Latest / Gunther Fehlinger Podcast / America, Don’t Abandon Europe – Prof. Rachel Epstein on NATO, Ukraine & Albright

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America, Don’t Abandon Europe – Prof. Rachel Epstein on NATO, Ukraine & Albright · Gunther Fehlinger Podcast

0:02
Perfect this is going to failing us podcast.
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We are now at 13,400 subscribers as YouTube and I thank you very
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much for this. It's a way the voice of the free
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world. We are discussing about many
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important issues. We have many important guests
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and now I'm very honoured to have an American professor here.
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Rachel Epstein is with us. I met you recently at a
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conference in Vienna and you were kindly enough to agree to
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come on our podcast and I'm very much, much welcoming you.
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It's the honour. You are from a very special
0:32
university and to you're very interested in European security,
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economics and many other issues. You have done a lot of research
0:39
papers on all these important issues and you really care for
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Europe. And we are very, very, very
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appreciating that you joined us this afternoon.
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It's a morning in Colorado. It's now in the afternoon.
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The time difference is also not making everything so easy.
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But thanks, professor, that you joined us.
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Please present yourself to our audience.
1:00
Oh, Gunther, thank you so much for having me.
1:02
My name is Rachel Epstein, and I'm a professor at the Joseph
1:06
Corbell School of Global and Public Affairs at the University
1:09
of Denver, where I've worked now for over 20 years.
1:13
And I also direct the C Center for International Security and
1:16
Diplomacy. And you're quite right.
1:19
All of my research has been on European politics, European
1:22
political economy. I focus especially on Eastern
1:26
Europe, Eastern accession to NATO, Eastern accession to the
1:29
EU. And then in addition to NATO and
1:33
EU enlargement, I've also done a lot of work, interestingly, on
1:36
European banking, which is part of the reason that you and I met
1:39
at a conference at the National Bank of Austria about 10 days
1:43
ago. And so in 2017, I published a
1:46
book on essentially the role of banks in the protracted economic
1:51
crisis that Europe experienced after the US financial crisis.
1:56
Tell me, how come that personality like you in the
1:59
middle of beautiful Colorado and this university is so interested
2:03
in Europe? What's the background of your
2:04
university? And if you tell me a little bit
2:07
about Mrs. Albright, I will be so happy because I think she's
2:10
the key to all this, and I'm very much a big fan of her.
2:14
Maybe you can elaborate a bit the history of your institution.
2:17
Absolutely. So as I said, I work at the
2:20
Joseph Korbel School, which is at the University of Denver.
2:22
Joseph Korbel, which is not something everybody knows, was
2:25
Madeleine Albright's father. And of course, Madeleine
2:28
Albright was the US Secretary of State under President Clinton
2:31
starting in the 1990s. She was the first woman to hold
2:34
that position. But her father's story is an
2:39
incredible story and is the reason that schools like ours
2:42
exist. So Joseph Korbel was a
2:45
Czechoslovak diplomat. He had worked in Belgrade.
2:49
And actually his daughter Madeline had been born in
2:52
Belgrade when he was working at the Czechoslovak embassy there.
2:57
And he was, you know, the child of Jews.
3:01
Both of his parents were killed in the Holocaust.
3:04
He and his wife, Anna, and their child at that time, Madeline in
3:08
1939, emigrated to London during the war.
3:13
And he served, you know, the Czech government in exile in
3:16
London during that period. But of course, you know, after
3:21
having many very auspicious posts on behalf of the
3:25
Czechoslovakia government after the Communist takeover in
3:28
Czechoslovakia in the late 40s, he applied for political asylum
3:33
in the United States and was granted it.
3:35
So he came to Denver. And Madeleine, when she would
3:39
come and do events at the Korbel School, which she did on many
3:43
occasions over the course of her professional career, she would
3:47
say that her mother had an expression which was basically,
3:50
there are only two great cities in the world.
3:53
One is Prague and the other is Denver.
3:56
And I think it's because when they came to Denver, they had a
3:59
really wonderful welcome. And he ultimately founded what
4:06
was then called the Graduate School of International Studies
4:09
in 1964 and ran that institution, was a professor at
4:15
the University of Denver. And although Madeline did not
4:18
attend the University of Denver, another really important
4:23
graduate of ours did, and that was Condoleezza Rice.
4:27
So Condoleezza Rice, also AUS Secretary of State under George
4:31
W Bush, was first an undergraduate at the University
4:36
of Denver and then went on to get her PhD at the Graduate
4:40
School of International Studies, the Korbel School and its former
4:44
name. And Joseph Korbel was one of her
4:47
professors. So he unfortunately died in
4:50
1977, I believe. Condoleezza Rice finished her
4:54
PhD in the early 80s before going to Stanford, becoming a
4:58
professor there, ultimately a Provost there, joining the US
5:02
National Security Council. Obviously, an incredible career
5:06
now runs the Hoover Institution at Stanford.
5:10
And Madeleine Albright, when she was alive, given her family's
5:13
legacy in Denver and at the University of Denver and now at
5:16
the Joseph Corbel School, was a great champion of our school and
5:20
came off into Denver to do events with us.
5:23
And we are in her debt, not just for the role that she played for
5:28
the school, but for the role that she played for the country
5:30
and certainly European and global security.
5:34
We are all in her depth because she is the great Liberator of
5:37
the Balkan. She's a unique personality.
