The Duran Podcast - Ukraine War Will Now Be Resolved on Battlefield-John Mearsheimer, Alexander Mercouris & Glenn Diesen

Episode Date: July 25, 2025

Ukraine War Will Now Be Resolved on Battlefield-John Mearsheimer, Alexander Mercouris & Glenn Diesen

Hi, everyone. We are joined again today by Professor John Meersheimer and Alexander Mercuris to discuss Trump's first six months in office. And we were just saying it's been a bit of a ride, quite chaotic days as we haven't seen before. But before we get to that, I thought we can address what is actually happening in Ukraine, as obviously the front lines are now falling apart faster and faster it seems and a peace agreement seems more and more impossible and the question appears to be if the war will end by a defeat on the battlefield or a collapse in the political system at least from my standpoint so i'm very happy to get your take uh john and alexander what is actually happening in ukraine this days because there has been a gradual unraveling for a while

but what's happening now seems to be something new. I'll let Alexander start. He follows this extremely closely. No, I think, thank you, John. I think that is correct. I think this is something new. I think that we've now reached that point where the pressure from the Russians is becoming too strong

and where Ukraine is visibly buckling. You remember that back in the summer of last year, we noticed that the pace of events seem to be accelerating. Well, it's accelerated much faster and further since then. So the Russians are not only advancing faster, but they're inflicting more damage. And I've been following what Ukrainian soldiers are saying, and they're becoming increasingly depressed and demoralized,

and most incredibly, and something that I've never happened, at any point in the war, I've been in touch with a soldier who is fighting for one of the very, very well-known nationalist brigades. I have to be very careful because I don't want to disclose which one or who he is, but he has been in contact with me and he's been telling me that the mood in his unit is, in his brigade, is terrible and that things are getting worth and that they're already talking about the last battle, which will be the battle, which will be the battle for Kiev, which they expect to be in a few weeks, well, not a few, in a relatively

small space of time. So, I mean, if people like that are now prepared to contact people like me and pass on that kind of information, and I can verify that this person is who he says he is, by the world, then, as I said, that is a sign that things are becoming, I mean, they're turning very bad on the battlefronts. Now, I mean, we can go into the Weeds, places like Pachrovsk, but I don't think we need to because I think we can all see what's happening. As I said, positions are falling, troops are unable to resist, their shortages of everything, drones, ammunition, everything you can think of. The claims we were hearing a few weeks ago that the drones are going to hold the Russians back by themselves are visibly

untrue, and we can see that on the battlefronts. And as Glenn said, the political situation in Ukraine is deteriorating also. Just to pick up on that, I was looking at the Kiev Independent, which always puts the best possible spin on what's happening on the battlefield. And they had an article on Pekrask, and the person who wrote it had gone there for a visit. And it said explicitly in the article that this will probably be the last visit to Procrofts by someone from the Keeve Independent. And in effect, that person was saying that Procrofts is going to fall. And as we all know, Proffs look like it's going to fall rather quickly and rather easily. You have the sense that if this battle for Percosk had taken place a year ago or two years,

ago, it would be a knock-down, drag-out battle, and that the Russians would have great difficulty just penetrating into the city. But that is not what is happening here. The defenses in Prakosk are tenuous at best. They may put up something of a fight, but it's not going to last that long. And of course, similar things are happening all along the front. And as Alexander has pointed out on numerous occasions, as you move further west, the defensive positions that the Ukrainians will be fighting from are much less effective than the defensive positions they have been fighting for. This is why they have fought like wild dogs to defend these cities and these position

in the easternmost parts of Ukraine. because those are the most, those are positions that are the most suitable for defense. So once places like Pekrosk and Chaucibiar fall, the Russians are going to have a much easier time of it. And this is all happening at a time when the Ukrainian army is unraveling. And just to put a finer point on what Alexander said, I think there's sort of two dimensions to this. One is the material dimension. I mean, there have a shortage of shells. They have a shortage of armored vehicles. They're badly outnumbered in terms of drones. They don't have any glide bombs. The Russians have an abundance of glide bombs. If you look at the balance of infantry on the ground, it decisively favors the Russians, and I mean decisively. So that's the sort of tremendous material disadvantage that the Ukrainians are facing. But then there's a the psychological dimension to this, which one could argue is the key? I think the Ukrainians are not simply getting desperate and deeply depressed because they're having trouble on the battlefield.

I think if you hypothesize what the future looks like, what kind of support you can expect from the Trump administration going forward, how could you possibly be anything but profoundly depressed? the Biden pipeline is going to dry up very soon. That can't go on forever. And Trump has made it clear that he's not going to open up a new pipeline with a substantial number of weapons in it. Even if he wanted to do it, in theory, he couldn't do it in practice because we don't have the weapons to give. And all this talk about the Europeans filling the void is just nonsense. That's not going to happen.

So if you're a Ukrainian fighter, you're going to do. say to yourself, what's the purpose of dying in a war that we're going to lose anyway? Why should I continue to fight? This is a lost cause. You know, you could make an argument that maybe we can pull out of victory a year ago or two years ago. I know all of us didn't think you could make an argument, but a number of people thought you could make a plausible case. But anybody who's arguing that the Ukrainians can, you know, stem the tide now and even reverse the tide, is living in a dream world. And I think, you know, that people on the front lines tend to be realist. There's nothing that focuses one's mind like someone shooting at you and trying to kill you.

And, you know, you begin to calculate what's going on here and where this is all headed. Anyway, all of this is to say, I would think that the psychological damage here, which of course is related to the material situation. I don't want to deny that. But the psychological dimension and the material dimension combined make this a hopeless situation for the Ukrainians. What is really intensified over the past few weeks is the drones and the missiles. It used to be a big deal when 40-50 drones were sent in one night. Now, it seems to fluctuate between 500 and 700 over the past two, three weeks. It's quite extraordinary.

and also with the missiles being launched, there hardly seems to be any functional missile defense left. That is that the Russians seem to be able to target whatever they can. And there seems to be improved intelligence as well. I'm not sure if there's Ukrainians who can see where this is going and they're, well, making deals or handing and passing over information. But the amount of production facilities which are being hit is quite extraordinary. So the whole point on this, the gap between the Russians and the Ukrainians, it keeps growing. And I'm not seeing how any of this can, this growing gap can even be reduced. The Europeans talk about buying missile defense from America, but the Europeans don't really have the money.

