The Look Inside function allows you to peruse the Table of Contents and a few pages of the very first chapter. Regrettably, Amazon did not make available on Look Inside the Foreword and Introduction which explain very clearly what this book is and what it isn’t. However, the book description below can serve as a brief guide:
Quote
Volume 1 of War Diaries presents the author’s essays on the Russia-Ukraine war from the period immediately preceding its outbreak in February 2022 to the end of 2023. The material is diverse. It includes the author’s travel notes on the home front in Russia from his periodic visits to St Petersburg. He records the availability of consumer goods and services on the market of a country under the most severe sanctions in history. He records the changing mood of the man in the street and of the intelligentsia as the war progressed and an upsurge of patriotism changed Russian society, bringing forward new elites. The author closely monitored Russian media, in particular the state news and political talk shows whlch have a wide audience in Russia and reflect the views of Kremlin insiders. His observations fill the void left by the departure of mainstream journalists from Russia following the start of the Special Military Operation. There are also links and summaries of his appearances on television programs of commentary broadcast by major global English-language media such as TRT (Turkey) and WION (India) as well as on widely watched private U.S. internet channels. This book is essential reading for all those interested in how Russia fared during wartime.
An e-book edition will be added to the amazon websites in about two weeks
Unquote
Translation below into German (Andreas Mylaeus)
Kriegstagebücher, Band 1. Der Krieg zwischen Russland und der Ukraine, 2022–2023
Ich freue mich, heute die Veröffentlichung meiner neuesten Essaysammlung in Taschenbuchform bekannt zu geben. Das Buch kann weltweit auf Amazon-Websites angesehen und gekauft werden. Der Link zur Buchseite auf der Deutschland-Website lautet:
Mit der Funktion „Blick ins Buch“ können Sie das Inhaltsverzeichnis und einige Seiten des ersten Kapitels durchblättern. Leider hat Amazon das Vorwort und die Einleitung, in denen sehr klar erklärt wird, worum es in diesem Buch geht und worum es nicht geht, nicht in „Blick ins Buch“ zur Verfügung gestellt. Die folgende Buchbeschreibung kann jedoch als kurze Orientierungshilfe dienen:
Zitat
Band 1 der „War Diaries“ enthält die Essays des Autors zum Krieg zwischen Russland und der Ukraine vom Zeitraum unmittelbar vor dessen Ausbruch im Februar 2022 bis zum Ende des Jahres 2023. Das Material ist vielfältig. Es umfasst die Reiseberichte des Autors aus Russland, die er während seiner regelmäßigen Besuche in St. Petersburg verfasst hat. Er berichtet über die Verfügbarkeit von Konsumgütern und Dienstleistungen auf dem Markt eines Landes, das unter den strengsten Sanktionen der Geschichte steht. Er dokumentiert die sich wandelnde Stimmung der Bevölkerung und der Intelligenz im Verlauf des Krieges, als ein Aufschwung des Patriotismus die russische Gesellschaft veränderte und neue Eliten hervorbrachte. Der Autor verfolgte aufmerksam die russischen Medien, insbesondere die staatlichen Nachrichten und politischen Talkshows, die in Russland ein breites Publikum haben und die Ansichten von Kreml-Insidern widerspiegeln. Seine Beobachtungen füllen die Lücke, die durch den Weggang der Mainstream-Journalisten aus Russland nach Beginn der „Sondermilitäroperation“ entstanden ist. Es enthält auch Links und Zusammenfassungen seiner Auftritte in Fernsehkommentaren, die von großen englischsprachigen Medien wie TRT (Türkei) und WION (Indien) sowie auf weit verbreiteten privaten US-Internetkanälen ausgestrahlt wurden. Dieses Buch ist eine unverzichtbare Lektüre für alle, die sich dafür interessieren, wie Russland während des Krieges abgeschnitten hat.
Zitat
Eine E-Book-Version der Kriegstagebücher wird in etwa 10 Tagen auf den Websites hinzugefügt.
“Don’t fight city hall.” That bit of American folk wisdom goes back to the early 20th century and had its origins in New York City, where the Tammany Hall crooked political machine made challenges to the authorities appear quixotic and unlikely to succeed.
Though some members of this Community will surely disagree with me, this is my best advice to Harvard University in its present direct confrontation with the Trump administration.
To be sure, corruption of those in power has nothing to do with this conflict. Political ideology is what it is all about. Trump stands for traditional family, religious, societal values, for veneration of our historical heroes, for an end to the forever wars that American foreign policy has given us these past 30 years. Though few American lives have been lost in these wars, they have literally cost hundreds of billions if not trillions of dollars and driven the U.S. federal deficit to unsustainable levels.
Harvard has for several decades stood for ‘woke,’ for dethroning American heroes after whom monuments are erected and university buildings are named due to their connection to slavery or to their holding ethnic, religious, sexual or other prejudices that are no longer acceptable in polite society. More to the point, Harvard has been an intellectual leader in forging a foreign policy based on American global hegemony that brooks no potential competitors and launches destructive, murderous proxy wars around the world.
That Harvard-inspired foreign policy is said to be ‘values based,’ meaning promoting human rights and democracy. Anyone who doubts the intimate connection between the Harvard professorate and our ‘values based’ foreign policy would do well to read the obituary essays in honor of Joseph Nye, author of ‘Soft Power,’ this past week. Still better, pick up my 2010 volume Great Post-Cold War American Thinkers on International Relations which dissects the writings of the ten most popular political scientists of the preceding two decades as they delineated a road map into the future now that the USA was the sole remaining super power. As I understood after I completed my manuscript, nine of these ten intellectual leaders had a close relationship with Harvard University.
By contrast, the Trump foreign policy today is ‘interests based,’ in the tradition of the Realistic School that was last seen as guiding Washington’s behavior under Richard Nixon. The flag of Realism flies highest at the University of Chicago, where Professor John Mearsheimer holds forth as the continuator of ideas long championed in the post WWII years by Hans Morgenthau, author of the seminal work Politics Among Nations.
From the very start of his presidency in this, his second mandate, Donald Trump began his assault on the elite universities which set the Leftist, anti-Trump tone for neary all of American higher education. The pretext for this attack was their tolerance for pro-Palestinian views and demonstrations on campus which, according to the government, jeopardized the safety of their Jewish students. This essentially phony allegation of anti-Semitism was carefully chosen by Team Trump to consolidate its support among the Zionist majority in both parties on Capitol Hill. It fit nicely with the blind eye that Trump turned to the genocide Israel has been perpetrating in Gaza. This was, as I have said elsewhere, political calculus to find support for Trump’s domestic and foreign policy initiatives that run counter to prevailing views of the American political establishment. Included in this otherwise unpopular Trump agenda is closure of the Russia-Ukraine war on terms close to those demanded by Vladimir Putin and the implementation of a new wide-ranging détente with Moscow.
The attack of Team Trump on several elite universities over alleged anti-Semitism focused first on Harvard and Columbia universities. Federal grants and contracts to these two universities were or suspended or cancelled pending their providing to federal authorities information about some, mainly foreign students enrolled there and their putting in place rules which Team Trump said would stamp out anti-Semitism on campus.
Columbia University initially protested when $400 million in grants and contracts were provisionally terminated, but then reversed course, knelt down and kissed the ring of Team Trump. Although the original grants and contracts have not yet been reinstated, there have been no further attacks on Columbia.
Harvard from the beginning refused to submit to what it called illegal pressure and punishment from the federal government. It initiated law suits to reinstate the funds. In response the government has escalated the punishment meted out to Harvard as I will mention further below to the point where it currently threatens the vital interests of the university.
Meanwhile, the Columbia President and administration have been criticized in both mainstream and in Alternative Media for failing to defend free speech guaranteed by the First Amendment and for submitting to the Trump demands. In my view, criticism of the Columbia administration is misguided. The university is guilty of much greater errors of judgment than what its detractors in the media are saying. I see a far more serious threat to the university’s standing as a defender of liberal values and common decency in its extension of professorial positions to two unindicted war criminals – Hilary Clinton and Victoria Nuland. Their presence on campus before students, the prestige that has been accorded to them levels to the ground Columbia University’s moral standing in U.S. higher education. I say that as an alumnus.
*****
Harvard’s president has listened too closely to the advice of its smart-assed, litigious lawyers from its world-renowned Law School. Consequently, Harvard will undergo serious reputational and financial damage before it ultimately succumbs to pressure from donors and alumni organizations, submitting to the will of Team Trump.
After suspending three billion dollars in federal grants to Harvard, Team Trump threatened and then took action to strip Harvard’s tax-exempt status. One major consequence of that action is to raise taxes on its endowment. Another is to dissuade potential donors from contributing to the endowment, since they personally will now get no tax credits for their generosity.
In the past week, Team Trump reached for the hatchet and issued an order terminating Harvard’s certificate of participation in the foreign student registration system which facilitates visa issuance and comes under the Department of Homeland Security. This order would compel these students to either transfer to some other university which enjoys that registration right or to lose their visa and be compelled to leave the country.
I note that the justification for this decision goes beyond the allegations of anti-semitism on campus to direct attention as well to cooperation with the Chinese Communist Party in areas harmful to U.S. interests.
Nearly 7,000 students at Harvard presently are registered in the visa registration system, representing one quarter of student enrollments. Their departure would impact greatly on the current operating budget of the university given that many if not most of the foreign students pay full tuition. The sum in question amounts to several hundred million dollars annually. Revocation would put in question the continued employment of nontenured faculty who would have considerably lower headcounts in their classes. More importantly, it would be a catastrophe for the international standing of Harvard, making it a less desirable place to teach.
The Harvard administration is putting a brave face on the situation. It contested the ruling in the courts and a district federal judge has just issued a temporary block on the de-certification. Presumably the motivation for the court to step in was that we are less than a month from the end of the school year and many students awaiting award of their diplomas would be compelled to leave the country with empty hands.
