Judging Freedom - Ukraine War & Diplomatic Malpractice w_ Matthew Hoh

Episode Date: June 30, 2023

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Thank you. Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Friday, June 30th, 2023. It's about 1.30 in the afternoon here on the East Coast of the United States. Our guest today in his maiden appearance, and I don't think it will be his last by a long stretch, is Matthew Ho. Matthew is a disabled American veteran from the Iraq War, having served honorably in the United States Marine Corps, rising to the rank of captain. That, of course, means he's still in the Marine Corps. Just as important as his service to the country in the military, he also served in the State Department under both President George W. Bush and President Barack Obama. Even more important, he has devoted his entire adult life to the study of the origins and the benefits of war. Matthew, it is a pleasure.

Welcome, my new friend, to Judging Freedom. Thanks, Judge. So you have a great piece out, which I just read, called A War Long Wanted, and you're talking about the Ukraine war. Who or what wanted the war in Ukraine before it started? Oh, I think this is a war. And thank you so much for having me here. And thank you for all the work you're doing. And I appreciate everyone watching today. This is a war that goes back decades. And of course, the shooting war begins in 2014. But the desire for this war predates that. And in my analysis, and I think a lot of people would agree, this is a very dirty war. This is a war about megalomania. And this is a war about fossil fuels and greater issues of commerce. Who gets to provide liquid natural gas to Western Europe. And so this is a war that has been wanted by people in Washington, D.C., people in London, people in Brussels, people in Kiev, and people in Moscow for decades now, for a generation. And of course, the result, they finally got that war. And what we're seeing now,

of course, is this terrible stalemated conflict where military victory is not possible for either side. But as a good friend of mine says, even losing wars make money. So as long as the war continues, the benefits to those who have wanted this war continue as well. Who in Kiev or what in Kiev or when in Kiev did anyone want this war? Surely you don't mean President Zelensky, or do you mean President Zelensky? I think people might be surprised when I say this, but I have a bit of sympathy for President Zelensky in the sense that he ran as a peace candidate in 2019. He ran a campaign where he said, I will go and I will bring about peace in Eastern Ukraine. As soon as he came into office, he, of course, he said, I will go and I will bring about peace in eastern Ukraine.

As soon as he came into office, he, of course, was overwhelmed. I don't know where his current views are on that. I think he ditched those and left those behind. And I think that came a lot from the pressure he came under from both the oligarchs. Ukraine is a terribly corrupt country, just as Moscow, just as Russia is a terribly corrupt country, just as Moscow, just as Russia is a terribly corrupt country, just as the United States is a country run by oligarchs, right? But he comes under the pressure of the oligarchs and he comes under the pressure of the ultra-nationalists, those who have been in this desire for a final war, a final conflict with those to the east of Ukraine, to have a final showdown between the Russians and the Ukrainians. These are people that you would describe as far right wing,

as hardliners. And you hear a lot about the Nazi element within that. And that's true. There are Nazis within Ukraine, within the Ukrainian military, within the Ukrainian government that have an outsized power to them, much greater than their numbers. But certainly their ideology, their desire for this ethno-nationalist type conflict certainly was something that put a lot of pressure and perverted what Zelensky said he wanted to do when he went into office in 2019. And of course, those in power there in Kyiv, they also see the benefits of aligning with the militarist foreign policies of NATO and the US. So they found themselves being underwritten, having a real steady, well-financed foundation to their efforts coming from Washington, D.C., from London, from Brussels. Matthew, give us a brief history lesson of NATO pushing for this war. Take us briefly

from the fall of the Soviet Union and the promises that NATO and George H.W. Bush and Jim Baker made to Mikhail Gorbachev and how Russia was betrayed by the West. Right. And the first thing I'll say is I'd encourage people to go to the National Security Archives at George Washington University. They have a tremendous collection of the documentation on this question because over particularly the last 18 months or so, we've seen in this country this denial that there was ever any agreements made between the United States, NATO, and Russia about eastward NATO expansion. There were no formal declarations, no treaty signed, but there certainly were a number of assurances given by the West, by NATO and the US, that NATO would not expand eastward up onto Russia's borders. And of course, Russia has a long history of concern for that. They have been invaded many, many times. Go back to Charles

