The Duran Podcast - The US Push for Peace & Europe Panics - John Mearsheimer, Alexander Mercouris & Glenn Diesen

Episode Date: March 8, 2025

The US Push for Peace & Europe Panics - John Mearsheimer, Alexander Mercouris & Glenn Diesen

Hi, everyone and welcome. I hope you're having a great day. Today I am joined by Alexander Mercuris and John Meersheimer to make sense of the current chaos and yeah, the world appears to be getting crazier by the day. I guess the big story obviously was past now, but the Oval Office spat, but we also seem that this has to be seen in a wider context, I guess, because Trump really is determined, I think, to end the war in Ukraine. And he also demonstrates that he's prepared to mount a lot of pressure. Now we're seeing that U.S. cut military aid, as well as access to its intelligence to the Ukrainians. And it also appeared that they're winning over some support among the Europeans.

At least, yes, some countries are coming along and having some hopes for Italy. but the Europeans still, the majority are still apparently determined to fill America's shoes and keep the war going. I guess a good place to start is this pure fantasy? Do Europeans have the weapons, money? If we couldn't do it with the Americans, is this a serious proposition that we can take on the Russians on our own?

How do you guys look this? I guess act of desperation perhaps from the Europeans. Well, I'll just say very quickly that, as you said, Glenn, if we couldn't beat the Russians, in effect, we couldn't stop the Russian steamroller with the Americans, the Europeans and the Ukrainians working together, it's hard to imagine how you can take the Americans out of the equation and the Europeans can pick up the slack. and we can at least restore where we are in terms of support. It's just not going to happen.

The Europeans don't have the wherewithal to give the Ukrainians to make up for the loss of American military support. And their militaries are in rather bad shape. It's not like, you know, the British and the French have formidable military forces that can be used for whatever purpose in terms of dealing with the Russians. They just don't have that capability. And they're now talking about spending a lot more money. But even if they spend that money and even if they spend it efficiently, it'll be years before you get the appropriate output that you can employ on the battlefield or you can give to the Ukrainians. So I think if the Americans pull out the Ukrainians and the Europeans can soldier on, the end result is they're just going to get defeated more quickly than they would if the Americans were involved.

That is obviously correct. Can I just say the very fact that this is an absolute hype dream that the Europeans can take the place of the Americans and can support the Ukrainians without the Americans is proved by the European. European's own behavior. They've been spending the last three weeks desperately trying to find ways to get the Americans back in the picture, at least in some form,

you know, with all this talk of the backstop that the Americans should provide to the European armies, talk from the Ukrainians about getting security guarantees from the Americans. Everybody in Europe knows that we have.

the Americans, this thing can't work. And this is what all of the rows and the anger and the tantrums and the spectacle and the Oval Office ultimately were all about, because if the Americans won peace, the Europeans are not in a position to say no. By the way, today, Orban was the first European leader to actually say specifically and expressly, that the Russians are winning. And that is with the Americans. He made that very point.

He said the Russians are winning with the Americans. It's absurd to think that this can be reversed without the Americans. He is the first leader, as far as I know, to actually say it as bluntly as that and as straightforwardly. But, of course, you know, if the real power was in taking group photos and making grand statements of standing with you, Ukraine and, you know, displaying self-righteousness, then the EU certainly would be a superpower. But this can't really mean much unless it's substantiated by the money and the weapons.

And also you need some coordination, solidarity. And as you mentioned, John, they don't have weapons going to take a while. But how are they going to put together the intelligence, the logistics? It's a here is proposals for, you know, they're going to send 120 planes to Ukraine to be manned by Europeans. You had a proposal by Macron, but even the proposals, are they all a non-starter because they all appear to think that the Europeans somehow can be, you know, monitoring or managing the front line in a peace proposal. But I think it's been quite evident now that the Europeans have been a part of this war. Indeed, one of the interesting things I found was

now that they stopped supplying, the Americans stopped giving the intelligence into this war, the British apparently can't use their stormshadow missiles anymore, which kind of proves the point that we are directly involved in these attacks on Russia. So given that we're this deeply involved, the Russians won't accept us being part of peace agreement, given that they invaded to make sure we didn't get into Ukraine. Do the Europeans have anything else? because this proposal from Macron, it just seemed, yeah, I guess I don't be rude, but a bit detached from reality. I think what's interesting about this whole situation, which bears on what you're saying, Glenn,

is that there's a tendency, especially here in the United States, to talk about Europe, is if it were a united whole. And Europe is just a collection of countries that have, in some cases, the same interest, but in other cases don't have the same interest. And that means that whenever a bunch of countries like that get together to deal with a problem like Ukraine, it's going to be collective action problems, getting everybody on the same page. And when the United States is involved, deeply involved, it largely solves the collective action problems because it's so big, so powerful, and it's willing to do so much of the heavy lifting.

