Transcript of NewsX panel discussion, 8 January

Transcripti submitted by reader

NewsX: 0:00
We are joined by Dr Sergei Dvorinov, Director, Communication of BRICS Culture Media Forum; Gilbert Doctorow, Russian affairs expert located in Brussels; Ambassador Bhaswati Mukherjee, former diplomat. Thank you for joining us on this discussion. Sergei, I wanted to come to you first. There is a lot of talk about this town of Kurakove. Russia says that it has claimed it. Ukraine does not, has not confirmed this. What can you tell me about the importance of this territory?

Dvorinov: 0:34
Yes. Good evening. Namaste. Namaskar. Like you already mentioned, that is very close to the logistic hub, Pokrovsk. And I just want to remind that eastern part of Ukraine, Donetsk region, is originally was a Russian territory and Russian land. And during USSR time, Mr. Khrushchev gave this, joined this land to Ukraine. It was his own choice and his decision and that’s why we have such kind of problems that our national leader Vladimir Putin should protect that population which is mostly Russian-speaking population with all traditional values of Russian civilization.

1:23
And right now it’s very significant after Christmas, Orthodox Christmas, which was yesterday, we achieve– it’s very significant not only tell about some military achievement, we should tell that right now we can see Ukraine army, they lost already the spirit of win, spirit of fighting, because they completely recognized and understand and realized as well that Mr. Zelensky, who is not legal president of Ukraine, you know this very well, He was not re-elected. During his election, by the time he promised to his nation that he will bring peace to Ukraine. And in history, everybody will tell the name of Zelensky, they will tell it was the president who completely cheat his nation and bring war, not peace, but war to the country, unfortunately.

2:27
And Mr. Zelensky was not invited to Donald Trump inauguration, which is a very important signal. And right now it’s not only loss of Ukrainian army, it’s also like kind of demoralization of all the nation where Everybody only just keep in mind one question. Who will be after Zelensky? Who will be next president responsible and honest and even not belong to some entertainment or show?

Because the mind and life experience of Mr. Zelensky is only before, it was only like a show. He’s a comedian. He is not related to any politics, no any, like, skills in this field. That’s why we can see that it’s a big strategy, but for us, for Russia, again, it’s according to the systematical plan of our national leader, Vladimir Putin.

NewsX: 3:30
Gilbert Doctorow, I wanted to move on to you next. Ukraine has launched new attacks in the Kursk region, or so it says. It has not released any information about these attacks, this offensive. How is Russia handling this? What does it aim to achieve with this?

Gilbert Doctorow, PhD:
Well, Russia has stymied the counter-attacks according to the latest information from their sources. But I think it is important that you bring up this question of Kursk, because the general public doesn’t know this town or that town. Kurokhove or Pokrovsk doesn’t tell the general audience for this program very much. Let me insist that this is the largest war in Europe since World War II. And those who think of Ukraine as a third-world country are missing the point entirely. Ukraine was at the start of this war, probably the strongest army in Europe, second to Russia.

4:30
It had been prepared by NATO instructors. It had been stuffed to the gills with NATO arms. It was prepared for a devastating attack on the Donbass. This is what precipitated the Russian attack in February to prevent a genocide of the Russian-speaking population in Donbass by that very massive and well-armed Ukrainian army.

So what we’re seeing now– despite all of the progress that Russia has made in beating back Ukraine, in moving beyond the fortifications that Ukraine had created in the neighborhood of the capital of Donetsk province in the eight years that they were being trained and armed by NATO countries– Russia has pushed way beyond that. It has now approached and passed the middle point geographically in the Donbas, particularly in the Donetsk oblast, region.

5:39
This is– they have now, when they approach Pokrovsk, which they will rename Krasnoyarsk, they are beyond 60 percent and they have a free road to the Dnieper River, which divides Ukraine in two. I say that because the activities of the Russian army have been to give the– relentless attacks, which give the Ukrainians no chance to fall back and create new defensive positions. So the Russians have opposed any ceasefire and will, since they are moving constantly, advancing and preventing the Ukrainians from creating strong defensive positions.

