The Duran Podcast - End of the Line for Diplomacy with Ukraine - John Mearsheimer, Alexander Mercouris & Glenn Diesen

Episode Date: August 21, 2025

End of the Line for Diplomacy with Ukraine - John Mearsheimer, Alexander Mercouris & Glenn Diesen

Hi everyone and welcome back. My name is Glenn Dyson and I'm joined today by John Meersheimer and Alexander McCurice to discuss these developments in the Ukraine Proxie War. So it's good to see you both again and I guess there's a lot to discuss. That is, Trump began his presidency by recognizing three main criteria, no NATO except territorial concessions and there would be no American security guarantees, which is more or less what Russia had demanded. I guess why the three of us were a bit optimistic at the time, but then he went back to the unconditional ceasefire, which means not actually addressing any of the things that Russia demanded. And now there's been this sudden return, or at least seemingly a return to, yeah, no NATO,

some territorial concessions, yet a lot of ambiguity. what exactly security guarantees would entail. So I'm very interested to hear what the two of you make of this. John, or shall I start? I mean, I would say this. Yeah, why don't you start? I'll say this. I mean, I think that this whole idea of security guarantees came out of discussions that he

had with Putin, in which clearly they did discuss the security situation in Europe and in Ukraine. And this is where I'm starting to get concerned because it was then taken away from that meeting in Alaska as if the Russians had agreed to security guarantees, which I don't think they have, at least not in the sense that they're being talked about in Europe now and by Trump himself. Trump sometimes gives the impression that he's giving security guarantees to Ukraine on behalf of the United States. Then he pulls back on that. Then one moment he talks, no troops on the ground. Then he floats the idea of the United States playing some kind of a role in terms of air power and all of that. then we are back to talking about sending European troops to Ukraine

and the Europeans giving security guarantees, but supported it did this by the United States. The Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov has now made quite clear over the course of an interview that the Russians are not in agreement with any of this. There were security guarantees negotiated between, the Russians and the Ukrainians back in April 2022 as part of the Istanbul agreement. I think the word guarantee, by the way, is altogether too strong.

There were some kind of security assurances. There was going to be a collection of countries that were going to say that Ukraine should be protected within its own territory at the end of the war. one of those countries was going to be Russia. The European countries and the United States would be those countries, other countries as well. China was going to be yet another country. And there were other countries, including, as I remember, Israel and several others, that were also going to provide these security guarantees.

The security guarantees envisaged that there would be no foreign troops. on Ukrainian territory and no deployments even on a temporary basis of foreign troops on Ukrainian territory without the agreement of each of the guarantors which would have given the Russians veto power over any deployments of any kind of foreign troops in Ukraine all of this in the context of an agreement which also envisaged very tight restrictions on the size of Ukraine's armed forces. Now, I suspect this is what the Russians have in mind or had in mind when this whole idea of protecting Ukraine's security was first brought up with them.

What we're now hearing people talking about in Europe and to some extent in the United States is something completely different, which goes beyond, far beyond what the Russians were talking about, and which looks like some kind of alliance between the Western powers and Ukraine, even if Ukraine for a temporary period remains outside NATO. And of course, that for the Russians is completely unacceptable. And as I said, Lavrov again made that. I think, fairly clear in the interview that he gave yesterday. So there is complete cross-purposes about this.

I'm not sure whether perhaps the Americans misunderstood the Russians. But I have to say, altogether, I do wonder whether perhaps the Americans, in their anxiety to get this process of negotiations going, are telling every side what they think they want to hear. So they're telling the Russians, and again, Lavrov, clearly, came away with the impression from Alaska, or says that he came away from the impression,

with the impression from Alaska, that the Americans were willing to discuss the entire security architecture of Europe, which I cannot genuinely believe the Americans do. And the Europeans are being told that there's security guarantees on the table and that the Russians are happy with that. And again, clearly from what the Russians are saying, they are not.

And I think that this is, I think this is dangerous because if you're telling each side what they each want to hear, the risky run is that when they all come together and we do actually have a meeting, if it ever happens, we will find that, you know, everybody comes into that meeting with contradictory expectations. And at that point, the whole thing could just fall apart with leaving us in an even worse position than the one we're in now. So that's what I think. Well, I think the big question in my mind to start with is, who's driving the train here? Where's all this discussion about security guarantees coming from? And in my opinion, it's coming from the Ukrainians and the Europeans.

They talk relentlessly about security guarantees. And the reason is very simple. Not only did they want to defend Ukraine moving forward, they want to keep the Americans in Europe. The great fear here is, and I think they have reason to fear this outcome, is that Trump is divorcing the United States. States from Europe's security, right? So talking about security guarantees ad nauseum is important just for Ukraine, not just for Ukraine, but also for keeping the Americans in Europe. But then the question you have to ask yourself is, what does this all add up to? There's sort of three things that they're talking about with regard to security guarantees, two of which Alexander mentioned,

I actually think there's a third one. But the first is that if there's an attack against Ukraine, we're going to come to Ukraine's rescue. This is the Article 5 guarantee or something equivalent to an Article 5 guarantee. We're going to be the cavalry and come in and pull their chestnuts out of the fire. The second dimension is they're actually talking about deploying troops in Ukraine, at least British and French troops. The third dimension is, and if you look at this memo that Sturmer put out, he and

