Judging Freedom - AaronMaté (The GrayZone) - Ukraine On Its Last Legs

Episode Date: January 31, 2024

Discover the unvarnished truth behind Ukraine's tumultuous situation as Aaron Matei and I, Judge Andrew Napolitano, traverse the obscured narratives of the war and the U.S. media's depiction. Our conversation cuts through the fog to reveal President Zelensky's desperate appeals for American support and the stark contrast between the Ukrainian military's actual predicaments and the polished presentations of U.S. officials. The exchange shines a necessary light on the inner turmoil of Ukraine's leadership and provides an honest assessment of their military standing against Russia, all while challenging the American public's perception shaped by media and government rhetoric.Venturing beyond Ukraine, the discussion shifts to the treacherous realm of journalism in conflict zones, as I recount a personal encounter with Ukrainian intelligence and the hazards journalists face in places like Gaza and Israel. With Aaron's expertise, we examine the complex landscape of reporting under Netanyahu's government and consider the implications for the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. Concluding on an unexpectedly uplifting note, Aaron's crane tale emerges, a testament to the serendipitous joy and innovation that can surface in the most serious of discussions. Our heartfelt dialogue concludes with an expression of mutual gratitude, underscoring the value of candid conversations and the enduring bonds they forge.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Thank you. Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Wednesday, January 31st, 2024. Aaron Matei joins us now. Aaron, it's a pleasure. My dear friend, thank you for joining us. I want to talk to you a little bit about Israel and the latest events there, including assassinations inside a hospital in the West Bank. But before we do, I recently learned about your research on Ukraine and your expertise in that field, and I'd like to be able to pick your brain on it, if you don't mind. Is Ukraine on its last leg? And if it is, why don't we know that here in the United States from the mainstream media? By all appearances, it is. I mean, Zelensky himself has said that unless Congress comes through with another $60 billion to prolong this proxy war, that Ukraine will lose. You compare that to what we've heard from the Biden administration talking about how Russia

has already lost. And Blinken a few months ago said that Russia has shown that it's not the second strongest army in the world. It's actually not. It's the second strongest army inside Ukraine. So all these rosy predictions and claims we've gotten from the Biden administration covering up for the fact that Ukraine never had a chance in this war because the aim was never about defending Ukraine. It was always about, as Lloyd Austin blurted out early on, it was about weakening Russia. And now we're seeing the results of that where Ukrainians are fleeing abroad and Zelensky is desperate just for a lifeline from his patron in Washington. And the reason we're not getting told that picture is simply because our media is so subservient to our government's line. My understanding is, and you know these facts better than I, so feel free to correct them.

About 10 million Ukrainians have fled the country in the past two years. About 500,000 young men are either dead or so injured they cannot go back to the military, and that President Zelensky and General Zelushny, we'll talk about the longevity of General Zelushny and his job in a minute, recognize that $68 billion is not going to do it. They need 500,000 soldiers more than they need 68 billion in cash and equipment. Is that a fair assessment? In terms of the numbers that have fled, I can't speak to that. I know it's in the millions. I don't know about 10 million, but certainly in the last 10 years since the U.S. backed a coup in Ukraine that set off this entire crisis, certainly it's in the millions that have fled Ukraine because it's been destroyed by war and the U.S. has blocked all peaceful alternatives.

In terms of Zelensky, one of the reasons why he's fallen out of sync with Zelensky is because Zelensky admitted a few months ago that the war was at a stalemate, which in fact was him being generous because it's not a stalemate. Russia is in fact winning, but the best spin he could put on it was that this was at a stalemate. He's also complained that the equipment he was getting from the U.S. and its partners was not enough to win the war. And there's an anecdote from Lloyd Austin where when Lloyd Austin heard Zeluzhny's wishlist of all the equipment he needed, Lloyd Austin said that that's impossible. We don't have that. And that's because Ukraine was put in an impossible situation. It was forced to fight against a Russia next door to it that is far more powerful, is far more people, and has the industrial capacity to manufacture the weapons that it needs. By contrast, the U.S. and its

allies simply don't. And that's why Ukraine is in the position that it's in. Chris, while Aaron and I are talking, can you look for the montage of President Biden and Secretary Blinken and a few others saying Russia has lost? I want to raise Aaron's blood pressure a little bit by playing what our supposed leaders have been saying. Just let me know when you have that. We have so many of these cuts like you guys do deep into the computer that we sometimes need to search for them. What has happened recently, like within the past 36 hours about General Zeluzhny? Colonel McGregor, Scott Ritter, Larry Johnson tell me General Zelensky is generally well respected as a military leader in Europe. And now I hear, correct me if I'm not saying this right, President Zelensky has said he

