The Duran Podcast - Putin challenged on Trump Tomahawk deployment

Episode Date: October 14, 2025

Putin challenged on Trump Tomahawk deployment

All right, Alexander, let's talk about the diplomacy between the United States and Russia. Once again, the diplomacy between Trump and Putin. And maybe we can also talk about the lack of diplomacy between the European Union and Russia. So let's start out with Trump and Putin. What's going on here? Well, I do think anybody completely can figure this out. But we've had more comments from both Putin and Trump over the last couple of days. Putin had an unusually difficult press conference in Tajikistan, in Dushan Bay,

where he was quite obviously being challenged over the Tomahawk missiles and other things. And I got the clear sense that the rush, well, there was no clear sense about it. It was absolutely clear that he was running into problems. now challenges from sections of the Russian media. He is trying still to keep some kind of door open to Donald Trump. In our last program, we pointed out how more hardline figures in Russia are starting to say enough's enough. We had Seredaeradha, the Deputy Foreign Minister, saying that the entire momentum created by the Anchorage Summit had stalled. We've had further strong comments from the, from Lavrov and from other Russian officials. Putin, however, was then

challenged about all of these comments. His closest officials, the officials, closest to him, Usherkhov and Peskov were asked about this. They did the extraordinary thing, most unusual thing, of, to some extent, well, clearly pushing back against what Riyan, Mabke had reported to the Duma. They said, no, it hasn't stalled. We've still got problems. The Ukrainians aren't showing any interest in negotiations, but Anchorage is not exhausted. And then Putin gave a press conference in Dushanbe, in which he said the same thing. He referred to Trump as Donald. You could see that there was unease, to put it mildly, from the Russian journalists there.

And one of them shouted at him, what about the Tomahawks, which is most unusual? And Putin responded very briefly and shortly about the Tomahawks and said, if the tomahawks are supplied, if there's any question of it, we will enhance our self-defense,

our air defense, which is again not a response that many people in Russia are satisfied with. So, you could see this. Now, on the other side... Just to be clear, Putin's response was if the United States fires long-range missiles that could be equipped with a nuclear warhead will just beef up by air defense. That was his response.

But the point is that these long-range missiles can carry a nuclear warhead if they're launched into Russia. And we also know about the launch platforms and how difficult it is and all of these things. But the point is Putin's response to the President of the United States saying, we are going to launch missiles with a nuclear war hit into Russia. His response was, we'll beef up our air defense systems. Well, indeed. What I will say about this, it's important to actually get a grip on the actual press conference itself, because in some ways, it's actually, I wouldn't say worse, but it shows that there is clearly argument and anger about this, because Putin was talking about

the fact that he was basically responding to the fact that Zelensky was talking about conducting missile strikes against Russia. And somebody said, you know, is this posturing? And Putin said, yes, it is absolutely posturing. I mean, what more can you expect for Zelensky than that? And then somebody clearly interjected. There was an interjection from the floor. And then Putin said, look, you're going to talk to me about the Tomahawks. And the question then came, well, what are we going to do about the Tomahawks? And a clearly very annoyed Putin said, we're going to be for up our air defenses, full stop. He didn't say anything more than that.

And he moved immediately onto the next subject. So my take on this is that he really doesn't want to talk about this subject. He doesn't want to talk about the Tom Hawks and people in Russia. And that was the whole dynamic of this press conference were pushing him and saying to him, well, you can't just leave it at that. You can't run away from this subject. So you could see that Putin was being challenged at this press conference in ways that, you know, to put it mildly, extremely unusual within the Russian media space. I mean, you know, with press conferences at which Lavrov goes or Medvedev goes, I mean, it's a free-for-all. Journalists can ask whatever they want.

