Former Ambassador to Ukraine Shares Her Story and Thoughts

Missoula, MT (KGVO-AM News) - In Missoula to participate in the Mansfield Lecture series at the University of Montana, former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch spent an hour in the KGVO studios on Talk Back, along with Bob Seidenschwarz with the Montana World Affairs Council.

Seidenschwarz asked Ambassador Yovanovitch about the impetus for her book, entitled ‘Lessons from the Edge – A Memoir’.

Former Ambassador Yovanovitch was on Talk Back to Discuss Ukraine

“When I retired from the Foreign Service and when I retired from the State Department, I wrote this book for a number of different reasons, but one of them was to honor my parents who had come from post World War Two Europe,” began Ambassador Yovanovitch. “They had grown up in totalitarian regimes. They knew what it was not to live in freedom, to not be able to say what you wanted to say; not be able to worship the way you wanted to worship, to be afraid.”

The conversation then turned to the United States' support for Ukraine in its war against Russia.

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Ambassador Yovanovitch Strongly to Continue U.S. Support for Ukraine

“This is I think the critical challenge of our times,” said Yovanovitch. “I think that when historians look back in 100 years, they are going to judge us on how we reacted to this particular challenge that Russia is posing right now, not just to Ukraine, but to the rest of the world, including for lack of a better term, the global south.”

Ambassador Yovanovitch continued to emphasize how vital continued support for Ukraine means for the region because she insists that Russian Premiere Vladimir Putin will not stop with the subjugation of Ukraine.

“Russia without provocation has marched across Ukraine trying to take all of Ukraine and subjugate it,” she said. “It's an existential war. I mean, Putin claims that there is no such thing as Ukraine; he claims that there is no Ukrainian language, no Ukrainian people, and no Ukrainian culture. He's going to stamp the whole thing out if he wins. That would be a tragedy for Ukraine, but it would be a tragedy for the rest of the world as well because Putin is going to keep on going.”

Ambassador Yovanovitch says Putin 'will keep on going' if Ukraine Falls

For those who insist that U.S. military support for Ukraine be suspended, Ambassador Yovanovitch said it’s worth the cost, with no risk to American military personnel.

“For about 5 percent of our defense budget, we are helping the Ukrainians and they are decimating the capabilities of the Russian military with no American boots on the ground,” she said. “Russia, by both NATO and the United States, has been defined as a threat to European and global security, and Ukraine is doing the job with no American boots on the ground.”

Hear Ambassador Yovanovitch’s full visit by clicking here.