WION ‘Game Plan’: Russians use Soviet gas pipelines to infiltrate Kupyansk / 700 Ukrainian forces trapped

With over 10 million subscribers worldwide, WION is by far India’s biggest and most authoritative English-language broadcaster.  It is an honor to be called upon by them periodically to comment on major Russia-related developments. My last time with them on air was a month ago.

This 9-minute interview taken this morning focuses on the ongoing Russian capture of the city of Kupyansk in northeast Ukraine. The novel and most newsworthy aspect of this conquest has been the use by the Russians of Soviet era gas pipelines to move their troops into the city stealthily and take the Ukrainian defenders by surprise, killing about one third of the garrison outright and trapping the rest.

With regard to those ‘rest,’ it is noteworthy that among them are units from the so-called Russian Volunteer Corps that staged a terrorist incursion in the RF border region of Belgorod a year ago. Destroying these murderers was certainly one key objective of the Russian forces entering Kupyansk now.

Taking the city of Kharkov by knocking out fortified towns in the vicinity and surrounding the metropolis is surely on the Russian game plan for ending the war, although in fact this is a secondary front while the center of Russian attention continues to be in the Donetsk region, where the main fighting is around another logistics hub, Pokrovsky, known in Russian as Krasnoarmeysk. That is also proceeding well for the Russians as they move ever closer to the city’s outlying districts.

Taking Pokrovsk will open the way for the Russians to take the last two heavily defended cities in central Donetsk, Kramatorsk and Slavyansk, after which they have a clear path to the Dnieper river that divides Ukraine in two. It is worth noting, when speaking of the changing Russian military objectives, that there is talk on Russian state television now of the importance of taking Odessa to ensure the safety of the Crimea. The distance by sea from Odessa to Crimea is rather short and the city’s port is viewed by the French and British as a desirable base for their own anti-Russian operations when the war ends.  If Odessa is excised from the rump Ukraine, the country will lose much of its attraction to these Western allies of Zelensky.

Transcript of ‘Judging Freedom’ edition of 24 September

Transcript submitted by a reader

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HY4T88gIpdw

Napolitano: 0:33
Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for “Judging Freedom”. Today is Wednesday, September 24th, 2024. Professor Gilbert Doctorow will be with us in just a moment on President Trump embraces Ukraine. But first this.
[ad]

2:02
Professor Doctorow, good morning and welcome here. Thank you for coming on the show. Thank you for accommodating my schedule. Let’s get right to the hot international news, at least in the West here. As the sun comes up on the East coast of the United States, President Donald Trump yesterday saying that Ukraine can win in all caps, W-I-N, the war against Russia, and retake Crimea and the other areas now under Russian security control. What do you make of that?

Doctorow:
Double talk. Look, my opinion has not changed. I do not say that I am certain. I do not claim that others are wrong, but I think I am onto something quite important when I say that Mr. Trump deceives constantly, misinforms constantly. These are the tools he uses to maintain his independence and to put at arm’s length his many opponents domestically and abroad.

Napolitano: 3:12
Well, what do the Russians think when Trump makes a statement like this? And there’s a lot more to it. “Russia is a paper tiger, NATO”, which of course includes the United States, which is predominantly the United States, “can help Ukraine win the war”. Do you think these are just negotiating techniques?

Doctorow:
I think they have the intent of making fools of his opponents and they very gladly fill that role. The BBC today put without any question whatsoever the statement that Trump has changed sides, that he now backs Ukraine, that Ukraine will retake its territory, they’ve gone in for that. Why not? They are so heavily invested in this story that the Ukraine will win, that Russia will be humiliated, that they will seize at any opportunity, at any straw that Mr. Trump gives them to think that he has joined their side.

4:16
That does not mean he joined their side. I look at the small print. When he said that the Europeans can go ahead and shoot down Russian military aircraft if they are violating the airspace of NATO countries over the Baltic — he was then asked afterwards by a journalist whether the United States would support Europe in this venture, and he said it all depends, depends on the circumstances.

