The Peter Zeihan Podcast Series - Ukraine Can Now Strike Russia Direct || Peter Zeihan

Episode Date: November 26, 2024

The Biden administration just gave Ukraine the greenlight to use American weaponry inside of Russian territory. So, what does this mean for the future of the Ukraine War?Join the Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/PeterZeihan Full Newsletter: https://mailchi.mp/zeihan/ukraine-can-now-strike-russia-direct

Everybody, Peter Zine here coming to you from Chile, Colorado. It is Monday, November 18th, and yesterday on the 17th, the Biden administration lifted restrictions on the use of American weapons by the Ukrainian government. And they can now launch wherever they want in the Russian space. The weapon system that is of the most importance are the outcomes, which are kind of a rocket ballistic missile that has a range of about 200 miles. And it's broadly expected that within the next day or three, the Ukrainians will be using them to target things like ammo dumps and air assets. assets and especially things like rail bridges. Basically anything to snarl the logistics on the Russian side of the equation. The two areas you're going to see the most activity here are in the vicinity of Kursk,

where the Ukrainians have a foothold in Russian territory and an area in the Donbos near Prakosk, where the Russians have been focusing really strongly on capturing the city of Percrost and the fact that it's a rail hub. So the whole idea is to disrupt the ability of the Russians to get military assets to the theaters. There's probably not going to be too much of an impact on things like air power on the Russian side because already 90% of the jets that the Russians have been using to operate in Ukraine are beyond that 200 mile range already. So you might push a few more back. So this is concentrating the fight on those two main salients, but it's probably not going to be generating any sort of meaningful breakthrough either way, but it will certainly help the Ukrainians hold out. But there are

three big things that we do need to consider now that we've had this kind of upgraded military capacity. First of all, I don't see this as a meaningful escalation by the war. I don't think it's going to generate any sort of meaningful response by the Russians. And that's not just because the Russians have, by my count, had over 200 red lines that eventually the West has skipped across. You can always tell if the Russians are serious or not by who does the speaking. And in this case, the Russian that came out and condemned the American action and said this was an escalation. was a guy by the name of Dmitri Peskov, who was basically their press attache. So it didn't even come from a policymaker.

So you know it's not serious. So I don't expect the Russians to do anything significantly more. Now, keep in mind, the Russians have been crossing a lot of what the Westerners were considered red lines, with spies, with sabotage, bringing in the North Koreans to fight in the war. There have been a lot of steps here. And that was probably ultimately what drove the Biden administration to take this action. But I don't think this is an escalation in of itself in the traditional sense.

Second, if the Russians want to rebuild their credibility when it comes to red lines, they have to talk. The way you establish red lines and mutual deterrence is through a direct face-to-face summit. And the Russians, Putin specifically, has refused to pick up the phone and call any of the leaders who are decision-makers because he knows if he does everything's on the table. He has to then give something up. And since the Russians have been pushing a broad spectrum interference in Western affairs, whether it's politically, economically, or strategically, now for three years, he'd have to give up a lot of that to get anything that he wants. And so it's simpler to just not have communication at all. Now, we've been here before. When the Soviet Union developed its first atomic weapon back in 1949, that was the height of the Cold War. Things

were really sketchy. And we didn't get our first real bilateral summit after that weapons test until 1955, after Stalin had died. I'm not saying that we have to wait for Putin to die or anything like that, but we're not in a position in Russia politically where it's feasible to have that conversation. And as long as the Russians feel that they're making incremental gains in Ukraine, which they have for about a year now, there's not a need to do a broader renegotiation of a relationship. Always keep in mind that Ukraine was never a one-off. It's the ninth post-Soviet conflict that the Russians have either instigated or been involved in. It won't be the last. And so regardless of how Ukraine gets settled one way or in, it's a night.

there will be another series of wars further west that will involve NATO countries. Until we get to that point, Putin feels that negotiations are something better carried out on the battlefield rather than bifone or in person. Which brings us to the third thing. This isn't really interesting timing for this step by the Biden administration because obviously Biden's not going to be president after January 20 and there's going to be no secession within the democratic structures. Donald Trump is coming back.

And here we have a very clear step forward that puts a very interesting chit on the table for potential negotiations down the road. And if there's anything that we understand about Donald Trump is that he sees everything differently. And putting this card into his hand to play with Putin at a later time is kind of fascinating. Now, what Trump will do with this is entirely up to him. but Biden appears to be setting the stage for Trump to have whatever he needs to force the Russians to the table in whatever way he wants to, which is a really interesting approach to bipartisan foreign policy that we used to see all the time during transition periods, but really haven't seen in the last eight years. All right, that's it for me. Everyone take care.