Daniel Satinsky: The movement of Americans into Russia and what I know to be many interesting stories from that time but a general story about the collapse of the Soviet Union and the new institutions in Russia and what part we Americans played in that, which is not a story very well told as far as I know.

Steve Mackey: Yeah. No, I would agree.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: I mean, you know, there's nothing that focuses on that solely. I mean, it's of course woven into various things, but most of that is like, and I may have even remarked on that in my email, but it'll be like, you know, the shock therapy and that kind of stuff and Harvard professor coming over to advise on, whoever that guy was, and Yeltsin's campaign and that kind of thing, but none of all the people like me, you know, and friends I have over there that are still there. It's funny because my father was the same way. I mean, he went to France when he was on a Fulbright actually, and then he went over on a sabbatical when he was a professor. There are several Americans that stayed, like he has American friends in France, right? I grew up knowing these Americans that lived in France, and it was kind of weird to me like, you know, they don’t live in America. I remember they gradually became a little detached, you know, I mean they read the newspaper International Tribune or whatever. But I remember I visited Paris once and had dinner with this guy, and he was asking me these questions about America kind of like, you came from there, tell me about it. And that was a puzzling thing. And now here I am. I have the same deal with about, well, I guess at this point it's really just two Americans who literally never came back from the same period. I worked with them as security guards at the American embassy in 1993 and then I said, I'm getting the hell out of here.

Daniel Satinsky: Right.

Steve Mackey: I did come back, of course, but you know, I left in 2004, and they never left and made a pretty good living too. So why would they, I guess?

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'll ask you about those in a minute, but let me just start from the beginning then, Mike. How did you get interested in Russia, and why did you go there the first time?

Steve Mackey: And by the way, when I made some notes, I might just glance to refresh my memory. But also if I talk too long or whatever, you can feel free to say, hey, I got enough or whatever. It's totally up to you. I won't take offense.

Daniel Satinsky: No, no, not at all. Don't worry about that. I mean, this is really a conversation, and I don't have a set of questions I need to work my way through. I have themes that I wanted you to think about. I want it to be a conversation.

Steve Mackey: So the reason I got interested in Russia was an interesting story in and of itself, to me at least. In the late 80s, I graduated from high school in 89 and as I was, let's say maturing as a junior, senior in high school, I was always a little bit out there with my own unique kind of ways. I didn't like to swim in the mainstream, so to speak. In high school, I even felt a little bit of an outsider.

Daniel Satinsky: Where were you in high school?

Steve Mackey: Natick, Massachusetts.

Daniel Satinsky: Okay.

Steve Mackey: Right near Wellesley, Needham, all those places. I mean, I had fun. I tried to be an average guy, but I was also in these upper level classes like Advanced English, and a class I took on international affairs, which was pretty unique to a high school. It was largely because they happened to have a teacher who loved the subject. It wasn't something that normally you'd see. So senior year I took a class in international affairs where we talked about perestroika and glasnost because that was all the thing there. That would have been 88 to 89.

Daniel Satinsky: Right.

Steve Mackey: And at the same time, I took a class in Advanced Placement English where we were reading Crime and Punishment and Solzhenitsyn. Again driven by this teacher who was like, hey, I'm not going to read Huckleberry Finn with you, you have that already.

Daniel Satinsky: Right.

Steve Mackey: So it was the nexus of these two, kind of having Russian politics thrown at me, or Soviet, and then having the literature, the culture at the same time. And it just so happened that I was going off to Madison, Wisconsin. Now I'll tell you why that's important in a second. But before I do that, while I was getting into these two subjects I kind of got interested in the Cyrillic alphabet. Like literally the language. Not even the language itself, but the alphabet. I mean, no joke. Like the artist in me kind of just really appreciated the look of it. My dad from Simmons College in Boston brought home some newspapers, and I would look at these newspapers without even understanding a lick of it, but it looked to me like a martian language, and I thought that was cool. And I was going to try to learn this language. So it just so happened that I was going to Wisconsin without a lick of an idea of what I wanted to pursue as studies. And of course, undergrad, it didn't really matter. But when I got there and realized just how large it was.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: One of the biggest universities, and me being as I said a little bit of not the type of guy to run around and meet a group of friends very easily. I was going to start taking Russian and I enjoyed these classes right off the bat that had only about 20 kids in it.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: So at first I was, I mean, I obviously signed up for Russian to learn the language, but it was confirming that that was a good choice. And then I also had this slightly tighter group and then, you know, I went to Middlebury College in the summer. I went to study abroad at Moscow State University, the last semester of my college experience, my college period.

Daniel Satinsky: Which would have been what year?

Steve Mackey: 1993.

Daniel Satinsky: Okay.

