The Duran Podcast - Zelensky PANIC. Weapons, money and MEDIA attention go to Middle East

Episode Date: March 8, 2026

Zelensky PANIC. Weapons, money and MEDIA attention go to Middle East

All right, Alexander, let's do an update on the other conflict, the other big war, which is Project Ukraine. Where are we with Project Ukraine? Obviously, the war in the Middle East between the United States and Iran has taken up all of the oxygen from the conflict in Ukraine. And all the attention is now focused on the Middle East and the U.S.'s war with Iran, the unprovoked full-scale war. kids to Iran, as they once said about Russia. But anyway, what is happening with Ukraine? Zelensky must be getting very, very nervous and worried as must the Europeans and NATO. Well, it is a disaster for them. First of all, the diplomacy has come to a complete stop. And to what extent Zelensky, I would welcome that is, of course, a big question.

But yesterday, the day before we did this program, I read a report saying that a decision has been made. I'm not sure by home, by the way, that all negotiations over the conflict in Ukraine or discussions are going to be called off until the situation in the Middle East stabilizes. So that's already very, very bad. It's bad for the Ukrainians because they have been hoping to use the negotiations to keep the United States still engaged in Ukraine and to keep the United States and the Europeans on side sending weapons and equipment to Ukraine. In fact, at the moment, all weapons of every type are being sent to the Middle East. Defense interceptors, Patriot missiles, in other words, are being sent to the Middle East.

Air to air missiles are being sent to the Middle East. There is no huge stockpile of those either in the United States. So I read a report again yesterday, the day before we make this program, that the F-16s in Ukraine are effectively grounded because they have no air-to-air missiles with which to shoot down Russian drones. So that is already a problem. And bear in mind, the Russians have been steadily escalating their missile and drone campaigns against Ukraine. Ukraine and the Europeans have been doing everything they possibly can to, as they say, cut off Russia's oil and gas exports to choke off Russia's funding flow.

They've been very excited because last year, Russia posted a budget deficit of above 2%. Oil prices, energy prices are rising, rising fast. The Russians remain positioned as a massive strategic oil and gas exporter. Is looking as if whatever gaps in the project, the Russians had, the extent of which have been overstated anywhere, are going to be plugged. And with all of this, the Russians are giving every indication that they are preparing for a major offensive this spring and summer, which will start as the offensives of last year, 2025 and 2024 started after the end of the all. autumn thaw, oh the spring thaw, sorry, the spring thaw.

So in April, the Russians, the Russian military will start to move. And the Russians, by the way, have been using the winter to shape the battlefield, as the military people like to say, in preparation for that offensive. They are very close to what the two important cities left in Zaporosia region, O'Rejov and Saperosia, and they've been tightening their grip on Dombas. And what I think must be worrying Zelensky even more is the fact that the Russians have been creating these large base areas in the north of Ukraine, close to Kiev. So all of this must be worrying Zelensky. But the thing I think that must be alarming him, most of all, is what Donald Trump and the Americans are saying about him and about Ukraine.

because Trump and the administration are increasingly blaming the war in Ukraine for the depletion of America's arsenals and for the difficulties that the US has in waging the current ongoing war in the Middle East. Trump is calling Zelensky P.T. Barnum, which is far from any sort of compliment. Catherine Levitt, the White House Press Secretary, is repeating these talking points now, that the war in Ukraine has wasted away, pointlessly, American arsenals. And this is, of course, true. So the U.S., I think this is going to be extend beyond Trump. It's going to extend to officials in the Pentagon. and the Democrats are going to be much less interested in supporting Project Ukraine over the next

few months than they have been up to now. Even if this conflict winds down quickly, the Iran conflict I'm talking about, let's say it adds quickly. Is it easy then for the United States to just switch back to Project Ukraine? No. And just a follow-up to that question, would a U.S. victory in Iran and bolden the United States to go hard against Russia. Yes. But then we come back to this question, even a U.S. victory against Iran, which would embolden the United States to go against Russia. If the Russians resist the pressure, the realities of depleted American arsenals and all of those problems remain. And the Russians are still in a strong position to take advantage.