But if you take the Americans out, and that's apparently what's happening here, or at least you reduce greatly the influence of the United States in Europe. And the Europeans are not on their own, but close to being on their own, then you see these fractious forces become manifest. And I would just note that if you look at the various meetings that they've had recently,

the Europeans, they've been in two places. One is Paris and the other is Britain. And the reason is because it's the British and the French who are working with the Ukrainians and everybody else is sort of taking a back seat. So it's not Europe. It's really kind of the British and the French and the Ukrainians. I like to refer to them as the three musketeers. They're working hard. But the polls who have spent the most money on defense in Europe and who have a big army have said they will not deploy any troops in Ukraine. The Germans have effectively said that so far. The Italians have told the French that they don't want the French making any commitments to put Italian troops into Ukraine for peacekeeping purposes. So you see, even in terms of creating a peacekeeping force or coming up with some sort of ceasefire agreement,

it's really the British and the French working with the Ukrainians. It's not the Europeans or Europe because there is no Europe and also because the Europeans have different views. And I would argue my final point here that as time goes by, those different views, those centrifugal forces will become increasingly powerful. I completely agree. I think that is completely correct. A German friend put it to me very well just a few days ago. He said that if we compare Europe with the United States or indeed Europe with Russia, it's like saying you have 28 Volkswagen cars and their engines taken together make up the same kind of power as that of a giant, you know, huge. truck that, you know, works. It is a complete misunderstanding of how economies and how power works. The reality is that no European country by itself can remotely match the kind of economies of scale and the power that comes from that, that a country like the United States possesses. And there is no such thing in terms of military, industrial, production.

in Europe, which means that all of these various countries taken together constitute a single whole. And that is absolutely the case. So what you have is 28 different armies, 28 different industrial systems, some of them big, some of them very, very small. None of them together make a single hole. None of them can match the United States. If the United States is not there, then you have a very fragmented and disputatious coalition in which there's constant rivalries and where people don't agree very much with each other. Now, the British and the French have been working together, but you can already see, especially if you're looking at this perspective of London, some tensions. I mean, the French came up with this proposal that Zelensky is running with for a ceasefire in the air

and on the sea and all of that. The British weren't keen, partly because it was the French who proposed it. And Macron gave a speech, the speech to the French media, one which caused an awful lot of annoyance in Russia. But the point about the speech was that he was harping on the fact

that France supposedly is the greatest military power in Europe. It's got the most advanced army. it's got the nuclear weapons and all of that, and that he's going to project France as the leader. And, of course, the country he is thinking about, I'm absolutely convinced of this, is Germany. And in fact, he talks about this. He actually talks about the fact that he's going to have a meeting

with the new German chancelley, which is, of course, Friedrich Mertz. And of course, the point is that the French, at the moment, of course, Maybe they are the leading military power in Europe, but if German rearmament were ever to get underway and to be successful, that might no longer be the case. So again, you can see the tensions starting to grow there as well. And the French and the Italians have had longstanding historic problems. And these are now manifesting themselves in the fact that Maloney and Macron don't get on very well.

In fact, there's no secret about this. So you can see the tensions. The Americans, when they are there, they can pull everyone together. They can have the meetings. People will agree because the Americans are so powerful. And as John has said in many of our programs now, they've been the balancer, they've been the mediator, they've been the glue that's brought everything together.

Without the Americans, and you now see the fear that the Americans are going, You're already seeing the cracks and the dissensions start to grow, and you can already see a scramble for leadership over this fractious coalition starting to emerge. And, of course, no one, no European country by itself can provide the leadership, is strong enough to provide the leadership and to lead the others. If I can just jump in and make another point that reinforces all of this, I think if you have the kind of collective action problems that we've just described, and you begin to take the United States away, somehow, if you have a really serious threat facing you, it goes a long way towards forcing people to work together. because they think their security is at risk. In other words, if you're really dealing with the equivalent of Nazi Germany in Russia, and they've got the equivalent of the Vermeck and Vladimir Putin is Adolf Hitler, that will go quite a long way towards dealing with the collective action problems.

But as the three of us know, Russia is not Nazi Germany. It does not have the Vermeck at its disposal. It's not a threat to overrun all of Ukraine, much less all of Europe. And a lot of people realize this. I think maybe the leaders and a number of European countries are delusional on this front at this point in time. But I think that it'll become more and more apparent that Russia is not bent on conquering any territory in Eastern Europe, much less Western Europe. and therefore the threat is not that great. So if you think about what's going on here,

you have a situation where you're taking the Americans out of the equation in a serious way, which exacerbates greatly the collective action problems, and at the same time, you really don't have a meaningful threat that ameliorates those collective action problems. So you could imagine a situation in Europe moving forward where there's just not,

a lot of coordination among these European states. There certainly is a lot of threat inflation at the moment. They're trying to build up the Russian threats greater than it is, but I guess we see plenty of examples, Macron suggesting that Russia is a threat to France. So the Danish Prime Minister, of course, making the claim that peace is more dangerous than war. but it's just it's hard to see that this

threat inflation would be taken serious but nonetheless there's talking in this matter and all these hundreds I think it's 800 billion euros to be spent it just seems very unlikely again the Europeans have patched up a lot

of debt through the COVID the green transition all of this when interest rates are low which they no longer are in addition we have the German as the Germany as the economic locomotive driving Europe forward, they're de-industrializing. We're having more political instability, increasing fragmentation and rivalry between the European states.

It's very hard to see how any of this can be pulled off. And if you're going to divert all this money away from welfare societies in this dream to create a warfare society, I think a lot of these fractures would emerge even more. but is this why Trump focused on the UK and France then because he took Starmor and Macron visiting him in Washington the British appeared to be bought off a little bit with the trade deal while again I'm not sure what they can do with France it's it sees it's well having military a militarized EU is effectively a way for France to take leadership so

but no I don't see it happening either but this makes the question what was the point of all of this or is it as Alexander now suggested it's just a bit of hyperventilating because I don't know yet what to be doing and there is desperation in the air I don't you know deny this well can I just make a few points

a few points here firstly about you know threat inflation and all of that that Mac Ron is engaging in. You follow his speech very closely. You read it carefully. I mean, he's already saying in it things which he must definitely know are untrue. I mean, he gives a completely false picture, for example, about what caused the failure of the Minsk Agreement.

