Anna Wieslander has had the temerity to point out that the West has no strategy to end the war in Ukraine. Listen as host Alan Stoga discusses with her what it might take to end this war, one way or the other.
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Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has settled into a grueling, vicious war of attrition with no end in sight. However, there is a growing consensus in NATO capitals that a long war not only favors Russia but has the potential for nasty, unintended consequences. What does not seem to exist is a strategy to do something about it.
Lots of rhetoric: “Ukraine will win” and “we will do what it takes” as well as tactics galore. Send more weapons; impose more sanctions; threaten the Chinese; cheer Zelensky’s Churchillian speeches. But define an endgame or a strategy to get there? Missing in action. Which leaves Russia—and, perhaps, its Chinese sponsor—in the driver’s seat.
Anna Wieslander has had the temerity to point out that the emperor has no clothes or more to the point, the West has no strategy. She is a Swedish defense and security expert, Director for Northern Europe at the Atlantic Council, and Chairman of the board of the Stockholm-based Institute for Security and Development Policy. Listen as host Alan Stoga discusses with her what it might take to end this war, one way or the other.
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Listen to the episode here or find the New Thininkg for a New World podcast on a platform of your choice (Apple podcast, Spotify, Stitcher, Google podcast, Youtube, etc).
ABOUT OUR GUEST
Anna Wieslander is Director for Northern Europe at the Atlantic Council and concurrently serves as Secretary General of the Swedish Defence Association. She also chairs the Institute for Security and Development Policy (ISDP) in Stockholm and is a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of War Sciences.
Anna Wieslander was previously Deputy Director at the Swedish Institute of International Affairs (UI). She has held positions as Head of the Speaker’s Office in the Swedish Parliament, Secretary of the Swedish Defence Commission and Deputy Director of the Swedish Defence Ministry. She has also served as Communications Director in the private sector.
She holds an IB exam from United World College of the American West (1987), a BA degree in journalism from Gothenburg University (1990), and a MA degree in political science from Lund University (1995). She is a PhD candidate in international relations at Lund University, and has pursued doctoral studies at University of California at Berkeley. She is a 2015 alumni of the Georgetown University Leadership Seminar and 2018 alumni of the Swedish Defence University Higher Comprehensive Security Course.
Her expertise is in security and defence policy, Baltic sea security, NATO and partnerships, the transatlantic link, and issues affecting the defence industry.
This invasion must stop
Is this any way to run a war?
People say all is fair in love and war. Love is between two persons. In love one person takes things for granted and the other is always ready to excuse the excesses. But war is not between just two countries, it is against the entire human race. Whatever be the reason behind a country waging a war, the war mongers are just raw.
Once macbeth wondered if “all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood / clean from my hand?”. Now I ask ‘Can all oceans clean the guilt of US which dropped the little boy and the fat man on Hiroshima and Nagasaki?’
May I conclude by saying “there can be no way to run a war”.