The Duran Podcast - Collective West sanctions, BRICS diplomacy w/ Jeffrey Sachs (Live)

Episode Date: September 3, 2025

Collective West sanctions, BRICS diplomacy w/ Jeffrey Sachs (Live)

All right, we are live with Alexander McCurice in London, and we are happy and honored to have with us. Once again, on the Duran, Professor Jeffrey Sachs. Professor Sachs, how are you doing today? Great with you guys. Great work you're doing. Thank you. Likewise, great to have you on. And I have the links to Jeffrey Sachs' work in the description box down below.

I will also add those links as a pinned comment when the live stream is over. So a big hello to everyone that is watching us on all the platforms. a big thank you and shout out to our chat moderators. We have a lot of news to get to. So Alexander and Professor Sachs, let's jump right into it. Let's indeed, because, as Alex said, an awful lot of news. And we've had a whole succession of very big summits and meetings in China. And the most important things for me are two.

Firstly, India and China starting to get on good terms with each other. to repeat again a point I've made in my last program on my channel, I think this is unequivocally a good thing. I don't understand why we don't see it in those terms in the West, an unequivocally good thing, and it opens up enormous possibilities. The second, which is a commercial agreement, is power of Siberia 2. Gas, which is flowing to the West, is now going to flow to the east. Now, contrast, the spirit and

atmosphere of the meetings in China. And by the way, Professor Sacks, who is of course with us, was a person whom I remember last year telling us that he thought that India and China were going to start to sort out their differences. I remember that. He said it on one of our programmes that we did with him. Anyway, contrast the positive, forward-looking approaches being taken in these meetings in Tiencise. between all of these various Asian leaders, East Asian leaders and Central Asian leaders. And the backward-looking views that we have in Europe, another meeting tomorrow of the Coalition of the Willing in Paris, moving troops around who we don't have, to fight whom?

To fight the Russians or not to fight the Russians or to deter them? To me, I mean, the other thing about this is it is so 20th century in the worst possible sense. And Professor Sachs has made, I think, some extremely pertinent and important points about Europe needing a new foreign policy, a new foreign policy approach. More than that, actually, I'd say a philosophy and a framework. So since we always are so keen to have you, Professor Sacks, but we know how busy you are. Maybe after that introduction, perhaps you can go straight in and make your comments about Europe. What's happening now, yeah, thank you so much. You know, what is happening now is, of course, the end of an era.

It's the end of a actually two, a sub-era and an era. The end of the era is the end of the Western dominance over the world system. And this is a dominance that began with the European empires and then transferred to the U.S. Empire after World War II. But that dominance essentially lasted from around 1750 to around 2000. So around 250 years. You could add one more 250-year period, hopefully. Starting in 1500, European imperial expansion began. That's with the voyages of Columbus and Vasco da Gama.

So the voyages both to the west and to the east from Europe led to the beginning of the European global expansion. But Europe had its rivals, especially in the old world. In the new world, people succumbed to the old world diseases mainly. But in the old world, Asia didn't simply succumb to Europe, but over a period of around 250 years, European powers gained their ascendancy. And Britain became the dominant of all of the European empires by the 19th century with the defeat of Napoleon. So we all grew up in the age when it was taken for granted that Europe and then after 1945, Europe and the U.S., quote, ran the world.

And indeed, in 1950, if you looked at the global landscape, the vast wealth, the financial power, the technological power, the new atomic age, everything. was in this Western-led world plus the Soviet Union. But China, India, Africa, Latin America had no discernible role. Actually, quite interestingly, the Western world also reached a peak of its share of world population, not only power. But we should remember that Europe, relative to Africa and the Middle East was much more populous than today in relative terms. Europe was a larger population than Africa and its Middle East neighborhood. Now it's half the population of those two.

So I was born in 1954 in a European-led world. There was a Cold War and a very dangerous one between, the Soviet Union and the United States-led world. But there was absolutely no doubt that this was a Western-dominated world. The main point, I think we see it in a hundred different ways, is that that is over. And it ended actually probably a quarter century ago, but it wasn't noticed as such. after the demise of the Soviet Union, while a new multipolar world was actually emerging, especially with the rise of China, but not only the rise of China, also the economic growth of India and others,

the United States was asserting something quite different, which is not only is it the Western-led world, the U.S. now is the only superpower in the world. It became the unipolar world. And this was a great delusion and a great arrogance and very badly mistimed because people in Washington are not very clever to begin with. I can absolutely assure you it's not a snide remark. They just absolutely don't know what they're doing. But in any event, they asserted,

their unipolarity at precisely the time that the Western led the world was coming to an end. And so we've been at a clash of reality and arrogance for a quarter century, where the United States and even vestigially, Europe, and within Europe, I have to say Britain, which is the craziest of all in terms of the gap between reality and image or delusion. thought, the West runs the world. We can tell Putin what to do. We can tell Xi Jinping what to do. We can tell Modi what to do. We can tell Lula what to do. We can tell anyone what to do because we are the West. We are the United States and the reality of a world in fundamental change. Two points about the fundamental change that I think are worth noting. first, and I find it stunning and counterintuitive because of the bubble that we live in in the West. But if you add the population of the United States, which is about 340 million people right now, the population of the European Union, the population of the UK, so that North Atlantic world,

you come to something around 900 million people, slightly more, than 10% of the world population. If you want, and I think it's wrong, but if you want to say that the U.S.-led world includes Japan and Korea, because I don't think that will be true for long, if you want to add Australia and New Zealand, and you can add Singapore if you want, and a very few other places, you get to around 12% of the world population. Well, this should tell us something to begin with. How could 12% of the world population in today's world in which technology is everywhere,

in which the Internet is everywhere, in which capacities, nuclear weapons have spread to nine countries in the world, and on and on, how could it ever be that 12% of the world? thinks that it runs the world anymore, that the others don't have a view, don't have power, don't have capacity to resist unilateral demands. This is the backdrop for me of everything that we're seeing, that we are in a delusion in our English language, Western media, ignorant, politically ignorant, world in which Washington, Grussels, London, Berlin, Paris think that this is the center of the world. And honestly, a hundred years ago, it was for good and for bad.

But it ain't now, not even close. And so we have two major groupings. You discussed them at length yesterday beautifully. the BRICS, which is nearly half the world population and half the world GDP. And that is a grouping that includes the original five, Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, but now includes Egypt and Ethiopia, Iran, the Emirates, Indonesia. And that's a worldwide group stretching from Brazil to China. So it includes South America.

It includes Africa, it includes the Middle East, it includes Russia and Asia. And we have the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which began very much as an Asian-Urasian group, but an East Eurasian group of China, India, Russia, and the four of the five countries of Central Asia, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan. And Belarus added Indonesia and a number of partners. But that's an Asian grouping. And as you said, these two are very closely related. They each have nearly half the world population, not exactly the same membership.

But they have two overriding realities to them. One is they're the fast-growing part of the world economy. and that itself is worth saying something about. And second, they don't want to be told what to do by Donald Trump. And the best phrasing of that was by President Lula of Brazil, who said a few months ago, we don't need an emperor. And this is the basic point, which is they're not even anti-American, by the way. That is a basic fundamental misunderstanding.

They'd actually like normal relations. The point I've been making to all of them for years is you can't trust the United States on this because the U.S. till today, in its delusion, is aiming for hegemony. Clearly, it's not a propaganda. It's the stated policy of the United States. to have what they call primacy or what the military calls full spectrum dominance.

This is the idea. I'm trying to say in Washington for 20 years, you guys are crazy because you're the U.S. alone, okay, you're 4.2% of the world. We are not in 1945 or 1950 or even 1990. China is bigger than the U.S. economy properly measured. That's not a myth. That's a reality. China is far bigger in industrial capacity.

And if you go to China, as I do several times a year, China is ahead of the United States on many technologies, not all, but many technologies. And notably, technologies that the world really needs right now. It will dominate electric vehicles for 20 years to come. It will absolutely dominate solar power production, which it has essentially no rivals in the world. It will dominate zero emission, ocean shipping, something of interest to Greece and interest to the world, because it makes the ships.

The United States doesn't make the ships. Europe doesn't make the ships, except in much, much smaller numbers. And you could go down a long, a long list of technologies like this. So the point is to just realign our understanding and our delusions of grandeur that come understandably from several hundred years of actual power.