Steve Mackey: And so, I mean, I think if I had gone for the semester prior, my life could have been totally different. And it's no kidding because when I went for the last semester, first of all, I wanted to go for a year, but my dad talked me out of it because he was just too cautious. He says, you don't want to go over there for a year. I wish I had, you know, stood firm and insisted on it because time flies by and four months was over like that. So a friend of mine and I in the dorms there, I mean, we loved it so much and we were graduating again, just like in high school I have no idea what to do next. So we just said, let's just stay. Now I did fly back for a couple of months. We didn't literally just stay, it would be insane. But we basically said, let's, I guess more truthfully speaking, let's come back right away and continue this lifestyle albeit not under the guise of academia or whatever, but just try to figure something out.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: So it was really driven more by that sense of, I mean, on one hand just let's do something because we got we're out of college now and we're stuck, you know?

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: I wouldn't be able to tell you even the smallest hint of an idea of what I would have done in America after college. I'm almost frightened to think of being in that position. So it was an escape for me really because I knew I could survive over there on $200 a month or something.

Daniel Satinsky: Right.

Steve Mackey: And I, you know, I think this was in part of your question or at least my answer. I mean, it wasn't really, you know, a lot of people there of course were getting into business and all that. I don't think I ever really had any realistic sense that I'd become like a businessman. If I did, it was I was talking myself into it. But I never really had that kind of mojo to to be in, you know, work for the oil industry or something. I just wasn't that way. I didn't have it in me. So we kind of…

Daniel Satinsky: Did you have Russian friends at that point? Groups of Russian friends or not?

Steve Mackey: Well, okay. Yeah. So, I mean in college, yeah. From the dorms we had, I wouldn't say a group of Russian friends, but we had picked up kind of attached ourselves to a group of mates that, you know, obviously enjoyed the exotic of these Americans there. And we, you know, likewise. Language was still pretty so so. I can't say we had deep conversations but, you know, enough to kind of hang out and party together. Basically, it was what we did. The real hook was I had a girlfriend actually, which not that you'll find a way to work this into the book but it may be a way.

Daniel Satinsky: I won’t.

Steve Mackey: Not the girlfriend. How I met her.

Daniel Satinsky: Oh, okay.

Steve Mackey: I was invited by these college kids who had a lot of friends that were in the local university where they were grooming KGB folks. So, you know, one of the whatever institute that launches like all these KGB folks. And we were invited to a disco that they had quote unquote put together in the Lubyanka itself. And I am not kidding. I mean the idea of going there now at all but let alone just opening the doors and letting all these kids in there including Americans. I walked by a statue of Dzerzhinsky like a huge thing, you know the whole marble. I mean you can only imagine the Stalinist entrance there. The whole place was a disco juxtaposed with all this crazy Soviet you know? And there I met this girl. Now she wasn't connected to the KGB thank God but she was actually a sweet person. And so we hung around for like the last two months of my studying. She sponsored my return.

Daniel Satinsky: Okay.

Steve Mackey: You know visa wise. And so we came back and bummed around a little vainly looking for jobs. I mean a half-hearted attempt. We would, you know, there's no internet, there's no real newspaper advertisements. Like we were going to bars and like trying to talk to people and say like, can you hire us? I think I got one measly interview out of anything I did. We were about to give up and just go back and say this is done. We did two months of this, put in a good fight and saw an advertisement in the Moscow Times for security guards at the embassy. And that's where we got so. So I stayed there for a year doing that which was perfect. It was the first job I had, paid, you know, $22,000 a year. For 1993 Moscow we were rich.

Daniel Satinsky: Right.

Steve Mackey: And then again kind of chickened out. I went to grad school because I didn't want to stay there as a security guard forever. But by that time I had enough of the bug because that year of living, you know, as the security guard by day and you know running around the city like a madman by night with all the crazy things like catching a bus for a taxi, you know because the guy can make an extra five bucks taking you home or two bucks.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: Women obviously. You know just the lawlessness of it was just kind of exciting and really it was just an adventure. And I mean not to be ignored was a true love of the language. I mean I would get drunk and wake up at 7:00 with a hangover, make coffee, and make flashcards. I have a distinct memory of doing this. Like I took it seriously.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Steve Mackey: That was my my main driver the entire time from high school all the way through this security guard gig. It was just language language language.

Daniel Satinsky: Well and that's the way you learn it, by hanging out with people, right?

Steve Mackey: Well exactly. But also you need that academic part though. I mean I think a lot of people. You know I have that friend that I mentioned who has lived there his whole life, essentially, adult life and his Russian is fine. But he gets by just kind of repeating the same stuff over and over again, you know, like you know to his wife. Well, I think they speak English at home frankly. But in his business he's working with Americans. He goes out he can order his food but he's actually not that great. Like you don't get it by osmosis. You know you have to still study. I still do to this day. And I'm married to a Russian. You'd think I'd be like perfect. But what do we say? What's for dinner? What do you want to do?

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So for you, it was just an adventure and a place with little boundaries but had this allure of the language.

Steve Mackey: Yes, I did.

Daniel Satinsky: Did you feel like you are part of history or did that matter or.

