Uzair talks to Dr. Margarita Konaev about Russia's invasion of Ukraine, what prompted Putin to invade now, and the risks of urban warfare in the heart of Europe.

Dr. Margarita Konaev is a Research Fellow at Georgetown’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET) interested in military applications of AI and Russian military innovation. Previously, she was a Non-Resident Fellow with the Modern War Institute at West Point, a post-doctoral fellow at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perry World House.

Her research on international security, armed conflict, non-state actors and urban warfare in the Middle East, Russia and Eurasia has been published by a whole host of publications, including the Journal of Strategic Studies, the Journal of Global Security Studies.

Reading Recommendations:

- A Small Corner of Hell: Dispatches from Chechnya by Anna Politkovskaya