The New York Times sent Sabrina Tavernise, a former Moscow correspondent who covered the Iraq war, to Kyiv.

On Monday in the podcast "The Daily" she described her encounters with citizens of Kyiv, who are preparing for the arrival of the invaders, in the form of a report made up of direct quotes.

Most reply in English.

A young man who enrolls as a volunteer scoffs at the Russians, calling them stupid.

For thirty years they have denied that Ukraine is a nation.

"You have to kill a lot of people to kill the nation, and that's not possible." A psychologist who donated blood says she was only scared the first night.

"We are together, we are in our country and we will stay here."

A family has found refuge in a subway station.

The grandmother tells that her grandmother used to tell about how she took shelter with her small children when the Germans bombed Kyiv.

"It's the same." The reporter says goodbye and wishes the best of luck to the people she's leaving behind underground.

Then a man says: "God with us." In German.

Sabrina Tavernise is only surprised for a very short moment and translates: "God be with us."

The blessing formula was probably not intended as a link to the memory of the last battle for Kyiv 81 years ago, which was just invoked.

The courage of desperation didn't need to be corroborated by the macabre historical irony that the Russians took the place of the Germans who had been attacking the Russians and Ukrainians at the time.

On the other hand, it can be assumed that a citizen of Kyiv knows that the motto "God with us" was written on the belt clasps of the conquerors of the time.

In 1958, a reporter from this newspaper saw a looted flag in the Historical Museum of Odessa with the slogan, which in the German historical consciousness of the so-called post-war period was considered the epitome of hypernationalist hubris.

Of the self-criticism of German self-criticism, which has led to the sudden realization that we must not forbid ourselves arms aid, only the result is relevant for the besieged of Kyiv.

With the German words, the American was addressed as a visitor from a West who, in the end, can only pray for Ukraine - because every people who call themselves a nation, that means they want to be free and want to survive their fate in God hands.