The Americans don't have the weapons. The Ukrainians can't operate it. And even if the war, nothing can stop these hundreds of drones being sent all the time. And it looks as if they're moving towards a crack which the Russians are preparing for. That is that the Russians are now preparing this huge amount of troops in the rear. And they're even expanding the front lines, further thinning out and taking advantage of Ukrainian weakness. And when a major crack comes, such as in Pokrovsk, or Konstantinovka or Chasiev, then it looks like the Russians will be in a position to really take huge advantage of it

and try to make this unravel the entire front line. So, yeah, it's just, yeah, this Pocrovsk thing as well, how quickly this is happening, especially coming in from the northeast. There's reports of Russians arriving at the defensive positions for the Ukrainians with the small groups of five to 12 men, and there's no people there. So what could have been well-fortified positions is just being not even overrun. They're coming and they're not actually defended. So I think crack can come sooner now rather than later.

I'll just take one very quick thing. I mean, drones, the drones that we see in the skies and the missiles. That's the visible side of this. From what I'm hearing, it's true at every level. I mean, the Russians just are there with more of everything. They're more Russians. They've got more guns. they've got more tanks, they've got more missiles, they've got more shells.

They are able to overwhelm the Ukrainians at every level in the sky, on the land, with tanks, with armor, with whatever you choose. I think if you look at the Russians from February 2022 when the war broke out up until now, what you see is that they started off more or less on their back foot. They were not in great shape, but they have rationalized things in truly impressive ways in terms of raising troops, training troops, employing troops, and then in terms of spinning up the industrial base, just very impressive. And I think they've, if you look at the tactics and the strategy on the battlefield, I believe they've gone to great lengths to minimize the number of Russian casualties.

And that's why all this talk about a million Russian dead or whatever is just pure nonsense. The Russians have not been engaged in human wave tactics. They've come up with very clever tactics to minimize the number of casualties. Of course, lots of people are still going to die, given the nature of this war. But at the same time, I think the numbers are not that high on the Russian side. And it's just a very impressive performance. If you look at the Ukrainians, it's not so much the Ukrainians that I would be critical of in terms of the trajectory over time, although they've had a lot of problems.

The real trouble is with the West and with the United States. If you're going to get a situation where the West is providing a huge amount of support to the Ukrainians, in a very important way providing the backbone of support for the Ukrainians, the Americans have to take the lead, right? Because otherwise you have huge collective action problems, and plus the United States has so much weaponry and is so wealthy. And during the Biden years, we took the lead. It's very clear. If you look at the Ramstein group and how it operated, we were in the driver's seat. We made things happen. And that made the Ukrainians more effective. And much to the the chagrin of a rush, excuse me, to the Russians, it made them Ukrainians a match for the Russians on

the battlefield for quite a period of time. But what's happened with Trump, Trump is not just suddenly cut off all aid to Ukraine, but he has slowly but steadily removed the Americans from the leadership position while at the same time saying that he'll go along with the Biden pipeline until all that material and economic support goes away, but he's not going to open up another pipeline. The Europeans are going to have to do that. And the Europeans can't solve the collective action problems, and plus they don't have the equipment, they don't have the money, and so forth and so on. So I think if you look at the West plus Ukraine, it's really the West that's sort of derationalizing. Well, if you look on the other side of the divide, the Russians have impressed.

rationalize their war effort over time. And I think in a very important way, that sort of gets at the essence of what's going on here. I think it's the need, though, to portray the Russians as simply wanting to, well, to present their motivation for simply being territory from day one. I think in the West, many of us fooled ourselves, because from this perspective, it looked as if the Russians were quite hopeless in the beginning. But as we know, when they did enter, at least what I hear, they were quite convinced that they wouldn't have to actually fight the war. They would introduce all these troops within the first few weeks. The Ukrainians would see the Russians would be serious. They would sit down in Istanbul.

They would negotiate a deal where Ukraine would commit to neutrality. NATO would also accept this. That would be no de facto NATO membership. NATO would pull out. And you could have a mince. A Minsk 2 plus or whatever it might be. But I think what the Russians did when they realized this could not happen is they readjusted their army for a war of attrition. And if you're going to destroy the Ukrainian army, which NATO has spent so many years building up,

and pouring in all these weapons is going to be a very bloody affair. And they need a lot of weapons and a lot of soldiers. So they did approach this in a very, I guess, rational manner. But I did want to ask the two of you about the possibility for peace now, because I, for one, was a bit optimistic when Trump took over. He, six months ago, he spoke of Ukraine having to accept neutrality. He also said, we have to recognize there has to be territorial concessions as a result of the past three years. But now he's back at, you know, talking about an unconditional ceasefire, which doesn't really address the political issues and primarily the neutrality issue.

What is, well, I guess a very simple question, is the time for peace done? Is it, has that possibility been thrown out the window? I just, I don't see a pathway anymore for a peaceful settlement. I think the door for a peaceful negotiated settlement is closing very fast. The only way it can now happen is if we get to a situation where the Russians feel they've won, about to win, but still decide that for whatever reason they would rather speak to the Americans and agree something rather than just-imposed terms. And even then, I don't think it is certain that it would be possible because I still think

that there are just too many differences and too many issues between the Americans and the Russians, between the Russians and what would be left at the Ukrainians to sort this out. The Trump affair, the Trump presidency, has approached this whole problem in a completely chaotic way. They never appointed a proper negotiating team. They tried to use one of Trump's friends as the chief negotiator. We said at the time we did a program, when we did one of our programs, That wasn't going to work. They never sat down, conducted proper negotiations with the Russians in the way that

same was done during the Cold War, during the negotiations in Geneva, over the Korean war, the negotiations in Paris, over the Vietnam War, with a view to finding out what the Russians wanted, what they could be conceded, how an agreement could be reached. We had this strange idea. The ceasefire, freeze. Trump tried one thing, gave up on that, tried something else, had rouse with Zelensky, had rouse with Putin. There was never anything that came together and showed a proper diplomatic strategy. Now, in the absence of one, given that you are in this moving situation, which is a war, inevitably.

