Jacob Mikanowski: belief

Transcript context

…Speaking of experiments: If you look at a map, you look at Kaliningrad (formerly Königsberg), you look at the Suwałki Gap — what’s the actual equilibrium there? Territory separated from the mother country, Alaska aside, it tends not to go very well, most of all in the history of Eastern Europe. What do you expect? Do I expect Polish tanks storming Kant’s birthplace? Not really. I think, as much as those exclaves used to be — and still are (in Nagorno-Karabakh) — very precarious, being a nuclear power is an awfully big trump card. I can’t see any of the countries surrounding that oblast making a big move. I don’t think it’s even that big of a deal. In Poland you never talk or think about it. A little bit — but I think it’s hard for the Russians to stage anything major from there. But it’s also hard for any of the surroundings to do a lot against it. I think it’s a curio. I don’t think it’s the Crimea of the Baltic. I think it’ll be an issue but not a huge issue. How many Eastern European borders have stayed the same for, say, even 50 or 60 years?…

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