Macron are both talking about building up Ukraine's ability to defend itself. So when you talk about the whole package of security guarantees here, there are, again, three dimensions, one, an Article 5 guarantee, two, we actually deploy NATO troops in Ukraine, and three, we build up Ukraine's military capability. And I would just note that all three of those issues are ones that are red flags or red lines for the Russians. The Russians are not going to accept an Article 5 guarantee from the West. This is why they oppose NATO expansion. into Ukraine. Secondly, it's inconceivable to me that they would allow NATO to station forces on Ukrainian territory. And third, one of their principal demands is that Ukraine be disarmed to the

point where it's not an offensive military threat to Russia. Okay, how does that square with the argument that Macron and Stommer are putting forward that we want to do is build up Ukraine, military capability. This is just not going to happen. The Russians are going to go to enormous lengths to prevent it. We're in the midst of a war that's been going on for three and a half years because the Russians categorically reject the idea of Ukraine being in NATO. And then you have all these proposals that mainly the Europeans are pushing and the Ukrainians are pushing

that the Russians just won't accept, and they've made that clear all along. Yet we continue to have this crazy discourse in the West about security guarantees. It never takes into account what the Russians actually think, and the fact that the Russians are actually in the driver's seat on the battlefield, and that does matter a lot here. So it's just all evidence of how Kaka-Mamey,

the discourse in the West is. It's just really kind of hard to believe these debates that we have. My final point on this, by the way, is that I think Trump understood after meeting with Putin that meaningful security guarantees are not acceptable to the Russians. But the problem with Trump is he then engages in lengthy discussions with the Europeans and the Ukrainians and the mainstream. of the foreign policy establishment in the United States. We don't want to lose sight of the fact that inside the United States, there are lots of people who agree with the Ukrainians and agree with the Europeans. And he talks to all these people, the Keith Kellogg's of the world, and he likes to throw him a bone. And he's very loose with his rhetoric. And he therefore ends up

sounding like he agrees with the Europeans and the Ukrainians. And this just adds more a legitimacy to this whole discourse, which again, we should take off the table because it's not going to happen. That's what I miss a bit in the whole thing, is some rational debate around actual security guarantees, because if the Americans do not want to be a part of it, then what can the Europeans really do? For the Europeans, it would be too difficult. They don't have significant forces.

The Russians wouldn't actually take it serious. as a tripwire, if you put British or French troops there have been helping to kill Russians now for three and a half years, would they really be spared if the Americans do not stand solid behind them? So the small European forces, which would be there, there wouldn't be even a credible tripwire. And also, do we really want this in the West? I mean, there's a reason why we haven't gone to war with the Russians. If you give a security guarantee, you create an immense incentives for Ukrainian to restart this conflict

and for good reasons. This war is coming to an end on very bad terms. That is, this will be a humiliating and painful peace for the Ukrainians. Now, if they suddenly have this very firm security guarantees, which

they can then try to trigger to pull the Europeans into this war, that would be a pretty great incentive, especially for us of grouping and all who seems ready to fight to the last man. Again, Ukraine isn't that consolidated. It's not necessarily only one voice, especially that I think that would be evident after this war. But I just was wondering what you guys thought about the dilemma that Trump is facing

because he doesn't seem to be able to move the Russians significantly because they don't think that they have to, given that the real. but also they can't because they say this is existential. But the only way Trump can pressure the Europeans and Zelensky is by cutting the ties. But if he cuts the many military supplies, then it can be blamed for the failure. So how, I mean, is this selling weapons to the Ukrainians? Is this not to the European, who then give it to the Ukrainians? Is this middle road or how are you interpreting this strange development?

Well, I think a lot of the answer goes back to a point that John has made in many programs, which is that Trump himself is very much of an outlier here. And he's not only up against the Europeans who have exactly the kind of rationale that John was saying, that they don't want the United States to leave Europe. They want to keep the United States in Europe. That's why they're pushing for security guarantees for UK. Ukraine, that's why they want, if they can't get boots on the ground in Ukraine, American Air Force patrolling the skies over Ukraine, all of those absurd things.

That's why they're talking about this. But he also has to contend with a very, very large community of people in the United States, in the foreign policy establishment, the defense establishment, the media, within his own administration, who are completely unreconsiled to. what he's trying to do in Europe with Russia, with his wider foreign policy. And I think he tries to move the process forward by doing constantly what John is saying, which is throwing these people of bone, trying to split the difference with them, if you like, hoping that eventually he will get to where he wants to be

before they catch up with him and try to pull him back in. I think this is a high-risk approach, actually, and I'm not sure this is the correct way to do it, but I think this is how he operates, and I think this is the cause of a great deal of confusion. Can I just say, it's a point I made already in other venues, which is that when you put aside all the noise and all of the rhetoric and everything that's been,

coming out over the last week's week. There has been one public agreement between the Russians and the Americans. And it is the Americans who have agreed that there will not be a ceasefire, that there will be movement towards a full negotiated solution to the conflict, and there won't be a ceasefire in the meantime, which might very easily lead to a freezing of the conflict, or at least that's what the Russians have been afraid of. The Russians have consistently pushed back against the idea of a ceasefire. Trump has now conceded to the Russians on this. So perhaps it's understandable that he's throwing out all of these words, all of this noise about security guarantees, about the Russians agreeing to freeze the front lines in some places if the

European Ukrainians pull back in other places in order to keep people talking about these other things, rather than the fact that he's conceded on the point of the ceasefire. which of course leaves the Russians in a position of advantage, because without a ceasefire, they're able to continue advancing and winning the war in Ukraine. I agree with that 100%. But I would note that once you take the ceasefire off the table and you say that you have to have a final peace agreement,

the whole issue of security guarantees is, integrated into that final peace agreement. In other words, for security guarantees to be realized, the Russians have to agree in the final peace agreement that security guarantees, which include the deployment of NATO forces on Ukrainian soil, is okay with them. And as we have said, and I think anybody with a triple digit IQ and an interest in facts and logic understands that's not going to happen.

