The Duran Podcast - RUSSIA prepares big retaliation

Episode Date: November 28, 2024

RUSSIA prepares big retaliation

All right, Alexander, let's do an update on what is going on in Ukraine. And let's start things off with the appointment of the special envoy for the incoming Trump administration to deal with the conflict in Ukraine. I was thinking it was going to be Grinnell, which I believe would have been a pretty good pick by Trump. But instead, we got Kellogg. Well, he's the guy, I believe he is the guy that wrote the policy papers on Ukraine for Trump with, I believe it was fights, Fred Fights. Yeah, fights. Yeah. And this was reported on a couple of weeks ago.

This is the freeze. Yeah, this is the freeze idea. Yeah, the freeze idea. the DMZ, Korea, West Germany idea with European troops monitoring this demilitarized zone, 800 kilometers or whatever it is. Ukraine doesn't get into NATO for 10 or 20 years. They're going to wait Putin out and they'll continue to supply weapons to Ukraine and stuff like that. This is... We'll see what happens in the next few months.

But in my opinion, not the best of picks from the Trump White House. Anyway, the incoming Trump White House. It is not the best of picks at all. You know, there's no way to get around this. What I would say is this is that as I understand it, the person who drafted that plan was fights rather than Kellogg. and there is some logic from Trump's point of view. Again, it's domestic political logic in picking Kellogg.

Now, bear in mind that Kellogg is a US military army general. He is somebody who's worked closely with Trump before in his first time. He was very loyal to Trump. He stood by Trump, for example, during the first Trump impeachment. He actually came out and said that he, You know, the whole business of the Zelensky Trump call was being misrepresented and that there'd be no impropriety whatsoever. So what Trump is doing, again, is that he's picking someone loyalty himself.

And, you know, he's got this longstanding relationship with Kellogg. Now, the problem is, Kellogg, there's a number of things to say about him. Firstly, he's 80 years old. So, you know, you can have very vigorous, very exuberant, very lively people who are 80 years old. But it does seem to be a rather elderly appointment for what I suspect is going to be a demanding role. And beyond that, given that Kellogg himself, even if he didn't actually draft that plan, nonetheless affixed his own signature to it, he is committed to a plan which the Russians have already categorically rejected. Now, Putin, as it happens, has been talking literally in the hours since the Kellogg appointment.

He is, I believe, currently in Kazakhstan, where he has had meetings with the Kazakh leadership. Very friendly meetings, by the way, which we might want to discuss some other day. But Putin has also been attending a meeting of the collective security, Trecii organization. And he's been talking about the situation in Ukraine and the conflict. And I haven't got the full text of what he was saying. But my impression is that he is taking an unyielding position. Now, this is before these comments were probably prepared. before the Kellogg appointment. So if Kellogg comes along to Moscow, which presumably he's going to

do, and is going to propose his plan, the Kellogg fights fights plan, what he's going to find is that the Russians are simply going to say no. And that is going to result in this whole process becoming stillborn before it even started. Putin apparently, the course of his latest comments, has even again reiterated that Zelensky is a usurper and has no legitimacy and therefore by logical extension is not a fict person with whom Russia can negotiate with. So it was not a good pick. It was an eccentric one. Again, Trump has been picking people, loyal to himself, perhaps not really understanding that there is a wider problem in Ukraine. that requires a more hands-on and more active negotiator and somebody a little bit more in tune with the actual realities.

So, you know, that's where I think we stand. It could be that Trump thinks that, you know, taking a hard line at the beginning will open up the ground for, you know, concessions and trade-offs and things like that. But as I've said many times, and I want to say this again, that is the approach that Trump is taking, if he thinks that starting, you know, with a very tough demands, is a better way, is a way towards closing a deal, then he is applying commercial business logic to diplomacy, which is completely different. What it is more likely to do, that approach is more likely to cause the role. Russians to harden their positions than to soften them. I think that's exactly what Trump is doing. That's what Trump always does in negotiations with world leaders, is that he takes a very hard approach in the belief that the world leaders will either