It is an open question how long the courts can block execution of the Department of Homeland Security decision. However, in any case whatever the ultimate court decisions may be, in time present Harvard’s ability to enroll foreign students will be in limbo and such uncertainty is fatal to the chances of maintaining present levels of enrollment.
While the administrators may be stiff-necked, I have little doubt that they will soon face massive pressure from the university’s wealthy donors to swallow their pride and seek some accommodation with Washington. We are speaking about businessmen, and businessmen never, ever go head-to-head against their nation’s government in pursuit of private interests; principles be damned. Moreover, it is inconceivable that alumni associations across the country and across the world will not counsel negotiation instead of litigation. I say this as a Harvard alumnus.
The only question now is how long it will take for Harvard men to understand that you ‘don’t fight city hall.’
„Leg dich nicht mit der Stadtverwaltung an.“ Dieser amerikanische Spruch stammt aus dem frühen 20. Jahrhundert und hat seinen Ursprung in New York City, wo die korrupte politische Maschinerie der Tammany Hall jegliche Auseinandersetzung mit den Behörden als unrealistisch und aussichtslos erscheinen ließ.
Auch wenn einige Mitglieder dieser Community mir sicherlich widersprechen werden, ist dies mein bester Rat an die Harvard University in ihrer derzeitigen direkten Konfrontation mit der Trump-Regierung.
Natürlich hat die Korruption der Machthaber nichts mit diesem Konflikt zu tun. Es geht hier um politische Ideologie. Trump steht für traditionelle Familien-, Religions- und Gesellschaftswerte, für die Verehrung unserer historischen Helden und für ein Ende der endlosen Kriege, die uns die amerikanische Außenpolitik in den letzten 30 Jahren beschert hat. Obwohl in diesen Kriegen nur wenige Amerikaner ihr Leben verloren haben, haben sie buchstäblich Hunderte von Milliarden, wenn nicht sogar Billionen Dollar gekostet und das Defizit des US-Bundeshaushalts in unhaltbare Höhen getrieben.
Harvard steht seit mehreren Jahrzehnten für „Woke“, dafür, dass amerikanische Helden, denen Denkmäler errichtet und nach denen Universitätsgebäude benannt worden waren, aufgrund ihrer Verbindung zur Sklaverei oder aufgrund ihrer ethnischen, religiösen, sexuellen oder anderen Vorurteile entthrohnt werden, die in einer höflichen Gesellschaft nicht mehr akzeptabel sind. Genauer gesagt ist Harvard eine intellektuelle Führungskraft bei der Gestaltung einer Außenpolitik, die auf der globalen Vorherrschaft Amerikas basiert, die keine potenziellen Konkurrenten duldet und weltweit zerstörerische, mörderische Stellvertreterkriege führt.
Diese von Harvard inspirierte Außenpolitik wird als „wertorientiert“ bezeichnet, was die Förderung von Menschenrechten und Demokratie bedeutet. Wer die enge Verbindung zwischen der Harvard-Professorenschaft und unserer ‚wertorientierten‘ Außenpolitik anzweifelt, sollte die Nachrufe auf Joseph Nye, den Autor von „Soft Power“, lesen, die in der vergangenen Woche erschienen sind. Noch besser wäre es, mein 2010 erschienenes Buch „Great Post-Cold War American Thinkers on International Relations“ zu lesen, in dem ich die Schriften der zehn populärsten Politikwissenschaftler der letzten zwei Jahrzehnte analysiere, die einen Fahrplan für die Zukunft entworfen haben, nachdem die USA zur einzigen Supermacht geworden waren. Wie ich nach Fertigstellung meines Manuskripts festgestellt habe, hatten neun dieser zehn intellektuellen Führer enge Beziehungen zur Harvard University.
Im Gegensatz dazu ist die Außenpolitik von Trump heute „interessenorientiert“ und steht in der Tradition der Realistischen Schule, die zuletzt unter Richard Nixon das Verhalten Washingtons bestimmte. Die Flagge des Realismus weht am höchsten an der Universität von Chicago, wo Professor John Mearsheimer als Fortführer der Ideen auftritt, die in den Jahren nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg von Hans Morgenthau, dem Autor des wegweisenden Werks „Politics Among Nations“, vertreten wurden. Seit Beginn seiner zweiten Amtszeit hat Donald Trump einen Angriff auf die Eliteuniversitäten gestartet, die den linken, anti-Trump-Ton für fast das gesamte amerikanische Hochschulwesen vorgeben. Der Vorwand für diesen Angriff war ihre Toleranz gegenüber pro-palästinensischen Ansichten und Demonstrationen auf dem Campus, die laut der Regierung die Sicherheit ihrer jüdischen Studenten gefährdeten. Diese im Wesentlichen falsche Behauptung des Antisemitismus wurde vom Trump-Team sorgfältig ausgewählt, um seine Unterstützung unter der zionistischen Mehrheit in beiden Parteien im Kapitol zu festigen. Sie passte gut zu der Blindheit, mit der Trump den Völkermord Israels in Gaza ignorierte. Wie ich bereits an anderer Stelle gesagt habe, handelte es sich hierbei um politisches Kalkül, um Unterstützung für Trumps innen- und außenpolitische Initiativen zu finden, die den vorherrschenden Ansichten des amerikanischen politischen Establishments zuwiderlaufen. Zu dieser ansonsten unpopulären Agenda Trumps gehören auch die Beendigung des Krieges zwischen Russland und der Ukraine zu Bedingungen, die denen von Wladimir Putin nahekommen, und die Umsetzung einer neuen weitreichenden Entspannungspolitik gegenüber Moskau.
Der Angriff von Team Trump auf mehrere Eliteuniversitäten wegen angeblichen Antisemitismus richtete sich zunächst gegen die Universitäten Harvard und Columbia. Bundeszuschüsse und -verträge für diese beiden Universitäten wurden ausgesetzt oder gekündigt, bis sie den Bundesbehörden Informationen über einige, hauptsächlich ausländische Studierende, die dort eingeschrieben sind, vorlegen und Regeln einführen, die laut Team Trump den Antisemitismus auf dem Campus ausmerzen sollen.
Die Columbia University protestierte zunächst, als Zuschüsse und Verträge in Höhe von 400 Millionen Dollar vorläufig gekündigt wurden, schwenkte dann aber um, kniete nieder und küsste dem Team Trump die Hand. Obwohl die ursprünglichen Zuschüsse und Verträge noch nicht wieder aufgenommen wurden, gab es keine weiteren Angriffe auf die Columbia University.
Harvard weigerte sich von Anfang an, sich dem, wie es es nannte, illegalen Druck und den Strafen der Bundesregierung zu beugen. Es reichte Klagen ein, um die Mittel wieder zu erhalten. Als Reaktion darauf hat die Regierung die Strafen gegen Harvard verschärft, wie ich weiter unten noch näher ausführen werde, sodass sie derzeit die lebenswichtigen Interessen der Universität gefährden.
Unterdessen wurden der Präsident und die Verwaltung der Columbia University sowohl in den Mainstream- als auch in den alternativen Medien dafür kritisiert, dass sie die durch den Ersten Verfassungszusatz garantierte Meinungsfreiheit nicht verteidigt und sich den Forderungen Trumps gebeugt haben. Meiner Ansicht nach ist die Kritik an der Verwaltung der Columbia University fehlgeleitet. Die Universität hat sich weitaus schwerwiegenderer Fehleinschätzungen schuldig gemacht, als ihre Kritiker in den Medien behaupten. Eine weitaus ernstere Bedrohung für das Ansehen der Universität als Verfechterin liberaler Werte und allgemeiner Anstandsregeln sehe ich in der Vergabe von Professuren an zwei nicht angeklagte Kriegsverbrecherinnen – Hillary Clinton und Victoria Nuland. Ihre Anwesenheit auf dem Campus vor den Studierenden und das ihnen entgegengebrachte Ansehen zerstören das moralische Ansehen der Columbia University im US-amerikanischen Hochschulwesen. Das sage ich als Absolvent dieser Universität.
*****
Der Präsident der Harvard University hat zu sehr auf den Rat seiner klugscheißerischen, prozesssüchtigen Anwälte aus der weltberühmten juristischen Fakultät gehört. Infolgedessen wird Harvard einen schweren Reputations- und finanziellen Schaden erleiden, bevor es schließlich dem Druck von Spendern und Alumni-Organisationen nachgibt und sich dem Willen des Trump-Teams beugt.
Nachdem das Trump-Team drei Milliarden Dollar an Bundeszuschüssen für Harvard ausgesetzt hatte, drohte es mit dem Entzug der Steuerbefreiung für Harvard und setzte diese Drohung in die Tat um. Eine wichtige Folge dieser Maßnahme ist die Erhöhung der Steuern auf das Stiftungsvermögen. Eine weitere Folge ist, dass potenzielle Spender davon abgehalten werden, dem Stiftungsvermögen Geld zu spenden, da sie nun persönlich keine Steuervergünstigungen mehr für ihre Großzügigkeit erhalten.
In der vergangenen Woche griff das Trump-Team zur Axt und erließ eine Anordnung zur Aufhebung der Teilnahmebescheinigung Harvards am Registrierungssystem für ausländische Studenten, das die Erteilung von Visa erleichtert und dem Heimatschutzministerium untersteht. Diese Anordnung würde diese Studenten zwingen, entweder an eine andere Universität zu wechseln, die dieses Registrierungsrecht genießt, oder ihr Visum zu verlieren und das Land verlassen zu müssen.
Ich stelle fest, dass die Begründung für diese Entscheidung über die Vorwürfe des Antisemitismus auf dem Campus hinausgeht und auch auf die Zusammenarbeit mit der Kommunistischen Partei Chinas in Bereichen hinweist, die den Interessen der USA schaden.