Well, if you’re sitting in London, Paris, Berlin, and you hear him say that, you understand perfectly that you will be on your own. And none of these countries is likely to take his invitation to fire [on] a Russian aircraft and face the wrath of Russia by themselves, which is what you–

Napolitano: 5:08
You missed one country in there which probably is prepared to fire at Russian aircraft and bear the brunt of Putin’s wrath on its own: Poland.

Doctorow:
No, I don’t believe so. I don’t think that Mr. Tusk is that bold or that much a risk-taker to put his country on the line without a firm backing from Washington, which he does not have and will not get.

Napolitano: 5:40
All right, Chris, put up the full screen. You had it there a moment ago. I just want to read the operative language of President Trump’s statement on what he calls “Truth Social”. This is yesterday, Professor Doctorow.

Trump:
“I think Ukraine, with the support of the European Union, is in a position to fight and WIN” [in all caps] “all of Ukraine back in its original form. With time, patience and the financial support of Europe and in particular NATO,” [now I’m editorializing: which includes the United States. Now back to reading] “the original Borders from where this war started is very much an option. Why not?”

Is this his negotiating, in your view, his negotiating technique? And if so, with whom is he negotiating?

Doctorow: 6:33
He is buying time, yet again. Now I’d like to note here that– and it goes back to his remarks in the General Assembly, when he said that he was disappointed that Mr. Putin did not do what the Americans expected, which is to defeat Ukraine in a week. And then he made this taunt that you have quoted, that Russia is possibly a paper tiger. I agree with him. And so far, what is really at issue is Mr. Putin’s way of conducting this war, where Mr. Putin, the lawyer, is at odds with Mr. Putin, the military commander in chief.

Napolitano: 7:21
But is not Mr. Putin’s goal in fighting the war to eradicate a Ukrainian military so that at least for another generation the Russians don’t have to put up with this again? He could send off a half dozen Oreshniks tomorrow and destroy the regime. That’s not what he wants to do.

Doctorow:
I agree with your analysis, but I say it’s a faulty policy, because the world does not stand still. This has been the problem with this war from the beginning, that every time it looked like the Russians were coming to victory, the West came in with a new escalatory move and provided Ukraine with manpower, with, I’ve got to say, advisors, and with hardware, which enabled them to fight on.

If the situation is now reaching a culmination point, which means that the defenders of Ukraine are all the more desperate and irresponsible in their behavior, [then] I think it is a big mistake if Vladimir Putin does not take that into account and do what is within his power, which is to utterly destroy the Ukrainian regime in one day with the Oreshniks on Bankovskaya Urytsia, whatever it’s called, the one street in downtown Kiev, where all the government officers are.

That would be much more sparing of Russian lives and Ukrainian lives than his war of attrition today.

Napolitano: 8:50
I guess he doesn’t want to spare the Ukrainian lives. Chris, let’s play back to back the cuts that reference what Professor Doctorow has been saying. 18 and then 22, Chris.

Questioner:
Mr. President, do you think that NATO countries should shoot down Russian aircraft if they enter their airspace?

Trump:
Yes, I do.

Questioner:
Would you back up NATO allies– you said that you thought that they should shoot down the Russian aircraft– would you back them up, would the United States help them out in some way?

Trump:
Depends on the circumstances. It’s been a terrible war, should have ended, and Russia should have stopped it.

But they’ve been three and a half years and they’ve gotten not so far. So we’ll see what happens. But the other side can fight, too. And they’ve proven that. Maybe it’s a – it could be that Russia is a paper tiger.

I don’t know what they are, but three and a half years of fighting and killing everybody, of killing 7,000 people a week For nothing. For nothing. So it’s a very sad situation, but most of you have seen the recent statement I put out a little while ago. And I’m glad you got it. But I feel that way. I really do feel that way. Let them get their land back.

Macron:
Yep.

Trump:
So we’ll see how it all works out.

