'We Don't Know What The Final Goal Is': Why Russia's Invasion Is So Dangerous

Professor Nina Khrushcheva joins Morning Joe to discuss Russia's invasion of Ukraine and her latest column 'Putin's War Will Destroy Russia.'

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'We Don't Know What The Final Goal Is': Why Russia's Invasion Is So Dangerous

[fazsaeed]

"[Stalin] was a massmurderer and now Putin seems to be walking in his footsteps" - Granddaughter of Soviet leader Khrushchev

[KD-zifi]

What a remarkable woman with very insightful takes. Bring her on again!

[Descamisado]

"We don't know what the final goal is" That's understandable, Putin doesn't seem to know what the final goal is either.

[arnowinter]

Mrs. Khrushcheva has the knowledge of Russian history, also due to her father's "heritage". Saying that Putin follows into Stalin's footsteps is a clear statement. Thanks to her.

[cameronkrause]

I am very impressed with the calibre of guests Joe and Mika have been bringing on this show.

[a.barker]

He's not even close to his goal at all. That's over. Scorch earth and keeping what he had before this started.

[robertmillar]

Very interesting lady - well informed, highly articulate and totally authentic - a great guest in this time of misinformation.

[RonWinter]

Nina speaks the truth. Talk about an expert.

[videoinformer]

Mika misread Khrushcheva's article (1:53), adding the word "no", making it say the opposite of what it actually said.
"There is [no] good reason to believe that Mr. Putin alone is behind the Ukraine war and that not even the highest-ranking Russian officials have much of a say."
What Nina Khrushcheva subsequently made clear in this discussion that Putin kept his plan to actually invade Ukraine such a secret from his own intelligence (FSB) and military (4:03) that "even they did not believe that he is going to be so suicidal and basically shoot off his legs and Russia's legs" by invading Ukraine.
This is why I believe Russia did so poorly from the start. Even the highest generals in his military did not believe he was going to actually order them to invade Ukraine until they were given orders to do so.
Everybody in the FSB and military thought Putin's placement of forces on Ukraine's border was just a ploy, and invasion was something Putin would never be so foolish as to actually do. Nobody, from general to private was ready to invade.

(Errata: I originally typed "Mike" instead of "Mika". I know how to spell her name. My fingers apparently have a mind of their own. Thanks for informing me of my typo in comments below.)

[PhunnyConflicts]

Nice interview. Got all of the good information out and no one speaking over each other. We need more of this!

[simonmultiverse]

Yes, we *DO* know what the final goal is. I recently saw an interview with Mikhail Kodorkovsky. He was commenting on the mind of Putin, as follows.
(1) Putin does not remotely accept the break-up of the Soviet Union.
(2) Putin blames America for the above.
(3) Putin is aware that he is growing older and he wants to leave a legacy.
The implication of the above is that Putin wants to reconstitute the Soviet Union.
I suspect that that means that Putin is going to be busy on this project for the rest of his life.

[PSA]

Take his daughters that's living like Kings in Europe and put them on the front line in Ukraine! 👍
Slava Ukraine 💙 💛

[ruthsikorski]

With such a loving "mother" like Russia, who would need the devil?

[rowlandlarkham]

- What 3 qualities does a person have that can be given away - but never taken?
- Honour - Integrity - Compassion -
- You lose one - The others are lost as well -

[tweetypie]

So glad I found another interview with her, what a remarkable lady!

[alikon]

I really appreciate that Nina Khruscheva acknowledged the Kazakh famine. The scale and the effect of Asharshylyq was unfortunately greater than that of Holodomor, but it rarely gets the recognition. After the great famine in Kazakhstan, Kazakhs became an ethnic minority in their own country. Around 42 percent of all Kazakhs died between 1930-1933. Today the population of Kazakhstan is 18 million, a population disproportionate to the country size (9th largest in the world)

[Itriedtakennames]

The fact Putin or any advisor thought Ukraine would want them back just based on Chernobyl alone (which came close to being much worse) is truly delusional….yeah, thanks for making a big part of our country uninhabitable for the next 10, 000-20, 000 years, please come back!!

[TheRoybert]

We Can Guess pretty easily.
He wants Soviet reunification. He will insist on keeping Donbas. He will keep Mariupol as a port access. He will attempt to take a land bridge from Mariupol to Crimea. He will pull back for a few years and regroup. Retool and retry to finish the job.
Think like a madman. It's not hard.

[vincef]

I vote for the last solution on the list. Get Putin out of the Kremlin!

[chrisjohnson]

He wants easy and inexpensive access to natural resources and an open seaport for exporting them.
Most of Russia's natural resources are astronomically expensive if not impossible to reach and extract because of extremely difficult terrain and brutal weather conditions most of the year and much of it's coastline presents the same difficulties, so having Ukraine under his control solves both of these problems, though he will never admit to this. putin had a deal with the former pro-putin President of Ukraine and when he was ousted putin had to renegotiate for the same rescues at a much higher price and he lost access to the docks. So in light of all this he decided to take what he wanted by force. Georgia and Crimea were a test run to see how easily be could capture all of Ukraine, but he underestimated the people of Ukraine's resolve.