XII, Napoleon, the Earl of Aberdeen, the Kaiser, Hitler, right? So Russia's paranoia, if you will, is well understood and well justified if you understand Russian history. And what happens in the 90s is there is, as I said, assurances given by the West to Gorbachev and Yeltsin that NATO would not expand eastward, would not threaten the Russians. It was clear the Russians made this point continually over and over and over again, that NATO expansion eastward would be seen by them as a threat it would be a danger to them it would be a red line to them and the united states uh and nato in its arrogance and its hubris dismissed all that uh multiple reasons for it some it's got to do with the arms industry uh the u.s arms industry after the cold war of course is threatened with uh uh cold war was not

good for the end of the Cold War was not good for their business, right? Let me, isn't it true that Jim Baker or George H.W. or someone on their behalf used words to the effect of, to Mikhail Gorbachev, NATO will not move one inch eastward. And now, of course, it's about 800 miles east of where it was when that promise was made. Right. And those were the exact words he used. And again, you can go to the George Washington University archives and see the actual State Department memorandums from those conversations where James Baker, George H.W. Bush's Secretary of State, says NATO will not expand one inch eastward, as well as a whole other collection of documentation from not just Americans, but from Germans, from French, from British, you know, making these types

of assurances to the Russians. Take us to the Minsk Accords. Who signed them and what did they agree? So the Minsk Accords come out of the Normandy talks, which begin in 2014 after the civil war in eastern Ukraine begins. And what the Minsk Accords do is the Minsk Accords bring about a diplomatic settlement over a period of years to what was occurring in eastern Ukraine. And essentially what it says is that the eastern Ukraine would be demilitarized, that neither Ukraine or Russia would militarily be involved there, and that eastern Ukraine would, to paraphrase it, be a court of special status. So particularly the contested Donbass area would be a court of special status that would eventually receive a type of autonomy, as well as the promise of referendums in the future to determine how and who was going to

govern Eastern Ukraine or the Donbass. And those agreements were signed by the Russians, by the Ukrainians, by the Germans, by the French. The United States backed it as well, though very grudgingly, because many in Washington wanted to have a victory, not a settlement. And we see that now, of course, too, with the terrible results on the Ukrainian people, right? This whole idea that we have to destroy Ukraine to save it. It's absolutely atrocious. Who violated the Minsk Accords? So what occurs is I often come down to a pox on both houses

and whether or not you provide, whether or not there's more of an abundance on one side of that pox. But for me, with the Minsk Accords, the violations, the Russians were involved militarily in eastern Ukraine, argue about to what degree they were. But to me, I feel the chief violation was the fact that the promise of the federalized region for eastern Ukraine, the federalized autonomy, if you will, for the Donbass region, as well as the opportunities for referendums were never provided by the Ukrainian government.

And particularly to once after Minsk Accords come in play in 2015, by 2017, 2018, the United States is sending weapons to Ukraine. I imagine the United Americans, the British were leaning into Ukrainian ears saying, you don't have to follow this. We are supporting you. We have your back. Victory is what you want. Victory is what we want. You can ignore these. And I think that's what occurs. This is an unraveling of any opportunity. Is there any serious dispute amongst historians, academicians, or even American military leaders? I'm keeping politicians out of this question. But that the West, particularly the CIA

or intelligence aspects of the State Department, fomented the revolution in Ukraine or the Civil War, whatever you want to call it, in 2014. Well, so you have the coup that occurs in late 2013 through early 14 that chases the legally elected, although corrupt, president of Ukraine to Russia. The Russians clearly saw this as a coup. There is an abundance of evidence, including leaked telephone intercepts between the head of European affairs for the U.S. State Department and the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine detailing the coup. There is the evidence of billions of dollars being provided to Ukraine by the United States through organizations that have been involved