Napolitano: 10:07
Let them get their land back. You know, Professor Doctorow, that that is a metaphysical impossibility.

Doctorow:
And so does Donald Trump. He is speaking with sarcasm and he is giving again the message that I have read into him going back weeks: that is, Mr. Putin, get it over with. Now he didn’t say how the war should end.

He didn’t say what Russia will give, should give up in a settlement. No, he expects Russia to take all the chips, but they should do it now so we, the United States, and you Russians can get on with our real business, which starts with renewal of the New Start arms limitation agreement, which expires in February 26, very, very soon. These are issues of much greater importance to Mr. Trump than where the lines between the new Ukrainian rump state and Russia will be.

Napolitano: 11:09
Well, they’re certainly of great importance to the Russians. I don’t know if they’re of importance to Trump. He’s the one that tears up these agreements. He thinks they’re a sign of weakness when the United States is very rationally restrained from expanding its nuclear arsenal.

I want to play President Trump and President Macron again. Watch the look on President Macron’s face. This goes to your argument, Professor Doctorow. He may be saying this for the benefit of the Europeans. Watch the smirking President of France.

——–
Trump:
It’s been a terrible war that should have ended, and Russia should have stopped it. But they’ve been three and a half years, and they’ve gotten not so far. So we’ll see what happens.

But the other side can fight, too. And they’ve proven that. Maybe it’s a — it could be that Russia is a paper tiger. I don’t know what they are, but three and a half years of fighting and killing everybody, of killing 7,000 people a week for nothing. For nothing.

So it’s a very sad situation, but most of you have seen the recent statement I put out a little while ago. And I’m glad you got it. But I feel that way. I really do feel that way. Let them get their land back.

Macron:
Yep:

Trump:
So we’ll see how it all works out.
——–

Napolitano: 12:27
Here’s President Zelensky’s reaction, Not to that interview with President Macron, but to the Truth Social posting that I read a few minutes ago, cut number 19.

========
“I think Ukraine, with the support of the European Union, is in a position to fight and WIN all of Ukraine back in its original form. With time, patience and the financial support of Europe and in particular NATO, the original Borders from where this war started, is very much an option.”

Are you surprised to hear that?

Zelensky:
A little bit. A bit. I mean, this, I’m sure in my people, in my army, and I’m sure in strengthening, in support of the United States. But President Trump was more positive in it. And he showed that he wants to support Ukraine to the very end.

So we understand now that we are ready to finish this war as quick as possible. And he wants, and I want, and our people want. But he understand that Putin doesn’t want. And he understands that he’s not winning, but he says to everybody that he will win. And I see very, it was a little bit surprise for me, you’re right. I was very positive signals from the side that Trump and America will be with us to the end of the war.

Yes, we will see. We will see. But God bless. It will be so.
========

Napollitano: 14:05
What do you expect him to say? Surprised and he’s happy, but he may not believe it. He may take the Doctorow view of this.

Doctorow:
Well, I don’t know how deeply he will analyze it. So long as Trump says what he said, that Europe will save Ukraine, Zelensky knows that it cannot save Ukraine. This is the key point.

Mr. Trump has washed his hands of American military and financial contributions to Ukraine. That is decisive. Everything else is irrelevant, actually. Let Mr. Macron smirk, let him feel satisfied that he has turned Mr. Trump, which he hasn’t. The man is not for turning. And I believe that Mr. Putin is missing the cues.

The cue is Trump is buying him time to end it. And end it, he can only do with Oreshniks. Otherwise, this will go on for one more year. And Lord knows what’s going to happen in the global alignment of countries on this war and on Russia in one year’s time. This is the time to end it.

Napolitano: 15:25
Can you give me your understanding of the drone issue, the claims that Russia sent drones over Poland, the counterclaims that these were Russian drones on the ground in Ukraine, reassembled by the Ukrainians sent over Poland as sort of a false flag. How do you read this drone controversy, which candidly seems a little like old news and then it keeps coming back?

