Judging Freedom - Prof. Glenn Diesen : Will Europe Challenge Putin?

Episode Date: December 4, 2025

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Discover why there's more to imagine when you listen at audible.com slash best of the year. Hi, everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Thursday, December 4th, 2025. Professor Glenn Deeson joins us now. Professor Dison a pleasure, my dear friend. Before we discuss the topic, which is Europe's relationship to Russia and its reaction, if any, the President of Putin's statement the other day, I do want to ask you if there is any palpable reaction, and if so what it is in Europe to the American military attacks on non-combatants in the Caribbean Sea.

well it's largely out of the media it's not that much coverage to be honest it's very hard to defend and no one really wants to criticize the united states too much these days besides the diplomacy with the russians hard hard to ignore here of course particularly in light of the follow-up killings which have resulted at least in one instance of the murder of survivors. So they blew up the boat and two people survived it. And then they killed these two people that were hanging onto the remnants of the ship. It may result in the Secretary of Defense losing his job and maybe even being prosecuted, both of which would be extraordinary here.

But not covered in the European press at all. No, it is coverage. It's just it doesn't really make the headlines or the top stories to a large extent. In Europe, there's mostly focus on Russia. This is pretty much top and center in the news here. One last question on this. Were you surprised that the British announced publicly that MI6 would not cooperate with the CIA in intelligence about these people?

their backgrounds who they are and where they are now I've never heard I would imagine there have been disputes between MI6 and CIA in the past but I never heard of one of them going public I'm not quite sure to be honest it's yeah sorry I don't have anything oh no that's all right M I six announced or maybe the British government announced for MI6 that it would not be sharing intelligence with the CIA or the Defense Intelligence Agency, which is the military intelligence arm in the U.S.,

about these boat people, because apparently the British government has a legal opinion 180 degrees from the American government. The American government says it's lawful under American law and under international law, and the British government must feel it's unlawful under both analyses. I don't think the British would like to stick their heads out on the legality of this. And indeed, where you say it doesn't conform with the American law,

but there's also strong doubts that this conforms with American law. You just mentioned this double tap on this Venezuelan boats. Again, are the drug smugglers or fishing boats, irrespective of this striking a boat and then seeing some survivors and bombing them again? And this is very hard to explain how this conforms with any laws. I've heard the spokesperson at the White House being asked what law justifies this. And the response was, well, it's self-defense. It doesn't really make much sense at all.

So I think, yeah, the British might be careful that they will not have any repercussions later on. But it could be something else besides a legal issue. That is, at some point, you're going to have a political opposition coming in. The Democrats, perhaps, they will maybe want to pursue some legal consequences for the people who participate in this. Now, if this happens, I think the British would like to have stayed out of the whole thing. Agreed. Agreed. Getting over to Europe, shortly before meeting with Jared Kushner and, Stephen Whitkoff, President Putin made a statement.

It's not very long. You've probably seen it, but we'll run it for you now. I'd like your thoughts on it, Chris, cut number 12. We are not planning to go to war with Europe. I've said that 100 times already. But if Europe suddenly wants to go to war with us and starts it, we are ready right now. There can be no doubt about that.

The only question is, in what way? If Europe suddenly starts a war with us, I think it will be over very quickly. This isn't Ukraine. With Ukraine, we're acting in a surgical, careful manner. Right? So that, well, you get it, right? How did that come off in London, Paris, and Berlin? Well, they understand the meaning of it.

And I think this, well, let me first say that the media coverage, as you asked about this before, it's very peculiar, it's very deceiving. And so you see that the media suggests that Putin is threatening war and all of this. And they take everything said out of context. That is, he didn't threaten to attack Europe. He made it very clear that he had said 100 times that Russia would not attack Europe. However, if Europe attacks Russia, then it would respond. And again, also the comparison with Ukraine, I think, is quite.

important because what the Russians referred to as a special military operation means that they're fighting also in a way which is very different from a war as Putin suggests they're using more surgical precision strikes they're avoiding civilian casualties so they're fighting in a cautious way because well part of the reason is they consider the Ukrainians and the Russians to be well brotherly people given that they all dissent from Kiev and Rus. However if the Europeans would attack, they would not be treated in this with the same softness. Well, to use those words, it's never appropriate, I guess, with war, but they would be much more brutal in the response to the Europeans.

Now, I think the message that should come across them to the European intelligence agencies is that they shouldn't have any illusions about escalation control. Because I think that ideal would be sending a few troops, launch a few missiles at Russia, and you control the situation, that it doesn't spiral out of control, assuming that the Russians will be too deterred, no matter what we do, step over whatever red lines, that they wouldn't respond. So I think this is a message to suggest that if an attack comes, there would be an overwhelming and immediate response.