back down or they'll negotiate something that is more beneficial to the United States. He recently took this approach. From what I understand, I haven't been following this story too closely, but I believe he's taking this approach with the border, with Canada and Mexico, where he's saying he's going to impose 25% tariffs. And from what I understand, I could be getting this wrong, but from what I understand, Mexico has already said, okay, we'll deal with the fentanyl issues and with border crossings into the U.S. So it looks like this is his general approach in diplomacy is to try and

and threaten and scare and put very, very big demands on world leaders and the expectation that they're either going to back down or that he'll negotiate something that's beneficial to himself. He's not going to get that with Russia, though. No, he's not because he doesn't have the strong cards that he needs to have in order to win that kind of that kind of poker game. Can I just say something? My question to you and I really believe this.

I'm starting to get a clear picture of the Trump administration that they're better informed than the Biden White House on Ukraine on what's going on, but they're still poorly informed. I agree. They don't have a full picture of what's going on. I believe that they're still, they still buy into a lot of the propaganda. Yeah. This includes Trump.

I believe this includes Vance. I definitely believe this includes a lot of people in Trump's foreign policy team. They still subscribe to this gas station masquerading as a country. Russia's running out of weapons. Russia suffered 10 million losses. The economy's going to collapse. I think they can't shake this belief off. It's too ingrained into their system.

And I think this is why they still believe that they can pressure Putin into some sort of a deal. Like what Kellogg's going to propose. I agree. I mean, I think that there are some people within the Trump team who are a bit better informed than others. I think that Vance, by the way, is better informed. I mean, I've been reading many of the things that Rance has been reading, writing rather about the conflict. But bear in mind, he's the vice presidency. He's not the decision maker, direct decision maker here.

I think Tulsi Gambard is better informed. And of course, she might become DNI. And we'll see what she does if she's able to become DNI. At the moment, as I understand it, it's increasingly looking as if she will be confirmed in that position. But I think that's what you say about the others. And to some extent, Trump himself is also true. This narrative about Russia being a gas station rather than a country about the 10 million. casualties that the Russian army is fighting, has been losing, the claims that the Russian army is

all but exhausted. They have been, they have become so much part of the accepted narrative in the United States for so long. These facts have been so uncontested for so long. that perhaps it's unsurprising that people are in the United States and even in the Trump White House, perhaps especially in the Trump White House, where there is a predisposition anyway to believe that the United States is extremely strong and that, you know, provided it pushes its weight around a bit, the other side will come to terms. It's perhaps not surprising that they believe that or that they believe things like that. The reality is it isn't like that at all. Now, there are some positives from this. However bad the Kellogg appointment objectively is,

it is the case that Trump is appointing an envoy. And the fact that he's appointing an envoy means that he's going to start dialogue with the Russians. You can't have an envoy who isn't going to conduct. a dialogue, it almost certainly means that this envoy, who at the moment is Kellogg, is going to go to Moscow at some point, is going to want to meet and speak to Putin himself, presumably, and is going to want to speak to Lavrov and perhaps some of the others. So the very fact that there is a dialogue going on, however difficult it is, is something.

The best example or, you know, from previous history of this is what happened with the conflict in Vietnam. When in 1968, the United States very grudgingly came to accept that there had to be some kind of a discussion with the North Vietnamese. There was an agreement to set up to meet and to talk about the problems in Vietnam. In Paris, the Americans and the North Vietnamese had a dialogue. There were, again, enormous illusions in the United States about how strong the North Vietnamese, how determined the North Vietnamese actually were about the conflict. It took years for this process to bear any fruit, but eventually the American leadership did begin to understand that the North Vietnamese were serious about what they were saying.

saying. So, you know, it may be that over time, the very fact that there is a discussion, a dialogue, will eventually take us somewhere, somewhere away from this first position that we are in now. Bear in mind that there has been no dialogue at all, no substantive contacts at all between the Americans and the Russians since, I think it's February 2022. Blinken and Lavrov had one meeting since then, which didn't go at all well. There had been a number of calls, discussions between Shoygu and Austin, and I think one between Bel-Uusuf and Austin. But Putin and Biden have not spoken.

to each other since February 2022. And as I said, there's been no real extensive diplomatic contact. The fact that there is an envoy now suggests that this period of refusing to speak to the Russians is coming to an end. Yeah, that's true. At least we're going to get some dialogue. We'll see what happens there. But we have to get there. We have to get to January 20th.

