TRANSCRIPT

McFaul: Hey everyone, you're listening to World Class from the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanfo rd University. I'm your host, or maybe I should say I'm your co-host, or maybe I should say this is the last time I'll be hosting World Class from Stanford University. Because as listeners and followers of FSI’s news may know, after eleven years, I just stepped down as the director a few weeks ago and I've handed the baton to my guest today, Colin Kahl, who's the brand new director of the Freeman Spogli Institute.

And it is fantastic, Colin, that you agreed to take on this assignment. This is another form, I consider, of public service just like what you've done for the U.S. government and the United States of America.

Colin, as you're going to hear in a few minutes, is the perfect mix of scholar and practitioner that we so value here at FSI. And we are really lucky that you are taking up this assignment.

So Colin, welcome to World Class where everybody will be listening to you forthcoming for, I hope, many, many years.

Kahl: Thanks Mike, it's a real pleasure to be with you and most especially thank you for your tremendous decade plus—eleven years—of service to FSI and the Stanford community. And I look forward to continuing to work with you as you transition to the next thing. And we should talk about that too. But it's great to be on the pod with you.

McFaul: Glad to be here. And just so everybody knows, I stepped down from FSI, but I'm not retiring from Stanford. I still have my various day jobs here. We can come back to that a little bit later.

But Colin, why don't you just tell our listeners and our viewers a little bit about your road to this present position.

Kahl: Yeah, sure. So I grew up in the Bay Area. I grew up in the East Bay in Richmond, California. I applied to Stanford as an undergrad, didn't get in. Applied again as a graduate student, didn't get in. So I got educated elsewhere. I went to the University of Michigan, which is a great school.

McFaul: Very fine institution.

Kahl: And then I went to Columbia University where I got my PhD in political science, focused on international relations and conflict studies. I did my PhD work in the 90s when the field of international relations was trying to figure out what the field even meant after the end of the Cold War.

So it was an exciting and very kind of plastic moment to be doing scholarly work.

I then started my first teaching job at the University of Minnesota in 2000. And of course, a year after that, 9/11 happened. And it was a terrible event for the United States and for the world. For those of us who lived in New York City—I did my graduate work there—it was especially painful.

And it really drove me to want to figure out a way to both do the academic side of understanding the world, but also see if there was a way to engage in public service. So my fifth year at the University of Minnesota, I actually got a fellowship through the Council on Foreign Relations . . .

McFaul: Right.

Kahl: . . . that put me at the Pentagon for a year and a half. This was during the George W. Bush administration. Don Rumsfeld was still the Secretary of Defense. I worked there for a year and a half. I kind of caught the bug, the Washington bug.

McFaul: What was your portfolio back then, Colin? Just remind everybody.

Kahl: So I worked in a small office called the Stability Operations Office. It was only 24 of us. worked within the office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy. It had historically been called the Peacekeeping and Humanitarian Affairs Office

McFaul: Right, right, I remember that. They changed it, right.

Kahl: But Rumsfeld was not a fan of peacekeeping, so they changed it to ‘stability operations.’

But at the time, most of what our office did was try to help the U.S. military reform itself in the face of the struggles that the U.S. military was facing in Iraq and Afghanistan with the stabilization missions there.

There's a lot of dark humor at the Pentagon, but we sometimes joked that the 24 of us were doing stability operations while the other 24,000 people in the building were doing instability operations.

McFaul: [laughing] Instability operations, yeah, that’s right.

Kahl: But anyway, it was totally exciting. You know, we were there when when U.S. counterinsurgency doctrine was being revised and a bunch of other things.

So that was 2005, 2006. I kind of caught the bug and decided to try to stay in Washington. So I actually took a job at the Georgetown School of Foreign Service where they were kind enough to give me tenure and I taught in the security studies program there for a decade.

McFaul: Let's just . . . hold on, hold on. Let's be clear. They were not ‘kind enough’ to give you tenure; you earned tenure. Nobody gives tenure anywhere. Congratulations that you landed that job.

Kahl: So, I was in the security studies program there for ten years, about a half that time I served in the Obama administration. We served together . . .

McFaul: Together, yes!

Kahl: . . . in the first few years. I was back at the Pentagon as the deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East during the drawdown of our forces from Iraq during the Arab Spring.

McFaul: Right.

Kahl: During the first flare up of Israel-Iran tensions over Iran's nuclear program. By the way, none of that was my fault, but I was there when all that stuff happened.

And then I went back to Georgetown for a few years and then I got pulled back into the Obama administration at the end to work at the White House as a deputy assistant to the president and as then-vice president Biden's national security advisor. So I was there for Russia's first invasion of Ukraine . . .

McFaul: Right.

Kahl: . . . and the Central American migration crisis and tensions in the South China Sea and the campaign against the Islamic State and the Iran nuclear deal. A lot of interesting things.

And then, when Trump was elected the first time, Mike, you reached out to me with this amazing opportunity at Stanford, the Steven C. Házy Senior Fellow chair that I currently occupy. Applied for the job and got it. It was an opportunity to come back to Stanford. I’ve sat at CISAC, the Center for International Security and Cooperation here at FSI. And I was the co-director of CISAC for a couple of years.

And then last but not least, when Biden was elected president, he asked me to serve as the undersecretary of defense for policy back at DoD, which is essentially the number three civilian and senior policy advisor to the secretary. And I did that for the two first two and a half years of the Biden administration.

Also also very interesting times: fall of Afghanistan . . .

McFaul: Yes.

Kahl: . . . Russia's further invasion of Ukraine, rising tensions with China, dealing with the aftermath of COVID, lot of changes in the world.

So anyway, I'm glad to be back at Stanford. I've been back since the summer of 2023, and I'm excited to try to fill the very big shoes that you've left at FSI after eleven years.

McFaul: Well, let's talk about the future in a minute, but just two follow-up questions on your history. You've had lots of government jobs you just described. I can't think of anybody that's had a more diversified set of experiences in national security. We are lucky to have you here.

Tell us about the best day of any of those jobs and tell us about the worst day and maybe reverse that. Worst day first, best day second.

Kahl: So first of all, I'm fortunate to have had the opportunity to serve my country. I believe in it strongly. I've served in Republican administrations and Democratic administrations. I've worked for two Republican secretaries of defense and two Democratic secretaries of defense. So I think I've demonstrated my nonpartisan bona fides in how I've served my country.