Derzeit sind fast 7.000 Studenten in Harvard im Visaregistrierungssystem gemeldet, was einem Viertel der Studentenzahl entspricht. Ihr Weggang hätte erhebliche Auswirkungen auf den aktuellen Betriebsetat der Universität, da viele, wenn nicht sogar die meisten ausländischen Studenten die Studiengebühren in voller Höhe bezahlen. Die betreffende Summe beläuft sich auf mehrere hundert Millionen Dollar pro Jahr. Eine Aufhebung würde die Weiterbeschäftigung von nicht fest angestellten Lehrkräften in Frage stellen, die dann deutlich weniger Studierende unterrichten müssten. Noch wichtiger ist, dass dies eine Katastrophe für das internationale Ansehen von Harvard wäre und die Universität als Lehrort weniger attraktiv machen würde.
Die Harvard-Verwaltung gibt sich angesichts der Situation tapfer. Sie hat die Entscheidung vor Gericht angefochten, und ein Bundesbezirksrichter hat gerade eine vorübergehende Aussetzung der Entziehung der Zertifizierung verfügt. Vermutlich war der Grund für das Eingreifen des Gerichts, dass wir weniger als einen Monat vor Ende des Schuljahres stehen und viele Studenten, die auf ihre Diplome warten, gezwungen wären, das Land mit leeren Händen zu verlassen.
Es ist offen, wie lange die Gerichte die Umsetzung der Entscheidung des Heimatschutzministeriums blockieren können. Unabhängig davon, wie die endgültigen Gerichtsentscheidungen ausfallen mögen, wird die Fähigkeit der Harvard University, ausländische Studierende aufzunehmen, mit der Zeit in der Schwebe hängen, und diese Unsicherheit ist fatal für die Chancen, das derzeitige Niveau der Einschreibungen aufrechtzuerhalten.
Auch wenn die Verwaltungsbeamten hartnäckig sind, habe ich kaum Zweifel daran, dass sie bald massivem Druck von den wohlhabenden Spendern der Universität ausgesetzt sein werden, ihren Stolz zu überwinden und sich mit Washington zu einigen. Wir sprechen hier von Geschäftsleuten, und Geschäftsleute stellen sich niemals aus privaten Interessen gegen die Regierung ihres Landes, Prinzipien sind ihnen egal. Außerdem ist es unvorstellbar, dass Alumni-Vereinigungen im ganzen Land und auf der ganzen Welt nicht zu Verhandlungen statt zu Rechtsstreitigkeiten raten werden. Ich sage das als Harvard-Alumnus.
Die einzige Frage ist nun, wie lange es dauern wird, bis die Harvard-Leute verstehen, dass man „nicht gegen die Stadtverwaltung kämpft“.
As an exchange of emails with several readers has indicated, the whole story is not as straightforward as I suggested in my essay ‘News Flash.’
The RT and Great Game programs that I cited in the essay are not coming from youtube accounts of the original broadcasters but are posted on private youtube channels. Whose channels are these? One is from a person who identifies himself as ‘Donetsk,’ which by itself should be very suspect to any youtube censors. Another is owned by Russian political comentator and activist Sergey Mikheev who is a regular panelist on the Evening with Vladimir Solovyov shows and is under Western sanctions as a propagandist. Why this cat and mouse game is tolerated by youtube.com is unclear. Meanwhile, correspondents say that youtube is still not accessible in Moscow.
My voiced over interview on ‘Judging Freedom ‘ from this past Wednesday for which I provided the first posted link from rutube.ru is also interesting. A day later it was reposted in voice over by a newly aired Russian channel on youtube which used Artificial Intelligence to synchronize our lip movements with the Russian voice over.
This is the first time I have seen that technique applied and now I begin to understand why Hollywood actors are in protest against use of AI in the film industry. On the other hand, the AI generated portrait of me on the right above is less impressive.
Note that this youtube video has, as of today, been seen by 57,000 viewers, presumably living in Russia for the most part. That is 15 times the number of viewers of any similar video on rutube.ru
Translation below into German (Andreas Mylaeus)
Nachwort zu „Kurzmeldung“ über russische Medien jetzt auf YouTube verfügbar
Wie aus einem E-Mail-Austausch mit mehreren Lesern hervorgeht, ist die ganze Geschichte nicht so eindeutig, wie ich in meinem Essay „News Flash“ dargestellt habe.
Die RT- und Great Game-Sendungen, die ich in meinem Essay zitiert habe, stammen nicht von den YouTube-Kanälen der ursprünglichen Sender, sondern wurden auf privaten YouTube-Kanälen gepostet. Wem gehören diese Kanäle? Einer stammt von einer Person, die sich selbst als „Donetsk“ identifiziert, was an sich schon für jeden YouTube-Zensor sehr verdächtig sein sollte. Ein anderer gehört dem russischen politischen Kommentator und Aktivisten Sergey Mikheev, der regelmäßig in der Sendung „Abend mit Vladimir Solovyov“ auftritt und als Propagandist unter westlichen Sanktionen steht. Warum dieses Katz-und-Maus-Spiel von YouTube toleriert wird, ist unklar. Unterdessen berichten Korrespondenten, dass YouTube in Moskau weiterhin nicht zugänglich ist.
Interessant ist auch mein Interview zu „Judging Freedom“ vom vergangenen Mittwoch, für das ich den ersten Link von rutube.ru gepostet habe. Einen Tag später wurde es von einem neu gestarteten russischen Kanal auf YouTube mit einer neuen Sprachüberlagerung gepostet, bei der künstliche Intelligenz verwendet wurde, um unsere Lippenbewegungen mit der russischen Sprachüberlagerung zu synchronisieren.
Ich habe diese Technik zum ersten Mal gesehen und beginne nun zu verstehen, warum Hollywood-Schauspieler gegen den Einsatz von KI in der Filmindustrie protestieren. Das von KI erstellte Porträt von mir oben rechts ist hingegen weniger beeindruckend.
Beachten Sie, dass dieses YouTube-Video bis heute 57.000 Mal angesehen wurde, vermutlich größtenteils von Zuschauern in Russland. Das ist 15 Mal so viel wie die Zuschauerzahl eines ähnlichen Videos auf rutube.ru.
I inform the Community about a dramatic development which, to my knowledge, has not been mentioned by mainstream media in the West, namely the return of Russian videos to youtube.com
Those who read my Travel Notes from my most recent visit to St Petersburg will be aware of my surprise to find then that youtube was virtually inaccessible during this visit whereas I had encountered no such problem in the past three years of war. At the same time, LinkedIn, which the Russians had banned from the start of the SMO, was once again accessible there. It made no sense.
It now would appear that during the period when youtube was cut off in Russia some negotiations must have been going on with the internet platform’s owners, Google (Alphabet). The ban on Russian media has evidently been lifted. Not only are current Russian media offerings available on youtube but it seems that media offerings dating back many years are also now accessible.
The Great Game (Bolshaya Igra) – Go to the search box in youtube and type in Большая Игра. For some reason the link does not open on this substack platform.
The last link above happens to be the Russian voice-over version of my interview with Judge Andrew Napolitano yesterday. Within 6 hours of the broadcast of the English language original, this voice-over was put on line on the Russian internet channel rutube.ru (pun intended, obviously) as was the case with all of my Judging Freedom interviews these past several months. The producer of these voice over versions is a certain Russian organization called Polit Mnenie (translation – Political Opinion).
I offer this news to break the ice and start discussion of this development in the West. I assume that others will soon provide additional remarks on how this came about, and what it may say about the lifting of censorship on things Russian in the USA under Donald Trump.
Kurzmeldung: YouTube zeigt jetzt russische Medienvideos in englischer und russischer Sprache!
Ich möchte die Community über eine dramatische Entwicklung informieren, die meines Wissens von den westlichen Mainstream-Medien nicht erwähnt wurde, nämlich die Rückkehr russischer Videos auf youtube.com.
Diejenigen, die meine Reiseberichte von meiner letzten Reise nach St. Petersburg gelesen haben, wissen, wie überrascht ich war, dass YouTube während dieses Besuchs praktisch nicht zugänglich war, obwohl ich in den letzten drei Jahren des Krieges keine derartigen Probleme hatte. Gleichzeitig war LinkedIn, das die Russen seit Beginn der SMO gesperrt hatten, dort wieder zugänglich. Das ergab keinen Sinn.
Es scheint nun, dass während der Zeit, in der YouTube in Russland gesperrt war, Verhandlungen mit dem Eigentümer der Internetplattform, Google (Alphabet), stattgefunden haben müssen. Das Verbot russischer Medien wurde offenbar aufgehoben. Nicht nur aktuelle russische Medienangebote sind auf YouTube verfügbar, sondern offenbar auch Medienangebote, die viele Jahre zurückreichen.
Das große Spiel (Bolschaja Igra) – Gehen Sie zum Suchfeld auf YouTube und geben Sie Большая Игра ein. Aus irgendeinem Grund lässt sich der Link auf dieser Substack-Plattform nicht öffnen.
Der letzte Link oben ist zufällig die russische Synchronfassung meines gestrigen Interviews mit Judge Andrew Napolitano. Innerhalb von sechs Stunden nach Ausstrahlung des englischen Originals wurde diese Synchronfassung auf dem russischen Internetkanal rutube.ru (das Wortspiel ist natürlich beabsichtigt) online gestellt, wie es auch bei allen meinen Judging Freedom-Interviews in den letzten Monaten der Fall war. Der Produzent dieser Synchronfassungen ist eine bestimmte russische Organisation namens Polit Mnenie (Übersetzung: Politische Meinung). Ich bringe diese Nachricht, um das Eis zu brechen und eine Diskussion über diese Entwicklung im Westen anzustoßen. Ich gehe davon aus, dass andere bald weitere Kommentare dazu abgeben werden, wie es dazu gekommen ist und was dies über die Aufhebung der Zensur russischer Inhalte in den USA unter Donald Trump aussagen könnte.
Various readers/viewers of my essays and video appearances have commented negatively on my remarks about how I stand apart from my peers on one or another issue. This type of comment was especially vitriolic when I took Scott Ritter to task for bringing repression from the Biden Administration down on his head by accepting payments from RT for journalistic work he did for them. The repression took the form of his being barred entry to a flight bound for Moscow where he was going to accompany some high-level meetings in Russia. Scott’s passport was confiscated at JFK airport and his residence was soon afterwards searched by FBI agents who took away documents relating to a book he was soon to publish.