will soon be fired. Correct. All the reporting we've gotten out of Ukraine is that Zelensky basically issued an order calling for Zelensky to step down. And apparently he was offered to take some different position inside the government, but Zelensky declined saying either I had the military or I'm out. And the reason why that Zelensky wanted Zelensky gone is that Zelensky interfered with Zelensky's narrative. There was a cover article in Time Magazine not long ago, and this

is the same Time Magazine that declared Zelensky the person of the year back in 2022. So fast forward nearly a year later and this article in Time magazine by Simon Schuster interviewed a bunch of Zelensky aides who called him delusional, who said he was out of touch, said he was messianic,

who said that he wouldn't listen to reason when they told him that they're losing and that this is a hopeless battle. He wouldn't listen to them. So that similar dynamic they're losing and that this is a hopeless battle they would he wouldn't listen to them so that similar dynamic happened with Zelensky with Zelensky and Zeluzhny whereas Zeluzhny has been saying that this is a stalemate that we need more equipment and we also need to force hundreds of thousands of more people to fight because we don't have the manpower anymore because so many people have been killed on the battlefield as everybody could have predicted and again the tragedy of all this this all people have been killed on the battlefield, as everybody could

have predicted. And again, the tragedy of all this, this all could have been avoided. There were so many opportunities to make peace with Russia. Prior to Russia's invasion, you had, ever since February 2015, so nine years ago, a peace accord called the Minsk Two Accords. And all Minsk said was simply that Ukraine should respect the rights of the Russian-aligned people of the eastern Donbass and also grant them autonomy. And basically, as a result, it would not join NATO because the autonomous Donbass region would have a veto over that. And in return, Russia will stop supporting the rebels in the east, and Ukraine can live in peace. But Ukraine's far right refused to accept those terms because they didn't want to acknowledge the equality of Russian-aligned Ukrainians. Fast forward to shortly before the Russian invasion, Russia presented these draft treaties

in December 2021, basically calling on the U.S. to respect the Minsk Accords that it had previously blocked, and also scale back the military infrastructure of NATO surrounding Russia. The U.S. refused to even discuss those core demands. Then you have after Russia's invasion, you've talked about this a lot in your show, that peace deal that was reached in April 2022, so weeks into the war. We know what happened next. Boris Johnson came in, no doubt at the behest of the U.S., and said that the West was against that peace deal. And so therefore, the fighting continued. Here's the montage of American leaders and their propaganda.

The answer is Putin's already lost the war. Putin has already lost in terms of what he was trying to achieve. In many ways, Putin has already lost. Putin has already lost this war. And that is Russia has already lost this war. In short, Russia has lost. They've lost strategically, operationally, and tactically. Putin's war of conquest is failing.

Russia's military has lost half its territory it once occupied. It's worth fighting for for as long as it takes. And that's how long we're going to be with you, Mr. President, for as long as it takes. We'll do it. And we're advancing this goal by providing them the support Ukraine needs now on the battlefield and helping them strengthen their military over the long term. The fact of the matter is that I believe we'll have the funding necessary to support Ukraine as long as it takes. The American people can be and should be incredibly proud of the part they've played in supporting Ukraine's success.

We'll continue to supply Ukraine with critical weapons and equipment as long as we can. If Putin takes Ukraine, he won't stop there. It's important to see the long run here. He's going to keep going. He's made that pretty clear. If Putin attacks a NATO ally, then we'll have something that we don't seek and that we don't have today. American troops fighting Russian troops. American troops fighting Russian troops if he moves into other parts of NATO. I know he may have problems processing data and information and expressing himself, but he says eight times Putin is lost, Putin is lost, Putin is lost, and then he says, if Putin takes Ukraine. This is Putin is lost, Putin is lost. And then he says, if Putin takes

Ukraine, this is worse than propaganda. This is madness. And the consequence is tens of thousands of dead Ukrainians and Russians as well. Yes. What? For the goal of weakening Russia. That's what Lloyd Austin admitted. Other Biden administration officials confirmed that that was the goal, using this poor country to bleed a geopolitical foe and lying in the process. And they have to lie because they have to tell their public who are footing the bill, over $100 billion allocated so far, now Biden wants another $60 billion. They have to tell the public that this is going well, that we're winning, Putin's lost, to justify shipping out so much money and energy into this futile proxy war. When in reality, as Zelensky recently admitted, so did his top aides, unless

we get another $60 billion, we will lose. So while Biden and his aides go before the public and lie just so they can prolong this war, they lead to Zelensky being in this horrible position where he has to beg for more money just to avoid an all-out defeat. That's how pathetic this is. And speaking of pathetic, your montage exposes the lies simply by listening to the words, because what do we hear up until the end? We're going to support Ukraine for as long as it takes. What did Biden say recently, just in December, 2023? We're going to support Ukraine for as long as we can. Yes, yes.

