Anticorruption revolution is unacceptable to him. Charlie and we talk about khodorkovsky, putin and the future of russia with stephen seatanovich, fiona hill, and michael mcfaul. Khodorkovsky pointed out something useful in the interview when he talked about the un predictability of revolutionary situations. He said, you know, these things cant be foreseen. It looks as though theyre not going to happen until suddenly they do, and hes banking on a kind of unease within the elite and, hopefully, within the population at some point that the combination of putins policies are producing a situation in which bad things lie ahead for russia. Charlie khodorkovsky part two. Russia and putin and khodorkovsky and a preview of the new movie gone girl when we continue. Funding for charlie rose is provided by the following rose additiona unding provided by and by bloomberg. A provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. Charlie you expect to see Vladimir Putin run for reelection in 2017 and win . I think that he will run, and i think that he will get the victory, but the method by which he will get this victory will depend on how events develop. He could get the victory relatively honestly because, right now, this National Chauvinism is supporting his popularity rating. Charlie you have said before about ukraine, you have said to him that you believe that he did not expect this, that this was not a wellplanned action on his part, but it may very well be what . The consequences of ukraine for Vladimir Putin. If ukraine will be a successful country from an economic standpoint, then this will have a very serious impact on the readiness of russians for a change of regime themselves. If ukraine is not successful, this will be an additional argument for not changing the existing leadership in the country. Putin understands this perfectly well, and its precisely for this reason that ukraines success on its path of anticorruption revolution is unacceptable to him. Charlie part of the conflict in ukraine was about turning to the west. That was part of the conflict in the beginning. You argue forcefully that russia has to turn to the west. That russias natural place is with the west. Explain that. Russia, in the past several centuries of its history, has been developing along the european path. There was some gaps, but, on the whole, if we look at 1,000 years of russian history, the greater part of all of russian history, we have been developing together with europe our ruling dynasty, as you know, was one in the same as todays germany, although germany didnt exist back then. Many researchers, by the way, feel that even the name ruus, we need to thank our northern neighbors for that name. Today, were trying to find some other path. I do not see another path for our 140 million people. We are part of europe. All of our culture is european. All of our traditions are european. A search for another path within the common european choice, that makes sense. Every country in europe has its own unique path, but to search for a path thats separate from europe, to me, sounds strange. I ask people, who are you . Are you chinese . Are youcin you koreans, asians . No, of course not. I think that here our country is going to have to make a choice in favor of europe and, on this path, jointly with europe, we will solve those problems that have arisen now with ukraine. Charlie theres also in russia recently this question and i want to say this correctly yevtushenkov. I know Vladimir Yevtushenkov well. We graduated from the same department at the me mendolay of technical institute. He is ahead of me, but i worked with him at the plant. I was one of his underlings on a machine tool. I have heard all kinds of attitudes towards him on the part of many people, but were all complicated people. There is some people he may have offended. That does happen. But what has happened with him is without a doubt a result of redistribution of political influence within the kremlin inner circle. Igor ivanovic has for quite some time demonstrated a desire to get bashneft within rosneft. By the way, i dont know, after this scandal will he continue to have this desire or whether hes going to find another finance group and purchase it through this company. Until recently, bashneft was in the ambit of medvedev. Now, from all appearances, medvedevs political position has weakened. While Vladimir Yevtushenkov didnt realize this immediately, while Igor Ivanovic is a man of traditional views, which is if you can grab a piece, youve got to grab it. Charlie hes also the closest person to Vladimir Putin, is he not . Well, he has always carried out the functions of a servant of his whose job is to take care of a whole bunch of tasks that putin didnt want to deal with himself. I think that maybe in a lesser role, but he still remains in this position. But you should note that he knows putin well and knows how to manipulate him well. I think that this effectiveness, this efficiency which consists of him coming up to putin with a question and just that time when putin is in the right mood or he creates the mood for putin and then comes up to him with a question, you know, the usual intrigues of this sort. This is something Igor Ivanovic is a great expert at. Charlie youre quoted as saying hes one of the few people i hate. Well, thats probably too strong but if we say there are people towards whom i truly do have a bad attitude then Igor Ivanovic is certainly at the top of that list. Charlie you have told me before i asked you how deeply you hated or felt because of what had happened to you, those ten years of your life and how you felt about putin. You said there are people i hate more than putin. I assume hes on that list. Yes, no doubt. No doubt. He heads this list. He knows that, which is why transferring his psychological ideologies to other people, he has interviews to all other kind of publications that hes afraid for hiso in