The Russians are not going to agree to that in a final peace agreement. So this is not a serious issue. It's just more of the empty debates that we have in the West all the time. I want to talk a little bit about Trump and what's going on here. I think Trump is in a very subtle and clever way. way trying to distance himself from this war and turn the responsibility from managing the war over to the Europeans and to the Ukrainians themselves, of course. Now, Glenn, this is picking up on a point you made.

Trump is in a situation where he has to be very careful when the Ukrainian military finally loses in a serious way that he's not blamed. So what he wants to make sure he does is not cut off the flow of weapons and not cut off intelligence because he doesn't want to be blamed when Ukraine finally loses. And what he has done here is he's come up with this clever strategy where Europe buys weapons from the United States, Europe pays for those weapons,

and Europe ships those weapons to Ukraine. So Trump can say the Ukrainians are still getting American weaponry. It's just that I've been clever enough to get the Europeans to pay for them and ship them to the Ukrainians. So the Biden pipeline is not going to end, but it's not going to be the Trump pipeline, at least from a public relations point of view. It's going to be the European pipeline. It's going to be a bigger pipeline because those American weapons are coming in. So the Ukrainians are going to continue to get weaponry from the West to include the United States. But Trump is going to be able in a very subtle way to distance himself.

Then just think about the meeting that he's trying to set up with Zelensky and Putin. You notice he says, I don't want to be there for the first meeting. This is Donald Trump, who's always the master of social. ceremonies, who always likes to be center stage. He's saying, let Putin and Zelensky get together and solve this one. And I think the reason is that he understands he can't solve this one. He can meet with Putin. He and Putin can agree. Alexander was getting at this before. There's not much daylight between Putin and Trump. The problem is that Trump can't sell anything he agrees to with Putin to the Europeans and the Ukrainians. Okay, then let the Ukrainians and the Europeans deal with the Russians.

Let them talk to Putin. Let Zelensky get together with Putin. And at the same time, everything that's happening on the battlefield will influence how Zelensky and the Europeans deal with Putin. And Trump surely realizes that with the passage of time, Ukraine, which is already in dire straits on the battlefield will be in an even worse situation. And there'll be more of an incentive than ever moving forward for the Ukrainians and the Russians to cut, Ukrainians and the Europeans to cut some sort of deal with the Russians. And Trump can sit back, let them do it. And as things deteriorate on the battlefield, he can say, I cannot be blamed for this, because I did not cut off the flow of weaponry to the Ukrainians.

So I think this is basically what's happening here. It would be a very clever strategy, though, because, again, it's evident that NATO has lost the war. So, you know, if you were advising Trump, this would be a good way to, well, first get your money back, that is, to have the first Ukrainians hand over some of their minerals, then, of course, getting the Europeans to accept that they will buy the American weapons to send to Ukraine. That also enables Trump to outsource the containment of Russia to Europe, while he can get along with the Russians, both in bilateral relations and possibly work together in Asia.

And also, when the whole thing goes south, the Europeans get to take the fall and blimp for the whole thing. So it does make a lot of sense in terms of losing a war. This is a good way of going out. But I guess my question is, what's in it for the Europeans? Because I see the Europeans, you know, sit there like good schoolboys in the Oval Office, but people like Mertz

is still suggesting that, you know, we really need this ceasefire and we commit ourselves to continuing to fight. Wonder Lion starts to speak of another sanctions package. I'm not sure if this is 19th or 20th, I

kind of, but I'm sure this one will do the trick. but it's how do you make sense of the European position because I can understand very well that the Ukrainians will have a hard time of swallong this. I understand for them the Russians are an existential threat. I understand the Russians

they see NATO in Ukraine is an existential threat. I get the Americans if they wanted to want to pull out of this a losing war but I just can't make sense of the European position. It's very strange to me. It is very strange and it's also, can I just say, an extremely undignified position.

This is something that even the British media is now talking about. There's been articles in the British media yesterday and today about what a shabby picture, the leaders of Europe cut in the White House. They were all there as if they were listening to the school teacher and that they were being given a lesson. I mean, it was unattractive. But ultimately, it all comes back to this desire to keep the Americans in Europe. And what I think they're doing, ultimately, is they're playing for time, trying to keep the war going, trying to keep the Americans involved, trying to the extent that they can

to turn Trump against Putin again. I mean, this still seems to be part of what they're trying to do, and basically wait out Trump, or hope that Trump himself ultimately loses patience with Putin and reverts to the kind of strong position that, as they would say, that Biden had. So I think this is really what all they have, and I think that's all they're doing. There are voices of dissent starting to appear. There was an article in the Daily Telegraph, which is an important use. paper, by the way, it's very, very close to the British defence and security establishment. Just a second. There was an article by a man called Owen Matthews, who's a well-connected journalist here.

And he said, for the first time, that not talking to the Russians for Europe had been a catastrophic mistake and that the time has come to start negotiations, to start a dialogue, a European dialogue, a proper European dialogue with the Russians. Now, for the moment, that's still unusual. It's the first

article of that kind to have appeared. But, you know, a swallow might point to the coming of summer. We'll just have to see. I have a question for both of you as Europeans.

