Judging Freedom - LIVE From Ukraine - Counter Offensive Update w/Matt VanDyke

Episode Date: September 7, 2023

LIVE From Ukraine - Counter Offensive Update w/Matt VanDykeSee 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 Thursday, September 7th, 2023. Joining us directly live from Ukraine is the intrepid Matt Van Dyke. Matt, it's good to see you. Glad you are well. And thank you very much for coming back on the show. So without telling us precisely where you are for security reasons, can you tell us what you're doing in Ukraine. Well, I'm beginning my service in the Ukrainian military. And that's basically what we're doing. What are you wearing? Is that an American military uniform or a Ukrainian military uniform?

This is a Ukrainian military uniform. It's not necessarily what I'll be wearing in combat because I have my own kit. The Ukrainian military uses a mix of different camo patterns, So it's not necessarily what I'll be wearing in combat because I have my own kit. The Ukrainian military uses a mix of different camo patterns, mostly American multicam and just Ukrainian digital camo. And how many Americans, as far as you have seen or observed, in addition to you, have joined the Ukrainian military since this conflagration began in February of 22? I'm not sure what the number is. The ones that I've encountered, probably 20 or less total, but I believe the number is much higher. I haven't met all of them. Do you have, now maybe I should know this as a lawyer

and former judge, but I don't. Do you have a legal obligation to report this to the American authorities? I mean, are you becoming an agent of a foreign government by fighting in their military, even though it's a foreign government that's at this point in history allied with the United States? No, America's fine with Americans serving in this military. I suppose an issue could come if it was a former U.S. military personnel and what knowledge or technology they were to transfer to the Ukrainian military. But in my case, not having served in the American military, there was no issue there. So when you first went to Ukraine, and you've been on the show many times from as far as we can tell, because I respect your safety and security all over Ukraine, but when you first went to Ukraine, you gave us the understanding that your goal was training you and your group, Sons of Liberty International, was to help train Ukrainian military to fight the Russians.

What caused you to transfer from training, which is relatively safe, to shooting, which is most unsafe? Well, we still have the training mission for the organization. My service in the Ukrainian military is in addition to my responsibilities of leading the organization. It also allows for a better integration of us with the Ukrainian military for the purposes of training. Since I have a direct line into the Ukrainian military, it'll just improve our training capabilities as well. But I believe in this conflict. I don't ask people to do something I'm not willing to do myself. And if I'm training people to fight in it, I'm willing to fight in it.

And so I enlisted. How desperate is the Ukraine military for more bodies? We are hearing stories. These are just anecdotal of 16-year-olds and 60-year-olds being conscripted. I haven't seen or heard of any cases of 16-year-olds or 60-year-olds being conscripted. I don't know why that would be done. There's plenty of military-age males who are left in Ukraine. I mean, this country of millions of people, there's plenty of people out on the street that you can see who could be serving but aren't yet.

Maybe they will be in the future. But there's no desperate rush for conscripting people who aren't the best candidates to go fight. The Russians have built, as you know, three rings of defense to repel, deter, prevent Ukrainian military from moving eastward. The rings were constructed not by picks and shovels, but by professional Russian construction companies, people that build roads and highways, early in the war, and they were essentially unmolested by the Ukraine military. With the exception of the Wall Street Journal, which persists in this story, American media indicates that the Ukraine military has not only not breached, but not even approached the first of those three rings. What can you tell us about how far eastward into the areas where the Russians have dug in the Ukraine military has gotten? In the south, the first ring has been breached. They're coming up on the second.

They've made a successful incursion into Russian territory. There's still a long way to go. Part of the problem is that the last fall's beginning of that counteroffensive that was successful wasn't continued through the winter, which only gave the Russians time to build better fortifications to dig those entrenchments and delay the mines. It's really slowing things down. So is the lack of not having air power for combined arms assault. The Ukrainians were taught tactics by the West during training in Germany and other places that usually are done with air power, and they don't really have the air power to combine with it. So it's a very hard almost impossible to push the Russians out of eastern Ukraine and inconceivable pushing them out of Crimea. Agreed? It will be extremely difficult without air power, except air power is coming. We have some air power. F-16s are on the way. I think another great effort this summer. You know the F-16s are not going to arrive until the end of this year, and you also know that there are no Ukrainian pilots qualified to fly them at this point. So it's going to be a while before they arrive. How much longer do you think

the war is going to go on? At least through 2024. I think another big push will be made next summer with the support of air power, and then we'll see what we can do. Why did the spring offensive fail? They should have continued. My view is they should have continued through the fall and winter when they had early success in the fall. Russia was at the weakest it would ever be at that point

in terms of morale, logistics, and they hadn't dug their defensive positions yet. That should have continued rather than waiting for Western armor to come. The Bradleys had helped, but really time was a much more powerful weapon than any technology that was coming from the West, and that opportunity wasn't seized in time. You gave us some pictures of your colleagues training. We're going to put them up and then talk over them. So what are we looking at here? I don't know if any of those guys is you, but what are we looking at in this photo? What is that piece of equipment there, Matt?

