Well-known American journalist David Satter – perhaps one of the first Western reporters expelled from Russia since the ” cold war”.

When asked why he, as a Western journalist, is interested in the unapproachable official Moscow’s themes of the 1999 bombings of residential buildings in the Russian Federation, the murder of Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, the destruction of flight MH-17 over eastern Ukraine, he briefly answers: “Because these are the most important topics.”

We collected Satter’s main points from his interview with Radio HB and designed them in the form of a short summary of the speech:

Ukraine suffered from Russian colonization, perhaps most of all. Because it is difficult to imagine that Ukraine, as an independent country, could undergo, for example, the Holodomor, the Great Terror, repressions of the Soviet system or the intellectual destruction of people that occurred as a result of communist dictatorship.

Therefore, in fact, Ukraine’s unfavorable position in the world – next to Russia – brought nothing particularly good to Ukraine. But I still think that such a developed and talented country like Ukraine has a lot of positive things. And one must not fall into apathy or despair about the past, but simply know that these events naturally left their mark on the psychology of people.

The experience of victimization even sometimes has its own positive aspect , because it can give people a deeper understanding, it can simply inspire decisiveness, the desire to develop positively and realize all the possibilities of the nation.

If we talk about history, about the interpretation of history, I don’t see the need to come to an agreement here. Most likely, Ukraine needs to determine itself , but this cannot be a consensus, such a consensus rarely happens. If we look at the relations between different nations in Eastern Europe ( and with Israel too) – the views are different, the claims are different. The nation itself, in spite of these differences, must find the correct ( in the relative sense), at least objective and honest interpretation of its past. And the past of Ukraine is largely connected with Russia.

I do not really like the expression ” post-truth”, because the truth still exists. The fact is that we now have the Internet; Previously, access to public discussions was limited. I am not saying that this was especially high quality [implemented], but still not everyone could publicly express their uninformed opinion. Now this is a mass phenomenon. This democracy was the result of the fact that the public sphere is simply overwhelmed with false information, uninformed manipulations in statements, but this does not mean that we live in an era of post-truth.

Photo: David Sutter via Facebook

The truth still exists, just now she has to compete with so many uninformed, stupid and intentionally distorted statements. The truth was in the Soviet Union when they built a whole system on the basis of lies and had the KGB to impose it on people.

In modern Russia, the forces of lies and propaganda reinforce a state that is rapidly working to mislead people on all important issues. But even in Russia, I think it’s wrong to talk about post-truth. Because the state lie, of course, works and prevails in the public sphere, but nevertheless the truth exists there too. And there, too, by the way, there are people who want to live honestly – and there are many of them.

What is the threat to Ukraine from misinformation in Russia? The threat is direct, because you, I think, have already seen examples: the capture of the Crimea, a senseless war in eastern Ukraine with many victims. Russia, unfortunately, attacks those whom it considers to be incapable of self-defense. Thank God this was limited by the resistance of the Ukrainians, but nevertheless the fact of aggression exists, and it has not been eliminated.

There is a danger of constant provocation, there is a danger of hostile propaganda, but I believe that Ukraine, with its free media, can withstand this. But this is the problem of the present, the problem for the future – and this problem will exist until there are changes in the mentality in Russia.

Ukraine also poses a threat to Russia, but this is a different type of threat – a threat to the authoritarian regime. Why did they start all this ( I mean the capture of Crimea and aggression in Eastern Ukraine)? Because the example of the Maidan, where people organize themselves against the kleptocratic regime, is an example to follow in Russia itself. They wanted to divert attention – and so they did. I know that for various understandable reasons in Ukraine there is a desire to create differences with Russia so that people do not consider how Russians like to say that this is “ one country”. Despite this, there is a lot in common between Russia and Ukraine. If Ukraine establishes a democratic, prosperous state, tolerant and open, this is a direct challenge to the authoritarian system in Russia.

It is difficult to say how scared [Putin] was [of the presidential election in Ukraine], but in general, this example, of course, people in Russia noticed. You can not underestimate them – there people also have eyes, have ears, they can also think about something. There are many family ties between Ukraine and Russia, many contacts: they see that something happened here that is absolutely unusual for Russia.

Many years ago I was in Moscow, standing in line for potatoes ( as it was then), and someone started shouting: “How many can you stand in these lines !?”. And one woman told him: “Nothing, the whole world is afraid of us.” Russians generally have a poor understanding of people’s desire to be independent. And especially – independent of them.

David Sutter is a well-known American journalist, an expert on issues of Russia and the USSR. Between 1976 and 1982 He worked as a special correspondent for the influential Financial Times in Moscow.

Also wrote for The Wall Street Journal and Radio Liberty. In 2013, Sutter was denied entry to the Russian Federation with the following explanation: “Presence on Russian territory is undesirable.” The journalist wrote a number of books that touched on topics that were acute for the Russian authorities.

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