the opportunity for a peace agreement was lost. And to be honest, I don't think it's coming now, at least not, as I said, until the war is won, and the Russians decide what terms they're going to settle for once they've won. I make a couple points. I think there's no question that the Trump administration has pursued a chaotic policy toward Ukraine and toward Russia. One could argue they've pursued a chaotic policy on almost every issue

Middle East included. But just on Ukraine, the question of getting a peace agreement is a very simple one. The Russians have set down a set of terms. As we all know, they did that last June 14th. And those terms, at least the main elements of the deal that they spelled out are non-negotiable, period. And we simply refuse to accept those terms. As best I can tell, we refuse, and here I'm talking about the United States and the West more generally, we refuse to acknowledge those terms.

The whole discourse pays hardly any attention to those terms. What we talk about is a ceasefire. The Russians have said ad no ceasefire, no ceasefire, no ceasefire, until you get a meaningful peace agreement, at least in principle, if not in writing. So there's no point in talking about a ceasefire, but that's all we ever talk about. And we don't talk about the terms. And if you don't talk about the terms that Putin has laid out, there's no point in talking because you have to accept those terms.

The Russians insist on that. For the Russians, what's happening in Ukraine is an existential threat. The problem is that most people in the West can't get this through their thick skulls. They just don't understand that this is not about territorial grabs or the fact that Putin wants to be Peter the Great or whatever. This is dealing with an existential threat. NATO on Russia's doorstep in Ukraine is an existential threat. And the Russians, therefore, came up with a series of demands that are non-negotiable.

And until we accept those demands, which were not, right, this one is not going to be settled peacefully. It's going to be settled on the battlefield. And the end result is you're going to get a frozen conflict. You're never going to get, in my opinion, I hope I'm wrong, but you're never going to get a meaningful peace agreement. And this conflict is going to go on, maybe not as an out-war, but as a frozen conflict for as far as the eye can see. Watch some of the discourse here in Europe, and it's, I would just describe it as quite radical and irrational, because now that they realize, yeah, the war is coming to an end, we can't continue this forever.

What people are saying then, okay, we need to come up with that peace if this is the case, but it's always focused on what does Ukraine need? and we come up with this idea well they need a proper deterrent so we need to obviously fill up with a lot of military capabilities there should be Europeans on the ground all these things but no one

actually asks what does Russia need this seems I mean never they never discussed this is quite surprising and especially given that Russia is winning surely their terms should also be discussed and I thought about this as well because

I think you're very correct but I think it's they can't discuss this because if they discuss well Russia can't live with NATO on its borders then we're going to have to accept some complicity in this causing

this war and you know they it seems like the key component in the war narratives has been this unprovoked invasion they just want to swallow up more territory and restore the Soviet Union if we have to go back and accept

well Russia invaded because they can't accept NATO in Ukraine, then not only did we help provoke this war, but also this could have been solved a long, long time ago. And indeed, we might even face the threat of considering Russian security concerns as somewhat reasonable that we wouldn't want this either. And the ceasefire is, again, it doesn't make any sense. invaded because they wanted neutrality.

And after all the suffering, they have also gone through. They finally come towards the end and they're winning the war. The solution is going to be to freeze without meeting any of the demands. They're back at square one. This is what they're being fighting for. And also if you have ceasefire, where's the pressure? The only reason why the Ukrainians and the NATO countries would accept, you know, what are very high demands of the Russians,

is because they're winning the war. If you have a ceasefire, unconditional ceasefire, it's just, there's no reason to accept any of the terms at all. But in the absence, though, of a peace agreement, what will Russia do? Well, I think that is the big question.

I mean, just a quick recap, I mean, refusing to discuss Russian terms and insisting on a free ceasefire, which the Russians have rejected is refusing to take no for an answer. Now, you can do that if you're winning, but it makes absolutely no sense to go on doing that and to continue to do that when you are losing.

We are losing. And just to go on saying in light of that, no, we refuse to take no for an answer. We refuse to accept that the Russians won't agree to a ceasefire. is not just irrational. It is pointless. It's completely stupid. It is completely not looking at the realities of the situation

as they are evolving. Now, what the outcome of the war is going to be is going to be decided. I think it is now increasingly clear, not in Paris or London or Brussels or even Washington. It's going to be decided in Moscow because in the absence of a peace agreement it is the Russians who are going to draw the line and who are going to say we're going to be here

and we're not going to be there. I still don't believe that the Russians want to go all the way to the West Ukrainian border. We've discussed this in many programs and the reasons for this are clear. They don't want to go to the Ukrainian, to the Western border. The people don't like them there. they don't want to be tied down controlling this territory indefinitely there's all sorts of compelling reasons why they would not want to go now given that this is so if i'm right about this then there is still a possibility if not for a peace a proper peace agreement at least for some kind of armistice arrangement whereby the Russians go this far, we accept that that is the line, and we each go our separate ways.

It's a dismal. It is a dreadful outcome, but perhaps we might be able to come to some kind of terms with the Russians at that point. The alternative is that we don't accept anything, that the Russians do eventually stop, in which case, as I said, we don't just have a frozen conflict, but a very, very unstable frozen conflict, which could restart at any time. And that would be an even worse outcome.