Not power nicely wielded, not power responsibly wielded in my view. So I think from a moral point of view, nothing very attractive about it. And as an economist, I have followed Adam Smith all my life because he was an anti-imperialist, very explicitly said, give up the U.S. colonies and trade with them. You don't need to own them. You just need to trade with them. And that's a very good point of view. Those who say, well, at least Europe spread its knowledge and science and so forth, well, yes, Europe did that, but it didn't have to do that through empire and war and conquest and forced famines and many other things that went along with European Empire. It could have done that through trade, commerce, decent human relations with other countries. So we have the world now much more equal in, of course, in literacy, in school,

in technology, in industrial capacity, even overtaking the Western world in many different areas. And we still have in the West this idea that this is a, we're preserving the Western-led world, but that's over. And then we happen to have one of the most, sorry to say it, but one of the least knowledgeable, conceivable presidents in the United States who, sorry, but knows nothing about any of this. He was a real estate developer. He has no training in anything of this sort. I granted, he knows how to build golf courses, I think, in many places in the world. But understanding these changes in the world actually requires something more. Strangely, in Britain, the idea that the British Empire still exists through the U.S. Empire, and it's going to be defended, and we can use every means from MI6 and covert operations to global dominance and so forth somehow still persists.

I marvel at it, as you say every day, better to take care of the national. health system rather than worrying about running the world 80 years after losing the empire. But that mirage still exists. And France still has it. And God knows what's in the German mind of Mr. Mertz right now. But none of it makes any sense. And when you come to Europe, the point of my article is precisely what you say. said, Europe is still battling its 19th century and 20th century delusions and wars well into the 21st century.

And the idea that Russia's greatest aim in the world is to invade Western Europe is an insanity and such a violation of any basic knowledge of history that you can. cannot believe a grown-up could say this, much less a grown-up in a position of any responsibility. Yet Europe is twisting itself into a pretzel that is completely useless because of fears that have no basis in reality whatsoever. And those fears are not dispel. because Europe doesn't understand anymore. I mean, European leaders, I should say, do not understand anymore. If you want to understand the other side, pick up the phone, take a flight, invite a counterpart to sit down and have a cup of coffee.

They'd actually learn something. So, bottom line, the reality is a multipolar world. You see it in the economics. You see it in the technology. You see it in the military force. The delusions are still Western dominance and within that U.S. dominance. That gap between reality and delusion is large and extremely dangerous. Donald Trump illustrates it almost every day by giving orders to the Chinese or to the Brazilians or to the

Indians or to the Russians. They're literal orders. You must have a ceasefire, unconditional, by August 8, he tells Russia. You must stop a court case, he tells Brazil. You must stop buying Russian oil, he tells India. And these are not only not put diplomatically or intelligently, they're on a social post where he's demanding of supposed vassals, which vastly are outnumber Americans,

he's telling them what to do every day. And then he has these completely ignorant minions around him, completely ignorant, who blow up any last vestiges of diplomacy, like this Peter Navarro, who is, I'm sure, I claim it every day. I think he's the most incompetent person that my economics department at Harvard ever gave a PhD degree to. I do not remember the guy. I'm almost sure he could never have been in my class because of the utter nonsense that's about it.

But this guy's trotted out every day to make it worse in breaking up U.S. relations with one point. billion people in India. The only slight thing, Alexander, that I would take, I'd quibble with you on a point you made yesterday. You attributed a lot of this to Lindsay Graham. I agree with that. I call him, by the way, I'm sorry, I hope I don't upset the show or anything else,

but I call him absolutely the stupidest senator in the U.S. Senate, I've watched him for a long time, and he's an idiot. He's just a fool, not only a warmonger, but an idiot. But in any event, it's not right to say that this is his doing, not Donald Trump's doing, because ultimately, I don't agree with Truman on many things with our President Truman, who needlessly dropped two atomic bombs on Japan, and rather blightly did so, but he was right when he said the buck stops here in the presidency. And we need a presidency that functions, that really functions.

And we don't have it right now. And it's just swinging in the wind every day because they don't have even the depth of knowledge within the White House to know what they're doing right now. And so, yes, you're right. Trump is responding to these, I mean, basically to the military industrial complex, which is, you know, 80 years built into the U.S. system. He is responding to that, but it's actually the job of the president to say no. That's really the president's job. And he doesn't, he can't do it.

That is a very good point. And I accepted completely just a second. Yeah, no, it's just a little, a little. quibble. Can I take up on a few of the points that you said? Because of course, I was born in 1961, an interesting year. It was the year of Gagarin's flight. It was also the year of the Berlin crisis. And of course, the first half of my life was lived through the Cold War. And I think a thing that many people don't understand about the Cold War is that the Cold War was ultimately a struggle for Europe.

It was a contest between two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, with different ideological perspectives about Europe. Now, whether the Soviets ever really had any actual ambitious, aggressive plans to take over Europe, I personally very, very much doubt. But the entire rhetoric of the time was that this was a conflict about Europe.

And when we thought about the rest of the world in Europe at that time, it was always seen as part of the game about Europe. In other words, the superpowers maneuvering for advantage in the rest of the worlds in order ultimately to advance their objectives in Europe. So even the Cuban missile crisis, for example, was often framed by many people. perhaps rightly, perhaps probably wrongly, as being ultimately about Berlin, that Khrushchev moved his missiles to Cuba so that he could force us to make concessions about Berlin. Now, what that did was that it made us in Europe feel very important. It was very frightening, but it also made us feel very important because we seemed to be right at the centre of the great events in history. This is where the contest, the great contest for the future, was being

played out. The Cold War ends and suddenly we discover that, you know, we're not that important after all. And the rest of the world has moved on and is continuing to move on. And that is very, very difficult for many people in Europe, particularly the political leaders, to accept and understand. So I get the sense sometimes that what we're trying to do is we're trying to take ourselves back to that world of the 1950s and 1960s and 1970s. When the conflict was there in Europe, we continued to be imported in the same way that we were. We trot out all the same rhetoric. We have the same kind of policies and things of that kind, because that made us feel important.

And of course, it is a colossal, a disastrous distraction from the realities of the world, which you have just described far more ably and with far more knowledge than I can possibly have. And what worries me as a European, and I am one, I'm a European to my country, is that by doing that, we are frittering away in Europe those things that we still have, which we can bring constructively to the table that will help to shape the future in a way that I think would be positive for all of humanity, because we have contributed so much in Europe.

I mean, I'm sometimes very critical of what the Europeans done, but they've done amazing, extraordinary things. So we are failing to bring that. And of course, at the same time, we are marginalising ourselves. And your point about the need for a new foreign policy, it's not just about breaking with the United States, which is absolutely something we have to do. It is also about thinking about Europe, its role,

what it could constructively do. and there are so much which we could constructively do. We still have great universities, great science, extraordinary culture. All of that is being fritted away. So anyway, any, any, I'm just inviting how to make some points about this. No, no, exactly. Yeah, right. But let me add a couple of points to this,

because this struggle for Europe itself needs to be unpacked. I, as I said, was born in 1954. And so I'm completely a Cold War baby. I grew up absolutely in the midst of this and was trained and imbibed all of the legends of the Cold War. And my wife, by the way, it was born in Prague. So she was born in Soviet-dominated Central and Eastern Europe. We know all about that. She shook hands with the Gagarin.

Actually, after his orbit, as a young pioneer in Prague when he came for a heroic visit. So this was absolutely the milieu. Now, of my upbringing. the American idea and the European idea and the NATO idea was that we faced an implacably expansionist, ungodly, totalitarian, communist international movement, and that we were defending freedom and democracy against the expansion of the Soviet Union. Union. I would say that was taken as 99.9% by Americans and Europeans at the time. And I crossed Checkpoint Charlie twice in Berlin. I saw the Berlin Wall with my own eyes as a young person,

of course, on many occasions. So the world seemed to be divided and the foe on the other side seemed to be implacable. And just to translate till today, communism is gone, Soviet Union's gone, but the rhetoric about Russia is almost identical to the rhetoric of the Cold War period, as if there's no change. Okay. But my point is even that Cold War vision, if you grow up and spend decades studying, learning, working on both sides, working in Moscow as I have, working all over the world, but especially in these two sides of Europe. The whole Cold War narrative is a huge blunder and tragedy in its way, because there's another story to it that's completely different from the one that you and I grew up with. And that story,

is the Soviet at the time until today the Russian search for security. And we don't give this one moment's thought. And I can tell you, I didn't even hear one minute of it growing up or going through university. And I had a good university education at Harvard, undergraduate and graduate school. I didn't hear one day, not one day in my life as a student. that there was another side to the Cold War story. Now, I may have taken the wrong classes,

but I'm telling you what the atmosphere was, which was an implacable foe. We read Solzhenitsyn, we knew about the crimes of the Soviet Union and so forth. We never stopped to ask one moment. Well, 27 million people in the Soviet Union died at Nazi hands. what is the implication of that for the aftermath of World War II? What might have been done? What were the Soviet or the Russian security concerns at the time?