Do you think that The European elites, the present cast of characters who are running the European countries, except for maybe Victor Orban and one or two others, do you think they view Russia as an existential threat? When I listen to European leaders and lots of you European commentators talk, it seems to me that they've convinced themselves that Russia is going to take all of Ukraine, it's going to conquer countries in Eastern Europe, and it is a serious threat to Western Europe. And if we don't stop them now,

we're going to pay a godawful price down the road. I mean, I think this is ludicrous, and I know you two do as well. But do you think that the governing elites in Europe seriously believe that Russia is an existential threat? Well, it's hard to be, I mean, it's possible that they have. have convinced themselves. But I find it strange because people like Macron, in her time,

Merkel, as well, they all recognize the dangers of trying to construct a Europe without Russia, more or less recognizing it would unavoidably become a Europe against Russia. And so it kind contradicts with some of the former statement. But also, if Russia's really an existential threat, why haven't we been building proper armies? Why not join the fight with the Ukrainians? Why aren't we're trying to take Moscow if we really think we're fighting Hitler here. I mean, this is very strange. I think it's a bit like the security guarantees. I think the main purpose, the reason why you want security guarantees with the Americans

is to lock in the Americans on the continent that the U.S. won't pull out of this transatlantic partnership. I think they see the world going in a multipolar direction. They're doing what they can to keep the Americans there. when they signed this god-awful trade agreement with the EU, even the EU officials were recognizing, well, it's not just a trade agreement. We have to strengthen the partnership and, yeah,

try to elevate the role or the value of Europe for the Americans. So I have a hard time believing it. On the other hand, you know, human beings were vulnerable a bit to group think, or we subordinate our rationality to this group psychology. And when every politician, every newspaper, every TV station says exactly the same thing. Anyone who dissents or criticizes this is immediately a Putinist. And, you know, what do you call it, almost like a fifth columnist, it's after a while, after three and a half years, I think it's just very difficult for anyone to push back.

I don't know. I at least spoken to several former diplomats in this country who would call, say, yeah, of course, this is crazy, this is nonsense. But no one would actually speak up because, you know, you would have your head chopped off. So it's, it might be some mass delusion, but I think it's fake, but that's my opinion. Well, I think this is right. I mean, hysteria, when it is so widespread, does pull in an awful lot of people. And a lot of this probably conceals deep doubts.

I suspect that it's different in different places. So if we're talking about the Baltic states, which of course very small, but which wield an enormous amount of influence, I suspect that there, some of the Baltic leaders probably do generally believe much of their rhetoric. They're very close to Russia. These countries were part of the Soviet Union and then the Russian Empire. until very recently, they feel very vulnerable and they're very nervous of Russia and they've got historical reasons to be. And I think this rhetoric when it comes from them probably has some basis and truth, some genuine belief behind it.

If you're talking about Spain, then they don't believe it at all. The Spanish government not only is resisting putting up defence spending to 5% of it. of GDP, but it's actually passing off some of its welfare and civilian infrastructure spending as defence spending in order to massage the statistics. Italy, by the way, is doing the same. The British government talks incersently about an existential threat from Russia, but it's only going to bring defense spending up to 5% of GDP, if it ever does, by 2035. So what is supposed to happen between now and 2035? So there is a lot of rhetoric, a lot of worry, a lot of anger, a lot of fear that the Americans

are going. But I don't think amongst the bigger states, this reality, this real fear, if you put, get below the hysteria is really there. What I think perhaps does play a role and which drives it to some extent is this, if the Americans were to leave and the Russians were to come out of the war appearing to be the winners,

then a lot of the processes of European construction that we have seen play out over the last three decades. the way in which the European Union has been built up, the way it's been organized, all of that would indeed be under challenge. And of course, with that, the political positions, not just of individual politicians and leaders in Europe, but of some of the political forces that they lead, would find themselves under challenge as well. So it may not be an existential threat from Russia in the sense of the Russians

marching into Europe, taking everything over and changing everything and supporting and aiding it to themselves. But it could lead to a different Europe from the one we have now. And those who are invested in the existing Europe would probably be very alarmed by that prospect. I was going to say, oh, sorry. No, I was just going to go ahead. You first. I was going to say, Alexander took the words right out of my mouth. I think that is what's going on.

I put just a finer point on it by saying that the package of developments that you described could be defined as an existential threat. In other words, the end of NATO and America pulling out of Europe in a serious way coupled with a Russian victory in Ukraine, that whole package could be seen as an existential threat. So it's not just Russia per se, as you were saying, that the elites are so concerned about, it's the whole package. Well, I just want to say, well, I think Russia being the new,

trying to restore the Soviet Union, obviously this is all nonsense. But that being said, you can't really rule out some, that the relationship isn't going to go back to the way it was when this war is over. It's worth knowing that the Europeans tended to be a bit cautious. If you remember, the Germans limited themselves to sending helmets. They didn't want to end up provoking a military response from the Russians. Well, in this war, though, we really went all in. That is, the Europeans now have become, you know, well, supported and being complicit

in the killings of tens of thousands of Russian soldiers for three and a half years. They talk about the strategic defeat of Russia on the battlefield, destroying its economy, isolating it in the international system, putting pressure on other countries to do so. You had Kayakalas talking about breaking up Russia into smaller nations. Similar comments from the Polish president, he called it a Russia prison of nations, 200 nations captured in Russia. I mean, as I said, we went to really all in on this,

and we would never have done so if the United States didn't stand right behind us. And now the war is lost and Americans are walking away. This is a very, very exposed position. So I do on some level understand why the Europeans now are, well, getting a bit nervous. but this feels like doubling down when it's obvious that Americans will leave. This will be the time to try to kiss and make up, I would think. But, yeah, I don't know, this would be, from my perspective, a legitimate concern, which the Europeans should have for Russia,

because there's a lot of anger now in Moscow towards the Europeans, especially the Germans. Well, the question you have to ask yourself was, where does this leave us? Where are we headed? I mean, I think it's quite clear that we all agree that you're not going to get a meaningful peace agreement. If anything, it seems like the distrust on both sides is growing, the mere fact that we're even discussing whether the Europeans think Russia is an existential threat. And you, Glenn, just said that the Russians are angry toward the Europeans for understandable reasons from their point of view, and especially angry towards the Germans. And the Germans are as hard line as the French and the British. I mean, where does this leave us? There's, I think, no way you're going to get a meaningful peace agreement.

