Judging Freedom - Ukraine War Changing the Face of Europe w_ Alastair Crooke

Episode Date: April 27, 2023

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Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Thursday, April 27th, 2023. It's about 11 o'clock in the morning here on the east coast of the United States, five in the evening, just north of Rome, Italy, from where our much esteemed guest Alistair Crook joins us today. Alistair, as always, it's a pleasure. Welcome back to the show. Pleasure is mine. I want to talk to you about an interesting piece that you wrote, a fascinating piece that you wrote called Europe Has Lost Its Guiding Myth. But before we do, there were two public statements made recently

that caused kerfuffles in Europe. Let me start with the more recent of the two, which is a statement by the Chinese ambassador to France who for some reason said, oh, and those former Soviet satellite countries in Eastern Europe aren't really independent sovereign nations. There's no treaty or international law that recognizes it. Now the folks in Beijing have walked that back, but I'm wondering what kind of problems did this cause? And how or why would he famously disciplined Chinese diplomat make a statement like this? I think it was really intended to suggest it is time that the West and Europe actually paid attention to international law and how it refers.

I think particularly they may have in mind the case of Kosovo in Serbia, whereby the Europeans organized a referendum for secession of Kosovo, effectively. And although that is, they say, illegal because the borders mustn't be touched, they're all there. Nonetheless, they had a special court hearing, which gave Europeans the right, if you like, to treat Kosovo as a separate state. Of course, Serbia does not recognize that.

It's still an issue there. So I think it was probably intended, but didn't go well, as an effort to say, know you can't play you know too loose with law and international law and the UN in the way in which you've been doing it and for example these states have not got a proper ratified position look it doesn't make any difference to the sort of day-to-day business. I mean, just as Kosovo goes on and Serbia, but nonetheless, I think it was just a sort of warning shot to the Europeans and they didn't like it. Does China recognize Crimea as a legitimate, valid, lawful part of Russia? They don't say. They don't say that particularly, but they probably do, because in the UN Charter, and they work to the UN Charter, and this is the point that they're making to the UN Charter, and that UN Charter does provide for a referendum and secession of a state, providing that it is approved by the population.

So I don't know technically, legally, what the legal people say, but I would expect that China would accept that because they do view this as within the bounds of the UN Charter. The secession, providing it is properly approved by legal authority, the Security Council, and a referendum taken, is valid. Of course, Crimea wasn't approved by the Security Council, but it was approved by referendum. Right. The second statement that I want to draw your,

to which I want to draw your attention, which will segue nicely into your piece about Europe losing its guiding myth, is French President Emmanuel Macron's call for Europe to reduce its dependency on the United States and develop its own strategic autonomy why did this cause a as you put it so nicely only you could say it this way a transatlantic temper tantrum well that's what it was yeah and i mean they just i mean on the face of it you know what macron said it's so radical, not so bizarre. He said, let's be equidistant from China and the United States because we've got interests in both those places. I mean, this is oddly stuff of the revolution.

But, I mean, the implications of it were really so large for the Europeans because I mean, they have, I mean, thrown their lot in so completely with the United States, becoming vassals, becoming basically a province of the United States. In political terms, we are just a distant province of the United States. And that happened when they

imposed the sanctions on Russia and went all down that route, and they can't get back. I mean, they can't get back from the route. Even this week, they're now considering a 12th round or 11th and a half round of more sanctions on Russia. If only they can find the things to sanction still. So it's very, you know, it just points out how Europe has, without thinking it through properly, put itself in a position from which they cannot retreat, and it's getting worse and worse. The consequences of these decisions that they made have led them into a cul-de-sac,

and they can't retreat. On one hand, some Europeans want Europe to go even further towards America. Others want it to go in the other direction. They're't retreat. On one hand, some of the Europeans want Europe to go even further towards America. Others want it to go in the other direction. They're a mess. It's a mess. And President Putin himself, perhaps with a little bit of tongue-in-cheek, has gone even farther when, in response to the silence by German leadership, to the revelation by Seymour Hersh, the great American investigative journalist, that the United States Navy and Central Intelligence Agency destroyed the Nord Stream pipeline between Germany and Russia, President Putin said, well, what do you expect? The United States still occupies Germany as it did immediately after World War II.