And I just want to mention that because I think it's important.

McFaul: Yes, it is important.

Kahl: Because, of course, FSI is a nonpartisan place.

Worst day and best day: in a sense, it's almost the same. There was no more harrowing experience than the collapse of Kabul.

I was actually at the NIH getting a medical treatment when I got a text message from the secretary's chief of staff that I needed to hurry back to the Pentagon. So I literally pulled an IV out of my arm and raced back to the Pentagon because Kabul fell.

And obviously that was a tremendously terrible event for Afghanistan. It was a particularly harrowing way for the 20-year U.S. involvement in Afghanistan to end. But it also put us on the clock. You know, we had basically 17 days before the deadline for all American forces to be out of Afghanistan, and we suddenly had to do a lot of things.

We had to flood forces back into the country to occupy an airport that was now in hostile Taliban territory when the Taliban took over Kabul. We had to secure that airport. We sent five or six thousand soldiers and Marines to that airfield. We had postured them in the region previously to be able to do that, but we had to get them there.

McFaul: Right.

Kahl: And then we then had to oversee the evacuation of 125,000 human beings in two weeks, which had never happened in human history and no other country in the history of the world would have been capable of doing. And it was pretty horrible.

McFaul: Yeah.

Kahl: A lot of terrible human tragedies. Obviously, we got a lot of people out. A lot of people weren't able to get out. There was the terrible ISIS bombing that killed 13 of our brave service members. Toward the end of the evacuation, there was an errant U.S. strike on what we thought was an ISIS operator that turned out to be an aid worker and his kids. It was horrible.

But I'm also incredibly proud of what we were able to do. I mean, in the macro sense, because we were able to project our power back into Afghanistan, lock down that airfield and get all of those people to safety, including the family members of some Afghans who worked for me. We were able to get a lot of people out.

We were able to bring them to bases and facilities that didn't even exist when the crisis . . . I mean the bases existed, but the facilities to house these people in the Gulf and in Europe and back here in the continental United States . . . the amount of diplomacy that required, the amount of logistics by the U.S. military that it required. It was an unbelievable operation.

And so it was terrible. But it was also an extraordinary demonstration of what the United States was capable of doing even at these dark moments.

McFaul: That's a great way to put it together. I would guess we would not have been able to do that if we did not have NATO allies and bases in that part of the world, or is that incorrect? I don't know the logistics of that part of the world.

Kahl: If anything, it's an understatement. I think one of the things that distinguishes the United States from every other superpower or global power in history is the depth and breadth of our network of allies and partners. At the heart of that are our treaty allies in the NATO alliance, but also in the Indo-Pacific region, so think South Korea, Japan, Australia.

McFaul: All of them, right.

Kahl: But we also have very close security partnerships in the Middle East. And so literally it would not have been possible to fly aircraft into Afghanistan, fly people out from Afghanistan into places like Qatar, Bahrain, UAE, Saudi Arabia. But then we brought them to Germany and Spain and other U.S. bases in Europe. And then we brought them back to bases here in the United States.

And that network, literally that network made it possible. And had we not had those allies and partners when that happened, we couldn't have done what we did. We couldn't have done any of it. We couldn't have gotten any of our people out.

And so that really is like some of the secret sauce to America's power and influence in the world. And it remains the case that we have more allies and partners than any other country in history.

But it's also the case that those alliances and partnerships are probably more strained than they've been in my lifetime.

McFaul: So, one other historical question about you. Why did you come to Stanford? I mean, you've got this great job at Georgetown. You obviously are connected to the policy community. We're far away out here. Tell us about that decision.

Kahl: Part of it is I grew up in the Bay Area. Part of it is that, mean, Georgetown is a remarkable place, but Stanford's one of the two or three best universities in the world. We had a great community of scholars out here. And a lot of the issues that I'm particularly passionate about now—especially the intersection of technology and geopolitics— I mean, this is ground zero for a lot of that.

And so it was for a mix of kind of lifestyle reasons and professional reasons. And it's been awesome.

McFaul: Well, that's a great segue to what I wanted to ask you next, which is about the big agenda items. I mean, FSI has a lot going on: we have lots of centers here, as our listeners know, because we've had many guests from all, I think all of our centers over the time I've been here.

But you've got some particular things that you want to focus on. I know, because I talked to people that were part of the selection committee, that that was what was most impressive about you, is that you have a big agenda. Tell us about that agenda, Colin.

Kahl: As your longtime listeners undoubtedly know, FSI is an interesting place because FSI Central, where you were the director until three weeks ago, and now I sit, essentially sits over nine main research centers that cover everything from democracy to international security to regions like Asia and Europe to issues like technology and defense innovation, food security, global health.

And the breadth of this place is extraordinary. But it's also a highly decentralized place. Yes, we oversee the centers, but in many respects, the centers are kind of quasi-autonomous nation states.

McFaul: Exactly, exactly.

Kahl: So this isn't about trying to micro-manage our centers; that would be a fool's errand. It is actually, though, trying to look for ways to have the whole of FSI add up to more than the sum of its parts. And to look for synergies across our centers on really big questions.

You took the helm of FSI, I believe, back in 2015?

McFaul: Yes.

Kahl: To state the obvious, the world in 2026 is a lot different than it was in 2015. And so, FSI has to adapt to that world. And I think there are four really big questions of the moment that I think FSI really needs to be impactful on.

One is that we're in this new age of geopolitics. And it's become kind of trite to note that, you know, we have a resurgence of great power politics and competition between the United States and China and Russia and other major powers. But it actually runs deeper than that.

The distribution of power in general across the world is fundamentally different than it was 15, 20 years ago, let alone 50 years ago. The United States remains the world's most consequential actor, but China is nipping at our heels as a global superpower. And while Russia can't dominate the world, Russia can blow up the world. And we also know that countries like China, Russia, North Korea, Iran are working more closely together.

At the same time, the traditional role that the United States has played in the world since World War II or since the end of the Cold War is changing. And our relationship with our traditional allies is changing. And I think anybody who kind of paid attention to the World Economic Forum in Davos over the last few days heard speeches from the Prime Minister of Canada referring to the rupture in the international order.

