SABRA LANE: Kyle Wilson has served as an official Russian interpreter for Australian heads of state and prime ministers.
He's had Department of Foreign Affairs postings to Moscow and Beijing and for 10 years he was seconded to the Office of National Assessments as the senior analyst for Russia and the former Soviet Union, and he joins us now.
Good morning and thanks for joining AM.
This co-ordinated diplomatic retaliation against Russia, what is it designed to do?
KYLE WILSON: Good morning Sabra, thanks for having me on.
Your reporter used the word 'punish'. I guess that's a fair word to use.
Well, obviously the countries have been confronted with a situation and feel that they need to react in some way - clearly it's designed to send a clear signal to Russia.
Some of your commentators have said that there's no evidence that Russia is behind the poisoning in Salisbury. Well, clearly there was enough evidence presented by Mrs May in Brussels to persuade quite a number of countries - altogether 21 countries have signed on to this.
I would have thought quite a few people in Brussels wouldn't be very well disposed towards Mrs May, given the Brexit imbroglio, and yet she was able to present evidence to convince countries.
Well, as you know, policy in politics is often a reaction to situations. Governments feel they have to react in ways that protect their national interests as they perceive them, and in this case, clearly that is the reaction - an attempt to send a signal to Russia that there's been an accumulation of violations of international norms as they are perceived by other countries - not necessarily so perceived by Russia.
But that this goes back a long way to about 2007 when there was the cyber-attack on Estonia and really, quite outrageous treatment of the Estonian ambassador in Moscow and it's gone through many, many things and as you say, so, it's basically an attempt to send a signal.
SABRA LANE: The Russian ambassador to Australia last night said it's up to President Putin to respond. What should Australia be prepared for?
KYLE WILSON: I thought it was significant that Mr Logvinov, you know, a seasoned and very professional diplomat who weighs his words, I thought it was significant that he said that the decision lies with Mr Putin because that is the nature of Putin's Russia.
He's accumulated great power in his own hands. This, of course, has some disadvantages as we're seeing with this awful tragedy in Kemerovo, the Siberian city where at least 60 people have died and 40 of them children and of course, people are turning to Putin because they say, "Well, Mr Putin, you have great power, you run this country essentially and ultimately, you are responsible".
Putin, of course, will be given policy options. How strong should Russia's response be to other countries responses?
Should it be muscular, should he show yet again that he is a strong leader?
I might mention that he has recently been called by the head of Russia Today, RT, Margarita Simonyan, she called him "our chieftain". That is the first time they have used this word about Putin, "our warrior chieftain and no one will take him away from us".
So, the fact is, we are likely to be dealing with Putin for many years yet so we're going to have to think too, very carefully, about how we deal with him, but he will take a decision on just how muscular the Russian response will be.
SABRA LANE: Does Russia really care what Australia does, surely we're small fry?
KYLE WILSON: Well Sabra, I no longer work for government so I can say what I think and I think you're probably absolutely right.
For good reasons we don't loom very large on the Russian radar screen of the world and frankly they don't loom so very large for us, though much larger of course.
I mean, they are a great power with 7,300 nuclear weapons more than anyone else. They've recently shown their reach into the South Pacific by sending two bombers down into the South Pacific from an Indonesian island.
But if you look at the trade between the two countries, it is not very substantial, affected a bit by sanctions.
I think Russia is somewhere between 30 and 40 in terms of the value of bilateral trade in goods and services so - and Mr Putin famously said in 2007 when he was coming to an APEC meeting in Sydney that he said "Well, I know where Australia is but I never have reason to think about it."
So, I think your description that Australia, relatively small fry for Russia, I think that's a fair description.
SABRA LANE: Kyle Wilson, thank you very much for your insights this morning.
KYLE WILSON: It's a pleasure Sabra, thank you.
Kyle Wilson has had Department of Foreign affairs postings to Moscow and Beijing, and for 10 years he was seconded to the Office of National Assessments as the Senior Analyst for Russia and the former Soviet Union.
He says there's been enough evidence of Russia's misdeeds to convince 21 countries to join together in diplomatic retaliation against the country, which is designed to send a clear signal.
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Kyle Wilson, former official Russian interpreter for Australian heads of state and prime ministers