How to End the War in Ukraine: Matt Duss and Ray McGovern Debate U.S. Policy on Russia, NATO & More



As the U.S. pours billions in military aid into Ukraine, we host a debate on the Biden administration’s response to the war and U.S. policy toward Russia amid increasing calls among progressives for a diplomatic end to the conflict. We speak to former Bernie Sanders foreign policy adviser Matt Duss, now a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and Ray McGovern, a former CIA analyst who specialized in the Soviet Union. “Everyone understands that at some point there will need to be a negotiation to bring this war to a close, but I think the tension within the progressive community comes to when and how that diplomacy actually takes place,” says Duss. McGovern stressest that U.S. policymakers must understand Russia’s motivations, saying Russia sees the eastward expansion of NATO as threatening its core interests akin to how the United States viewed the Cuban Missile Crisis in the 1960s. “We need to go back and figure out how this all started in order to figure out how to end it,” says McGovern.

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38 thoughts on “How to End the War in Ukraine: Matt Duss and Ray McGovern Debate U.S. Policy on Russia, NATO & More”

  1. How do you end this conflict? Easy. Get the u.s out of NATO. We are the problem. This conflict could have ended in the spring when Ukraine was negotiating with Russia. Guess who arrived to stop it? B.j on the behest of the Americans. How fucked up is that?

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  2. The US interfered with Russian Ukrainian Affairs for the past decade and instigated a military and cruising by putting into the Ukraine horrible or resulted as a transfer of Technology from the west to be used against the Russians if we think we can escape this without some sort of compromise we are only fooling ourselves

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  3. Glory to Ukraine and her Courageous people fighting for their freedom and rights against a bully dictator who has corrupted many in his greed and need to control others. Ukraine is leading the world shining a big light over this evil, greed and corruption and the world do not want this behaviour where they keep people locked in the past of yesteryear, who can live there now only old tired energy!! There are many Russians who don’t want putins war and we recognise this and also see their plight when these ones rights have been stolen from them by putins dark evil but change will happen and we are beginning to see noises coming from these ones who object this war of putin and the world reaches out to these people. The world needs peace where “every nation has opportunities to live in peace when we say no to war and evil and create positive changes that doesn’t not dictate fear, greed, corruption from any nation” The way forward is to leave these dark old ways behind and move forward where every nation and their citizens live peacefully beside neighbours. We don’t know when puttin will stop his evil ambitions but if he is allowed to take one nation he won’t stop if he thinks he has the power to keep invading other nations, he has no conscience about what he is doing in Ukraine until he is stopped. The world has seen enough wars, conflicts and loss, if he can’t fit in then fly him to mars where he doesn’t need to share the planet!! 🙏🏻🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦🙏🏻

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  4. Ray McGovern is uneducated about the history of Ukraine. He's ignoring that Putin broke his agreement to not invade Ukraine, yet here we are. putin has been clear that he wants the old Russian Empire back. I have no idea what Ray is smoking.

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  5. The thing people need to understand is that 'Ceasefire' has a specific meaning in warfare, it means combats stop shooting but DO NOT MOVE. In other words it means Russia remaining in occupation of vast swatch of territory. The letter from the Progressive caucus was completly unacceptable for this reason because it didn't just ask for negotiations, it asked for a specific outcome to be targeted, and that outcome would be for Ukraine to stop taking back its own territory.

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  6. The withdrawal of that letter marked the end of progressives within the democrat party. You can’t change a corrupt political party from within, anyone who claims to be a "progressive" but runs as a democrat is either fooling themselves or are trying to fool you.

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  7. This bearded man is brainwashed by CNN..His whole speech is " im stupid, supid, stupid I am"..He is one of the reasons why people in Ukraine die right now..

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  8. McGovern is unmoored from reality here. I’m not saying he’s stupid, but he’s stuck in the (understandable) backlash to the Cold War, which is the last time he was a CIA analyst. He is woefully out of touch with Putin’s motives and ambitions, as well as his agency in the situation and responsibility for it. It is a laughable take to suggest Putin wasn’t trying to take all of Ukraine. Simply by looking at the pre-invasion buildup and attack vectors, it was obviously an attempt to overthrow the country’s leadership and claim all of it. No one doubted this while it was happening.

