Judging Freedom - Prof. John J. Mearsheimer : Ukraine’s Dangerous Last Gasp.

Episode Date: March 14, 2024

Prof. John J. Mearsheimer : Ukraine’s Dangerous Last Gasp.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 Thursday, March 24th, excuse me, March 14th, 2024. Professor John Mearsheimer is with us on how dangerous a place is Ukraine on its last leg and who's really running American foreign policy. But first this. How do you really feel about your financial future right now, today? Stable or uncertain? Despite all the happy talk that the Fed and the banks want you to buy into, I believe that 2024 is going to be a very unstable year, politically and financially. That's one of the reasons I decided to buy physical gold and silver. And I suggest you

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protection in place. So call Lear at 800-511-4620, 800-511-4620, or go to learjudgenap.com and tell them your friend the judge sent you. Professor Mearsheimer, welcome back to the program, my dear friend, and thank you for your time and your thoughts on what I know will be your analysis. took to the floor of the United States Senate where he's the majority leader and called for new elections in Israel, the emphasis on it's time for Prime Minister Netanyahu to go. In response, the Prime Minister canceled a speech he was to give via remote to a Senate retreat this weekend, claiming he had a scheduling conflict. A, are you surprised that Senator Schumer did this? And B, how will this square with the donor class, the powerful Jewish lobby in America that you have told us has an iron grip on American foreign policy? Well, first of all, I'm not terribly surprised.

The fact is that what's happening in Israel is a disaster for the Democratic Party. And I think people in the Democratic Party are beginning to panic. And I think the fact that Schumer made this speech is hardly surprising at all. I think the more important point is that Schumer and many Americans, especially on the liberal side of the political spectrum, don't seem to understand that Netanyahu's not the problem. The problem is that virtually every member of the foreign policy establishment in Israel shares Netanyahu's views. We recently had General Benny Gantz, who's in the war cabinet and is a possible successor to Netanyahu, come here to the United States. And he made it perfectly clear to everybody in the administration that he spoke to

that his views on how to deal with Gaza did not differ in any meaningful way from Netanyahu's. So the idea that you're going to get rid of Netanyahu, who is the problem, and this is going to make everything better, is an illusion. It just is not the way Israel works. And just one more point on this. If you look at the cabinet that Netanyahu now heads up, he's a centrist in that cabinet. He has a good number of people who are to his right. So in a sense, what Schumer said matters little. Why do you think Schumer would have said it? And what do you expect would be the reaction of the donor class? Would they react the way you did and not take it

seriously and realize it's for domestic political purposes rather than a realistic expectation that A, Netanyahu would go and B, somehow Israel-Gaza would be a more peaceful place under his successor? Well, let me just say a few words about why he said it. I think that staunch supporters of Israel in the United States tell themselves a story that there are a few bad apples, and occasionally they are put in charge in Israel. And if it just weren't for those few bad apples, Israel would be a wonderful place and there would be no problems in the U.S.-Israeli relationship. It's a story they tell themselves. It no problems in the U.S.-Israeli relationship. It's a story they tell themselves. It's completely fictitious. It's just not what's going on in Israel, but they're blind to that. And I'm sure that Schumer is in that category, as are people

like Tom Friedman who write for the New York Times. Now, with regard to your question about how this will affect the donor class, as I'm sure you noticed, Mitch McConnell immediately said after Schumer's talk that it was disgraceful and that he was, in effect, selling Israel down the river and so forth and so on. And of course, McConnell is doing that in large part because he wants to get the donor class not to give money to the Democrats because of what Schumer said, and instead give it to the Republicans. Whether that happens or not is hard to say at this point in time, because this game has many iterations left in it. And what happens between now and November is what really matters. What Schumer did today is of minor consequence

in the overall scheme of things. So we'll see how this plays out. But my guess is that as time goes by, more and more pressure will be brought to bear on the Democrats to get tough on Israel. And as Schumer did today, more and more Democrats will get tough on Israel. And I think that will have consequences for the Biden administration. You know, when the Biden administration brought General Gantz, he doesn't go by general anymore, but he's the former commander of the IDF. He was the, I believe, at some point, maybe even under Netanyahu, was a minister of defense. But whatever, we all know who he is. When they brought him over and he basically articulated what you said he articulated, the only difference is he's a little softer in tone than the prime minister.