Steve Mackey: I did once I got in there. I started to realize that. I'm embarrassed to say that, I'm not really embarrassed is just the way it is. I didn't go over there with a great understanding of what was going on. I mean despite the high school class on perestroika, you know, I did take some classes on Soviet history in college. I mean I majored in kind of Slavic studies so I certainly picked up a lot of what was going on. But I wasn't like reading the New York Times every day, like so I had the basic landscape of Soviet history and all that stuff. It was the current stuff that I wasn't seized by. So when my father came up, right before I was going to go back to Russia after study abroad. He said like, you know, you're going back at kind of a tough time. Are you really following what's going on here? And so I landed in Moscow for that return. None other than October 2nd 1993 which was right before I'm sure you know the white House attack.

Daniel Satinsky: I landed in Sheremetyevo on that day. I watched the assault on that building from the TV cameras in Sheremetyevo.

Steve Mackey: Well, I can one-up you on that. I watched the assault from the bridge. I actually, we were crazy enough to walk down there, you know, like go. And I mean, I really felt I was in the middle of, I mean, we were in the middle of a civil war but I'm talking like gunshots from different directions kind of stuff. It was insane to do that of course. But the point is I didn't really know that was going on. Like, I mean, I'm sure there were political difficulties but I wasn't tracking day by day, who has what, and what Yeltsin was trying to do. You know the history part, you know that being a part of it, certainly took a hold as I continued to live of course, you know meeting Russians, and you know getting deeper and deeper, more deeply embedded in society so to speak. I mean the real thing that stuck out in terms of the history in the making was the lawlessness over the American Western kind of influence. I mean that was certainly one thing that you would be reminded of. Yeah. But the lawlessness was something that kind of made more of an impression on me. I mean I think I have more memories of, and this is later maybe after the, you know, the first year security guard thing, but like I remember, you know, just gangsters all over the place. I mean it really was like Chicago in the 20s as they always say. I mean I remember a gangster getting out of his car and picking up a road. You know one of those signs that stopped traffic or I don't know. You know what do you call it? They're like triangular things.

Daniel Satinsky: Traffic cones?

Steve Mackey: Not a cone but more like hobbyhorse type or whatever.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Steve Mackey: Picked it up and just started wailing on this car because of course, you know, the driver did something that put him off. And in the car was this poor old man, right? So he's probably a, you know, hero of the Soviet Union for all this idiot knows, right? It was that aggressive kind of like totally like no respect. I don't care about the rules and I'm just going to do what I want. And that was kind of nuts. Just see that all the time.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And, and yeah. And I know I remember those years too. And so, were you part of the expat community? Would you say you were part of that?

Steve Mackey: In terms of like hanging out with them.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah, yeah, the hungry duck and you know.

Steve Mackey: Yeah this group, I mean not in the sense of, it was kind of like a repeat of high school. It was like I know there's something bigger that I'm not totally integrated into. In terms of, you know. We had a small group of like four friends and we would bounce around together. Americans. 4 or 5, depending on who came and went from the security guard gig.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: We would go to casinos together, underground casinos at the bottom of an apartment building and kind of stuff like that. And you know the bars whatever. Of which there were not that many at that time. I mean there was like a couple of them.

Daniel Satinsky: Right.

Steve Mackey: You know. And so I have fuzzier awareness of that. I mean that was one year in my life, the security guard gig. And it was just these four kids and we were bouncing around town, going to McDonald's, bars. It was really more when I came back in 97 through 2004. That was my whole life, I mean I just didn't move from there and that was my life. 97 to 2004. You know I reconnected with some of these friends the ones that had remained more focused on work and soon family at that point. And I definitely did, you know, sense when I would let's say go out with one friend and see him at a bar and kind of walk in through. Hey Joe. Hey George. Hey, come on over to meet my friend Steve. And I'm thinking like I don't have this huge group of expat dudes that I hang out with. Yeah again I felt a little like in high school. Just that's who I was. I didn't do that very well.

Daniel Satinsky: Right, right.

Steve Mackey: And like the same thing I was telling you at the little preamble, I was happy and I had the Russian friends still and soon a Russian wife and her friends and I own Russian friends and a few American friends. And it was just a continuation of what I got today. It was like, you know, 6 or 7 here and there.

Daniel Satinsky: Right right. No. But what did you do in the interim period before you when you left and before you came back?

Steve Mackey: Oh I went to grad school at George Washington University.

Daniel Satinsky: Oh okay.

Steve Mackey: That was another escape. Like I can't be a security guard forever. This is getting old. I'm going to go to grad school and see if that'll change things for me. And it did, in fact, because from that, even though it was an expensive way to find out what an NGO was, you know, for better or for worse, you know, that's what propelled me into working for IREX because, you know, it was just the people you meet in grad school. You know, hanging around the career office and all that stuff. And, you know, when I got out of GW in 97, and by the way, in 96, I went back over for the summer. And this is actually the most expaty I got, in 96 in between. And this also speaks to really the magnetic pull of me going back there because even though I returned and, you know, done a year of study, I said, you know, the summer in between these two years of master's degree, I'm going back to Russia come hell or high water. And I myself, you know, researched like what program could possibly send me there and found this small international affairs program that, you know, for extra money of course, would, you know, maybe had like 15 people in it. And so for the summer, I studied, you know, some kind of half-assed classes they put together, a little bit of a boondoggle academic experience but interned at the American Chamber of Commerce.