Now, since then, I've spent 30 years pretty much in depth in understanding these issues. And it's a point that I really want people to understand. when you lose 27 million lives or China, by the way, with its military victory parade today, China lost a comparable number of lives in its war with Japan, which, by the way, we never discussed one day in my youth. The fact that China, I mean, I knew that China was invaded by Japan, but anything about the actual war or the scale of loss, not a moment. Okay, coming back to Europe, the Soviets or the Russians said, how do we protect ourselves against another invasion, against a remilitarized Germany, round three, because after all, the first World War was a German war in part on Russia.

The Second World War was Hitler's attack on the Soviet Union, 27 million dead. And the Soviet side said, we need a peace agreement that addresses our security interests. And the United States essentially said no. And Britain said no. And we know even in the spring of 1945, Mr. Churchill was already asking about the possibility of maybe just the possibility of invading the Soviet Union, our wartime ally, in Operation Unthinkable. It's pretty much unthinkable that your ally has just lost 27 million people and you're asking your war command about maybe we should invade this fall. because the implacable hatred of Russia went way back. And in Britain, it went back to the 1840s.

And this is part of our story. The United States absolutely rejected a core agreement made in Potsdam at the end of the Second World War for a demilitarized, unified Germany. and instead it said, we'll take our part, the three occupied zones by Britain, the U.S., and France, so called. We'll build that into a new Federal Republic of Germany or West Germany. We will remilitarize it, and it will join NATO, our new military organization in 1955. And all of this time from 45 onward, the Soviet Union rightly is saying, but excuse me, what about our security? We just lost 27 million people. That wasn't a distant history. That was an immediate reality in which the U.S. was remilitarizing Germany.

And if you go back now, as I have for many, many years and look at choices that were made, we had many diplomats led by George Kennan in the United States who said, take the deal. A neutral, demilitarized Germany will end the Cold War. The Soviet Union tried to prove it again and again, including most notably in Austria in 1955, When there was an agreement, Austria would become neutral. It would not join NATO. The Soviet occupying forces left eastern Austria and never bothered Austria again. They were saying to the U.S. do the same for Germany and the Cold War ends.

But the U.S. UK idea was block mentality. And this is why what's happened in the last 35 years is so poignant. Because what President Mikhail Gorbachev at the end of the 1980s and early 1990s was about fundamentally was ending that division by ending the two military blocks. And to do it, he went first and disbanded the Warsaw Pact. And in the U.S. and U.K. mentality, which is crazed in its way, I have to say, they say, They said, oh, that's not peace. We just won. We won.

Now we can do all that we've always wanted. And so formally, World War II was ended in 1990 because the United States had rejected a treaty to end World War II up until the reunification of Germany. In that reunification, the U.S. and Germany, explicitly unambiguously said that NATO would not enlarge. It should have said NATO is ended, but they said NATO will not move one inch eastward. Terribly, Gorbachev did not put it into the 4 plus 2 treaty because he said this is a treaty not about NATO, but about Germany.

So there's a reason it's not in there. But the commitment was no more NATO. but the American and British mentality. And I add the British, they had no weight in military terms, but in psychological terms, we were living the British imperial dream, but just as the American Empire. As soon as Germany was reunified, the United States without losing a beat said,

now NATO goes eastward. We won. We are the military alliance. and we would never listen one moment to the Russia and say, but we're not at war. We just disbanded. Why are you pushing NATO? Why are we're not supposed to have any NATO enlargement? And the U.S. attitude was, as you absolutely know, you are a third or fourth rate country.

You count for nothing. we'd like to pump your oil for you, so we want Chevron and Exxon to be there. Other than that, you are a, quote, gas station with nuclear weapons. You will listen to us. You have no choice. And the grand puba of that theory in the 1990s was Big New Brzynski, who was, by the way, to me a very nice man because I was advising Poland and he helped me in the advice to get my advice actually implemented and it worked. But when it came to Russia, he was a true Polish patriot. He

hated Russia. That goes back to the 17th century. And he hated Russia. So in 1997, he laid it all out as clearly as it can be laid out. Expand NATO, expand Europe. Russia will have nothing to do but to exceed because it could never join with China. That's unthinkably. It's a whole chapter in his book about why Russia won't sign up with China. So we have falsehood and delusion, a complete one-sided story about the Cold War itself, which is really wrong historically. And then after 1991, we have the grandiosity.

of supposed unipolarity. And now we have the idea, since that unipolarity didn't exist, and Russia has its security interest, now we have the return of the most primitive kind of Russophobia imaginable. So Europe meets, as you know, every two or three days in terror of Russia with these fools around the table without talking to, the Russians at all. And so it is this self-fulfilling, grandiose, delusional sense of power and vulnerability together

and thinking that the United States will, you know, pull them out of, bail them out, pull them out of this fire and protect them from the Russian bearer. And as you said, completely rightly, this incredibly stupid set of demands, for example, on India, which I think is probably the single stupidest moment of foreign policy of modern America that I know of. That was promoted by the Europeans. So you were completely right to point out that, yes, Lindsay Graham had the idea, quote unquote, Donald Trump implemented it, but the Europeans were desperate for it. Secondary tariffs, secondary sanctions, stop the Indians. So all of it is such a bad misreading of history, of current events, of tying yourself in knots,

of failing to look at a map, of failing to do the most basic arithmetic of world population or technology or industrial production. or direction of trade. And if you just watch these people, they don't know anything. And they don't want to learn anything. And they don't want to hear anything. And especially in Europe, the most desperate thing is, for God's sake, don't talk to the other side. It may be a little annoying. And so we actually have a spectacle of grown people like Starmor,

Merz-McCron, grown people that won't even have a discussion with President Putin. Not a talk, not an idea, not an honest exchange. Only, okay, I won't go on. It's a rant. But it's so ignorant, it's unbelievable. It is unbelievable. About the Cold War and the realities of it, The historian Jeff Roberts recently passed on to me a article by Joan Robinson, whom I'm sure you know, the economist. And she said at the time, if the entire premise of Russian expansion is wrong, then our whole policy is nonsensical. That was a, I don't know that article, but I look forward to reading it. But Jeffrey Roberts also.

wrote recently a brilliant piece on the Soviet Finnish wars. And showing another basic point, by the way, which people will not know unless you look. In 1939, there was the famous Molotov-Ribbentrop agreement in which ostensibly Germany and the Soviet Union divide up Poland. And we're told, we're taught, and I was taught that this proves, of course, the Soviet perfidity and expansionism, and that this is exactly what the Cold War was all about. It actually started with a joint Hitler-Stalin agreement to eat up Poland.

and similarly about the Soviet war with Finland. And then you delve a little bit more deeply into this, and then you can go as deeply as you want. This story is completely, completely upside down. Because what actually transpired, which the Western world and our students and I never would have learned, was that Stalin rather desperately in the late 1930s was trying to make an alliance with Britain and with France against Hitler, because he understood that Hitler was going to invade his country and that Hitler was the expansionist threat to peace.