So this idea that we were behind Ukraine all along was always a lie. We were going to support Ukraine so long as it could pursue our sole goal, which was to weaken Russia, not to defend Ukraine. What will happen? What will become of the $61 billion if, God forbid, the Congress decides to spend it? I mean, again, according to our military people, there aren't enough human beings alive and well in the military to use any equipment. And the United States is actually running low, meaning a lot of that money will be cash. Some of it will be stolen. But what can they do with it?

Well, it's a racket. So the money actually goes mostly into replenishing the U.S. stockpile, which means that the U.S. gets to purchase fancy new weapons for itself. So it recycles money through the military industrial complex at home. And then Ukraine, as guests on your show have talked about, Scott Ritter talks about this a lot, they get our leftovers. They get our hand-me-downs. All this obsolete equipment that barely works, that's what Ukraine gets. And that's why Ukraine's been having such a hard time in the battlefield, because they're not even getting top US equipment. The money is spent to replenish the arsenal at home, and Ukraine gets recycled weaponry that gets dusted off the shelf and doesn't even work. How bad is Ukraine's manpower problem, and what are they doing to satisfy it?

Are they impressing people? Are they just arresting them off the street and putting them into the military? There are widespread reports and video footage of people being taken off the street. Ukraine has recently been asking its European allies to help force repatriate Ukrainians who have fled to their countries back to Ukraine. And Zeluzhny has talked about a mass conscription of 500,000 people and lowering the age of fighting. You've seen video footage, I'm sure, of some of the gatherings of Ukrainian forces and people are being forced to fight who

should not be fighting. They're at the age when they should be with their children or grandchildren because they're in their 50s or 60s, but they're out there instead forced to be on the battlefield. What is the status of journalism in Ukraine? I presume Western journalism, American journalists, British journalists, are they free to observe what they wish and report what they see? Well, it depends. Ukraine is now controlled by two different forces, the Ukrainian government and Russia. And you have people who basically only report from one side. Very rarely do people report from both sides. Try to find frontline reporting inside Ukraine over the last two years. There's not very much of it because Ukraine, understandably, did not want Western journalists

to go to the front lines and see how bad it was. Because every time there are reports coming out of the front lines in the Western media, such as in The New Yorker or in The New York Times or The Washington Post, it's not very pretty. And I imagine the same dynamic is going on the Russian side as well. I would like to go to Ukraine, but I can't because I'm on a Ukrainian government hit list. And most recently in the Twitter files, which Matt Taibbi did, and I did a little bit of reporting on this to the extent it related to me, I was on a list of accounts that Ukrainian intelligence wanted the FBI to ban and remove from Twitter. And the FBI actually relayed this request to Twitter on Ukraine's behalf. So I don't

see myself going to Ukraine anytime soon. Did the FBI have the courtesy to call you or call your lawyer and tell you what they were doing? I'm going to guess we know the answer to that. They did not. No, the only reason we knew this is because this was in the Twitter files, which is leaked from inside Twitter. The FBI did say to Twitter in response, as we know from the leaked correspondence, that we can't censor journalists on your behalf. So they at least had the decency to say that. But no, I was never told. I'm sorry you're on this list, but you're in good company.

Yes, absolutely. Let's switch to the state of journalism in Gaza and in Israel. How severe are Israeli censors? Could you go to Israel? Could Max go to Israel and see what you want and write what you saw, write about what you saw? Well, we are Jews and we are Westerners. Max is from the US. I'm from Canada. So technically we'd be allowed to go. At this point, after all the criticism that we've leveled against the Israeli government, I wouldn't be surprised if we'd be

turned away. They've done that before to people like Noam Chomsky, Norman Finkelstein, many others. So I wouldn't be optimistic about my chances of getting in. But, of course, the dire situation for journalists is the journalists in Gaza, the Palestinian journalists who aren't just censored, but they're murdered. Dozens of Palestinian journalists have been killed. Al Jazeera, one outlet alone, can speak to Dozens of Palestinian journalists have been killed. Al Jazeera, one outlet alone, can speak to so many of its staffers being killed. There was the infamous incident where one of its cameramen was shot, badly wounded, and when they tried to call in an ambulance to help, that ambulance was blocked and this cameraman died. He bled to death. What is this current stability of the Netanyahu government?

Actually, before you answer that, Chris, do we have the two right-wing members of the cabinet shrieking to that large crowd while he's looking for it? Oh, we do have it. So this is Ben-Gavir and Smotrich. It's in Hebrew, but there are English translations. I want your opinion of this. They are riling up a crowd, but they're addressing Netanyahu, who's not there. Mr. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, I'm addressing you from this stage.