And as Alexander emphasized before, the ceasefires off the table. So, again, it just seems to me it all comes down to what happens on the battlefield. Absolutely, it's exactly that. That is what's going to happen on the battlefield. And here, just to make an observation, which is that those who have been following the battlefield closely, which is all three of us, I've been discussing many times the importance of the fighting in Dombas and the way the Russians have come up against the last big barrier there.

And one of the useful things that's come out over the discussions of the last week is that there's finally an admission in the media at large, at least here in Europe, about the fact that this is basically the big fortified barrier that Ukraine has been defending itself behind, and that if it is broken, then Ukraine is going to be in very difficult position indeed, not just in terms of Dombas, but in terms of its overall position.

Now, I remain of the view that despite all that we've been hearing about the Russians, the distrust of Europe, there are continuing concerns about, the US, they would still prefer a peace agreement. I think that what the Russians are probably hoping is that as they break through this last remaining big barrier, as they see their army becoming more successful on the battlefields, over the course of a negotiating process, there will be more and pressure, ultimately from the Americans, upon the Ukrainians, to make more and more concessions, leading to something very close to what the Russians proposed in Putin's speech to the foreign

ministry last year. I still think the Russians don't want to go to Western Ukraine. I'm not convinced they want to cross the river, the deeper. I don't think they want to do any of those things. That would be, from a Russian point of view, the optimal outcome. The danger is that with this animus towards them that John was talking about, the Europeans don't see this. The Ukrainians refuse to see this. They go on fighting and continue to fight, even as the Ukrainian defences in Dombas break down. They spurn any American attempts to get the Europeans, the Ukrainians, to come to terms of the Russians on the kind of terms that we've just been talking about, in which case, of course, the Russians will break through to the river. And then we will have a

crisis on our hands much bigger than the one we have now. Because the Russians might not want to cross the NEPA, but they might feel that they have no choice. And we are in exactly that desolate situation that John, you've warned about in many, many programs that we've done and in many, many places where we have an indefinite crisis in Europe with two armed forces facing off against each other, the Russians positioned where they don't want to be, where there's no real agreements between either of the sides, and Europe is in a state of continuous military confrontation against Russia, which doesn't want to be in that position either, but which also finds itself there.

So that, I'm afraid, is a very real possibility. And it depends on, to avoid it, it depends on a level of statesmanship from the leaders of Europe, which we have absolutely not seen up to now. And which would mean them going back on their rhetoric and doing what Owen Matthews was talking about in the Daily Telegraph, which is beginning their own contacts with Moscow, of which for the moment it must be said, they show no sign. I'd just like to say a few words about the course of the war. If you sort of look at what's going on in the battlefield, it's quite clear that the Ukrainians are suffering enormously from the fact that they don't have enough infantry. And you need a lot of infantry to populate the forward edge of the battle area, what we used to call when I was in the military, the FIBA. and they just don't have enough infantry. And as time goes by, I think the infantry forces thin out even further.

So just looking at the battlefield itself, it's just hard to see how the Ukrainians can stem the tide, much less reversing. And then you go to the home front. Public opinion in terms of support for the war, has tanked. It looks like around 70% of Ukrainians want to settle this one. They've had enough of the war. So when you put what's happening on the battlefield together with what's happening on the Ukrainian home front, it's hard to see how they can sustain this war for a long period of time. And then take it even a step further, the Americans. The Ukrainians, the Ukrainians, surely understand both the body populace and people on the front lines and the elites that the

Americans are slowly but steadily divorcing themselves from this conflict that can't help but have a negative effect on ukraine's sort of willingness to continue this conflict uh you would just think that this can't last that long from a Ukrainian point of view. I understand that Ukrainian nationalism is really a powerful force that allows the Ukrainian military to fight under the most adverse circumstances and to do remarkably well, given the disadvantages they've had up to now and will have moving forward. It's quite amazing how hard-nosed and tough the Ukrainians are. But at the same time, that was true the Germans in World War I. And in 1918, they had just had enough. Events on the home front

brought the Germans to their knees, coupled with what was happening on the battlefield. And it's hard to see that not happening here. And I think when that happens, it's going to be a devastating blow for NATO. And as we were saying before, you want to remember that what Trump is trying to do here is she's trying to shift responsibility for the war to the Europeans and to the Ukrainians. And he's trying to back off himself. And he wants to leave himself in a position where he's not exposed because he's giving weapons through the Europeans. So I think the Europeans are going to end up with egg all over their face. And by the way, one other argument that Trump can make is, listen, I talked to Putin in Alaska. Putin and I were willing to settle this one. And it was the Europeans and

Ukrainians who were roadblocks. And now that things are going south, you want to blame me. Don't blame me. If you would listen to me after Alaska, we could have solved this one then. But you wanted to continue fighting. I didn't. Look what's happened. We've lost this war. And really, when you get right down to it, you, Europe and you, Ukraine, have lost the war. So I think that's sort of where we're headed here. It's hard to say for sure. But it certainly looks that way to me. We just discussed the rationality of threat analysis in terms of whether Russia's trying to restore the Soviet Union. But I think this is also a problem with the analysis of the front lines, because I keep hearing in all media reports from politicians, when they want to build up a case why we should continue this war. Well, the frontlines haven't really moved that much.