And you can say that this is good communication, because if there's something that will get us into a direct war with the Russians, in my opinion, is this illusion of escalation control that we can decide how much we want to escalate, when we want to de-escalate and bring it down. I think we're going to lose control very quickly as soon as our troops officially begin to march into Ukraine. Your analysis, in my view, is spot on, absolutely consistent with Colonel Douglas McGregor, with whom I discussed this a few hours ago. Colonel McGregor adds that the military preparedness,

and strength of the three major European countries, at least the ones that are making the most noise about this, that would be Great Britain, France, and Germany, is a pittance compared to Russia, and they know it. Do they know it, Professor Dieson? Well, it's hard to say, to be honest. Well, in their own language, they are ready, and if they just stand up, they have more people,

they have better economies, and if they just commit to the industrial production, they can defeat Russia. But, you know, they made this point that Russia is a threat to Europe, but they've been saying this for the past few years, yet they didn't engage in proper militarization, that is industrial-level militarization. They didn't take any real action. So I doubt that they actually believe this,

because none of their actions actually conforms with this. We don't have a war economy anywhere in Europe. so I don't think anyone really believes this I think in Europe for anyone who studies the European Union there's an obsession with speech acts that is that wars shouldn't only describe something there should be an action

something that is being done so in other words words should create a new social reality so for example we know now so yesterday that the NATO Secretary General said oh I don't need to comment on what Putin has said He's not that important and try to ridicule a bit because if he doesn't take Putin seriously, then other people shouldn't do it either.

And then this will diminish the influence of Putin, you know, or threatening to go to war. The whole idea is that you prepare the public for war by telling them we can win. They will rally around the government, something that's very, well, important if you're extremely unpopular and also supposed to deter the Russians. They keep saying a lot of things which doesn't conform with reality. And it can have a real function, but the risk they're running is that we end up with all these leaders who talk about how they wish the world was and end up deluding themselves and making very foolish policies. You know, I forgot. I mean, I didn't name President Macron or Chancellor Merr's or Prime Minister Stormer by name. I just used their countries.

I don't know what country should come. I think she's German, you'll have to correct me. The person that really wants to be the commander-in-chief of the now-non-existent European army, the most pugnacious of all of them, Ursula von der Leyen. Yes, that's German, even Angela Merkel didn't want running their army because she's, well, quite awful, but this is a key problem of the European Union. I mean, how do you keep all of these countries united within a border? block that the member states have to transfer so much sovereignty to. In the past, they used to have

an economic utility to it, that is, that the government would deliver actual economic benefits to its member states. The problem now is it transition to something that the von der Leyen and the rest of the EU bureaucrats refer to as geopolitical EU, which means that it shouldn't only be a geoeconomic institution, but a political one. And this translates essentially into which find unity in confronting Russia. The problem is because the cooperation with Russia was essential for the European economies to get natural resources and have a big market to sell to. We are sabotaging the European economies. So the geo-economic Europe is more or less dead now because we're de-industrializing. We don't have access to cheap energy and we're putting all our

eggs in the American basket at the same time as the U.S. seeking to pivot other places. So we're now stuck with this geopolitical Europe of underline, which is premised on the idea that we will have perpetual unity based on a shared hatred of Russia. I'm not suggesting that there's not a lot of hatred towards Russia. The continent is quite sick with it that is full of it. But nonetheless, this is not going to sustain. And once the war comes to an end, also there's a source. of a lot of the unity, the reason why people won't essentially talk back or confront

Van der Leyen and her gang, it's simply because the war comes first. So, no, I think she would like to keep the fair going. She sees an opportunity to centralize power and keep the whole shaky project together. And this is an unfair question, and you'll probably laugh. worse. Van der Leyen or Ruta? One is the head of the EU, the other is the head of NATO. Well,

yeah, it's hard to say. I would probably put Wunderlander at top because Rute, he's more just a front figure. He doesn't have that much influence. This is, you know, he's doing what Americans want him to do. Indeed, when he was

Prime Minister of Netherlands, he He went in, a lot of the decisions were exactly aimed to get his post. So bombing, the Houthis, supporting unconditionally, Israel being super hawkish against the Russians. I mean, all of this won him the position and many of his colleagues in various international institutions. So he doesn't have that much autonomy on its own. But no, I think Wunderland will probably top the offer. at least of the people are undermining the foundation of Europe at the moment. Is Hungary going to leave the EU and leave NATO?