Doctorow: 15:57
It keeps coming back because it is not a self-standing issue. The drone issue is part of the Russian incursion issue. They are both being masterminded by the same people, probably sitting in MI6 in London.

It is because the Brits are way ahead of the States in nasty, nasty tricks, especially today, when Mr. Trump has pulled in the CIA and the other actors who otherwise took part in dirty tricks and false flag operations in Ukraine.

The situation is complex, and I’m not surprised that many people have not seen this as one whole campaign by the leadership in Europe, this means Britain and Germany, to nail Russia with accusations that are false or which are, may be true as in the case of incursions, but are true for reasons that are not coming up in the press. I have in mind specifically the point that in effect, the NATO powers in Europe have created or want to create an air blockade on Russia.

17:17
They are saying that Russia is crossing their airspace. Well, it probably is, because if you look at the map, and if you ask Google artificial intelligence this question, can any aircraft pass the length of the Baltic without passing over NATO countries’ territorial waters, the answer comes back: it cannot. So what we saw–

Napolitano:
That’s Sweden, right?

Doctorow:
Sweden joined NATO, and that made it almost impossible for Russian aircraft to cross the Baltic and not touch on one or another territorial water of a NATO state. That is not being discussed in the media.

It is a nasty secret because what we’re talking about now is essentially an attempt to blockade in the air, which follows the May events. You will recall, in May of this year. The Estonians sent cutters to arrest a gray fleet tanker that was taking oil to or from St. Petersburg as Russia owned. And they were driven away like scattering mice before a cat when the Russians sent up fighter planes over that area.

18:39
That failed. The naval blockade on the ground, on water level, failed. Now they’re trying an air blockade. So the only way– what this will lead to, if it is pursued, and if they follow the advice of Mr. Trump and shoot down a Russian plane, it leads us directly to World War Three. Since Mr.

Trump did not answer the question– you heard that he didn’t answer the question, but the United States will provide support– he was asked that elsewhere, in which he said it depends on the circumstances. The point is that it’s very feeble to non-existent support, and no NATO country will dare attack a Russian airplane if it doesn’t have US backing.

Napolitano: 19:20
Does Emmanuel Macron believe that Russia is a paper tiger?

Doctorow:
I don’t think for a minute he believes that. He knows how many nuclear missiles he has. He knows that the Russians have 10 times or more that number. And that he knows that the Russian nuclear triad is totally updated, which the United States is not. Therefore, if anyone is feeding him proper intelligence, and I assume they are, he knows that that is not a paper tiger.

Napolitano: 19:48
Back to the drones. Is it your understanding that MI6 engineered this, that the drones were a false flag and the Poles were in on the scheme?

Doctorow:
My first reading of the situation was much more simple and direct. It seemed to me, and not just to me but to many other people, that the Ukrainians had initiated this, and that the intent was to put the Russians into direct conflict with Poland. If a military action took place, then that would quickly broaden into a direct kinetic war, as opposed to proxy war between NATO and Russia.

20:30
Then when this broadened, then Romania became an issue. And then following that several days later, at the end of last week, we had this Estonian claims. It became clear that this was not a one-off, the drones were not a one-off act by Ukraine to engage Poland in war. It was something much bigger, and it was being directed most likely from the West and most likely from Britain.

And the timing, let’s look at this question of incursions. The incursions, even Kallas said, Kallas, the head of, the foreign policy commissioner of, the vice president of the European Commission, said that there were four Russian incursions over Estonia airspace this year.

21:17
Well, why wasn’t the complaint made earlier, and why was it made now? The answer is Zapad-25, the military exercises that Russia was conducting at the same time as the drone incursions and ended just before the story of jet fighters over Estonian airspace.

This was a NATO response to Zapad 25 to start the 100,000 Russian soldiers in operations from Murmansk to the southwest of the Russian Federation with a very big soft-power impact on the 25 delegations from all over the world, including Iran, who were present as witnesses.