And there's just the sense that things are fundamentally changing. And some of that may be a direct reaction to some of the policies of President Trump. But frankly, I think a lot of it is structural, that the policies of the current administration are as much an artifact as they are a cause even if they are accelerating some of the structural dynamics.

And then of course, there's big chunks of the world that doesn't want to be on anybody's team.

McFaul: Right.

Kahl: That wants to be non-aligned and multi-aligned. A lot of countries in the so-called ‘global south’ fall in that category. So we should be studying this new era of geopolitics

I would encourage you to say more about how you plan to study it, because I know you have a really fascinating project in this space that brings FSI and Hoover scholars together on some of these questions.

Kahl: So, one issue is the new geopolitics. The other though is what I call the new techno politics. It's actually a term I think Ian Bremmer coined.

But it's not just the notion that technologies like AI, biotech, quantum, space, clean energy are transforming our world, but also that the actors at the heart of these innovations are these multinational corporations that if their market cap was translated into GDP,

they would rank as G20 nations, right? When you're Nvidia and you have $5 trillion

McFaul: That's a great point.

Kahl: Like that would be the top half of the G20. But it's not just that. They have global presence. And for a lot of these companies, they have near sovereign control over the environments through which we live our lives.

McFaul: That's a great point.

Kahl: So, think cloud service providers, social media platforms, but also the infrastructure: undersea cables, low earth orbit constellations. And all of these things are under regulated spaces. So, it's not just that the technology is changing the world, but the companies are international actors. And again, where else should we be studying that but here at Stanford?

McFaul: Right.

Kahl: The third thing is there's a broader category of what people might refer to as existential risk. Nuclear weapons and the salience of nuclear weapons are back with a vengeance. For the first time, we're entering a world in which there are not two but three nuclear peers as China quadruples its nuclear arsenal. India and Pakistan are at loggerheads. They both have nuclear weapons. Israel and Iran are at loggerheads over Iran's quest for nuclear weapons. North Korea is expanding its arsenal. And arms control is breaking down.

So we know that the nuclear age is back with a vengeance. Simultaneously, we're facing the climate crisis. We all lived through COVID. It won't be the last pandemic, unfortunately, I think, in our lifetimes. There are other biosecurity risks emanating from emerging technologies. And then there's also the possibility that technologies like AI will produce their own existential externalities in the form of things like rogue super intelligence or other things.

So we should be studying those things. And then lastly, I think we have to be studying the future of global democracy because democracy is under siege around the world from revisionist authoritarian powers like Russia and China. But it's also eroding in many traditional democracies that are becoming increasingly illiberal.

And advanced democracies no longer agree on what democracy is. A big divide between the United States and Europe at the moment is both laying claim to being democratic, but in fundamentally different ways.

And so the point just is, we have 150 researchers at FSI, 50 of them are tenured faculty, many of them were working at the intersection of these issues. I want to support that and I also want them to do more together.

McFaul: That sounds fantastic. That is the agenda for our moment. And I think you're right that we have some people that work on some of those things, but we have holes to fill. And I wish you success in doing that to compliment what we have here, but also to try to get these different scholars that work on these different pieces to understand how they are intertwined, right?

The future of global democracy is also highly impactful on geopolitics and vice versa. I think that is a great agenda for FSI for the future.

I mean, on my own piece: I would just say in terms of what I want to work on, I have a lot of interests, but the main research one is I just did finish this book, as listeners will know, called Autocrats vs. Democrats, China, Russia . . .

Kahl: Available now!

McFaul: Available now! Available while you're listening on your phone. You can get it, and it's highly discounted now. And I'm going to tell you a little story about that actually, Colin. I don't think we've talked about it. The original title was ‘American Renewal.’ That was like two or three years ago. Then it switched the title to ‘Autocrats vs. Democrats.’ But the subtitle, until just a few months ago was ‘China, Russia and the New Global Order.’ The now title is ‘China, Russia, America and the New Global Disorder,’ reflecting a year ago what I thought was going to be a pretty tumultuous time. And I think I underestimated how tumultuous it is and your agenda is addressing that.

But I would say two things that I want to do here at FSI. One is, when I was working on this book, I knew a lot about the Cold War, so there's a debate, are we in the Cold War or not? And I addressed that. My answer is yes and no.

But I knew a lot about the Cold War. I know quite a bit about Russia. I know a fair bit about America and America's place in the world, both from teaching and being in the government. But I had to learn a lot about China. And I've been going to China for three decades, but I'm not an expert. It took me a long time. That's why it took me eight years to finish this book

But there were two big gaps that I saw at the end of it. One is we have a lot of great people working on capabilities of these various great powers. We have a really great literature on intentions of America, Russia, and China. And big debates, by the way, on the intentions, especially on the China side. I would say comparing the debate in the Russia field to China field, there's a lot more consensus in the Russia field about intentions of Putin's Russia than there is of Xi's China, and that's a good thing. I think that debate is unsettled and we should keep interrogating our hypotheses.

But what I was really struck by is very little examination. And with some exceptions, I'm looking at my shelf. There's some really great books. But there's not that many books that look at impact of this competition on other countries in the world. And when you do find great books—there's a great one on China and Zambia, for instance—it's just China and its impact on Zambia. There's no Europe in that story. There's no Russia in that story. There's no America in that story. So that's the academic kind of research project that I want to do here with Liz Economy from the Hoover Institution, Jim Goldgeier—he's going to cover the European part. And that'll take many, many years because we want to really get into the nitty gritty of these countries. And we want to find country experts to be the main people that write that.

The second part in my book—you know, my book looks at the debate, examines where we're at, and then has these three prescriptive chapters. And even had Vice President Harris won the election last year, the structural things that you identified would have been still a part of our trying to figure out where we're going and the debate about international order and how to manage the decline of democracy, technology and the global order, that would all been there. But to your other point you made earlier, it's been accelerated by President Trump.

And in my public policy life, I want to keep engaging that debate because yes, the old order is broken. We're not going to go back to it. But the idea that we have to just go back to some Hobbesian jungle that Trump seems to want to fight in, I don't accept that as an inevitable consequence. And even if it is analytically, and I'm wrong about that, I want to do everything I can to avoid it, even if it's going to be in failure. In a way, Trump has moved us in a different direction and I want to be part of that debate.