Or worse still for everybody, the Russians decide that is an intolerable situation. They can't allow any uncontested territory beyond the areas that they control. They may not want to go. all the way to the West they might not want to take Loveol or all of these places

but they might decide that they have no option but to do that with all of the dreadful consequences for them and for us which would follow. There is no good outcome to this conflict for anyone now. That

it seems to me is where we are. Yeah I agree with that I agree with everything you said I was going to ask a question which you in a sense answered Alexander, but I'll ask it anyway. Maybe we can go into a bit more detail, and Glenn can give us his views on the question. I just start by saying that if you look at how the West treats this conflict, this is especially true in Europe, but it's true with many people in the United States

on the hawkish side of the equation. A Russian victory is an existential threat to the West. Many people believe that. I don't believe that for one second, but many people do believe it. So let's assume that we're correct and that the Russians win, and it's clear that Ukraine has lost. This is going to be a devastating defeat for the West, devastating defeat psychologically, given how much we've invested in this war and how we portray Russian victory as an existential threat. So that raises the question in my mind, what are we going to do?

What are people in the West going to do? Are they going to say, well, we lost. This sometimes happens and we just have to accept there's a frozen conflict. Or are we just not going to quit? And if we just don't quit, what does that mean? can I just quickly comment into that because I think that's an

excellent point I mean I was reading an article in the Financial Times by a man called Martin Wolfe very well-known journalist here he makes exactly that very point he's a huge supporter of Ukraine we cannot afford to lose

this war because if we lose this war liberal democracy in the West is doomed that's that's almost I'm slightly exaggerating, but only very slightly, that is how he talks about this. Now, I don't believe that for a moment. I don't believe that the end of the West will immediately follow if the Russians

regain territory that they've controlled for most of them more than history. I mean, to me, this is an absurd idea, but there are people undoubtedly who do think this. Now, I think if we are in that situation, there is a difference between. the United States and Europe. The United States does have the Atlantic. It's far away. It is a single country. It is much richer. It is far more powerful. It is many, many other issues around the world that it has to take care of. And I don't think it is so obsessively focused on Russia in the way that we have become in Europe. So I think the United States will eventually pick itself up, will say, well, sometimes wars don't go, well, this one didn't.

We're going to have to come back, maybe five, ten years. We're going to start our dialogue with the Russians again. We can find our way through. What we are going to do in Europe is a completely different question. Now, there is a lot of talk about remilitarization, about Germany, building up its forces, about doing all of these things. These all look very unrealistic and bad plans to me. But if we continue in that direction, if we continue to frighten ourselves in this way, then our future in Europe is going to be bleak indeed.

Because our economies are going to continue to buckle under the strain of all of this. I was reading that energy costs in Britain are four times greater than they are in the United States. and that the article didn't say why, it's not difficult to see why. It's because of this rupture in Europe, in the continent, the oil and gas flows from Russia have now been interrupted. And we'll get to deepen our underlying problems. And at some point we're going to find ourselves in a very, very deep crisis. Now, the alternative, and there's always alternatives, is that eventually some kind of sanity will prevail. We will come together. We will come together. we will put aside these nightmares and we will start to reach out to the Russians and try to establish a dialogue with them as we did during the Cold War. Maybe the Americans will help us to do that. I'm not confident of it. The panic, the hysteria, the anger, the fear, all of those in Europe are so strong, difficult to see us escaping this anytime soon. So I'm afraid we're going to have a very, very dark time in Europe going forward. One created largely, exactly by the fears and pathologies

that you're talking about, John. I was, well, from the American side, you know, you heard something that could make you optimistic, but again, things changed back and forth too often. Keith Kellogg, he made this interview, I forgot which channel, but he, he, if he, he, if effectively argue that in a peace agreement, Russia would need some reassurances that NATO wouldn't enter Ukraine. And he suggested that within this framework, we also have to then look at NATO's future relationship with countries like Georgia, Moldova. You both probably saw this interview.

And I thought this was interesting. It caused some pushback from the Europeans because this broke with the narrative that the European security architecture had anything. to do with Russian motivations. But my point is, I think this could be one lesson. That is, okay, we had a war because European security architecture essentially fell apart. It was unsustainable, the path we took from the 90s. And we can start to look for ways of pushing for a structure based on indivisible security.

In other words, resolved the underlying causes. This is, yeah, I'm not that optimistic. because no one's speaking of the European security architecture anymore. Instead, again, since we're going back to the unconditional ceasefire, the premise there appears to be that this is a simpler territorial issue. And I don't think Trump really understands the war, to be honest. And so I think the main view in Europe will probably be that, yeah, the battle was lost, but the war still goes on.

So we can, this will become a new cold war. We will get them at the end, just like the first time. We will eventually come out at the end because we got freedom and all of this. And there's going to be this more dangerous version of a Cold War pump a little bit more weapon into opposition groups in Ukraine or what remains. We have to confront the Russians in the Arctic. So instead of taking lessons from Ukraine in terms of seeking a more neutral position for Georgia and as Keith Kellogg suggested, there's instead going to be pushed to increase the Western presence and pull them into, if not NATO membership, at least in NATO orbit. And within this, if one bias into this premise that this is just a Russian territorial expansion and they were successful this time, you know, we could get ideas like trying to liberate Belarus from, you know, from Russian influence.

It's quite interesting. If you drive through Lithuania, they have street signs. They actually have next to Belarus. This direction is Minsk. This is presently occupied by Russia. This is on the roads when you drive. It's quite crazy. So if this view prevails, I think they can,

I think we're just going to go into another cold. war where, yeah, where we, or alternatively or additionally, also the idea that if, if we want to save face, we have to embrace the narrative that doubled down on this narrative. You can say that we didn't actually lose because Russia wanted all of Ukraine and they only got, what, 25% or it could be much more. And indeed, this in a way was a victory because they paid a heavy human toll. and they were isolated internationally, meaning the West. And so this was kind of a victory for us anyways.