Not necessarily. I think they're getting more and more worried that the EU is putting more and more pressure on them, because the whole cost-benefit analysis is beginning to shift towards an exit. That is the cost of the EU in terms of all the bullying, the pressure, the poor, economics is becoming a burden and so I think it's becoming less popular but I think what the Hungarians might seek is simply to diversify a bit to reduce their dependence on the EU because they like the idea of the EU working as a block to use collective bargaining power to get better economic deals for Hungary so they're very much hungry first if you will

but from the EU they're getting more and more pressure now from from the Germans especially but also the European Union, which is now more or less openly talking about why Orbán is a bad leader and we need to get rid of him. And even the question, why are the Hungarian citizens being taxed to finance NGOs, which are used then by the EU to undermine its manipulated civil society? So they become more, more vocal in the criticism. And I recently saw the Hungarian foreign ministers. minister in a conference in Minsk and he was making the point that the EU has a crisis of

common sense and reason it's just there's no nothing it does make any sense anymore anyways what I want to get to is I think because to make themselves less vulnerable to the pressure of the EU and especially the Germans they would like to diversify bit to cooperate more with economies than especially in the east a bit more with Russia China India and others just so they won't make themselves excessively reliant on the EU. Without getting into the merits of this issue, same-sex marriage, which is unlawful in Hungary, the EU top court just ruled that every country has to recognize same-sex marriage

if people were married in another country, even though it's illegal in their own. I've never heard of anything like this. What will Hungary do? he's not going to tolerate that no well this is the kind of the liberal authoritarianism that's uh that's the ruling in the european union because um it's it's a common theme though in liberalism that it comes with two conflicting principles on one hand it's it's a very uh it's it's it's very open for the individual so the individual should have uh be allowed to do what it wants which is where all this

yeah the gay marriage all of this comes from why it's a need to a challenge existence institutions such as a marriage being between a man and a woman, but at the same time liberalism also assumes universalism that we're all going to march towards this common goal. So universalism becomes almost like a universal religion. So we have these arguments that well, because of liberalism, tolerance, everyone, you know, gay marriage has to be allowed. But if you have some societies saying, well, we would like to preserve our traditional values and the family is the most important institution so we're not going to go with this

then there's zero tolerance there's all bigotry then it's all has to be censored this is why there's no more acceptance of any debates in Europe what happens in Hungary and we'll get to your bailiwick in just a minute but what happens in Hungary

if our man tells that high court to go take a hike yeah that remains to be seen we don't really have that many precedents for this it's assumed that everyone would gradually conform more and more so yeah it does yeah it depends but um i think overall this is a different vision of what europe is if you ask the german what is europe it's all liberal ideals so immigration globalization all of this if you ask the hungarians they have a more traditional or conservative view that is to reproduce the culture maintain Christian values.

And so when you have issues such as mass migration, the Germans say, well, being Europeans means you have to open your borders and take anyone in, no matter what culture they're from. If you ask the Hungarians, they will say, well, if you're undermining the ability of our society to reproduce its own culture, then you're undermining Europe. So they're no longer speaking the same language. And again, there's no desire anymore to talk to the other side in Europe. It's all virtuous versus unvirtuous, essentially.

Did the EU recently just ban the sale of Russian liquefied natural gas starting in 26 and all of the EU, even if the war is over? Yes. Again, I very much agree with Hungarian foreign minister when it says there's a crisis in common sense. I mean, the Germans take, they stop their nuclear power plants, then they're cutting themselves off Russian gas. It's unclear how they're going to stay warm or where the energy are going to come from. And here's the problem. They're trying to impose these things on, for example, the Hungarians as well, the Slovak. And the problem then is when you, for example, have incidents such as the Ukrainians attacking pipelines delivering to Hungary, the EU is seemingly taking the side of the Ukrainians against their own members.

So this is the problem. The EU is not really delivering economic benefits to the same extent it used to to its member states. Indeed, it's beginning to undermine the ability to prosper. And I think this is where the crisis will come from. Well, was it a waste of time for President Putin to spend five hours with with Trump's former business partner and his son-in-law? Well, it's a strange delegation, but... Where was Marco Rubio? Where was Sergei Lavrov?