And one of the things I would add to that is part of the reason liberal internationalists like myself have lost that debate is because we lost the American people on it. And we didn't focus enough on trying to explain why being a NATO is in our interest or explain why it's better off to have a foot in even something like the United Nations than to pull out. Why we're better off to support ideas of democracy and freedom rather than just think that it's just all about power.

And so I'm going to be spending a lot of time speaking, not just in Silicon Valley—I'm still doing that—and not just Washington and New York or Brussels and Beijing, but my next stop for my book tour is Boise, Idaho. And I've done this for a while and not everybody agrees with me. I even had a few people walk out before I even said a word because they saw that I'd worked for Barack Obama.

But what I can tell you and report is people are curious. All my talks are sold out. And the agenda you just outlined, Colin, is an agenda I think that when we have things to say with our scholars, we should bring those ideas through things like World Class. I think there's a demand and a thirst for trying to figure out this new world order/disorder that we're in, and FSI has a great role to play in that.

Kahl: Hard agree. And also I'm thrilled that this is going to  be so much of your focus.

I would just say on the alliance piece: my view is that as the distribution of power changes, it's clearer than ever that foreign policy is a team sport.

McFaul: Yes.

Kahl: I used to make this reference: Michael Jordan, probably the best basketball player who ever lived. Although I'm sure there are people who claim it's LeBron or Kobe or somebody else. But if you believe that Michael Jordan was the best basketball player who ever lived, he still needed four other Bulls to win championships.

And as we go around, and address every problem that I've ever encountered as a policymaker, whether it's the rise of the Islamic state or the invasion of Ukraine, we need our team.

McFaul: Exactly.

Kahl: And our allies and partners are our team. So I think we have to tell that story. We also, as we enter this new world, have to figure out a way to re-anchor our alliances in a way that are politically sustainable on all sides, and that actually deliver benefits for the American people.

So it's not just telling a better story. There's an interesting example of this. Recently the Trump administration agreed to help South Korea with their submarine program. But South Korea in exchange is making tens of billions of dollars of investments in American shipyards . . .

McFaul: Right.

Kahl: . . . to build up our capacity. And I do think these ideas about joint industrial capacity across the free world might be a way to generate jobs, to generate political incentives on all sides to keep those alliances intact and give some people confidence on both sides of our alliances that we're not going to have these violent swings every four to eight years.

McFaul: I could not agree more. And that example you gave is a great example. And we have to be more creative about re-anchoring and win-win for everybody. I think that's a great idea.

Colin, I'm going to hand this over to you. We've already gone longer than we should have because you're so interesting. Tell us a few of the guests you have coming up on World Class.

Kahl: First of all, not only big shoes to fill on the FSI director position, but big shoes to fill as the host of World Class. We're going to try to start off with a bang in the near future. So stay tuned. We hope to have a great conversation involving H.R. McMaster, who is at Hoover, but as many of your listeners will know, was President Trump's national security adviser at the beginning of the first Trump administration.

And we're going to pair H.R. with Jake Sullivan, who was Joe Biden's national security advisor.

McFaul: Wow! Both on the same show?

Kahl: On the same show!

McFaul: Oh my God, that's fantastic!

Kahl: And the idea is to ask two of the smartest minds on different parts of the political spectrum to help get us smarter about the state of the world and where things are going for the rest of 2026. I have to say for the rest of 2026, because like we're not even a month in and we had Venezuela and Greenland and Iran, and Iran could come back and like, we're three weeks in.

But people should stay tuned because that's going to be an awesome conversation.

And then without naming names, I'm very hopeful to bring on leaders from the tech community here in Silicon Valley to interface with our scholars about some of these technology trends we talked about earlier.

McFaul: Great, excellent.

Kahl: So it's gonna be great. If you're a geopolitical nerd, you're going to love it. If you're into technology, you're going love it. And we're gonna find ways I think to both highlight the extraordinary work being done here at Stanford, but also Stanford's role in the broader ecosystem. It’s going to be fun.

McFaul: Sounds exciting, Colin. Well, first of all, thank you for taking on the role of leading FSI. We need you because of all the things you just described. Second, thanks for taking on World Class. And third, just with that teaser, I know that World Class is going to get a lot more interesting in the weeks and months to come. So congratulations.

Kahl: Thanks, Mike.

McFaul: You've been listening to World Class from the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. If you like what you're hearing, please leave us review and be sure to subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts to stay tuned, to stay up to date on what's happening in the world and why.

And for the last time, this is Michael McFaul signing off as your host of World Class. Stay tuned for the next episode hosted by Colin Kahl.

Authoritarian rebalance 

Maduro served as president of Venezuela for more than 10 years before he was ousted Jan. 3 in a U.S. military operation that brought him to America to face narco-terrorism charges.

Trinkunas, a senior research scholar at FSI’s Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), discussed the possibility of Venezuela transitioning to democracy, especially given the opposition's overwhelming victory in the 2024 presidential elections. But an authoritarian rebalancing looms large, he noted.

“We have to remember that all the institutions of power and all the electoral offices in Venezuela below the president are held by supporters of the regime,” he said.

Trinkunas recalled political scientist Alexander B. Downs’ book, “Catastrophic Success,” which examined the negative consequences of foreign-imposed regime changes and highlighted that such interventions often lead to civil war and violent removals of leaders.

“About one-third to 40% of all regimes installed by a foreign intervention end up in civil conflict within 10 years,” Trinkunas said. And, almost half of leaders installed by foreign powers withdraw from or are pushed from office before their terms are up.

He foresees a divergence between the interests of the intervening power, the U.S., and Venezuela’s power elites and population under the proposed arrangement. “The people with the guns stay employed.” And they may not be eager to cooperate if it involves sharing Venezuela’s mineral wealth with the United States government.

Díaz-Cayeros said, “Nothing has changed in the basic underlying economic conditions of Venezuela that has forced an exodus of 8 million people.” Days after the arrest of Maduro, the government in office is still the same government that came into office through an electoral fraud, he added.