I mean, that's pretty strong language, but it's not inconsistent, I submit, with what you just said, nor is what you just said inconsistent with reality. Exactly. And I mean, you know, this is under the kitchen table conversation in Italy and in Germany and elsewhere, in the sense that, you know, here we are in Italy, and how many American bases do you think we have here in Italy? 100. 100 American bases here in Italy. Including, if I am wrong, stop me, nuclear weapons. Including nuclear weapons, exactly. Also here, and Italian pilots are trained for the delivery of nuclear weapons on their airplanes. So yes, I mean, and so even parts of Italy, I mean, Sicily, I saw a letter that was delivered by the US embassy in Sicily when someone complained about damage that was done by Americans in Sicily, I mean, a helicopter destroying crops and things. And the embassy said, well, under the law, you are an administered occupied territory

and therefore do not qualify for any compensation. So, I mean, there it was in writing that, you know, Sicily at least is still formally occupied territory. So I think, you know, this is all, I mean, I'm sure the Chinese ambassador wasn't thinking of this, but there are a lot of these things where, you know, what is the legal status of things? And I think his point is that, you know,

and the Chinese and Russian point is we have to go back and strictly adhere to international law, not to the rules, the rules-based order. It has to be done according to international law. So I think that's the point he was probably making. And yes, you know, there is a sort of feeling no one says it publicly, because as you know, in Europe, we're not allowed to say these things publicly. The press is tightly, tightly controlled. At least you have Tucker Carlson. We don't have a Tucker Carlson in Europe, which we did. But even so, I think this was the point to try and get this across.

All right. And, of course, you said we have Tucker Carlson. You meant we had. Well, I saw his tweet last night. He'll be back. I don't know under what circumstance, but his audience is enormous and salivating for his return. He, of course, is a friend and a former colleague of mine. But into this maelstrom of American military dominance throughout Europe, American military destruction of European property with no material consequence, enter the neocons. What do the American neocons want? What is their dream besides driving Vladimir Putin from office? These are the people behind. They're in both political parties. They run the State Department. Whether Donald Trump is president or Joe Biden is president or Barack Obama or George W. Bush, doesn't matter. What do they want? Well, I mean, these neocons spread

across into Europe, of course, and we have them in the German Green Party, very obviously. I mean, they are clearly, completely neocon. They want the destruction of Russia. They want, of course, the Green Agenda too, but they want the destruction. This is the sort of fusion between the Green Agenda and the neocons that has taken place in Europe

and parts of it. So you get that from... No, it's a bizarre fusion, at least from the American perspective, because over here, the Greens are hard left and the neocons, neoconservatives, once were lefties, now are politically conservative. Not traditional conservatives, which is no foreign wars, not the Robert Taft style conservative, but the sort of George W. Bush style conservative. What kind of an odd symbiotic relationship do the lefty Greens and the righty neocons have? It was it is odd because the Green Party, German Green Party, was originally a traditional leftist party,

anti-nuclear, you know, all of that. And then they've now shifted into a sort of extreme North Atlanticism, whereby they ask to be, if you like, America's North Atlantic sort of pro-consul in Europe. And so it is a strange, I mean, I can't totally explain how in 20 years they evolved into this, but they have support in the Brussels, quite strong support in Brussels in the commission and there's a neocon, very strong neocon level. And of course, in East Europe, inand and the former soviet republic who are also salivating for neocon policy towards putin and russia and uh what are the what are the neocons wanted well where it comes together with the green is quite interesting, is that the policy of the green, in a sense, is using this crisis to enforce green policies in Europe on every state, not allowing each state to make their

own decision, but weapons have to be bought communally. We have to do this. We have to do that for Ukraine. So they're moving it towards a sort of world government type of structure, a form of, you know, Davos, if you like, that they are going to have a very controlled Europe that runs to an agenda which is transnational, which is global, which gives us, and so, you know, the sort of controls they're looking for are very big. The European Union is at the moment discussing whether Europeans should be allowed to eat more than 13 kilos of meat a year. Because it sounds like your countrymen got out just in time. Yes, but paradoxically, the elites want them back in. That was the point of the coup d'etat against the last two prime ministers. And this is the deep, not the same deep state as yours, this is the bureaucratic state in Britain, working with the, if you like, Brussels, in order to create the circumstances in which Britain will be brought back into the global system. Let's get back to American neocons.