But with Putin, usually it's much, much more respectful than this. This is one instance when, as I said, the media, the media group, who are all Russian journalists, by the way? He was only taking questions from sections of the Russian media. They are getting increasingly frustrated about this. That's Putin. Can I just say because the journalists are doing their job, Alex. I mean, they're doing their job. It's perfectly okay to question. No, no, no. I'm not dispute. Absolutely people should question Putin. Yes. He's the leader of a country. And I think the journalists are doing their job. But the point is, as I said, that this is now being done in much more aggressive ways than I have ever seen. And this is coming, as I said, from the media. And the media clearly are expressing wider frustrations within one. Russian society and within sections of the Russian leadership. Anyway, he still clings on to this idea that he can somehow patch something together with Donald Trump. Now, Trump himself has also been speaking, and Trump gave really quite extraordinary comments.

Firstly, he thanked Putin for Putin's comments about the Nobel Peace Prize. I'm not going to waste time about that, but it was a polite thing from Trump towards Putin. And then Trump is again talking about Putin, you know, obviously wanting peace and we're going to get peace together. And then he also said, you know, if I tell Putin that we must make peace and Putin doesn't agree, then I will send Tomahawks. Which gives clearly the impression that Trump is trying to use Tomahawks, the whole issue of the Tomahawks, to try to gain leverage over Putin and push Putin towards. negotiations. And I think that at some level, this is what this is all about. Now, I think Putin doesn't want Trump to think that by talking about Tomahawks, he's gaining any leverage. So he's trying to play this whole issue down. The point is that people in Russia, I mean,

they don't care anymore. They don't believe that this dialogue between Putin and Trump is going to lead anywhere in the end. And the fact that the media, the Russian media are challenging Putin, the fact that the Russian foreign ministry is challenging Putin shows that Putin on this question, as we discussed in our previous program, is becoming increasingly, well, he's increasingly out there on a limb. Why doesn't Putin just play it straight with Trump? Because this is not diplomacy. It's not diplomacy from Trump. Definitely not diplomacy from Trump. And it is this stupid little game of if, yeah, it's a bluff. But it's a little game of, you know, if you don't agree to capitulate Russia, then we're maybe, maybe going to send Tomahawk missiles to Zelensky,

the big, beautiful missiles to Zelensky, who's been calling me now every day, it seems, and I'm discussing with him every single day about Tomahawks. But that's coming from the Trump side of things, not to mention all the truth social posts. where he's bashing Putin and Russia. I mean, he bashes and insults Russia. Plain and simple, there's no sugar-coating this, so there's no Tendie chest or anything like that. In Trump's posts, he bashes Russia,

he bashes and embarrasses and humiliates Putin. That's the bottom line of it. That's it. He may be doing it to please the neo-cons. He may be doing it to please the Europeans. But why? I thought he's the big, bad emperor of the West. I thought he's the one that dictates to the Europeans

and to the neocons, how things go down. I thought he's Mr. Peace through Strength. But anyway, that's one point that I want to make. On the Russian side of things and on the Putin side of things, why doesn't Putin, who's also not engaging in diplomacy, Putin is not engaging in diplomacy. Maybe he thinks he's engaging in diplomacy. Maybe he thinks he's being clever, but he's not. Why doesn't he just come out and say, look, I want to deal with the United States. I thought we had a good meeting in Alaska. Alaska could be something that we can build on. You have our Istanbul 2024 terms. They're still on the table. Amazingly enough, they are still on the table. I can't believe it, but they are. And you know what,

President Trump? You need to stop going after Russia. You need to stop trying to humiliate Russia and the Russian people. And if you continue down this path, we are going to win this war in a way that will embarrass you and embarrass your presidency and embarrass your legacy. Just come out with it. Just come out straight with it. You're going to send tomahawks to Russia? You know what? We've got an answer for that. Learn from Medvedev a little bit.