He does perfectly well that the Minsk Agreement was never implemented. He was involved in many of the discussions. He himself told the Russians, you know, stop thinking, about the Minsk agreement because he cannot function in the way that, you know, you wanted to. He said that in a telephone call to Putin, which he himself recorded, and he was unwise and reckless enough to publish that recording himself. So when somebody says things like that in a speech and at the same time talks about, you know, the enormous threat from Russia, you say something which he knows is wrong, that you can also tell that he really doesn't believe very much

in the great threat from Russia either. But if you see this speech as Macron trying to improve his domestic political situation, because there's always some element of that, but also trying to stake some kind of leadership claim in a Europe where there is this worry that the Americans may be leaving, then you can understand what he's doing. He's, you know, raising the Russian scarecrow to actually do what John was saying, trying to bring everybody together and to accept France and him as the leader.

So that's the one thing I wanted to say. The second is very difficult, it would be very, very difficult in the long term to persuade the European public that there's any real danger. and that they should really sacrifice their living standards and their welfare systems, which people are very attached to here in Europe, if there really is an improvement in relations between the two superpowers,

Russia and the United States, because if there is that improvement between Russia and America, the reality is that fear of war in the Western Hemisphere is going to be. start to diminish. So keeping up the tension, stoking up the hysteria, talking up the story of the Russian scarecrow is going to be particularly difficult. The problem, the real concern for the Europeans is not that there is a threat from Russia. It is that the Americans are sowing signs of wanting to leave. And we've discussed many times in these programs.

how problematic for the Europeans that is. Now, about those visits by Macron, Stama and Zelensky, one after the other to Washington, in my opinion, that was an extremely ill-judged and misconceived joint diplomatic initiative to try to keep the Americans still involved in Ukraine, to try to get the Americans to promise some kind of backstop or security guarantee. And it went spectacularly wrong.

The French weren't able to persuade the Americans to agree to that. The British weren't. The Ukrainians weren't either. And in the case of the Ukrainians, it evolved into this open row in the Oval Office, which showed that the Americans were becoming very frustrated and very angry. So it was an extremely ill-judged and ill-thought-out diplomatic initiative. It was based on the assumption that Trump could be flattered and manipulated into changing his stance. It was not really thought through well. It was not prepared well at all. And it blew up and failed

spectacularly. Now they're trying again and we have another meeting in Riyadh next week and we'll see how that goes but you can see that what's been going on since then is an attempt by the British and the French to repair the damage because ultimately they don't want the Americans going either and that's ultimately what the objective in Europe now is. Try to keep the Americans still committed, committed to the war in Ukraine, obviously, but deeply committed to Europe, most of all. Alexander, I want to ask you a question. If you look at what happened the week of the blow-up, Krohn came on Monday, Stormer came on Thursday, and then Zelensky came on Friday. All night one week, the three musketeers appeared, and then put great.

pressure on Trump to give some sort of security guarantee to Ukraine. And it's quite clear that they failed. Now, a lot of people think the blow-up on Friday really mattered. But let's assume there had been no blow-up and that the temper of the meeting had, or the temperature of the meeting had been a lot like the one that you had with Macron and with Starmer. It would not have made any difference because Trump is just not giving them the security guarantee they want. You know, you had this big blow up and everybody talked about it and it was, you know, quite fascinating, to be honest, to see this on the screen. But in the final analysis, I just don't think it mattered that much, right? Because Trump is not going to give a security guarantee to Ukraine, period, end a story. So they can have endless meetings

and come up with all sorts of ways to finesse the letters. Did Zelensky write to Trump? But in the final analysis, it doesn't matter. That's absolutely correct. I mean, it was a diplomatic initiative that failed. And the fact that it ended in a row simply underlines the fact that it failed. But the key point is that it failed. It was not that, so there was a row. It was that the Americans said, no. They did it very politely to the French. They did it very politely to the British.

The Ukrainians didn't approach things with the sophistication that the French and the British did. And they were rather more blunt and crude and maybe entitled, came across as entitled. And I think American frustration at that point boiled over because basically they were being asked the same thing again and again after they'd said no. But ultimately the point is exactly correct. The point is that the Americans just said no. They said no to the French.

They said no to the British. They said no to the Ukrainians. And whether they'd been a row or not, the answer would still have been no. The simple truth is, if you want peace with the Russians, there can't be an American security guarantee to Ukraine, period. And it's quite clear that Trump wants peace with Russia. Therefore, by definition, he can't give a security guarantee to Ukraine. Well, I was curious, because the United States is putting a lot of pressure now on Zelensky

to, you know, even challenging his legitimacy in order to make him shift his performance. position. But do any of you see any similar pressure being mounted on the Europeans? Because every time they are suggesting that they will replace or fill America's shoes, this is effectively a way of saying that they want to sabotage Trump's peace efforts by removing the pressure on Zelensky to come to the negotiation table. I know the meeting with Macron and Starmor went better, but still, there's been a few snippy comments nonetheless, even when Starmor was there. Then, you know, Trump suggested, who's going to take on the Russians?

Okay, is Britain going to do it? And, you know, the whole room laughs. You know, this was the punchline of the joke. You know, you can do it on your own. So I'm curious, do you see any more pressure coming on the Europeans? Or is it simply not necessary? Is there any possibility at all that Europeans can issue any security guarantees on their own? Or would this just be, yeah, I guess suicidal?

Well, I don't think the Americans need to put pressure on the Europeans in that way. Why would they? I mean, what would be the reason for the Americans to do that? The Americans can go ahead, talk to the Ukrainians. The Americans are going ahead and talking to the Russians. The Europeans ultimately are neither here nor there in this process. A fact which the Europeans should accept, And if they want to become involved and to try to work to shape, you know, the future of the settlement, then, you know, they're already talking to the Americans.