What does Ukraine do for weapons? Well, I don't know. They are trying to produce some. They're turning to their European friends. The Europeans, of course, were already before the war in the Middle East began in a major economic crisis. That crisis is inevitably going to get worse. Even if the war in Iran ends quickly, there will still be.

be an energy shock, which is going to put pressure on European budgets and pressure on the European economies. I don't think the Americans are going to return to providing Iran, as Ukraine, with the conuncopyer of weapons that we saw before. So I don't know what Ukraine does for weapons. logically, given Ukraine's position now, this is the moment when they should be picking up the phone and calling Moscow and saying, this is the time we need to stop. But of course, they're not going to do that. They're not going to do that. Europe's not going to do that. The U.S. obviously is occupied in time. Absolutely. Absolutely. So what does Russia do? Does Russia take advantage of all of this? Does Putin take advantage of this, or is he just going to remain on course

with whatever the military is saying, whatever the plan was before this conflict? We're going to stick to it. I think this is where we come up against the issue of the way in which the Russians conduct rule. My strong sense is that back in 2022, after the first weeks, after the failure of Istanbul, sometime around August, September, Putin said to the military, to get Asimah for the general staff, right, it's your business from now on. I'm not interfering in the day-to-day conduct of the war. This is your responsibility. And I think that the Russian military reacted to this in exactly the way they do,

very systematically and methodically. They built up their reserves. They organized their military industries. They defeated the offensive that the Ukrainians' law. launched in 2023, and then they've launched this long, systematic, prolonged, offensive to break Ukraine, to achieve the political objectives of the leadership, and they've conducted the war in the way that we've seen. I am going to disappoint many people. I don't think that's going to change. I think if the Russians had wanted to move faster and take more casualties,

they would have done it by now. I think from a Russian point of view, the Russians are probably saying to themselves, the military leadership is probably saying to itself, well, look, we've got something that's working. Let's stick with it. Why do we need to hurry? We're not going to hurry.

I don't think Gerasimov is the sort of person who likes to do things in a hurry. So long as he's in charge, so long as his chief deputy, Rutskoy are in charge, they will continue to wage this war in the way that they always have. Of course, there are people in Moscow who are pressing for things to be pushed harder and faster and further, who want to see more reserves committed, who want a push, a faster push to take Dombas and a faster push to take

Kiev. But my own sense is that Putin himself is perfectly happy to leave Gerasimov running things in the way that Gerasimov does, and in which, if you know anything about the Russian general staff, they would always do. Now, one thing I will say is that we are actually very close now to a decisive moment anyway in the wall. The remaining defence lines in Donbass, the key cities of Slavians Kramatos have already been reached. The city of Zaporozia of the Dnieper is only 12 kilometers away from where the Russian military already are. If Donbass is captured, well, the Institute for the Study of War and all sorts of Western commentators and the Ukrainians themselves have been confirming, vindicating our analysis,

going all the way back to February, March 22, that the key defense line, The center of gravity of this war is Dombas. If Dombas falls, the Russians have broken through the main fortress line, as it's now been called by the Institute of the Study War and all of these people. And then they gain what is called operational space. And at that point, the tank armies, the mechanized armies can start to move much, much more quickly. And if in Zaporozia region, the Russians reach the river, the Nipa, if they capture Zaporosia city, which is said to be mostly undefendable, then I've already said many, many times

in many, many places, and I stand by this, and all sorts of other people have been saying this recently as well, if the Russians capture the central Nipa region, and Zaporosia is on the central Nipa region, Ukraine ceases to be viable as an economic and state unit. And by the way, the other thing to say, if the Russians capture Zaporosia city, if they capture NEPRO, which is a bit further to the north as well, a more complex place to capture, by the way, because of the geography. But nonetheless, if Zaporosia falls, probably NEPRO would follow, then the way opens for an advance on Odessa, the Ukrainians are already worrying about a Russian advance towards

Adessa. I spoke in a program about a week ago that the governor of Adessa is already anticipated, the Ukrainian governor of Adessa, is already anticipating a Russian advance on Odessa. He says that Odessa is now being fortified in advance of a Russian advance on that city. So, you know, things, putting aside everything else, things may start to move much faster anyway, even if people like Gerasimov and the Russian general staff are left in control. One thing, this conflict in Iran, this war in Iran has shown. us is that Russia and the United States definitely fight to war very differently. Absolutely.