It's a shame to wait another 19 years to understand that Gush Katith and northern Samaria must be returned. The responsibility of brave leadership is to make courageous decisions. We are settling our land from width to length, controlling it and fighting terror always and bringing with God's help security to all of Israel. You know what the answer is. Without settlement, there is no security. We know what width to length means. We know that Netanyahu had a picture of Israel at the UN. Two weeks, there he is. This is two weeks before October 7th. Look at Israel. Can you see the Gaza Strip? Can you see

the West Bank? No and no. So there's no question what their goal is. Not a peep out of the so-called two state staters in the American State Department. No, nothing. The official platform of Netanyahu's government says that all of the land of Israel belongs to Jewish people. And by all land of Israel, they mean Gaza, the West Bank. Some of them even think that Lebanon belongs to them as well, including Jordan. The country has gone so extreme in recent years. And all this talk about hope for a two-state solution. How can you have a two-state solution with a country that doesn't even recognize its own borders? Israel's internationally recognized borders stop at the

June 1967 lines, which means a Palestinian state and the rest of it, the West Bank and Gaza, which by the way, for Palestinians is a massive compromise because that's just 22% of their historic homeland. That's a compromise that even Hamas has actually accepted before, contrary to popular belief. But the Israeli government is so extreme that they will not even accept a massive Palestinian surrender of just accepting a Palestinian state inside the West Bank and Gaza. And that's why we're seeing spectacles like this where Israeli officials call for immediately putting back their settlements in the Gaza Strip. As if to respond to what they said, although he actually precedes them, Prime Minister Netanyahu uttering words which, if you say on the Columbia University campus, not far from where you and I are now while you're carrying a Palestinian flag, they'll kick you off.

Here's Bibi on from the River to the Sea. For 30 years, I am very consistent, and I'm saying something very simple. This conflict is not on the lack of a state of Palestinian, but the existence of a state, the Jewish state. Every area that we evacuate, we receive terrible terror against that. It happened in South Lebanon, in Gaza, and also Judea and Samaria, which we did it. And therefore, I clarify that in any other arrangement, in the future, the state of Israel has to control the entire area from the river to the sea. This is what... Goes on to say, this is what you sometimes have to say to your friends. You have to say no. I guess he meant that to Joe Biden.

Unfortunately, Joe Biden and Tony Blinken don't have the same determination to say no to him. There's no question in your mind, is there, but that the stated goals of Israel are not the eradication of Hamas and the return of the hostages. They are to make greater Israel, legal Israel from the river to the sea. Absolutely. And Netanyahu's defenders will say that the Hebrew translator there made a mistake. He didn't literally say from the river to the sea. But look at Netanyahu's party's charter, the Likud party charter from the late 1970s. It says there will only be Jewish sovereignty from the river to the sea. That's what they believe. That's what they've always implemented. preceding this ethnic cleansing campaign since Israel was founded. Israel was founded by expelling hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, changing the names of their towns and villages from Arabic names to Israeli names. There are mass graves still inside Israel today with Palestinians who were killed in 1948.

And that's the project they've been pursuing ever since. The assault on Gaza is the latest phase of that. And it's the most brutal phase. It's a genocidal phase. But that's always been the goal, to ethnically cleanse Palestinian areas and lay claim of this land from the river to the sea. How stable or unstable is the Netanyahu government at the present time, from your understanding? I'd say it's pretty unstable. The more this war goes on, the more Netanyahu is seen for who he is. He doesn't care about the hostages, the captives who are in Gaza. He doesn't care even about defeating Hamas. He just wants to ethnically cleanse Gaza and make it unlivable for those who happen to remain. And now he's

facing heavy pushback from the families of the captives who realize he's only putting them in danger with every day that this genocide continues. There are Israeli officials who don't see him as a good leader, understandably, because he presided over the massive intelligence failure that was October 7th. But the problem is he knows that as soon as this genocide ends, his political career will end as well because he'll be held accountable for the failures of October 7th. Plus he faces all these corruption issues that could result him, could lead to a prison sentence for him. So he has every incentive to keep this war going and resist all the pressure

coming his way. Aaron, thank you very much, my dear friend. Great, great conversation. Thank you especially for that insight into Ukraine, which was a happy surprise for me. All the best, my dear friend. Thanks, guys. Likewise. Good to see you. Thank you.

As we proceed through the week, Professor Mearsheimer, Professor Sachs, and the iron fist to this velvet glove, Max Blumenthal. Judge Napolitano for judging freedom. Thank you.