Status quo interests

Curiel, a research scholar at CDDRL, research manager for the Democracy Action Lab, and a native of Venezuela, described the ecosystem of armed actors in Venezuela and outlined how both state and non-state security forces have the incentives and capabilities to preserve the status quo. 

“They’ve had arrangements that have been important for their survival, up until now. And so, there’s a question that these groups face with the loss of Maduro and [his wife Cilia] Flores,” she said.

To the extent they perceive their arrangements are under threat, they might respond with violence or engage in chaos, Curiel added. This is further complicated by the fact that different armed groups are loyal to different members of the governing coalition, creating competing power centers.

Fuentes, a CDDRL visiting scholar and Venezuelan native, noted that the situation in Venezuela remains extremely fluid and that it is still too early to determine whether Maduro’s removal will lead to authoritarian rebalancing or a genuine democratic transition. He argued that policymakers face a real tension between two objectives: stabilizing the country while accounting for the complexity and fragility of the Venezuelan state, and recognizing that stabilization without a clear commitment to democratic transition as the ultimate goal is not sustainable.

“The stability is not going to happen unless you promise and commit to the final goal of a democratic transition,” said Fuentes, a lawyer and policy expert from Venezuela.

He explained that the regime’s basic instinct is to resist and survive any U.S. involvement in the way its key ally, Cuba, has done through the decades.

Zambrano, a Stanford law professor and CDDRL affiliated faculty member who grew up in Venezuela, said he was guardedly optimistic about a democratic transition and supported the military operation that removed Maduro. As for the legal implications of the capture of Maduro, he cited prior examples of the U.S. taking military action in Kosovo, Libya, and Panama, among others, without Congressional approval and in apparent violation of international law.

The international law prohibition on the use of force “has been violated [maybe] 40 times” in the last few decades, he said. “This is one more violation. Is that good? No, that’s not good, but it’s not a drastic change the way the Russian invasion of Ukraine was,” because the latter implicated the international prohibition on the annexation of territory. Moreover, in Venezuela’s case, the Venezuelan people welcomed the U.S. intervention.

Kronick, an associate professor of public policy at UC Berkeley and Stanford alum, observed that U.S. officials at a January 3 press conference didn’t mention democracy and totally dismissed María Corina Machado, whom she described as “Venezuela's most popular politician and the driving force behind the opposition candidate in last year's presidential election.”

The 2024 Venezuelan presidential election was highly controversial, given that both the opposition showed incontrovertible evidence, widely verified by the international community, that the election was stolen by Maduro and that the opposition actually won by a landslide.

Kronick said the acting president of Venezuela, Delcy Rodríguez, is clearly not a democratic activist and has been a key member of the regime for years. “It’s a little bit hard to be optimistic about the prospects for democratization,” given her current role.

On the other hand, Venezuela has very capable election-vote-counting technology and decades of high-turnout elections, all of which could potentially facilitate re-democratization. 

‘Gangster diplomacy’

In the question-and-answer session, Michael McFaul, former FSI director, described the Trump Administration’s current attempt to take more than $2 billion in oil from Venezuela as “gangster diplomacy” and a “travesty.” 

Díaz-Cayeros said, “This kind of U.S. unilateral action strikes a very deep chord in the Latin American psyche. And it doesn’t really matter if someone is on the left or on the right” in Latin and South America.”

Kathryn Stoner, Mosbacher Director of CDDRL, noted that the U.S. arrest of Maduro raises troubling questions about whether Russia would attempt a similar action against Ukraine’s leaders in the future. “What then stops Putin, other than the incompetence of the Russian armed forces, from going in and trying to get (President Volodymyr) Zelensky or any other high leader in Ukraine?”

Kronick suggested audience members read a recent Foreign Affairs essay, “A Grand Bargain With Venezuela,” in which the author argues for a “pacted transition,” a negotiated, power-sharing arrangement, as the most viable path for Venezuela. This would involve an agreement between the current regime and opposition to coexist and gradually democratize, rather than one side seeking total victory.

“Whether you read this and think this is pie in the sky and this is never going to happen, or you think this is what we need to really push for, I think it’s really worth engaging with, so I’ll end with that recommendation,” she said.
 

TRANSCRIPT

McFaul: You're listening to World Class from the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. I'm your host, Michael McFaul, the director of FSI.

Today I'm sharing a conversation I had with Gabrielius Landsbergis. He is the former Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Lithuania, and he is currently here at the Freeman Spogli Institute as our Bernard and Susan Liataud Visiting Fellow.

Gabrielius has an extremely impressive resume, and we can't go through it all right now, but he's been instrumental in pursuing a values-based foreign policy in Lithuania and the European Union. He is also one of the most vocal supporters of Ukraine, Taiwan, and freedom fighters worldwide.

We had the opportunity to discuss not just the diplomatic and political ramifications for Europe of Russia's war against Ukraine, but also the emotional journey this war has had for many people in Lithuania, including Gabrielius.

This was a very unique, often poignant conversation, and I hope you'll take away as much from it as I did.

[BEGIN EVENT RECORDING]

Before we get into the questions that I have that we agreed to talk about, I first just want to get your explanation of the title of this talk. It's an interesting title. Why did you choose it?

Landsbergis: Well, first of all, it's a great honor to be here, to speak to the people who are interested in the topic of Ukraine, that's mainly at the core of it, and the war that's ongoing.

I'm really honored to be at Stanford for the year. Thank you so much for kind words. It makes me blush every time.

When I was thinking about the topic, I was thinking for the first time as a bit of an observer.

McFaul: Because you used to be a participant.

Landsbergis: Yeah, it felt like one. So, the war started in 2022 when I was a minister. I was fully in my office when I got the news. I was supposed to travel to Kyiv the same day, February 24th; I had a ticket to go to Kyiv.

McFaul: Really?

Landsbergis: Yeah. I went to the airport and the flight was canceled at 5 a.m. And I called the chief of staff of the Lithuanian Army and they said, this is it. This has started.

So the opportunity to travel to California to stay at Stanford allowed me a step back. Even though my mind is fully with the people who are fighting for their country—basically that takes all my thinking time throughout the day—but still one has an ability to reflect.

And what I reflected is that there is an amplitude of emotion when we observe the war. It started with a shock, with the first sights of burning buildings in Kyiv, Russians crossing the borders and just flowing in, like really existential threats.

