Roberta Buffett Visiting Professor Lecture: Ambassador (ret.) Ian C. Kelly on How the West Got Moscow So Wrong for So Long
For too long, the West's policies toward Ukraine and other states in the former USSR took a back seat to a bigger priority: encouraging Moscow to give up its expansionist ways by integrating Russia into Western institutions. The thinking was that a Russia knit into trade and political networks with the West would become a peaceful, non-aggressive Russia.
Up until fairly recently, policymakers thought such a transformation was possible. Even after Putin’s invasion of Georgia in 2008 and annexation of Crimea in 2014, many in the West, particularly in Western Europe, returned to business as usual with Russia. It wasn’t until Putin's full invasion of Ukraine in 2022 that many in the West genuinely woke up to the reality of Putin's regime and realized that continuing to conduct business as usual with Moscow didn’t discourage its aggressive tendencies. It encouraged them.
At our annual Roberta Buffett Visiting Professor of International Studies Lecture, Ambassador (ret.) Ian C. Kelly shared insights into the West's wishful thinking that got Moscow so wrong for so long.
This event was co-sponsored by the Roberta Buffett International Studies Program at the Weinberg College of Arts & Sciences' Center for International & Area Studies.