and it was the British and the French that rebuffed him completely cynically in 1939, which led to Stalin rather desperately trying to create a space to protect the Soviet Union, a space both in Finland and in Poland, against what he knew to be a coming German invasion. we lost the opportunity, we, the Russian and Western world, to contain to prevent World War II because the hatred of Russia was so high that in British elite circles, many felt better Hitlerism than communism or than Bolshevism. And we interpret every move of the Soviet Union in the most anti-Western way because we don't dare look at the truth, which is that we, I mean, we in the, if I could put it this way, I don't like to think of it this way, but in the West, rebuffed the chance for an alliance with Russia. in essence. And with Finland, the Stalin knew that the Germans were going to come through the Baltic states and come through Finland and ended up doing precisely that in the siege of Leningrad and

starving millions of people. And he understood that. And he asked for an ability to station Soviet troops or to even change, to swap some land areas to protect Leningrad, today, St. Petersburg, and again, was completely rebuffed by the Finns. And this is the origin of what happened. So we don't even want to look at anything from the other perspective. There's a name for this, by the way. It's called the Security Dilemma for people who want to study this, which means you take the worst of interpretation of the other side. It was brilliantly written by a late colleague of mine, a really a brilliant, decent man named Robert Jervis at Columbia University. But the idea is you interpret everything the other side does

in the absolute most negative possible light, partly for your own propaganda and partly out of your ignorance and your psychological reactions. And the way to overcome that is actually to talk to the other side, to try to understand what their motives are, and to see if there isn't a modus Bivendi. Just to quickly add, Taylor also, AJP Taylor, has written very, very interestingly about that whole period of Soviet diplomacy before the Second World War. And of course, Jeff Roberts absolutely has done. I want to discuss quickly, because we have been talking a lot about these things, but I would

like to discuss also what you've been writing about Israel, about its foreign policy. You've made some comments, I think absolutely excellent and outstanding and very important comments. And I would like you just to touch on that before we end the program. Yeah, just very, very basically. There is a semi-nasty, semi-correct theorem of mind that all problems go back to the British. I hate to say it, but in this case, the Middle East crisis and the crisis in Gaza absolutely goes back to Britain, 1917, the Balfour Declaration, which attempted to entice Americans to enter World War I on the British side and other aims, but it declared the intention that Britain would own the the near east of the Levant, the eastern Mediterranean,

anticipating a victory over the Ottoman Empire in World War I, and that there would be a Jewish homeland created. Interestingly, we don't have much time, just to say the one Jew in the cabinet, the war cabinet in 1917, the one Jew in the cabinet opposed the Balfour Declaration, Sir Edward Montague, he said, no, we don't need a homeland. I have a homeland.

I'm British. I happen to be Jewish, but I'm British. And if you make a homeland for the Jewish people, you're saying that I'm less British. And so it's very, very interesting and ironic. But the idea of a Jewish state, the so-called Zionist idea, emerged in the milieu of nationalism, I would say crude nationalism at the end of the 19th and early 20th centuries. And it was not a Jewish movement. It was a very secular movement by very secular and sometimes radical Jews opposed by the religious Jews. Very important point, because to equate Zionism and Judaism is to get the history again.

completely upside down because the rabbis were against all of this. They said, we don't need a state. We need our synagogue and our local community. We need to walk down the block to our synagogue. But the Zionists had a different idea, which was the kind of, I would say, crude nationalism of the 19th century, that you're nothing if you don't have a state. And they weren't religious, so they weren't worrying about religion. And they, even Ben-Gurian, the founder of Israel, said, we're not yeshiva students. We're making a state. You know, we're the new people. Anyway, this is the origin.

And what was supposed to be a homeland became a state. What was supposed to be a state divided, even in the Zionist mind, okay, we'll divide the Arab-Palestinian side, which was the big majority of population and a minority Jewish population. The Arab leaders at the time said, why should we divide Palestine? It should be independent. It should be a unitary state like all the post-colonial states, like all the mandates of the World War I era being turned into independent countries after World War II. have a regular majority rule. Okay, the Zionists prevailed to divide mandatory Palestine under British rule into two.

The Arabs said, no, we want a unified state, not this division. In the end, Israel unilaterally declared independence. And it declared independence initially on about 56% of the land area, even though the Jewish population was much less than half. Anyway, it declared it on 56%, which was what a UN advisory decision had mapped. And then it won the 1948 so-called War of Independence. and it ended on borders that had 78% of British Palestine. What arose from 1948 until today was a very strong movement, very complicated, if you're dealt deeply into it, but in any event that said, no, we will take all 100%, even though half the population,

about 7 million, 7 and a half million are Arab Palestinians, and 7.5 million are Israeli Jews, some of which hundreds of thousands who are living in the 22% that was not in Israel after the 1948 war, in Israel came a movement that will take 100%. We're strong enough to do it. We should do it. For some of them, God gave it to us. If you read a text from a 6th century BC book of the Bible, some say we do it because why not?

we're powerful enough or we do it because it's the only route to our security. But what evolved in Israel was the idea of complete domination over the Palestinian people. In 1967, in the so-called six-day war, Israel captured the other 22 percent of the land. And suddenly there were, half the population was Arab Palestinians under their rule. And the rule was and is brutal. It is at best apartheid. And now in the last two years, it is, in my view, a genocide. By the way, not just in my view, the International Association of Genocide Scholars,

which is the global group that studies genocide, declared it a couple of days ago, unequivocal genocide. And of course, many Israeli groups like Betselem, the human rights group, many Israeli rabbis. This is not in any way, I think, controversial outside of the very narrow extremist circles. Israel's committing a genocide. Why? Because it is claiming 100% of mandatory Palestine, and for some of these crazies, and believe me, they exist. Name, rank, position in the cabinet, they claim parts of the broader Middle East. It's not only defense or anti-Hasbalah or other things that Israel is in Lebanon and in Syria, because if you believe it or not,

if you go back to the book of Genesis or you go back to Deuteronomy, it talks about from the Great River, meaning the Nile, to the Euphrates. There are many, many things that you can find in a text that is more than 1,500 years old. And there are people who live

as if that is our absolute immediate reality. Okay. All of this is to say we have an ongoing genocide through a completely illegal, brutal, and immoral attempt of a radicalized government of Israel to dominate half the population of what was mandatory Palestine. How do you do that? There are only three ways. You kill the people. you ethnically cleanse them or you you dominate them in a kind of apartheid rule all are on the table right now the whole world i would say is realizing this now but the hold of this the hold of this the hold of

israel and this extreme extremist government on the hands of the hands of the the U.S. government is both a mystery until today nearly complete. Ununderstandable. I'm a Jew, a lot of American Jewry is aghast at what Israel's doing. I regarded as so un-Jewish and a complete shame, disgrace, as well as being massively illegal. I'm hardly alone. So we can't even understand the behavior of the United States. of our own government, really. We know there's an Israel lobby. We know how much money is paid to by congressmen and so forth.

Even so, when you see a mass starvation in front of your eyes, it actually calls on a national government to do something different from complete complicity and protection of this. very weirdly and interestingly, despite the 100% practical backing, I call it complicity in this genocide of the U.S. government, the one thing Donald Trump said a couple of days ago, which shows, by the way, the mentality, he said, Israel's winning the war, but it's losing the PR battle. To discuss genocide as a PR issue shows a kind of point of view, which is, let me just say, rather problematic. But that's how it's viewed.

What Trump actually might mean by this because he reads opinion polls carefully is the overwhelming majority of Americans want the United States to recognize. a state of Palestine on the borders of the 4th of June, 1967, in other words, for Israel to end its occupation that it took in the 1967 war. And an overwhelming majority of American voters oppose what Israel is doing. America is the last holdout in the UN on this. It's the only veto. So it is Israel and the U.S. against the whole world, even, I will say the British, even the French, even the Belgians who yesterday announced that they will recognize the state of Palestine. And in this desperate maneuver to fight the American people and to fight all the rest of the world, Marco Rubio, our Secretary of State, came up with this ingenious idea. of blocking the Palestinians from even coming to the United Nations in September, which is also completely against international law.

They're desperate. But maybe to reduce or end their desperation, they should just realize that siding with the genocide is not a good policy. Professor Sachs, I thought that was a wonderful, very moving comment that you just made. Not as a comment, it's a two to force, actually. Just one very quick thing. Well, actually, there's lots of things I could say. But there's one thing I do want to say.

Don't feel, as I speak now as a British person, inhibited about refer referencing to what the British have done. My friend, Alex, who's sitting there, he can tell you what the British did in Cyprus and how their policies stand at the core of what happened. many people who watch these programs in India will know all about what happened in India and partition and all of that. The British Empire, which by the way expanded after the First World War. This isn't a fact that many people understand.

Amazing. Its widest extent came after the First World War. Has left a huge number of terrible legacies in all kinds of places. Now, as I said, there's an awful lot more that I would love to discuss, but I'm conscious that we've had you for well beyond the time. Could I mention one more thing just to keep us one more minute if it's not too long for you guys? No, no, no, not too long for us. But absolutely fascinating. The India-China dispute, even the wars, of course, have their British origin, which is amazing.