That's anti-tank missile. We train them on anti-tank missiles. This was in Constantinivka, which is a city that was just hit by a Russian missile strike, I believe yesterday, which was the deadliest strike in a while, 16 or 17 killed in a market. It's the city that my team and I deployed to with the 47th Brigade, which is a unit that is spearheading the current counteroffensive that has had incredible success on the battlefield. But this is a city that we're familiar with, a unit we're familiar with, and they've been in the news a lot. So we see this piece of hardware and we see portions of three human beings. Are those guys Ukrainians or Americans?

In the background are Ukrainians. The trainer on the left is American. And is he part of your group? He was at the time. He has another job that he is doing now, but he's a former Marine, and he was with us there last summer. Is there some security issue with you taking photographs of Ukraine equipment and soldiers and American trainers and posting it on an international site, as is the case now? No, this is the most photographed and videoed war in history. You see in that photo, their faces aren't shown. If they have a problem with their faces shown, we don't show them or we blur them out. My trainers are all comfortable being seen.

And there isn't any sophisticated technology there. Those aren't even Javelin-level anti-tank missiles. Okay, Gary, let's go to the next of Matt's picture. What are we watching here? It looks like four soldiers with their faces covered. Yeah, this is, again, their faces are covered to protect their identities. Sometimes they want to do that if they're going to be photographed. This is a room clearing exercise for checking room for enemy and particularly useful in urban combat.

I know for a fact that the 47th has been using these skills quite successfully, in fact. Are these Americans, Ukrainians, or both these fellows that we see in the military garb? These are all Ukrainians in the 47th Brigade, one of the ones spearheading the counteroffensive. At the time, it was the 47th Battalion. What is the weaponry that they have in their hands, Matt? I'd have to zoom in, but AK-74. And are they supplied by the United States, NATO, or the West? Supplied by Ukraine and some Western countries, presumably Poland or others, that had AK-74s. An AK-74 is what I'm issued as well. When they train like that, do they train with live rounds of ammunition?

No, none of that's fire training. That training in the photograph was to get down to movements, including moving with a weapon. We also do a lot of training with airsoft that involves engaging. And it's usually role played by us. Sometimes it's a great pain. I think we have one or two more photos. What are we looking at here? It looks like somebody without a helmet on, none of them

have helmets on, but somebody in a trench and three other fellows looking at them or pointing to them. These are two of my trainers demonstrating digging a one-man fighting position. And something we haven't had to do in any previous mission over the past nine years was think about fighting positions in trenches. It just wasn't an issue. But here it's one of the things that they want most as it can be the matter of life and death in a war using this much artillery. How close do the Ukrainian soldiers and the Russian soldiers get to each other if they're shooting from a one-man trench like that? Most of those trenches, you normally start with one-man trench when you first arrive at position, and then it expands, you improve your fighting position and link one-man trenches together, build a trench system. In this case, you know, that would mostly be for perimeter defense. That's what we

were teaching at that site. Yeah, but how far away would the Russian soldiers be? Let's say this were real, not training. Is this a realistic view of what a one-man trench or shooting position would look like? It would be designed to keep the Russians back at least a few hundred meters. So the Russians at whom the person in the trench is shooting would be no more than one or two football fields distance away? Probably about 300 meters or so. Okay. I think we have one more. Chris is all over the place here. I think we have one more. Now, this is a training exercise. That guy whose belly we see is not dead. What's going on there? This is our medical trainer. Medic training is one of the things that we provide. One of the things that's most demand, actually. We do this, we do it under other, under scenarios as well, where there'll be active shooting scenarios with the airsoft, where we'll have somebody be wounded,

so they have to learn to evacuate a casualty and do this under fire. So we try to give them some, some angles on this that other organizations won't, because there are organizations provide medical training. But as part of our standard standard package when we do a training, we definitely provide medical training. And the guys that we see in this photo, Ukrainians, Americans, or both? The right is an American and the ones in the back are Ukrainian. Okay. But why do you, well, do you believe that the Ukrainian military can withstand the Russian military, notwithstanding a seven to one kill ratio in favor of the Russians and superiority in terms of equipment and manpower in favor of the Russians?

