‘Judging Freedom’ edition of 19 December: “Murder in Moscow”

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‘Judging Freedom’ edition of 19 December: “Murder in Moscow”

I am appreciative of the title given by the producer to today’s broadcast, as it likely assured higher than usual audience interest. And, in fact, Judge Napolitano and I did spend some time talking about the assassination of General Kirillov by an Uzbek man in the pay of Ukrainian intelligence.

 The key question surrounding the murder that you see headlined on you.tube video clips posted by The Times of India and other peddlers of lurid, usually fake news is the following: what violent act of revenge  may we expect from Moscow today. It is assumed that Russian revenge will be directed against London, where the MI6 is considered by the Kremlin to be the mastermind of this act of terror and its chief beneficiary.  However, as I say in this interview, Russians’ concerns presently lie elsewhere:  to see what they can do to prevent the repetition of such terror acts against other leading military officers, against their top scientists, who all lack much-needed security details.

Otherwise, I note with interest that in advance of our chat Judge Napolitano had managed to watch at least one very important video clip of the Putin Q&A in English translation. This showed the questions put to him by the NBC journalist Keir Brennan-Simmons, in particular his very first question on how Putin would conduct his eventual meeting with Donald Trump to find solutions to the war knowing that he was in a weakened position due to the sanctions, to the loss of Syria, to the assassination of General Kirillov.

The fact that this video was posted so quickly reflects the effectiveness of the Russians’ organization of the press conference event this year. Their aim was clearly to grab as much international attention as possible and to ensure that Vladimir Putin’s words reach the broad public in the West. 

See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vE97FaADEb4

Translation below into German (Andreas Mylaeus)

„Judging Freedom“-Ausgabe vom 19. Dezember: „Murder in Moscow“

Ich bin dankbar für den Titel, den der Produzent der heutigen Sendung gegeben hat, da er wahrscheinlich für ein höheres Zuschauerinteresse als sonst gesorgt hat. Und tatsächlich haben Judge Napolitano und ich einige Zeit damit verbracht, über die Ermordung von General Kirillov durch einen usbekischen Mann zu sprechen, der vom ukrainischen Geheimdienst bezahlt wurde.

Die Schlüsselfrage im Zusammenhang mit dem Mord, die Sie in den Überschriften der von The Times of India und anderen Anbietern reißerischer, in der Regel gefälschter Nachrichten geposteten YouTube-Videoclips sehen, lautet: Mit welcher gewalttätigen Racheaktion müssen wir heute aus Moskau rechnen? Es wird davon ausgegangen, dass sich die russische Rache gegen London richten wird, wo der MI6 vom Kreml als Drahtzieher dieses Terrorakts und Hauptnutznießer angesehen wird. Wie ich in diesem Interview jedoch sage, liegen die Sorgen der Russen derzeit woanders: Sie wollen sehen, was sie tun können, um die Wiederholung solcher Terrorakte gegen andere führende Militärs und gegen ihre Spitzenwissenschaftler zu verhindern, denen es an dringend benötigten Sicherheitsmaßnahmen mangelt.

Ansonsten stelle ich mit Interesse fest, dass es Judge Napolitano vor unserem Gespräch gelungen war, sich mindestens einen sehr wichtigen Videoclip der Putin-Fragerunde in englischer Übersetzung anzusehen. Darin wurden die Fragen des NBC-Journalisten Keir Brennan-Simmons an ihn gezeigt, insbesondere seine allererste Frage, wie Putin sein eventuelles Treffen mit Donald Trump führen würde, um Lösungen für den Krieg zu finden, da er sich aufgrund der Sanktionen, des Verlusts von Syrien und der Ermordung von General Kirillov in einer geschwächten Position befinde.

Die Tatsache, dass dieses Video so schnell veröffentlicht wurde, spiegelt die Effektivität der Organisation der diesjährigen Pressekonferenz durch die Russen wider. Ihr Ziel war es eindeutig, so viel internationale Aufmerksamkeit wie möglich zu erregen und sicherzustellen, dass Wladimir Putins Worte die breite Öffentlichkeit im Westen erreichen.

Siehe https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vE97FaADEb4

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Published by gilbertdoctorow

Gilbert Doctorow's latest book, "War Diaries. The Russia-Ukraine War, 2022-2023" is a unique contribution to literature on the war thanks to the author's reports on the Russian home front written during his periodic visits to St Petersburg at a time when Russia no longer issued visas and nearly all Western journalists had left the country. Doctorow's two-volume "Memoirs of a Russianist" published in 2020 also constitutes a category of its own, consisting largely of diary entries rather than reminiscences written decades later.. Volume 2 focuses on the community of 50,000 expatriate managers working and living in Moscow during the 1990s, about which none of his peers has yet to write. Gilbert Doctorow is a professional Russia watcher and actor in Russian affairs going back to 1965. He is a magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College (1967), a past Fulbright scholar, and holder of a Ph.D. with honors in history from Columbia University (1975). After completing his studies, Mr. Doctorow pursued a business career focused on the USSR and Eastern Europe. For twenty-five years he worked for US and European multinationals in marketing and general management with regional responsibility. From 1998-2002, Doctorow served as the Chairman of the Russian Booker Literary Prize in Moscow. During the 2010-2011 academic year, he was a Visiting scholar of the Harriman Institute, Columbia University. Mr. Doctorow is a long-time resident of Brussels.

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One thought on “‘Judging Freedom’ edition of 19 December: “Murder in Moscow””

  1. I watched the interview clip on NBC to see what they made of it. They left out most of Putin’s answer, only showing him stating that Russia was stronger “because of its sovereignty”. A bit disingenuous, I thought.

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