I'm not saying go completely hardliner like Medvedev. But, I mean, learn a little bit from what Medvedev is saying so that Trump gets the message because this has been going on now for what, a month or two months? It's ridiculous. And the Financial Times is reporting and the mainstream media in the West is reporting that since July, Trump has absolutely. been escalating with Ukraine towards Russia, that Trump is more open to escalating than Biden ever was. And a lot of people say, that's some financial times. I doubt it. You know, it's fake news. Yeah, the financial times is crap and it's fake news, in my opinion. But there is some truth

to the story. It's undeniable that the United States has been providing all of the targeting and satellite and all that stuff for Ukrainian missiles and drones, not into pre-2014 Russia. Not into post-2014 Russia, but into pre-2014 Russia. It's undeniable that the U.S. has been providing these things to Ukraine, not only from July of the summer, but even before that, the Trump administration has put no stop to this. So, I mean, that's my question. It's extremely weird this song and dance, on again, off again, bromance between Putin and Trump or one-way bromance between Putin towards Trump and then Trump being upset with Putin,

day and then being happy with Putin the next. The war's not ending, though. They're not getting anywhere. They're not engaging in any diplomacy to end the war, any negotiations. I don't see any of that going on. No, none. Can I just simply say the whole point, everything that you've just said has been said in Russia now. And if you go back to that press conference, that was what that exchange with the media was all about. That was what the media, the journalists who put that question, to Putin. He wanted Putin to answer in exactly the way that you said. That is what people in Russia are arguing for and are pushing for. Now, for whatever reason, and we can come up with all kinds of reasons. My own reason is very straightforward. I think Putin has always still

hankers for this kind of relationship with the United States. He wants to get some kind of agreement with the Americans to sort out Russia's Western border. He's still, I think, tied very closely, invested very heavily in that policy. And he still says to himself, well, at least I want a president here, whom I can talk to, whereas I never was able to talk to any other US president. So I'm not going to give up on this yet. But this is not, this is not something that most Russians want to hear anymore. they want him to use exactly that very straightforward language, which he is himself avoiding. Now, as to why he's avoiding it, I can only assume that he assumes that if he did talk in that

very, very straightforward way, it would be the end of any prospect of moving forward with the Donald Trump. What many people are saying to Putin now, and you could see that was the undercurrent of the message in that press conference is, why are we wasting our time at all with this man? Why are we wasting time with Donald Trump? He is never going to deliver. Now, about that Financial Times article, I believe every word of it. I absolutely believe every word of it. I don't think it's untrue.

I think it is absolutely true. Have we seen any denial from the White House? Have we seen any official of the US government come forward and say that story is not true? The United States is indeed assisting Ukraine to carry out drone attacks against Russian refineries, oil refineries, something which, as you absolutely correctly say, Joe Biden never agreed to. But the United States is doing that. Now, one can argue, and in fact I can I'm not going to, I'm not just one. I would argue that, again, this whole story about the attacks on the oil refineries is another

attempt by Donald Trump to try to gain leverage. One of the things he has discovered clearly over the last few months is that he has no real leverage over the Russians. Threats of sanctions and tariffs against India and China, is they go on. buying Russian oil don't work. Seizures of ships on the high seas run into all kinds of problems and he's probably not a good idea. He can't buy the Russians. He's trying to bribe them with economic agreements and they're not interested. He's very frustrated because Putin has not pushed back, pulled back in any way from Istanbul Plus, and Putin is rejecting a freeze and is

rejecting a ceasefire and doesn't want to meet Zelensky. So Trump has been on a hunt for the last couple of months trying to get leverage over the Russians. He authorized strikes on Ukraine, on Russian oil refineries. He talked during July about sanctions, tariffs on China and India. He's now talking about Tomahawks and he's floating this idea of Tomahawks all of the time. Putin says, look, this is all bluff. It doesn't change anything. It doesn't change the situation on the battlefronts.

we're still winning. We're going on winning. Better that we maintain this dialogue with the US than not, because we're still winning and these attacks on the refineries aren't making any fundamental difference. If the Tom Hawks are delivered, they're not going to make any fundamental difference either. And other people in Moscow are saying, why? Why are you constantly telling us this? Why are you wasting your time? When you went to Anchorage and met with Tr, Trump, in Alaska, the drone attacks on our refineries had already started. And they'd already started because of, they were already happening because of US intelligence. Did Trump talk about that with you?