And people also should understand, in 1907, a big. junior British officer, a British officer, McMahon, without any basis, took a map and drew a line across the Himalayas for what the outward reach of the British Raj in India was. And so he decided what the boundaries were. And the Chinese had other opinions, but the Chinese were, uh, extremely, well, they were weak and the Qing Dynasty was about to fall. That McMahon line was 1907 and the Qing Dynasty ended with the Republic of China in 1911. But the British drew this arbitrary line, also the Radcliffe line.

And sadly, really sadly, when Nehru came to power in independent India, and he was confronted by this, by the Chinese. He made a bad mistake, and it was a kind of lazy mistake. But he immediately said, we defend the McMahon line. And this was a huge mistake because Nehru was actually a wonderful leader. And if he and Joe Enlai had sat down, this whole divide never would have happened. But the British shadow accidentally infected the relations from 1949 onward until now. And that's why I've been saying to my Indian and Chinese friends, come on.

It's a 197 line. Settle this thing. You have much bigger issues at stake than the exact line in the Himalayas. You need to remake the world as a multipolar. multilateral UN-centered world, don't fight each other. And I think that this is exactly what's happening right now, I'm happy to say. I completely agree. There's a comment, Alexander, Mr. Sachs real quick, from Sanjave, which says there has only been twice previously that India and China had attempted reconciliation resulting in China being India's. Second largest trading

partner. So monumental is an understatement about what's to come. When Modi and Xi reconciled, India will irreversibly pivot east. India is a great civilization, a great nation, a great power, and it will pivot east, north, southwest, because it will be a major part of the world society and world civilization, but it will not be a vassal of the United States, which is what the U.S. thinks it is in this quad arrangement, which I think is one of the dumbest things possible. And where I always tell, again, my Indian friends and colleagues, don't join the quad against China, for God's sake. That makes no sense.

Pussy Balls asks, Professor Sachs, since we're talking about Indian China, could an Indian and China make the disputed land a demilitarized zone with Russia providing security and allow free passage for Indians and Chinese. It seems like a practical solution. It may be a wonderful one. There are 100 practical solutions possible. Neither side. This is a small issue which became the subject of war, but it's a completely solvable issue with goodwill. And by the way, both India and China have brilliant foreign ministers, really brilliant foreign ministers, so they can work this out. Professor Sachs, I think we've kept you, but it's been an, I think perhaps the most

outstanding of our programs with you. Thank you very, very much. So great to be with you guys. Thanks a lot. We'll see you soon. Thank you. Bye-bye. The sweep and coverage, this program has been established. economics, it's all there. Yeah. A lot of good history lessons. Alexander, let's run through the questions. You've got a lot of great questions.

I bet we do, yeah. Absolutely, sure we do. As always from the community. Let's start off with Haruko's super chat. Thank you so much for that. And Alexander, we go to Nikos. And this is a one, two, this is a five-part question.

I saw, I saw Yerosimov's analysis, and it contradicts what Dima is showing us. The Russian air defense is depleted, and Ukrainians are hitting oil depots. Ukraine every day destroys equipment, helicopters, and damaged another ship just with drones made in homes. Russia is hitting buildings with no effect. Ukraine has an infinite amount of people and they are taking land. Russia can't stop their production and drones. What happens when Europe invades? Europe will invade Russia.

They'll say they'll pay the debt after the invasion because they have the system. I am sorry, but the people want this. And the final part. Russia can't keep losing oil refineries and ships, choppers or jets to drones and just keep hitting empty buildings with missiles that have no effect. Well, first of all, I mean, I watch steamers programs quite regularly. And his recent ones, and I haven't noticed him saying these things, or at least not in the way that you said, yes, the Ukrainians do launch drones against Russia.

They do launch drones against the Russian energy system. We did a program about this with Stanislav a few days ago. we pointed out that this has had insignificant effect on the overall Russian economic system. And I mean, he's absolutely right. And by the way, I've been looking at the movements and gasoline prices in Russia since the start of the year. And there is absolutely no evidence that this has had the effect, remotely the effect, the people are saying. So, yes, the Ukrainians do churn out an awful lot of pictures. They show us pictures of helicopters being attacked,

which we don't know always when these pictures were made. They might have been made a week ago, a month ago, today, a year ago. There's been instances of this. And to say it again, propaganda is a part of war. The Ukrainians should not be criticised for doing this sort of thing. But the reality is that the Russian strikes on Ukraine are devastating. They are not against empty buildings, contrary to what may be suggesting. They have done colossal damage to Ukraine's industrial system.

It is Ukraine's air defense system, not Russia's, which is depleted. When the Russians attack, Kiev, one of the things that was really noticeable was that the Russian missiles and drones were hitting positions. So there was no actual sign of any air defense system operating at all. So I think the realities are the exact opposite of what is being said. And where the Ukrainians are taking territory, I really, again, I don't really know all of the advances have been on the Russian side. So what Gerasimov said, and we did a whole program about this, you can watch it on our channel, Gerasimov aggressive aggression. What Gerasimov showed, not only is that the...

the Russians have advanced further than I think most people believe that they have. But he explained the strategy and what the information we are getting from the battlefields confirms that what he said was mostly, in fact, probably entirely true. So that's my reply. Tim Gibson, thank you for the super sticker. Limiting Factor asks, where do you see Romania in the next five to ten years that's an excellent question because i mean we've had a extraordinary crisis in romania over the last couple of months we saw that when uh the romanian people were

actually offered an alternative they seemed to want it they were prevented from having that alternative not by uh through the ballot box but through uh manipulations of lawfare and cancellations of elections and extraordinary and very, very disturbing and troubling things, anti-democratic things, I would say. And so it depends ultimately on Romania itself and on the larger developments in Europe. My own view is that we are closer to a major crisis in Europe than we have ever been the crisis that we could be seeing is going to be much worse than the one that we saw in 2011, 2012, you know, the famous Eurozone crisis. This is going to be far worse because it is the central states of the European Union, Germany and France, and by the way, Italy too, that are the most

affected this time. And we will see how that plays out. And of course, bear in mind, we have a crisis, not just an economic one, but a geopolitical one as well. The war in Ukraine is now being lost. There's problems with the United States. It is for the Romanian people to draw conclusions and to take advantage of that and to chart a different course and to take steps finally to bring their political class, which is clearly captured and under the control of people in Brussels under control. So I think Romania is at a crossroads and it could make important decisions in the near future and we will see where they take us. William says Siberia 2 means the current leadership of the Frankenstein monster, aka the EU and the UK has entrenched the project Ukraine

decline. The damage is now impossible instead of difficult to remedy. You are completely correct. You are absolutely right about this. I mean, what is being diverted through power of Siberia 2 is the is literally the gas from the gas fields that was previously being sent to Europe. Gas that would have been assigned for Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 and the Yamal pipeline is now going to be sent to China. And there is no reversal here. I mean, Europeans sometimes say, well, we paid a better price. But ask Alex, who's been in business, who's been in business. If you are in business, you want a trustworthy, reliable partner. You might offer a bit more money. But if you blow up pipe, send weapons against someone, engage in endless lawfare, seize people's assets.

You really think the people want to go back on everything and say, we're going to have our gas. You nailed it. Yeah, you nailed it down. Exactly. Exactly. Who cares how much you pay when you're blowing up the pipelines? Exactly.

Elsa says the collective West should sanction everyone who doesn't care about their sanctions. That might work. That's a great one, actually. OJ. Walters, good morning. Sangeva. Thank you for that super chat that we just talked about with China. and India, hope all as well. Stefan Gabrila,

thank you for that super sticker. Fuzzy balls, put the question up about Russians in Russian pride and security for the zone in India and China, which Professor Sacks answered. Paul Walker says,

USA, the West Hegemani has fallen. Time for Bricks. Yes. Sticky Marx says, does Professor Sacks think the world has turned? I knew it had it had to but didn't expect to live to see it. LMPs from this

crazy old lady ladyish in Yorkshire, UK. I think Professor Sachs answered. He did answer that. I mean, that was a lot of what he was discussing in the live stream and I mean, you know, you're very welcome from Yorkshire to put these actually very good questions

because I think this is a pivot. This is a pivotment. Wei Yao, thank you for joining the drag community. Zalin, thank you for in the drag community. Halman Kushos Stademera says spamming UABarak needs to be banned and go to other channels related to Bandaristan.