Now, this could be a very attractive face-saving narrative, but again, it would mean that we're still doubling down on this premise, that this was about territory. And I think this is why this war of narratives is so important, because if there isn't introduced any rationality into this, any reason, any willingness to address why this war began, we're going to learn all the wrong lessons. And I think, in my opinion, that's the direction we're going,

where effectively mindless hatred of Russia will be the new virtue. Two quick points. One Alexander said, and I agree completely, and I think you agree too, Glenn, based on what you just said, that the Russians will not take all of Ukraine, and you will end up in, Western Ukraine with a rump state. And you want to think about what that means. In other words, it's not like Russia just completely conquers Ukraine, incorporates all of Ukraine, and the Ukraine

problem, so to speak, is taken off the table. Ukraine remains. It's just a rump state. And the question we then have to ask ourselves is, what are relations between the West and that rump state to look like. And I would bet that we will continue to maintain we meaning the West, reasonably close, maybe even very close relations with that rump state. And that will be a source of huge trouble. Second point I would make is if you watch what's going on in the Baltic and you listen to how people talk about Kaliningrad these days and the possibility of surrounding Kaliningrad with NATO forces, it sends shivers up your spine. I mean, don't these people understand that they're playing with fire? And anyway, I just take that, I hope I'm wrong here, but I take that

as an indicator of how crazy the West may behave once this war comes to an end and we get a frozen conflict. I just to quickly add to this I think any any attempt to see the future through the framework of the Cold War the Cold War that was waged between the 1940s and the 1990 would be a profound mistake the Cold War was a conflict that was basically about Europe it was a situation where Europe the Soviet Union the United States I mean the Cold War was a conflict that was basically about Europe it was a situation where Europe the Soviet Union the United States I mean the that they were the major places in the world. And the two superpowers of that time, the Soviet Union and the United States were indisputably the most powerful countries. And Europe was the prize in the middle, which was the most important continent. And of course, on top of that, it was a major ideological struggle.

if we suppose that because we were successful in that Cold War, we're going to be successful in whatever conflicts, types of conflict are going to happen in the future. We are blind to the reality that the world is different, that Europe is far less important today than it was in the 40s and 50s, that the United States inevitably is going to be thinking about other places. It's not going to be as focus on Europe as it was in the 50s and 60s and 70s and 80s. It's got to think about the Asia-Pacific region.

It's got to think about the Middle East in ways that it simply didn't do at that time. And Russia, obviously, is not the same place that it was in the 40s and 50s and 60s. It's different. Again, so we will not be re-fighting the same struggle, expecting the same outcome. On the contrary, if we lock ourselves into these fantasies, you know, saying to ourselves, you know, one day we will liberate Minsk and one day we will liberate Don Bass and Crimea and all of that again, then all we are doing is we're locking ourselves indefinitely, not just, into a conflict, but into a conflict that is going to marginalise us even further in a world

in which we are already a much smaller part. I think this is something people in Europe need to understand, and perhaps people in the Baltic states, most of all, about the Baltic, you're absolutely, we're both absolutely, but the things that people are saying about Kalinigrad are off to scale insane. I think that one almost gets the impression that there are some people who almost want a war with the Russians in the Baltic. And all I can say about that is that, I mean, that is the last stage of madness. If we start getting into war there, what we're being through in Ukraine is going to look like an overture to an opera with a very, very dramatic outcome. What will this mean for NATO?

That would be interesting to me because for some, mainly the Americans, it looks as if they do still have an interest to normalize relations with Russia. As Alexander said, we don't, well, the United States have to adjust to this multipolar world. They have to make priorities. They can't be everywhere at all times. When you have many centers of power, you don't want to push necessarily the Chinese, and the Russians too close together. So it would make sense for the United States, at least to have some bilateral relations with Russia

to shifts its priorities and resources to Asia. But meanwhile, in Europe, you have, I would say the Baltic states, they finally have the entire political West hating Russia as much as they do. And this is, I think, also for the Europeans, keeping NATO alive, you need that external. adversary and Russia plays that part quite well in the minds of the Europeans. So if this war comes to an end now, what will this actually mean for NATO? It doesn't seem,

I mean, it's not either it remains or it collapses. It could end up in some weaker form. But surely this is a wider collapse of the European security architecture. I would think so at given how much the Europeans have invested in this. I mean, we threw everything in gambling on this idea of defeating Russia. Well, I'll tell you, Glenn, if you read the papers these days, you see quite a few articles talking about nuclear deterrence for Germany. The Germans are talking to the French, and there's the whole question of whether the French nuclear deterrent can provide security

for Germany, even people in Germany are even talking about the possibility of Germany getting its own nuclear weapons. But they're basically saying that we can't count on the American nuclear umbrella anymore. And the American nuclear umbrella is at the heart of the security guarantee that is built into NATO. And if that is going away now, if that is going away now, Now it's only going to erode further in the wake of a Ukrainian defeat and a Russian victory. So I think that America is no longer in a position, and it doesn't want to be in a position where it's providing security for Europe. It wants the Europeans to provide for their own security.

We use that rhetoric. The Trump administration uses that rhetoric all the time. And you can disagree with it or agree with it. But the fact is, it's the way the Trump administration thinks. But once you go down that road, once you start talking about Europeans providing for their own security, then the American security umbrella, the American nuclear umbrella goes away. And again, this is why the French and the Germans are talking about trying to figure out what's the best way to provide nuclear deterrence for Germany.

So I think that the alliance will surely remain in name, but in terms of being a meaningful alliance the way it has been since 1949, I don't think that's going to be the case moving forward. Yeah, absolutely. And can I say something else, which is that we have the real risk. and we said this many times in many programs, if the Americans start to withdraw, we're going to see fragmentation in Europe and a return to rivalries. And, you know, one wasn't pushed this too far, but, you know, we're starting to see some signs

that might eventually point in that direction. So there was the idea that the Germans came up with, that they buy weapons from the United States to send to Ukraine. And then it became very clear that this is an idea that only the northern countries, Germany, Britain, the Scandinavians, the Baltic states, the Dutch were really interested in. The French, the Italians, the Spanish didn't like it. So they started to go one different way.

Then the British and the Germans, Stama and Mouths, signed a security agreement with each other. Again, that is a very strange thing to do. given that we are supposed to be already in NATO. So why do we need a security agreement? Well, again, you could argue that this is reinsurance against the Americans. If the Americans go, we need to have a security arrangement with each other, but then why not involve the French? Why are we doing it bilaterally?