6:20
The war is approaching its conclusive phase. The Russian population is aware of that and anticipates victory. There is nothing that the incoming Trump administration can do to influence or change the policies of Moscow, which are that of the victorious side in a conflict which was, at the wish of the European Union and United States, to be decided on the field of battle. It is being decided on the field of battle.

6:51
But it’s a very tough fight, and that has to be emphasized. The Russians have a very high advantage in artillery shells, artillery pieces, missiles, compared to Ukraine. They have a very big advantage in manpower on the front, compared to Ukraine. But the Ukrainians are fighting. Despite all the stories that we know of desertions, The fact that 1,700 Ukrainian soldiers trained in France came back as a brigade and disappeared into the population to avoid going to the front. We know those facts, but we also know the facts of the reality of the counterattacks that you described at the start of this program.

And as I say, this is a vicious battle, a vicious war, and no one should underestimate the extreme passions on both sides. Russia is now the strongest military force in Europe and possibly in the world, given everything that it has learned in the nearly three years of war in which the latest technologies of all science have been brought to bear in the battlefield.

NewsX: 8:00
I just wanted to, I’m sorry to interrupt, I just wanted to bring in Ambassador Baswati Makkadi just because we are running out of time. Where did you see the war heading in the next few months? We are obviously approaching a Trump 2.0 administration. Is there any chance of a stable peace soon, peace agreement soon?

Bhaswati Mukherjee:
Thank you. I’d first like to begin by saying that looking at it from India’s perspective in Delhi, we look at the war in Ukraine as a proxy war fought by NATO with Russia. That’s the way we look at it. From that perspective, it hasn’t exactly gone the way NATO wanted it, because when they kept on provoking President Putin by saying that Ukraine will become a NATO member, it was very clear to everyone that at that point of time, Ukraine did not have the necessary qualification either to join the European Union or NATO, but it was just a question of pulling, pushing or pulling or whatever way you want to put it, the bear’s tail as hard as they could, the way we refer to the Chinese as the dragon.

9:10
So here you’re pulling the tail of the bear maybe a little too hard and the conflict started and it didn’t go the way NATO wanted. It went to a certain extent. They were able to use Ukrainians as a proxy to test their weapons, to see how far they could go, to see how far they could provoke a nuclear weapons state with a non-nuclear weapons state, etc. As my Russian colleague has said, the territories that have been captured by the Russian army are traditional Russian territories which go into the very heart of Russian civilization, of Russian literature, of Russian poetry. They were handed over to Ukraine, it was a strategic error.

9:49
Moreover, when the former USSR was disbanded, it was on the basis of the Minsk agreement; there were certain red lines drawn up which the West and the Russians were supposed to respect; that was not done. Now the question is, in India, how do we look at the prospects? We see the prospect of Ukraine as a defeated country, holding on to a little bit of Russian territory for compensation, because it is clear that when there will be a peace agreement, unfortunately, Ukraine will have to live with territory that has parted with, possibly, in a war which NATO could not win for them. In the process, as my colleague in Brussels has rightly pointed out, the Russian army has experienced how a modern war is fought. We all have, actually.

10:40
So has India. We have watched very closely the role that drones play, etc. This has actually been the age of dispelling innocence of how new wars are to be fought in the 21st century. It’s been an educative experience for all countries including India which have hostile neighbors on their territory, on their borders. I see this war coming to a rapid conclusion, I agree with my Belgian colleagues.

I see that the Ukrainians naturally from their perspective trying to hold on to whatever little Russian territory they’ve been able to capture as a bargaining chip. That’s quite normal too. I don’t see this war continuing. I agree with my Belgian colleagues. But I don’t see it as a victory either for NATO or for Ukraine.

11:25
But yes, like the so-called WMDs in Iraq of Saddam Hussein, it gave the West an opportunity to test out their latest weapons. They always like to do that. It gave a boom to their armaments industry. That’s what capitalism is all about. I think now we are all tired of this war, and I personally would welcome it to come to an end, because as a result of this war people are forgetting what is happening in Gaza which is unfortunate. If the Ukraine conflict would come to an end, we could then focus on ending also the conflict in Gaza and the distressing images that come every day of women and children dying in Gaza.

NewsX:
Thank you very much. We’ve run out of time, unfortunately.

12:08
Thank you to all our guests for joining us.