5:40
Nobody with the exemption maybe of the Bush family have done so
5:44
much for the liberation of Southeastern Europe.
5:47
And then she and in a way you're not just from one Professor 11
5:52
University, but very much from the cradle of transatlanticism
5:56
in America. It's a special honour to talk to
5:59
you, Professor Rachel. So let me let's come back a
6:03
little bit to this is Albright and her role.
6:06
You met her, I think personally, yeah.
6:08
I met her, she was at the school on several occasions, yeah.
6:11
She was told many. Great stories.
6:14
Personality And she was also key for the liberation, especially
6:18
for Kosovo. I think she was motivated by
6:21
this very from her family history as well, from the drive
6:25
to end genocide with American power when there is the
6:28
opportunity to intervene. She was the great liberal
6:32
interventionist of our time, and Kosovo would not be free without
6:36
her. Yeah, I agree.
6:39
I think, you know, when I think about Korbel's legacy and in a
6:42
way at the school, I don't think we talk about it enough.
6:46
But schools of International Studies and public affairs, like
6:49
the Korbel School, I mean, Central European University in
6:53
Vienna also fits this description.
6:55
I think really run by and staffed by people who, you know,
7:02
never. And certainly Madeleine Albright
7:05
shares this, as you just said, I mean, really trying to encourage
7:10
people to study the issues that will prevent things like
7:14
genocide from ever happening again, trying to understand the
7:19
institutional foundations that prevent things like the Russian
7:23
invasion of Ukraine, which we've seen unfold.
7:27
And I didn't mention this in my original introduction, but of
7:29
course, more recently, I've done a lot of work on Russia's
7:33
invasion of Ukraine starting in 2014.
7:36
It's devastating effects. I mean, of course, this was
7:38
exactly the kind of thing that Madeleine Albright was deeply
7:42
concerned with. And in fact, before she died,
7:45
just like, I don't know, it might have even just been as
7:48
recently as a few days before she passed away, she wrote an
7:52
opinion piece, I believe it appeared in the Washington Post,
7:55
about what a huge mistake this would be for Russia and for
7:57
Putin to launch this invasion, which of course they did anyway.
8:02
But the tragedies of Europe, war, genocide, discrimination,
8:10
you know, economic nationalism, protectionism, so much of what
8:13
we all tried to do, I think in the post war period was to build
8:18
the institutions that guard against those very dangerous
8:21
political impulses that lead to death, destruction, unwanted
8:26
migration. I mean, I'm sure Joseph Korbel
8:29
and his family, they never wanted to have to leave
8:31
Czechoslovakia. It was only because of an
8:33
authoritarian takeover that they were forced out and because of
8:35
their Jewish heritage. So yes, exactly.
8:38
These are the kinds of things that schools like ours are
8:41
trying to educate students of today about, given how few
8:44
survivors of that period we now have to really stay the course,
8:50
which I think we've gotten off course.
8:52
Gunter, I think you would agree with me that we've gotten off
8:54
course with respect to preserving institutions that
8:57
guard our safety, security, prosperity and freedom.
9:01
Come back to the great, the greatest intervention of America
9:05
ever. It was of course, the liberation
9:07
campaign against the Nazis in Europe.
9:09
And here in this podcast, we always, when I say have an
9:12
American guest also personally, when I meet the American, I say
9:15
thank you very much for liberating Europe from the Nazi
9:19
terrorist regime. And you did it and it was a huge
9:23
investment of America. You were neutral before until
9:27
194041. You changed from neutrality to
9:30
intervention and you mobilized all your fiscal, technology,
9:35
innovation, manpower and military resources to end this
9:39
terrorist regime. I want to say thank you very
9:42
much for that. Well, I'm very glad that the
9:45
people who were alive at that time and had the authority to do
9:48
that and the resources to do that, I'm so glad they took the
9:52
actions that they did. And I think you would agree it
9:55
would have been better had they even done it sooner.
9:57
But I'm glad that they ultimately came to the right
10:00
decision. And I know it was politically
10:02
really challenging. Unfortunately, in the United
10:05
States today, I don't know under similar exigencies whether the
10:11
country is now politically capable in the same way it was
10:13
then. And you, you know, you have
10:16
thoughts about why that is, but it's.
10:18
We will discuss this in a second, but you hugely mobilized
10:22
resources again when the Soviets took over the Czechoslovakia and
10:27
your founding father had to flee.
10:29
As a established diplomat he was in a high-ranking position, but
10:33
his foreign minister was basically thrown out of the
10:35
window by the communists in 1948, so he had to flee.
10:39
And then America again kept Europe free and free from the
10:43
Soviets in about the years of Cold War.
10:46
I want to also thank you very much for this.
10:48
And what an investment, again, that was.
10:52
Indeed it was. Yes, I'm delighted, was
10:56
delighted and continue to be so happy about the liberation of
11:01
East Central Europe. And then came this Milosevic,
11:06
who threatened again European peace.
11:09
He destroyed the rest of Yugoslavia, attacked Slovenia,
11:12
Croatia, Bosnia, made genocide in Bosnia, and then he attacked
11:17
in Kosovo. And so this spirit of liberation
11:20
and the same spirit impersonified in Mrs. Albright
11:24
was there in power at the right moment to stop him.
11:28
And that's something really wonderful because you intervened
11:31
again, you liberated Kosovo. And it was again, a very risky
11:35
way, a thing to do. It was military action for
11:38
diplomats, for states is always for democracies is very
11:40
difficult. And again, you did it.