Daniel Satinsky: Okay.

Steve Mackey: Which was very cool because then I saw embassy officials coming for meetings. I helped put together the 4th of July celebration thing. I was an intern. It wasn't that great. I met some of the Russian tech people that you were talking to who were working on the website and things like that. And by the way, that summer program is kind of weird as it was. The guy who ran it was some ex-KGB guy and had all sorts of connections and he would bring in these speakers every week. That included Irina Khakamada, Legasov showed up, one of the coup plotters of the Gorbachev coup.

Daniel Satinsky: Wow.

Steve Mackey: As guest speakers. Zhirinovsky. And we went to Zyuganov's office in the Duma and sat in his office like at his conference table. And, you know, one after another.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: So I mean.

Daniel Satinsky: That's pretty amazing.

Steve Mackey: It was very amazing. It was.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: And so again that was just the summer of like hey I got to get back there. But when I graduated, it was almost just as immediate because I got this job doing, you know, working on American scholars that wanted to go over there to study because the archives now opened up. And you know there was lots of funding for research there.

Daniel Satinsky: Right. And who funds IREX?

Steve Mackey: Mostly, well back then IREX was a little different than it is now. They're way more international in scope. Like then they were really just former Soviet Union. But the funding is pretty much limited still I think to the State Department and USAID.

Daniel Satinsky: Okay. Okay.

Steve Mackey: So it's just civil society development programs, media, academic exchanges, this kind of thing.

Daniel Satinsky: Okay.

Steve Mackey: But the interesting thing there was that even though I was a total newbie in the professional world, imagine, you know, I put on a tie for the first time. It was that kind of first shocking, like coming to the office and kind of try to work. And you know, I was 27. I was like, I tell my son all the time like do not worry you're 22. It's okay if you feel like a total moron because you basically are.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: You know, I felt that at 27, I still felt like an idiot. But they had this crisis of the organization so to speak. Their Vladivostok office had lost its director. And that was a pretty important hub because they were coming around to recruiting for this program in the Far East. That was in their grant proposal. They had to deliver on all of these, you know, that program fed a lot of people. You know I mean.

Daniel Satinsky: It was USAID-funded program.

Steve Mackey: US Information Agency.

Daniel Satisky: Okay.

Steve Mackey: The USIA was kind of like the propaganda agency of the US but they've now come into the State Department as a bureau. They kind of disappeared. Jesse Helms back then made that happen.

Daniel Satinsky: I see.

Steve Mackey: But they were recruiting these businessmen, as you know, you did the interviews. They had no director. So the vice president of it was like I got to get someone out there like yesterday to start to work on this thing. And he kind of talked to me and he was just like, look you know Russian. He probably was not overly impressed by my presence there as this kid who could barely shave still or something. But he had no choice essentially, like everyone else, I mean he didn't say this to me, but other people had their wives, their girlfriends, they don't want to leave. I was like get me the hell out of here. I'll go back there in a second.

Daniel Satinsky: Right right. Had you been to Vladivostok before?

Steve Mackey: Never. No. I mean that's the weird thing about me. As kind of timid as I am in some ways the Russia thing kind of stripped that out of me. And I said I'll go I'll do anything.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: I mean because you know I went to Moscow. You know, again on this trip that I was sent on for two days and then they put me on a plane to Vladivostok.

Daniel Satinsky: After two days on the job in Moscow?

Steve Mackey: Or maybe it was a week. I don't want to exaggerate but it was a blip. It was like here's the program, here's what you do. Go.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: I mean there was an office there so I had support. There was Russian staff that could kind of train me up and email was now a part of work. So it wasn't that crazy. But all I'm saying is that I wasn't bumming around Moscow getting all prepared for it. I mean I basically hopped through Moscow to Vladivostok. And within, you know, weeks really because it was the October November December that I made my arrival in October. And then it was this recruitment period was October through December essentially where I suddenly was just like you saw in Yaroslavl living in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk and Khabarovsk and Vladivostok. Like those three I would just cycle around, train, plain, and live there like, you know, rent apartments or hotels and then try to interview local businessmen, government officials, the whole deal. With, you know, by now pretty damn good Russian at least for a young guy.And that of course spurred many local adventures because, you know, someone befriends me and takes me up to the bar and this and that. And of course they all wanted a little trip to America if they could get it too. So it was just glomming on to me like let's hang to this guy.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah. So I had almost forgotten that I had done interviews for you so you reminded me. So just for the sake of all this, can you just kind of go over what was the point, the purpose of business for Russia and how hard was it to recruit those people? And what did they expect? What did you expect? Could you just talk more about this?