My point was that by taking pay ‘from the enemy’ Scott Ritter was discrediting all of us in the Opposition. He was violating long-existing rules from Cold War 1.0 that my friend Professor Steve Cohen had explained to me several years ago: namely never to accept money or gifts from Soviet/Russian state agencies since you might appear to be acting on their behalf, against American interests in your publications.
For this criticism, I was denounced by some as a violator of Opposition solidarity. However, to my view, such solidarity is another word for conformism and equates to the same ‘go along and get along’ that we see in the hangers-on of the Establishment for whom we have no respect.
Allow me to say that Scott Ritter has unique experience as a former UN arms inspector posted to Iraq and has solid knowledge in arms control issues that I do not possess. I have read some of his essays with admiration. However, he has at times taken what I consider to be very wrong-headed positions on major issues and I have no reason to be silent about this given the broad following he enjoys.
One perfect example of what I find objectionable in what Scott Ritter says and writes came in his latest interview on ‘Judging Freedom.’
I cringe when Ritter says that Donald Trump is ‘a fundamentally weak person,’ a conclusion he introduces to explain why Trump does nothing about the horrific Israeli genocide in Gaza.
To call Donald Trump weak is dead wrong. A week ago, we all heard Trump speak out in Saudi Arabia, cutting to pieces the entire Neocon directed U.S. foreign policy of the past 30 years during both Democratic and Republican administrations. He praised the Saudis for their impressive prosperity, saying that this was due to their own efforts, not to the ‘nation building’ policies of the U.S. Government these past decades which had only brought destruction and death wherever they were applied.
Everything that Trump has been doing to decapitate the Neocon dominated intelligence agencies in Washington, to close USAID, the administrator of regime change programs drawn up and financed by the CIA, to remove woke and ideologically driven promotion of every weird minority in the Armed Forces and Pentagon – all of these actions bespeak the kind of bravery of a U.S. president that we have not witnessed for a century. And Scott Ritter calls this man ‘weak’!
This is not to mention the spontaneous bravery he demonstrated during the attempt on his life during a campaign rally in Pennsylvania. After a bullet grazed his ear, he stood up, waved his fist and vowed to continue the fight.
My point here is that the Alternative Media are often as anti-Trump as the mainstream media. They do not want to believe that a U.S. president can do anything good or that he can know what he is doing. They insist that the last person to have his ear dictates what he will say next and they refuse to see how the President spreads confusion not because he is confused but because this keeps his enemies at bay. These enemies all believe, mistakenly, that with one more effort they can bring Trump around to their side of every argument.
I insist that Trump’s failure to speak or act against the Israeli genocide may be explained by realistic if cynical political calculus. This is the calculus that Machiavelli described for us more than five hundred years ago and it continues to be operative in many halls of power in this world.
In foreign policy, Donald Trump made it his first priority to resolve the war in Ukraine while re-establishing normal state-to-state relations with Russia. This was and remains an objective that does not enjoy majority backing on Capitol Hill. To win on this point, that is of vital importance to prevent the proxy war from becoming a hot war between the Collective West and Russia ending in nuclear exchanges that kill us all, Trump has needed the support of the Zionist majority in both parties. Had he ‘done the right thing’ on the Israeli genocide, the would have sacrificed at once this overarching foreign policy objective.
By the same token, doing the right thing on Israel early in his administration he would condemn his domestic program including his budget bill which even today hangs by a hair.
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In the video cited above, the hosts conducted an online poll of viewers in which 1500 persons participated. They were asked whether Trump understands Russia. 87% said ‘no’. As viewers of my own appearance yesterday on ‘Judging Freedom’ know, I was asked the same question and said ‘yes.’ That is to say, I was in the 13% minority.
However, this poll is biased against Trump, since the viewer population watching Scott Ritter is negatively disposed. While viewer comments on Ritter’s video all praise him to the skies, my own viewer comments praise my brilliance and essential contributions to understanding present-day events.
The fact that such different viewer groups are all subscribers to ‘Judging Freedom’ attests to the high value of this youtube channel as a platform for informing an enquiring public about differing expert opinions on key current events.
Before closing, I note that in the Scott Ritter video Secretary of State Rubio is lambasted as incompetent, knowing nothing about Russia. We are shown a tape of Rubio’s testimony in the Senate during which he says that Russia has no rights to the land it is claiming. However, those who question Rubio’s competence for his position are missing his utility to Donald Trump. By making such ill-informed and wrong statements in Senate hearings, Rubio is giving comfort to Republican skeptics of Trump’s policies on Russia and thus preventing them from ganging up to oppose the President.
And one last comment regarding linguistics. In this video, Scott Ritter notes that the Russians speak of their Minister of Foreign Affairs and of his diplomatic corps as ‘адекватный’. Ritter jokes that he did not understand this word in the past. It is usually translated as ‘adequate,’ which is not fulsome praise in English. Ritter turned it around in his mind and arrived at ‘competent.’
However, he is wrong there, as are the vast majority of English speakers who come across this word. In fact, адекватный ‘means suitable’ or ‘appropriate.’ Nothing more, nothing less, but in Russian culture it is a very positive notion.
The Russian адекватный was taken directly from the French adéquat, which English speakers also usually mistranslate as ‘adequate’ when it means precisely ‘suitable.’
Ritter was making the point that the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs is highly competent, head and shoulders above others, in particular the American diplomatic corps. Here, regrettably, I cannot agree with him.
Yes, many if not most of the senior diplomats in Russia are graduates of the prestigious and highly rigorous university that was specially created for this purpose, MGIMO. In the 1990s, these well-trained diplomats were given their freedom. The Yeltsin government was not cohesive; it was poorly run. In the new millennium, the ‘vertical of power’ has been the guiding principle and this pertains also to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
As a practical matter, the Russian ambassadors around the world have almost no freedom to take independent actions of any kind. All power has been drawn back in to Moscow and the office of Sergei Lavrov. That is a depressing reality for the people in the field and it does a disservice to Russian diplomacy.
The Ministry also suffers from a widespread practice of excessive terms in office of people at the top. Lavrov has simply been in office for too long. He should have been rotated out to some consultative position while a fighter like his deputy Sergey Ryabkov would have been an excellent replacement for Lavrov during wartime.
Verschiedene Leser/Zuschauer meiner Essays und Videoauftritte haben meine Äußerungen darüber, wie ich mich in der einen oder anderen Frage von meinen Kollegen unterscheide, negativ kommentiert. Besonders giftig waren diese Kommentare, als ich Scott Ritter dafür kritisiert habe, dass er sich durch die Annahme von Zahlungen von RT für seine journalistische Arbeit für diesen Sender die Repression der Biden-Regierung auf den Hals geholt hat. Die Repression äußerte sich darin, dass ihm die Einreise in ein Flugzeug nach Moskau verweigert wurde, wo er an einigen hochrangigen Treffen in Russland teilnehmen wollte. Scotts Reisepass wurde am JFK-Flughafen beschlagnahmt, und kurz darauf wurde seine Wohnung von FBI-Agenten durchsucht, die Dokumente zu einem Buch mitnahmen, das er bald veröffentlichen wollte.
Mein Argument war, dass Scott Ritter durch die Annahme von Zahlungen „vom Feind“ uns alle in der Opposition diskreditiert hat. Er verstieß gegen langjährige Regeln aus dem Kalten Krieg 1.0, die mir mein Freund Professor Steve Cohen vor einigen Jahren erklärt hatte: Nämlich niemals Geld oder Geschenke von sowjetischen/russischen staatlichen Stellen anzunehmen, da man sonst den Anschein erwecken könnte, in seinen Veröffentlichungen in deren Interesse und gegen die Interessen der USA zu handeln.
Für diese Kritik wurde ich von einigen als Verräter an der Solidarität der Opposition angeprangert. Meiner Ansicht nach ist solche Solidarität jedoch nur ein anderes Wort für Konformismus und entspricht dem gleichen „Mitläufertum“, das wir bei den Anhängern des Establishments beobachten, für die wir keinen Respekt haben.
Erlauben Sie mir festzuhalten, dass Scott Ritter als ehemaliger UN-Waffeninspekteur im Irak über einzigartige Erfahrungen verfügt und fundierte Kenntnisse in Fragen der Rüstungskontrolle hat, die ich nicht habe. Ich habe einige seiner Essays mit Bewunderung gelesen. Allerdings hat er meiner Meinung nach zu wichtigen Themen teilweise sehr falsche Positionen vertreten, und angesichts seiner großen Anhängerschaft habe ich keinen Grund, darüber zu schweigen.
Ein perfektes Beispiel für das, was ich an Scott Ritters Äußerungen und Schriften ablehne, findet sich in seinem jüngsten Interview in „Judging Freedom“.
Ich schaudere, wenn Ritter Donald Trump als „grundlegend schwachen Menschen“ bezeichnet, eine Schlussfolgerung, mit der er erklärt, warum Trump nichts gegen den schrecklichen Völkermord Israels in Gaza unternimmt.
Donald Trump als schwach zu bezeichnen, ist völlig falsch. Vor einer Woche haben wir alle gehört, wie Trump in Saudi-Arabien die gesamte neokonservative Außenpolitik der letzten 30 Jahre unter demokratischen und republikanischen Regierungen in der Luft zerrissen hat. Er lobte die Saudis für ihren beeindruckenden Wohlstand und sagte, dieser sei ihren eigenen Anstrengungen zu verdanken und nicht der „Nation Building“-Politik der US-Regierung in den letzten Jahrzehnten, die überall, wo sie angewendet wurde, nur Zerstörung und Tod gebracht habe.
