The Duran Podcast - Saudi peace summit fails. Zelensky warns Russian navy

Episode Date: August 10, 2023

Saudi peace summit fails. Zelensky warns Russian navy

All right, Alexander, let's talk about the peace summit, the Saudi U.S. Ukraine, peace summit that was held in Jeddah. That wrapped up over the weekend in Saudi Arabia. And it's kind of a mixed bag of reporting, to be quite honest. Some Western mainstream media outlets are saying this was a huge success. Others are saying this was okay. It was a moderate success. success for Ukraine. Other outlets are saying that this was a big nothing burger, that nothing really came out of it. I think this was a complete failure. And actually, we have statements

now from Zelensky and Podoliak, his top advisor saying that pretty much saying that whatever concessions Ukraine appear to have made during this conference, forget about it. The only formula is Olensky's piece. They call it. There's Olensky formula is what they call it. There's Olensky formula is what they call it. That's the only way forward for Ukraine. And I think this is a failure because there's one signal, there's one sign which points to this being a complete absolute failure. And that is the fact that there was no consensus on a statement from the parties. They couldn't come up with one unanimous statement to conclude this summit. So what was your thoughts? No, I think I am in complete agree with you. I think it was a failure. If I would go further,

I would say it was a debacle, actually. Now, first of all, a number of things. In the run-up to this summit, it looked as if China and Brazil were going to stay away. China and Brazil in the event attended, and I think the Western powers would have been much more relieved and happy in some respects if China and Brazil had stayed away, because what I suspect happened is that there were lots of phone calls

between the various BRICs countries, between Brasilia and Beijing and, dare I say, Moscow. And it was agreed that they would all go. Because what actually happened at this Jeddah summit is that the West, the United States, which had called this meeting in the first place, and of course Ukraine, lost control. They lost control of the agenda. It became absolutely clear that the global south countries, the BRICS countries, the Saudis, the Chinese, the Brazilians were not interested in the Elensky formula.

I mean, they were just, I mean, which is what this summit was originally supposed to have been convened to discuss, they said this is an absolute non-starter. We are not interested in that. Li Kui, who was the Chinese representative, remember he's supposed to be the Chinese mediator, who's supposed to be mediating or trying to mediate a solution of the conflict between China and between Russia and Ukraine. He said quite openly, you know, there are disagreements between us about what is going on. And, you know, there has to be a more realistic approach taken. Saudi Arabia came forward with its own peace plan, which was not a peace plan, which Alensky or Zelensky,

whatever he calls himself, would have been happy with at all, or indeed Jake Sullivan either. And the Brazilians said, well, look, we've come along this time, but we don't think any more of these meetings should happen without the Russians. And it seems that,

to the extent that other global South countries participated, that was their general view. And perhaps not coincidental, there's been a rather sniffy piece that's appeared in the Wall Street Journal. It covers various topics, but it says one interesting thing, which is that the fact that Ukraine's offensive is not succeeding has made the Biden administration cool to the entire idea of talks at all because Ukraine and the United States are not in the United States.

the position of strength, which they wanted to be in order for talks to happen. Now, that to my mind simply confirms the point that you were making, you know, several videos ago, which is the whole point about having this meeting in Jena, Jedder, was that there was going to be a Ukrainian breakthrough in the battlefronts, and then you'd go to Jeter and you'd present the Olensky piece's formula, as I go to call it, as the way forward, and get everybody to rally around it. When it became clear in Jeddah that that wasn't going to happen, the Americans have walked off with the sulk,

and they're now telling their friends in the media, well, in all the circumstances, we don't think that this is a good time for talks at all. Yeah, what do you make of Padolyak's statement, and Zelensky's statement, which is, you know, Essentially, whatever we discussed in Jeddah, forget about it because there's going to be no peace negotiations. There's going to be no ceasefire, none of that stuff. How do the countries that attended this peace summit look at the Ukraine government after that statement?

24 hours after the summit wrapped up, you get the statement from Padolyak and Zelensky. And why do you think the Ukraine government came out with a statement like this 24 hours? hours after the summit wrapped up. Well, the reason... Wiping away everything that was discussed at the summit. The reason that it happened is not difficult at all to work out. What happened clearly was that Ukraine, and of course the Western powers, came under very heavy pressure from the Saudis, the Brazilians, the Chinese, the Indians, all of them.