actuality, i think that, in this way, hes asking in an indirect way for Vladimir Putin to give him sanction to do something. To me and my partner neslin whom he also despises and fears. Charlie that is the interesting question for me, for you. Do they, because of your people that are close to you, they dont have your body your body is outside of russia but people that are your former partners, people that you care about are there. Are you i in any way a hostage o that, what might happen to People Associated with you or people close to you . We are at war. And, of course, i cant not think about hostages, but neither can i wage war as if though they are limiting me in any way. There are very many people who have to encounter this dilemma. Israel has to deal with it every day. And the decision that they make is a difficult one but its understandable why they make that decision. Charlie you are at war with Vladimir Putin and others who are a part of a system that you want to overthrow. Let me repeat what we started our talk with. I believe Vladimir Putin is but the expresser of the system. In actuality, the fight is with the system. As for igor sechin, he is just an unpleasant element who is outside the bounds of our real objectives. Charlie do sanctions work . Badly. Charlie badly. Yes. Charlie so theyre not having the impact that we might think they are in the crisis over ukraine . I think that, in the form in which they were adopted and announced lets put it that way. The second one is more important. The way these steps were announced, they had more of a an opposite effect than the one which they were supposed to have. Charlie do you believe that Vladimir Putin fears you . I think that today, no. But i do think hes worried. How strong this worry is depends on how effective i am. Like all my life, actually. My opponents, my competitors worried about me only when i was working well. Charlie are you working well . Im just starting. But i am going to try. Charlie thank you for joining. Pleasure to have you here. A conversation with Mikhail Khodorkovsky. We go now from the conversation with Mikhail Khodorkovsky to a conversation about Vladimir Putin, the president of russia and the future of russia within the context of some of the Things Considered cord says and some of the some of the things khodorkovsky says and some of the realities in russia today. Joining me to talk about these issues, stephen seatanovich, a professor at columbia university. Fiona hill, brookings institution, latest book is mr. Putin operative in the kremlin and from Stanford Michael mcfaul, former ambassador to russia former member of the National Security city council and professor of stanford university. Stephen, tell me about this man you obviously know as a russian expert but also having followed what he has done since he left prison and what he said to me in this interview. Well, khodorkovsky is an extremely careful, cagey guy. He didnt become the richest man in russia without being a strategist. He is very aware, now, of the uphill struggle that he has in trying to dislodge putinism in russia. Very aware of putins assets. Putin has incumbency, resources, popularity, and he has the strength of the state on his side, the ability to rewrite laws, and khodorkovsky is plainly aware that, in trying to organize an opposition, that its going to be extremely difficult for him, particularly because hes not going back to russia. Hes trying to unify the opposition from abroad. Charlie and its hard to do that. Every revolutionary force has always come from within, has it not, for the most part . Well, there is the famous story about lenin. Charlie yes. laughter and russians are aware of that. But we tend to think of cord of khodorkovsky as having the enormous assets of wealth, notoriety and moral authority, but it may be that, in the struggle that he sees for himself, other assets are and tests of political strength are going to be important, what we call a ground game here, of organization and issues and allies. And that is still untested for khodorkovsky. Hes plainly got a lot of feelers out to try to figure out how to if yo unify people, but e dont know what kind of success hes having or exactly how he intends to proceed. I thought this was a very interesting interview but one that didnt tell us a lot about his next moves. Charlie nor is he saying about his next moves. Hes not only not saying, he said hes not going to say a lot if he thinks it isnt going to help. Charlie all right. Michael, whats the opinion of him in russia . Depends on who you ask. Charlie clearly, the kremlin, i know what they think. Well, actually, charlie, that would be a more confused answer, too. Charlie really . Mr. Khodorkovsky actually have some friends who work in the kremlin. I know them, i used to work with them. They would not want me to reveal your names their names on your program but there is sympathy for him in the kremlin. Certainly in the financial and business circles in russia, hes well regarded. As he himself says to you, you know, he thinks theres 10 , 15 of the population thats proeuropean. Well, that part of the population is sympathetic to what he did, and i just remind you, the notion of spending a decade in jail in a way that is perceived by that 10 as being just political gives him a kind of credibility that other political leaders in russia today on the liberal side of the ledger do not have. Charlie does he have the moral authority of other dissidents . Yes and no. I mean, when he was first arrested, there was a debate among the human rights activists, many of whom spent time in the gulag of whether they should support him. Over the years, they have come to see him as one of theirs, yes. Thats interesting and different. That didnt happen before. Charlie yes. The problem that steve pointed out is how do you lead this movement in exile . It has happened historically, not just lenin, but one can think of the African