Steve Swerdlow returns to the podcast to give us an update on the Russia/Ukraine war. When the war began in late February of this year, many believed the Ukrainian army would be defeated in a matter of days.  Now we're in October, and it's safe to say Ukraine has surpassed everyone's expectations besides theirs. But as Putin becomes more and more frustrated, fears grow over Putin's threat to use nuclear weapons. 

Steve Swerdlow is an  Associate Professor of the Practice of Human Rights in the Department of Political and International Relations at the University of Southern California. A human rights lawyer and expert on the former Soviet region, Swerdlow was Senior Central Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch, heading the organization’s work on Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, and founding its Kyrgyzstan field office. Swerdlow has worked as a consultant with the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and the International Labour Organization (ILO)