Were they surprised? Didn't they know in advance what he was going to say? You could have told them what he was going to say if they had called you up. Well, they wouldn't call me up any more than they'd call you up. And you and I, of course, could tell him what he'd say. But the fact is, as I said to you before, most of Israel's supporters in the United States and the foreign policy elite, especially in the Democratic Party, has a view of Israel that bears little resemblance to reality. And they need to tell themselves this story so that they can support our unconditional support of the state of Israel. They have to believe that there's hope there. They have to believe that Netanyahu is a bad apple. And there are lots of good Israeli leaders who, if we can get them

into the prime ministership, will live happily ever after. But this viewpoint, this story that they tell themselves bears no resemblance to reality. These people are out of touch with regard to what modern day Israel is all about. We're going to play a clip, number 15, Chris, from Andrea Mitchell, whom I know, who is Jewish, who's a senior NBC correspondent. She asks a rather long-winded, disjointed question. It's the answer from Secretary Blinken that I'd like you to focus on. The essence of the question is, how can you be funding the war and slaughtering these people, and at the same time saying you're going to try and provide them with aid? And what do you mean you're building a dock? Why don't you send trucks there? It's a far more efficient way. Won't the Israelis allow American trucks? That's basically what her answer

is. Her question is a little long-winded, but the answer from the Secretary of State is what I would like you to analyze. The U.S. is weaponizing the war. We are the leading supplier of weapons to Israel. At the same time, you are leading an international rescue effort to get this aid in, despite the obstacles from members of the cabinet in Israel, which have delayed the opening of more land access and still are. And as you point out, these sea routes are slow, slower than they should be even, because not all the ports are open.

And they're not a substitute for the hundreds of trucks that could get in by land. So can you explain to the American people this incompatible policy? These policies are in conflict. SECRETARY BLINKEN These two objectives are not in conflict. The question is whether Israel, on the one hand hand is and can effectively deal with its security needs in defending the country, while at the same time maximizing every possible effort to ensure that civilians are not harmed and that assistance gets to those who need

it. And as I've said for some time, we see a gap between the intent and the result that we're determined every single day to close. With regard to Rafah, the President's been very clear about this repeatedly. What we've said to Israel is this. Given the large number of civilians that are now in Rafah, many of them displaced from other parts of Gaza – about 1.4 million. We need to see a plan that will get civilians out of harm's way if there's to be a military operation in Rafah, and not only gets

them out of harm's way, but also ensures that they have what they need, that they have shelter, that they have food, that they have medicine. We've not yet seen such a plan. Is that response worthy of belief? There's two possible ways to interpret that response. One is that he's delusional, or two, that he's dishonest. And I just don't have enough information to judge which one of those answers to your question is the correct one. But it's just hard to believe that he would say that about the movement of aid into Gaza. And of course, then he goes on to change the subject to talk about RAFA because he doesn't want to talk much more than he has to about the aid that's coming into Gaza. But if you look at what the Biden administration is doing

here with regard to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, it's absolutely disgraceful. It is just hard to believe that the United States of America is behaving like this, but we are. Do you think that Joe Biden's in charge of foreign policy, or do you think that Anthony Blinken and Jake Sullivan are making the decisions? Well, I think they're three peas in a pod. I mean, I don't think that there's much difference among those three individuals. And I think probably Sullivan and Blinken run all of their statements or positions or policy views by Biden, and he does the same with the other two. But this is not a case of Biden having different views. And if only Biden were in charge, we'd have different policies than having Blinken or Sullivan in charge in

