Judging Freedom - Prof. Gilbert Doctorow: [LIVE from St. Petersburg] : Can Trump Negotiate for Peace?

Episode Date: April 30, 2025

Prof. Gilbert Doctorow: [LIVE from St. Petersburg] : Can Trump Negotiate for Peace?See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Whatever your stage, businesses that grow, grow with Shopify. Sign up for your $1 a month trial at Shopify.com slash listen. Hi there everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Wednesday, April 30th, 2025. Professor Gilbert Doctorow joins us from St. Petersburg, Russia. Professor Doctorow, always a pleasure. Thank you very much for taking the time to chat with us. You are in St. Petersburg, Russia, truly one of the most captivating cities in the world. Have you been able to grab a sense of the Russian people, their attitude about the war, their economic prosperity, their level of happiness, whether the military is still recruiting, the expectations about Ukraine? Well, I'll answer the easiest question among that group, their feelings about prosperity. We had a dinner party with some old friends, old in the dual sense of the word.

One of the couples was old, they're friends of a long period, and the gentleman celebrated his 90th birthday a few months ago. He told us over dinner that this is the most prosperous and the most comfortable time in his whole life. And they're doing well. He worked until age 85 or so. He was a key person in one of these military institutes doing something with rockets. I don't know what. He wasn't firing, that's for sure.

He was in the design bureau. The situation is genuinely one of a lot of money coming into people's hands, and that partly explains the inflation rate, rather largely explains it. They're not printing money. The problem is that people have been receiving big increases in their salaries as there's been a labor shortage. And so it's kind of a vicious cycle. The labor shortage means that they can't produce goods and services to the level that meets

the demand of a more prosperous population. That's where we are now. What about military recruiting? You mentioned to me in one of your notes, you didn't see a single military recruitment poster. What does that tell you? Well, I was corrected by one of our dinner guests last night. I could be wrong about this. The military, like all the advertising, the advertising is done in cycles. And it could be that we're at a pause between the end of one contract

for advertising and another. But I think it's more likely something else, which was my interpretation of a day ago, namely that they have decided at the federal and local levels to call a halt to promotion of new recruitment because I think the war is coming to an end. They have been paying more recently a lot of money, up to say 35,000 euros to anyone who would sign up now for the war in Ukraine. And that would be unjust to those who have been fighting until now, if people were to receive that money, and they never get to the front line, because the war has stopped before that. So I think they have called a pause, at least, in the recruitment, and I don't see anybody noticing that.

Well, it should be noticed. And I hope that others will join in and try to find an explanation if they disagree with my interpretation. How do your friends who are either military, ex-military academics, I'm talking about the gentleman who just turned 90, how do people like that perceive Mr. Witkoff having the presidency here spending now by my count a total of 10 hours one on one, although I imagine others were in the room with President Putin, but not an official of the United States government in any sense. It's a bit embarrassing to say it, but they were waiting to hear from me how to interpret it. Well, they probably have not seen anything like this before.

No, no, they're puzzled. They are hopeful. Look, among the intelligentsia, among the educated people who are in public relations or in the creative domain, people were always very pro-Western and very hopeful that the good old days will return. In that sense, they would like to read into Mr. Vitkoff the most positive possibilities that indeed there will be not just a reset, but a genuine rapprochement or détente with the United States, and that all of these restrictions will be lifted. This is a widespread hope. And it's understandable because they were so proud that they could travel the world,

but they had no problems. And now, well, one of our dinner guests just came back from six months in the States where she was staying with her brother, who lives in Queens. And she got there, she got to the States by flying to the other side of the moon. She had to go to Georgia, Tbilisi, Georgia, to get a U.S. visa. Then to get to New York, she had to fly to Qatar and have a 16-hour flight to New York from Qatar.

So they have experienced all the inconvenience that the sanctions, particularly on travel, have caused the general population. But she went through the 16-hour flight and all the other hurdles she had to pass over to spend this time in the States, which was very valuable to her. I don't mean that she was in love with the States. She was there to see relatives, to see her grandchildren, and so forth. But she was very pleased to have had the opportunity to be in the States.

I think everyone at the table felt the same way. They would like there to be something like normal relations and return to where things were before say before 2008 Hmm, you know, I Wonder if one of the cards Trump believes he's holding in negotiations With Putin is the sanctions obviously Putin's not crazy about the sanctions But people forget. And I'm going by Foreign Minister Lavrov's figures. American industry has lost over 350 billion in revenue during these sanctions.