So you could start to see, perhaps, you know, this is, I'm not seeing it's going to work like this, but a kind of northern block emerging, maybe centered on Berlin, maybe London, and a sort of southern block on Paris and these other places. Now, obviously, this is looking too far ahead, but you can already see that there are going to be these tensions, and they're inevitably going to grow, just as if German rearmament really does get going, then inevitably that is going to cause stresses and worries as well. Poland already is showing signs of nervousness about some of this. So I, if European leaders were wise, they would work to leave NATO as it is. Better keep things as they are.

Have the Americans still here, maybe begin the dialogue with Russia, because otherwise the risk that you do, run is that you're going to start getting all of these conflicts and tensions in Europe, start to reawaken again, and then the situation in Europe might still, might become a lot more complicated and potentially even dangerous. The problem the Europeans face, though, Alexander, is that the Trump administration wants out of Europe, and they're just real limits to what they can do to keep us in Europe.

I think the Europeans would do almost anything to keep the American security umbrella over their head, which is another way to say they'd do almost anything to keep NATO intact. But I think they understand that with Donald Trump, it's a lost cause. And then all the logics that you just spun out begin to kick in. I'd make one quick point on this to illustrate how tricky this can all be. If you go back to the Cold War, when there really was a serious, threat called the Soviet Union that the West faced. Both France and Britain developed nuclear weapons. They had a nuclear deterrent. The British agreed to integrate their nuclear deterrent

into NATO, which is basically a way of saying that the Americans controlled the British nuclear deterrent, which I think was a smart policy. But leaving that aside, the French, as you would expect, This is the ballast France, absolutely refused to subordinate their nuclear arsenal to American control. So they actually pulled out of the military half of NATO in 1966. Most people don't realize this. I remember when I used to study the conventional balance in Europe, I could tell you all the forces that we had on our side, the Soviets had on their side, and the French were not included because they were not in the, the military part of the alliance. They remained in the political part. But this was driven in good part by the fact that the French did not want to subordinate their security, i.e. their nuclear

deterrent to NATO control, which meant American control. So you can see the British and the French had very different views at the time on how to provide nuclear deterrence for themselves. And this situation will be even worse now because there's no Soviet threat to, to act as a glue. Well, it's just hard to see how we can go back to the way things wore. Again, John, you often speak of America as a pacifier, which I think is very correct, that without the United States, the Europeans aren't going to have much of cohesion.

But also, the Russian boogeyman to keep this external threat to have everyone in line and be willing to make these concessions. I think this is also going to be weakened once the war is over if Russia simply communicates, it's fed up with the West. It wants its main economic interests, political interests are in the East and it shows more and more disdain and this interest of the West. In other words, its weapons should still point West, but its economic ties should go east. But also in Europe, you're going to have to have some accountability once this war has been lost and a lot of the war narratives are exposed for being fraudulent.

And of course, we're having economic problems here, especially in Germany. Things aren't going well. This is also producing some social problems. We're having a struggle with political legitimacy from France, Germany, UK. Yeah, I would at least characterize this as a legitimacy problem of many of the political elites. And it's just hard to see why. Europeans wouldn't turn on each other once this war comes to an end.

And all these plans of, well, if the American leaves, Germany can militarize. But it is assuming that the rest of the Europeans will be comfortable with this new Germany. And again, this is not the Germany of five years ago. This is a Germany which having huge economic problems, Germany which now envisions prosperity through some military Keynesianism, wanting to be a huge military power in the same. center of Europe. Not everyone in Europe is quite comfortable yet with the Germans doing this. And also growing disdain for political opposition, now banning the main opposition party in Germany. Germany talking openly about obtaining nuclear weapons, you know, they're already backing genocide in Gaza.

And now they want to be the leading power in Europe to confront Russia. This is just the idea that this will simply be a new version of. I'm not really buying it. I think this can fragment very quickly and become very unstable. But again, these are realities, though. The Americans will leave, I think, more and more, seeing Europe as having delayed what they should have done years ago. Is this, we'll come back to Trump and the fact that he's now been president for six months.

Is this the big message, in fact, of the last six months? that the Americans are leaving, in effect, because Trump's been absolutely chaotic. His presidency says many different contradictory things almost every single day. But there is a kind of drift away. I mean, American forces, I understand, are actually being quietly reduced. The United States is clearly less engaged in the conflict in Ukraine than it was. Biden doesn't seem, sorry, Trump doesn't seem to be as comfortable with the, well, as comfortable with the European leaders as Biden was.

There's still, I think, some hope in Europe that Trump is the aberration. But for me, the interesting thing about Trump is that despite the chaos and the dysfunction and all of this, there's been a lot less pushback against some of the broader, you know, currents of what he has been doing in terms of disengagement. from Europe than you might have expected. I mean, if something like this had been attempted a decade ago, well, more than a decade ago, 20 years ago, there would have been a massive reaction against it in the United States.

The Congress would have combined against it. The informed opinion across the United States would have rejected it. But that doesn't seem to be the case. So, I mean, is this actually the trade? Is this the major message of the first six months of Trump, at least in terms of foreign policy, that the United States is now disengaging from Europe? I mean, this is a question. I think that you're exactly right, Alexander, as to what's happening.

And I think there are two factors at play that explain it. One is the Middle East and the other is East Asia. The fact is that the United States has just got dragged into a war with Iran. We went to war on June 22nd, and by almost all accounts, that one is not finished. And we're joined at the hip with the Israelis, and the Israelis are fighting wars here, there, and everywhere. And we pay lots of attention to those wars. We're backing a genocide in Gaza, which is a huge, consequential event for us and for the Trump administration in particular.

So the focus is in a really big way on the Middle East. And of course, Israel, for all the reasons we fully understand, is of importance, great importance to the United States. So focusing on Israel has taken attention away from Europe and allowed us to drift away from Europe. And then there's East Asia. Thankfully, there is no crisis there and there's no crisis on the horizon. But at the same time, the American newspapers are filled with stories about growing Chinese military strength in East Asia. China building a blue water navy, China becoming more aggressive in its behavior towards Taiwan, and so forth and so on.

a fleet around Australia and so forth and so on. So there's a sense that the Americans have to pay more attention to East Asia. And, of course, they're now paying a huge amount of attention to the Middle East. And there is a limit to how many balls you can have in the air at the same time. And unsurprisingly, Europe is the one ball that is getting the least amount of play at this point in time. And that allows the commitment, the American commitment, to basically wither away. I mean, that's what's happening. Trump hasn't made a simple policy decision to end the American commitment to Europe.