I'm not saying that, I mean, I wasn't listening into conversations, but I'm sure people are saying this to Putin now. Did Trump tell you about this when you met with him in Anchorage? Did you have a discussion about this? Why are you persisting in this dialogue with Trump when it is never going to end in anything, in anything good? If he constantly bluffs, well, that's his business. We should just go ahead, say enough, enough.

We don't need to escalate massively. We can just go and win the wall, but we shouldn't waste any more time with Trump and with his negotiating, teams, we can maintain a low-level dialogue with him. But frankly, anything else is a complete waste of time. I mean, listening to what you're saying, it's amazing that the way Trump, and going off of the Financial Times article, absolutely, they said it, they spelled it out. The way Trump is going to get leverage over Russia is by the United States attacking Russia? Yeah. Really? And the problem is that Putin allows it. Yes.

That is, no, that is the problem. The United States of America, it's not Ukraine. The Financial Times was very clear. It's not Ukraine. The United States is even picking the targets, they said. They're even picking what to hit. They're attacking Russia, not only with missiles, but with the drones. And this is their way of gaining leverage.

And Putin is, Putin's response. to this is just we're just going to just continue to do what we do. I mean, I understand, and I agree with you, it doesn't change the trajectory of the war. True. Russia is still on course to win the war. True. Russia is defeating NATO. True. Russia is defeating the U.S. proxy. True. But hitting the refineries damages Russia. It damages infrastructure. More importantly, it damages the Russian citizens, people, people's lives. I mean, it does, to just say this doesn't have an effect is not true. It does have an effect. And most importantly, it also, also important is that this is crossing such a taboo, a red line that that has existed in all our lives,

the superpowers attacking one another, the United States, a nuclear power, attacking the nuclear power, Russia, inside of Russia. Once again, not post-2014, pre-2014 is what is being targeted, because as you've explained many times, post-2014, Russia has created this. This line of, okay, well, post-2014 is fair game. Pre-2014 is not that. That used to be the red line. That red line's gone. Now it's all of Russia, which is why Russia should have never allowed post-2014

to be attacked by scalp and stormshadows. They probably should have sent the message back then. But you see, they crossed the red line, and now it's a new red line. Now, I don't think there's any red lines anymore, to be quite honest. Well, let's come back to this, because, of course, The Russians cannot stop the Western powers from assisting the Ukrainians to conduct their own attacks on Russia. I mean, if the Americans and the Europeans want to do that, of course they can. The Russians can take very, very strong measures of their own, retaliating against the United States and the Europeans in all sorts of other places.

They could even start strikes in Europe. They could do all kinds of things of that kind. but they can't themselves control decision-making in Washington and London, Paris, Berlin and wherever. What the Russians can do, if they don't want to escalate the situation completely out of control, is they can say to the Americans, look, you're doing all of this. There's no point in this even having any further discussions anymore. We're just going to go on and continue fighting the war, and we're going to lift all our restrictions on the military aid.

that we supply to our friends. I mean, that would be, I think, a policy which would gain support in Moscow. The problem is that Putin is going way beyond that. He's saying all of these red lines are being crossed, and it doesn't matter. And that is what I think is creating real tension and difficulty in Moscow. And it comes back to a point I have been making in program after program, we have been making it program after program. I've been had a whole argument about this with somebody very recently. In Russia, Putin is a moderate, very, very much on the moderate side of the Russian political spectrum.