Steve Mackey: Yeah absolutely. And I'd love to. I mean this is it was the great love of my life at the time and still, you know, obviously I have fond memories of it. There were two aspects to this program actually. One was business for Russia and the other one was called Community Connections. There were two different ones but they were under the same rubric of these short-term exchanges. So one model of exchange is like the Fulbright. It's not really an exchange. It's kind of one way. I mean exchange is the wrong word but you know one is like send somebody to grad school for two years. Another one is like send someone for four months. These programs were send someone for like two weeks to a month. So it was very much on like the numbers, throw as many as we can and something's going to stick. I mean at least that's the way I interpret it, you know? Plus you know frankly it's not a, you know, I mean the funding only goes so far. So are you going to pick ten businessmen for a year to intern in Silicon Valley or wherever you can be, or a thousand entrepreneurs. And so essentially, I'm answering the question of course. Essentially for the business for Russia we had to find young, well not young, but they usually were, entrepreneurs who spoke English well enough to live in America for about 4 to 5 weeks with a host family. An intern in a business that kind of corresponded with what they were interested in. So if I met someone who was making signs, I remember this actually distinctly. Someone was now making signs, you know, put it in a store front, you know, fresh bagels, whatever you want to sell. I, you know, we had this application. Everyone turned in their applications. We had an application deadline. They would come by my little office. And then I would call them up for interviews. And that's when you would come in. We'd have the panel of like Americans and Russians. And, you know, Irina of course is an alumna of the program from way back when. And we'd interview them and basically try to assess their language. Could they survive basically in America? You know, under the supervision of everybody. And you know did they have goals for the program or were they just trying to put one past us? But it was, you know, it was such a quick thing like we had to recruit let's say in Yaroslavl or from Khabarovsk or Vladivostok or whatever roughly 20 to 30 participants for this program within two months. My arrival and then my departure from that city started with me knowing nothing about the city, them knowing nothing about the program and me advertising in newspapers, sometimes doing TV spots, trying to get on like the TV local news, doing interviews, spreading the word right?

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: Develop contacts, and like let's say the government then helps me recruit for this. We do press conferences the whole thing. And then we culminate in interviews that we would do. And by the time I left two months later we'd have let's say hopefully 20 to 30 candidates that I would then, you know, feed into IREX. If they would figure out what to do with them later I'd move on to the next city and keep the whole show going.

Daniel Satinsky: So how many people per cycle or what was a cycle?

Steve Mackey: So a cycle was, and by the way before I answer that,the community connections part was kind of different.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: It was the same kind of model of a group of ten people but they were more thematically focused on let’s say NGO development, public spaces, let's say, one thing was criminal justice reform or business development and things like that. But not like the entrepreneurs, it would be government people who were working on this topic, local leaders that were active in that topic. So that was more intense because we had to document on our own, I'm talking about on behalf of IREX, that these people were worth something. They were spinning whatever story. And they were good. They weren’t lying to us. But certainly a few stinkers got by that they had to be sent home because they weren't participating, they didn't know what was going on. But you know, overall we'd send these groups of ten. Oh public health was another one. So I'd send doctors, like the ones who ran the hospitals, you know, and I mean everyone was more or less kind of the big league category. To make it a somewhat a cohesive group of ten that from one community would go to another community let's say in Cincinnati to be given a two week tour of like the local hospital, the local public health system, you know, blah blah blah, could be education. They go to schools and you know, it was kind of a nice model. I mean they supposedly were bonding as a group, sharing experiences and learning from the American way of doing it. And going back and presumably applying maybe something that could be applied to their own local endeavors. So in terms of the cycle it was like I did Yaroslavl and Vologda. I think simultaneously for two months. I would go a week in Yaroslavl, Vologda, back to Yaroslavl, Vologda. And just like seriously for two months it was like bing bing bing bing bing bing with nary a visit to Moscow in between. There was just one week on one week off. Then I would take a break back in Moscow, go to Nizhny Novgorod and Kostroma. I did those and then I went to Izhevsk and Orenburg. And I started of course with Khabarovsk and Vladivostok. And so I did eight of these communities in the span of basically a calendar year so it was crazy. I mean and you're talking again to the kid who could barely turn the computer on after grad school. Well I could from grad school. I knew how to work a computer but, you know, professionally speaking I was very lacking but thrown into this like you're on your own buddy kind of mode and and then feeling this sense of fulfillment because I'm like the nerdy kid from high school who, you know, never was popular. Suddenly being alone in these cities and hanging out with the deputy mayor.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: You know, selling this program. So it was just like wow. Like how did that happen? And I was doing it, you know, like.

Daniel Satinsky: It was kind of a validation.

Steve Mackey: That was what I was looking for.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah, yeah.

Steve Mackey: Super, super validation. Super proud of myself. You know let me just show you one thing. I just spotted this. I forgot about this. I don't know if you can see it. And it's nothing. Nothing great. But this would just get me high, you know, like on TV.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Steve Mackey: I don't know if it's focusing.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah, I can see it. I can see it. Yeah.

