Judging Freedom - Can Ukraine Possibly Still Win the War? w/Tony Shaffer

Episode Date: September 26, 2023

Can Ukraine Possibly Still Win the War? w/Tony ShafferSee 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 Tuesday, September 26th, 2023. Tony Schaefer joins us now. Colonel Schaefer, Tony, always a pleasure. Thank you for coming back to the show. Do you think that the elite, of course, do you think that the elites in the West finally recognize that Ukraine can't win this war, but are trying to figure out a way to acknowledge it publicly or look for an off-ramp? Or do they still think that with American and Western aid, enthusiasm dwindling, Ukraine can pull this off? No, I think the same neocons who said we could win in Iraq without regard to consequences, who said we could win in Afghanistan without regard to consequences,

are doing the same thing again. I referenced to you and I referenced to your audience the 60 Minutes interview with Lindsey Graham. Lindsey Graham is the neocons neocon. And, you know, if we just get a few more troops, we'll have victory. If we just do this, it's always just that next thing that's going to bring victory. It's not, it's not. And I think they've had influence over the, they've had influence, heavy influence over the mechanisms of governance. And Biden's one of them. So they've continued to foster this narrative that Ukraine's winning. They're not.

That just one more weapon system will be that which actually seals the victory. It won't. And that the Russians are nearly defeated. As a matter of fact, it's funny that I think it was Graham or Hodges, one of the two, the former general, said that

Russia's been, the Russian military capability has been split, has basically been halved. It's like, it's not, not remotely. As a matter of fact, it's been strengthened. And again, I want people to go out and watch that thing because I think this is their public. This is their public face. You and I know the way we think, and we actually know a good number of them personally from when we both were at Fox. What do they inwardly think? Do they inwardly recognize, hey, guys, this is over and we need an off ramp? No, no.

It's the John McCain syndrome. I'm going to fake it till I make it or I die, pretty much. And I think that's the way they look at this. They do not believe they can be right. This is a form of narcissism as far as I'm concerned, that they are incapable of accepting the reality which they face and otherwise will continue to project an alternate perspective that is based on emotion, not on reality. I don't believe in it. They've internalized it and judge. They would sooner see us go to war over their lie than accept the truth. Wow. That's profound. That's profound, Tony. And I appreciate you being that.

Do they know the bad, the lousy, the horrible week that Zelensky had here last week, starting with the polls thumbing their nose at him while he was in the UN. And going to Kevin McCarthy, refusing to let him address a joint session of Congress, and Joe Biden refusing to do a joint presser with him, and the Canadian parliament recognizing and applauding a Nazi. Does he know how horrible his week was? Everybody on the pro-Ukraine, they're going to win no matter what side, will use every excuse to explain away why it was that it wasn't successful. They're going to explain, oh, Biden

wasn't able, he butchers everything, that would be a bad optic. McCarthy, oh, McCarthy's just being influenced by the extreme elements of the Republican Party. There's going to be excuses galore on why he didn't succeed. And then it's hard to explain a way the polls basically comparing Zelensky to a drowning man at the very time he's here. It's like where lifeguards are afraid to save him because with, with his adrenaline, he'll pull the lifeguards down. I mean, how, how gloomy an analogy can you possibly come up with? I, and I looked at that as like, Holy cow. I don't, I don't know how you come back from that, but it didn't matter judge. They don't care. Literally. I mean, you're going to see the same narrative. We're going to see, we're coming up

here on the 4th of October. It'll be four months. I challenge your rational listeners and followers to go look at the BBC maps. Look at the BBC map on the 4th of June and look at the BBC map on the 4th of October. And you tell me how much has happened within that context. And are we, quote unquote, on the verge of seeing Ukraine win? Just so a top Ukrainian general told CNN that he cannot conduct operations with groups of Ukrainian soldiers larger than 12 to 15. I think it's how can they possibly take on the Russian army if they can't move in units larger than 12 to 15 troops? And what are they doing? Going into the gray zone just to take pictures

for Zelensky to show on on Kiev television? Pretty much. So I, again, refer back to the 60 Minutes article. 60 Minutes actually had a reporter out who was in what we call defilade, in the hidden positions with the Ukrainian army. And the Ukrainian army, she actually asked him, oh, do you have to hide like this to hide from the Russian drones? He says, yeah, we do.