They're talking to the Ukrainians. What they need to do is talk to the Russians. But the Americans don't need to pressure the Europeans. And the Americans are able to do what they need to do without that. The question is they're pressuring the Ukrainians. They're trying to push the Ukrainians to commit to a peace process, which up to now the Ukrainians have been very unwilling to do. The Europeans obviously are in no position to provide the kind of security guarantees

by themselves that the Americans are refusing to provide. They just don't have the means to enforce them. as everybody knows. The question is, the Russians, the only question it seems to be now going forward is that the Russians have their own conditions. They're not the same.

They're not identical to what the Americans want. The Americans could put pressure on the Ukrainians. Are they going to try to put pressure on the Russians, which is a completely different proposition? And what kind of negotiation? are the Americans and the Russians going to do with each other? Because that's going to be the really difficult one.

The Ukrainians can be awkward, but they can be brought into line and are being brought into line. That I think is what the Riyadh meeting is all about. But the Russians are a completely different proposition because they may not be a power as powerful as the United States. Obviously not. but they are still a power of a different level to the Europeans and certainly to the Ukrainians. So that's where the problems that Trump, in his drive for peace,

that's where ultimately he's going to collide with realities. Does he bend to what the Russians want? Is he going to try and escalate as he's been talking about today by trying to impose more sanctions on? them, what is he going to do? And does he have a plan? And has he sought this through? That I don't know. And we'll have to see. But it seems to me, Alexander and Glenn, that Trump has to go along with the key demands that Putin laid out last June 14th. Otherwise, you're just not going to get a deal. You're not going to get a police agreement. Um, just doesn't have a lot of maneuver room here. and what happens if he doesn't get the deal?

I mean, if he doesn't get the deal, does he walk away? I don't think so. And if he doesn't walk away, then he's back to Joe Biden number two, right? I mean, I don't see where Trump has much maneuver room here. He has made it clear he wants peace, and the Russians have said from the get-go, it has to be peace on our terms, by and large. There may be a little maneuver room, but not much.

Do you see any problems with that analysis? None, none at all. And I think you've put the problem the Trump faces absolutely correctly. Because to say it again, it's the Russians who have the strong cards. They have the strong cards because they're winning the war, and they've withstood the sanctions challenge, and their relations with their key allies, their key friends around the world look solid. So given that they're winning the war, as we discussed in one of our recent programs, inevitably, if you're going to negotiate a piece, it has to be one that reflects Russian concerns and ultimately mirrors their terms. So I think sooner or later, at some point or rather, Trump is going to come to that realization if he hasn't done so already. I'm just not sure whether he's understood that yet, whether he still thinks he can somehow improve on what the Russians are saying or not.

I mean, the thing that concerns me is he's still talking all the time about. a temporary ceasefire. Let's talk about a six-month ceasefire. And then you negotiate the terms afterwards. The Russians have rejected that outright. I don't think they're going to change their stance on this. If the Russians reject that and tell the Americans that, all right, we're fine, we're happy to negotiate.

You know what our terms are. But you can negotiate it without a ceasefire. That's the point. where I think Trump has to make the decision. Does he continue with negotiations, even if he doesn't get the ceasefire? Or, well, what else realistically does he do? Does he retreat to Biden become Biden?

Or does he try more sanctions? What does he do in that position? He's got to balance this very carefully, and he's got to think very carefully about where the situation is, and understand, as I said, that the Russians are not in a mood, I think, to be pressured into doing things that they don't want to do and don't feel they need to do, certainly at this point in the game. I agree that the ceasefire is the one area where this can all go wrong.

And especially now that Europeans are expressing all this intention of putting hundreds of billions into developing all these weapons to confronting Russia. when you have Ukraine standing on its last leg and you can solve this conflict, why would you delay it for another six months and give the Europeans time to pump Ukraine full of weaponry? It's, it doesn't, again, and what is the purpose behind it? Because the Europeans have also communicated clearly that they won't accept any of the terms. I think it was a British ambassador to the United Nations who made the point that Russia can't dictate NATO expansion and they can't also keep any Ukrainian territories.

So then the biggest question, if there's no willingness to accept any of the conditions which Russia won't budge on, then ceasefire is simply going to be a temporary pause for the Europeans to rearm the Ukrainians. So I also think this is a non-starter. But I think besides this negotiation, I think two possible challenges more to Trump.

One is that the Europeans might be, they continue to emboldened. Zelensky to keep on fighting at the time when Trump is trying to do the opposite. But I was also wondering what the two of you think about Russia's likely approach, because on one hand, I'm very convinced that if they can get a peace deal which can reshape their relationship with the Americans, given how profound that would be, in terms of reorganizing the world, having some great power reset, and restructuring the whole international system away from the unipolar to some kind of a great power compromise.

I think in this context, they would be willing to, yeah, they would prefer a peace, which they can agree on a settlement with the Americans. But also, in the other hand, if they can just win this whole war and dictate their own terms, you know, how great is this temptation? I know that if the Americans are pushing a ceasefire, then, yeah, definitely they're going to the ladder. but how do you think the Russians are going to lean on this one? Well, I think it's quite clear the Russians will not accept a ceasefire.

They've made it un-operably clear. We never listened to them, but they've made it perfectly clear. You laid out the logic, Glenn, as to why it would be foolish for them to do so. But just in terms of what a peace agreement looks at, I think from the Russian point of view, you have to take into account the fact that the United States, is a wild and crazy country. First of all, he just looked at Trump.