Steve Mackey: 28 years old being interviewed by the local press like I was some local celebrity. So there was a little bit of the ego thing to that. Like I feel popular and people want to talk to me and I won't deny it. And also I'm not going to, it can't be boiled down to all one phrase like I want to affect change in Russia. I mean honestly that was like the third in line for me. I mean I did believe in the programs but I wanted to be independent, make money, enjoy life in Russia. I wasn't overly sold on the whole thing about Western society, you know, changing life. I mean I bought enough of it to be able to pass it on to those that wanted to listen. But for me I mean, you know, it was frankly a job that I loved rather than like a mission that I felt.

Daniel Satinsky: Right. You weren't a missionary or something like that.

Steve Mackey: I mean, there were some like, definitely USAID people. I meant now this is where we are getting a little bit into, the expat kind of thing. I mean, certainly as I continued. And by the way, this goes from 1997 to the end of 98, this program I described, but I moved on the program in 99-2000 throughout the whole former Soviet Union advising education centers we had established. We still have them, actually, these little hubs in Tashkent, in Belarus, everywhere that we were providing information to locals on how to apply to Western universities, how to get scholarships. And my job is to coordinate all this. So for the two years after the program that I just described, I was running around not only Russia, but now to all of these countries, giving workshops and training and all that stuff. After that, I was running the business for Russia programs, and I was managing all the guys who were doing all the travel. And then after that, I was in USAID anti-trafficking programs and other things like that as I became more kind of like a manager in IREX and whatnot, and now I had a family, so I was not as interested in all the travel anyways. So throughout the course of that, I certainly did connect more or less with the, you know, if at first I thought it was all like oil and gas people in Russia, the kind of milieu that I found myself in at that point was definitely more of the the Peace Corps type of people that came over here to change the world and things like that. We'd hire people like I was in 97-98. Now I'm doing the hiring in 2002 and 2003, and they're all kind of coming in and out, they do a year and they quit and that kind of thing. So we certainly saw a lot of these people who wanted to have a piece of the adventure, but many of them were also, you know, kind of I want to do some good in the world and all that. So, you know, I was just more inclined not necessarily by an interest in that group or by design, but just by the people that were around me, to be socializing with those types, in the bars or in the restaurants or whatever or at someone's house. They would all be like, I work for USAID, I work for this, I work for project Harmony, I work for that. You know, there are all these NGO types, right? And then you go out and you see bankers hanging out. And they were the ones that maybe I thought I would have been going towards in 93, but here I am in this whole other camp.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah yeah yeah. So how long did Business for Russia as a program, When did it start and when did it end? Do you know?

Steve Mackey: Vaguely. It started in around 1994, 1995. And I say that because by the time I had gotten there, I remember kind of a certain footprint this program had, you know, like material that dated back, you know, a couple of years. It wasn't just like I was the pioneer of it or something.

Daniel Satinsky: Right right.

Steve Mackey: And it lasted long enough for me to continue working on it as a director of it in Moscow, that is. And they did this, by the way, in Ukraine. Community Connections kind of blossomed and they did a Ukrainian version of it. They didn't call it Business for Russia, but they did the whole, you know, Community Connections aspect of the NGO and the education and public health groups and some entrepreneurs as well. So it had more of a reach than in Russia itself. And then I think it fizzled out around—and you know these decisions are made by some assistant secretary somewhere in the United States. There wasn't any, you know, "it's not working" or something else. Priorities shifted and eventually, I think they transferred the Community Connections program to USAID. And in the process, the Business for Russia piece just kind of fell apart. Maybe in 2004 or 5 or something like that. So you know, having like a ten-year run probably.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah yeah. And so how many people a year participated in it?

Steve Mackey: You know, I happen to remember actually very well because when I was the director of it, I was looking at all the, you know, the scheduling and the staff and all that stuff. And under my directorship there were about 800 to 850 a year.

Daniel Satinsky: Wow.

Steve Mackey: Yeah. And now, before we put that in the book or something, let me just do a quick math check. Let's say you had six communities. This will be quick. One person would do a year, let's say, and maybe get 30 people. So that's 180, I'm saying in each. I think it was about 800. It might run less or more a little.

Daniel Satinsky: Right, right. I've run into other people in Yaroslavl, some of whom no longer speak English. You know I'm losing my Russian very rapidly but they fondly remember that program because they would talk to me about it. I mean, they're businesspeople. They run a restaurant or they run a printing shop or, you know, a small business usually, but pretty comfortable. And they remember that program, you know.

