The shift in U.S. support for Ukraine in its war with Russia, which enters its fourth year on Monday, has raised alarms in Kyiv and in capitals across Europe. A new documentary finds that those anxieties are especially high in some of Russia’s neighbors on the Baltic Sea. John Yang speaks with NBC News producer Joel Seidman and correspondent Kevin Tibbles for more about their film.
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John Yang:
The shift in U.S. support for Ukraine and its war with Russia, which enters its fourth year tomorrow, has raised alarms not only in Kyiv but in capitals across Europe. A new documentary finds that those anxieties are especially high in some of Russia's neighbors on the Baltic Sea, Estonia, Finland and Sweden.
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Man:
Every day we are working to get this message over to Russia that even if you try, we will make you pay.
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Man:
Russia invaded one of their neighbors, so it was quite an awakening for the whole Swedish society and of course, the Swedish armed forces.
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Man:
Yeah, at least in this part of the world, we would be ready to fight tomorrow.
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John Yang:
The film is called "Putin's Endgame: The Stakes Beyond Ukraine." It was produced in partnership with the Atlantic Council's Eurasia Center. It's the work of two veterans of NBC News producer Joel Seidman and correspondent Kevin Tibbles.
Kevin, I'd like to start with you. In the film, we see you going traveling through these countries, asking a lot of people the same question. What if Putin wins in Ukraine? I want to play a little bit of you talking to two young men about this in Estonia.
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Man:
What happens to Estonia if Putin wins Ukraine?
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Man:
We never thought about it, actually.
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Man:
Why?
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Man:
I don't know.
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Man:
It's terrifying to think about this.
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Man:
Yes. And the part of our brain is just blocking —
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Man:
This scary thought about.
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Man:
Yeah, because we don't know what this guy wants and what consequences this will bring.
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John Yang:
How strong and how pervasive were those sentiments in what you found?
Kevin Tibbles, Correspondent, "Putin's Endgame: The Stakes Beyond Ukraine": They were very strong, very pervasive. You know what's interesting about that is that those two young men, we're in the town of Narva, which is just across the river, Narva river from Russia. Putin has already said that he wants to retake Narva.
But what is also interesting here is the fact that the Soviet Union took Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, the Baltic nations during the Second World War. They either murdered anyone who was in any position, or they deported people to Siberia to perhaps die in labor camps working for the Soviets.
So the memories of that history are very strong. But you can also tell on the faces of those two young boys that they're scared to death. They're scared to death.
The question that I asked them, to be honest with you, John, because they don't know what's going to happen, but what they do know is that Putin is right across that river.
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John Yang:
And they feel that Ukraine is fighting their war, preventing a future war with them. Is that right?
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Kevin Tibbles:
Well, absolutely. And as a matter of fact, the Estonian foreign minister said to us, listen, Ukraine is fighting our war for us. We need to give them as much support as possible. And he's talking about bringing up levels of GDP to support NATO. Of course, Article 5 says that if any member of NATO is attacked, everyone jumps in to assist in that.
As we heard from one of the Estonian officials, they are hoping that NATO is going to save the day. Well, of course, John, all we're hearing now is that the whole question of Article 5 is now in doubt because of what officials on this side of the Atlantic are saying.
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John Yang:
Joel, I've heard this described as a passion project for you. What made you want to do this?
Joel Seidman, Director, "Putin Endgame: The Stakes Beyond Ukraine": I've been doing lots of films with Kevin over the years about the NATO alliance, about Russia's aggression toward NATO. There are ships, many of them with foreign flags, that have been dragging their anchors and severing very important cables between the Baltic nations.
And that is what is called a hybrid war, that Russia has been testing the alliance to see what to do. So we thought this is a good time to take the temperature of the two newest NATO members, Sweden and Finland, and also the NATO member that has its most eastern border with Russia, and that's Estonia.
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John Yang:
Hybrid warfare sounds high tech, but this isn't cyber-attacks. This isn't hacking. This is sabotage.
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Joel Seidman:
Yes. And it's very difficult to point the finger onto exactly who is behind it. And that's the beauty of hybrid warfare. The officials that we spoke to and also the people in Helsinki that are actually looking at this as institute, say these ships are basically dragging their anchors, and they could drag their anchors up to 100 kilometers.
So therefore, that's not just an accident. They're causing havoc, and they're breaking a lot of very important communications lines.
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John Yang:
Kevin, you mentioned NATO, and Joel just talked about NATO. Is there a sense of what frightens people in this region more? President Trump sort of pivot away from Ukraine or his talk about perhaps leaving NATO?
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Kevin Tibbles:
Well, I think they're both part and parcel of the same thing. And the word that I would use is fear. What Joel was talking about in terms of hybrid warfare, you know, it goes way beyond the shipping. For example, the Estonians say that the Russians are jamming their GPS signals and that sometimes planes can't land at their airports.
It all seems to be a pattern of trying to destabilize societies. We saw that in Ukraine prior to the invasion of Ukraine. In the end, the Estonian foreign minister said to us that this is Donald Trump's Churchill moment. Does Donald Trump want to be seen as someone who perhaps stopped the Third World War, stop the invasion of the other side?
If Vladimir Putin is really trying to recreate some imperial slash Soviet style Russia, I mean, these people in the Baltic nations know exactly what that's like because it's their relatives who were sent to Siberian labor camps. So they are looking to the United States. And the events of this past week, I think, have probably scared the living daylights out of them.
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John Yang:
Joel, what do you hope people will take away from this?
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Joel Seidman:
I think that certainly our audience is the American people. And I think this is an area of the world that's a little bit alien to them. So we want to give them the opportunity to see what normal citizens, border guards, heads of state, foreign ministers, think about this region and understand that they are under threat and that they do believe that they could be next.
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John Yang:
Quickly, where can people see this?
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Joel Seidman:
Certainly they could see it on the Atlantic Council's YouTube channel. It is right there at the very top. And we encourage Americans to take a peek.
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John Yang:
Joel Seidman, Kevin Tibbles, thank you both very much.
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Kevin Tibbles:
Thank you, John.
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Joel Seidman:
Thank you.
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