And that takes us to the current situation right now, which is... is very dangerous. The Biden White House continues to escalate. The collective West media, they claim that Russia is escalating. And one of the narratives that they put out there is that Russia, there is no fear that Russia is going to use nuclear weapons. This was reported by Reuters. You're citing Intel officials who did analysis of seven months. And they invited Biden, according to Reuters, that it would be okay to green light long-range missile strikes into Russian territory, pre-2014 Russian territory, because there are no risks of Russia using nuclear weapons. And so this opened up the way for Biden to give the permission,

if you want to say that, to give the permission to Zelensky to fire those missiles. We know what the real story is as far as who's firing those missiles into Russia. But the Intel officials did not anticipate the nut, the hazelnut, as it's being called. What are your thoughts on where we are today with all of the escalation? There are reports that the areas from where the Oreshnik was first fired, Astrakhan region, that the airspace in this area has been closed down, which... at least until November 30th, which might indicate that Russia might be preparing for something. Then again, Russia just may be messing around with the collective West. Who knows?

We know that the Russians are preparing for something, because amongst the things that Putin has just said in this meeting with the collective security treaty organization, Amongst the things he said is that the general staff is now reviewing options, is reviewing targets for the next Oreshkin strike to hit. And he opened the possibility for the first time that the Oresnik might target decision-making centres, which looks like a suggestion that the next strike might be in places in Kiev. And he also made further points about the Oresnik, which is that the Oresnik, which is that the Oreschristian, Though a conventional system, it does not use nuclear material, it's not a nuclear, you know, doesn't have a nuclear warhead. But the, and it has enormous precision strike capabilities. Nonetheless, is able to inflict damage comparable to that of a nuclear, of a low-yield nuclear device.

and he also gave some information about it, which I have to say, I mean, again, I'm not expert in these things at all, but it seemed to me to somewhat corroborate Professor Theodore Postal's theory, that it is a hypersonic glide vehicle. So, you know, he's come out with an op lot of things. I'll have to follow this. We'll have to look at this properly. but there doesn't seem to be any doubt that over the next couple of days, we are going to see more strikes with a Reschnik missile.

And he went on to say, by the way, that even though serial production has only just begun, nonetheless, the Russians do already have a number of these things. He didn't obviously tell us how great that number is. Now, coming back to what you said, that we're being told that, that Biden was informed that there was no risk that Putin would use nuclear weapons. We see that that is true. It is incredible. It is staggering that the US intelligence community missed the existence of this Russian capability, the Orscinik.

It suggests, again, that there are fundamental problems with, with US intelligence gathering in Russia, you would have thought that whatever the Eurasnik is, whether it's a hypersonic glide vehicle or an adaption of the Bulaava sea launch ballistic missile or whatever it is, you would have thought that the United States would be aware of it and would be aware of its potential capabilities. But it seems not. And the result is that once again they've underestimated the Russians and made a catastrophic miscalculation

that the Russians would not respond in the way that it's likely that they will over the next few days and in the way that they have already done with a strike that they conducted against the Yushmash factory in Yerra. So there we are. The advice Biden was given, by his intelligence people has turned out to be wrong. For the record, Seymour Hirsch, who does have his contacts,

says that some sections of the intelligence community were not consulted before the decision to launch these missile strikes on Russia was made. Well, it would not be the first time that the Biden White House doesn't consult various experts before making a decision. They did the same thing with cutting off of the swift back in February, 22 or March.

2022, they completely ignored the advice of many financial experts. Just to quickly say about that, I think that is right. And I'm going to say this also. I think what is happening and what has been happening for a long time, specifically with respect to Russia, is that the Biden White House and before that, the Obama White House, handpicks the intelligence officers and analysts, who will give it the advice it wants to hear.