Alles, was Trump unternommen hat, um die von Neocons dominierten Geheimdienste in Washington zu entmachten, um USAID, die Verwaltungsbehörde für von der CIA ausgearbeitete und finanzierte Programme zum Regimewechsel, zu schließen, um die woke und ideologisch motivierte Förderung jeder seltsamen Minderheit in den Streitkräften und im Pentagon zu beenden – all diese Maßnahmen zeugen von einer Tapferkeit eines US-Präsidenten, wie wir sie seit einem Jahrhundert nicht mehr gesehen haben. Und Scott Ritter nennt diesen Mann „schwach“! Ganz zu schweigen von dem spontanen Mut, den er während des Attentats auf sein Leben bei einer Wahlkampfveranstaltung in Pennsylvania bewiesen hat. Nachdem ihm eine Kugel das Ohr gestreift hatte, stand er auf, ballte die Faust und schwor, den Kampf fortzusetzen. Mein Punkt hier ist, dass die alternativen Medien oft genauso anti-Trump sind wie die Mainstream-Medien. Sie wollen nicht glauben, dass ein US-Präsident etwas Gutes tun kann oder dass er weiß, was er tut. Sie beharren darauf, dass der letzte Mensch, der ihm zuhört, ihm vorschreibt, was er als Nächstes sagen wird, und sie weigern sich zu sehen, dass der Präsident Verwirrung stiftet, nicht weil er verwirrt ist, sondern weil er damit seine Feinde in Schach hält. Diese Feinde glauben alle fälschlicherweise, dass sie Trump mit einer weiteren Anstrengung in jeder Frage auf ihre Seite ziehen können.
Ich behaupte, dass Trumps Versäumnis, sich gegen den Völkermord Israels auszusprechen oder dagegen vorzugehen, durch realistische, wenn auch zynische politische Kalküle erklärt werden kann. Es handelt sich dabei um Kalküle, die Machiavelli vor mehr als fünfhundert Jahren beschrieben hat und die in vielen Machtzentren dieser Welt nach wie vor gelten.
In der Außenpolitik hat Donald Trump es sich zur obersten Priorität gemacht, den Krieg in der Ukraine zu beenden und gleichzeitig die normalen Beziehungen zwischen den Staaten wiederherzustellen. Dies war und ist ein Ziel, das im Kongress keine Mehrheit findet. Um in diesem Punkt zu gewinnen, der von entscheidender Bedeutung ist, um zu verhindern, dass der Stellvertreterkrieg zu einem heißen Krieg zwischen dem kollektiven Westen und Russland eskaliert, der mit einem Atomkrieg endet, der uns alle vernichtet, brauchte Trump die Unterstützung der zionistischen Mehrheit in beiden amerikanischen Parteien. Hätte er in Bezug auf den Völkermord Israels „das Richtige getan“, hätte er dieses übergeordnete außenpolitische Ziel sofort opfern müssen.
Umgekehrt hätte er, hätte er zu Beginn seiner Amtszeit in Bezug auf Israel das Richtige getan, sein innenpolitisches Programm verurteilt, einschließlich seines Haushaltsgesetzes, das auch heute noch an einem seidenen Faden hängt.
*****
In dem oben genannten Video führten die Moderatoren eine Online-Umfrage unter den Zuschauern durch, an der 1.500 Personen teilnahmen. Sie wurden gefragt, ob Trump Russland versteht. 87 % antworteten mit „Nein“. Wie die Zuschauer meiner gestrigen Sendung „Judging Freedom“ wissen, wurde mir dieselbe Frage gestellt, und ich habe mit „Ja“ geantwortet. Das heißt, ich gehörte zu den 13 % der Minderheit.
Allerdings ist diese Umfrage voreingenommen gegenüber Trump, da die Zuschauer, die Scott Ritter sehen, ihm gegenüber negativ eingestellt sind. Während die Kommentare der Zuschauer zu Ritters Video ihn alle in den höchsten Tönen loben, loben die Kommentare zu meinem Video meine Brillanz und meinen wesentlichen Beitrag zum Verständnis der aktuellen Ereignisse.
Die Tatsache, dass so unterschiedliche Zuschauergruppen alle Abonnenten von „Judging Freedom“ sind, zeugt vom hohen Wert dieses YouTube-Kanals als Plattform, um eine interessierte Öffentlichkeit über unterschiedliche Expertenmeinungen zu wichtigen aktuellen Ereignissen zu informieren.
Zum Schluss möchte ich noch anmerken, dass Außenminister Rubio in dem Video von Scott Ritter als inkompetent und als jemand, der nichts über Russland weiß, kritisiert wird. Wir sehen eine Aufzeichnung von Rubios Aussage im Senat, in der er sagt, dass Russland kein Recht auf das Land habe, das es beansprucht. Diejenigen, die Rubios Kompetenz für sein Amt in Frage stellen, übersehen jedoch seinen Nutzen für Donald Trump. Durch solche uninformierten und falschen Aussagen in Senatsanhörungen gibt Rubio den republikanischen Skeptikern von Trumps Russlandpolitik Rückhalt und verhindert so, dass sie sich gegen den Präsidenten verbünden.
Und noch eine letzte Anmerkung zur Linguistik. In diesem Video weist Scott Ritter darauf hin, dass die Russen ihren Außenminister und sein diplomatisches Korps als „адекватный“ bezeichnen. Ritter scherzt, dass er dieses Wort früher nicht verstanden habe. Es wird normalerweise mit ‚angemessen‘ übersetzt, was im Englischen kein großes Lob ist. Ritter drehte es in seinem Kopf um und kam zu „kompetent“.
Allerdings irrt er sich hier, ebenso wie die überwiegende Mehrheit der Englischsprachigen, die auf dieses Wort stoßen. Tatsächlich bedeutet „адекватный“ „geeignet“ oder „angemessen“. Nicht mehr und nicht weniger, aber in der russischen Kultur ist dies ein sehr positiver Begriff.
Das russische Wort „адекватный“ wurde direkt aus dem Französischen „adéquat“ übernommen, das Englischsprachige ebenfalls meist falsch mit ‚adequate‘ übersetzen, obwohl es genau „geeignet“ bedeutet.
Ritter wollte damit sagen, dass das russische Außenministerium sehr kompetent ist und anderen, insbesondere dem amerikanischen diplomatischen Corps, weit überlegen ist. Hier kann ich ihm leider nicht zustimmen.
Ja, viele, wenn nicht sogar die meisten hochrangigen Diplomaten in Russland sind Absolventen der renommierten und äußerst strengen Universität MGIMO, die speziell für diesen Zweck gegründet wurde. In den 1990er Jahren erhielten diese gut ausgebildeten Diplomaten ihre Freiheit. Die Regierung Jelzin war nicht geschlossen, sondern schlecht geführt. Im neuen Jahrtausend ist die „vertikale Machtstruktur“ das Leitprinzip, und dies gilt auch für das Außenministerium.
In der Praxis haben die russischen Botschafter weltweit fast keine Freiheit, eigenständige Maßnahmen zu ergreifen. Alle Macht wurde nach Moskau und in das Büro von Sergej Lawrow zurückgezogen. Das ist eine deprimierende Realität für die Menschen vor Ort und schadet der russischen Diplomatie.
Das Ministerium leidet auch unter einer weit verbreiteten Praxis überlanger Amtszeiten der Spitzenbeamten. Lawrow ist einfach zu lange im Amt. Er hätte in eine beratende Funktion versetzt werden sollen, während ein Kämpfer wie sein Stellvertreter Sergej Rjabkow ein hervorragender Ersatz für Lawrow in Kriegszeiten gewesen wäre.
Napolitano: 0:32 Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for “Judging Freedom”. Today is Wednesday, May 21st, 2025. Professor Gilbert Doctorow joins us now. Professor Doctorow, thank you very much for your time, of course.
Do you see in the reports of the negotiations, whether it’s Donald Trump on the phone or whether it’s Steve Witkoff in Vladimir Putin’s office, that the Americans understand the Russian mentality on things like land areas that have been Russian for 300 years, the attitude about a ceasefire while war is going on. Do the Americans grasp that?
Gilbert Doctorow, PhD: Well, the Americans are a different group. If you take Rubio and General Kellogg, of course, they may be more obtuse, and I’m not sure if they’re interested in understanding. But with respect to Donald Trump and to Steve Witkoff and others in his circle, I have little doubt that they understand what’s going on very well.
And the peculiarities that we’ve spoken about in past chats, or that I’ve written about separately, are– the peculiarities in the behavior of Donald Trump may be largely explained by his attempts to ward off and to keep disoriented and away from his back the strong opposition that he faces, of course, within all the Democrats, within a portion of the Republicans on Capitol Hill and with all of the main leaders in the European Union.
2:14 What the Russians are talking about is a threat to Trump of precisely the combination of his domestic opposition in the Democratic Party and the leaders of this coalition of the willing in Western Europe.
Napolitano: Well, the coalition of the willing in Western Europe seems to be aligned with the neocons in the United States. And I wonder if the Russians understand that Trump is hearing different things in each ear. In one ear he hears the neocons. He hears Rubio and Sebastian Gorka and that crowd saying, “Keep up the war, keep using Ukraine as a battering ram, Ukraine can win, Putin can’t last forever.”
And in the other ear, he hears, I’m going to guess it’s Witkoff and the vice president. I don’t know. The vice president says some things in public that are not always the same as what he’s having been reported as saying in private, but it’s more, “Let’s end this now. It was a waste of money. The Russians are going to win. Let’s save lives.”
So he’s hearing opposite things in his ears, and he says opposite things when he talks. Remember how he said he would end the war in 24 hours? What did he learn from this conversation, or what do we know or believe he learned from his conversation with Vladimir Putin on Monday of this week?
Doctorow: 3:48 Well, I wouldn’t worry so much about Trump being confused. Spreading confusion is his game. And as I say, that’s his best policy against his enemies forming a united front and attacking him in a dangerous way. The fact that he has two different sets of views in his immediate advisors or assistants is obviously intentional. It’s not accidental.