And not only is he a moderate, he's becoming now an increasingly isolated, This is not going to continue for very much longer, by the way. I mean, I think one of the reasons is that one of the hardest liners of all, who is Medvedev, is away. He's in North Korea at the moment. He's been having meetings with Kim Jong-un. He'll probably come back. There'll be more increasingly difficult meetings of the Security Council. But the point I want to make, and this is where I come back, what that press conference exposed,

once and for all. I mean, there's now no doubt about this any longer is that important people in Russia are directly challenging Putin on all of these matters. They're pushing back against the idea that Ukraine can join the EU. They're pushing back against the whole idea of dialogue with Donald Trump and with the United States. And they're saying to Putin, are you serious? Are you really going on with this? Let's have enough of this. It's a game of bluff.

There's no point of wasting time. Let's go on and win the war and sort out our new alliances and forge our relationships with our new friends in Asia and elsewhere. And let's forget once and for all about the United States and the West. These people are not ever going to be our friends. They're going to be our enemies. And that's what they are. Well, it's a game of bluff.

I agree until it's not a game of bluff. I mean, you know, the Europeans and the UK and Zelenskyy, you know, they don't see Trump's comments as a bluff or they don't only see Trump's comments as a bluff. Yeah, they see Trump talking a lot and they probably have doubts that Trump is going to ever send the top. But you know what they're saying? They're saying, you know what? We can latch on to these comments. We can latch onto these statements and we can continue to push Trump on these statements. Yeah, he may be bluffing about Tomahawks, but let's keep on pushing him.

Let's push them to give long-range missiles. Let's use our friends in the media, of which they have all the friends in the media controlled by the neocons. Let's use them to further our agenda to escalate the common narrative now coming out of Europeans, coming out of Zelensky is that the Tomahawks scare Russia. Just the thought of giving Tomahawks to Ukraine, bring fear to Putin. So what we need to do is we need to give the Tomahawks and we need to give even more than the Tomahawks because it's that fear that eventually will bring Putin to the negotiating

table. That's what they're saying now. That's their angle. So I mean, it's a bluff from Trump. It's a dangerous bluff. It's a bluff that the Europeans, that the neocons, that the UK establishment, that Ukraine itself is going to latch onto and they are going to manipulate Trump and push Trump to the point where maybe it's not the tomahawks, but maybe it's the tourists, maybe it's the barricudas,

maybe it's the J-sams. Maybe it's a combination of all of these things. The long-range missile may not be a tomahawk. Maybe it'll be something else. But the point is that they're pushing. the United States and they're pushing the Trump administration, as highlighted by the Financial Times, to continue to escalate. That's what they're doing.

And maybe the Tomahawks are never sent because of various reasons, logistical reasons, supply reasons. But I don't think the Europeans and the neocons are going to allow Trump to not escalate based on his comments. I think they're going to look at his comments and say, we can continue to bring this guy towards more and more escalation. with Russia, which will keep the conflict going. And on the other side of things, from the Russian side of things, they say nothing, they do nothing. We seize ships. They say nothing. We seize

frozen assets. They come out with a couple of statements saying, we're going to take this to court, whatever. And when it comes to red lines, there are none. This is how the neocons and how Ukraine and the Europeans are looking at this. Right. Well, let's let's say what Putin is going to be saying, because, again, I don't think there's much difficulty working out what his response specifically on the argument of the Tomahawks is. What he's trying to do is he's trying to say, look, these Tomahawks, old missiles, if they're launched, we'll have no difficulty coping with them. This is no big deal.

If the Europeans and the Americans and the neocons think we're scared of them, if Trump thinks we're scared of them, that we're not. We're just going to go on and fight the war. And if they are delivered and they are used, against us, then that will indeed be the end. We will not have any further relations with the Americans and with Trump at that point. That is what Putin is saying and what he's trying to say to his critics in Russia. And now there's no doubt at all that there are critics of his line in Russia. And he will say to them, look, if we talk in the way that you do, if we say that

using Tom Hawks really is a red line, then the neocons will say to Trump, look, look, the fact that Trump, Putin is talking in this way proves that he is in fact scared of the Tom Hawks. So we must indeed then, in that case, send them because that proves that Putin really doesn't want us to send them because, and that does give you leverage. Now, again, that is, Putin's line, but one can sense that others are just taking a completely different view. Now, on the seizure of the frozen assets, I think the Russians have said what they're going to do. They're going to seize assets of all of the Western businesses and companies and shares in Russia, which, by the way, have a value apparently about the same as the value of the assets in the West.