Then it was changed with some sort of a relief or even a joy that Ukrainians were able to push back. Then it picked up when the counter-offensive started and when Ukrainians started pushing Russians out. I've seen people who are like watching this as if they were winning. We were winning. This was part of our victory. It felt as if any one of us could go to the front and help Ukrainians just to finish this off and restore the normality, restore something that we were afraid that we were losing.

And then it was changed again. The first signals that the West is unable to support to the extent that is needed. Russia threatening with a nuclear (possible) nuclear strike. The West taking it very seriously [and] stopping Ukrainians moving forward. And then the question, okay, so what's next?

And then when I came back here, the information that reached us was that the one that Ukrainians developed new weapons. They've developed long range missiles. They developed the ability to strike deep within Russian territory. Apparently the allies have removed the restrictions on the strikes and Ukrainians have been very successful with that.

So the first thing that I would do: I open whatever social media I'm using that day and one of the first messages there is, “New factory is burning.” It's like, oof, okay, so we still have cards. We're in this and it's not over. Even though it was said in the Oval Office that that's it, Ukraine has no cards. We do have cards. And “we” as those people who are deeply supportive of Ukraine.

And then came Alaska, now the peace plan. And again, we're over the hill and down to valley, so to say, of emotions.

So I was thinking about this trajectory because there is a lot of emotion into this. So how do we deal with that? How do we stay on the line? How do we explain to ourselves where Ukraine actually is, what actually needs to be done, and how we can continue supporting despite what the headlines are telling us today? So we don't give in to overjoy that, Okay, this is won, this is fine, like we did in late 2022.

Or we don't give in to despair like it happened a number of times when the front is breaking or one important point on the front line is being lost.

McFaul: Step back for a minute and talk about not emotions, but objectives. To the best of your knowledge and guessing—these are difficult things to establish—what are today, Russia's interests and objectives in the war? What about Europe? What is your assessment of American interests? I'm kind of curious what you think about that because I'm not quite sure what they are. And maybe they're self-evident, but I don't think they are: maybe say a little bit about what you think Ukrainian objectives are today.

And as you go through that list—and maybe add China too if you want; I think that could be interesting to hear your view on China—and as you do so, also do you think they've changed over time? Most certainly the American objectives seem to have changed with our election, but maybe not. I don't want to presume that I know that. Or have they been consistent over time since the full-scale invasion began?

Landsbergis: So first of all, think that one country that has not in no way changed their objectives is Russia. Their objective is subjugation of Ukraine or Ukrainian country. Full control, either physical or political control, any way they can exert it. That might require them conquering the whole country. That might require just creating enough instability so that the country is ungovernable and would be basically then controlled in a similar way like, for example, Georgia now is. Russians did not need tanks to take Tbilisi; they managed to do that in a different form. Even though people are still protesting there, the country is ruled basically by a Russian proxy. 

So, this is still their goal. It could be political. It could be that Putin's mandate, the way that he structured his mandate, why people do support him, why his circle of oligarchs continues to support him is because he can bring victories. And this is still required and he still has this goal. 

But there is also a practical element in this. I try to imagine if there would be a ceasefire signed between Ukrainians and Russians. Just imagine: 2,000 kilometers of frontline. 2,000 kilometers is like half of Europe from Vilnius, from Lithuania's capital, all the way to Amsterdam. That's how much frontline there is.

So to maintain a ceasefire on that extensive frontline, you basically have to have an enormous amount of trust that the other side will not counter attack. I very much doubt that Putin has that trust on Ukrainians and vice versa, right? So both sides will be forced to keep and maintain the force presence on a frontline just in order to make sure that the frontline is not moving. And Ukrainians have showed that they're capable with Belgorod.

It's almost couple of years ago when they crossed the Russian border and attacked a Russian territory, taking a bit of Russian Federation as a leverage for the possible upcoming negotiations. So, Ukrainians show that they have the capacity.

Thinking about that, Putin will have to maintain about a million peoples army, as much as he has now, on the front line to make sure that the front does not progress. Or he needs Kyiv. So, that's why I believe that in his mind, a ceasefire will not work.

And that's why he was pushing back on American efforts to offer a ceasefire. When President Trump suggested that, he said, well, I need a comprehensive peace agreement with everything that I set out to achieve. This is what I need. And the reason is it could be very practical because the ceasefire will just not work. He will never trust Ukrainians. And he doesn't want to maintain troops. If he wants to let troops do something else, attack another country, turn back home, whatever that he has on his mind, he needs Kyiv where he wants that.

So whatever comes out of any talks now, I'm pretty convinced that Russians have not moved with their goals. And they believe that they're successful with that. That's number one.

So I will jump over to Europe. Europe is developing its goals. My biggest criticism of Europe that we've set out to support Ukraine without a clear plan as to what we want to achieve. Like, what is our goal?

Do we want to stop Russians? Do we want to push them back? Do we want Ukraine to win? Do we want to restore the deterrence of the European continent with European Union on one side, but allies kind of also in this hold? What is our plan? So we paid up without knowing what we are buying.

So we bought some time. With a lot of money, we bought some time. We bought four years. But we have not developed a strategy. The reason could have been is that we've outsourced the strategic thinking over to the other side of the Atlantic.

We said, “Okay, fine, we'll pay the bill. There are people in Washington who will know how this should end. We might not like it, but we still trust that it's probably the best outcome.” And that has been happening through with the previous administration, where Jake Sullivan was the one saying the strategic defeat of Russia is in the transatlantic goal. Again, that was the only time that I heard somebody suggesting a strategy.

With the change of administration, there is no longer a strategy. And Europe is now figuring out that we have to have something. That's why you see Europeans scrambling for money. Because we don't have a plan for next year. And the only way to have a plan for next year is to have something we could finance it with.

And that's why we need frozen Russian assets. That would help us finance for next year and maybe a couple of years in the future. That is the first shape of the European strategy to Europe. I hope that it will have other steps. I'm still hoping that we have enough time.

For Ukraine, the strategy, you might say, that it has not changed fundamentally: it's to defend the sovereignty of its country. Certain elements have moved. First of all, was claiming back all the territory, 2022 autumn. Ukrainians have declared that our goal is to go all the way back to Crimea. Now this is no longer a goal. And honestly, I do understand them. They have a strategy, right? They had a strategy, but it very much depends on [if] our strategies are aligned, if we see the same way, and if we're going to help them to achieve their strategy.

