In this video podcast award winning Russian journalist Elena Kostyuchenko speaks to Keith Gessen about the themes of her new book 'I Love Russia'. They discuss places that non-Russians have never seen and voices that are rarely heard. The book is Kostyuchenko’s courageous attempt to document Russ...

Historian, lecturer and Russian security affairs expert Mark Galeotti joins us to discuss the fallout in Russia after the dramatic death of Wagner boss Yevgeny Prighozin. He discusses whether Putin has become more secure with Prighozin out of the way and what impact this political drama is having...

What are the connections between propaganda about the Russian Empire and the invasion of Ukraine?

Mikhail Zygar, a renowned Russian dissident journalist, is the founding editor-in-chief of Russian news TV channel Dozhd, who was forced to close his company and flee the country after condemning t...

‘Putin’s calculation is simple: a Ukraine with a permanent war in its eastern region will never be fully welcomed by Europe or the rest of the world’ ― Andrey Kurkov, Grey Bees

Andrey Kurkov is Ukraine’s most famous living novelist. Hailed as a latter-day Bulgakov and a Ukrainian Murakami, he im...

As Russia, Ukraine and the West engage in a military standoff over the eastern border of Ukraine, we speak to national security expert and former White House advisor Fiona Hill. She has advised three former US presidents, including President Trump who she later famously testified against.In con...

‘We rebuilt the same barracks, we rebuilt the new dictatorship, we rebuilt the same regime that we used to live in and now we have another regime, and the question is the same: How to preserve our human dignity, if everything is humiliating?’ – Mikhail Shishkin

Mikhail Shishkin is one of the mo...

What are the lessons that history can teach us about the Russian war in Ukraine? In October 2022 three of Britain’s most distinguished and bestselling historians – Peter Frankopan, Max Hastings and Margaret MacMillan – came to the Intelligence Squared stage in London to share their insights into ...

As the war in Ukraine enters its bloodiest phase, there’s no shortage of experts in the West holding forth on how best to bring the violence to an end. But what do the Ukrainian people themselves think? In May 2022, Intelligence Squared brought together three prominent Ukrainians, all currently l...

‘The future of European security is being decided now, here in Ukraine.’ These were the words of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky before Vladimir Putin's Russia launched an all-out assault on Ukraine, sending tanks and fighter jets deep into the country and forcing thousands of Ukrainians t...

No other country has been so divided over its own past as Russia. To understand what Russia’s future holds – to grasp what Putin’s regime means for Russia and the world – we need to unravel the ideas and meanings of its history. That’s the argument that historian Orlando Figes makes in his most r...

Mark Galeotti is one of the world’s leading experts on modern Russia and on February 26 he comes to Intelligence Squared to talk about the themes of his new book Putin's Wars: From Chechnya to Ukraine. In conversation with the New Statesman’s Katie Stallard, Galeotti will detail how Vladimir Puti...

Observed from afar, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine might appear to be a replay of the Cold War stand-off between Russia and the West. But according to political scientist Ivan Krastev a closer look complicates the picture. In a recent op-ed in the Financial Times Krastev argued that while America’s...

By launching a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Vladimir Putin has started the first war in Europe for a generation, defying the post-Cold War international rules-based order and inflicting great suffering on millions of civilians in the process.

In April 2022, the FT’s Chief Foreign Affairs Cor...

In February 2022 Russian shells rained down on Kyiv as tanks crossed the border into Ukraine. At the time American forces prepared to evacuate President Volodymyr Zelensky for fear of his life. But Zelensky refused to abandon his country, saying ‘I need ammunition, not a ride’ and quickly became ...

Since Russia invaded Ukraine last February the West has ramped up sanctions against Russia to an unprecedented level. Both Russia and the West are feeling the pain, but are the measures having the desired effect?

Unquestionably, say sanctions supporters. A report by Yale University shows that t...

“I will work to make sure the regime in Russia changes. The question is: am I prepared to go all the way? Yes, I am prepared to go all the way.” – Mikhail Khodorkovsky

Mikhail Khodorkovsky has experienced first hand the wrath of Vladimir Putin. Once an oil tycoon and the richest man in Russia, K...

Fiona Hill is the foreign affairs expert who started life as a former coal miner’s daughter in Bishop Auckland, County Durham, and became an adviser to Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump. She came to public attention in 2019 when she testified against President Trump during ...

Want to join the debate? Check out the Intelligence Squared website to hear about future live events and podcasts: http://www.intelligencesquared.com
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Isn’t it time we took a more intelligent approach to Russia? You don’t have to be a fan of Vladimir Putin or support h...

Want to join the debate? Check out the Intelligence Squared website to hear about future live events and podcasts: http://www.intelligencesquared.com
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http://www.intelligencesquared.com/events/stop-poking-the-bear-the-west-needs-to-engage-with-putin/

Filmed at Cadogan...

There's not a lot to like about Vladimir Putin: he's autocratic, vain and runs a corrupt government. And he doesn't give a fig for human rights. The repression in Chechnya, the jailing of the businessman Mikhail Khodorkovsky and the Pussy Riot protestors, the murders of journalist Anna Politkovsk...

Is Vladimir Putin the most powerful – and dangerous – man in the world? With Putin in the Kremlin, we have returned to an era where former Russian spies are mysteriously poisoned on British soil and where Russia feels emboldened to roll its tanks into an eastern European state. The Kremlin uses d...

War and Politics in the 21st Century with Sir Lawrence Freedman
Sir Lawrence Freedman is the UK’s leading expert on military strategy and the go-to voice since Putin’s invasion of Ukraine for his clear-sighted analysis of the conflict.

On October 6 he comes to Intelligence Squared to discuss the...