If you look at the big Ukrainian map and it's full, it's only tiny slivers the Russians. are able to take. So it's this glacier speed. But from my perspective, this is very dishonest because this is not, again, this is a war of attrition. I feel I made that point until I was, you know, blew in the face. That is, you know, you don't storm heavily fortified defensive lines and bleed out all your forces and equipment in a war of attrition. You destroy the enemy. And once they're destroyed, as exhausted, and as John suggested, when they're not able to man the front lines anymore and there's more holes popping up,

then you go for the territory. And I feel this is the moment we're currently in big places, like Kopjansk is being encircled. Pokrovsk is encircled. Konstantinivka, not just encircled, semi-encircled, that is, but the Russians have now entered the city as well. If this falls, combined with the breakthrough north of Pokrovsk,

they can begin to encircle slowly both Krematarsk and Slaviansk. This is going to be very problematic. You're going to have logistics cut off. The Russians will be able to build up more forces closer to the front line as well as the logistics. The Ukrainians don't have that many frontlines which are reliable. As we often see at the end of wars, the casualties begins to spike on the Ukrainian side. More desertions.

People don't want to fight anymore. you're seeing all of these things happening now. But when you address the analysis coming from especially the European politicians, it's like, well, you know, this war could last for another hundred years. Look how slowly the movements are forward. But that doesn't really mean much. When there's no more soldiers to hold the front lines anymore, suddenly you see huge groups of soldiers being encircled, captured, killed.

Things are going to go from bad to worse. very soon, I think. So it just feels Trump is ready to save the day for the Europeans and we're fighting him to the bitter end. It's very strange to watch. Well, I agree with that completely. And I would add that we don't actually have much time in Europe to prevent the worst. Because, of course, if there is a Ukrainian collapse in the front lines, if the Russians reach the battle through to the NEPA or something like that happens, then we are in a very, very difficult indeed and all of this constant rhetoric about the Russians only moving a few hundred yards or whatever it is and that the war will go on for another four years and that the Russians will lose was it two million men or something like that

capturing the remainder of Donbass all of this all that he does is it reinforces in well apart from being very cruel it reinforces a dangerous complacency in Europe that we have plenty of time and that we can maybe wait this out and string the Americans along and keep the Ukrainians still fighting and then Trump will go away and things will be all right somehow

in some kind of a way. I don't think we do have an infinite amount of time. I think we have very, very short amount of time. I mean, I think that what John's analysis about the state of the conflict is absolutely correct. But what has to get breakthrough this conceptually as well to understand that we are closer in Europe, specifically in Europe, to a much bigger crisis than we believe ourselves to be in. And that might not be that far away. It might be months away, certainly not years.

And the United States, to repeat again, many points made many times, the United States is an ocean away. It's well protected. It's huge. It's rich. It can get by whatever happens. It won't be directly affected. But if we end up in the situation in Europe, where the Russians battle through to the Dnieper,

and we still haven't come to any kind of agreement with them, and we might have political chaos in Ukraine, and the Russians might feel obliged because they don't want chaos on their borders to move beyond the Dnieper, or something like that. Then we would be in that situation of desolation that John has talked about in many programs, and the people in Europe who are going to be affected by it is us,

Not the Americans, the Americans can do many things. We will be in that crisis. At a time when our economies are in crisis, our financial systems are in crisis, I was reading recently an analysis about how we have no plans in Europe about how to increase productivity, which in Europe has been falling. We are nowhere close to where the Americans and the Chinese are in developing the new technologies.

We, in fact, falling further and furthered behind. And if we have this crisis on top of that, then, frankly, the outlook for Europe and its people is very bleak indeed. Yeah, I agree with that. I want to make two more points just about the war of attrition. I believe that if you look at how the Russians have waged the war, they've waged it in a very sophisticated way. And the Ukrainians sometimes say that, including General Siersky. If you compare World War I to Russian strategy in this war, it's actually quite different. In World War I, both sides would take massive forces, get out of war.

out of the trenches and attack head on into the teeth of well-fortified defenses and huge numbers of people would die. Think the Battle of the Somme, think they're done, and so forth and so on. It was incredibly bloody. And in the process, the Allies and the Germans, whichever side was on the offensive to start with, ended up conquering very little territory. The front lines hardly moved at all. What the Russians have done is they have avoided, for the most part, frontal assaults, especially

in more recent years. And they use clever tactics. This is not to say that they don't suffer significant casualties because there's no way you can fight a war of attrition and not lose lots of people. But the Russians have not lost that many people. And they have not gained much territory in large part because they've not been. not focused on that. They focused on using clever tactics to isolate the Ukrainian forces and kill more Ukrainian forces than kill Russian forces, right? So it's just very important that one not

emphasized territory, not that we were doing that, but many people on the outside do. Capturing territory is not the name of the game here. It's the casualty exchange ratio. And the Russians have done, I believe, as good a job as you can, in. minimizing casualties. Second point I'd make, just to go back to comparing World War I with the present war, if you look at 1918, in the spring of 1918, March 1918, the Germans launched the famous Ludendorf offensives, and it looked like the Germans might win the war in the spring of of 1918. Remember, they had knocked the Russians out of the war in October of 1917. That's when the communists came to power, the Soviet Union came into being, and they dropped out of the war.

And all those divisions that were on the eastern front were moved to the Western Front. So the Germans had a significant advantage in March 1918 when they launched the famous Ludendorf offensives. Those offensives failed, and by the summer the Germans were in deep trouble, and of course the war ended in November. Now, one of the key reasons that the Germans did not win the war was that the Americans came in. The Americans declared war in April of 1917, but they did not have substantial troops in Europe until the spring, late spring of 1918. And it was the coming of a massive American army, this infusion of infantry.