I think this is the problem. Yeah, they cherry pick the stuff that they want to hear and they completely ignore the stuff that they don't want to hear. Exactly. Which is that Russia has equivalent, if not better, military systems and military capabilities than the United States. The US doesn't have the hypersonic missiles. It doesn't have anything even close to the Orschenik.

But they don't want to hear that. They don't want to hear that. They don't want to hear any of that because that destroys their belief that Russia is the gas station. And it ruins the narrative of their continued escalation. Yes. So yeah. So that makes sense. What Russia could do as far as escalating is they could escalate within Ukraine. And that way it will lessens in the, we will actually eliminate any risk of widening the war out to include NATO. I think that is where the next retaliation is going to, or that's how the next retaliation is going to unfold.

It doesn't mean that they may not strike targets outside of Ukraine. I think that's still very possible. Absolutely. But I think in this second strike, they're going to focus on Ukraine. I think that's right. I think my own view, and I've said this previously, and I can reiterate it, is that Putin still wants to see whether he can come to some kind of understanding with Trump. And I think that for that reason, he's going to confine Oreshnik strikes to the territory of Ukraine itself until Trump's inauguration.

That if Trump rescinds this decision, this disastrous decision that Biden made, then we'll start to see this escalation situation begin to abate, and then at that point we might start to get some kind of proper dialogue going. If, on the other hand, the Trump administration miscalculates, makes the same miscalculation that the Biden administration has just done, that they can continue conducting strikes into Russia, then I think Putin has made it absolutely clear, other Russian officials have been doing so as well, that not only does the option of striking

with the Ereschnik at U.S. military targets in Europe exist, but that the Russians will do it. Yeah, I think it's incredible that we're three years into this conflict and the Russians have allowed the NATO collective West decision-making centers to exist in Ukraine. I think that's pretty incredible. So those would be at risk now. I wonder how the collective West will react when those decision makers. If those decision-making centers are hit, we don't know, but let's say that is one of the targets that Russia goes after. I don't know what the reaction is going to be from the collective West. It will not be the first time, though, that a decision-making center has been targeted.

A West decision-making center has been targeted in Ukraine. I wonder if that would even be enough, though, to deter the Biden White House from continuing to escalate. This is another question. Well, yeah, go ahead. On the last point, I've heard reports. I haven't actually seen these, but I gather that even people like Senator Ted Cruz, it's not saying that the Biden White House is going too far, that it's, you know, alighting the fires,

and that this is completely reckless and irresponsible in the weeks before the new administration takes office. There are problems. I mean, the Biden White House wants to escalate. I mean, there's no doubt about this. But apparently they've just been told by the Pentagon that the Pentagon is out of weapons. So there's a reporting Politico to take. Of course, we have to be so careful because we get these reports and some of them turn out to be true. And some of them turn out to be cases of misdirection. I think this one probably is true. that the Pentagon is saying, look, you've got $6 billion still to use for funding with Ukraine. But if you use that to try and give Ukraine weapons out of our own arsenals, you are going to deplete these arsenals to incredibly dangerous levels. We just do not have the weapons to fulfill what you are seeking and what you're asking for. So absolutely, I think the Biden White House does, I don't think they're going to be deterred by any Russian strike. The Russians strike decision-making centers inside Ukraine,

including situations where NATO officials are involved in those centers and become casualties. I think their instinct will not be to pull back. I think their instinct will be to retaliate and escalate even more, because that's what these people do. It's the no reverse gear mentality. I think that this is something that the Russians, until very recently, perhaps not even now, have fully understood. The Russians are still working, at least Putin is still working, within the Cold War framework.