He says one thing one day and another thing the next day. He's now talking about, you know, getting tough with sanctions on Russia if they don't do X and Y. Who knows? If you look at what he's doing with tariffs, they're on, they're on, who knows? And furthermore, Trump is not forever. It could be that things go spectacularly wrong for Trump. Who knows what the economic consequences of? are of his policies. And we get Joe Biden the third, or Joe Biden the second, somebody like him

in 2028. And all of that means the Russians have a window of opportunity here to take lots of territory and to put Ukraine in a position where it can never join NATO and where it's not anywhere near being an offensive threat to Russia down the road. So I think American behavior and European behavior for sure incentivizes the Russians to take as much as they can, especially now that they have a window of opportunity, given where the balance of power is at. So I don't see the Russians being in a generous mood in the negotiations with the Americans. Certainly, if I was playing their hand, I would be driving a really, hard bargain. And the other dimension to this, which we were talking about five minutes ago,

is that Trump doesn't have a lot of options here. He's committed himself to peace with Russia. And that means he's got to make huge concessions because it's very difficult for him to walk away. It would have all sorts of political repercussions. And furthermore, the war would just go on. So in a funny way, Trump is boxed in. And when you marry that to the fact that the Russia, have powerful incentives to drive a hard bargain, I don't think you're going to get anything that looks like a sweetheart deal from the West's perspective.

I completely agree. I think what, if I have to say, perhaps the one big mistake that Trump made is that by insisting that he wanted peace quickly, he communicated to the Russians that he's very eager to make peace.

And so that that gives the Russians leverage over him, you know, for the great deal maker that he imagines himself to me to be. I was surprised that he did that. I mean, I would have thought a much more conventional approach to negotiations would have perhaps worked better for him. But the Russians know how strong their position is, and you only have to look at what they're saying, which, of course, nobody does, exactly as John says. the Europeans, you listen to Macron, you listen to Stama. They're still paying no attention to what the Russians are saying, but the Russians are being absolutely clear that on the points that Putin made,

in his speech on the 14th of June last year to the Russian foreign ministry, they are not prepared to budge an inch. And why would they? why would they agree to ceasefires, to pauses in the conflicts, to any of the things, which would ultimately weaken their own position? What I think the Americans perhaps ought to do is to accept that there's not going to be a ceasefire, to try to get the negotiations with the Russians going, to negotiate themselves, perhaps in parallel to whatever negotiations the Ukrainians get.

up to. And perhaps to say whether as part of that negotiating process over the course of the given take that takes place in negotiations, the Americans can perhaps find some ways to maybe not shift the Russian position, but to get things from the Russians in return for other things that the Americans might be prepared to give in other respects. But it's going to be very, very difficult. And to repeat a point that not just I, but several other people are now making, the Russians are very formidable negotiators. They come to negotiations extremely well prepared. This is not the Gorbachev and Jeltsin era. It's more like how the Russians used to negotiate before and now they negotiate in the same way again. They will come very prepared. They will take,

They'll be very thorough in their preparations. They will have everything at their fingertips. And I wonder whether the Americans are prepared in the same way. Just very quickly, before I turn it over to Glenn, but it's always important to remember that from the Russian perspective, what's going on in Ukraine is an existential threat. Many in the West refuse to accept that. But from the Russian point of view, this is an existential threat.

And you do come seriously prepared for the negotiations when you're dealing with an existential threat. Exactly. But I was wondering the wider picture of how is this going to impact the West? Because, of course, at the moment we're having squabbles in the West, the Americans want to end the war, the Europeans want to continue the war. But in this context, the Americans keep putting more and more pressure on Zelensky. Again, you can't really reverse this overnight. Now you have people like Lindsay Graham, scolding Zelensky. I've been watching Fox News where I forgot what the anchor was called,

where he essentially calls Selensky a proxy. You don't tell us when the war is over. We tell you, you're the proxy. I mean, a lot of the rhetoric and the narratives taking place now, you can't simply turn those back later on if you want to increase pressure on the Russians. And furthermore, with the Europeans, this is causing, a huge fragmentation though. That is the split

now, indeed, a lot of the rhetoric coming from the Europeans could be aimed towards an American audience as well that, you know, we don't need you anymore. We're, you know, finally grown up, we're going to move out of your basement and look after our own security. This is, yeah, causing very

permanent rifts. Again, if I was advising the Russians, I would, you know, just sit back a little bit and, you know, watch the whole thing on Ravre. while they, you know, not interrupt it. But where is this going? You think this is existential? Can we end up seeing a fragmentation of NATO?

I see, for example, Elon Musk taking to Twitter where he wrote something or retweeted something along this line that NATO is outdated, why are we still there? Did you see it going this far, or is this just a bit of a pressure as well on the American side? I think it's very hard to say, you know, whether NATO will come to an end during Trump's four years. I think you can make a good case. I'm choosing my words carefully here. I think you can make a good case that NATO will be a hollow shell at the end of Trump's four years. there will not be as many, nearly as many troops in Europe then as there are now, there'll be no security guarantee to Ukraine.

And indeed, there'll be all sorts of questions as to whether the Article 5 guarantee means anything anymore. And we'll be pushing the Europeans to do more for themselves and all sorts of nuclear issues, like Germany getting nuclear weapons, would be swishing around, and it'll be a very tumultuous time. But again, I don't think that NATO will completely fall apart in four years. But again, we don't want to underestimate the contempt that Trump has for Europeans.

Remember, in Trump's first term, his goal was to have good relations with Russia, have good relations with Putin and to greatly reduce the American commitment to Europe. And he made it clear in his first term that he basically loathe the Europeans. He was unable to act on that policy goal in large part because he got caught up in Russia gate and so forth and so on. But it appears that in his second term, he's come in, determined to do now what he didn't do back then, which is to improve relations with Russia, improve relations with Putin,

and to basically greatly reduce, if not eliminate, the American military commitment to Europe. Whether he succeeds, I don't know, but we're certainly heading in that direction. I think that there are enormous tensions building up, and it's, one cannot rule out the possibility that there will be some final bust up.