I don't know what the Russians have lost. They actually seem statistically more prosperous, notwithstanding this inconvenience. And of course, the inconvenience is bilateral. When I interviewed Prime Minister, forgive me, Foreign Minister Lavrov, I had to fly JFK, Dubai, 12 and a half hours, wait a little bit, and then Dubai, Moscow, five and a half hours. And then because I'm an American I was stopped and interrogated for an hour at the airport and then everything was fine but it's a long arduous trip. a favor to Donald Trump by handing him this card to play, or is this not a big deal sanctions to President Putin and the Kremlin? The sanctions are a very big deal. I've been looking over my notes going back to 2014 because I'm preparing a third volume of memoirs during the time that I've been in the opposition, so to speak, to US foreign

policy and publishing articles. And I found in 2014, in the early autumn of 2014, after the first very serious sanctions were imposed, the Russian economy was not doing well, not doing well at all. These are in my notes, what I saw around me, shortages and so forth. So it took them eight years to become sanction proof. And that's why the war broke out in February 22, not just because in 2018 they had a more advanced offensive weapon, strategic weapons than the United States possesses. That was point number one. But point number two, they made themselves sanction-proof.

Having said that, there's no question that Mr. Putin and his colleagues would like to see the sanctions lifted. There are distortions in the Russian economy that are caused by the sanctions. You don't have to produce everything at home. Before they produced too little at home, they were content with very big energy exports. But let's look at the figures. There was a prophesied of $135 billion

in Russian foreign trade last year. That's to say they were exporting a lot more than they were importing. And that is a consequence of the sanctions. Was this good for the economy? Well, it's a questionable thing if it depends on which school of economics you're in. But it was a bit abnormal to have this whopping prophecy. And at the same same time the market is starved. Look I went to the, I went to the, not just to supermarkets but to electronic stores, the people are selling the gadgets, selling the computers.

I can tell you in the six months that I was away all western computers have disappeared from the mass market. I don't mean to say they've disappeared from the market, because small shops specializing in parallel trading and serving very wealthy clientele are selling, you can be sure, anything that's available in New York. However, the big retailers, the ones that have stores across the country, they cannot do business on this lot or that lot coming by parallel trade.

They need large supplies and reliable supplies. And so what I saw on the shelves were Chinese no-names. There was no wahey. They were companies that are able to defy American sanctions because they have no American business. But are these the best computers for the consumer? I don't know. I doubt it. How does the Kremlin perceive General Kellogg?

I mean the proposal that he came up with is so I mean, the proposal that he came up with is so absurd, it's such a non-starter, one wonders if he even ran it past Donald Trump first, that NATO would supervise the partitioning of Ukraine, much like Germany was partitioned in 1945. I don't think the Kremlin puts Kellogg as very distant and contradicting the proposals that Guttwaffe brought. In point of fact, as you know from Sir Gaylord Roth's, I think it was Meet the Press interview over the weekend, he set out very clearly the Russians desire after what they want in a peaceful way, and that is very far from Witkoff. So from the Russians, the Kremlin... Very far from Witkoff or very far from Kellogg? From both, because they want,

essentially they want the de-dotsification, the demilitarization. They do not want Ukraine to have an army capable of staging a new offensive. And clearly they want regime change in Kiev. They don't want Budanov to stay in power and to do what he has threatened over the last few days, to have 20 years of terrorism against Russia and to try to kill any Russians they can find, they can get their hands on. They don't want that.

And this is the head of the Ukrainian Intel who probably is responsible for the murder of the Russian general last week. Exactly. Do you believe you, Gilbert Doctorow, do you believe that Trump can close the gap and bring about an amicable resolution of this or are the parties so far apart that only a military victory will bring an end to the war? I don't believe that Trump can succeed. And as I have said in the last 10 days, the smartest thing he could do would be to pull out now. I think what he's looking for is a reason that will shut up his critics in the Congress, critics in the Republican Party as well as the Democratic Party, that will satisfy them

that Kiev is not capable of arriving at a peace because Kiev is insisting on a Russian capitulation when they are the losing party. So if Trump were to abandon this project, walk away from it, it would be the best for his rep for his own personal standing and it would lead to a peace much faster than anything else could happen. But what I believe is that that will happen without affecting the rapprochement with Russia, because the rapprochement with Russia has its own justification quite separate from the whole story of the Ukraine war. Well, the rapprochement with Russia is what both Trump and Putin want, as I understand it, which is a reset, an amicable, commercial, cultural reset without any sanctions whatsoever. Chris, can you put up the picture

from St. Peter's Basilica of President Trump and President Zelensky. I wonder what value could come from this or if it was just for political purposes. I mean, to have no one else there for the Americans to rely on just Trump's memory or Trump's spin on one hand, on the other hand, can Zelensky concede anything material like Crimea and expect to stay alive, Professor? Yes, so you put your finger on it. It's not his whim or his arbitrariness or he has a nasty personality. These are irrelevancies. The point is that the people behind him, the people behind the throne, will not let him

or anyone else in that position make concessions, territorial concessions, do your aid to Russia. The meeting that you're showing here, they were alone because Trump had chased away Macron. Macron was hanging around with his hands over the shoulder of either Trump or Zelensky, that's his usual habit, he's got to have pressed the flesh, and Trump got rid of him. And that's why I was one of the ones that... But I mean, there weren't even Secretary Rubio or Mike Waltz or even some person whose name we don't know to record what was said. You know, I know Trump, he's gonna remember this the way he wishes it happened.