He knew whom he was selecting, and he selected people like Rubio for very clear, understandable political reasons to maintain his position in the Senate where anything foreign policy would be heard. He is keeping his enemies off balance by letting them believe what you just said a moment ago, that he follows the recommendations of the last person to have his ear. I don’t believe that there’s anything more to it than precisely that.
Napolitano: 4:45 Do the Russians understand this? Does the Kremlin know of the neocon forces in his immediate circle as well as the, I’ll call them America-Firsters, I don’t know what that means, but let’s just use it as a handle because the president uses that phrase every once in a while, and the America-Firsters in his orbit. Does the Kremlin get that?
Doctorow: Oh, they get it very well. And they are satisfied, Putin himself is satisfied, that Trump understands the situation and is sympathetic to their security needs. And they give him a long leash, so to speak, to do what he has to do to maintain himself. They believe that he has achieved something which we don’t talk about so much, but that it pays to bring forth in our discussion now.
5:39 The latest Russian analysis you hear on the talk shows of how this talk how this discussion with between Putin and Trump went highlights the fact that Trump has kept the Europeans out of this game. That they were all waiting to speak to him and they were greatly disappointed that after he spoke to Vladimir Putin, he spoke to them all as a group, including in that group Zelensky. None of them had a chance to get his ear separately. And moreover, they seem to have acquiesced in the way the negotiations are going and which Trump addressed in his remarks following the talk with Putin by telephone, namely that the sides, the Ukrainians and the Russians, are in deliberations directly without any intermediaries. Now let’s remember, go back three years, every time the question of peace talks came up at the initiative, of course, of Zelensky and his European friends, it was always in the context of getting 30, 40 countries all together to talk about condemning Russia.
6:51 Russia was not invited to these first talks, and even if it were invited, it would have faced a united, a combination of all of the sympathetic countries to Ukraine and hostile countries to itself. Now the meetings are going one-on-one. And for Russia, that is a very important achievement which Donald Trump facilitated.
Napolitano: I don’t want to get too much into the weeds, but prior to the conversation, the telephone conversation between President Putin and President Trump, Trump and his people and everybody– not everybody in the West, but the EU leaders– were saying, “Ceasefire first, ceasefire first, negotiations afterwards.” Now we know that that’s not the way the Russians operate at all, going back to the invasion by Napoleon. They’re not going to talk about, they’re not going to stop the fighting, whether it’s offensive or defensive, just to negotiate.
7:51 However, after the conversation between Trump and Putin, President Trump has stopped asking for a ceasefire. Question: can we conclude from this that Vladimir Putin was very clear? Ceasefire as a prelude to negotiations is off the table.
Doctorow: I think that’s a correct assumption. And I think that has sunk into the thick brains of the Europeans as well, because they have become much quieter about what’s going to happen at the next meetings, what the timetable will be and so forth.
Although Ursula von der Leyen has got her 17th or whatever number package of sanctions ready to roll out, this is all on the sidelines. In the front page, what we see is the Europeans have fallen back. There’s wide anticipation that Trump is going to remove himself, remove the United States from this war. That’s the current expectation, and I believe it will be fulfilled.
8:53 The Europeans are trying to deal with that fact without having to go into a direct attack on Donald Trump. And Trump has managed to detoxify this decision. I have to take my hat off to him, because I was quite critical of his not dealing with this properly, of his spreading confusion. Now I see that his tactic has achieved a certain result.
The Europeans are backing off. They are gracelessly accepting the fact that … the United States is going to withdraw. He’s not doing it in a fit of anger, in a fit of confrontation with Mr. Zelensky. He’s doing it simply saying, “Look, these sides have many issues on the table that you and we don’t understand, and therefore best if we leave them alone to do it themselves.” That is an enormous achievement, and we didn’t see it coming.
Napolitano: 9:48 Do the people in the Kremlin view the United States as a neutral, sincere mediator between Russia and Ukraine or as a co-belligerent with Ukraine against Russia?
Doctorow: I think it’s the second. Having said that though, they understand that Trump is trying to extricate the United States from this situation, and they are very happy about that. Generally speaking, the review that I heard last night on these talk shows is flattering towards Trump. They are satisfied with it.
At the same time, they are saying clearly, loudly and clearly, that Trump is not a friend of Russia, that Trump is looking after American national interests, period. So there’s no romanticizing this relationship. And yet they are pleased with what Trump has achieved by getting the Europeans out of the act.
Napolitano: 10:52 Here’s President Zelensky on Monday after reports of the Trump-Putin conversation came out and presumably after President Trump addressed EU leaders along with President Zelensky. I’m going to ask you if this is domestic political claptrap or if he really believes it. Chris, cut number three.
Zelenski: [English voice over] Nobody will withdraw our forces from our territories. It is my constitutional duty, the duty of our military, to protect the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine. Yes, there are temporarily occupied territories now because of the aggression of such a huge country. It is understood, but we will accept no ultimatums. We will not give away our land, our territories and our people, our homes.
Napolitano: 11:55 Now, all right, you don’t need my opinion, but I need yours.
Doctorow: I think these are brave words. They will be undone the moment that Donald Trump acts on what he was hinting at the last couple of days and says that this is not his war, this is not America’s war, it’s Europe’s problem. And he hands it over to Europe to solve, assuming that he does what is logical and connect to such a position, and he stops US supply of finance and military materiel. And he refuses Europe the right to buy US equipment for delivery to to Kiev.
If he does that, then Mr. Zelensky will have to eat his words. And he will do that, unless he gets on a plane and leaves the country, which would be, frankly, a better option for him.
Napolitano: I don’t see how he can avoid getting on the plane and leaving the country, unless he wants to be a martyr. I mean, if he concedes one inch of territory, notwithstanding how realistic it would be for him to do so, how could he possibly expect to stay in office or even alive back in Kiev?
Doctorow: Well, yes, if he leaves the country, then he can claim that he has done the honorable thing, he has refused to sacrifice his country’s national interests, and he leaves that unpleasant task, that dishonorable task, to anyone who takes power after him. He would then leave in his own eyes as a hero, and possibly as a hero in the eyes of many of his followers today in Ukraine, such as they are. So I see that as a very real possibility. As for the Russians, they definitely want to have a negotiated settlement. Mr. Putin is not saying that just to please the ears of Donald Trump.
Napolitano: 13:52 Very, very interesting. In the meantime, is there going to be a Trump-Putin– well, before I get to that, what will the EU leaders do if Trump turns off the spigot? What will von der Leyen, Merz, Macron, Starmer, Tusk of Poland, what will they do? Will they try to replace American military equipment with their own?
Doctorow: Oh, they will try. That will give them a few months of breathing space, during which they can write a new script for themselves and explain– some of them, not all of them– why they are extricating their countries from the coalition of the willing and facing the facts that Russia has won the war. I think in a few months that they pretend to provide aid to Ukraine, they will succeed in developing a common narrative that frees them from their guilt of the last three years, or at least tries to. But they will have to come around to the facts that Ukraine is going to go belly up.
Napolitano: 15:06 Are you surprised that there seems to be a sentiment amongst European leaders that Prime Minister Netanyahu and the IDF have gone too far in Gaza, too many innocents killed, too many children starving, too many babies about to die of malnutrition, it’s time to dial it back.
This seems to be an attitude relatively new amongst European leaders. I point out the British Foreign Minister on the floor of the House of Commons and President Macron. I haven’t actually heard anything from von der Leyen or Merz or Starmer on this.
Doctorow: Just as we spoke a moment ago about the EU taking its time to reposition itself and actually to reverse itself on the Ukraine war, what you have just said indicates the first baby steps in the direction of sanctions and pariah status being given to Israel if it pursues its present genocide in Gaza. They’re not doing a flip-flop from one day to the next.
These very important remarks by Starmer which were flashed over the BBC every 20 minutes, what is he threatening to do? Not to continue to extend the free trade arrangements that they now have, not to sanction Israel. That will be the next baby step. Other European countries are speaking of sanctions. So as a collectivity, the European states will head towards severe penalties for Israel, but not all at once. They’re feeling the ground under their feet.
Napolitano: 16:56 Here’s Prime Minister Netanyahu’s latest, this is two days ago, stating publicly that the IDF intends to take full control of Gaza, which means controlling food, water and medicine for the Gazan babies. Cut number 14.
Netanyahu: [English voice over] Eventually, we will have an area fully controlled by the IDF, where Gaza’s civilian population can receive aid, while Hamas gets nothing. This is part of the effort to defeat Hamas alongside the intense military pressure and our massive incursion, which is essentially aimed at taking control of all of Gaza and stripping Hamas of any ability to loot humanitarian aid. This is the war plan and the victory plan.
Napolitano; 17:41 I don’t know if Donald Trump wants the IDF to take full control of Gaza. I mean the cynics would say he wants his son-in-law to develop, but the realists would say, “Where are two million people going to go?”
Doctorow: Well, I think Donald Trump can only handle– not because of his own limitations, but simply the realities of office– I don’t think he can handle two major crises simultaneously with efficiency and equal logic.
The logic is that he would dump Israel. The question is when will be opportune for him to do that? If the Europeans will come in and go from the baby steps I’ve mentioned a minute ago to some real sanctions against Israel, then the United States can begin to make a move. What Netanyahu is talking about, essentially, is going back to where the situation was before Sharon pulled Israel out of Gaza. But doing it in a most violent, repugnant way that flags Israel as a demonic entity to the whole world.
Napolitano: 18:51 Talking about “demonic entity”, here is a former member of the Knesset articulating about the harshest view imaginable on the relationship between the Netanyahu regime and the babies, the children of Gaza. This is stomach churning. It’s in Hebrew, but there’s a translation. Chris, cut number 10.
Moshe Feiglin: 19:19 [English voice over] Every child in Gaza is the enemy. We are at war with the Gazan entity, the Gazan terror entity, which we ourselves established in Gaza, in Oslo, and in the disengagement. The disengagement that Prime Minister Netanyahu voted in favor of, that is the enemy now. Every such child to whom you are now giving milk in another 15 years will rape your daughters and slaughter your children. We need to conquer Gaza and settle it. And not a single Gazan child should remain there.