Now, that may not sound like a big response. I've already had people who, hold these shares, one of them in particular, has written to me, I suspect that those people might quite plausibly start taking legal action, also against Western governments that do that. I don't think that is a small matter. But about the Tomahawks, I think that in Russia, many people are simply going to say to Putin, this, what you're saying, what you're doing, doesn't come anywhere close to being enough. It's not just whether it will deter the Americans or whether it will deter the Europeans.

Think of the signal you are sending to your own people, to the people of Russia themselves. We have a president who says rude things about Russia one day, cause it a paper tiger one day. You have a president who conducts drone strikes or assists, facilitates drone strikes against oil refineries. You have talked about launching missiles on the Kremlin itself. And instead of pushing back and saying enough's enough, and we can't continue this dialogue anymore, then you just go along and say, let's give these little warnings.

and Anchorage was still a great breakthrough, and let's persist with that. And these arguments are getting stronger every day. The fact that they've now spilt over into the public domain so that the Russian media are now challenging Putin directly in press conferences, that is, I won't say it's unprecedented. It happened once before, I remember it happened during the Syrian conflict. But it's a sign that the debate in Russia is becoming increasingly tense, other Putin is becoming increasingly isolated in it. I mean, my question to you just to wrap up the video is,

the tomahawks can be nuclear capable, right? Yeah. Yes. So how does this protect the safety of the world? This is the part that I just can't understand. Okay, the tomahawks are slow. Russia can knock down those tomahawks. It's an old system.

It's a crappy missile. I understand all of that stuff. We've talked about that stuff over many videos. I understand all that. It doesn't change the fact that one superpower is launching a long-range nuclear-capable missile into the territory of another superpower. How does that keep the world safe? It doesn't.

How come if you're Putin? It's incredibly dangerous thing to do. Yeah. How come if you're Putin, you just don't say that to Trump? How come you just have come out with a statement and say, look, look, enough of your truth social posts, enough of your Tomahawk posturing and your bluffing. These are nuclear capable weapons. If you fire a nuke at us, if you fire a missile at us, we will consider that that missile could have a nuclear warhead. Don't do it, Trump.

Back off on this. Tell you, back off. In that type of straight language, back off on talking about sending nuclear missiles into Russia. I think I've explained Putin's logic. I mean, you know, the point is that the interesting thing is not that Putin is clinging onto this now. It's that others in Russia are saying all of the things that you have just said. It's a nuclear capable weapon. I mean, not just, you know, the usual people on the telegram channels and the substact blogs and the equivalent blogs in Russia or in social media in Russia.

I mean, Russian officials are now openly talking about these things. They're saying these things. And they are showing increasing signs of frustration with the boss himself, with Putin himself. And now, eventually, and this is a consistent story with Putin, and I've discussed this previously, he will change. I mean, he will have to. He has consistently shown that if there is a majority, if the positions of the Security Council crystallise, then he always goes with them. He's never one to let himself be completely isolated on this.

But the fact that he's clinging to this position and the way that he is is bizarre in itself, some would say. But what is more interesting and more important is that now he's thought. Finding himself, finding it increasingly difficult to sustain this position for much longer. That for me is the big, that for me is the important thing to understand here. Maybe it's bizarre, but if you go back to Minsk and his dealings with Angela Merkel, he does this. He clings on to these Western leaders' statements and their promises. is, and he actually believes them.