That's gonna be two vastly different versions of this. Do you think Zelensky said to him, hey, Donald, I can't concede Crimea or you'll be coming to my funeral? You know, I don't think that any distortion that Trump would give to this conversation would be greater than distortion which the Ukrainians have given to it. I was asked about this in another interview a few days ago. Oh yes, it was with the Indians who were presenting the Ukrainian argument that this was so important that they had a, that Trump during the meeting had spoken critically of Putin and that gave

hope to Zelensky that he was coming around to see the truth. And this is rubbish. The meeting was 15 minutes long and the second meeting that Zelensky had asked for later in the day was refused by the White House. Compare that with the four hours that Ridcliffe had the preceding Friday, that's two days earlier, sorry, one day earlier, on his day with Vladimir Putin in Moscow.

What are we talking about? Who has Trump's ear? Zelensky or Putin? There's nothing to talk about. The Ukrainians were putting lipstick on a pig. There's nothing there with Trump. So how do you see this ending on the battlefield? It's unpredictable. As I've said, this is a new war. The Ukrainians keep on repeating this, that they are working hard on expanding their own production of drones. The drones we know are getting through into Russia and are causing damage. This is clear as day. And the number of people that you meet to have this drone warfare is measured in tens of thousands, maybe just in single thousands, as opposed to hundreds of thousands of soldiers on the front line.

So it serves the Ukrainians very well as a kind of leveler for the weaker side against the Russians to have this drone warfare so prominent. Nonetheless, the Russians are advancing every day. That's also clear. Right. So how long will it take? I think that the psychological issue, when Trump turns his back on Ukraine, I think the Ukrainians will fold. Not because they have to, but because they will have lost their Ailan, their spirit. Not because of attitude, but because we have lost their, their, their spirit.

Let's switch focus for a moment. If Donald Trump turns off the spigot, will the Europeans attempt to replace it? They will, but they can't. The, how much everyone talks about, oh yes, and Trump is there to sell arms to the Europeans. Is he really? I think this is also a misreading. He already turned down the request of Zelensky to buy 50 billion dollars of patriots. He turned that down. I don't know how he will respond to European requests to buy American equipment to supply

to Ukraine. I would not take it for granted that he will acquies European requests to buy American equipment to supply to Ukraine. I would not take it for granted that he will acquiesce on that. So the ability of Europeans without American equipment to keep Ukraine afloat is very, very limited. What are the Belgians doing? The Belgians are doing very stupid things. We have a Flemish nationalist prime minister who has been a force behind the throne of Belgian governments for the last 10 years. He didn't rush to become a prime minister because a person who made his career talking about breaking up the

monarchy was not an ideal candidate to be the King's Prime Minister. However, however, he found they finally found terms to make this acceptable and he did in February he became the Prime Minister after eight months were spent trying to put it put together a coalition that would have a majority in the Parliament. He succeeded. But what he's been doing with respect to Ukraine and defense is a fool's errand. The French-speaking newspaper Le Soir, the main newspaper for half the population, came out with a three-page article last Thursday, I believe, in which they set out the ideas of De Wever, how he's going to raise the Belgian contribution in defense to 2%, raise it to 2%. Just keep in mind that Belgium is the home of the NATO headquarters and it is together with Spain

at the bottom of the pile in its contributions to defense. How was he going to do it? By theft, by theft and deception. And this is not my interpretation. It comes out perfectly clear from what Lissua was saying. That is, they will take $500 million, stealing it from Russia. These are the, this is the interest on the 200 billion or whatever in Russian state assets that are

frozen in EuroClear, which is a European-wide organization that has its headquarters in Belgium. So the money is in Belgium, and the Belgians are saying that they will steal that money to raise the 3.5 billion that's short in the budget to bring their general finances of defense up to 2%. Is this part of the von der Leyen, Mertz, Stammer, Macron coalition of the willing? What a poor choice of words given recent history. But anyway, is this part of the whole thing?

It is part of it. And just keep in mind that two to three weeks ago, Tevever and his Minister of Defense and Commerce Theo Franken visited Kiev together with the heads of the Belgian arms suppliers and manufacturers. And the Prime Minister committed to making a 1 billion euro contribution to Ukraine this year in military supplies. They've also said that they are ready to join the coalition of the willing to enforce any ceasefire. This is utter madness because the money isn't there and only can be taken from social welfare where it will destabilize the government.

Unbelievable. Professor Doctorow, enjoy your time in St. Petersburg. We look forward to chatting with you again. Thank you very much for all your incredible first-person insight, extremely helpful and to me and to our audience, fascinating. All the best to you. We'll see you next week. Thanks. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. And coming up later today at 1230 from Shanghai, Pepe Escobar. From Brussels, Professor Glenn Deason. From somewhere in the bowels of Washington, DC, Max Blumenthal, and from good old Virginia, Phil Giraldi, Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. Music