Thank you for that. D.F. says if EU leadership pro-war stance isn't driven by the electorate, it seems natural that it's driven by funding. Who would be funding them towards war policies, open society, the CIA or USAID? All of them. And the military industrial complex.

and certain other institutions that exist within Europe itself, which have also been the same institutions, that have been driving the entire process of European integration, just a second. Alexander Ross says, Robert Fetzel correctly described the EU as frogs at the bottom of a well, croaking away like characters from an Aristophanist play as well as the well dries up, as the well. Absolutely, absolutely.

Fidz, which actually is bad. And isn't it, isn't it appalling that he was the only European leader in Beijing? I mean, Obtchich was there too. I said the same thing that you stood in Alexandria, my video yesterday, and everyone let me know that Bucchid also was supposed to. He was the only EU. He was the only EU leader. I mean, Al-Bun obviously has all kinds of fires to put out because, I mean,

they're trying to do all kinds of things to him. But someone from the EU should have been there. I mean, but anyway, probably just as well that they weren't. Isn't it also amazing that heroic that we see FITO in China, meeting with Putin after being shot five times in the afternoon? Absolutely. Amazing. He is a heroic figure, absolutely. I agree, totally. Game of chair says, is the U.S. economy heading for a major.

to recession given the effects of Trump's tariffs are now showing. Why does MAGA not realize that ultimately it is the American consumer who ultimately pays? Well, there's a huge discussion about tariffs, which we've had on many programs. And I'm not going to repeat it here because that would take up time. I think that there is a real risk of recession in the United States. I think tariffs probably have some parts to play. But I have to say this. I think even before the terrorists, even before Trump's election, the United States was an unsustainable trajectory for some time, actually. And I think if we do have a recession in the United States, we should not overstate the importance of tariffs in bringing that about. Double down says, can we expect Pacific allies to behave similarly to our Atlantic allies?

Will their leaders demonstrate the same zeal for personal gain at the cost of a nation? I find this a difficult question to answer because, of course, I don't know East Asia in the same way that I do. Europe. My own senses that in certainly in South Korea, there is very, very significant political pushback against all of this. And the new president of South Korea seems to have different views. About Japan, I am not so sure. I used to have lots of contacts in Japan long ago. when I worked with various Japanese companies.

And the people that I knew then absolutely did not want to have Japan in a long-term confrontation with China. In fact, they were businesses that were investing in China at that time. But what the general outlook or thinking in Japan is today, I don't know. John Skee says, does Professor Sachs support the W.EF 2030 agenda plan and why? Well, I don't think he does. But I mean, I don't know if I'm not going to want to speak to him.

New 2 says, go guys. Every bit counts information-wise. Major historical, important things are now underway. They are. They are absolutely. Zalin says, I get the impression that the EU is trying to sideline van der Leyen from the commission given her unpopularity in Europe. Merz is allegedly considering endorsing her for the 2027 German presidency.

How likely is this? Well, I think it's quite impossible. I mean, you know, she's been, in my opinion, the single most disastrous politician in Europe since the Second World War, that's saying a lot. I mean, really, I mean, the damage she has done is incredible. So maybe there are some people who are starting to see this. But look how it works. You fail utterly.

You are the most disastrous political leader that Europe has had. So you get a promotion. You're a president of Germany. Oh my God. Cloud World. Absolutely. Jamila says, Hello, gentlemen.

I have a question for Professor Sachs. Can collapse economy be turned around? You can ask you. Yes, absolutely. Like the UK or France be turned around. Absolutely. If the will to do it is there and the organization to do it is there, it can be turned around.

around. Again, arguing that it cannot be is a Council of Despair. I've talked about councils of despair many times. One should never fall for them. But it's hard work. It requires commitment. It requires, you know, a single purpose. But, you know, in the 1990s, Russia looked like a collapsed economy in the 1940s Germany looked like a collapsed economy. In the 1930s for a brief time, in 1932, 33, when there was the banking crisis of the United States, it looked like the United States economy was going to collapse. And people came and pulled it round. It can be done, but it requires hard work, it requires commitment, it requires, it requires, courage and it requires realism, a realistic sense of what is happening and a focus on

doing the things right. And if you do that, you have all of those things together. There's absolutely no reason why economies like British, Britain's, France, Germany's cannot be revived. from Jamila, Alex and Alexander. Can anything be done to politicians who do not stand up for the people who take care of them? Well, in democracies, we should vote them out of power. Once we've done that, or at least find proper means to vote them out of power or remove them from power. If we do that and if they've done worse things, then, as I said, in a properly functioning, system, we can perhaps hold them to account through the legal systems and things of that kind.

But the most important thing we must do in Europe, in the United States, is to push these people out. And we need to do that in a democratic and lawful way, a properly democratic and lawful way. And that means that we need to resist all of these attacks on democracy. and the law that these people are trying to inflict upon. Zeylon says, we know that Macron is out the door between now and 2027. Should he manage to make it until 2027? And pertaining to my last question,

do you think Macron has his eyes on Vanderlain's seat for EU Commission President? Well, that's a very good idea, because, of course, he's failed at Artelli as President of France. So he needs a promotion. Go to that sake, he must be promoted. I mean, so European Commission President would suit him very well. I mean, if you can't do that, maybe president of the European Council. I mean, he can bring his genius to bear in all of these things.

So, yes, I mean, now I hear we come back, actually, to the previous question, because the proximate source for France's political crisis is Emmanuel Macron. I mean, he's making, he's making the political crisis. political situation in France, ever more unstable. So what logically ought to happen is that the French Parliament should reject any choice he puts forward for prime minister, say that we insist that the president resign, that we consider impeachment proceedings if he doesn't. and put Macron in a position where either he resigns or he calls parliamentary elections, which will strengthen the opposition, or in any rate, in some form, leaves the scene.

Because this is an impossible and unsustainable position in which he is leading Franc Simpson. The timing lines up, Alexander, because I think Merch said 2027 he would like to see Ursula as president. President of Germany. Yeah, absolutely. So it fits beautiful for you. Yeah, fits well. Yeah. Ursula, to President of Germany, Macron, to a President of the Commission.

I mean, this is the optimal choice. Interesting. It's the A team, it's the A team taking over. Yeah. Nicos says, we see Russia using many missiles and drones. They've supposedly destroyed so many things. How has Ukraine not collapsed yet if everything is destroyed? Well, I mean, it is gradually collapsing, but of course, the reason it isn't, it hasn't collapsed is because every single day, your money and mine goes to Ukraine.

I mean, this is what is keeping Ukraine, Gary. If that funding stops, the war would be over within a month. I'm quite quite convinced of it. And so the UK economy is collapsing. The French economy is collapsing. The Italian economy is collapsing. The Italian economy. Yeah, exactly.

German economy. We're down to 25 operational tanks. I thought it was 40, but it turns out it's 25 operational tanks in Britain. I mean, we are extending and protracting this war. And by doing so, we are ruining ourselves. And we're making our eventual defeat worse. Miriana, thank you for that super sticker. Sir Mazgames says there has only ever been one Russian asset, and that is Mr. Putin. Thank you for that. Russia has a huge number of assets. It's got a massive science base.

It's got a technology base. It's got industries. It's got oil. It's got gas. It's got all kinds of minerals. I mean, it's got an extremely educated population. It's very patriotic and very disciplined as well. The West has completely misjudged Russia and underestimated it catastrophic.

Shaddle as Kik says the problem is that Western powers, often bully other nations in the name of freedom and democracy. Yes. Don Zucker says Trump cheats a golf, cheat his workers out of the pay, cheats on his wife, and will cheat on any international agreement he signs. Well, there is this massive issue, and it goes beyond Trump. Can anybody trust the United States? What happened with Iran did not help?

Well, absolutely. Yeah. Game of chair says, Trump is upset that India chooses to purchase Russian weaponry. Surely this is free trade that the US promotes. Well, absolutely. And they encouraged India to buy the oil. Something I didn't know, by the way, until the Indians disclose it. And now it's true. And apparently the person who was most actively telling the Indians buy Russian oil to stop oil prices exploding was Janet Yellen. Death dealer 1341 says France is being ordered to start World War III next year.