They piled in and they said the Yelenski formula is a hopeless idea. It simply won't fly. and the Saudis then came along with their plan, which basically asks Ukraine to cede eastern Ukraine to Russia. There are other aspects to it, but that's what it amounts to. And I think that what happened was that Yermak, who is another of Zelensky's advisors, who was the representative there,

I think he was very anxious to get agreement for another meeting, because it's important for the Ukrainians and for the West to show that this process is rolling along. So he probably said, well, you know, we're prepared to discuss these Saudi ideas. And of course, when Yermat got back to Kiev, that wasn't acceptable. So that needed a statement from Padole Act to say, well, you know, whatever Yomat might have said in Jeddah, this isn't what we're prepared to do at all.

We stand firm on our hardline position, which remains as hard line as ever. And in fact, we're getting all kinds of extraordinary statements now from Ukraine. I mean, Zelensky is now writing on his telegram channel about general mobilization. He's saying that Ukraine can't rely on its friends to the extent that it did. He's also talking about a diplomatic initiative. You covered this very well in one of your videos, by the way, on your channel. a diplomatic initiative to try to win over the global south, which looks like being independent of the Jeddah process.

So Ukraine is trying to reassert its hardline in light of, not exactly concessions, but a sort of retreat under pressure that Yermark did it make in Jeddah. And that's the story. And of course, in this, they are being sort of. supported by their near-con friends in Washington, who are now busy telling the Wall Street Journal that actually negotiations at the moment are really not a good idea

because instead of being in a position of strength, we find ourselves in a position of weakness instead. So you can see that there's actually been a hardening of the positions. And what Jeddah has done is it's actually made the Ukrainians and the Americans, or at least the neocons in the U.S., less willing to even consider negotiations. Unbelievable. What do you make of Zelensky's statement where he said that he's going to sink the Russian Navy, the Russian fleet, if they continue to assert their dominance of the Black Sea?

I mean, you're talking about hardening your position. You know, here you have Zelensky now talking about some sort of naval conflict. with what navy, obviously with drones that he's going to use to try and attack the Russian ships that are in the Black Sea. But, you know, these are going to be drones and weapons supplied by the collective West, most notably, I imagine, the UK, along with the US coordination. So what do you make of this statement from Zelensky? Well, I think on the one level, it's an absolutely melodramatic statement that, you know, Zelensky likes to make. And it's also, I think, partly intended to put,

pressure on the Russians to go back into the grain deal. And there's going to be a pile up of pressure on that as well over the next couple of days. We'll discuss that, perhaps in a different video. But anyway, so I think it's partly that. But I think it's also something that should be taken seriously. Ukraine is now hunting for more long-range missiles. So it's got these drones. which, by the way, have been almost entirely ineffectual. I think that's the thing we need to understand about these drones. The Ukrainians have launched them against various Russian warships. They managed to do minor damage to one,

even though these seaborn drones, even though they've been launching them at Russian ships for months now. But, I mean, you know, they did a small amount of damage to a landing ship, but not enough to sink it. and they did a small amount of damage to a tanker, but again, not enough to sink it. The drones are not the real danger. The greater danger is that Ukraine might be supplied with long-range cruise missiles by Britain, France and conceivably Germany, and that they might try to launch attacks, missile strikes,

on Russian warships in the Black Sea. Now, whether that will happen or not, I'm not saying, but I think that this is not just a bluff from Zelensky. It's partly what he's trying to do. He's trying to force the Russians back into the grain deal. But he's also, I think, trying to win victories in the Black Sea given that he's offensive elsewhere

is at a complete stop. And it's the kind of thing, I have to say this, where I think the British, the French, and even the Germans, and perhaps even the Americans, well, definitely the Americans, might try and help him. Well, I think they are helping him,

and they definitely will help him. Of course, they're going to say these are groups which are not affiliated with their militaries, these are mercenaries, or contractors or stuff like that, but there's no doubt that that the collective West is going to see this as an opportunity to to as Lloyd Austin once said

to give Russia a bloody nose which which is basically what what NATO is yes is now focused on I think there's a general consensus now throughout the collective West that this war is is lost and and they're now just going to fight it in order to to weaken Russia or perhaps hope for some sort of Hail Mary incident that results in some sort of regime change. But I think there is now a clear understanding, or there's beginning to be a clear understanding that the counteroffensive has failed. The conflict is unwinnable. And so now what do you do? You try to extend the conflict out. You try to damage Russia as much as possible. And you hope that, you know, if you're the collective West, you hope that something happens. Yes. That can lead to some sort of

outcome that is beneficial to you. That's such, I think, their position now. Absolutely. I mean, I should say that, you know, I'm already reading articles at the British media about how this is, you know, a clever idea by Ukraine to launch attacks on Russian shipping in the Black Sea because supposedly the Black Sea is so important for Russia's overseas trade that it would damage the Russian economy if they can't send their ships through the Black Sea. All of this is wildly exaggerated.