in coups around the world. There is the long, long, long, well-known history of American coups since basically forever, but especially since the end of the Second World War. So we'll have to wait, I think, until maybe the American archives are opened or maybe until something gets spilled from Ukraine to have any type of certainty about it in terms of documentation, like as we do now with the coup in 1953 in Iran, say. I mean, for years, the Americans denied it and denied it and denied it, even though it was very clear what happened in 1953 in Iran. And then finally, this century, the Americans began to say, yes, it happened. Barack Obama, as president, acknowledged it. And then finally, there was documentation that showed, yes, there was. So I think in time, there will be that documentation. But I think if you look at what

happened, knowing what the U.S. has done before, what the U.S. routinely does, you know, it doesn't take much to say one and one equals two here. Paint the picture of the current war. We're not going to talk about Yevgeny Prokhorin and the episode of last weekend, but big picture, paint a picture of the current war from the Russian perspective? I think for the Russians at this point, and as I said earlier, I don't believe military victory is possible for either side. I believe it's a stalemated war. I think the Russians do have the upper hand now. I believe that their goals have always been limited. The widespread assertion in the West that the Russians launched this war to take over all of Ukraine is simply not true. in order to get Ukraine to the bargaining table and negotiations, which, of course, as we know, were occurring in February and March of last year before the U.S. and the British yanked the Ukrainians out of those peace negotiations. So I think their goals were always limited to take territory in eastern Ukraine to include a buffer zone for their

protection as they see a security zone, as well as establish a corridor between Crimea and Russia proper. I think the war, as I said, though, is stalemated. Russia may have the upper hand in some ways in the sense that they have a much larger force than Ukraine. They have a much larger population. So their ability to mobilize, their ability if they want to go into conscription is certainly great. Their industrial capacity is much greater than anyone in the West estimated, understood, and it's still being dismissed now to really quite a huge degree of error just in their ability to produce what they need for the war. And I think this is a war that

the Russians prepared for, unlike the West. How unwise, I'll even use the street word stupid, how immoral was it for the U.S. to yank Ukrainian diplomats out of negotiations with Russia because Victoria Nuland and her buddies wanted a hot bloody war instead. I think it's in line with the American foreign policy community, the megalomania of the United States. It's in line with what happens in Vietnam, where the negotiations that we began in 68 resulted in 73 in the very same things you could have had in 68. It's the same things I saw in Iraq, where for years we fought a Sunni insurgency that we said we could never talk to. And then as soon as we start talking to them at the end of 06, 07,

they stopped fighting us. It's the same thing I saw in Afghanistan. One of the reasons why I resigned from my position in Afghanistan in 2009 over the escalation of that war is because the Taliban wanted to negotiate at that point, and the United States lied about it. So I think what we saw last year and now, because even now, the American side will say the Russians don't want to negotiate. And that may be true now because the Russians may believe they have an upper hand. But up until and through the fall, the Russians want to negotiate. And I'll remind people that no one less than General Mark Milley, the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for the U.S. in the fall was saying, this is when we should negotiate. We will not have a better time

negotiating now. That was dismissed. And I think just like what happened in Afghanistan, where the Taliban offered to negotiate, they offered to negotiate for years. We said, no, that was dismissed and i think just what like what happened in afghanistan where we the taliban offered to negotiate they'll negotiate for years we said no we are going to send in more troops we will win militarily and then what happens when you lose judge right and that's what happened here catastrophic exactly what happened to you hurt to you personally and to a million other people as well as to the American psyche. Well, and then for your adversary, right? Correct. If the Russians made these attempts to negotiate, if they had a 15-point draft agreement with

the Ukrainians at the end of March, which Reuters, the BBC, Financial Times all reported on at the time, this is not something the Russians are making up, what happens then when they were buffed, when that's pulled out from underneath them and the Americans and the British and NATO say, we will defeat you militarily? What does the American foreign policy establishment want and has, I don't want to get too political, but has President Biden painted himself into a corner because he doesn't really have an off ramp here? The Ukrainians can't win. We've put in 60 billion already. He still has a blank check for another 53 or 54 billion. He wants to run for reelection as a wartime president.