And I think some of the things that have been said in Europe are unwise and unhelpful to anybody who really wants to see NATO preserve. What may actually rescue NATO meet is that one power above all, and I've discussed this in many places, also wants the United States. to remain in NATO, to remain in Europe. And that is Russia. We've seen over the last couple of weeks how unstable the Europeans are.

We've had the incredible rhetoric from Macron, which the Russians have taken to very badly, by the way. They were very angered by the things that Macron said. We've seen Germany talk about rearmament, that that could logically lead to nuclear weapons, given the kind of atmosphere that there is there. Or so it must look from Moscow. So the Russians, if there's negotiations over, you know, between themselves and the Americans, I can quite easily see them saying, Putin saying to Trump, yeah, absolutely, we want good relations with you.

we want good relations with you. And one of the reasons we want good relations with you is because you can keep the Europeans in order for us. So please stay in Europe. We don't want to see the Germans acquiring nuclear weapons or the French, you know, talking about this. And look at the British. Look how hostile they are to us too.

So let us see whether or not we can improve relations with each other. let us talk about how to ease tensions between each other. Eventually that will play out in Europe as well. You will get the better relations with us that you want. And as part of that, you stay in Europe, perhaps not to the extent that you have been. You can certainly draw down your forces. You can keep something called NATO together. and we can come to some kind of understanding that way.

And I can actually see that. I can see how that might be what evolves, how to the Russian-American discussions. The Russians have never, to my knowledge, I mean, I don't know of a single moment when they've said that they want to see NATO dismantled and done away with. I mean, I can't remember that they have ever said

anything like that. What they were against Alexander was NATO expansion. Exactly. So I think exactly right. The Soviet Union at the end of the Cold War wanted us to stay in Europe and wanted NATO to remain intact for exactly the reasons that you said. The problem is that this doesn't square with the narrative that dominates in the West, right? The narrative that dominates in the West is Russians want to drive the American.

and the British off the beaches at Dunkirk for a second time and they want to dominate all of Europe and so forth and so on but as we all know this is ridiculous right and there's no reason that we can't work out of Modus Vivendi with

the Russians and the Cold War was declared over in Malta in was 1989 you had Condoleezza Rice this is a documentary when she's making the point as well that we were so surprised because they thought that the Gorbachev was going to push for Nate for the US to leave Europe in a, you know, in this, by ending the Cold War.

And they were so surprised that, no, no, they don't mind having us there. Like, yeah, John went out many a time. They have a pacifying effect. So, yes, I agree with Alexander. I think it's very correct. But again, they took it as such a surprise. So we always learned that they wanted us kick. us out of Europe. So they, you know, they learned this lesson that, okay, they don't want to kick us out.

But, you know, here we are again, and we keep forgetting this historical lessons. But I just want to make a point on the French or the British or the Europeans in general, why Trump might, you know, resent them a bit. Keep in mind that before, during the election time, that NATO was talking about making NATO trumpproof to make sure weapons will continue to flow even if he came to power. And again, almost after three years of fighting, you know, this proxy were against the Russians, the only reason why Biden administration and the Europeans agreed to start to do this long range strikes into Russia was to also a large extent to make a mess out of the situation. So it would draw up Trump into, make it difficult to make peace. So they've been seen to sabotage

Trump for quite some time. And now, of course, they make it very clear that they will do whatever if they can to keep the fighting spirit within Zelensky, as opposed to agreeing to some kind of a peace. So I can see why Trump would be upset and indeed resentful. But I do think that the Europeans are missing out a bit on the idea that Trump is just one wild man. I mean, I think he's the only one that could pull this off. Don't beg me wrong, but I think it's more of a transitional figure because he owns the Republican

party now, though. No one's opposing this. The fact that Lindsay Graham also stood by him with this spat in the oval office, and he's been the sidekick of Zelensky. And also it's becoming Trump's America. That is his desire to end the Ukraine war is popular. His efforts to drain the deep state is popular. This is making America more efficient, cutting the cost.

All of this is gaining him a lot of support. So it's very hard to see that Trump goes away, and someone says, well, let's go back to this unipolar project, which already crashed. It's very difficult to put this thing back together, it seems. So waiting for Trump to go away, I don't think this is necessarily a good approach for the Europeans. Yeah. If I were playing the United States' hand, and I wanted to shut down the Ukraine war and greatly improved relations with the Russians,

I'd focus to start with on the Europeans, and I tell them, here's the deal. You join with us to work to end this war. We join with us to put huge pressure on Ukraine and improve relations with Russia. And the quid pro quo is we won't leave Europe. NATO will remain intact. We may reduce our forces somewhat, but we will keep our commitment to the alliance. and we'll do what we can to have good relations with Europe. But for that to happen, you have to help us shut this one down. You can't resist the way you're doing now. And then I get the Europeans on

board, and I'd work with the Europeans to put huge pressure on the Ukrainians. And I'd make a strategic argument and a moral argument. I think there's a powerful moral argument here that Trump is on the morally correct side of the equation in that we have to stop this war now, stop the killing, and if we continue it, just more Ukrainians will die, because Ukraine cannot get that territory back, and indeed it will lose more territory, and it will lose more soldiers if it continues the war. So I Donald Trump are, am pushing what is not only strategically smart, but both Ukraine and for Europe, given what I just said, but I am pursuing what is the morally correct policy.