During the Cold War, there were basic, lines that the two superpowers always knew that they should never cross in their relations with each other. So never attack the other side's people directly, always do things through proxies, never attack each other's territory, lots and lots of other things. And those rules were abided by. Putin is still, has been playing that, this game, still by those rules. He hasn't understood that the Biden White House

does not play by those rules anymore. Now, if I can just go back to Kellogg, Kellogg is 80. He's been a US, a senior US military officer. He fought in Vietnam, in Iraq. He has been a member of the Pentagon for a very long time.

he probably does remember the period of the Cold War and perhaps he does have some more understanding of these rules of the game that existed then. But the Biden administration, the Biden White House, absolutely does not. And that's been no problem. Yeah, well, the statements from Kellogg pointed a different direction.

I mean, I think the guy was even calling for a no-fly zone at one point in time. I've seen like a CNN clip or something where he was talking about a no-fly zone. Yeah. So, yeah. Anyway, I don't, but let's not just. Yeah.

But my question is, even if the Biden White House wants to escalate further, what can they realistically do outside of nuclear weapons and boots on the ground? Yeah. What can they do? Tomahawks? Possibly, but unlikely, but possibly.

But whatever they throw at Russia, whether it's attackums, stormshadows, scalps, jams, tomahawks, Russia's going to deal with it, and it's going to make no difference in the actual conflict. It's going to make no difference in Kursk. It's going to make no difference in Dombas. Things are going terribly wrong for the Ukraine military across the entire front line. And all we're seeing is that Ukraine's air defense systems are getting depleted. every couple of days now we have huge Russian strikes throughout all of Ukraine, whether with

drones or with missiles, and they're completely depleting whatever is left of Ukraine's air defense systems, which is basically air defense systems in Kiev and Leval. That's all they have left, and those are being depleted. Well, on the other side of things, the Biden White House is sending attackums and storm shadows into Kursk or into Bryansk, and they're depleting whatever missiles they've given over to Ukraine, whether it's 50 attackums or 150 stormshadow. So I mean, air defenses for Ukraine are getting depleted. And whatever long-range missiles, the leverage of the Biden White House to escalate is also being depleted. Are they going to put boots on the ground? No chance. And I don't even think this even scares the Russian military to be quite honest,

boots on the ground in Ukraine. So that's not an option. Are they going to go nuclear? Who knows? I doubt it. But you do have that talk about giving nuclear. material or whatever to Ukraine that the New York Times floated out there. That would mean the end of all of us. I mean, that would be nuclear war for the entire planet. I don't think the Biden White House wants to go there. I don't think the U.S. or the Pentagon wants to go there. I think they want to escalate this to a level where there's such chaos that it's so difficult for any administration to get out of Project Ukraine. And if they do get out of Project Ukraine, then I think the media is they've got the, their scripts and they're all cued up to run with the story, he, he, as in Trump, once again,

folded to Putin. I think, I think that's, this is the box, this is the trap that they're setting up. And I think Trump is walking straight into it. I really believe he's walking straight freaking into it. Maybe he's playing 5D chess. I don't know. I don't think so. I think once again, that bias and that misinformation about Russia is what is going to do the Trump administration in. It's what's been doing the entire Collective West in over the past three years, over the past 15 years, is the fact that they always underestimate Russia, whether it's on economics, on military, whatever, on Putin's elf. It doesn't end. Russia's going to take Kiev in three days. It's just spin and false narratives, but they can't, they can't shake.

it loose. So how can they escalate? What can they realistically do? I guess is the comment on what I said, but that's my question. What can they really do outside of the annihilation of the entire planet, which would be giving nukes to Ukraine? That's how I see it. Anyway, what are your thoughts? Well, they can't do anything. And I think that's the thing to understand at this point. Now, I mean, the report in the New York Times about transferring nuclear weapons to Ukraine, There's been lots of people trying to explain that. They're saying that this is intended to ennerve the Russians and all this, that it's all made up by the New York Times reporter.

Remember, you know, any article that goes out in the New York Times goes through an editorial process. The editor, see something like that would want to make sure that, you know, this actually does, that there were real discussions, or at least that the source who's providing that information actually did say that. So I think people who have been trying to cast doubt on what that article said are wrong, actually. The claim that the deployment of Western troops to Ukraine between the British and French is also a misunderstanding by Le Monde. Again, people who say that are not familiar with Le Monde.