Well, I'm certainly not familiar with that kill ratio in favor of the Russians. It's the general consensus is that the Ukrainians have killed way more Russians than the Russians killed Ukrainians. But that aside, I am confident that we can win this. We have some of the best equipment in the world, both high morale, have advising by the United States military, although perhaps it could be listened to more than it is. But, you know, do you really think America has gone all in on this and Western Europe if they think they're going to lose it? I don't. Here's an interview that my friend and former colleague,

Tucker Carlson, conducted with Viktor Orban, the prime minister of Hungary. I mean, the interview is an hour long. We're just going to run a couple of clips. This first one, which is a little more than a minute long, Prime Minister Orban explains why he believes the Russians will win. I'm anxious for your thoughts on this. In the United States, the view is that Ukraine is winning this war. It doesn't sound like that's true. No, it's a lie.

It's not just a misunderstanding. It's a lie. It's impossible. Everybody who's in politics and understand the logic, the figures, the data, no way. Why is it impossible? Because that way, the poor Ukrainians die every day. Yes. Hundreds and thousands, you know.

So my heart is with them. It's a tragedy for Ukraine. But they will run out earlier from the soldiers, number of soldiers, than the Russians. What finally will count is boots on the ground. And the Russians are far stronger far stronger far numerous more numerous there is more of many more so this strategy what we are just supporting is a bad engineering of the strategy sooner or later the ukrainians will run out of boots on the ground and the russians won't

i'm i'm paraphrasing him what What are your thoughts? He's right there. I mean, it's a country of tens of millions. There's no shortage of people willing to fight. The main issue is supply from the West and ammunition, which a lot of those issues will be resolved in 2024. So really, it's going to be a matter of willpower. It's going to be a matter of what strategy works in a counteroffensive to reclaim territory and dig in and then maintain enough territory to have a good bargaining position when the negotiations come down this war. And what would they possibly negotiate if President Zelensky agreed to a stalemate or agreed to anything that did not remove the Russians from eastern Ukraine or Crimea, he'll be gone. You know that. Right. I hope that they don't negotiate away any territory. You know, one negotiating point could be whether or not Ukraine joins NATO and how soon. That's one of the things that perhaps could be up for discussion, but I think territory is non-negotiable.

It's hard to believe that the Russians would agree to give up eastern Ukraine. I mean, Russian speaking, Russian cultural, Russian allied and has been bombarded by Ukraine. Ukraine has bombed its own people there. Isn't that true? We don't think they're going to give up willingly, but we're going to push them out. All right. Here's another. You're very steadfast, Matt, and I admire that in you.

Here's another clip from the interview with Tucker Carlson on this one. Prime Minister Orban says the war will end tomorrow if Joe Biden makes a phone call. If the United States would like to have a peace, next morning there is a peace. Because it's obvious that the Ukrainians, the poor Ukrainians on their own, they are not competitive in this war.

So if there is no money and there is no equipment from the West and especially from the United States, the war is over. The solution is in your hand, is in the hand of your president, the present one or the future one, but you will solve it. The United States can do it, nobody else. It's not the solution for the Ukrainians. Of course, it's about Ukrainians. They cannot be neglected. They must be involved. But the real factor is not Ukraine. The real factor is the intention of the United States. The real factor is the intention of the United States. I'm paraphrasing, I think, fairly. And without the United States, the Ukrainians have no ability whatsoever to

resist the Russians. Agree or disagree? I agree that without American and Western support, there's no ability to really liberate the lands that Russia holds. But to resist Russians, I mean, Russia invaded in 2014 initially, and Ukraine resisted since then. So it changed the nature of the conflict. It goes certainly more guerrilla than conventional, but the will to fight is still very strong here in Ukraine. So it certainly would change the course of the war and our expectations if we lost all Western support. If Donald Trump or Ron DeSantis became president, both of whom have said they'll stop the war

in 24 hours by making that phone call that Victor Orban alluded to, what becomes of you and your buddies? We keep fighting. But isn't it a hopeless cause without American support? Without American support, Russia would probably try to seize more territory within Ukraine and would be on the defense. we could do it, but it would definitely result in much higher casualties and prolong this conflict indefinitely. Are you willing to give your life for the Ukraine cause, Matthew Van Dyke? Yes, I'm willing to give my life for the cause of liberty. That's for Ukraine and for anybody else that's fighting

an aggressor or fighting for liberty in an oppressive state. I wouldn't have signed up if I wasn't willing to make that sacrifice. Best of luck to you. Stay well, stay safe, and thank you very much for the time you give us. The next time you're in another place in Ukraine, hopefully a peaceful place, please let us know and we'll pop you up right on the screen thank you Matt all the best nice talking to you thank you of course wow there you have it live from Ukraine he told us where he is but he doesn't want us to say and of course I respect that if you like it if you like what you saw help us spread the word like subscribe tell a friend tell colleague, tell somebody at a

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