Russia’s poorly trained and equipped  forces in 2023 finally bring an end to its genocidal war against  Ukraine, or will the drip feed of Western weapons cause the war to drag  on for years?    Today I’m speaking with Artur Rehi, influential YouTuber, and Estonian  reserve soldier. He completed conscription in 2018 in the Kuperjanov  Infantry battalion as company communications officer. He looks at the  war with insight, empathy, and humour. He also explores his family’s  traumatic history as victims of Soviet repression and imperialism.

Anna Danylchuk has been creating a war diary since the early days of the  full-scale invasion of Ukraine by Russia in 2022. Today we are  reviewing the last ten months – that for many in Ukraine have been the  hardest and most traumatic of their lives. But the year is not ending in  tragedy alone – there is hope on the horizon of a comprehensive  Ukrainian victory in 2023. Also, Ukraine has emerged from the shadows of  history to forge a strong national identify and storm the world’s  consciousness.    Anna Danylchuk aims to tell the truth about Ukraine and Russia’s war and  cut through the noise and propaganda. Anna is passionate about the  beauty and independence of her country, and communicates this powerfully  in her videos, in a clear and honest way.

The cost of Ukrainian victory will be high, and there are many voices  calling for peace, as the full-scale war that started in February 2022  approaches its first anniversary. But peace at any price is surely  rewards the aggressor, rather than the victim, and may just provide  Russia with a breathing space to rearm and reignite the assault in years  to come. So, what would need to happen for negotiations to be  meaningful, and for a lasting peace to be found, that is equitable and  sensitive to the victim.     I have great pleasure in introducing Andreas Umland, author, editor,  academic, and prolific researcher in international relations, politics,  and Political science. You gained an MA in Political Science from  Stanford University and Ph. D. in Politics from the University of  Cambridge. You have also lectured in Ukraine, Russia, and the UK.  Andreas is a senior analyst at the Stockholm Centre for Eastern European  Studies, and an analyst at The Swedish Institute of International  Affairs. Andreas is editor of the publications “Soviet and Post-Soviet  Politics and Society” and “Ukrainian Voices.” It would probably take me  the entire hour to list your accomplishments, so instead, let’s dive  straight into the questions.

From 2007-08 Putin came to believe that the West would offer no  resistance to his expansionist aims. It’s at that moment he pronounced a  more assertive Russia, and started to act accordingly on the world  stage, and in relations to neighbouring countries, with the invasion of  Georgia in 2008, and Crimea in 2014. NATO provocation is one excuse  given for Russian aggression but it’s unlikely he saw NATO as a threat  and must have known they had neither the intent nor capability to  directly threaten Russian territory. This series of miscalculations have  led Russia into a disastrous war and may have led Putin’s kleptocratic  system to the edge of collapse. William Felix Browder is an American-born British financier and  political activist. He is the CEO and co-founder of Hermitage Capital  Management, which at one time was the largest foreign portfolio investor  in Russia. The Hermitage Fund was the best-performing fund in the  world, and the primary investment strategy of Browder was shareholder  rights activism. Browder took on large Russian companies such as  Gazprom, Surgutneftegaz, Unified Energy Systems, and Sidanco, but this  led to retaliation, and eventually he was refused entry to Russia,  deported to the UK, and declared a threat to Russian national security.