It's not just about sending European troops after a ceasefire has been agreed. No doubt there is some discussion about it. And Kellogg has talked in that way. But again, these comments do reflect things that people are really saying amongst each other. What they demonstrate, the Tomahawk story, which started with Zelensky's the same. What it demonstrates is the anger, the panic and the fear that currently exists. And the stupidity. And the stupidity, because they all know, I mean, deep down everybody knows that none of this is possible.

Now, I've been seeing some polling data from Germany. And German public opinion is overwhelmingly opposed to the supply of terrorist missiles to Ukraine. Just to say, I mean, you know, we're talking about 80% plus. They're absolutely not going to countenance ascending of European ground troops to Ukraine. I doubt that it's any different in the United States. I haven't seen polling in France, and as far as I know, polling in Britain doesn't exist. Because there is a reason to that. The British government doesn't want to get the opinion polls,

which show conclusively how hostile the British would be to the idea of sending troops to Ukraine. So you're absolutely right. It's not going to happen. Doing it will provoke a political crisis. Sending nuclear weapons to Ukraine is a massive complex undertaking. it would, as you said, almost certainly provoke World War III. Even if it didn't provoke World War III, it would be the end of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty once and for all.

And the United States is the biggest single global beneficiary of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. If everybody around the world started to acquire nuclear weapons, which they probably would, then the US's own ability to conduct itself in the way that it has been doing for the last 30 years will disappear. So it's not going to happen. The idea of sending Tomahawks, well, you know, if you had six months or a year of time to do it, you perhaps could do it.

You'd have to create ground launches for Tomahawk missiles. That's going to take time. Again, it's going to be very, very visible to the Russians. It's not something that can be done in eight weeks. I mean, it just can't be. It is technically impossible to do. Atacom's missiles in short supply. They're not being produced anymore.

I am absolutely certain at this now. Storm shadows, apparently they produce around one a month. They're in sort of supply as well. They can't be sent ship to Ukraine in vast quantities. It simply isn't possible. These are relatively short-range systems. They can't be used in any effective way. Yes, if Mautz becomes Chancellor, he might override German public opinion and send the tourist missiles.

But if he does, as you correctly say, the Russians will deal with them. The same with the Jassens as well. There is nothing they can do that can reverse the trend of the situation across Europe now and across Ukraine now. And every day, every single day, we hear more reports of more Russian advances, more Russian advances in the Kurokawo, Selidovo, Chasovya, Kuroskerias. I mean, it's, in fact, it's impossible to keep up with the speed of the Russian advance. Last week, the Russians captured apparently something like 285 square kilometers of territory. And the amount of territory they are capturing is increasing with every week that this war goes on for. So there is nothing they can do.

And the sooner this fact is acknowledged, the better it will be. But as you rightly said, all of this narrative, all of the propaganda that we've been hearing, this is ultimately propaganda that has been there going on for the last 30 years, unfortunately, is distorting understanding and is contaminating decision-making. This is what propaganda does. You constantly make up things. Sooner or later, you become trapped inside the web of narratives that you are yourself creating. Yeah, it's even distorting things for the incoming administration as well.

Absolutely. Yeah. And I think that the Biden White House, actually I would say the whole DC establishment, the foreign policy establishment swamp, they understand that Putin is going slow. Yeah. That he's a moderate. And he does have constraints. Yeah. I think they understand that and they try to benefit off of this because they go very hard against Russia.

whether it's sanctions, whether it's the economic war, whether it's trying to get regime changed to topple the Putin administration, or whether it's emptying all of your inventories, which is what many countries in the collective West has done in order to try and inflict a defeat on Russia. They've put the foot on the gas and they've gone as hard as they can outside of boots on the ground and nuclear war. They've gone as hard as they can to try and defeat Russia. And they lost. But what they, the one thing that they count on that they understand is that Putin is not going to put his foot on the gas and he does have constraints. And I'm just, my final question to you is, do you think those constraints are finally being lifted on Putin, the man, the decision maker? Because I'll name two very big constraints and maybe you may want to talk a bit more about this.