It's a good question. I didn't see them there either, but I'm actually a bit optimistic about this. At least they are talking and getting so positive feedbacks. And also, I think the American side is able to push the Ukrainians gradually towards something of a settlement, which is more realistic. So I think it can go somewhere. But in the meanwhile, the longer this takes, the more realities will change on the ground within Ukraine. But overall, I think the main weakness still in these negotiations is, again, and I applaud that Trump has. administration for trying to put an end to the war, but the efforts to present themselves solely as mediators in the war between Russia and Ukraine, it doesn't really make much sense. It is a proxy

war. I think it's important to remember NATO, we started this war back in 2014, when we toppled the government in Ukraine and began to hijack the Ukrainian intelligence services, the military, the government, civil society, the media. I think this efforts to make Ukraine into front line against Russia. This is what triggered the hostilities within Ukraine. This is when the Russians also intervened. And so the idea now that Trump is simply going to be a mediator trying to bring this conflict between Ukrainians and Russian to an end, it misses the point that this war is not primarily about territory. It's not even that much primarily about Ukraine. Ukraine is a symptom of a broken European security architecture. That is the format for European

piece is supposed to be the perpetual expansion of NATO closer and closer to Russian border. The whole format has collapsed. The idea that the largest country in Europe shouldn't have any say at all, it's gone. So I think this is why it's important that Americans also recognize that this has to be a U.S. Russian negotiation as well. Is there, last topic, is there an understanding? not stated publicly but whispered privately amongst European leaders that Ukraine is finished in this war

Well, I hear some talk that behind, you know, away from the cameras That there is a growing recognition that this war has come to an end The problem is you can't say it out loud because again it goes back to the speech acts If you say that, oh, the war has been lost then people will be less willing to send the weapons, the morale might drop in Ukraine and then you create a loss essentially. So it's all this concern about

socially, well, creating your own reality, but with your language. So they have to kind of walk around and pretend as if Ukraine can still win, if we just send a little bit more money. But no, I think there's still the deluded ones who think, you know, you can still defeat Russia. no one defines what defeating world's largest nuclear power entails but but there are some but i

think a large portion is now coming to terms with the idea that we lost the war and but there's no real plan b anymore they're not sure how to respond to this because with the defeat of NATO in ukraine many things will happen for one it will intensify america's already existing efforts to pivot a bit more towards the Western Hemisphere and to Asia, that is, to pivot away from Europe. Meanwhile, the whole point of NATO expansion was create a hegemonic format for Europe. It was an important component of the unipolar world order. And now that, of course, we reached Ukraine, which was the most important piece, and we weren't able to pull this off, then the Russians will essentially cement its voice on the European continent as well.

that is this whole idea that if you just exclude Russia from every institutions, then it shouldn't have a say in Europe anymore. I think this is also gone. So, yeah, the whole NATO goal, keep the Americans in, the Germans down and the Russians out. It's falling apart. The Americans would like to leave. It's a 1945 way of thinking,

and it no way reflects the reality of life and society today. No, not at all. And this is, you know, international institutions are effective and can deliver peace and stability when they actually reflect the international distribution of power. Once they do not, they can become quite disruptive and so instability. And that's the problem now with the European security architecture. Again, Russia has the country with the most people, the largest territory. It has the largest economy in turn. So purchasing power parity is the largest army.

and the idea that everyone in Europe should be included in the main European institutions, be it the EU or NATO, except for the largest one, it doesn't make any sense. It did make sense in the 90s when we thought that the main policy towards the Russian was simply to manage its decline, as the Europeans and Americans would create collective hegemony here. But those days are gone. So there's a need to reform the European security institutions, realized that the hegemonic project has failed and seek some alternatives

which fosters indivisible security instead of this idea that if we're only powerful enough then it doesn't matter what the Russians think. This is what we attempted in Ukraine and it blew up in our faces. Now we've been defeated so there has to be some settlement which reflects this and I think towards this

and the discussions between Washington and Moscow could be quite interesting. From my rather scant but in-person communications with Foreign Minister Lavrov and I've had more of them, Maria Jaropova, his spokesperson, it is clear to me the Russians have a lot more in mind than just the resolution of the war. They want a grand reset between the United States and Russia. They want to be able to fly from JFK to Moscow. They want cultural, financial, commercial, political, academic exchanges, just as you have with other countries today. So to the extent that talking is a baby step in that direction, I applaud President Trump for it.

But it is odd that he would say to his Secretary of State, you're not going to Moscow and you're not going to Geneva. I'm sending some people to Geneva than nobody ever heard of and I'm sending my son-in-law because he's the only one I trust and my business partner to Moscow. I don't know how the guy Rubio can work, but whatever.

I can understand a little bit of Trump though because in his first administration, he had so much pushback from the intelligence agencies with the Russia gate and also he probably just uses the people he can trust. The problem is the people he trust doesn't necessarily have any of the professional

professional expertise or experience that he would want. Or an understanding of the history. We'll see where it goes. Great conversation, Professor Deeson. I enjoyed it immensely and look forward to seeing you next week. Yes, great. Good to see again, Judge. Thank you, my friend. All the best. Coming up at 2 o'clock on all of this,

Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, at 3 o'clock on all of this, Professor John Mearsheimer, at four o'clock on whatever he wants to talk about, Pepe Escobar, Judge Napolitano for judging freedom. Thank you.