Steve Mackey: Yeah, I know, I went to Yaroslavl when I was at the embassy. And also when I was at the embassy in Moscow, going to these receptions and stuff, you'd meet people and I would meet the alumni, not only of that program, but of others as well. And, you know, you learn the bits that you can have. And I was telling somebody about this the other day, it was a friend of mine, we were reminiscing and I was like, you know, if your life is generally fairly monotonous for the most part and then when you insert a week event that is just totally different from the other weeks that you've had, it seats into your memory banks.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: So independent of how influential the program was or whatever. It still is the experience itself, the very fact that it transpired, that people just cling to that. Like, I remember I went to Cincinnati in 96 and it was freaking awesome, you know?

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Steve Mackey: And I think that's what a lot of alumni are reacting to. I mean, they're just like, oh my God, it was crazy. Just like when I show up in Russia taking the bus to Moscow City University, you know, totally scared. That's the memory I remember. Not another bus ride I took, you know.

Daniel Satinsky: Right. Right. So, do you know, are there any reports or evaluations of Business for Russia that exist somewhere in the State Department or USIA or anywhere that would summarize this program and what came of it?

Steve Mackey: For Business for Russia. Well, first of all, I can almost guarantee you on some shared drive somewhere in the digital bowels of the State. There's definitely stuff on this program. I mean, I know some of the people that were my kind of controllers, so to speak, from the government.

Daniel Satinsky: Right.

Steve Mackey: That are still there.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: We still talk about this program when we run into each other. In terms of, like, a formal evaluation, I'm not sure. The government, in my view, is still talking about this in 2021. You know, we are not doing enough to evaluate our programs. I mean it's so much easier to pass them off to some NGO to manage. IREX or somebody else. Just, you know, make it happen and move on to the next problem. But not like maybe reflecting on did that work or did that not work? And every once in a while they will do a deep dive evaluation like the ECA. Now ECA is called the Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs, like they are the bureau version of the information agency that was once an independent agency. Now it's a bureau of the State Department. And every once in a while, they'll do a deep dive and try to assess how successful it was. And, you know, they talk with alumni and they figure this all out. And I don't know if any such evaluation was ever done. But I'd be happy, if this is of real interest, I don't mind reaching out.

Daniel Satinsky: I just think it's a really interesting program. And, you know, when I Google it, it doesn't show up anywhere. I can't, I find it. I mean, it's as if it didn't exist.

Steve Mackey: I know.

Daniel Satinsky: 800-850 people a year who came to the US and formed some opinion about this country is pretty significant, particularly in light of how separated we are now. You know, that there was that level of opportunity because obviously they went home and talked to everybody they knew about what that experience was, there was a multiplier effect from having done that. If there were such a thing, I would love to be able to, you know, find it.

Steve Mackey: No, I mean, I would be interested. Now that you've sparked the return of this program to me, I don't mind, you know, picking a few people that are still hanging about and seeing if they can. All you have to do is go into a folder and say, oh, yeah, we have all those evaluations over here.I mean, it's really no big deal. But just to keep in mind, though, ECA are still doing variants of this and have been throughout the world. The most maybe proximate to Business for Russia, in a sense, or at least the Community Connections kind of version of it, is the International Visitors and Leadership Program.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: They also send over groups of ten, twelve or whatever for about a week, ten days, maybe sometimes two weeks in tens of thousands almost. I mean, I don't know how much each year. You know, even though that program disappeared, there have been plenty of other ones that continue that spirit of just bringing you over, showing you the thing and something.

Daniel Satinsky: But not from Russia.

Steve Mackey: Well, no. But there are other ones, like the young something. Maybe the Legislative Fellows Program. That's small, but I managed that at the embassy, believe it or not, just five years ago. Now that was just a group of ten or something that would go over to look at legislative affairs, but these were people who were actually involved in the Duma and things like that. So a little bit of a higher level of people. Of course, you the Muskie program, which was graduate study. Fulbrighters. So you know, there's that. The big one, which the Russians put the kibosh on when I was at the embassy, was the Future Leaders Exchange Program. Now, that's, that's huge.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: If you're looking at these programs, that's the big one called FLEX. That's high school study for youth from Russia and other countries to be in a high school. I mean, these guys would come back, like basically half American after a year when they were 16 or 17 in high school.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: And half of the embassy is filled with alumni of these programs. I mean, with a little exaggeration, at least maybe 25%.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: The head of Russia Today (RT) is a FLEX alumna. It didn't go to good use with her.

Daniel Satinsky: Right, right.

Steve Mackey: But I mean, they learn American big time, learn English perfectly. And so, you know, Business for Russia is one of many of these kinds of programs. So the fact that it came and disappeared, to the government it was just like moving pieces around, like, let's put money here, let's put money in this country, let's move. Then let's go to Ukraine. Like, you know, during the Orange Revolution Ukraine funding exploded. So they take it from Russia. And then after Maidan, more money went to Ukraine. There was another country. And frankly, with going back to my narrative just a little bit, when I was at the embassy in 2003, I think, at a meeting with USAID, a roundtable of all the local NGOs. One of the USAID people came in and said that Khodorkovsky was just arrested at this airport, maybe in Siberia somewhere. And it was kind of a chill in the room because there were several, you know, leading NGO people up, not like little dipshits that I was back in the day. But like Mila Alexeyeva, the human rights activist, she would attend these meetings. And so it was kind of a more of a big scene for the NGO community, as much of a big scene as there can be. You know, and that was it. There was a chill in the room, and I remember, I mean, in a movie, I would overdramatize this and I it's never as dramatic as it seems in your memory, but I do remember thinking, shit, you know, this might not… Just three or four months before that, IREX was working with Khodorkovsky’s NGO to try to build programs with them. We're not doing programs with the government. We can even do it. Like, how exciting it is that society has evolved, that we can get into corporate cooperation with this NGO. It seemed like the pinnacle of what we have been working towards.

