When Challenged On Ukraine, Hillary Clinton Lashes Out

Lucy Komisar reports from Manhattan on her confrontation with Clinton

A few days ago, former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton replied to my question about Ukraine at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). She and John Sullivan, who served as Ambassador to Russia under both Presidents Trump and Biden, revealed themselves to be either liars or so ignorant of reasons for the U.S. Ukraine war as to be utter fools. [The full video can be found here].

This was a fly-on-the-wall event where you get to hear the delusions of the people who shape US foreign policy. The CFR meeting was hosted by the Dean of the Columbia School of International and Public Affairs, Keren Yarhi-Milo, who talked about the biases commonly found among policymakers and the intelligence community when they try to understand the intentions of US adversaries. She spoke about mirror imaging, which is what happens when you think that the adversary thinks in exactly the same way that you do; she spoke about the inability to empathize, she spoke about other biases that lead us to misunderstand and misperceive the intentions of our adversaries. She said it happens in the United States, repeatedly. All important.

But then Keren Yarhi-Milo veered into arm-chair psychology, telling the audience that in her view, ”[if] you want to understand the Ukraine, the decision to invade Ukraine, what’s driving this, you have to really understand Putin’s psychology, and the reference point, and how it’s all about, in his mind, regaining the Soviet empire.” So she knows what is in Putin’s mind, though he has never said that!

At the event, Ambassador John Sullivan, who also served as Deputy Secretary of State under Trump, echoed Yarhi-Milo, asserting that “you have to really understand Putin’s psychology” when evaluating his policy in Ukraine. He said, “I once had a conversation with my then-boss Secretary Blinken. And we were talking about what Putin is like. And, you know, he’s often compared to a gangster. And I didn’t want to make an ethnic reference, or if I made one it would be one that would be from my own tribe. So I’m from South Boston. And I started talking about Whitey Bulger.”

Bulger was a mafioso, murderer and a crook. Is that how Sullivan really feels about the Boston Irish?

“And I mean, you’ve got to understand, you can’t understand Putin unless you really understand where he’s from, what he’s about. He’s a tough kid from Leningrad, right? And not understanding who—his sense of grievance, his sense of loss.” He adds: “He is committed to the proposition that the great geopolitical catastrophe of the twentieth century was the demise of the Soviet Union. …He doesn’t lament the demise of Soviet communism. He famously says, if you’re not nostalgic for how we lived in Soviet days you don’t have a heart, but if you want to return to Soviet communism you don’t have a brain. I mean, it’s hard to be the richest person in the world with a billion-dollar palace in Sochi.”

So, Putin is like the Bulgar of the American politics, not Russia?

In fact, there is no evidence that Putin is richest person in the world (that seems to be Elon Musk) and there is also no evidence of this palace. But who cares about evidence! And even his “you don’t have a brain” quote contradicts what Putin said! But who cares!

For once, Clinton got closer to the truth when she said, “... it’s been our experience, and certainly the research shows, that you introduce, through this over-personalization, volatility. And really, the volatility becomes a greater driver than your credibility, your ability to really read this person, to manage this person, to try to shape the events.” But she didn’t challenge Yarhi-Milo or Sullivan on Putin. And she certainly didn’t like me raising the point when I asked her question:

My name is Lucy Komisar. I’m a journalist.

I was very impressed with the Dean’s analysis of how one should look with empathy and look at the other side. And then I saw in the discussion of Russia absolutely the opposite. I didn’t hear anybody talk about Kissinger and Kennan talking about not moving NATO one inch to the east, the 2014 American-sponsored coup that threw out an elected Ukraine head of government because he was too pro-Russian, the new government bombing the Russian speakers for eight years.”

David Westin of Bloomberg News, serving as moderator, then broke in:

There’s a question here, right? I’m sorry, ma’am, is there a question in here? Is there a question? This is a speech. I’m sorry.

[Here I would note that my comment was way shorter than others were allowed to make without interruption. But then again, those didn’t challenge the speaker.]

After the unasked for interruption, I continued:

Let me finish. That the Soviet Union, anybody that wanted it—that talked about it being collapsed, that it was a tragedy, but anybody that wanted to have it come back had no brain. Why did you not talk about any of these facts? And instead of that do a lot of armchair psychologizing about Putin and his motives?.

Enter Hillary.

Secretary Clinton, clearly annoyed by my daring to question the prevailing wisdom she has dedicated her career to crafting and selling replied:

First of all—(applause—of course there was applause, this was the Council after all)—I reject the premise of your question. I think you have gone into a lot of misstatements. (More applause). I don’t agree at all about a lack of empathy and understanding. You know, both John and I have spent a lot of time with Putin trying to understand. And what we finally understood is that he wants to destroy the West and destroy the United States.