We mentioned earlier in the video that most likely, most likely the second. and retaliation from Russia is going to happen within Ukraine. Not a guarantee, but most likely. We'll see. We'll see in the next couple of days, most likely, where this retaliation is going to be. But one of the things that has been constraining Putin, or at least keeping the conflict in Ukraine moving at a slower pace than what many might have expected is that I believe that Putin is very concerned about what Russia's allies are thinking. Yeah. Specifically China.

And that's why he probably hasn't gone after any decision-making centers. That's why he hasn't gone hard against Ukraine or the Zelensky administration's decision-making headquarters, something like that. I think he's worried about what China and India would think. And then you get to the railway system, the bridges, the electric, the energy infrastructure. He's degraded to these things, especially the energy infrastructure. But I think that Putin sees this conflict very much in terms of not only in terms of fighting the collective West, but he sees this in terms of Russians fighting Ukrainians who have been, who are connected,

historically connected, not but Ukrainians in the West, but Ukraine is in the center and in the east. And I think he's been very careful to minimize whatever damage is going on in Ukraine because he understands that when the war winds down, they're going to have to live together. They're going to have to find a way to live together. And so you could say that he could destroy the energy infrastructure, but this would cause great suffering to the people in Ukraine. It would most likely lead to a huge exodus of Ukrainians going to Russia or going to Europe. I mean, this would cause a huge burden on the EU. So I think that's why he's held off on completely destroying the energy infrastructure or the bridges or the railway systems. I mean, to this day, Russia lets Western

leaders travel on rail from Poland to Kiev to visit with Zelenskyy. I mean, the U.S. would never have allowed this. In the first month, the U.S. military would have destroyed all of this stuff. They would have destroyed the railway systems. They would have destroyed the energy of it. It all would have been destroyed within the first month. Within the first days, it all would have been destroyed. And they wouldn't have cared how society's going to function.

So I don't know. What are your thoughts there? I mean, he has these constraints that he's working within. Absolutely. I mean, on your very last point about, you know, the Russians allowing Western leaders to travel to Kiev, You remember when Biden went to Kiev, the Americans and the Russians agreed in advance that he should be allowed to travel to Kiev. It's extraordinary, but they did.

Every Western leader is getting permission from the, I mean, there's no doubt about it. Even Annalina Baerbach, before she travels to Kiev, I'm a thousand percent convinced that the foreign ministry in Germany calls a foreign ministry in Russia. And they say, look, we need you to guarantee the security of Annalina. Yeah. Without a doubt. Without a doubt, this is guaranteed. Yeah. Yeah. Now, a number of points taking off what you said. Firstly, the thing always to remember, and we're both familiar with this, if you drive, if you keep your foot on the gas all the time, you will eventually run out of gas. And that is exactly the kind of position that the West, or at least the US in Ukraine, is finding itself in now. We've just discussed the fact that there's a fact that there. they're basically out of options. Their ability to go on escalating is becoming reduced. At the very time when the Russians are showing that their ability to escalate is in fact growing.

And partly the reason for that is, of course, that the Russians did not put their foot down hard on the gas right through the entire conflict. that they've gradually increased the pressure as the war goes on. Now, let's come back to Putin's constraints. The constraint of the external, the external constraint, keeping Russia's friends, its allies on side, is absolutely essential.

And it is something that in the West, and including amongst many, many, people who comment about these things, people who are sympathetic to the Russians or believe they are, and some people in Russia as well. This is simply not acknowledged or understood. Putin simply cannot afford to just go all out and, you know, obliterate Ukraine without first making sure that the Chinese are on side with it, not just the Chinese, the Indians, the Brazilians as well. All of these countries have their own interests. They've gone along with what the Russians have been doing.