11:44
Yeah. And I should say, I mean,
11:45
another legacy of this school we did have as Dean.
11:51
And this was just so this school was renamed the Joseph Korbel
11:54
School of International Studies in 2008.
11:57
And then it was in 2010 or 11 we had a new Dean come.
12:02
His name was Ambassador Chris Hill and he had been very.
12:06
Important personality for Southeastern Europe as well.
12:09
Yeah. He had been the special envoy
12:12
for the United States to Kosovo and negotiated with Milosevic
12:15
directly and actually tried to prevent the bombing campaign
12:21
that Serbia ultimately suffered as a consequence of their
12:23
activities, their genocidal activities in Kosovo.
12:28
And then Chris, following his deanship here again became U.S.
12:35
ambassador to Serbia and served there until quite recently under
12:38
the Biden administration. So was recently in Vienna and I
12:42
was honoured to shake his hand and chat a little bit with him.
12:45
He's a great personality as well.
12:47
But let's come to Condoleezza Rez because she was in power and
12:51
during the Bush years of George W when NATO was enlarged so
12:55
tremendously, I think it was 7 years, 7 new countries coming
12:59
into NATO parallel to the UN enlargement in 2004.
13:02
And she was the National Security Adviser at that time.
13:06
Yeah, she was National Security Advisor.
13:08
You're right. I don't know until exactly what
13:10
year, but I have to emphasize that it was in 1999 that the
13:15
first post communist NATO enlargement took place to
13:19
Poland, Czech Republic and Hungary.
13:22
And of course, that was the Clinton administration.
13:26
So I want to give due credit, and I think President Clinton
13:29
was instrumental in making the ultimate decision, along with a
13:33
couple key people in his administration to admit those
13:37
countries, those three countries.
13:39
Leaders had made a plea to Clinton at the opening of the
13:44
Holocaust Memorial Museum in DC in the early 1990s.
13:48
And according to James Goldgeier, who's a great
13:51
colleague and professor at American University who wrote
13:54
the book, not whether but when, that was a critical point of
13:59
intervention. And I think it really belies a
14:01
lot of the Russian narrative about NATO enlargement because,
14:06
of course, it's not so much a question of NATO and the United
14:10
States orchestrating an imperial agenda of, you know, forcibly
14:17
putting these countries into the alliance.
14:20
It was much more about these countries wanting the security
14:22
and prosperity and at that time the democratic rights that other
14:26
NATO members enjoyed. But you're quite right.
14:29
Then by 2004, eight more countries were admitted to NATO.
14:35
I believe it was 8 post communist countries at that
14:37
point. I think it was 7 to be accurate.
14:39
And then and then later came Croatia and Albania.
14:43
That was 8:00 and 9:00. In 2000. 9 George Bush actually
14:47
was in Croatia and he was starting to cry for emotions
14:51
when Croatia was entering NATO. And we, we are lifelong grateful
14:56
for his great efforts because his presidency he really
14:59
enlarged NATO. He was a great friend of Europe.
15:02
So, of course, looking back on this period, this is a period
15:04
also of enormous policy continuity and I would say
15:08
bipartisan agreement about what constituted US transatlantic
15:12
NATO interests. You know, you could have a
15:15
policy initiated under a Democratic administration and
15:19
have it continue very robustly through the Republican
15:23
administration of George W Bush. Of course, that is no longer the
15:27
case. But yes, I'd say that.
15:29
Was a stable Europe is much cheaper for American taxpayers
15:33
than coming to fight our wars here around.
15:36
And you ultimately always have to fight our wars as well
15:39
because it's also your wars. So having security structures in
15:43
Europe which help to keep the peace is of course a very good
15:46
investment for Americans. Unfortunately now, now the the
15:51
Tucker Carlson and the American MAGA movement has somehow
15:55
strided away in some kind of narratives which definitely seem
15:59
to be from Russia inspired that NATO enlargement was a mistake.
16:03
How do you judge this? Why this is coming?
16:06
This argument that we provoked Russia and all this Russian
16:11
interest must be taken into consideration.
16:13
Why is this so prominent in the American political discourse
16:17
after 50 years or so? It's 80 years or is led by
16:22
American firepower and NATO institution basically.
16:26
Why now? So a different America?
16:31
It is a great question. I wish I had.
16:33
I wish I had for you a better answer.
16:35
I think. I suspect that, you know, in so
16:40
many of the Trump administration's policies we see
16:44
admiration for authoritarian politics, authoritarian methods
16:50
of running politics, and economies for that matter.
16:55
And I am afraid that might, what might be at the root of it is a
17:01
sympathy for Russia's position because people in this
17:05
administration don't hold democratically organized
17:09
institutions or indeed the democratic order in very high
17:12
esteem. I think that that, you know,
17:16
President Trump in particular believes that the US defense
17:21
budget is unduly financing the lifestyles of European publics.
17:29
I mean, that's he's said as much.
17:31
And so in theory, you know, on according to one kind of
17:35
argument, they're seeking more so-called burden sharing.
17:41
But in another way, I think that the Trump administration just
17:44
doesn't see multilateralism and global cooperation as having the
17:51
peace and prosperity building effects that you and I believe
17:55
those institutions have. And honestly, I think it's, you
18:01
know, they're just, they're not very well informed about the
18:03
history or the role of the institutions or the founding of
18:06
the institutions or what the institutions do to do things
18:10
like preserve peace and prosperity.
