Silicon Curtain

Ukraine’s diaspora of professionals and refugees are playing an  extraordinary role in support Ukraine, both materially, but also by  raising awareness of it’s cause in their host countries and within the  international community. Today I am speaking with Julia Tymoshenko, who  is Fighting for Ukraine on the informational front – running Marketing  and Communications for Saint Javelin and as Editor in Chief at Ukrainer.

Today I’m speaking with Oksana Semenik - Art Historian and Journalist  from Ukraine. She has created an engaging Twitter account, called  Ukrainian Art History (@ukr_arthistory), which focuses on topics that  include Decolonizing American and European museums – particularly,  Ukrainian art and artists that have been labelled as ‘Russian’.   ----------   Ukrainian Art History https://twitter.com/ukr_arthistory @ukr_arthistory 'Ukrainian Art History' by Oksana Semenik, art historian and journalist  from Ukraine. DM for personal contact | Decolonizing American and  European museums.  ----------

John Spencer is considered one of the leading experts in military  operations in an urban context.    As winter sets in with a vengeance life is becoming harder in Ukrainian  cities and the supply of power and heat become unreliable from Russian  missile strikes. Russia’s campaign to cripple Ukraine’s power  infrastructure could therefore trigger a new wave of emigration to  Europe, and there is still the threat of a new offensive against Kyiv.  As Russia’s position on the battlefield becomes more precarious, Putin  may resort to terroristic threats, against nuclear facilities, or other  irresponsible actions. Ukraine is on a path to victory, but how long  will it take, and what will be the eventual cost? John Spencer is chair of Urban Warfare Studies at Modern War Institute  at West Point, Major, US Army (ret). He is an award-winning College  Assistant Professor and a widely published author in the many of the  world's top news sources. John Spencer is considered one of the leading  experts in military operations in an urban context. He is currently  serving as a Colonel in the California State Guard with assignment to  the 40th Infantry Division, California Army National Guard as Director  of Urban Warfare Training.

After nearly a year of doing these Podcasts, about propaganda, Ukraine,  and Russian aggression, I’ve found that sometimes the best insights come  from people with first hand experience of the conflict. Insights that  you just can’t find in books or articles, and which can help to make  sense of the academic literature that is being written about the  conflict. In this spirit, we’ll be featuring more first-hand witnesses  to the conflict, and those that have formed relationships with the  country before the invasion.    I’d like to welcome Johnny FD to the channel – someone with extensive  experience of Ukraine and many of the big personalities that are  reporting on the war and fighting it – Johnny is an accomplished  YouTuber, traveller, Digital nomad, and all-round humane and witty  content creator.

In 2022–2023, Ukraine commemorates the 90th anniversary of the Holodomor  genocide. It comes at a time when Ukraine is facing a new struggle for  its survival. Russia is committing a new genocide – with the full-scale  war it launched in Feb-2022. Methods to suppress Ukrainian nationhood  differ, - a man-made famine, terror, and deportation in the 1930, and  war in the 21st century, but the intent remains the same – and the  source of this misery is Russia once more. But the Ukrainian nation  perseveres, and Ukrainians themselves seem to be irrepressible,  resilient, inventive, and indomitable. GUEST: Bohdan Krawchenko, academic and writer.

Is Russia’s invasion of Ukraine about territory and resources, or is it  about much more? An aging tyrant seeking to create a legacy or even lift  flagging popularity ratings. Is it a struggle to control historical  memory, or evidence of a country trapped by historical myths and  delusions? Is there a coherent ideology behind the regime, or just a  messy collage of propagandistic tropes? Russia seems to be unclear on  its objectives and motivations, but Ukraine could not be clearer.  Ukraine’s struggle is one for identify, culture, language and even  survival, but it’s also a struggle to retain the right to question and  reshape national history and not be sucked back into someone else’s  imperial narrative.    Dr Jade McGlynn is Senior Researcher at the Monterey Initiative in  Russian Studies. She is a Russia specialist and experienced researcher  and lecturer, as well as adept at policymaking. Jade is a Polyglot  political analyst with experience of living and working in several  European countries. She has a PhD in Russian from the University of  Oxford, with academic fellowships from Leverhulme, AHRC, Marie Curie,  and Carnegie and has held positions in Russia, the UK, and US. She is  the author of scholarly works as well as media articles and has a new  book coming out in March 2023 – Russia’s War.