by the way, but I can see how those arguments could be made and, you know, that will put pressure on the Russians and it might, who knows, even trigger regime change there and of course if they could hit a Russian warship, like they say

they hit the Moscow. You remember back in May last year, then of course, you know, it's a big feather in their cap. The only thing I would say about hitting a Russian warship is that, of course, the Moscow was a very old warship in the 1980s, very run down. We don't quite know what happened, but even if it was

Ukrainian missiles that got through, it's not up to the level of sophistication of the other remaining ships and the Russian Black Sea fleet, which has been reinforced by the way since then. So launching a missile offensive against the ships of the Black Sea might not be particularly easy. That might be very difficult indeed. And bear in mind that Russia, also has a strong submarine force in the Black Sea as well, which is basically invulnerable to anything Ukraine can do. So what Zelensky and the Western media are talking about can only have limited effect and in terms of disrupting Russia's overseas trade. Well, historically there have been ways of protecting civilian shipping, you can create convoys, you can

do all kinds of things and a lot of Russia's shipping anyway doesn't go through the Black Sea anymore once upon the time it did you know in the 19th century Odessa was Russia's biggest port at the third biggest city of the Russian Empire but that's not the case any longer I have a final question we had the other day Zelensky in this big media PR stunt he accepted the delivery of French scalp long-range missiles, which is pretty much Storm Shadow. Yeah. For what I understand, it's pretty much the same thing. But he did this signing of the fighter jet.

He got into the cockpit of the jet, and it was this big media production to signal that Ukraine is now getting these French scalp missiles. You have reports of the UK Storm Shadow missiles being used to hit the two bridges in Crimea. What methods do you think Russia is going to employ in order to retaliate against the UK and against France? I'm not talking about the U.S. I'm talking about the U.K. and France because it seems like the U.K. and France, when it comes to Europe, at least on a military level, if there's two countries that are really pushing the escalation, especially to hit Russian territory, which I think is key, especially to target Russian civilian infrastructure, Kremend, and Moscow, it seems to be France and UK that are leading to charge. I just have a feeling that Russia is not going to leave this unanswered. I don't know how or when or in what way they're going to retaliate against the UK or France. But I don't think that Russia is just going to accept this from the UK.

I agree. I think the Russians up to this point have been basically responding with defensive things. know, we should be clear about the storm shadows. I mean, to all intents and purposes, they failed. And they were massively talked up as missiles. That, you know, it was going to be another game-changing weapon. I mean, we've heard so many game-changing weapons, but, you know, it's a sophisticated missile.

It's subsonic, but very fast subsonic. It flies low. It was said to be very, very difficult to intercept. Well, the Russians are shooting them down in large numbers. and apparently, you know, talked about that attack on those two bridges. Well, the Russians claimed that there were 12 missiles launched in a single volley, that they shot down nine and managed to jam and bring down a tenth, and only two got through, and the damage to the bridges is pretty superficial.

We've seen pictures of that, so we can confirm it. So, you know, they've not been particularly effective. But having said that, the British and the French, are nonetheless escalating. I mean, the French are now sending scout missiles and the British are clearly very involved in the Black Sea activities. I think what the Russians will do, I think that I think you're right. I think that their patience with the British and the French is increasingly exhausted. I think what they will do initially is that they will start to hunt British and French military people in Ukraine.

I think that's the first escalatory step they will do. They know where these people are and they will now start to search them out and hunt them down. This sort of decision-making centres. We've seen attacks on some of these decision-making centres already. There was a big attack, a missile attack, a Russian missile attack,

on a hotel and and restaurant I think it was either in Akrovsk or Kramatostka I mean one loses track of things but we hear that this is a hotel which foreign correspondence stay in which suggests to me

that it isn't just foreign correspondence remember foreign correspondence you can use that expression to cover all kinds of things I mean it's fairly well known that you can. And I think that the Russians will start hunting down, as I said, the British and the French, in Ukraine itself. Conceivably, if this thing escalates even further, then you could see even more aggressive Russian escalations in other places shooting down British aircraft and drones over the Black Sea. They do operate. The British do operate aircraft over the Black Sea.

I think this is quite possible. Okay. We will leave it there. The duran. Dotlocals.com. We are on Rumble, Odyssey, Bichutes, and Telegram as well as Rockfin. And go to the Duran shop, 10% off. Use the code.

Good day. Take care.