Daniel Satinsky: Right.

Steve Mackey: The fact that we can do it as an independent foundation with another independent foundation, almost independent of government work. And then it all came crashing down, frankly, when he was arrested, because it was like that, that's the writing on the wall right there.

Daniel Satinsky: Right. Right, right.

Steve Mackey: And then that coupled with Putin appointing governors versus selecting them and, you know, with my own personal situation, my son was about to get into kindergarten and I was like, let's get the fuck out of here because it's going south and I gotta raise a family now. And so I skedaddled. But it was fairly prescient in a way, because all of the forgetting about where society went with Putin and everything else, these programs just took a mad dash for other countries. And, you know, I came from the bustling office of maybe as many as 70 employees at one point which was reduced to like five or six.

Daniel Satinsky: And this was right after Khodorkovsky was arrested.

Steve Mackey: Well, it was in that area. I'm saying I pulled out in May of 2004. And what I'm saying is programs were kind of shutting down. It felt a little bit like the movie where the guy is running across the bridge as the bridge is collapsing behind him, you know?

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah, yeah.

Steve Mackey: I mean, you know what I'm saying is, by the time I came back to the U.S., and I was still in touch with people. I was working for IREX in the US for another three years in the Washington office.

Daniel Satinsky: Right.

Steve Mackey: It was gradual. We're not doing that program anymore and that kind of thing. And you just kind of saw, like, yeah, we had to shut down Vladivostok. We shut down. I mean, we had offices in Irkutsk, Vladivostok, Novosibirsk and Moscow and maybe Petersburg. We had some representatives, at least in Petersburg. And it was all just, you know, Moscow, 15 people at some point and then ten and then five. So the NGO, the love over there definitely dissipated. The Peace Corps was kicked out, I believe, while I was still there, 2003, maybe. That's a big sign that like, we don't want you here, you know?

Daniel Satinsky: Right, right. Right. Well. I'm just making a note to myself. Did IREX shut down completely?

Steve Mackey: Oh, no. IREX as an organization is still going strong.

Daniel Satinsky: No, no, I mean in Moscow.

Steve Mackey: Yes, when I was there at the embassy. So, you know, after I left the organization in 2008. I arrived at the embassy in 2012 as a government employee.

Daniel Satinsky: Okay. So what were you in 2012 when you went back?

Steve Mackey: So, in 2008, I joined the State Department.

Daniel Satinsky: Okay.

Steve Mackey: And then in 2012, by a fluke, I got an opportunity to go work as essentially a diplomat in the embassy. I was basically, for all intents and purposes, filling a vacancy that a diplomat vacated.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: They didn't have any time to train anyone up for it because there's always the language preparation for it. So they pulled me out because I already had the language and stuck me in there. And so I became an assistant cultural affairs officer, just kind of, you know, like any other diplomat.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: And at that point, I think IREX was seriously like four people or something. And it was just like a little piddly program. They essentially kept it afloat, basically because the director was, you know, an old longtime employee like myself. They kind of just kept it on fumes for as long as they could and eventually, just like, let's get out of here.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah, yeah. And so how long were you in that temporary appointment in the embassy?

Steve Mackey: Two and a half years.

Daniel Satinsky: Wow. Okay. And your family moved back with you?

Steve Mackey: Oh, yeah. I know this was like, you know, when the State Department, which was an eye opener for me when they moved the diplomats around the globe. They ain't messing around. I mean, they pack up your house, put some of it in storage and give you the rest if you want it, you know?

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: Move your car over there, put your kids in private schools, which happened to me too. They put me in the little townhouse community for God knows how much money.

Daniel Satinsky: Yeah.

Steve Mackey: That's your true expat experience. I mean, there was, like, Pepsi-Cola, you know, Deer Tractor Company.

Daniel Satinsky: Where was this?

Steve Mackey: The metro is Tushinskaya, in Moscow. It's a community. Have you been there?

Daniel Satinsky: I've been there to visit a guy who was, an executive for TAKBP.

Steve Mackey: There you go. See? That's what I mean. And that was your first kind of, you know, that's where if you wanted to get expat, that's where it was.

Daniel Satinsky: But you know that that place was initially built by an American entrepreneur from Boston who was relieved of his ownership at one point.

Steve Mackey: Oh, okay. So I guess we got this. We'll take it from here.