How could this possibly end well for Victoria Nuland and company? Well, it won't end well for that cabal, right, for that group of neoconservatives who, again, are motivated by, in particular, say, Nuland's case, megalomania. The idea of anything other than victory from them is abhorrent. I mean, it goes to the very foundation of who they are in the sense of whether or not you can get a White House that understands the reality of what's occurring here. And we have seen over the last couple of months, the Post, the Times, the Journal, Politico, putting out reports that there is contention between the State Department and the White House, the National Security Council, over this idea of a negotiated settlement. The big thing is whether or not the Russians will go along with that at this point. I think there's a possibility the Russians would

because again, they've achieved most of their objectives, I feel, as well as the uncertainty of what the future can hold. I think the Russians are in good spot now, but maybe two years from now, they won't be in that good spot. One of the things about foreign wars, wars like this, it always has a domestic

political cost, and the Russians will not be immune to that. So while the war may be popular in Russia now, two years from now, it may not be. And I think the Russians understand that. And so I think there still is a chance for negotiations, but it has to come with a degree of modesty

and a degree of humility from the West. Also, too, with the very real understanding that you could have had a deal a year ago that would have pulled the Russians out. Matt, there is no modesty or humility in the West, at least not in the American foreign policy establishment. I don't know what's going through Prime Minister Sunak in London or President Macron in Paris or Chancellor Scholz in Berlin. They're probably looking to Joe Biden and he's looking to Tony Blinken and Victoria Nuland. And there I'll use a Hebrew phrase, chutzpah on steroids. Right. Absolutely. And that's that's what you have here is you have this very small community that has defined American policy, foreign policy for generations, backed by a massive defense industry, backed by the military industrial complex, backed by the fossil fuel industry.

Right. Biggest customer for Exxon is the Defense Department, you know, and backed by the banks that own all of that. I mean, so it's not just their desires. It's not just their worldview. It's not just their chutzpah, right? It's also, too, the fact that they are massively underwritten by the military-industrial complex that allows them to continue whether or not what they're engaging in is pure fantasy. The reality is that these people are fabulous.

And I think any type of getting through to them is going to be very difficult. And I think the only chance that may have in DC is the reality of the 2024 election and the Biden White House or the Biden campaign making the determination that getting out of this war is the best thing for us in 2024. Matthew Ho, it's a pleasure, my dear friend, but I do have to ask a favor of you, and I'm putting you on the spot because I'm asking you a favor in front of many, many people. Will you come back on the show? Oh, absolutely, Judge. Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. Have a happy holiday and happy and safe holiday, everyone. Thank you. Thank you. Happy

Independence Day, as many of my libertarian buddies believe. The last moral war we fought was the American Revolution. But we won't go there, even though I know you're a historian. Thank you so much. We'll have you back next week. Thank you. Boy, if you like that, like and subscribe. You know our goal is 175,000 subscriptions by the 4th of July. We have 150 short of it. That's all we need in the next five days. I think we're probably going to get it today. In 15 minutes at two o'clock Eastern, Larry Johnson and Ray McGovern together here on Judging Freedom. And of course, as always, more as we get it. Judge Napolitano for judging freedom. Doctora Ramos a la sala de espera.

Hay un problema que afecta a muchos niños que no puedo resolver sola. Se llama estrés tóxico y esto aumenta el riesgo de problemas de salud. Pero hay pasos que los padres pueden tomar para superar el estrés tóxico.