And then I just push very hard to make that policy work. But I think that that's probably the best way to shut this one down. It is the rational way to do it. The great problem at the moment, and this may be a temporary thing, but we're going through an extraordinary spank, in Europe at the moment when they just probably don't want to hear that message. They're very, very emotionally invested in Ukraine.

I think this is one of the things that's become extremely clear. Political reputations are very bound up to Ukraine. The European Commission, the European institutions of the European Union have committed an enormous amount of investment, political, economic investment in Ukraine. So having the Americans come along and saying, look, this is the quid pro quo. You help me close down Ukraine.

It's the moral thing to do. It's the politically wise thing to do. And in return, we will stay in Europe. We will prove relations with the Russians. We will have an era of detente again. That's absolutely the right thing. And in time, by the way, it might actually gain, you know, a hearing in Europe as well. If the Americans were to say, you know, we will stay, we're not completely backing our bags,

we're not completely going away, it would calm things. But for the moment at least, especially given the immense antagonism to the personality of Donald Trump that there is in Europe, which has been built up over many, many years, it's going to be difficult to get that message through, even to parts of the European public, which might otherwise be more receptive to this. But, you know, say it, repeat it, over time, people will probably start to listen.

No European country is a monolith. There are different political views. Italy, for example, probably would already be very receptive to that sort of message. I suspect that other countries would eventually follow. I'm thinking John, you as a neolist or offensive realist, you would, a lot of the premise here is that the state would be a rational actor, but you can't really overstate the extent to which the propaganda has really just, taken over society.

I think rationality is a bit thrown away. Everyone in Europe now seems convinced that this is really the moral fight that we are faced with Hitler. If we don't do anything now, then tomorrow it's Poland. I'm not sure if all believe this, but this is the rhetoric, which means that everyone has to follow the narrative. So anyone who deviates from it,

any politician who suggests maybe we shouldn't send weapons, they would just be dismissed immediately as being, you know, talking, doing the Putin talking points and would no longer be considered legitimate. Also, I think there's something was strange instinctively, because there's this assumption that the more conflict is with Russia, the more it will bring NATO together. But I think this is the alliance system which functioned in the unipolar and bipolar system. At the moment now that the US is pursuing this great power compromise, adjusting to this new multipolar system,

the tensions with Russia is doing the opposite is making the Americans push the Europeans away of it. So I think it's the Europeans, it will be a very hard adjustment to accept the rational arguments which you are making. Because I don't see any reason when I'm listening to their speeches, when I'm seeing the headlines in the papers. It's quite a hysterical mood here in Europe at the moment. And the basic assumption is whatever Trump says, whatever he wants to explain, to the Europeans, the reaction is always, oh, well, you know, we bring back something from Russia gate. He's a pro-Russian.

He wants Russia to win. He wants Ukraine to lose. I mean, there's no analysis behind this. It's just that he's an authoritarian, so he likes other authoritarian. We're good. That's why we still support Zelensky. This is, it doesn't go much deeper than this, the discourse. I agree with all that.

Can I just say that the thing with hysteria is that he's a very difficult thing to sustain over time. And over time, hysteria does gradually fade, and you will start to see people, you know, in Europe start to take a more material. One would like to think so anyway, more mature and more balanced approach. But, you know, we are going through this period of hysteria now, and it is very bad. I mean, the rhetoric is terrible. And it's a rhetoric of betrayal, of treason, of its. It's absolutely outrageous that, you know, the Americans are talking to the Russians, that we've been locked out of the discussion.

That has to ebb a little before the kind of suggestions, the kind of ideas that John expressed are really going to be heard, because at the moment, they risk being drowned out by all the noise. I've studied a lot of international history over the course of my career. And I've always thought that when you're leading a state, when you're responsible for the security of your state, it's very important to be cold in calculating and to pay really serious attention to facts and logic and to not be emotional. And you can have a certain deep emotional attachment to the state that you're a part of. But when you're making national security, it's very important to be hard-nosed to admit when you're in trouble and figure out the best way to get out of it and so forth and so on. And what I find striking about the elites in the West today is just what terrible strategists they are.

how emotional they get and how oblivious they seem to be, the facts and logic. And take it a step further. How unwilling to listen to different views. We have this narrative that everybody has to agree with. And if you don't agree with the narrative, you're Putin's puppet. It's really lunacy. We should be having serious debates. And in those serious debates, facts and logic should matter.

of a lot. And emotions, yeah, they can play some role, but not a major role. But if you just sort of look at our behavior, and it's not just, you know, this year or last year, it's for a long time now. Really, I think since the end of the Cold War, we've been going steadily downhill in this regard. And of course, the end result of this is the elites no longer have much credibility. The truth is that the publics in these various countries, the United States and these European countries, have begun to figure out that the elites are bankrupt. Just look at the recent German election. And that's one example. And the fact that you have Donald Trump in the White House, I don't think Donald Trump could have even been considered a serious candidate when I was younger.

But, you know, he is twice elected the president of the United States. And by the way, in 2016, Bernie Sanders, who has a self-declared socialist, right, would have been the Democratic candidate, had the Democratic Party establishment not moved in and axed his candidacy and sort of pushed forward Hillary Clinton. And you would have had Bernie Sanders versus Donald Trump. And you want to ask yourself, why is this the case? And it's because the more traditional elites have lost their credibility with, large chunks of the American public. And I believe, by the way, you're going to see more of this in Europe moving forward. I think in countries like Germany, the AFDA is likely to become

more powerful over time or get a larger percentage of the vote over time than it gets now. It's already just doubled the percentage of the vote that it gets. But we're in real trouble, and it's because the elites have failed us. Well, Horban, he recently, well, gave an interview with Tucker Carlson, he was, who made this comment that politically we're still democratic, but intellectually we're moving towards a dictatorship. And I don't think this is exaggeration. There's zero tolerance for opposition. And I also notice the interviews, whenever people are on any talk shows, you know,

Pierce Morgan, whatever, the first thing they always ask, if it's about Gaza, do you condemn you know, Hamas for the, you know, for the October attack? And, you know, if it's about Ukraine, do you condemn, right? Russia's invasion. It's very strange. Like when you're doing some analysis, what do you want my condemnation? Where is this coming from?