18:12
And so I think they've made a series of terrible
18:14
miscalculations that if Russia is allowed to succeed in
18:19
Ukraine, the Europeans and the Americans are going to pay
18:22
dearly for in the medium and long term.
18:24
And the Ukrainians are paying for it with their lives right
18:27
now. You know, you said before that
18:31
you think it's cost effective in a way for the United States to
18:38
provide, you know, in part for European security.
18:42
I think that's true. But I don't want to lose sight
18:44
of the human cost of the conflicts.
18:47
And of course, you you wouldn't either.
18:50
You know, the United States lost comparatively few people in
18:54
World War 2, but still hundreds of thousands of people.
18:59
And you know, certainly the Russians suffered in the
19:02
European, everybody suffered enormously.
19:04
People all over the world, just lives were lost and ruined in
19:09
that kind of conflict. And so it's, you know, it is a a
19:12
matter of, you know, where do we invest wisely?
19:15
But it's also a matter of how do we support the human condition?
19:19
And I do, you know, the European institutions and I have enormous
19:23
regard, respect, you know, admiration for Europeans and
19:28
what they did following World War 2, for the institutions that
19:31
they've built and for the fact that they enlarged their
19:35
institutions to East Central Europe and fully enfranchise
19:37
those countries, as problematic as some of them have been in the
19:41
rules and the institutions of of the European Union.
19:44
So I, you know, this isn't just an American story.
19:47
The Europeans were critical. This American, this American
19:52
thanks a lot. This American peace LED efforts.
19:54
This kind of post World War 2 order has now held for 80 years.
19:58
Yeah, 80 years of security, of prosperity, of freedom of human
20:02
rights on the European continent.
20:04
We have never, have ever seen such a period in this continuity
20:08
and this prosperity because we are simply a very conflict
20:12
prone. In the whole history, we have
20:14
only history of wars. Now we have 80 years, maybe
20:17
three generation of peace. Thanks.
20:19
To this American imposed world order and this kind of
20:23
structures like in NATO and EU, which we have, yeah.
20:26
So in the first Trump term we had actually on the Balkans
20:30
considerable progress in some aspects.
20:33
Maybe it was Trump or not, but we had Montenegro joining at the
20:36
beginning of his presidency in NATO.
20:39
We had N Macedonia at the end of his presidency.
20:42
He was brokering at least some agreement between Serbia and
20:45
Kosovo, which led to the recognition of Israel for for
20:49
Kosovo and the opening of an embassy of Kosovo in Jerusalem.
20:53
So it's it's not amazing, but it's for the for the Balkan.
20:57
It was really good. Yeah.
20:59
And in the second term, now in the second term of Trump and we
21:03
try in Europe to understand what's going on because in the
21:06
biggest ever crisis we have now since World War 2.
21:10
And this is this huge scale invasion from Russia against
21:14
Ukraine since 3 1/2 years. We miss American leadership and
21:19
we need you so much. We need you so much.
21:21
We miss American leadership. We miss it.
21:23
We're all missing it. I mean, I think, you know, as I
21:26
said before, I think this administration is making a
21:28
terrible set of calculations about what actually constitutes
21:31
American interests, the degree of alignment in European and
21:35
American interests, the threat that Russia poses, you know, not
21:40
just to Ukraine, but to the idea that there is democratic
21:43
sovereignty, that there is rule of law.
21:46
I mean, this administration, as far as I can tell, is also
21:48
violating international law and its activities in drug boat,
21:55
so-called executions overseas. So there are lots of ways in
22:00
which the United States now is a central actor in eroding the
22:04
international order that I believe was so good, as you just
22:08
said, for preserving 80 years of relative peace and prosperity.
22:12
Obviously not for everybody, not for people in Russia's near
22:15
abroad, not for the people in Belarus, not even for the people
22:18
in the Western Balkans. But in relative terms, the
22:22
institutions that enveloped countries have done extremely
22:27
well. And I feel like the United
22:28
States, unfortunately, in this administration, is undermining a
22:33
lot of that rule of law. Especially worried by JD Waynes,
22:38
who is potentially a presidential candidate for the
22:40
next time as vice president. And in his chats now in the
22:44
March, he was really having some kind of virulent, virulent
22:48
hatred for Europe. Like we would be, you know, we
22:52
are not the enemy. We are just, you know, we are
22:55
like the older brother who is a bit jealous to this very
22:58
successful younger brother America.
23:01
But we are very similar people and we haven't done no harm to
23:04
America ever. So where does this come from?
23:07
This kind of, oh, you lazy Europeans, we always have to
23:11
bail you out there. But we are really bit shell
23:15
shocked after Munich, after the security conference and now we
23:18
are really kind of desperate alone asking ourselves what have
23:23
you done wrong to be faced with all the Putin's war machine.
23:28
The Ukrainians are dying, we are paying hundreds of billions, and
23:32
America seems to be capricious to say the least to.
23:36
Say the least. Yeah.
23:38
I was also shell shocked after the Munich Security Conference
23:41
and reading Vance's statements. And, you know, all of my
23:45
colleagues were as well. Again, I think it goes back to a
23:48
lack of understanding of the historical ties between the two
23:53
political entities, a lack of understanding about what
23:56
constitutes common interests, a lack of appreciation for what
24:01
the foundations of democracy are.
24:04
I think if there's any any shed of good news in this story to do
24:10
with JD Vance, I don't think right.