That's true. So you're not going to muster sufficient combat power to punch through three layers of intense and reinforced obstacles, Judge, by 10 to 12 to 13. They might get up to 25 member military units being able to strike at a time. You need literally, and this is one of those rare times I agree with H.R. McMaster, you need to have 300 Abrams focused with adequate armored personnel carriers prepared to punch through the line. And as you go through, accept 40 to 50% casualties and have reserves available to continue to punch through to have any potential chance of victory. We're talking about probably 3,000 men on a single bridge. From the Ukrainian perspective, Tony, what would be the reason for just 12 to 15 people,

even to a lay person like I am? It seems absurd. It's a paltry number. Because they can't assemble in a cohesive way combat power beyond that without getting it wiped out. Remember, the Russians have improved, Judge, their ability to use artillery an order of magnitude since the beginning of the war. Instead of having to use, I think, 30,000 a day, they've been able to bring that down to about 10,000. The reason I brought it down, because they're very accurate, because they have learned how to use drones way more effectively

than the Ukrainians. The Ukrainians started out with an edge, they've lost the edge. The Russians now have it. So yeah, the moment you start moving on the battlefield, especially during daylight hours, they're going to spot you and you're going to have a bunch of 155 artillery coming down on your head within minutes that's why they can't muster more than what they're doing wow uh it's a bleak situation are are the uh f-16s or abrams tanks going to accomplish anything for ukraine or are they too little too late too little too late again i i agree with hr. McMaster's like you need 300, not 31 or 28, whatever the number is. And yeah, I've used this analogy before. When Eisenhower, when General Eisenhower decided to invade the Normandy beach,

he didn't say, let's send in the P-51s ahead of the invasion. Let's send in the airborne troopers next. Let's try to see some how the British do on Gold Beach before we send troops into Omaha. No, you executed vigorously and violently all at once to achieve a specific outcome, which was landing 60,000 troops on the beaches of Normandy to be able to continue and expand combat operations to breach that beach to get inside the interior. No other thing has been available or able to do that beach to get inside the interior. No has been available or able to do that. So sending in the F-16s after the fact, after you've had all this opportunity, it's not gonna have any significant effect. Here's President Zelensky over the weekend

on the tanks and the F-16s. The first American-made Abrams tanks are already in Ukraine. We are preparing them to reinforce our actions against the occupiers and it will be a significant reinforcement. We are also working to get all the other weapons capabilities we need. This includes F-16s. We are preparing pilots and infrastructure. The best thing for us is to be able to produce air defense and other advanced weapons. This is the only way to guarantee Ukraine's security. Is he lying to the Ukrainian public if he thinks that F-16s are going to provide an air defense when he doesn't have anybody to come fly them and when they're not there yet? It's an order of magnitude more difficult

than what he's making it out to be, Judge. Look, you need logistics. You have sustainers. You have to have weapons folks. You have to have weapons folks who understand how to install the weapons and have them maintained. You have to have people programming the computers, the weapon systems, which go on those aircraft. It's not just the pilot. And the pilots will have no experience flying the airframe to any significant degree to prevail in combat. Look, we have something called Top Gun. You have F-16s as the adversary aircraft at Top Gun, mixing it up with aircraft every day. I'm telling you right now, there's going to be no aviators who are able to do anything against the Russians. The Russians now are combat experienced. They've been fighting the war for a while. There's no way you're going to have people coming in with a new airframe being able to prevail against the Russians at this point, especially regarding the fourth generation. You are so logical, but I know an admiral that disagrees with you. I wonder who that could be. His name is John Kirby. Here he is. It's kind of a long clip,

but this is vintage Admiral Kirby on Ukrainian progress, Tony. How do you, based on the information you're getting, how do you think the counteroffensive is going? And are the Ukrainians closer to victory than they were six months ago? Based on this letter from J.D. Vance, can you just answer some of these questions? Do you think that Ukrainians are any closer to victory than they were six months ago? Is the counteroffensive any more effective? Well, it's a shame that the senator didn't take advantage of the opportunity to listen to President Zelensky himself today, who I am absolutely certain was updating members of

Congress about progress on the battlefield. But let me take a shot at it. The truth is that the Ukrainian armed forces, particularly in the south, are making steady progress. Now, is it as far or as fast as they want to go coming out of Zaporizhia towards the coast of the Sea of Azov? No. And they'd be the first to tell you that. I'm sure President Zelensky shared that perspective. The Russians had months to dig entrenchments, what we call defense in depth. They have literally put up tens of thousands of mines and minefields all across that southern expanse to try to slow the Ukrainians down. And it has certainly had an effect on them. But they are making progress. And one of the reasons they're making progress, first of all, it's obviously because of their skill and bravery and the fact that they're allocating resources to this advance, but it's because of the tools, the training,

and the technology that the United States and our allies and partners have lent them, have given them, have provided them to be able to make that progress. Is that credible at all, Tony? He's using a lot of words which don't actually answer the question. John, if you're listening, if you are, accept my criticism for what I mean it to be, constructive. Spend more time studying actual factual reports than going to Georgetown buying ties. It's a better investment of your time, just saying. And on that note, he did not answer the question, Judge.