But it's always the same. It's setting the premise. You know, here's the bad guy. And certainly not supporting the bad guy. Well, if it's good versus bad, but it also pollutes the scope for actually making any compromises. And as soon as you say that this is the perpetrator and this is the victim, it's impossible to have any compromises.

diplomacy becomes kind of meaningless. And they always walk into this trap over and over again, which is why I thought it was very powerful that the United States didn't vote, that actually voted with the Russians at the United Nations. I thought this was very interesting because, again, if the Americans would buy into the narrative, this is all Russia's fault and support this resolution, then suddenly they lost the ability, really, to make any compromise.

But again, I see the media across Europe. No one's picking up on this. It's just, oh, Trump voted with North Korea. And that's it. He's with the authoritarians now. And this is, again, this is the shallowness of the analysis. It's all, who's the good guy, who's the bad guy, and how dare they talk to the bad guys.

It's really become, yeah, this primitive, it seems. Well, it seems to me, and this is only a very partial and incomplete explanation, but at least in Europe, one of the reasons we become so, you know, focused on rhetoric in that way, you know, talking the kind of way that you just said, is because we've been able to. We haven't had the need to think about to make the kind of cold, calculated decisions about foreign policy and security and defense policy that we need, we once had to make. I mean, we have had the protection of the great superpower, the United States.

So it was very easy and cost-free to take rhetorical positions and to strike poses because there was never any negative consequences in doing so. And you could always rhetorically give yourself an advantage over anybody who did disagreed with you if you did strike those poses. Now the problem is that that world is changing, that situation is changing and we are not in a position where we can go on doing this for very much longer. And exactly as John said, publics are starting to sense this and to realize that and they're beginning to see that we have to start thinking more coldly and objectively about what our true interests are

and what actually ultimately works works not just for us but for others too. But that's proving very difficult thing to do because we're so accustomed and we become so spoiled that we think in this way and have come to think in this way. So I'm not suggesting this is, you know,

the whole explanation, because it doesn't explain why you've had the same problems in the United States. But note that the United States has been the first big country in the West to be able, to some extent, at least, to break free from this. You mean with the election of Trump? With the election of Trump, exactly, and with the fact that there's debate. I mean, there is an awful lot more discussion in the American media and has been than there has been in the European media.

It may be that you only get 5% of the articles in the United States that actually, you know, raise these things, and they might be in the more heavyweight journals, you know, foreign policy and whatever. But at least they are there in Europe, in Britain, up to now. They haven't even been there. I mean, you didn't get 5%. You got zero. Now we are no longer in a position where we're able to do that. And maybe over time that will change.

Just saying. My final thought and comment on this, though, is that I think for the past few decades, as you suggested, the Europeans outsourced all their strategic thinking to the Americans. So we're just talking cliches now. And meanwhile, the Americans, they've been too dominant to the extent

that they never have to make any priorities. They can do everything everywhere, as Biden suggested. and also they've been, I guess, too powerful to the extent they can always make mistakes and just absorbs all the costs. So I think both the Americans and the Europeans have to adjust to this new world, although in different ways. And it does appear that Americans are doing a better job at it

as we are more in a panic mode at the moment in Europe. Anyway, so I think we're wrapping up. Any final thoughts, John, Alexander? I'll just say very quickly, Glenn, you don't want to underestimate the extent to which Trump is an anomaly in the United States, almost the entire Democratic Party. And a large chunk of the Republican Party really identifies with the European view. It's just that those Republicans are scared stiff of Trump and Trump is able to sort of lock them in the back closet and have them keep quiet. But Trump is an anomaly here, and he's very powerful, and he's likely to get his way on this issue, assuming he doesn't reverse course. But you don't want to underestimate the extent to which the United States remains a lot like Europe when it comes to thinking about Ukraine and foreign policy more generally. Which the Russians perfectly well understand, and which is going to make them take the line, the hard line, that we talk. about because they know perfectly well that the next administration might have a completely different,

much more conventional view of foreign policy, conventional in terms of recent American policies and positions than the Trump administration does. I think the Russians will say to themselves, we got this extraordinary individual in the White House at the moment. Let's see what we can achieve with him whilst he is there, but let's not at the same time give anything away that we might regret doing in a few years' time. So that's, I think, something that the Russians know. In fact, it's not a mystery again, because they talk about it with each other. If you go to the Russian media, you will see that they talk about this all the time. The Russian are about as transparent as you can get in my opinion. I realize it's heresy to say that in the

West, but Putin says what he believes. Lavrov says what he believes. They're all basically on the same page. And anybody who's taken a course in strategy 101 knows what they're saying does make sense. You might not like it, but it does make sense. So I think reading the Russians is not that difficult. I agree. I agree. So, yes, let's wrap up then. Thank you so much.

John, Alexander. It's always a great pleasure. So we'll look forward to the next time we talk, and by that time, the world will probably, yet again, be an awfully different place already. So, yeah, it's going to be four interesting years. So thanks again. Thanks.

Thank you, Glenn. Yeah, you're welcome, Glenn. It was a pleasure dealing with you guys. always.