This infusion, massive infusion of trigger pullers on the allied side that convinced the Germans that they could not win the war after the Ludendorf offensives failed. Now, what about the present situation in Ukraine? The Americans are going in the other direction. The Americans are not coming in. The Americans are pulling out. Just think of our discussion of security guarantees. Just think of Alexander's discussion of how secure the United States is, how it has that big ocean, how the United States can go cause trouble around the world, and then when things go south,

just pull out. And it's still secure. But anyway, to go to Ukraine, we are slowly but steadily withdrawing our support for Ukraine, unlike the situation that you saw in 1918. And this is why I think Ukraine is doomed. Yeah, well, the Russians call it cauldrons when they do the semi or almost full encirclement of key strategic regions. And it's quite clever because these key regions, which are important to the Ukrainians, the Russians make sure that they get the main supply roads under fire control to make sure that there's heavy losses as they do their supplies in and out and rotation.

in and out of these cities or regions. Now, what you often see then is that the Ukrainians are rushing troops into this cauldrons in order to hold them, so they won't have a breakthrough. And again, they take all this heavy losses only entering and leaving the city, only to find that the Russians are not really in a rush, that they find this, they create these scenarios or situations where they have very favorable attrition rates, where the Ukrainians are taking massive losses.

And often they find the Russians don't seem to be in a rush to take these territories because this is an opportunity to grind down the Ukrainian army. So, no, I don't know, I just feel we watch the same thing happen over and over again, and it doesn't seem to impact the narrative, which our politicians and media seems to push. That is all the Russians aren't able to take this. territory. Well, they created a perfect scenario where the Ukrainians take huge casualties and the Russians have minimal. Why would they be in a rush? It's just, it's, you know, if we're allowed to say something positive about Russia in the West, we could admit that in a war

of attrition, this is a clever move. But, you know, every narrative has to be that the Russians are stupid, they're having human waves, they don't care about lives, even though it's strategic to preserve life when you're in a war of attrition. I just wanted to, well, unless you have other comments on... I'll just make one very quick comment about this, which is about rules of attrition. Now, I'm not, as I said many, many times that person with any sort of military background or a previous interest in military things. But one thing I have learned is the extent to which the Russians have an intellectual

approach to war. I mean, this is what the general staff in Moscow is all about. It's got vast numbers of military accounts. and institutions and all kinds of things. And they are the sort of people who, more than perhaps, you would find in militaries in other places, would probably look at a problem, like the one that they were confronted in,

in Ukraine, initially, a country, a very large country, a sophisticated and advanced country with relatively sophisticated armed forces, and they say to themselves, how ultimately are we going to win a war against an adversary like this? And you can imagine that they sat down and worked it out and planned it out in advance. It's not, I think,

if you know how the Russian military system functions. It's not, I think, completely surprising that they do that. I mean, the amount of time and resources and energy they give to thinking about war It's very unlike what we see in the West. It's the one thing they do very well. The other thing I would say, Alexander, is that all armies learn in the course of the war.

So if you look at the Russian Army in 2022, it was a much less effective fighting force than it is today. Because again, armies learn. You know, I've looked at the Soviet performance in World War II. and the exchange ratio in terms of lost armored vehicles in 1941. This, of course, is when Barbarossa took place from June 22nd, 1941 to December 8, 1941. The exchange ratio in lost armored vehicles was about seven to one in the Germans favor. In other words, the Soviets lost, the Red Army lost seven armored vehicles for every one that the Germans lost. By 44, late 1944, early 1945, the ratio is about one to one, close to one to one.

The Soviets have really learned how to fight those Panzer divisions. They've gotten much more effective. Now you say to yourself, John, well, what about the Ukrainians? Don't they learn as well? I do think the Ukrainians have learned. And if you listen to them talk, they've learned for sure. But the problem is their military has been hollowed out. It's not that they haven't learned.

It's that the fighting forces, as we've talked about with regard to their infantry, have reached the crisis point. They're not able to train forces. They recruit people and basically ship them to the front lines. This is a disastrous situation. The Russians on the other side not only have been learning, but their forces are anything but hollowed out. They've raised huge numbers of forces.

That rather small and not terribly effective Russian army of 1920, excuse me, of 2022, is a much bigger army today and a much more effective army. And I think this explains a lot about where the war is heading these days and where it's likely to head moving forward. So, well, we all seem to think this is going to end in a war going to end on the battlefield, or at least more pressure is going to have. to be, the Europeans can have to come under greater pressure before accepting these very harsh terms of the Russians. What I find interesting with the territorial issue though is the argument is we can't walk out of Donbass, the territory which the Russians do not hold yet, because this is where all the great front lines are and the great defensive lines. Because from what I understand the Russians will be willing to make some freeze the front lines.

lines or change the borders of Kreson and Saperuizia, but the Donetsk, they want everything. However, every day that passes, this will be less painful, I guess, because more territory will fall to the Russians. Not so there will be less to give up in Donetsk, but at the same time, the Russians will then begin to take more out of Sapericia, especially if they now open up this front line, which there's been a lot of talk about, well, I guess to some extent they already are. So, but, yeah, I want to just, yeah, my,

I guess my last issue wanted to ask, the both of you was, where do we go next in this diplomatic efforts by Trump? I'm not sure if he really believes in it or not, but again, the first step was Trump put in, the second was Trump Zelenskyy, plus his European entourage. And next one would be either Putin Zelensky or Putin Zelensky and Trump. But do you see this moving forward?