He's just letting it wither away, which I think Alexander fits with his chaotic way of doing business, right? He doesn't, you know, even if he makes a concrete decision, he'll switch it the next day, then go back to the original decision. the following day. But I think if you sort of look at what's happening in Europe, we're drifting away. And we're going to focus a lot more on the Middle East because of Israel and our commitment to Israel. And we're going to focus a lot more on East Asia. I think, again, the Europeans prediction about what's going to happen with the United States that they might be convinced to stay behind. It's, I think, they're misreading, because they're always I guess it's a very common problem in the world to focus excessively on the personality of leaders.

And of course, Trump is quite unique to this regard. But it is important to note that in the first administration of Trump, I mean, he's more of a transitional president. When he pulled the U.S. away from the JCPOA with Iran, this wasn't, it was seen as something radical. It's just Trump. But again, Biden didn't reverse it. He went very aggressively after China seeking to crush its economy or prevent its technological rise. This didn't get changed under Biden either. So I think we overestimate how much of this is about Trump and as opposed to what is more systemic or structural,

given that the world is becoming multipolar. And as both of you said, priorities have to be made. And there's also a sense that it's not getting necessarily better. Economically, the whole post-World War II era or economic system seems to be shaking in terms of just interest in things like the US treasuries or bonds. I think many feel that this system, as Musk would say, they're spitting towards bankruptcy. There has to be some reshuffling. And I think after Trump is gone, the idea that we're just going to go back to the way things wore, it's very flawed. And I bring this up because it appears to me that European policy is just unlimited flattery and just wait him out.

Just as Trump would say, kiss his ass as much as possible. And yeah, just get this four years over with. And then later on they can all write books about how they were able to. to manage Trump until he went away. But again, I think the policies will stick because it's not all about Trump. I think he's more some of it's Trump, but he's quite unique. But a lot of this is trumping a symptom of something wider. And I think the Europeans are preparing themselves for this by fooling themselves.

Well, it's not surprising in some ways because the period of American ascendancy, at least in Western Europe, has been so. pleasant. It's an incredibly pleasant, comfortable time relative to other times in European history. I mean, the period, especially the first 30 years after the Second World War, an extraordinary economic boom, an incredible increase in living standards, a massive political stabilization across Europe, an absence of war, an actual peace. I mean, you know, people talk about Pax Americana, and of course, of course, talking about the world at large, maybe one can understand why one should take that with, you know, certain dose of cynicism. But in Europe, it was true. I lived in. I mean, I remember the 60s and, you know, what it was like. John would remember it in Europe. It was a very, very pleasant time to be there. And of course, there were the Americans and they were keeping it all together. So not. surprisingly, given that this has been the reality of what we've lived through in Europe,

there's a lot of people who just don't want to let it go, because we don't want to go back to the world in a system where European powers are again in competition with each other, where there's a kaleidoscope of things, where there are economic stresses and uncertainties, where people have to decide whether to spend more on butter or on guns and all of those kinds of things. So it's not surprising. But the thing is we need to understand that if the Americans are indeed leaving, which I think they are, then we have to develop policies for Europe and for the people of Europe, which

take that reality as fact, and starts to work and try to find a way forward. And that has to mean talking with the country, the other country in Europe, which remains a major power, and that is going to be Russia. Now, until we do that, we're not going to be able to stabilize and sort out our affairs properly in Europe. And that's, we come full circle again to the conflict in Ukraine. resolving the long-term relationship with Russia is absolutely in our interests, a long-term interests, and that means finding a long-term solution

to the problem of Ukraine. Before we finish off, I wanted to just ask about Trump's first six months in office. It hasn't gone as expected. I know this would be a massive topic as a final question, But where how do you see this six months? Obviously, he didn't finish the war in Ukraine. Well, I think he was a bit too ambitious.

He wasn't really able to end the forever wars in the Middle East either. The whole America first principle appears to be challenged. The tariffs, which I'm a bit of a Hamiltonian economic nationalist, so I'm not that opposed to tariffs. them as being an interesting instrument if they're, you know, very targeted towards some sectors for developing some technological sovereignty or industrial capabilities if they're mixed with subsidies. But again, this appears to only be used now as a big hammer against punishing, like, a

form of sanctions or economic coercion. So I think it's abused. But how are you guys interpreting his first six months? Can it continue like this for another three and a half years? I'll say a few words. Let me just start with the foreign policy front, which I think is not his biggest problem at the moment. But he's failed almost everywhere. He's failed in Ukraine slash Russia, as we just talked about.

Remember, he said he might even shut down the Ukraine war before he moved into the White House. He's not succeeded after six months. Then there is the Middle East. We're now in a war with Iran. Joe Biden had the good sense to avoid a war with Iran. The Israelis tried to bait us into a war on two occasions, and Biden didn't take debate, and Trump did. We're still supporting the genocide in Gaza.

The Israelis are still in southern Lebanon and in southern Syria, and we're supporting them there. And you want to remember, Trump went to war against Yemen and said he was going to deliver a decisive blow to the Houthis. And after about 30 days, he quit and said the Houthis won. And then there are the tariffs, which are hard to make sense of because he constantly goes from one point. to another point, to another point on the tariffs and where this all ends up, who knows. But it doesn't strike the vast majority of people who study these issues that this is a smart way to do business with regard to tariffs. So I think if you look at his performance on the foreign policy front, it's actually dismal. But I think his biggest problems are at home.