…And you may disagree with that. You may have a more benevolent view of what he did, invading—you know, first of all, making up Chechen war, invading Georgia, invading Ukraine twice, threatening his neighbors, being Assad’s air force. I could go on and on. So you have your view. I do not think it is the view supported by history. And certainly not the view of what we’re seeing today.

I would commend to you, if you’re willing to read it, a recent study out of the University of Munich talking about what if Putin could win. Because there’s no doubt, with his latest drone activity and what he’s trying to do to intimidate everybody from Poland to Romania to Denmark to Italy, he is sending a message that you had better back off from supporting Ukraine, a free and independent country that has every right to chart its own sovereign future—just like Poland did joining NATO, just like Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania did joining NATO. Putin and Russia don’t have a veto over what free and independent nations can choose for themselves. It’s time he understood that and got over both his history and the greater history that has kept him imprisoned and kept Russia poor, an extractive commodity market that could do so much more on behalf of its own people. And you and I have a disagreement. (Yet more applause).

A few comments are in order.

I found Clinton’s remarks deeply misinformed, especially since it’s clear that it was Washington that started this new Cold War. As former US Defense Secretary Robert Gates wrote in his 2014 memoir “Duty: Memoirs of a Secretary at War” that, “When the Soviet Union was collapsing in late 1991, Dick [Cheney] wanted to see the dismantlement not only of the Soviet Union and the Russian empire but of Russia itself, so it could never again be a threat.”

There is no time here to go into her nonsense about the drones (some of which are coming from Ukraine and Poland); the Russian invasion of Georgia which actually was a response to Georgian aggression; and the war in Ukraine which was clearly provoked after 8 years of Ukraine’s war on their own ethnic Russian citizens. Her remarks about Romania, Denmark, Italy: Any evidence? And if Russia is so poor how can it invade Europe? And how is it that its extractive market-based economy have a higher growth rate than the U.S. and Europe?

And then there is, given her record, the biggest question of all: Why would anyone believe (much less applaud) what Hillary has to say on these matters?

After Clinton’s diatribe, Westin, good establishment lackey that he is, added:

I will add only that I am so happy for the Council and for the United States of America where we can have this sort of discussion… There are a lot of places in the world we could not have had this sort of discussion, which is only beneficial.

Clinton replied, Absolutely.

Well.

Following Westin’s assertion that at the Council one could have this discussion, I was threatened by the Council director of meetings that I could be defenestrated (removed from membership) for asking my question. This is relevant in an era where from cancel-culture to deportations, free speech in the U.S. is under attack.

Here is her email:

Subject: 10/8 CFR Event
Date: Thu, 9 Oct 2025 21:16:34 +0000
From: Nancy Bodurtha NBodurtha@cfr.org
To: LK@Dear Lucy:

Following your disregard of the moderator at last evening’s discussion with Secretary Clinton, Dean Yarhi-Milo, and Ambassador Sullivan, I write to remind you that CFR’s code of conduct is explicit in the expectation that members exhibit the highest levels of courtesy and respect toward speakers, moderators, staff, guests, and one another. CFR reserves the right to drop or suspend members for any conduct that is prejudicial to the best interests, reputation, and proper functioning of the organization.

Sincerely,
Nancy

Nancy D. Bodurtha
Vice President, Meetings and Membership
Council on Foreign Relations
58 East 68th Street, New York, New York 10065
tel 212.434.9466
nbodurtha@cfr.org www.cfr.org

Here is my response:

Following my remarks, Westin said: “I am so happy for the Council and the United States of America where we can have this sort of discussion. There are a lot of places in the world where we could not have had this sort of discussion, which is only beneficial.”

I guess you don’t agree. Should I ask him if my question was “prejudicial to the best interests, reputation, and proper functioning of the organization”? Of course, there are countries where questions like mine would not be allowed. Was your message to me directed by Mike Froman or your own idea? BTW, NOBODY intimidates me!

—and—

The best interest of the Council is to promote diversity of views and expression, not to try to shut down minority views.

Lucy Komisar

***

Council officials should inform Nancy Bodurtha that it is not appropriate to threaten journalist members for asking challenging questions of powerful political figures. I would add that it is actually hard to know if my views are those of the “minority” since CFR members have often thanked me for questions they did not raise themselves.

Lucy Komisar is an investigative journalist based in New York. She won the Gerald Loeb, National Press Club and other awards for her expose in the Miami Herald of Ponzi fraudster Allen Stanford. Her articles have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Chicago Tribune and many other publications in the U.S. and Europe. Her website is https://thekomisarscoop.com/