That's the way, I mean, Merkel, he even admitted he got burned by Merkel. Putt had admitted. He got played and burned by Merkel. And he clung on to everything that Merkel was telling you about Minsk 1 and Mints 2 and all of those things. And then when Merkel came out with her statement and she said it was just all an act, right? It was just a way for us to buy time to arm Ukraine. That bothered Putin. I mean, it would be really visibly bothered him.

And he came out with a statement and said, yeah, she played me. Yeah, and I didn't like it. You get the sense. Can I just say, and there are going to be people in the Kremlin now who are telling him, Trump is playing you. Why do you believe Trump all the time when he is obviously lying to you? I mean, from a Russian point of view, if Putin and Trump meet in Anchorage and Trump has secretly authorized drone strikes against oil refineries deep inside Russia. And Trump is not

coming out openly and telling Putin about this when they meet in Anchorage. That is a lie. There are lies by a mission, just as there are lies by commission. And my point is that there are people in Russia who are now clearly telling Putin exactly that. They're saying, look, This whole business of you and Trump has gone beyond the point of the ridiculous. I think the damaging part about the Financial Times article is that when you read everything that they're saying, you come to the conclusion that, yeah, Trump is the Trump administration. If you go by what the FT is reporting, yeah, they're lying and they're lying to Putin in Alaska, right?

But the Russians know this as well. I mean, everyone that watches these videos, they know the situation that the United States is providing the targeting of the satellites. I mean, that's not a secret to anybody. And the Russians obviously know this. But you get back to the point where if the Russians know this, why are they not saying anything to the United States about this so that it ends and this danger of a bigger, escalation, you know, is removed from the table. At least we remove the danger of this long-range

missile escalation. We get rid of it because it really is a danger. What if one Tomahawk gets through? Maybe Russia knocks down all 50 tomahawks. But what if one gets through? What if crazy Zelensky or someone? I don't know. I'm throwing out stupid stuff now, but what if someone crazy decides to, you know, take things further with the tomahawk? I mean, these are all 0.000 0.01% chances, but I don't think we should play with this situation, right? Because it could get very dangerous, very fast. And I don't see either of the leaders being responsible here. I come back to what happened after Putin's visit and meeting with Trump in Anchorage. I remember Putin came back and he addressed the entire Russian political and military leadership.

It all happened in the Catherine Hall. And I remember, I remember noticing how he was reading what he was saying, and he was the people who were listening and to what he was saying. You could see that it was a whole row of stony and perhaps even angry faces. I mentioned this at the time. Now, coming back to what you have been saying, of course the Russians know that the Americans have been providing all of this intelligence assistance to Ukraine. So people are going to be saying to Putin, well, you're not only letting Trump lie to you. You are actually letting Trump lie to you, even when you know he's lying to you. Did you push back against Trump in Anchorage about what the Ukrainians were doing, about what the Americans were doing?

Did you bring this topic up with them? If not, why not? I mean, those conversations, I am sure, I've no doubt at all, that they are taking place in the Kremlin all the time. And, well, you're absolutely right in what you said about the fact that Putin has a habit of being led by the nose by people like Merkel and to some extent Trump. And there is a massive degree of wishful thinking on his side. He wants to develop some kind of long-term relationship with some European leaders. He undoubted, and I have no doubt about this, he sincerely believes that some kind of understanding with the United States especially is in Russia's interests, just as he believed that a relationship

with Germany was in Russia's interests, as I've pointed out any number of times. gas from did not want to build Nord Stream 2. He pushed them to do it. They told him, we shouldn't trust Merkel. We shouldn't deal with the Germans anymore. We've been through all of this with the Europeans. And he insisted on doing it. And, well, we all saw the outcome.