24:13
And it's always a risk to make political predictions.
24:16
But I don't think he has a political future on the national
24:19
stage for the Republican Party. The thing about Donald Trump,
24:23
and I don't know if this comes across to European audiences or
24:26
not, but in the United States, he has a style of communication
24:31
that many people find enormously entertaining and charismatic.
24:36
And even if I don't share that sense about the way he
24:43
communicates in his appeal, I can see that he has that appeal.
24:46
And JD Vance doesn't have that right.
24:51
There's a kind of unusual, I don't want to say unique, but it
24:55
is unusual magnetism that Trump has.
24:59
And people tend to view him as terribly authentic, and they
25:06
really like that about him. So even if he's doing things
25:09
that a lot of the American voting public doesn't
25:12
necessarily like, they think at his core he's being real.
25:17
And that has enormous political currency in this country.
25:21
JD Vance doesn't. He doesn't have those qualities.
25:25
And I don't think that his political views ultimately are
25:29
consistent with what the American public really wants on
25:33
the question about, you know, denigrating European culture,
25:40
ways of organizing their economies in the Republican
25:44
Party. They are quite allergic to the
25:47
idea that government can be a productive role in people's
25:51
lives and can be an equalizing force.
25:53
So, you know, the Europeans, in my opinion, are really good at
25:57
taxing and redistributing in ways that create wealthy but
26:02
relatively equal societies. And the United States,
26:05
particularly with the current legislation that was just passed
26:08
that we're all going to suffer the effects of in the coming
26:11
years as you know it, among other things, cuts healthcare
26:16
benefits enormously for people who need to be able to afford
26:19
health insurance. So it's an ongoing ideological
26:25
battle that the Republicans are fighting.
26:28
And in a way, European politics is illustrative of a lot of
26:33
values that I think the Democratic Party in the United
26:36
States espouses that they are trying to argue against.
26:39
So some of that was, you know, for the Europeans to feel the
26:44
effects of those comments of JD Vance, but it was also for the
26:47
domestic political audience in the United States to have the
26:50
Republican vice president saying, you know, we disagree
26:53
with the extravagance of the European welfare state.
26:56
Professor Rachel, you know very well Europe and America.
27:00
Obviously you're very well travelled in the more many
27:03
countries of Austria you have been recently.
27:05
You know, we are a little bit worried about this perception
27:09
and the portraying of Europe as a kind of breakdown disaster
27:14
continent, which Mr. Elon Musk, who has 220 million or 200 for
27:19
something even more followers. And he put razors as a kind of
27:24
an anarchistic breakdown society in his many tweets.
27:28
Yeah. And you know, I've just passed
27:31
now the Stefan's bloods in Vienna on the way to this
27:34
podcast studio. And there are thousands of
27:37
tourists in Vienna. Rich, affluent people are trying
27:40
to celebrate Christmas here in the market, preparing the
27:43
presence. And our societies are maybe not
27:46
as good and innovative as the American one.
27:49
And but we have the rule of law. We have order here.
27:53
We have absolutely a welfare state, but we also have
27:57
prosperity. We have far from from the
28:00
portraying which I see in the American MAGA movement as a
28:04
breakdown of a disaster society. Actually we are kind of very
28:07
rich and actually quite successful.
28:10
Not as dynamic as I want, but why do you some in America
28:14
portray us like this so badly? It's a mystery for me.
28:19
It's a mystery for me too. I mean, I share all of your
28:22
admiration and, you know, following World War 2, so, you
28:28
know, I think many Americans still probably don't realize how
28:33
significant things like devastating food shortages were
28:38
following the war and how long and how much work it took for
28:43
the European economies to recover.
28:46
And of course, the United States was very helpful through the
28:49
Marshall Plan and I think the creation of the of the
28:53
predecessor of the OECD. But I do, you know, I think for
29:02
reasons I'm not fully informed about.
29:06
I mean, the United States does have in its political narrative
29:15
a, you know, highly individualistic libertarian
29:21
strain. I guess it's that libertarian
29:23
strain that's coming through with respect to how at least
29:30
current U.S. officials differentiate themselves from
29:34
how European politics is organized.
29:35
So as I said a minute ago, I do think the Democratic Party in
29:40
the United States, and certainly with the victory of somebody
29:42
like Mamdani just now in New York, I mean, he says he's a
29:46
democratic socialist. If you compare him to European,
29:50
the European political spectrum, he's like it's kind of center
29:53
left. He's not, he's not actually that
29:55
radical. He wants to tax the extremely
29:58
wealthy people living in New York City in order to be able to
30:01
pay for things like childcare and public transportation.
30:05
And you know, he does want rent controls more broadly across the
30:10
city to address the affordability crisis.
30:13
So I've, you know, I hear what you're saying and of course I so
30:18
strongly disagree with the Elon Musk's of this world.
30:21
European Society is not in a state of decay.
30:24
I think since the end of the Cold War, actually, I would
30:28
describe Europe as in more of a renaissance, having included 100
30:34
million new people from East Central Europe in its political
30:37
organization, having. Introduced very successfully so.
30:41
Very successfully so. I mean, those economies are in
30:44
some cases more than three times as large as they were when
30:48
communism ended. Romania 8 times GDP.
30:52
Romania since, yeah. Exactly right.
30:55
So I know that Hungary is a Hungary is a is a difficult
31:00
issue for many analysts of European politics and translated
31:03
community I think is a net negative for NATO at this point.