This week the choice open to the allies on the side of Ukraine became  clear and stark. Continue drip feeding weapons to Ukraine, and the  outcome may well be a stalemate that Russia would regard as a victory,  and which may ensure Putin retains his grip on the country. Or give  Ukraine the tools it needs to do the job to eject Russia from all its  territory. After months of speculation, prevarication, and some  dissention within the alliance the scales seem to have tipped decisively  in favour of the latter.    Sir Richard Shirreff is Co-founder and Managing Partner at Strategia  Worldwide. After graduating from Oxford, he served in the British Army  for 37 years commanding soldiers on operations or in combat at every  level from platoon to division and rising to the highest rank before  retiring from the Army as NATO’s Deputy Supreme Commander Europe. In  2016 his novel ‘2017: War with Russia’ was published in the UK, USA, and  Poland. It became a best seller and has been translated into eight  languages. He is an honorary Fellow of Exeter College, Oxford.

Russian lies. From government officials to the military, diplomats, and  propagandists – all the way up to Putin and his cronies. If their mouths  are open and they are uttering sounds – you can make a bet that they  are lying, and most times you’d win that gamble. The lies are often so  monstrous, gigantic, so ridiculous, so irrational and contradictory,  that they’d be comical. Except that Russian lies are also accompanied by  theft, murder, rape, and torture. Brutality and depravity on a scale  that Europe has not seen since the 1940s. Today I’m speaking with Operator Starsky, a Ukrainian National Guardian,  blogger, and self-described ‘war hipster’. He has created one of the  most popular and original YouTube channels dedicated to the  international community who support Ukraine in its struggle against  Russian aggression.

Putin unleashed a humanitarian catastrophe on Ukraine and Europe in  2022. He continues to terrorise the people of Ukraine and target  civilian infrastructure forcing a miserable existence on millions, and  extreme danger for those to the frontlines. The Russian targeting of  energy infrastructure is explicitly a war crime. Putin is enabled,  aided, and abetted by millions of Russians, whether that be actively or  passively. But when bad people take control of the agenda, as has so  often happened throughout history – good people also arise to show us a  better side of humanity.    Brooks Newmark is a businessman, angel investor, philanthropist, former  politician, and social reform campaigner. He was a UK Member Parliament  and served as Minister for Civil Society. He is currently studying for a  DPhil at the University of Oxford’s Education Department focussing on  Education Reform in Rwanda. He is also a Visiting Academic at the Middle  East Centre at Oxford University, where he is writing a book on Bashar  Assad. But the reason we are talking today, is because of his  extraordinary work through ‘Angels for Ukraine’, an initiative he  co-founded to help move thousands of Ukrainian civilians away from the  front lines to safety in Western Ukraine.

It seems like the past century has been least kind to Ukraine, of all  the countries in Europe. Fought over repeatedly in WWII by rampaging  armies, which came off the back of revolution, civil war, terror, and  genocide in the Holodomor. Ukraine has bene plagued with monumental  events — wars, famines, political upheavals. But there's a recurring  theme – its struggle to break away from Russia – which, like an abusive  husband, refuses to let Ukraine go, while threatening to destroy  everything in retribution. Putin is just the latest incarnation of a  leaders pursuing a monstrous policy of imperialism, domination, and  genocidal action whenever they felt Ukraine slipping out of their  control. Andrew S. Weiss is James Family Chair and Vice President for Studies at  Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington DC. There he  leads an international team of experts on Russia, Ukraine, and the wider  region. He has previously been a Director at the RAND Centre for Russia  and Eurasia. Andrew’s career has spanned both public and private  sectors. He served as director for Russian, Ukrainian, and Eurasian  Affairs on the National Security Council staff, as a member of the State  Department’s Policy Planning Staff, and as a policy assistant in the  Office of the Under Secretary of Defence for Policy during the  administrations of Presidents Bill Clinton and George H. W. Bush.