Anyway, that is Putin. I mean, I can't go beyond what I've said. I mean, I've already made the point that, you know, ultimately, he clings onto this, he clings onto this belief that perhaps some kind of deal with Trump is possible. But you can increasingly see the signs that many, many people in Russia. And I don't, to repeat again, I don't just mean the people on the telegram channels, but people in the leadership now are not agreeing with him. Look, I mean, the point that I'm making throughout this whole video is that if you do want a normalization or some sort of detente between the United States and Russia, which is absolutely a positive thing, I'm for Russia and the United States finding a diplomatic settlement, working together, absolutely.

But I believe that both leaders, and that could be a thousand percent wrong about this, both leaders should be. responsible and both of them should come out and say, look. Trump should come out and say, look, there's going to be no long-range missiles into Russia. It's not going to happen, period. Everything else, drones, okay, fine. We know how the game is being played. We're all adults and we understand the way this game is being played. But on the subject of long-range missiles, deep into Russia, I'm sorry to tell you, Zelensky, I'm sorry to tell you, Stomer, Makron, it's not going to happen. forget about it. And I think Putin on his side should also say the same.

He should say, look, no long-range missiles. And if there are long-range missiles fired into Russia, then we have big, big problems. So let's just not even go. I think both of them need to take the whole long-range missile thing off the table. Everything else, we're all adults. We've been following this conflict. We know how it goes. We know the proxy war.

We know the coalition war that you've described. We know all the games and everything that's being played. But on the topic of nuclear capable long-range missiles, however old and slow they are, I don't think it's getting to any kind of resolution between the United States and Russia to continue this charade that is being played by both leaders. And I just have one final question who will wrap up this video. What if Putin does not change his mind? What if I miss one? He digs himself even deeper.

it sticks to his policy of going along with this game that he's playing with Trump. Right. I think the first argument, the argument that you're going to hear and probably hearing increasingly in Moscow is that we are not going to get any improvement in relations with the United States until we won the war. That that is the absolute thing that we must do first. focus on winning the war once we've won and have achieved all our objectives in Ukraine and the United States has lost, then it may take some time, but at that point, we're talking

with the Americans with a position of strength, which the Americans will understand, and at some point then we can find our way back. But negotiating with the Americans while the war is still underway in the way that we are doing far from hastening or achieving a Russian-American rapprochement is on the contrary making it much more difficult, making that whole problem process much more difficult because it gets completely tied up with the whole question of the war and we are constantly having to face down these unending American. provocations, which get worse and worse with the Americans still trying to use the war to gain leverage over us. So I am sure that that debate is taking place. And of course,

the Russians should say to the Americans, look, this is indeed a nuclear capable missile. Under no circumstances should it be deployed. It's completely reckless and irresponsible that if it ever were deployed. And by the way, going back, back to that press conference, Putin would have helped himself a great deal if he had said, in response to that question, if the Domo missiles are indeed deployed to Ukraine and launched against us, where we will beef up our air defenses and we reserve our right for a further response. If he'd said that, he didn't need to spell it out, but it would have certainly calmed the temperature in the room. It was, well, very uncharacteristic of him that he didn't do so.

And again, it indicates to my mind the fact that he didn't do so, that he wanted to close down the whole discussion and move on. He didn't want to have further questions asked about further responses. And he's clearly very embarrassed about this whole affair. I personally don't think there is going to be any diplomatic settlement of this war. I don't myself believe there is any going to be any rapprochement between the United States and Russia whilst the war is underway. And I think we have to wait until the end of the war for that to happen. And if I'm sure that people in Moscow are saying to themselves, we are winning, we are going to. to win. Let's just focus on that from now. To answer the question, what if Putin doesn't change

his direction? Oh, yes. If he doesn't change direction, then the challenges and the problems will escalate. We'll see more and more Putin, more and more officials start to speak out publicly. We'll start to see the military do so. We'll see more challenges in press conferences. we will start to see decisions and actions being taken by other officials contradicting Putin's. And he will gradually lose control of the whole process, which he will never allow. I mean, he will eventually swing round and go with the majority, which he always does. Okay, we will end the video there. The durand.com.

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