31:09
But in any case, what I want to emphasize is that European
31:14
politics, economics, organization, it's done
31:17
tremendous things for populations.
31:20
The 400 million people living in that part of the world enjoy
31:24
much more peace, prosperity, opportunity, a more dynamic
31:29
existence and longevity, and educate everything as a
31:33
consequence of European collaboration.
31:36
Exactly. And the last year actually we
31:38
produced €17 trillion of GDP. So it is not completely poverty
31:43
here around. It's not as good as America.
31:46
OK, fine. And we love you and we want to
31:49
be better and more innovative, but we are also producing our
31:52
share of the world GDP, which is not neglectable and.
31:56
No, I know. I know actually was teaching my
31:59
students to this this past quarter.
32:00
So I think the United States is probably 25% of global GDP, but
32:05
the Europeans are between 17 and 19% of global GDP.
32:09
We also have produced some share of the cake and together
32:12
actually we produce half of world's GDP.
32:15
And but this kind of bizarre portraying of NATO as a failed
32:19
alliance and the economy grumbling is somehow showing
32:23
such a division and a bit of an unattractive picture to the rest
32:26
of the world. And that basically this only
32:29
serves the Russian propaganda. I agree.
32:32
So can I just say one other thing about NATO enlargement
32:34
because I was living in Warsaw for much of 1999 researching the
32:40
politics of NATO enlargement. And I think, again, this is
32:43
something that people forget. But in the 1990's, the Americans
32:46
under Clinton, you know, they were trying to establish a much
32:50
better relationship with Russia. They didn't want, you know, they
32:54
didn't want a renewed Cold War. And so at the time, living in
32:58
Poland, you know, as you know, the polls are very, very
33:01
concerned about the historical precedents that many iterations
33:06
of Polish Russian interaction have provided.
33:08
I mean, they're very leery of Russia, understandably.
33:12
But at that time, Americans were telling Polish officials you
33:15
shouldn't publicly justify your desire to be in NATO with the
33:21
idea that Russia is going to pose a continuous threat because
33:25
we are diplomatic. We're trying to establish a
33:26
different and transformed relationship with Russia, right?
33:30
And I think Poland heard this. You know, it was also in the
33:33
context of NATO encouraging these countries to radically
33:36
downsize their armed forces, professionalize their armed
33:39
forces, stay away from something called territorial defense or
33:43
total defense, which is, you know, the possibility of
33:46
mobilizing all of society in your defense in the event that
33:49
there's a ground invasion. In my view, at that time in the
33:53
1990s, early 2000's, the alliance was in a way trying to
33:57
demilitarize these countries politics and trying to get these
34:02
countries away from this idea of defense self-sufficiency and
34:06
also trying to get them to prepare Expeditionary forces
34:10
which they ultimately sent to Afghanistan and Iraq.
34:13
So it's interesting to me, and I think against the historical
34:18
facts that Russia portrays enlargement of NATO in the late
34:24
1990s and early 2000s as being an aggressive set of moves by
34:30
the West. It was definitely not the
34:33
intention at the time. The intention at the time, you
34:36
know, the, I think the priority number one.
34:37
And this was true also of Madeleine Albright.
34:39
You can go back and find Albright's statements on this
34:42
topic saying we need first and foremost to limit the potential
34:47
for regional rivalries within Europe.
34:50
And the best way we know how to do that is by admitting
34:53
countries into NATO and by making sure that the European
34:56
Union's doors also remain open. That had been the the most
35:02
effective recipe for preventing conflict in Europe since the end
35:05
of World War 2. That's what she was set on doing
35:08
in the context of the post Cold War moment.
35:12
And that's what we did. Professor, what's your opinion
35:17
about Ukraine's wish to join NATO and the European Union,
35:20
which is a constitutional objective of the Ukraine's
35:23
constitution since 2017 when President Poroshenko put it in
35:27
the constitution demand ratified they want to join.
35:31
What do you think about it? Well, you know, ultimately I
35:35
think they should be able to join.
35:37
So the the thing that I think is at stake with Russia's invasion
35:40
of Ukraine is this idea of democratic sovereignty.
35:43
You know, when the Cold War ended and Poland and the Baltic
35:46
States and Bulgaria and everybody, you know, those
35:49
countries finally got to decide for themselves with whom they
35:52
would ally in the international system and what international
35:55
institutions they would join. You know, I think Ukraine and
35:59
for that matter, Belarus, I mean, I think all of those
36:02
countries should have the political opportunity to decide
36:06
for themselves. So on a principled basis, if I
36:10
were structuring a peace agreement with Russia, which I
36:13
know is not immediately in the cards, but let's say we were
36:16
doing that, I would want to hold out the possibility on principle
36:21
and also for practical reasons that Ukraine ultimately be able
36:24
to have that right of democratic sovereignty, of deciding where
36:27
with whom it's going to be alive in the international system.
36:30
Now, from a diplomatic point of view, in order to stop the
36:33
killing, if that's not possible in the short term, then I would
36:37
think that a set of security arrangements that were as good
36:40
as being in NATO for Ukraine would be an acceptable
36:44
substitute in the medium term, if that makes sense.
36:48
In the 28 points, immediately American negotiators presented
36:52
this plan and they have from the beginning excluded Naitumba, a
36:55
membership for Ukraine, without any reason.