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  9. Matt! You leave out everything that started this war in the first place! Why don’t you mention the civil war in Ucraine since 2014 and even before that? There are two narratives here and You’re onesided! Right? You’re a onesider proNato warmongerer! When this war is over there are no talks needed because there will be a tragic result and no possibilities for any talks! Where is your common sense? Why would Ucraine have to be ruined because of the rich US? The crisis in Ucraine is the West’s fault! Have you read anything before February 2022. No you haven’t. You’re siding with the Hawks! John Mershheimer is more experienced than you; he’s a professor and has studied this! You degrades his knowledge to be just an ”opinion”. Peacetalks are not ” appropriate” they’re essential! Sad to listen to your laid back arrogant utterances about something so much bigger than you!

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  10. الحل في الاختيار العاقل. الاختيار الدبلماسي والتفاوض والحوار الجاد هو الحل. اتفق مع الرئيس ترامب بان الحوار الجاد وفورا هو الذي يقود الي الحل.

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  11. Some of us are so used to opposing US foreign policy that it has become impossible to see the situation with objectivity, because according to dogma, any US military intervention = bad and wrong. Meaning their opponent must always have just cause — even if they are a right wing, authoritarian regime committing mass murder and war crimes in a territorial war of aggression and choice against a sovereign nation. It’s the inverse of the “America Can Do No Wrong” dogma, equally in the service of atrocity.

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  12. 15:30 Mr. Ray, the RuZZian does know how to keep their promises! That's why. The US keeps its promise NOT to invade Cuba and it made good on that promise. RuZZia promised Ukraine to PROTECT IT in exchange for decomissioning its large stockpiles of NUCLEAR arsenal. RuZZia DIDNT MAKE GOOD on that PROMISE. Instead it INVADED UKRAINE! We should NEVER FORGET this.

    In gist, RuZZia cannot be trusted. PERIOD.

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  13. Did Biden say ."The first time the world has seen a direct threat of the use use of a nuclear weapon since the Cuban crisis". Has he forgotten Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I suppose dropping them without warning is not threatening.

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  14. Ray McGovern is making crazy analogies. I am MI also. NATO will not put holes in the ground in Sweden or Finland. They will put trucks with nukes. Russia knows NATO is a defensive alliance which will not attack Russia. Therefore, this is a BS argument.

    What McGovern is NOT doing is looking Putin’s Russia from their point of view. Russia was fine with an “independent” Ukraine when they had a Russian puppet leader installed in a shame election like in Belarus. When Ukraine had its Orange Revolution, the new pro-Ukrainian leader was still warm to an economic relationship with Russia. He also kept all the KGB operatives and Ukrainian Oligarchs. After a time, Putin’s Russia accepted this set up.

    Then the Maiden Revolution occurred. This is when Ukrainians had enough of corruption, Oligarchs, and Russia friendly trade. Ukrainians were demanding EU and NATO membership. Within months, Putin was countering the Maiden Revolution with annexation of Crimea and arming Russian speaking Separatists in Luhansk and Donetsk.

    What is Russia’s fear of Ukraine joining the EU like Finland?

    Russians do not have many personal level contacts with Finns compared to Ukrainians. Putin is afraid that an EU rich Ukraine with a lot of contacts with Russians, will undermine his authority. Of course yet to be developed gas and oil reserves in Ukrainian is a motivating factor too. Finally, a Ukrainian Crimea is taken by Putin as an affront to Russian’s Black Sea Fleet. This was never considered when the Soviet Union dissolved.

    As an MI person, McGovern is intellectually ignorant of what really drives Russia. You cannot negotiate with a Putin whose Russian world view is similar to the world view of Hitler’s Germany. This is not a person with an understanding to compromise. He wants to impose.

    When peace negotiations between Ukrainian and Russia occur, Ukraine will be a NATO member and in the EU Membership process. The boundaries of Ukraine and Russia are open to what is achieved on the battlefield. Repatriation of citizens to their countries will be part of it. Reparations for damages and war clean up will also be part of it. These are the terms.

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  15. Hardly surprising duss would want to demonise Russia, he is Ukrainian American after all! But I'm glad DN have caught up with the rest of us in talking about negotiating cons. how nato began all this back at the turn of the millennium.

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