And the fact is that there is no sustained combat victory. It's just not. Again, I challenge your viewers, check for yourself. Go and look at the BBC maps that are available online from the 4th of June until now. And you'll see for yourself, there's no measurable sustained. Judge, did you ever watch the TV series Black Adder? Have you ever seen the Black? It's a- No, I've never heard of it.

I don't watch television, but I've never heard of it. Black Adder is Rowan Atkinson, a very funny guy. And they're doing a thing on World War I on trench warfare. And basically, Black Adder is coming back from the battlefield. And they have a big room with a big, big green piece of grass. And the lieutenant says, General, here's the progress from the battle yesterday. This is what we were able to take during the battle yesterday. And the general looks at this big thing of grass. He says, what's the scale?

And the guy says, one to one. That's it. They got this big piece of grass. That's it. That's what we're seeing here. We're seeing like, OK, yeah, you've got a yard. That's it. That's what we're seeing here. We're seeing like, okay, yeah, you've got a yard. That's progress. That's what we're seeing. But they're trying their best to not tell you the full truth or me the full truth about the fact there's no sustained victory,

no sustained progress that is achieving anything like the victory objectives they established themselves back in June. Okay, so the next clip of General, of Admiral Kirby, he talks about an exit strategy. And according to him, their exit strategy is to browbeat Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table. This is crazy, but here he is again. What's the strategy? What's the exit plan here for the U.S.? Well, again, I'm not exactly clear what the senator is referring to. Normally, again. when President Zelensky, and only President Zelensky can determine when it's time to sit down with President Putin, that he can sit down and have a diplomatic dialogue with a wind at his back and with some strength. So they can get President Putin to sit down while they, the Ukrainians, have a wind to

their back. This is so misleading i understand what pr people do you understand what pr people do but i know john he's a master at it john i know but they can only go so far before they have zero credibility whatsoever well baghdad bob did a pretty good job in baghdad and i think john is following that tradition because yeah to that point there's no indications that anything like any favorable win is at the back of Zelensky to force Russia to the table. I think you, between you and me, I think the Russians and Ukraine, Ukrainians need to go to

the negotiating table, but they're not, the Russians are going to be forced to do it. There's no advantage that's been built by the Ukrainian military action over the past four months that would indicate or encourage Putin to do that based on being leveraged to do it. If the Russians do it, they will do it because they want to, not because they're being forced to. And right now, you've got about two weeks of combat left before the rainy season hits and everything gets bogged down. So you've got until I think the first week of October, maybe the second week of October before things hit. And then after that, Judge, you're going to have essentially a weather-caused pause in combat. That is to say that

once the rain hits, it's going to be bogged down. You're going to have a pause that's forced on the battlefield probably from mid-October to December, January, till the hard freeze. During that time would be a perfect time for them to actually just sit down and be adults and enter a negotiation. Unfortunately, I think you're going to see John Kirby saying, this has got to be dragged into December and the other. I don't think it's going to have any, there's no way that the Russians will be forced.

If they do it, they'll do it because they decide there's advantage to be had of having a negotiated discussion on this. Do you think a time will soon come when Putin will conclude to himself with the advice of his senior people, enough's enough, let's just get this over within two or three weeks? So that's always, I think they're going to have that option. So at this point, I see the Russians continuing to build combat power, effectively building it, building it at the core level. As you point out, Judge, the combat power by Ukraine is actually focused at the squad level, squad level versus core level combat power. Almost a joke. Even for a lay person like me, it's almost a joke. So you have effective core level units being put together and being prepared for the offensive.