36:58
But why was that? And what is this 28 point plans
37:02
which was supposed to be implemented before Thanksgiving
37:06
and now we are by the way, happy Thanksgiving.
37:09
But but it was not very nice of Trump to say to withdraw the
37:15
military support completely and the intelligence sharing by
37:19
Thanksgiving and imposes such a draconic kind of piece of
37:24
submission on Ukraine. I agree.
37:27
That was despicable. Highly regrettable.
37:30
Shameful even. I mean, it's, it's a, and then
37:34
of course we realized we were, there was leaked information
37:38
suggesting it had all come from Russia in the first instance.
37:40
Anyway. I think, you know, going back to
37:43
the Biden administration, and I wish the Biden administration
37:46
had been more supportive of Ukraine, had allowed Ukraine to
37:50
use more weaponry for the purposes of destroying
37:54
infrastructure and military equipment deeper in Russia
37:58
earlier, and had been more forthcoming with respect to air
38:04
defenses, all of that stuff. And I wish that the Trump
38:07
administration were much more assertive on Ukraine's behalf.
38:11
So that would be my policy preference.
38:13
I've had a number of conversations with American
38:18
academics on the issue of the risk of escalation in Russia.
38:23
So when it comes to the Biden administration, what we talk
38:27
about is the fear that Russia ultimately would deploy A
38:31
tactical nuclear weapon in Ukraine in retaliation for more
38:37
aggressive US assistance for Ukraine.
38:40
And I have tended to think that that was never likely on
38:45
Russia's behalf, that Russia wouldn't do that because they
38:48
would be inflicting so much damage on themselves in terms of
38:52
global public opinion, in terms of contaminating the area
38:57
territory that they in theory wanted to capture.
39:01
But then also the radiation effects on Russia's own
39:06
territory, including damaging potentially huge swaths of of
39:11
Russian agriculture, Right. So from my point of view,
39:15
escalatory risks were overblown in the Biden administration.
39:21
And, you know, I don't even think the Trump administration
39:23
is thinking along these lines. I think they're their America
39:26
First Doctrine suggests that the United States is better off, you
39:32
know, kind of like how Putin wants to organize everything on
39:36
a bilateral basis. I think that's what Trump
39:39
believes is in the US interest. I disagree wholeheartedly.
39:42
But in any case, I think part of what has informed the American
39:46
response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine has been this fear of
39:51
Russian escalation in response with the possible threat of
39:56
nuclear use, which of course Putin has threatened on many
39:58
occasions. Just from yesterday.
40:01
He does it now on a daily basis. On a daily basis, yeah.
40:05
And we all in Europe for 80 years now live under the
40:09
American nuclear umbrella. We depend on your security and
40:13
we depend that you secure us from Russia.
40:17
That's the whole arrangement since 49 and now we have this
40:21
situation that we feel a little bit left alone.
40:25
Yeah. So can I ask you a question on
40:27
that? I mean, do Europeans currently
40:29
think that the American Nuclear Security Guarantee is a
40:32
guarantee? We have no other.
40:35
We have no other but. We rely on you, we rely on you.
40:40
100 lonely nukes leftover from the Cold War.
40:44
I mean, in the meantime they are renovated and new ones, but
40:47
nevertheless, there's no there's a French and the British is all
40:50
fine. I don't want to talk them and
40:52
belittle them, but nevertheless, without you we are lost.
40:58
But do the Europeans on the side have conversations among
41:01
themselves about how to organize themselves differently so that
41:04
you're not as dependent on the Trump administration for your
41:08
security in light, you know, in the threat of Russian nuclear
41:11
use, for example? We do a lot of things.
41:14
The war has changed Europe tremendously.
41:17
We now spend huge amounts of European Union funding, which
41:20
was never allowed to spend it on the military.
41:22
We spend it for Ukraine's support militarily.
41:25
We buy a lot of weapons. We unify our industrial basis
41:29
for mobilizing for Ukraine's defence.
41:32
But, you know, the task is enormous and our structures are
41:36
not made for that. And we have always been not, of
41:40
course, relying on America. But we hadn't, you know, with
41:43
all our history of wars, we were proud to be peaceful.
41:47
And we had maybe for sure neglected the necessity of this
41:52
kind of defence to our big regrets.
41:56
But nevertheless, without America, we certainly cannot
42:00
help the Ukrainians as efficiently.
42:02
And Russia knows that as well. That's why they are intervening
42:06
so heavily in American politics. Exactly.
42:09
The result is probably the whole MAGA narrative.
42:13
Yes, I agree. We need the spirit of Mrs.
42:16
Albright again. We do.
42:19
I mean, I think there are, there are a number of people on both
42:22
sides of the Atlantic who embody that spirit.
42:24
Just many of them don't occupy positions of political power at
42:27
this moment. So we can hope for political
42:30
party turnover and the democratic process to reassert
42:34
what I think are democratic, peace loving, collaborationist
42:40
values. That's what I hope for starting
42:42
in 2026 for the United States. Professor, we see that we have a
42:45
real friend in your in the friend of Free Europe in
42:49
Colorado that's really assuring and I'm very happy about it.
42:53
Maybe it's two or three sentences about the European
42:55
economy and your research on what's your magic way and to
43:00
copy the American model and to be successful.
43:04
Well, so part of the reason that I was attending that banking
43:08
conference at the National Bank of Austria 10 days ago was to
43:12
try to learn where the Europeans were on capital markets union
43:16
and banking union. So what I had found in the 2017
43:20
book Banking on Markets was that European banks in some cases
43:25
were quite disruptive to the smooth functioning of the euro.