your hypothetical scenario. I mean, it just doesn't matter. But they can't have it both ways. I think Andrea Mitchell put her finger on it. They can't be funding slaughter and at the same time claiming that they're aiding the poor souls who managed to survive the slaughter. And the aid is so paltry, so tepid, so lukewarm as not to move the dial at all. It's absolutely horrible. I mean, I don't know what to say. I don't disagree with you at all. I just can't believe that we're doing this. And, you know, the dishonesty or the delusion here is

just off the charts. Let's move over to Ukraine. The president made a number of statements during his State of the Union intended to prod the Republican Speaker of the House who was over his left shoulder at the time he was speaking to allow a vote on the floor of the House on legislation which passed the Senate, which, as you know, is about $61 billion. People on this show who have military experience and who respect you and the show have told me that about two-thirds of that is not going to leave the United States. That's $61 billion. It's going

to go right to the manufacturers of arms in the U.S., so it's not like Ukraine's going to get $61 billion in hardware right away. Keeping that in mind, Chris, number five, here's President Biden. A couple of things I want you to look for. One, the Speaker of the House silently nodding. He can't stand up and applaud. God forbid he should applaud a Democratic president. He's a Republican. The Democratic vice president's right next to him. Watch him nod. And two, a bizarre phrase that the president uses. The official transcript of the speech says that he said, there are no American soldiers who are in Ukraine.

But if you listen carefully to the words that came out of his mouth, he seems to be saying a phrase with which I'm unfamiliar. You may know it from your West Point days. There are no American soldiers of war who are in Ukraine. It's only half a minute. Here we go. Ukraine can stop Putin if we stand with Ukraine and provide the weapons that needs to defend itself. That is all. That is all Ukraine is asking. They're not asking for American soldiers. In fact, there are no American soldiers in war in Ukraine, and I'm determined to keep it that way.

Do you know this phrase, soldiers of war, as distinguished from soldiers? No, I have not heard that phrase before. My guess is that what he's saying is that there are soldiers there, you know, small numbers of troops that are training the Ukrainians and so forth and so on, but there are no combat forces there. So I think the of war, soldiers of war means combat troops. I mean, this gets back to what Macron has been talking about. You know, Macron has been talking about putting boots on the ground in Ukraine, and the Polish foreign minister has said there are already troops there. And of course, there are already troops there, but they're not, you know, combat troops that are boots on the ground that are going to engage in fighting against the Russians.

They're just advisors of one sort or another. And I think that's what President Biden was talking about as well. That was the distinction he was making. you when earlier this week, Jake Sullivan, the National Security Advisor, told the White House Press Corps that the Defense Department, I'm doing air quotes, found $300 million in military equipment and artillery shells, just found them and sent them there, claiming that it had already been authorized. We had our accountants look at it differently and it turned out we had more than we thought we did. Is this the way the Defense Department operates, number one? And number two, what good is it going to do them, the Ukrainians, when they need human beings? Yeah. I mean, it didn't surprise me. And there's actually another $4 billion that they could tap into if they wanted.

But the fact is, it just doesn't matter. What they need are weapons. And the weapons that they're going to send them that come from this $300 million package are just very small. It's just not enough weapons to matter at all. What they need, what the Ukrainians need is they need lots of artillery, they need lots of tanks, they need lots of aircraft. And furthermore, they need more manpower. And there's no way we can provide manpower. And there's no way we can provide the necessary weaponry that they need. If you look at what's happening on the battlefield, it's becoming clearer and clearer every day that the Ukrainians are losing. interesting question is how much territory they're going to lose and what the final line of division will look like between the rump state of Ukraine that's left over and the area that the Russians

annex. That's the big question for the future. But it's over. And, you know, giving them $300 million or another billion dollars or even giving them $61 billion is just not going to matter. What will happen? Are you able to assess how much of that $61 billion would go and how soon it would get there? And if it would pull Zelensky's feet out of the fire, they're on their last breath over there now. Well, they can give him a big chunk of that money for purposes of keeping the government to float. So that money can be sent over right away. But a lot of the other money is designed to build weapons to be sent to Ukraine. That's why a lot of the money will stay in the United States, because it's going to stay here for the purposes of building artillery tubes and artillery shells,