Yeah. Saddam says Europe will never ban Russian gasoline. They will not survive. Well, don't make those assumptions. That's a rational decision that you're describing. Are there the people who are in charge in Europe? Do they sound to you very rational? Because they certainly don't sound like that to me anymore.

Lala Levy says, Are other countries going to join to a military attack against Venezuela? There are reports that the U.S. has asked other countries to join too. Yes, I think that's a real risk, and we'll see who they are. But I don't know which countries those would be. I mean, Colombia, its president, seems to be completely opposed to this. So we'll see what happens. Zizi Karyanis, thank you for that super sticker.

Monty says, why do I get the feeling that North Korea sent troops incurses since the country will need a lot of economic assistance while in Russia? Any kamikon kind of arrangements are an absolute taboo today? The relationship is an interesting one. I think what the Russians really want from North Korea is industrial workers in the Far East. And apparently North Korean industrial workers are extremely well trained and very disciplined, as you might expect. And they also want North Korean factories producing things. and I've been getting an awful lot of information about that.

So this works well for North Korea because it means that the economy there is now reviving and getting stronger. And apparently there's been lots of telltale signs of this. The metro in Pyongyang, for example, has been refurbished, there's been much building now in Pyongyang in other places. So this is what the Russians want.

They want, in effect, to restore the economic links that existed between themselves and North Korea during the Cold War and the North Koreans want the same. And given that this is an important relationship with the Russians, because they're getting a lot of things like artillery shells, for example, from North Korea, King Jong-un wanted to send troops to Russia, to Kusk region, and it would have been very difficult for the Russians to say no. and so they apparently accepted the offer. And Kim Jong-un wanted it because it solidifies the relationship between North Korea and Russia. But it also, of course, gave his military

its first real experience of actual fighting since the end of the Korean War. So the North Koreans have learned an awful lot. They're doing very well for themselves. out of these trades. Nitzschwich says headline in ARD, Tagascao, Germany. Russian economy is worsening rapidly, complete loss of reality in Germany. Absolutely.

I mean, how many articles about like, of this kind have we been reading? This is an unending succession of them. Even as our own economies go down, we just spend all our own. time, you know, forcing the imminent Russian economic collapse. Kayakalus is saying that the sanctions are working in Russia's economy is in bad shape. I mean, who are they fooling? We're they trying to fool? Yeah, quite.

John Winston says, good morning, fellas, from Cape Cod. Lots of protests in Bulgaria around Ursula's visits. Friends say there is nostalgia for closer ties with Russia. and that Todor Zykov is still revered in most circles. What do you think about Bulgaria? Well, I don't, I'm not heard about Todor Jifkov, who was the communist leader of Bulgaria for most of the time that Bulgaria was a communist country. I've not heard that he was revered, but certainly, I mean, there's a long, deep history

of close relations between Bulgaria and Russia. Russia was instrumental in liberating Bulgaria from the Ottomans. The languages are very similar. They're both Orthodox countries and, of course, their Slav countries. So, I mean, there's been a long history, a long tradition of very close relations. And I have family connections in Bulgaria, by the way. And I can confirm that there are strong pro-Russian sentiments in Bulgaria. The political class in Bulgaria is completely Europeanized.

And it's the same as in Greece, for example, the political class resists all of these efforts that come from below. Jack Ridley, thank you for that super sticker. Fuzzy Ball says under international law, if Russia takes the Carpathian mountains, could they gift that territory to Hungary and Slovakia, which could facilitate Brick's membership if they were to be connected to Russia? Well, I'm not going to discuss the international legal sides of this. I suspect the answer is no. But then international law is a fungible thing.

And if something becomes accepted and recognized, and Lavrov, by the way, today reiterated that all territorial changes in the conflict needs to be internationally recognized. So, you know, this remains still a russarrow. condition but if it is recognized then of course it becomes legal that I mean that that is the way international law basically works now whether we start to get those kind of land swaps I think we have to wait we're far away from that point so for Hungary doesn't seem to be very keen on things of that kind I think they

probably worried that if they did go down that road it would create more complications than these territories are worth. Harry C. Smith says you should get Garland Nixon on regarding Venezuela. He's been an election observer there at least once and travel all over the country meeting regular folks. We haven't had a program with Garland for a long time, and I think it's perhaps time that we did for saying. Nico says, I know that the Ukrainian air defense is depleted and Russia hits buildings

that don't affect Ukraine's strikes. the Russian air defense is also depleted and they are hit by drones. What is your evidence of this? I mean, I mean, the Ukrainians, I mean, Russia is the biggest country in the world. You can't have air defense systems everywhere

in every part of Russia. But it seems to me that if you look at what the Ukrainians are achieving with their drones, the short answer is it isn't very much. Shouldn't be misled by what the Ukrainians are saying. And in terms of the Russian strikes on the Ukrainian industries, my understanding is on the contrary, that the effect has been devastating. You can see that in the economic numbers that are coming out of Ukraine. I mean, the Baydhaktor factory, which the one's brother-in-law, whatever it was, relative built in Kiev, has been completely destroyed, apparently.

the missile factory in NEPRO, the Yuzmash factory, has been completely destroyed. There was the factory that the Americans were making those electronic goods. Apparently, it's being completely destroyed. And there's increasing acceptance that trying to establish any kind of industries on any scale in Ukraine at this particular time is impossible. So again, I'm not sure where you're getting this information. because it is completely a variance on the information I'm getting from multiple sources, including Ukrainian ones. Yeah. By Raktar drone factory, grand opening, and it had a grand closing on the same day.

On the same day. Yeah, same day. Dirk Diggler says, how will the UK economy survive without a World Bank bailout? Well, it will survive. I mean, we'll still be here. We're not going to just disappear. What I The risk Is if we see some kind of major Crash is that it will translate into Inflation and bankruptcy

And that kind of thing And a major fall in the standard of living And probably ultimately situations Where are already very very creaky Infrastructure and welfare system And pension systems would start to become unaffordable and we'll start to close down. So there is a long, because we're a rich, developed country in Britain,

there's a long way to go to hit bottom. But we are starting to move in that direction. And we show no sign of trying to do anything about it. And our prime minister is engaged in this. He's off again tomorrow to Paris, where he's going to meet his great friend, President Macron. and his other great friend Friedrich Merz, and his greatest friend of all,

Vladimir Zelensky, they'll be hugging each other again, and they'll be talking about fictional truth deployments in fantasy peace agreements, and they'll be spending all their time talking about that. All distractions. They don't want to deal with the problems that they've created at all. It's that simple. Yeah, absolutely.

So they're all actors. So they're playing Napoleon, and they're playing all these parts. Churchill and Napoleon because they don't want to deal with the big mess that they've made at home in their countries. It's that simple. Nico says, we also see that Ukraine is still having men and still taking territory back in Pachros and Kupiansk.

The problem, though, is Europe and they will invade. Russia can't lose any more equipment to drones. About the Ukrainian countertacks in Kupiansk and Pakrovsk, my own view is that these are entirely imaginary. The coupians counterattack, I believe, was a failure. And I've been reading an awful lot about the countertacks in Pachrosk. And those seem to have been failures as well. I mean, remember, these are battles.

And in any battle, there is an urban flow. I mean, inevitably so. There's attacks, there's counterattacks, both sides, engaging them. But ultimately, it's always the Russians who move forward. And always the Ukrainians who lose more men and are the. and come out of these battles weaker and weaker. So, you know, one, I think this isn't, this information is factually wrong. But secondly, as I said, you mustn't get to absorb by battlefield, you know, ebts and flows.

They happen all the time in this war. They're not particularly relevant. And you must look at the wider picture overall. And there, I don't think there's any real doubt at all, at all as to what. the progress is. Now, about Europe and about us going to war with Russia, with what? What? 25 tanks, which is what the British army has, we can't do it. It's, it's, it's, it is an absurd idea. Even the militaries are telling the politicians that, um, sending a, a so-called reassurance force to Ukraine isn't going to convince or impress the Russians.

It would simply put our troops if we sent them there in an impossible and incredibly dangerous position. We have nothing equivalent to the Ornashnik. We have nothing equivalent to Russia's drone capabilities. The Russians produced more tanks in a week, probably, than we have in Britain. I mean, this is a fantasy plan and one we should drop right away and the idea that Europe without the United States could go to war with Russia is an absurd one. And even with the United States, it would be suicide. Exactly.