43:28
In the sense that, and you probably know this is an
43:30
economist in many cases, particularly in Western Europe
43:34
with the financial institutions and the governments, their
43:37
financial fortunes are very strongly linked partly by bank
43:42
credit to governments. And that's important because on
43:45
many really critical occasions it's kept European governments
43:49
borrowing costs down and you know, as a very important source
43:52
of credit for the economy. And in exchange, you know, banks
43:56
get a lot of out of this relationship, including
43:58
taxpayer, taxpayer funded bailouts when when the occasion
44:02
arises. So what it looked like in 2014
44:06
when European Banking Union was being implemented was that this
44:10
was a way to create a more integrated financial market in
44:16
Europe because the ECB was going to become the sole bank
44:19
licensing authority for the Eurozone.
44:21
And that's the case. But for some reason, and Guntra,
44:25
I would be interested in your views on why this is, there has
44:28
not been more transnational ownership meaningfully in
44:34
Western Europe. Now, of course, Eastern Europe
44:35
is a totally different story. They open themselves up to
44:39
foreign bank ownership starting in the early mid 1990s.
44:43
You know, in a way, even though some of those countries are not
44:45
in the eurozone, they are more financially integrated in ways
44:49
that would support a common currency than the West European
44:52
economies. But it seems to me that the
44:53
West, the West European economies are still very
44:56
reluctant to allow large scale foreign ownership in finance.
45:02
And I think that attitude of national authorities, that sort
45:05
of protectionist impulse is also hampering, you know, regulatory
45:11
standardization that would allow Capital Markets Union to take
45:15
hold. But I would be curious about
45:17
your views on where all of that stands.
45:20
We still are not united enough, however, in NATO, nor in the
45:24
capital market union, nor in the banking union, nor in any other
45:28
sector because why? Because we are a union of member
45:31
States and the German authorities want German banks.
45:35
They telling banks want Italian politicians and the Spanish to
45:38
Spanish. And so we have some crossover
45:41
membership and we have gone a far away from where we have
45:44
been, but we are still far away from where we should be in order
45:48
to get out of a common market of 500 million people or 600
45:52
actually with the British and the Turkish.
45:54
We have 700 million people in free Europe.
45:57
We could be much more successful, similar like the
46:00
United States if we were a little bit more united and
46:05
that's. Well, yeah, I mean.
46:06
I think Russia exploits in militarily but with our
46:09
opponents also. That's why we are lagging behind
46:14
the lack of community. So, you know, I will say the
46:17
United States has an incredible the, you know, the economy is
46:21
incredible. It has an amazing array in depth
46:25
of capital markets. Firms here can finance
46:28
themselves in a zillion different ways.
46:31
And I mean, that does have some advantages.
46:34
It also leads to incredible volatility.
46:37
Also for my students, I was looking at GDP per capita of our
46:41
various political entities. You know, the United States is
46:45
now $85,000 a year. If however, you take, you know,
46:50
the multi millionaires and the billionaires out of that, I
46:53
don't know what it is for, for normal people living in the
46:55
United States. So, and then of course, as I was
46:59
in telling my students, relative to Europe, the United States has
47:03
enormous, you know, not just capital market flexibility, also
47:06
labor market flexibility, but the human cost of Labor market
47:09
flexibility is that people in the United States have to
47:12
retrain a number of times over the course of their lives
47:16
normally to and also. Relocate to the.
47:20
Job market, Yeah, they have to. Relocate.
47:22
They have to retrain or they have to put up with a position
47:26
that's not as good as the position that they've just
47:28
vacated. So, you know, we, we could have
47:32
a debate about, you know, the value of dynamism in an economy
47:37
versus the quality of life. And having just spent a week in
47:41
your beautiful Vienna, I mean, it's pretty great.
47:44
Did you like it? I love.
47:46
You did, you enjoy it? I hope you come back again,
47:48
2026. I will, I will.
47:51
And I've got good friends there including you now.
47:54
Thanks a lot. And then?
47:55
You will join. Central European you.
47:57
Will join the show again in 2026.
48:00
Professor, after the midterms, absolutely, absolutely, we can
48:05
make several shows. It would be wonderful to hear
48:08
your opinions about capital market union, about unity of
48:11
Europe, and to keep this heritage of Mrs. Albright, the
48:14
great Liberator of the Balkan and of Condoleezza Rice, the
48:18
great unifier of NATO and then larger of NATO.
48:21
This is the tradition in which you are working.
48:24
And I'm very honored to meet you.
48:26
And this morning, thanks a lot that you take the time to speak
48:29
to us. And please, in 2026, may this
48:32
spirit return to Washington and bring some sense to the
48:37
governing institutions of your great nation.
48:40
Because we need you for victory. We need you for Ukraine's
48:44
liberation, and we need you also for the success of our common
48:47
endeavor. That's the free world.
48:49
And together we can be great again.
48:52
I would like to conclude like this Professor Rachel Epstein, a
48:56
great friend of Europe in Colorado.
48:58
I want to thank you very much for taking the time and all the
49:01
best to you and your family in 2026.
49:04
And that's the spirit win. Again, thanks a lot.
49:08
Thank you so much for having me, I really appreciate it.
49:11
Thanks a lot. I will now close this recording.
49:15
One moment. Very good.