They understand what the Russians have been doing. Their respect and support for Russia has grown over the last three years, precisely because the Russians have acted with moderation and restraint. Had it been otherwise, it would have been completely. completely different. We would not have had movement towards Bricks or Kazan or alternative payment systems or all of those things that we're talking about if governments in Beijing, Delhi, South Africa and Brazil had concluded that, you know, Russia is just veering out of control. So this is, this is something as I said, when one tries to explain it, eyes roll, people don't listen.

they say, you know, Putin is being overly cautious, too conservative, that sort of thing. He's playing a long game and he's playing his cards with great skill. He's just not playing all of them at the same time. And he's right not to. You have to bring your friends along. Now, this has been an educational process for the Chinese, the Indians, the Brazilians and all of the others. Because they have been talking at various times about. the need for a peaceful settlement of the crisis. They've been talking about the need for negotiations.

They found that the Russians are open to the negotiations. They know that the Russians did negotiate in good faith at the start of the war. They know all about the Istanbul Agreement. They know all about these things. And they see where the process, the pressure for escalation has really come from. And they also see where the obstruction, the sabotage of negotiations has come from as well, from Kiev, and the Chinese, the Indians, all of these people. They've spoken to Zelensky. They've spoken to his officials. They've come to realize how absolutely hardline and intractable and frankly irresponsible these people are. And they're also very, very well aware by now of who wrecked the Istanbul agreements back in April 22, the Ukrainians and the Western powers. So the fact that Putin has been successful here has been a product of, as I said, this success in explaining things to his allies, which is premised of, as I said, this success in explaining things to his allies,

which is premised on a certain approach to the war. Now, about the conduct of the war itself and put his own feelings that the Ukrainians are a fraternal nation, that one should not seek to be too hard on the Ukrainians, that is indisputable. He absolutely does care about that. So do many Russians.

It's important to remember These are two countries very interconnected with each other. There are families that have members on both, both in Russia and Ukraine. There's lots of family connections, lots of friendship connections, all of those sort of things. So absolutely, this has been a factor for Putin as well. But again, he has to think about further things too, which is what is the end game in Ukraine? going to be. Now, he didn't start with a plan to conquer Ukraine. He said this very clearly at the outset of the war. He was seeking to ensure that Ukraine didn't join NATO, that there were

protections for Russian speakers inside Ukraine, and that the conflict in Donbass was brought to an end. That was why he started the special military operation. As the West and the Ukrainians have taken an absolutely immovably hardline position. And Yermont, by the ways, again talking about the Russians being pushed back to the 22 front lines. In other words, that the Russians should retreat back to where they were before the special military operations started. Unrealistic, fantastic things.

As the Ukrainians have shown themselves completely unwilling to conduct negotiations, as they have tightened their pressure on the Russian-speaking population in Ukraine, as they have launched attacks on Russia itself, as they have demolished monuments, acted in Kusk, as the West has supported them with more and more advanced weapons, prolonging the war, as all attempts at the negotiated outcome have been sabotaged. has inevitably been a process of radicalization on the part of the Russians, and part of Putin himself and of Russia's external supporters. And we now see that whereas back in February, 2022, and for several weeks after,

the Russians were trying to negotiate with Zelensky. Putin today is saying that he's a usurper, he has no legal authority, it is impossible to deal with this man. So we see Russian positions hardening, the Russians becoming more radical, the Russians escalating the way that they conduct the war. They have a far bigger army, perhaps five or eight times bigger

than the army they started the war with. They're attacking every part of Ukraine. They're hammering Ukraine every day. they're launching missiles like the Orasnik against Ukrainian installations. None of this would have been conceivable for the Russians back in March 22. You always hear people say, what if the West had given all of these weapons that it's now giving to Ukraine back in the spring of 2022? You could say the same, and it is often said about the Russians, what if the Russians had, had, acted in the spring of 2022, in the unconstrained way or less constrained way than they are,

that they are acting now. Almost certainly they would have won the war within a few weeks. Or at least Ukraine would have been destroyed within a few weeks. At that one cost, yeah. Tremendous cost, obviously. All right, we will end the video there. The durand.com. We are on Rumble, odyssey, Bitchie, Telegraph, and X, go to the Dreadshop, pick up some merch like what we are wearing in this video today. The link to the Dreadshop is in the description box down below. Take care.