#415 – Serhii Plokhy: History of Ukraine, Russia, Soviet Union, KGB, Nazis & War

Serhii Plokhy is a Ukrainian historian at Harvard University,
director of the Ukrainian Research Institute, and an author of
many books on history of Eastern Europe, including his latest
book The Russo-Ukrainian War: The Return of History. Please
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Transcript: https://lexfridman.com/serhii-plokhy-transcript


EPISODE LINKS:
Serhii’s X: https://x.com/splokhy
Serhii’s Website:
https://history.fas.harvard.edu/people/serhii-plokhii
Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute:
https://huri.harvard.edu/
Serhii’s Books: https://amzn.to/3OS2EqK
2006 – The Origins of the Slavic Nations
2010 – Yalta: The Price of Peace
2012 – The Cossack Myth: History and Nationhood in the Age of
Empires
2014 – The Last Empire: The Final Days of the Soviet Union
2015 – The Gates of Europe: A History of Ukraine
2016 – The Man with the Poison Gun: A Cold War Spy Story
2017 – Lost Kingdom: The Quest for Empire and the Making of the
Russian Nation
2018 – Chernobyl: History of a Tragedy
2021 – Nuclear Folly: A History of the Cuban Missile Crisis
2021 – The Frontline: Essays on Ukraine’s Past and Present
2022 – Atoms and Ashes: A Global History of Nuclear
Disaster
2023 – The Russo-Ukrainian War: The Return of History


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OUTLINE:
Here’s the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players
you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that
time.
(00:00) – Introduction
(09:10) – Collapse of the Soviet Union
(25:19) – Origins of Russia and Ukraine
(38:22) – Ukrainian nationalism
(46:04) – Stepan Bandera
(1:15:05) – KGB
(1:30:03) – War in Ukraine
(2:06:19) – NATO and Russia
(2:17:22) – Peace talks
(2:31:09) – Ukrainian Army head Valerii Zaluzhnyi
(2:37:46) – Power and War
(2:48:37) – Holodomor
(2:55:09) – Chernobyl
(3:05:43) – Nuclear power
(3:15:20) – Future of the world