When I see the word or hear the word neocon, I think of Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs, Victoria Nuland. You, of course, are familiar with her public persona. You recall that piece that you and I watched where she called for an invasion of Crimea supported by American arms. I think she's crazy. I think this would be tantamount to World War III, but that's the neocon attitude. What are the myths that the neocons believe?

You ask in your piece, do the neocons believe their own myth? Yes. I mean, the principal myth is one that the Soviet Union took the wrong turn and should have adopted a liberal, neoliberal economic structure in the 90s, instead of which they continued with centralized Soviet bureaucratic planning and that that has left them as a weak, fragile, broken state, one that if you give a little push, the whole thing will collapse like a, I don't know, like a sort of dried up leaf. And this is a myth that is very powerful that they think, you know, and they think China is making. Yellen's speech the other day was about

China making the same mistake. China making the same mistake and sort of things the other way around, that actually see the West as the economically fragile component, and that they are the most more, because of their attempt to move away from the neoliberal economic system towards much more self-sufficient economics that will give sovereignty the key. Do the neocons actually believe that the war in Ukraine can, will, or should result in President Putin's removal from office? You know, I mean, I find it quite hard to answer that because I would say it's both yes and no. I think that some of them already have convinced themselves that Russia is a sort of fragile, broken structure

that is about to collapse, when actually its economy is booming. I mean, I have a friend who's just been a month in Moscow. When the economy is going, it's great. I mean, you know, in the UK, food inflation is at 20%, 22%.

Food inflation in England is at 22% by the central bank latest statistics. Let me stop you right here. The Joe Biden imposed European supported economic sanctions on the Russian economy have not made a dent. Am I right?

Not only, whereas in Russia, food inflation is 0.08%, and inflation overall, the country is 2.8%. And in Europe, it's over 10% inflation. Food inflation is about 20%. And they are growing. Russia is booming. It has no problems. But, of course, the narrative still goes back.

This is the myth. Narrative still keeps back. The economy is weak. The economy is fragile. Any moment now it will collapse and Putin will be gone in the chaos that will ensue. But you know, that's because they're stuck in the thinking of 1998 when, you know, Russia was vulnerable to Western financial structures. But that's what Putin has done, is he's rebuilt the economy.

And this is really, I just want to say, because it's so important, you know, everyone talks about the Chinese-Russian project as being about the war in Ukraine. And, of course, that's the keystone in some respects. But it is also the move to get away from, if you like, the Anglo-American economic structures in order to get some form of sovereignty back. And that's what they're saying to Africa. That's what they're saying in South America. For sovereignty, you need to go back to the old 19th century form of more closed economy with small trading, external trading model, the work of people like Friedrich List and others of that 19th century who attacked Adam Smith's idea. And this is why you're having the run on the dollar at the moment, is because this is suddenly

these states are trying to move towards some sort of sovereignty again. And China and Russia are encouraging it, of course. The documents that the top secret American Pentagon documents, which were recently leaked, the government blames one 21-year-old part-time National Guardsman on this. Most of us can't imagine how he could have done this on his own. But nevertheless, the government does not deny their authenticity or their accuracy. And one of the takeaways from these documents is the belief by American senior military leadership that the Ukrainian war is going very badly, that Ukrainian air defenses have been degraded to near zero and will be at zero by early June, which is just a month away now. Is that view of the futility of NATO in Ukraine shared by Brussels, by Rome, by Berlin, by Paris, by London? Yes. It's shared particularly amongst the uniform branch.

I mean, the military personnel all understand that it's a disaster in the making. They realize that. They know they have no weapons or ammunition to give to Ukraine. They can see what is coming, but we are not allowed to say it. I mean, by we, I mean the established does not allow this narrative to go out because they have to keep in line with Washington on this. Washington may be shifting a little bit, who knows. I mean, there are signs, there have been quite a lot of articles which are saying we should go for a ceasefire. Of course, I don't believe that a ceasefire is workable. I spent a lot of my time doing ceasefires, many, many ceasefires. And I keep saying to governments that come and say,

can you open a channel of communication? We want to get somebody back from, I don't know iran or something like that and i keep saying to them opening a channel no problem the problem is what are you going to say what are you going to say have you thought that through the answer is almost certainly no never they never thought it and i then say what are you going to say when you get a response from the other side have you thought that moves through or the one after no just how we how how unhappy do you think the american state department was to learn that the president g of china and president zelensky of ukraine spoke on the phone for 90 minutes the other day. They were 10,000 miles apart, obviously, but each issued some talking points, readouts, which were complimentary of the other. Yeah, I read the