Unfortunately, they were not aligned. And that means that they are unable to achieve certain goals. And Zelensky was brutally clear yesterday in his interview, suggesting that, unfortunately, the plans changed. We cannot get to NATO because there is no path for us going there. We cannot reclaim Crimea and so many other things.

I mean, it breaks my heart to listen to that. For me, it's very, very much 1938, a speech by Czechoslovakia's president saying, certain things were forced on us and we're just unable to withstand pressures from two sides. And this is where Ukraine currently is.

I could talk about China, but I mean, it will take another 20 minutes.

McFaul: Well, let’s come back to China, because they're peripheral. But you haven't seen any change in their behavior, have you?

Landsbergis: I think I do see. Many people do argue, and I participate in number of conversations where people would argue that saying, “Well, for China, they need a stable world. And they need Europe stable because it's a good client for whatever they're selling and they require stability.”

And I'm not so sure whether that's true any longer. They built up an enormous, extraordinary leverage on Russia as it is now.

When experts say that 90% of Russian military output is produced with Chinese help, either equipment or material or just produced in China, that tells me that if you remove that, Russia would be unable to fight against Ukraine, not at the extent that they are doing it currently.

So that means that China actually is invested in the war. That actually they want the war. So that raises a lot of interesting questions. So that means that instability in Europe works in their benefit.

And I mean, even in stable Europe, just the recent quarter numbers, German imports of Chinese goods has risen by 14% in just the last three months. That's biggest in the world. So even unstable Europe is a rather good client.

McFaul: So they have their cake and eat it, too.

Landsbergis: Yeah. And they are probably getting other cakes that we can only kind of try to imagine or I mean, try to understand what those are. One of them [is] building up a leverage on Russia where you can call the credit back either in Indo-Pacific or actually keeping Europe occupied. I mean “busy.”

McFaul: Talk a little bit about the U.S. and the piece that you wrote in the New York Times and what is your analysis—I'm asking not for your opinion about what should be the U.S.—we'll get to that later. Analytically, what do you think the Trump administration is trying to achieve right now?

Landsbergis: Well, that's probably one of the most difficult questions that there is. Honestly, when the administration took over, I tried to understand, tried to read the administration's mind as a European. And there are certain elements that I do understand.

It's very difficult to explain to an American why Europe is unable, like completely unable to deter Russian attack. A continent of 450 million people, if you add United Kingdom, more than half a billion people. Probably one of the richest places in the world.

And we are seeing Ukraine, a country of 40 million people, that was able to stop Russian attacks. Or at least to slow it down significantly in order to retain its sovereignty for a number of years. And then the continent of 450 million says, “Well, unfortunately, there is nothing that we can do.”

You're unable to square this. So when we hear criticism, or at least a question like, guys, are you sure that there is nothing that you can do? I cannot answer that. I only can say, yes, there are things that we can do. We should be doing them. We should have been doing them long, long ago, probably when President Obama suggested that United States will be pivoting over to Indo-Pacific.

That was the beginning of it. This is where we should have started our rethinking of a European strategy. We did not do it. It's on us. We'll fast forward it now and we'll figure things out.

I understand that Europe has to become stronger. I understand that Europe has to find ability to deter Russian attack to help its allies and make a proposal to United States why a strong partner is a better partner.

This is the part of the strategy, the part of thinking that I understood as a strategy. Now the recent documents that have been announced, they talk about very different point of view. They talk basically about weak Europe, about divided Europe, about a Europe of Hungarys that would all look just for their own interest. No united Europe, no Europe that could be able to figure out its united budget of defense.

If this is the vision of Europe, this Europe will be purchasing Russian oil and gas the same way that Hungarians are doing. This is the Europe that will not be able to help Ukraine as much as Hungary has blocked almost all the attempts of Europe to do that. This is the Europe that will not be a good partner for United States, either deterring China or stopping Russia or basically doing anything. This is the Europe that would be susceptible to Russian attacks, that will be susceptible to Chinese interventions, economic or otherwise. The weak Europe that is suggested in the latest strategy document is a very scary perspective for Europe.

It's very difficult to understand why that would be in the interest of the United States. That's probably the most difficult question to answer. Maybe it will be explained in some way. People are trying to square the circle, and I've seen Sir Elbridge Colby trying to explain that it's still the same strategy. We still want a strong Europe.

McFaul: It wasn't in the document, though.

Landsbergis: Yeah, wasn't in the document. So, for a European, it's very difficult to understand that. It doesn't change the fact that Europe has to get its act together.

And my piece in New York Times argued that basically the way that I see is that there are things that we just cannot change in the United States, and we shouldn't be attempting that. In many ways, President Trump, for us, is a force of nature. We are not participating in the election. We won't be. We don't have a vote. So we just have to accept whatever he considers is in the interest of Americans.

But that doesn't mean that there are nothing that we can do. We can make a very good proposal to American people [to] have a strong partner in Europe. Be successful. I argue that nothing brings success as much as success. And we can do that in Ukraine. We can do that with our own defense. And kind of I have a sense that if there's something that could convince [the] U.S. administration to turn around and look differently at the European Union, that would be us becoming stronger.

McFaul: Well, I agree with you, by the way. And I am an American; I do get to vote, unlike you. 

And I do think this is a debate we need to now have now that this national security strategy has put it out so baldly. I've been traveling around the country talking about my book. And in the conversations later, I sense that people like me most certainly, but maybe also Europe needs to make the case— I'm just restating what you said, but in a more America-centric way—about why Europe is so good for us. I think we've taken advantage of that and we've forgotten what the arguments were, kind of original purposes.

But come back just for a moment on the Ukraine part. What do you think this latest rounds of negotiations are they trying to achieve? What's the outcome they desire? Is it just simply they just want to end the war and let the president say he ended the war? Or is there something bigger at stake?

Landsbergis: You mean U.S. effort?

McFaul: U.S.effort, yes.

Landsbergis: I'm thinking that probably for some in the current administration, the war in Europe is a distraction. It’s a distraction for what's really happening in the Indo-Pacific and the worries that are growing there.