Let’s stop telling ourselves this deception, just to score points in this game between pro-Bibi and anti-Bibi. This isn’t about left or right, it’s about winning this war and it’s about justice.
When will we learn? When will we learn?
Napolitano: 20:05 In other words, slaughter the babies. I mean, this attitude should be unacceptable everywhere on the planet.
Doctorow: Well, justice will be served when that gentleman is facing court charges in the ICC. Of course, the behavior of Netanyahu and his government is monstrous. It’s taken a lot of time, much too long, for European countries to back away from their unqualified support of Israel with a backward view at the Holocaust and Europe’s complicity in the destruction of European Jewry. But we’re reaching that point, that tilting point, when Europe is facing directly what you were just showing on the screen, the awful nature of Netanyahu government, and it’s calling for a tribunal to try its leaders for genocide. We’re coming slowly to that point.
Napolitano: 21:05 As if Trump doesn’t have enough headaches, what is your take on India-Pakistan?
Doctorow: The United States shares with Russia a basic alignment with India, whereas China is the basic backer of Pakistan. So here is where both Trump and Putin are really in the same camp, regrettably both American and Russian armaments to India have not been as efficient as cutting-edge as what China has supplied to Pakistan. So there was a very big embarrassment on the Indian side for its failure to show its muscle when it was challenged directly to dogfights with the Pakistani Air Force.
22:03 So the United States surely is embarrassed by this. Russia doesn’t talk much about it, but it isn’t exactly their best hour either, that the Chinese force have assisted Pakistan better than United States and Russia have assisted India.
Napolitano: Before we go, you have a book coming out pretty soon, don’t you?
Doctorow: Yes, in the next week, this first volume that’s entitled “War Diaries” will be appearing on Amazon and will be available, of course, from all booksellers.
It is– just to be clear about it, my diaries are diaries in a very specific, personal sense. They are these essays that I have been publishing in great volumes over the last three years relating to the war. Essentially, I see the value of this book will be to those who want to follow the evolution of Russian society under the pressures of the war. I am not pretending to be a front-line follower or a military expert on what has been going on in the field, but how this war has changed Russian society, where it started before the special military operation was launched and where it is today. It’s a dramatically different society with different makeup, composition of leadership and elites to come.
23:35 And that is what the virtue of this book is, particularly the essays from my periodic visits to Russia, at a time when all Western journalists had left the country and there was no serious reporting going on.
Napolitano: Well, the cover’s very enticing, and you’re a gifted writer and observer of the scene. I wish you well on the book. We’ll talk more about it once it’s available. There it is. “War Diaries”. Very optimistic. “Volume 1, the Russia-Ukraine War 2022 to 2023”.
Professor Doctorow, thank you very much for your time, my dear friend. We look forward to seeing you. We have a short week next week, because Monday is a holiday here in the US, but we’ll see you next week.
Doctorow: OK, look forward to it.
Napolitano: Thank you. All the best. And coming up later today, some schedule changes. At 1 o’clock, Pepe Escobar; at 2 o’clock, Matt Hoh; at 3 o’clock, Phil Giraldi; at 4 o’clock, Scott Ritter. Aaron Mate moved to tomorrow.
‘Judging Freedom,’ 21 May edition: Trump/Putin: Who Has the Upper Hand?
Today’s discussion with Judge Andrew Napolitan touched upon several different major developments in international relations over the past week, beginning with the Russia-Ukraine peace negotiations in Istanbul last Friday and the related phone call between the American and Russian presidents on Monday.
I brought to the discussion the optimism that Russian political commentators have expressed on the Vladimir Solovyov talk show yesterday: they are positively impressed by Trump’s success in keeping the European leaders out of the game, by reducing the negotiations to the two sides at war, whereas over the past three years Ukraine had been repeatedly trying to surround itself with as many of the world’s powers as possible thereby using diplomacy to defeat the Russians when a peace is drawn up.
Yes, the Europeans have backed off, which is all to the good. They are anticipating Trump’s announcement that he and the USA remove themselves from the conflict and leave it to the Europeans to carry on if they will. Indeed, we may expect the Europeans to do just and claim to replace the USA as supplier of money and arms to Ukraine. But that will be done just to buy time while they collectively write a new narrative that allows them also to leave Ukraine to its fate, which will be capitulation in a few months’ time.
Other topics included the first baby steps of Britain and Europe to apply sanctions on Israel for its ongoing genocide in Gaza and what we have all learned from the six days of air war between India and Pakistan.
Vladimir Putin’s latest faux pas in relations with Donald Trump to end the war
I am fortunate to have some serious readers of my blog essays who occasionally send me directly very thought-provoking comments.
This happened last week when I got a message from a reader and follower of my appearances on ‘Judging Freedom’ who argued that neither the Russians nor the Ukrainians were truly serious about the peace treaty they initialed in April 2022. The cancellation of that deal has been blown out of proportion by Vladimir Putin in recent months, ever since he waved a copy of the initialed treaty in front of reporters and blamed Boris Johnson for preventing its final approval by the parties. That version of events was later backed up by other witnesses including a former Israeli prime minister. As we all now ‘know,’ Johnson visited Kiev and persuaded Zelensky to continue the war with full Western backing.
In light of the slaughter that followed over the course of the past three years, with Ukrainian deaths on the order of half a million or more, the decision that Zelensky took in April 2022 looks tragic and the intervention of the British Prime Minister looks especially irresponsible and sinister.
However, when, a couple of months ago, I read very carefully through my essays from the March-April 2022 period in preparation for the publication of my War Diaries, 2022-2023 (availability on Amazon expected in a week or so), I was surprised to find that the peace negotiations of that spring and the scrapping of the draft treaty received almost no attention, exactly one essay to be specific. What little was said at the time in Russian media played down the peace negotiations, because the concessions in the draft were deemed to be excessive.
The fellow who wrote to me last week argues that the Russians had no intention of returning territory to Kiev, such as was envisioned in the draft, and that, he says, is proven by the Kremlin’s confirmation of civil administrations in some of the newly occupied land, whereas establishment of military rule there would have signaled only temporary occupation. For its part, Ukraine already began staging the Bucha massacre before the arrival of Boris Johnson in Kiev, and as we know, that false flag operation was used by the Ukrainians as their excuse for breaking off talks with Moscow and for beating the drum of Russian villainy before the world, with great effect in terms of the sanctions then applied to the Russian Federation by the EU, following the US example.
Now, this very diligent correspondent has sent me the link to an interview with a former Russian diplomat (1987 – 2003), present day history professor and widely followed blogger on current international developments, Nikolai Platoshkin that presents several important critical comments on how Vladimir Putin has been handling the peace negotiations this past week, and in particular, in the days leading up to the Russian-Ukrainian negotiations in Istanbul last Friday.
‘Widely viewed’? Until youtube cancelled his channels definitively, Platoshkin had 700,000 Russian-speaking subscribers to his you tube video presentations. So much for the ‘neutral status’ that I recently gave to youtube management! As regards all things Russian, they appear to be indiscriminate in their censorship.
In the given video, Platoshkin makes three important points that I have not seen or heard made in Western media. As for Russian state media, commentary on the Friday talks in Istanbul and on the telephone call yesterday between Putin and Trump have been slavishly praising Vladimir Vladimirovich and saying little else.
Point 1: Putin should have agreed to go to Istanbul, because then Trump would have gone and the meeting there would have been 2:1, Trump and Putin against Zelensky, a very advantageous situation.
Point 2: When he announced his riposte to the Europeans’ threats of devastating sanctions if he did not immediately agree to a cease-fire, proposing instead a Russian-Ukrainian meeting in Istanbul on 15 May, Putin should have specified then and there at what level (working level) and what the subject for talks would be exactly. By not doing so, he let Zelensky run away with the PR credits by making himself available in Istanbul while Putin refused to come.
Point 3: Putin should not have suggested Istanbul for these talks, because the host, Erdogan, is pro-Ukrainian and anti-Russian on the key points of territorial concessions. He instead should have proposed Minsk, where the 2022 peace talks began before being moved to Istanbul. Lukashenko would be a pro-Moscow host.
Frankly, what Platoshkin has said speaking as a professional diplomat is vastly better than what any of the half-dozen political science experts had to say yesterday on Evening with Vladimir Solovyov. It proves the worth of an MGIMO diploma and of 16 years in the Russian diplomatic service including foreign postings to Bonn and Houston.
Wladimir Putins jüngster Fauxpas in den Beziehungen zu Donald Trump zur Beendigung des Krieges
Ich habe das Glück, einige ernsthafte Leser meiner Blog-Essays zu haben, die mir gelegentlich direkt sehr zum Nachdenken anregende Kommentare schicken.
Dies geschah letzte Woche, als ich eine Nachricht von einem Leser und Anhänger meiner Auftritte in „Judging Freedom“ erhielt, der argumentierte, dass weder die Russen noch die Ukrainer es mit dem Friedensvertrag, den sie im April 2022 unterzeichnet hatten, wirklich ernst meinten. Die Aufkündigung dieses Abkommens wurde von Wladimir Putin in den letzten Monaten übertrieben dargestellt, seit er vor Journalisten mit einer Kopie des unterzeichneten Vertrags wedelte und Boris Johnson dafür verantwortlich machte, dass die endgültige Zustimmung der Parteien verhindert worden sei. Diese Version der Ereignisse wurde später von anderen Zeugen bestätigt, darunter ein ehemaliger israelischer Ministerpräsident. Wie wir alle inzwischen „wissen“, besuchte Johnson Kiew und überzeugte Selensky, den Krieg mit voller Unterstützung des Westens fortzusetzen.
Angesichts des Gemetzels, das in den letzten drei Jahren mit mindestens einer halben Million Toten auf ukrainischer Seite stattfand, erscheint die Entscheidung, die Selensky im April 2022 getroffen hat, tragisch, und die Intervention des britischen Premierministers erscheint besonders unverantwortlich und finster.