And again, if his main goal is just tell people what they want to hear, so he tells Europeans and the Russians two different things, won't this all fall apart when he brings the two parties together? Well, I would ask you, Glenn, what's the deal here? I mean, what's the compromise deal that both sides can agree to? For Trump to bring them together

assumes that you're going to get some sort of agreement. I don't see any basis for an agreement. So why do you think there's any chance of this working? I agree. No, well, this is why I do think you know that both of these meetings could go well that it now would it go well

because he could as you suggested before it could tell that Russians what they wanted to hear it can tell the Europeans more or less what they wanted to hear except for the ceasefire but I don't think it would go well at all with meeting both Zelensky and Putin because well they're too far apart

and I think there's no deal here Glenn there's just a deal oh exactly so it looks like this would blow up in his face. And the idea that they would be rushed ahead before I mean, why would they meet if there's

not a deal in place? You know, Putin and Zelenskyy aren't negotiators. It's very strange to me that, you know, isn't this the last step of negotiation? You bring in the big guys to shake hands and the signs on papers, but you know, what about the

small guys, the ones who actually hatch out the deals? They seem to have skipped that whole part, which is a bit strange. Well, I don't know that there's going to be any serious meeting between Putin and Zelensky. I think Putin can conduct a negotiation. I think he's the sort of person who would be very good at negotiation. I think Zelensky is capable of conducting an effective negotiation for exactly the reasons that John basically pointed to,

which is that any negotiation at this stage at the war would require Zelensky to make concessions to the Russians on core issues, core issues for him, which he is not capable, he's not capable of making. The only way, I mean, that they could be a peace agreement, any kind would be as a result of a complete change of power in Kiev. Zelensky himself goes. Somebody completely different takes his place and negotiates an agreement very much along the lines that the Russians set out in their terms of 14th of June 2024 and accepts that the Ukraine that comes out of this crisis is going to be one which to a greater or lesser extent is going to be a bit like Finland after the Second World War in the Russian sphere of influence. Now that is a very, very tall order.

I mean, even if you could remove Zelensky from the scene, there's no guarantee that you could control the outcome in Kiev. So unless there is major diplomatic pressure by the Americans, by the Europeans, the Americans and the Europeans working together to control what happens in Kiev to try and bring about a change there, trying to get somebody completely different to take over. I can't really see the negotiation working out at all. I think all of this talk about a trilateral meeting and a bilateral meeting between Putin and Selensky and holding it in Rome or holding it in Geneva or holding it in some other place.

Budapest, I believe, is the latest place that they're talking about. I don't think this remotely addresses the core problem which is that these two men are so far apart. That just isn't any way that they can agree, even if this meeting happens. And Zelensky himself is not going to be capable of conducting a coherent negotiation. Yeah, and you want to remember when we started the program,

we were talking about security guarantees and all grand schemes that are being floated. Those security guarantees make it even more difficult to compromise. The situation is just getting worse, right, in terms of reaching some sort of deal. And, again, as I think we all agree, this one's going to be settled on the battlefield, and the end result is not going to be pretty for Europe, as Alexander was articulating earlier. Yeah, this is the part that is very infuriating, because this is, you know, For all this talk, all this years about wanting to stand with Ukraine and all this supposed empathy,

this is going to destroy Ukraine. Not only will they take huge casualties at the last stages of this war as things begin to collapse, they will lose more territory, they will lose more infrastructure, the ability to recover at all for Ukraine to actually survive as a nation. All of this will be undermined now. There's nothing to rebuild if you don't put an end to this. This is going to be, I think, John, you referred to it in the past as a very ugly piece if it is finished on the battlefield.

Well, if I'm not mistaken. I think this is, yeah, what's going to happen. And it's just the rhetoric you get here in Europe versus the actual reality of what they're doing. It just seems like their oceans are part of it. and the damage that's been done to the European economies, especially the German economy. I mean, it's not only the Ukrainians who are losers here, it's also the Europeans. I mean, of course, the Europeans have lost nowhere near as much as the Ukrainians have, but the Europeans have lost here.

This is going to do significant damage to NATO. And you have Donald Trump in the White House. Is he going to help Ukraine recover in the years ahead? Is he going to send lots of largesse, lots of money to Ukraine to help Ukraine recover from this war? I would not bet a lot of money on this. This is a catastrophic situation for Ukraine. And the idea that continuing this war is going to rescue the situation for them, it's just not a serious argument.

But people like us can't sell that logic. Can't sell that set of facts to people on the outside. for the most part. I agree with that. I mean, I have nothing really to add to that. We have experienced the greatest failure in European statesmanship since the end of the Second World War.

I mean, it has been a disaster, and it's getting worse, and one concedes that all the pieces are falling into place to make that disaster happen. To come back to the earlier points, I don't think there is going to be a diplomatic solution to this war. As I said, it would require too much to happen in Kiev, in Europe, for that to be possible.

Any lost words? John. I'm out of words. I don't know. Well, I don't know what to say. All these shows end on such a depressing note, but... I think, you know, if you're operating in a reality-based world, it's hard not to be pessimistic in the extreme. But, you know, one little positive in out there would be Trump's efforts to normalize the bilateral relations with Russia.

Again, I don't exclude some deception here. That is that he still would like to outsource. a lot of the hostility to the European. So if he sells the weapons, you know, Americans will still provide the intelligence, logistics, and targeting. So it's not as if they're divorced, but the efforts nonetheless to have improved relations between the United States and Russia, I think this is great news for everyone. If you have the two world's largest nuclear powers, yeah, two of the three major great powers in the world, now being able to sit down and talk to each other, which apparently wasn't possible for three years, you know,

I think the world is a much safer place. So, you know, that's at least something, you know, if we're looking desperately for some, you know, ending on a good note. So anyways, thank you both. I always look forward to this. So, yeah, thank you for your time. Thank you. Thank you, Glenn.

Thank you, Alexander. Thank you.