US Institute of Peace and the Russo-Ukraine war

Ambassador William B. Taylor Jr., Vice President for Russia and Europe of the US Institute of Peace (USIP), discusses his work at USIP focusing primarily on the current Russo-Ukraine war. 

Ambassador Taylor is a West Point graduate with 6 years in the US Army including 18 months in Vietnam. He has a Masters in Public Policy from Harvard and decades of public service in various roles. This includes serving in the Department of Energy, the Department of the Treasury, the Office of Management and Budget, the Council of Economic Advisers, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the State Department. The latter included service in Iraq and Israel-Palestine before being named the US ambassador to Ukraine from 2006 to 2009 under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. 

Spencer Graves and Karl Brooks interview Ambassador Taylor.

Regarding deterrence, Taylor insisted that NATO successfully deterred the Soviet Union from invading Western Europe, and more recently, Putin’s perceptions of the relatively weak military maintained by Ukraine encouraged led to the current Russo-Ukraine war. He insists that deterrence works. He does not agree with Richard Ned Lebow, who said that a deterrence strategy is as likely to provoke as prevent undesired behaviors. (See the interview with Lebow on Radio Active Magazine 2023-11-28 and his comments for All Souls Forum, broadcasts on KKFI 2024-03-26.)

 


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