The United States, they bomb the capital, they'll hit whatever they need to hit, they'll assassinate leadership, they'll go after the top leader. The Russians have not and do not do any of that. No. Right? I mean, very different way of going about war. Totally different. I mean, the other thing the Americans have done, of course, is that they've destroyed a warship in the...

They destroy that. I was going to say that. And they're celebrating it. Absolutely, yeah. What do you make of that? Well, I don't. Well, I mean, I... A warship at a ceremony, an event.

You know what I heard, Alexander? It was invited by India and it had no ammunition because it was just there to take part in a ceremony. Absolutely, yes. And bear in mind that the United States is not technically even still at war in Ukraine against Iran. I mean, they're talking about this being, what is it, an operation of some kind. So, I mean, a gratuitous acts of destruction and killing on the high seas, fulfilling no purpose. The one thing the United States cannot do, however, apparently, is deploy large numbers of ground forces and conduct the kind of ground offensive that the Russians are doing. The wars, the military cultures of the two countries could not be more different.

Final question. Does Russia, how am I going to phrase this? Does Russia avenge what the United States, what the collective West, what the Europeans have done or tried to do to Russia during the conflict in Ukraine via this conflict in the Middle East? possibly. If the conflict goes on long enough in the Middle East, then the Russians will certainly take advantage of it. They will start to provide more and more assistance to Iran. They'll provide economic assistance, which they're already doing. And of course, they could start providing

military assistance to. So that is absolutely within the realm of course. You've drawn parallels in previous programs to Vietnam. I don't know if you want to say something very quickly. This is exactly what happened. So in the 1960s, the United States got involved in the war of Vietnam, again expecting that it would end quickly, by the way, just to say. And half a million American troops, of course, became involved. Now, the Russians, and by the way, the Chinese, but we're mainly talking about the Russians, because the Russians were the big superpower at that time, waited to see whether North Vietnam could defend itself. And then when it became clear that it could, they started to ramp up economic assistance to North Vietnam and they started to provide military supplies to North Vietnam.

Eventually they took over North Vietnam's air defense system and they supplied North Vietnam with what were at that time sophisticated surface to air missiles and we've since learned. We've learned it only over the last 10 years that many of those systems used, had actual Russian personnel there helping to operate them. Just to say, people are not well aware of this, but this did indeed happen. And they started to provide North Vietnam with advanced fighter jets. And of course, they started to provide the North Vietnamese with Kalashnikov rifles, which was the first time the Kalashnikov was used in a major conflict.

So all of this took place in the 1960s. And the very interesting thing about what the Russians did is that obviously they were helping the North Vietnamese, but they also used the help they provided to the North Vietnamese to gain leverage over the United States. And that resulted in the United States making a series of concessions to the Russians about the situation in Europe, which eventually led to the detente process, which was the heyday of good relations between the Soviet Union and the United States in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

You know, the time of Nixon and Brezhnev, of the Glaspera summit, the sort treaties, the sort and the ABM treaties, all of that. And it's the Russians, of course, remember all of that. They have the institutional memory of that period. There are probably still people in Moscow who were involved in handling all of that and doing all of those things. And they're absolutely capable of doing that again. The Chinese did the same, by the way. I mean, the reason Nixon went to Beijing, to China was first to know. foremost. There were grand strategies and all of that as well. But the Americans were also neat

looking to try to get the Chinese to reduce their arms supplies to Vietnam also. And what actually happened is that as the Chinese and the Russians discovered that their arms supplies to North Vietnam, we're giving them leverage over the Americans. They actually stepped up their arm's plans, because that gave them still more leverage. And of course, at that time, China and Russia were in very bad terms. And they started to compete with each other. So, I mean, it became a very complex game, but it gives you a sense of how the Russians tend to do things. I think this is more likely than a quest for revenge. So that the Russians don't think about revenge and aren't capable of pursuing revenge,

but they are Klausivitians to the core, and they will never let a desire for revenge blind them to the pursuit of their political and geopolitical objectives. All right. We will end the video there. The durand.com. We are on X-Rumble and Telegram. We are also on Substack.

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