Panos says there are decades where nothing happens and there are weeks where decades happen. Ringing so true lately, understand Elas Cyprus kind of stuck. Do you see a way out down the track, way down the track, obviously, at least an EU breakup? Well, I do. An EU breakup is inevitable. The question is how long it takes and how much damage is going to be done in the process. But there was that famous economist who once said that that which is unsustainable cannot be sustained.

And that is the situation with the European project. Sooner or later, in some form or other, it will break down. But the longer it takes, just like with the Ukraine war, the longer this process is played out, the more damage it will done. And a weaker, more decayed, more bankrupt, more unhappy, more disputatious Europe is going to come out the other end. Lola Renee, thank you for that super chat. Sparky says, will bricks erect a statue of President Trump for helping to accelerate the significance and success of Bricks?

I think he should be awarded the Nobel Prize. I think all the Brick states should recommend it. I mean, he's brought India and China together. I mean, what greater achievement of a peacemaker is than that? Yeah, at least give it to Navarro. Absolutely. Sparky says, free Greenland from Danish tyranny and brutal oppression. Absolutely.

Sparky also says, build a better world with Bricks. Of course. Saddam says, I agree their decisions make no sense, but legally they want to be able to ban LNG and gas. Too many countries are dependent on it. Yeah, absolutely. They're working towards that all the time. Like they're taken first, I mean, the moment it was suggested that Nord Stream might be reopened, he actually arranged at the European Union to impose sanctions to prevent the reopening of North Street. I mean, it's it's so astonishing.

It's so crazy. I mean, it's demented. The European leaders, they hate the people. It's amazing that European, that so many people in Europe don't see that. Absolutely. They want to destroy the people. They want to destroy the people. They want you to have nothing.

They want you to have nothing. Yeah. They don't care. the price increases 5%, 10% or 20% for them, it's nothing. No. They don't care. They don't care about inflation. They're going to have energy.

They're going to have hot showers. They're going to have heated homes. But then they're not worrying about this stuff. It's the people, the people they want to destroy. Absolutely. That's what this is all about. That's completely right. Yeah.

Nicos says, I guess my main question is how fast can Russia replace what they lost? Panks and ammunition are easy, but how fast can they make fighter jets and ships? the Black Sea Fleet has lost 11 out of 61 ships. Well, I mean, yes, but again, you're talking about 11 ships out of 61. But what ships were those? My understanding is that the ships that have teeth, none. And if you're talking about the frigates and the submarines, one submarine was damaged, but it was already under repair.

All of the rest are fully operational. I don't think my own personal view, given that this is a war, and given the resources that were expended on trying to damage the Black Sea Fleet, the storm shadows and all of that, and the drones, the submarine drones, I actually don't think it suffered that much damage. I know that's not what you read every day in the Western media, but the Russians have an enormous naval program and they don't seem to be particularly. bothered by losses of the Black Sea. They lost the Moscow. That was probably, that hurt. But in other respects, I don't think this was, you know,

I don't think it's been dented, actually. Now, how quickly can they replace them? If you're talking about missile corvettes, the answer is very quickly. I mean, they have strong assembly lines for those. If you're talking about the bigger warships, the frigates, they haven't lost it. If you're talking about diesel submarines, they're building them all the time.

In fact, the size of the Russian fleet has steadily grown during the period of this war. Absena, thank you for the super sticker. Jonathan Ventura says, good day from California. Will you have Alex Kramer on? We should do. Sure. Sparky says, should the Sejel countries stick with the colonial frank for now or switch to the Bulgarian Lev? they might get a good deal on the coinage notes, printing plates, etc.

Since Bulgaria's going Euro. Well, that's a good point. What a big mistake. What a big. But you could see, you could see again, it's exactly the point that Alex was making, that these European leaders are, they don't care about their people, ultimately, because if they did, they wouldn't do this crazy thing. Bulgaria would not be doing this crazy thing.

But the political elite in Bulgaria want to do this because they want to lock Bulgaria into the Euro system because that is how they themselves will retain control. So that's the entire game that's played here. By the way, just to go back to what Nikos was talking about because I forgot to mention aircraft, the Russian Air Force,

one of the big, big changes of the last 10 years, is the enormous upgrade and transformation of the Russian Air Force. I remember when the Russians first sent fighter jets to Syria. I remember at the time going through the modern fighter jets, the post-Soviet fighter jets that the Russians actually had at that time. And it was about 20. I mean, their entire Air Force was based on Soviet, you know, aircraft left over from the Soviet time.

Now they're fielding fifth generation fighter jets and they're building more every month. The Russian Air Force has been massively upgraded and transformed over the last 10 years. Josh Winston says, what do you think will result from the plan? Tommy Robinson raised the colors rally across the UK on 913. I don't think it'll bring out many people because as I've discussed many times. I mean, he does have his supporters, but I mean, he is not the key figure in British opposition politics that I think many people outside think he is. Nigel Farage is that person, just to say, and his movement is growing in strength all the time. But that's not to say that this protest won't be significant.

And one of the things it's going to do, and it is very, very disturbing, and something that we should be worried about all. the time is he's going to provide another excuse for the British authorities to engage in further lawfare against him and ultimately to take more actions of an legal kind against all of us in Britain as well. So this is what worries me about this. Niko says my grandmother fled Serbia when the US bomb Belgrade, Bouchich has zero control of his government. They sell weapons to Ukraine, I think they'll collapse. I think, I think Vuchis is a very complex person. And I don't think he has, he doesn't have control.

But I think he works like a kind of spider with lots of webs that he weaves. And I'm going to say something else, which is that in, I think a lot of people in Belgrade, perhaps, because they understand him, don't particularly like him. of that don't like him. So I don't think it's going to collapse, but that doesn't mean that many people support him because they like him. They support him because they worry about the alternative. Zaylen says, do you think Maloney is in the same situation as Berlusconi was in 2011 EU coup? And given the debt that Italy is into the EU due to Draghi during COVID,

Do you think she has been put in this situation to bend the need to the EU? Well, I think she probably has been, and I think every Italian politician has to remember what happened to Berlusconi. And you're absolutely right to describe it as a coup, because that is exactly what it was. I wrote about it at length of the time, even as it was playing up. So, of course, Maloney has to think about this. But I also have to say this. Maloney was gifted by the Italian people with a real opportunity. to make a difference. I mean, she won a convincing mandate. She had a solid support within

Italian society and within the Italian parliament. And she didn't do it. And I had to say, at some level, she didn't want to do it. She wanted to be on good terms with Ursula and the EU leadership. She wanted to support Zelensky in Ukraine, as we see. So don't excuse use her too much. Yeah, she's a globalist. Yeah. From Sir Muz game, after Alaska, Mee thinks Putin sees Trump as President Don Quixote,

tilting at deep state windmills and VP vans as his Sancho Panza. Well, maybe. Putin is still very careful to speak very politely about Trump. Yeah. Nico says, one final thing, I keep telling my friends and all the university students I know to visit the famous Winter Reserve Bansko in Bulgaria

now this year because they won't be able to do it again. Good point. Yeah. Ah, the euro to Bulgaria. What a terrible, terrible thing. I mean, the people who do it have done it, by the way, know exactly what they're doing. Yeah.

I mean, it is a terrible wrong that they've inflicted on their own people. Absolutely. Okay, Alexander, I think that's everything. So your final thoughts while I do a final check. Absolutely, wonderful program with Jeffrey Sachs, wonderful questions as well, by the way, if I can say. What he said, I thought about the Jewish people and people, the Jewish people, many of them being horrified by what has happened, and that this was not what he understood Jewishness to be all about. I could say a huge amount about that as somebody who, who did a huge interest in Jewish culture and science

and its contribution to European culture in the 19th and 20th centuries. But that is for another day. All right. Thank you to everyone that watched us on Rockfin and Odyssey, Rumble, YouTube and our locals, community, the durand.com. Sparky says,

will Cote-Auvre remain with France or move towards cooperation with Burkina Faso, Niger, and Mali. They'd be a good path to the sea. Sooner or later, they will move away from France, but it's going to be the last one. All right. Okay, a big shout out to our moderators as well before we sign off, Harry C. Smith and Zarael.

And I think that was one second, Alexander. I think that was it for today for the moderators. So thank you to Harry and Zareel. That is, yeah, that's everything. All right. Absolutely. Take care, everyone.