National congress, for instance, that had a big exiled community for a while. It was decades before they had impact inside south africa. Charlie fiona hill on Mikhail Khodorkovsky, an opinion on him and the struggle he has and authority he has within segments of the russian population. Theres a very significant thing about khodorkovsky that steve and mike have also touched upon, it is that he has earned, in many respects, the respect of the broader population, not just in and around the kremlin, but across the russian populous, because he actually served his time. Although part of the story of his release seemed to indicate he asked about some sort of pardon or Early Release because his mother was sick. I dont think people saw that. When putin announced he was having clemsy or mercy for khodorkovsky and releasing him, he made the point of saying he was stuck in jail for a long time and has been really punished. That resonates in the russian psyche and in history of people who have suffered in that way. In that respect, whatever he did in the past, khodorkovsky has earned this grudging respect in some quarters, but a certain kind of moral authority. He didnt run away. He went back to russia when he knew he was sure to be arrested and he did his time. That does count for something in that rather complex society. Charlie so lets talk about russia today and putin. Measure his popularity now as we look at ukraine and look at his own support within the community. Most, i guess, the assumption is when a president does the kinds of things that he has done, at the first instinct, his popularity goes up. Is that true with putin . It certainly is. We actually saw putin on the downward trajectory in his polling ratings. Last year, putin was actually to some degree in trouble. He had gone down from about 86 , 87 in the polls in 2008 to at the end of the year before the Winter Olympics down to 64 . I mean, a great polling race in a normal circumstance, but putin has always been judged according to his past performance and clearly people werent seeing him performing as well. He saw the polling ratings go up again after a successful Winter Olympics and have gone off the charts after crimea which has been immensely popular. What goes up can come down and i think the kremlin and putin are watching for hints of trouble. Its going to be hard to maintain those kinds of ratings as it is in any circumstance and it is, including in russia, where, again, its all about putin and his performance, all eyes are on him in this system. Charlie michael, what are his vulnerabilities . The economy, without question. This is a leader who does not have an ideology. Theres no communist party. Theres no party system here. He doesnt get authority from god like previous leaders in the past so its all about economic performance. Fiona is right, his numbers went over 80 after crimea, but george bush was over 90 when he went into afghanistan and close to 75 even when he went into iraq in 2003. And thats without controlling all of the media. Thats without having Just One Party in control or a congress, right . Lets just remember its easier to have those numbers when you control all the institutions of the political system. If you look at the economy, its not growing, its going to be zero this year, maybe less than that next year. Capital flight is tremendous. The ruble is falling. Investment is way down. Just this week, there was a major Investment Conference that putin performed at, and he was in a very good mood and very funny and, you know, a lot of confidence, but all the economic tectechnocrats including those o worked for him were not in a good mood and thats his achilles heel. Charlie will sanctions make him more vulnerable . In the long run. The sanctions are having an impact on the economy, without question. The problem is theres a long cycle from sanctions to opposition to putin, right. First, the economy has to worsen. Then somebody has to organize around that, politically. That hasnt happened. The haves and have nots andinst rally people to say that this is being caused by the west. So i think the cycle of how sanctions play we should measure in years, not weeks or months. But without question, it already is having an impact on the economy, and people are starting to talk about it. Is it really in russias National Interest to be mucking around in Eastern Ukraine if the price to be paid for that is a collapsing ruble and zero percent growth . Charlie as events have unfolded, stephen, do you believe that whats happened in ukraine was not something he intended to do but a reaction and he may now look at it as a mistake but hes got himself out there and doesnt know what to do . For putin, i think crimea was a big score, a big success and i doubt he has any real regrets about that. The crucial moment for him was the pivot from seizing crimea to getting embroiled in ukraine Eastern Ukraine, which is much more of a less, much less payoff and a kind of openended commitment that he may not be able to manage well. You know, i would add another vulnerability, charlie, to the question you asked mike about, about putins position, because khodorkovsky pointed out something useful in the interview you had with him about when he talked about the unpredictability of revolutionary situations. He said, you know, these things cant be foreseen. It looks as though theyre not going to happen until, suddenly, they do. And hes banking on a kind of unease within the elite and, hopefully, within the population at some point that the combination of putins policies are producing a situation in which bad things lie ahead for russia. Hes talking about a revolutionary scenario that everybody wants to avoid, but hes saying putin is making that more likely with a combination of economic policies, corruption, delegitimizing the regime, cronyism and maybe getting bogged down in a war that doesnt succeed. Thats a combination that could produce mor