And I think this Jeffrey Epstein business is a huge problem for him. And it's a huge problem. because the MAGA base is consumed by it, and they are very angry at Trump. And if you look at the polling figures on Trump, he is sinking rapidly in the polls. I was looking at a CBS poll before. This is of 18 to 29-year-olds. In February, he had a 55% approval rating. and a 45% disapproval rating, 55% approval, 45% approval, 45% disapproval. In July, the approval is 28% and the disapproval is 72%.

That's a 54-point swing. And there are other polls that show smaller swings, but not by much. And there's just a lot of anger in the land, and a lot of it has to do. with the Jeffrey Epstein business. Because Jeffrey Epstein business says a lot about the governing elites in the United States. And this is an issue that concerns the MAGA base and a lot of other people who think the governing elites are not only incompetent, but deeply corrupt. And this is, you know, causing Trump all sorts of problems because of his close affiliation with Jeffrey. Epstein. And then there's the whole business of that big bill, that big beautiful bill that he just

got passed in Congress. I was actually shocked by that bill in Lornport because it has a huge downside for the Maga Base. You know, it's rich people who really should like that bill, not, you know, people who are struggling to get by, struggling to put food on the table and pay their rent and get health care. I don't think that bill helps at all on that front. In fact, I think it's going to hurt people. And I've talked to a few people who were big Trump supporters who are now not so sure when they try to get, you know, Medicare and have all sorts of problems. They're not happy at all. And these were former Trump supporters. So I think that it is likely, you know, these things are hard to call

and Trump does have this Teflot effect, but I think Trump is in trouble on the home front and I think when you marry that with the situation I described in terms of foreign policy, he is not looking good after six months.

I would agree actually. I think that he's badly misjudiced the Epstein affair. I see, I that because of course I don't know what the truth about the Epstein affair is. But it politically, he needed to understand one important thing about Epstein, which is that he goes on constantly about Russia Gates, you know, the scandal of his first term. That's a scandal about him. As far as

his base is concerned, Epstein, the Epstein scandal, is a scandal about them. They are much more interested in it than the really very arcane questions of who bugs who or what went into a you know a intelligence community assessment that was published in january 2017 that really isn't something that people outside a very small ring really concern themselves about but etstein is something that they can relate to and understand for exactly the reason that john said that there is this widespread perception that there is corruption within the political elite. And one of the reasons why people backed Trump in the first place was that he persuaded them that he was not part of that political elite and that he would go into Washington and would somehow defeat it.

And as he said, drained the swamp. He seems to be doing the opposite. That is, I think, incredibly corrosive to his overall policies. I think the other thing I have to say is that his whole governance style is so unstable and chaotic that it is inevitably going to generate more and more political resistance and more and more problems because for every person that he must be making happy with any particular move that he does, like the big, beautiful bill, he's going to make it. other people much more upset and eventually that is going to start to weigh him down and it's going to make governance of any kind all but impossible. I have to say it says an awful lot about the United

States that despite having a president as chaotic and disruptive as this, the government machine continues to function. I'm not sure that would be true in some other countries. just quickly, Glenn, if you look at the economic indicators, Alexander, the economy is moving along quite smoothly. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Now, I just wanted to add, I think, yeah, one shouldn't underestimate the stability of the American

institutions, as I said, with all this political chaos, all this economic uncertainty, and still, things are running. So it's, yeah, not to be underestimated. I also very much agree that all of this is now catching up. I think many people are willing to think that perhaps there's a great plan behind some of this. He's going to end the Ukraine war. Oh, he's going to end the conflicts in the Middle East. We're not seeing the full picture yet.

But with Epstein, I think it became so obvious that just the behavior. and also the very blatant reversal and yeah the way he even went after his own base when he yeah trashing them as soon as people like well unrelated to this but when Musk goes against a big beautiful build

the way he's turning on his closest ones Tucker Carlson everyone who doesn't go along he goes after very hard I think this is where he's probably going to reach a wall so no it's a lot of It's, yeah, until next time we speak, I'm sure the world will look very different by that. Anyways, any final thoughts before we wrap this up? Well, we certainly live in very interesting times, if I could say.

But just to say one thing, maybe given the inherent stability of the United States, which is remarkable or considered, but real, we shouldn't perhaps focus too much on, you know, Trump's own political prospects, if the trend is indeed that the United States is gradually ending its deep connection to Europe, which it had since the Second World War, then that is an epic, momentous event, at least for people in Europe. I mean, it's like, you know, the Roman emperor writing to the British cities, telling them in 400 AD that they must look to their own defence. I mean, it's on that kind of scale.

And I mean, that really is the big event that we are living through in Europe. The United States has a different history. It beats to a different drum. It will remain a superpower. It's protected by its oceans. It has an enormous economy. It can adjust to this. But in Europe, we need to think very hard and work very hard to adjust to this change.

And we're not doing that at all at the moment. Just one final point. When President Trump moved into the White House in January of this year, he confronted a series of extremely difficult problems to solve. And I think that if he was going to solve those problems, he needed to think really carefully about how to deal with each of them. And he needed to rely on experts. They could be experts of his choosing, but he needed to have people around him who really understood those problems. This is certainly true with regard to dealing with the Russians. But he did exactly the opposite.

He thinks he's a genius, and he by himself can solve almost any problem. And then to the extent that he brought people along with him, he brings someone like Steve Whitkoff in. Whitkoff knows hardly anything about international politics. He has hardly any experience. And Trump assigns him three different portfolios, the Russia portfolio, the Iran portfolio, and the Gaza portfolio. And you watch Whitkoff operate in those early days. He has hardly any staff, if any, staff around him. And you just sort of scratch your head and say to yourself,

how's this going to work? And then he brings in people like Mike Walsh, who he quickly fires, Marco Rubio, Pete Higgsith. I mean, this is not the A-Team. It just isn't. And again, I'm not making a judgment based on ideology. There are people on the right who are really very smart know these issues that he could have brought along with him. But the end result is, you know, we have this chaotic foreign policy, as Alexander described, we mean in the United States.

And it's people by individuals who are not part of the A team. And the end result is we're just in a heap of trouble. and there's no sign that we're going to get out of it anytime soon. So, yes, to summarize interesting times. Thank you both for your time. This is very interesting.