So it's a kind of a cut loss situation. And there's no better strategy, right? This is what President Trump has always been saying. And even in yesterday's interview in Politico, he said, “Well, if Europeans do have a strategy, they should come forward with it.” And to our embarrassment is like, yeah, we have not figured that one out. So what do you expect, right?

So it's the best strategy in town. It's a horrible strategy for Ukraine. It's a horrible strategy for Europe. It basically increases the chance of Russian attack on Europe tremendously, at least from my perspective. If he's given, if he's rewarded for his attack of 2022 and 2014, that will only increase his thinking that he can continue with that. But it's on Europe

Now we need to figure out what we're going to do with it. And then in this, well, President Trump is doing what he does, right? So if you don't have a better plan, that's my plan is the only one that I have.

So Russia’s not in good place with this. U.S. basically is just . . . I usually call that a shift, shifting from Europe, from European security area, wider security area, meaning that it's larger than just NATO. And Ukrainians are basically cornered with very little things that they can do. 

I've heard, again, it was written out that Zelenskyy spoke with the European leaders, and he said that he's extremely worried that if Europeans will not figure out the frozen assets. That's basically the last thread for Ukrainians. If that gets figured out, then Ukrainians get in a stronger position. Then they have a lifeline, know, some more runway for two, three years to figure things out. If they don't have that, then this is it.

McFaul: That debate, in my view, is so tragic. I run an international working group on Russian sanctions, and we’ve published 23 papers on how to increase sanctions over the last three and half years.

In October of 2022 was when we published a paper about these assets. We're still debating these things. That just doesn't seem strategic to me.

And this thing that you've talked about before, that we're constantly worried about escalation from Putin And you noted that the biggest moment was in the fall of 2022 when allegedly he threatened to use nuclear weapons. But then we do so many things that I just don't think are in our own national interest.

So you've hinted at this, but I want to hear you one more time on your sense of, even more emotionally, to use the title of the talk, of the sense inside Ukraine. Your colleagues there, what you're reading, does this feel like the valley? Obviously it is. We get that. But is it this last valley, and that they're just going to have to capitulate? Or is there other things that, I mean, the assets is one of them, maybe weapon systems that are coming on board, that you hear gives Ukrainians hope right now?

Landsbergis: Well, I've never heard Ukrainians complaining. I can tell a short story which defines the spirit of Ukraine. So that was in 2023, Vilnius was supposed to host [the] NATO summit and President Zelenskyy did a tour in the Baltic states to talk with the countries about what to expect from [the] NATO summit.

And prime minister of my country, my good friend, she invited me to participate in the meeting which she had with the president. During the meeting, she gave me the floor and I said, “Well, unfortunately, Mr. President, I'm doing the diplomatic rounds in Europe and NATO. And as an upcoming host of events in Vilnius, there are not too many things that I can promise. And if there is a saying about the glass being half full or half empty, my glass is almost empty, preparing for NATO summit.”

And I meant that most of the promises or belief that they had, the invitation coming over or, something substantial being announced . . . it's just not happening. There's just too many divisions within the alliance.

And Zelenskyy reacted in a very Zelenskyy way. He took his bottle of water and said, “Do you want me to pour you some?” And this is what Ukraine has always been.

I've been fourteen times in Kyiv after the war started.

McFaul: Fourteen times?

Landsbergis: Yeah.

McFaul: Wow.

Landsbergis: And every time I go over there, I said, I'm really depressed. I mean, this is looking so bad. And they're like, no, it's not that bad. We're fighting. Donbas has not fallen. Kyiv is standing. And now they're saying we're fighting corruption. Bad guys lose. We still have a hold of it.

I mean, it's incredible. It's incredible. If you want to lift your spirits, just talk to a Ukrainian. They will tell you the most horrible stories that they're undergoing, and they will still be upbeat. That kept me up and lifted me up and never allowed me to get into despair.

And today is exactly the same story. Yeah, the allies betray. Some of them walk away. Some of them change their attitudes. But nothing has been lost yet. That is their attitude. I'm pretty sure that they are. And it actually there is a political element to this.

So when people are saying, well, Zelensky can just give Donbas and let it go. Ukraine is a democracy. And that means that the president is mandated, very strongly, democratically mandated by its people. And people do not believe that they should be letting the territories that are not under Russian occupation go.

And these are the civil society, the so-called Maidan people who are still very much there, who walked over to the streets last summer during the war protesting against the reform of the anti-corruption agencies and told the government, you cannot do that. We're against this. And [the] president retracted.

These are the frontline warriors who spent decades in the front line digging in, fortifying the cities in Donbas. And I don't imagine them letting that go. And they mandate, democratically, the president. So, and when Zelenskyy says, “People will not allow me to do that,” this is not a way to politically get away from a pressure. That's a reality. His political mandate does not allow him to do that.

And this is what upsets me when the Coalition of the Willing meets, takes a picture and suggests, well, we're talking about security guarantees. Ukraine can mostly depend on Ukrainians. This is their thinking. This is not a way to do it. Ukraine needs true commitment. Ukraine needs Western commitment, no longer just words.

If we want to make sure that this peace holds, that the Russians don't attack, that we have to tell Putin that the next time you attack, you are going to meet, like President Macron suggested, French troops in Odessa, Polish troops in Kyiv, Lithuanian troops together with Poles and German air force, whoever is willing to give their equipment or people for the cause.

That is the statement that Ukrainians want and I'm pretty sure that this is the thing that is required. Are Europeans ready to do that? Well, I have not yet seen the signals that would encourage me.

McFaul: Well, that's a downer note in the valley of emotions, just like you said. But I want to end on an optimistic note.

As an American who believes that my country is stronger and more secure and prosperous and free with strong European allies, it's one thing to like debate these things abstractly when you've never been to Europe. But when you meet leaders like Gabrielius, how can you not be inspired about a future with guys like him in power in Europe? That's a world I want to be a part of. And that's why I'm so grateful that you're here with us at Stanford today.

Landsbergis: Thank you.

McFaul: Thank you!

[END EVENT RECORDING]

McFaul: You've been listening to World Class from the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. If you like what you're hearing, please leave us a review and be sure to subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts, to stay up to date on what's happening in the world, and why.