which can then be shipped over to Ukraine. But the problem is you can't manufacture quickly enough artillery tubes and enough artillery shells and enough tanks and so forth and so on to redress the significant imbalance in artillery inside of Ukraine. And again, all of this has nothing to do with manpower, and manpower is really turning out to be the key issue at this point in time, even more so than weaponry, which is of immense importance as well. Let's broaden our focus, Professor Ramir-Sheimer, didn't Russia's economy grow faster than any of the G7 economies did during the so-called period of sanctions imposed by the West? Well, I think it's quite clear that last year that was the case, 2023. if you look at the effect of the sanctions on Russia and the various countries of

Europe, it's quite clear that the Russians are in much better shape than any of the European economies, and in particular, the German economy. It's quite clear that these sanctions have boomeranged and have ended up doing significant damage to the German economy and to Europe more generally. And the Russians appear to have recovered very nicely from the sanctions. Could you argue that one of the causes of the terrible German economy is the United States' attack on the Nord Stream pipeline? Attack on and destruction of the terrible German economy is the United States attack on the Nord Stream pipeline, attack on and destruction of the Nord Stream pipeline? Well, I think even if we hadn't attacked the Nord Stream pipeline, the Germans still would not be

getting much gas and oil from Russia. I don't think it mattered that much in the end. I think it was the fact that we moved forcefully to sever relations, economic relations, between Russia and Europe as much as possible. And we did a very good job. And in the process, taped conversation of German generals plotting to send Taurus missiles behind the back of their own chancellor to Ukraine? Russians are doing everything they can to cause trouble inside of Europe and between the United States and Europe. And this is just one example of that. And I think they were very successful. This caused all sorts of problems for the German chancellor. It's caused all sorts of problems in terms of intra-European relations. And I think the Russians played this one very smartly. I'm asking everybody this week, even though she has been gone for a week now, do you have an opinion on the departure from the State Department of the princess

of neocons, Victoria Nuland? Was she pushed or did she jump in your view? I think she jumped, to use your language. I don't think she was pushed. I think what happened here is that last year, when the position of Deputy Secretary of State became open, there was a question of who would get that job. And there was talk at first about Jonathan Feiner, who is Jake Sullivan's deputy, assuming that position because he's very highly regarded inside the White House. But then it was decided it was important to keep him in the White House. And it became a contest between Kurt Campbell and Victoria Nuland. And the administration, for one reason or another, decided to go with Kurt Campbell. But before he was confirmed, they moved Victoria Nuland into

the position as the acting Deputy Secretary of State. And she held that position for a couple months. But then when Kurt Campbell was confirmed in February by the Senate and he took up the position, she then had a choice to go back to her old job or stay in her old job or move on. And I've heard over the years that she and Kurt Campbell did not get along well. And given that she wanted to be deputy secretary and she didn't get the position, I think she just decided it was time to resign. I also think an argument can be made. I don't know whether it's true or not. She's not a foolish woman. And she surely understood that Ukraine is going south. And given that it's going south, it would be a good thing not to be around. Do the neocons ever take a step back? Do they ever acknowledge that these coups and wars that they've fomented were wrong? No, no. They're actually geniuses at coming up with explanations as to why they're always right. I mean, just take the Iraq war. The argument is that the decision to invade

Iraq, which they pushed very hard, and in my opinion, made happen, was a good idea. It was just bad execution. And of course, they had nothing to do with the execution. They just pushed the war, which again, was a good idea. How acute are the tensions now between the United States and Russia and the United States and China? Well, I think the tensions between the United States and Russia are very great and likely to get greater in large part because I think the Russians are going to win in Ukraine. And this is going to be a devastating blow for the United States and especially for the Biden administration.