Putin will have the option for an offensive. If he takes it, I think he's going to bifurcate. He's going to split Ukraine. He's going to go to the Dnieper. I don't think he wants the whole thing. I think he's going to have enough to basically take the oil and gas resources and then split the nation in half and let there be a rump Ukraine that cannot be used by NATO or the EU for purposes of troubling the Russians. I think that's what he has the option to do. And that's what I think he may well do starting in January if there's no other negotiated option available to him and that's what i think he may well do starting in january if there's no other negotiated

option available to him at that point in time i've got chris here is a little bit of a camera hog he wants and he wants the nibble on my fingers that's good well bug my cat is up somewhere else but he'd be here too ham and i'll be crispy good boy um i want you to take a look at what happened in the Canadian Parliament, and I want your comments. Sure. And then we'll take a look at Justin Trudeau's comments on it, which in my view made things worse. So this is President Zelensky last week in the Canadian Parliament. I don't know if you've seen the clip. If you've not, you see him in the very beginning all the way over to the left.

Then, of course, the camera pans to this former SS guy. I can't imagine this happened by accident, but here's the clip. Chris. His speech received at least a dozen standing ovations. There was also one for this man, a 98-year-old Ukrainian-Canadian who fought for Ukrainian independence against the Russians during the Second World War. Wow. On Yom Kippur, the most sacred solemn day in the Jewish calendar, the Canadian parliament, one of the five eyes, you know what that means, in terms of intelligence sharing, decides to do that.

Yeah. I don't think this is random. I mean, this guy, this member, he was part of the, let me make, I want to make sure I get this right because I don't want to be called out on it later. Basically, he was a member of the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS, the Waffen SS. Let me be very clear on what this is for those who don't necessarily study history. There were those like Lieutenant Colonel Stauffenberg, who were honorable soldiers in the German army, the Herr. I don't speak German, but he was in the German army. There was respect between officers during the war regarding regular military. The Waffen-SS was created out of the

Nazi party, out of those elements of the protection squad, the SA that protected Hitler and the senior Nazi leaders. The SA became the SS under Heiner Kimmler. These units were created for purposes of cleansing the captured territory of Jews and other undesirables. That unit, the 14th Waffen Grenadiers were in the rear areas during combat doing those things the regular army officers refused to do, which was murder and liquidate, participate in what Hitler called the final solution to the Jewish question. So why would the Canadian parliament choose to honor this guy? And now the polls want him back. The polls have actually put in a request to have this guy returned to Poland for crimes against humanity. Why would the Canadian Parliament, in what was obviously planned or staged,

choose to honor this guy with international cameras and television watching? Well, I can tell you that my belief is they knew exactly what they were doing. I don't think they understood the backlash that would come from this, because, again, you don't make this level of mistake. And the lady who runs Parliament there actually said that, quote from this because, again, you don't make this level of mistake. And the lady who runs parliament there actually said that, quote, unquote, everybody was vetted before this happened. It's like, oh, okay.

They knew exactly who he was. The only thing that made it worse is Justin Trudeau who blamed it on the Russians. Here he is. Obviously, it's extremely upsetting that this happened the speaker speaker has acknowledged his mistake and has apologized but this is something that is deeply embarrassing to the parliament of canada and by extension to all canadians i think particularly of jewish mps and all members of the jewish community across the country who are celebrating or commemorating Yom Kippur today. I think it's going to be really important that all of us push back against Russian propaganda, Russian disinformation, and continue our steadfast and unequivocal support for Ukraine.

You know, Donald Trump said he thought that Justin Trudeau was a lunatic. There's an example of it. How can you blame that stunt with the 98-year-old ex-Nazi on the Russians? I've been watching Canadian media on this, and a lot of the Canadians say this is on brand for Trudeau. This is typical. Remember, he is out to basically undermine all social order and cause chaos. I believe this was completely planned, and I think they planned to blame the Russians. As insane as that is. And look at how calm he was. I don't think he's unplussed. He's just like, I got to go out and say this. This is who they are, Judge. This isn't left or right anymore. This is not about left.

I do talk solidly. This is not left or right. This is good and evil. That's evil. Agreed. Agreed. Thank you very much for your time, Tony. Folks are asking about Chris, and a lot of people have guessed, is he Beagle? He's Beagle and German Shepherd. I love Beagles. We used to have a Beagle. We's Beagle and German Shepherd. I love Beagles. We used to have a Beagle. We have a Beagle around somewhere. He's a wonderful dog and is great around the house, but like somebody else

around here, he likes to be in front of the camera. Thank you, Tony. Please come back again soon. Great to have you. All the best. Thank you, sir. All right, my friends. There you have it. One more for today. The great Professor John Mearsheimer, 5 o'clock Eastern on Judging Freedom. MUSIC