Baker and Murrett are connecting Bridge organizers with resources at Syracuse University and offering their expertise in the pipeline, sharing best practices and guidance gleaned from their own experiences. A highly regarded national security lawyer, policy advisor and former chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, Baker is professor of law in the College of Law and professor of public administration and international affairs by courtesy appointment at Maxwell. Former director of the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency, Murrett is professor of practice of public administration and international affairs and is principal investigator of the Intelligence Community Center for Academic Excellence.

In addition to the Institute for Security Policy and Law, Veterans’ Bridge is supported at Syracuse University by the Daniel Patrick Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs at Maxwell and the D’Aniello Institute for Veterans and Military Families (IVMF).The University’s involvement with Veterans Bridge follows campus visits this past spring by Nataliia Kalmykova, a Ukrainian Fulbright scholar at the University of Buffalo who became executive director of the UVF weeks before Russia’s invasion.

Says Murrett, “Our involvement is important because the Ukrainians deserve whatever support they can have from us at Syracuse University to ensure a better future and to restore the territorial integrity of their country.”

The connections are mutually beneficial to students. Murrett points out that a group he teaches in Maxwell’s master of public administration program, for instance, is exploring Ukraine’s challenges related to security and governance in a fall semester workshop inspired by Veterans Bridge.

Similarly, Baker says the related Ring Around Russia initiative he leads provides faculty and students with opportunities to collaborate with scholars and students in the frontline states on pressing global issues.

For Ring Around Russia, he has coordinated scholars from 11 universities in the U.S., Ukraine, Estonia, Finland, Georgia, Latvia, Norway, Poland, Romania and Slovakia who are committed to using national security law and values to enhance European security. The goal is to develop national competencies and capacities in intelligence oversight, national security decision-making, the regulation and use of emerging technologies, and responding to Russian disinformation.

Baker was inspired to develop Ring Around Russia following a series of remote lectures he provided in February 2022, two weeks before the full-scale Russian invasion. His audience included academics, lawyers and government officials in Ukraine. “During each question-and-answer period, the question participants returned to was: ‘Does law matter when a nation faces an existential threat?’ Baker says. “I had heard the question before, in the U.S. government. When I left the sessions, it occurred to me that these were messages that warranted emphasis throughout the frontline states.”

He has since traveled throughout frontline states to meet with university scholars, government officials and civil society groups. “Many of these countries are evolving from post-Soviet systems,” he says. “Our network of scholars is trying to spread the word. Good process leads to better results and the good faith application of law protects democracy and enhances our physical security by making our security services more professional and effective. My vision is to have this network of professionals to offer best practice guidance on how to build a national security architecture, committed to democracy and law as well as security.”

Baker’s travels this past year have included two trips to Ukraine, the most recent of which was in June and included 16 meetings and a television appearance during which he advocated for the care of Ukrainian veterans.

In the crisis, he sees hope.

“The scope of the destruction Russia has wrought is criminal and tragic,” he says, “but I feel hope and optimism observing this generation of civil society leaders in Ukraine, as well as the resolve of Ukraine’s leaders. The people of Ukraine are resilient. It is hard to describe how resilient until you hear person after person declare ‘We are Ukraine’ and ‘We will win this war.’”

By Jessica Youngman