readout. I mean, I'm quite sure you're right that they're getting into a lather about it because it's China and will China get involved in this and this is frightening and everything well but they shouldn't be I mean as I say I read it through as the doing what I did time and time again is just simply keep a channel there for when you need it and for when the time is right. So I was kept being asked, could I do a ceasefire by the European Union when I was in Israel and Palestine and these things? And I keep saying, you know, you can only do these things when the tide turns. You know, you can't be King Canute and say, you know,

the tide must go out because it won't do that. So timing is absolutely key. And the timing doesn't favor a ceasefire at the moment. It's not the right moment for a ceasefire. I mean, certainly from Russia's perspective and probably from the Ukrainian one, too. I don't know so much. I would imagine if President Zelensky called up President Biden and said, I'm going to ask for a ceasefire, Biden would say no. I'm sure. And this is one of the problems with the ceasefire is, I mean, you know, and Xi knows this very well. There's no point talking to Zelensky. I mean, he hasn't got the, you know, he hasn't got the power.

He hasn't got the, if you like, the final say. That's in Washington, clearly. So it has to be, the ceasefire has to be agreed with Washington. And this certainly isn't the moment for Washington to do that just after declaring for a presidential run, they won't do that. Last subject matter for us. President Zelensky for months has been talking about a spring offensive. It doesn't appear, his own offensive, not a Russian offensive. It doesn't appear as though it's going to come. It doesn't appear as though it is militarily feasible, no matter what he may say politically. That's correct. I mean, I absolutely follow it quite closely. I mean, the Ukrainian system, not just the military position and the contact line, but

the Ukraine is getting close to entropy, whereby everything just freezes solid and it's not able to go forward. It just sort of sits in paralysis because it hasn't got the troops to do an offensive. It hasn't got the weapons to do the offensive. And I'm not sure if it has the political will at the stage, the energy to do an offensive. And the Russians are just sitting there and they are taking advantage of the situation as more and more troops are sent into Bakhmut, Adyar Mosque, and are basically killed. And, you know, they don't have enough experienced troops i mean i think they may have 30 000 troops that could be the front end but that's not much against you know what we're talking we started this the other way around we started ukraine the other way around with the

economy of forces with russia and a big army of uk. Now it's inverted. Now we have a very small Ukrainian army and we have a much larger Russian force. These are undeniable the dynamics of conflict, I'm afraid. The Spanish newspaper El Pais reported a brigadier general, a Ukrainian brigadier general Melnyk, this is just three days ago, saying unless we have four to six times the manpower and equipment of the Russians, we're hopeless and helpless. I'm paraphrasing, but it's an accurate paraphrase. Yeah, I mean, that's really about, you know, if you go on the attack, that is, I mean, the minimum you need. I mean, this is the old rules of thumb of war is you need at least three times the force that is the defensive force. I mean, this is not about Ukraine.

This is the general view. But it could be three to five to six, something like that. But that is numerically impossible, inconceivable for the Ukrainians to imagine. Inconceivable. They'll put maybe 100,000 people, they have 100,000 in uniform, most of whom have not been properly trained, who are there against their will. Many of them just run as the first opportunity. Understandably, these, I don't want to call them, make them seem cubs, these are boys, you know, taken and put there with no training.

They go into their positions late at night. They wake up to find they're on the front line of Bokhmun, where the sort of life expectancy is in hours or days. And, you know, they don't know what to do. So they just turn and run. So they may have 100,000 in uniform, but maybe 20,000 to 30,000 only of those are real troops in the sense that they're going to want to and are willing and are able to fight in a coherent way. So I think that's understood much more widely. It's still not really said.

And now Washington, the Pentagon, is sort of humming and hawing, saying we're going to be criticized for whatever we do if we do this or we don't give enough. There isn't a wonder weapon that will change this. Alistair Crook, always a pleasure. No matter how gloomy the world is, you always enlighten it for us. Enlightenment leads to understanding. Thanks for joining us.

We'll look forward to seeing you next week. My pleasure. Thanks so much. More as we get it. Justin Politano for Guiding Freedom. Alteno, forgetting freedom.