So I think that the road ahead here is filled withmines, and we have to be very careful. With regard to China, the fact is the United States has a deep-seated interest in damping down tensions with the Chinese. Look, we're up to our eyeballs in alligators in the Middle East. There's no sign that the situation is going to improve any time. This is going to go on and on for the foreseeable future. We're up to our eyeballs in alligators in Ukraine. We're probably going to lose sometime this year or next year, and this is going to cause enormous problems for us. So given that we're in these two problems, given that we have these two problems, the last thing the administration wants is a crisis in East Asia. So we're going to great lengths not to stoke tensions in East Asia with the Chinese, but instead to ameliorate tensions. based allegedly on the statements of three CIA agents

that President Trump in 2017, when Mike Pompeo was in charge of the CIA and Donald Trump was only a couple months into office, authorized an attack on Chinese social media platforms in such a way as to embarrass and humiliate Chinese leadership. Same thing that we accuse them of doing here. A, if true, does it surprise you? And B, why would CIA officials acknowledge this now? I don't know why they acknowledged it now, but I would remind you that when Donald Trump became president, what he did was he fundamentally altered American foreign policy towards China.

Up until Trump moved into the White House in January of 2017, we had pursued a policy of engagement with China, which was all about cooperation, especially on the economic front. Trump radically altered the foreign policy, and we went from an engagement policy to a containment policy. So any evidence that Trump was tough with the Chinese in his first administration is hardly surprising. The interesting question is how he will behave towards China if he becomes president again and takes office in January of 2025. And I would imagine that he will be tough on China once again. And what Trump would like to do is he'd like to have good relations with the Russians. He'd like to put an end to the war in Ukraine, have good relations with Russia, especially with Putin, and I think focus on China. And as you well know, there are a lot of China hawks in the Republican Party.

And a lot of those China hawks want out of Ukraine because they want to focus on China. But I think the Biden administration at this point in time does not want trouble in East Asia because, again, we're in so much trouble in both the Middle East and Ukraine. Don't the elites in the State Department and all these think tanks view Russia and China as sort of natural enemies of the United States with respect to Russia, almost as if it were still the Soviet Union and we were fighting the Cold War? Yeah, there's no question about that. I mean, the Russophobia in this country and the demonization of Putin are just off the charts. And what we have ended up doing is pushing the Russians into the arms of the Chinese.

So these two countries are working closely together. And that just fuels the view that these are two evil countries, the countries that are run by evil dictators. This is autocracy versus democracy. We have these two terrible autocracies that are a threat to democracy, a threat to the West. So we have to treat them the same. We have to deal with both of them. And we, in effect, have to defeat both of them.

Does the Biden administration understand that? Does the Biden administration believe instead of trading with China and making them wealthier and us wealthier, we have to fight with them? Well, the Biden administration followed in the footsteps of the Trump administration when it came to China. If you remember when the Biden administration took over in early 2017, they were, and I'm choosing my words carefully here, remarkably tough on China. And they could be remarkably tough on China because the problems in Ukraine and the problems in the Middle East had not begun at that point in time. But they were not, the Biden administration was not comprised of a bunch of shrinking violets when it came to China. What's caused them to back off with regard to China, not to return

to engagement, but to do containment light is, as I've said a few times now, the fact that we have these other problems and their limits to how many problems we can deal with at the same time. Professor Mearsheimer, it's a pleasure. I know we were all over the place, but there's so many issues happening at the same time, and you're the master of synthesizing them. I was away last week. I missed you, and I know our audience did, and I'm deeply grateful for, and I know we went a little bit longer than we usually do, but it was a fascinating conversation, and I'm deeply grateful for your time and your analysis, my friend. You're more than welcome, Judge. Thank you. I hope we can see you again next week, Professor.

I hope so, too. Thank you. Boy, what a fascinating tour around the hotspots of the world. At four o'clock Eastern today, another fascinating intellect, Max Blumenthal. Judge Napolitano for judging freedom. Thank you.