Als ich jedoch vor einigen Monaten meine Essays aus dem Zeitraum März-April 2022 zur Vorbereitung der Veröffentlichung meiner „War Diaries, 2022-2023“ (voraussichtlich in etwa einer Woche bei Amazon erhältlich) sehr sorgfältig durchlas, stellte ich überrascht fest, dass die Friedensverhandlungen in jenem Frühjahr und die Verwerfung des Vertragsentwurfs fast keine Beachtung fanden, genauer gesagt in nur einem einzigen Essay. Das Wenige, was damals in den russischen Medien gesagt wurde, spielte die Friedensverhandlungen herunter, weil die Zugeständnisse im Entwurf als übertrieben angesehen wurden.
Der Mann, der mir letzte Woche geschrieben hat, argumentiert, dass die Russen nicht die Absicht hatten, Gebiete an Kiew zurückzugeben, wie es im Entwurf vorgesehen war, und dass dies durch die Bestätigung der Zivilverwaltung in einigen der neu besetzten Gebiete durch den Kreml bewiesen sei, während die Einrichtung einer Militärverwaltung dort nur eine vorübergehende Besetzung signalisiert hätte. Die Ukraine ihrerseits begann bereits vor der Ankunft von Boris Johnson in Kiew mit der Inszenierung des Massakers von Butscha, und wie wir wissen, wurde diese Operation unter falscher Flagge von den Ukrainern als Vorwand benutzt, um die Gespräche mit Moskau abzubrechen und vor der Weltöffentlichkeit die Trommel für eine Schurkerei Russlands zu rühren, was sich in den Sanktionen niederschlug, die die EU nach dem Vorbild der USA gegen die Russische Föderation verhängte.
Nun hat mir dieser sehr fleißige Korrespondent den Link zu einem Interview mit einem ehemaligen russischen Diplomaten (1987–2003) geschickt, der heute Geschichtsprofessor und vielgelesener Blogger zu aktuellen internationalen Entwicklungen ist, Nikolai Platoshkin. Darin werden mehrere wichtige kritische Kommentare dazu abgegeben, wie Wladimir Putin die Friedensverhandlungen in der vergangenen Woche und insbesondere in den Tagen vor den russisch-ukrainischen Verhandlungen am vergangenen Freitag in Istanbul geführt hat.
„Weit verbreitet“? Bis YouTube seine Kanäle endgültig sperrte, hatte Platoshkin 700.000 russischsprachige Abonnenten für seine YouTube-Videos. So viel zum ‚neutralen Status‘, den ich kürzlich der YouTube-Führung zugeschrieben habe! Was alles Russische betrifft, scheinen sie bei ihrer Zensur keine Unterschiede zu machen.
In dem genannten Video bringt Platoshkin drei wichtige Punkte zur Sprache, die ich in den westlichen Medien weder gesehen noch gehört habe. Was die russischen Staatsmedien angeht, so wurden in den Kommentaren zu den Gesprächen am Freitag in Istanbul und zum gestrigen Telefonat zwischen Putin und Trump Wladimir Wladimirowitsch sklavisch gelobt und sonst wenig gesagt.
Punkt 1: Putin hätte zustimmen sollen, nach Istanbul zu fahren, denn dann wäre Trump auch hingefahren und das Treffen hätte im Verhältnis 2:1 stattgefunden, Trump und Putin gegen Selensky, eine sehr vorteilhafte Situation.
Punkt 2: Als Putin auf die Drohung der Europäer mit verheerenden Sanktionen reagierte, hätte er nicht nur eine russisch-ukrainische Begegnung in Istanbul am 15. Mai vorschlagen, sondern auch genau sagen sollen, auf welcher Ebene (Arbeitsebene) und worüber genau geredet werden soll. Weil er das nicht gemacht hat, hat er Selensky PR-Punkte geschenkt, weil der sich in Istanbul bereit erklärt hat, während Putin nicht hingehen wollte.
Punkt 3: Putin hätte nicht Istanbul als Ort für diese Gespräche vorschlagen sollen, da der Gastgeber Erdogan in den entscheidenden Fragen der territorialen Zugeständnisse pro-ukrainisch und anti-russisch ist. Stattdessen hätte er Minsk vorschlagen sollen, wo die Friedensgespräche 2022 begonnen hatten, bevor sie nach Istanbul verlegt wurden. Lukaschenko wäre ein pro-moskauer Gastgeber gewesen.
Offen gesagt ist das, was Platoshkin als professioneller Diplomat gesagt hat, weitaus besser als das, was das halbe Dutzend Politikwissenschaftler gestern in der Sendung „Abend mit Wladimir Solowjow“ zu sagen hatte. Das beweist den Wert eines MGIMO-Diploms und von 16 Jahren im russischen diplomatischen Dienst, einschließlich Auslandsaufenthalten in Bonn und Houston.
NewsX: 0:00 our big focus this hour: the Kremlin has confirmed that a meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky could happen, but only if key agreements are reached. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov has emphasized that the identity of the Ukrainian signatory to any agreement remains a crucial issue. Meanwhile, talks between Russian and Ukrainian negotiators in Istanbul lasted for about two hours, with no breakthrough on a ceasefire. However, both sides agreed to a significant prisoner swap of 1,000 prisoners of war.
0:26 In Albania, European leaders attending the European Political Community summit expressed deep concern over the lack of progress in peace talks. EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced that the EU is preparing a new sanctions package to increase pressure on Russia, targeting entities like the Russian shadow fleet and Nord Stream pipelines. Meanwhile, a Russian drone attack on a Ukrainian minibus has killed nine civilians, mostly elderly women, in the northern Sumi region, sparking further outrage. US President Donald Trump claimed that Putin is tired of the war and is eager for peace talks. Trump said he believes he can facilitate a deal, but stressed the importance of direct talks with Putin to end the conflict.
1:12 Gilbert Doctorow, Russian affairs expert, is joining us live from Brussels in Belgium. Gilbert Doctorow, thank you for being with us today. What is your analysis of the progress made in the peace talks in Turkey? How do you react to the deliberations that happened between the Russian and Ukrainian sides, even though the heads of state did not attend?
Gilbert Doctorow, PhD: Well, it would be exceptional, in fact, it would be nonsense for the heads of state to attend a preliminary meeting. Heads of state normally come in to sign off on agreements that their assistants, their expert assistants, have arrived at in consultations. That was what was foreseen in March- April of 2022, when the first direct negotiations between Russian and Ukrainian teams met in Istanbul, and it made sense that all the work was done, a 50- or 60-page agreement was prepared and initialed, and there was going to be a meeting between Zelensky and Putin. That’s how these things go. And anyone who says that Putin should have come to a first-time meeting with nothing whatever agreed is only doing it, saying it for propagandistic reasons.
2:33 The people who are saying that are obviously von der Leyen and the EU leaders who have formed a coalition of the willing. The main point is: the likelihood of an agreement being reached between these two sides is nil. Their positions are entirely contradictory. Each side is expecting an agreement that will record the complete defeat of the other side, a capitulation. The Ukrainians want a trial, a tribunal against Mr. Putin and his colleagues. They want reparations. They’re acting as if they won the war, when everyone knows they’ve lost the war.
3:20 The Russians, similarly, only are willing to speak about a ceasefire if the Ukrainians withdraw from the four oblasts or regions in Eastern Ukraine that are now part of the Russian Federation, but are only partially occupied by Russian troops. These positions are contradictory, irreconcilable, and it is pointless to expect a negotiated settlement, which is not to say that I disagree with Mr. Trump. I agree completely with his statement two days ago that he personally can bring peace to end this war. And he can, but not at the negotiating table. He can do it by stopping US deliveries of weapons to Ukraine and by refusing to sell weapons to the EU for further delivery to Ukraine. If he does that, the war will end in weeks or a couple of months, And that will bring peace and an end to the slaughter that we see every day.
NewsX: 4:21 Yes. We are seeing now, Gilbert, that, you know, this new deal has been agreed to. Do you see that as progress on a prisoner swap, thousand, thousand to be exchanged?
Doctorow: We’re speaking about 2,000 families in Russia and Ukraine, who will have their husbands, their brothers, their fathers, their sons return to their midst. We can only applaud that agreement. It is humane and humanitarian. However, that is not an end to the war. But it’s a good step. It shows that the sides could find something to talk about that is constructive. That’s very good.
NewsX: 5:00 How do you react to this EU package now that it’s being announced to try and pressurize Russia, the EU looking at stepping up sanctions further?
Doctorow: The only thing that von der Leyen of the EU Commission can do is make packages. She’s a real good packateer, as the Russians are calling her. It’s nonsense to put sanctions on a pipeline that has been destroyed, tells you the level of thinking of Madame von der Leyen and her close colleagues.
5:30 It is nonsense to say, that they will impair the movement of Russian shadow fleet oil tankers is also nonsense, because the latest attempt to do that in the Baltic was ended when Russian jets flew over the, I believe it was Norwegian, and certainly it was Estonian, cutters, that thought they were going to intercept and stop a Russian shadow-fleet tanker. They want war, they’ll get war. But unfortunately for them, they really cannot have a war.
And so this is posturing. Madame von der Leyen is posturing. She is bluffing, and everyone serious knows that. The Russians aren’t moved one inch by all of her threats, because they’re totally empty.
NewsX: Gilbert Doctorow, thank you for joining us with your perspective on that story.
A day has passed in the fast moving reportage on the peace talks from when this video with the Indian broadcaster was recorded, but I remain satisfied with my appreciation of the improbability of these talks producing any results given the wholly irreconcilable positions of the two parties – each side in effect is demanding the capitulation of the other. And, as I say here, that Donald Trump does have the possibility of ending the war if he can muster the courage to do what has to be done – end all military and financial assistance to Ukraine right now and refuse to sell arms to the EU countries for onward delivery to Kiev.
Gilbert Doctorow 