Napolitano: 22:06
If MI6 orchestrates this type of dirty tricks– and I don’t mean to demean it by calling it dirty tricks; it could have led to the loss of life; it could have led to a a war– is CIA far behind? Don’t they work hand in glove?

Doctorow: 22:23
Well, I think you have other panelists who are much more capable, much more experienced in judging what CIA can do. I, as an outsider looking on, say that’s doubtful.

After all, I think that Mr. Trump has some control over policy, even in the CIA, and they would be much more cautious about something as inflammatory, as escalatory as what has gone on in the last week; whereas MI6 knows no restraints. Their boss is all in favor. It’s all sporting for a war.

Napolitano: 22:59
Professor Doctorow, a fascinating stuff. Thank you very much. Welcome back home from your happy trip. And thank you very much for joining us. We’ll look forward as always to seeing you next week.

Doctorow:
My pleasure.

Napolitano:
Thank you again. Coming up later today at 1:30 this afternoon, Aaron Maté– do you know that General Petraeus embraced somebody he once tried to kill who was the head of the Taliban when Petraeus was leading the charge in Afghanistan? We’ll get into all of that.

And Pepe Escobar– what do President Xi and President Putin think of Trump’s latest words, which I think are nonsense and Professor Doctorow says are carefully calculated? That’s Pepe Escobar today at 3.30 this afternoon.

23:49
Judge Napolitano for “Judging Freedom”.

‘Judging Freedom’ edition of 24 September 2025: Trump embraces Ukraine!

In today’s discussion with Judge Andrew Napolitano, I was able to set out more completely arguments that I have made over the past several days regarding the linkage between the alleged Russian drone attacks on Poland and the alleged incursion into Estonian air space of Russian military jets, all of which I say add up to a campaign directed from NATO, most likely from Britain’s MI6 to be specific, for the purpose of pressuring Donald Trump to join them in supporting Ukraine and making war on Russia. We also discuss Trump’s statements in and around the General Assembly meeting in New York yesterday which point to his “embracing” Ukraine.  This, I firmly believe, is just more dissimulation, more disinformation coming from Trump to make fools of his domestic and foreign opponents.

More News X World (India): 3 minutes on Trump and Russia in today’s ‘World Report’

The link to the full content of yesterday’s interviews on this Indian broadcaster may not be available for reposting, but their production team hastened to send me the link below to their news wrap-up this morning in which I was given 3 minutes (15 – 18) to comment on Trump’s seeming return to support for Zelensky. Viewers may find it informative to see what this Indian English-language broadcaster and their expert panelists have to say about the other world developments as well.

News X World interview 23 September: the Indian understanding of British sense of fair play is a knee to the groin

News X World interview 23 September:  the Indian understanding of British sense of fair play is a knee to the groin

Yesterday I had two brief interviews with News X World relating to the latest NATO Council accusations against Russia for ‘irresponsible’ incursions into Estonian and other NATO air space over the Baltic Sea.

One of these interviews has been partially put on line by the broadcaster

You will note that the video stops just as I was about to say the following:

My characterization of these NATO allegations, which were picked up and disseminated by the BBC and other Western major media, is that they corresponded to Western, in this case specifically British, behavior in the sporting world during competitions with Indian teams: the Brits use a knee to the groin. I was merely repeating what I had heard some years ago from an Indian news analyst on air. The NATO story line against Russia is precisely a knee to the groin.

I say this because it is virtually impossible for aircraft to navigate the Baltic Sea without passing over the ‘territorial waters’ of one or another NATO nation given the narrowness of the sea in various places and the fact that since the accession of Sweden to NATO, the sea is lined by NATO member states.  What we are talking about in effect is an attempt by the European NATO member states to impose an air blockade on Russia.  If pursued, this can only lead to WWIII.

However, I greatly doubt that it will be pursued.  Even when Donald Trump said yesterday to a journalist that the Europeans should shoot down any offending Russian planes, he went on to say that whether the U.S. would back them up ‘depends on the circumstances.’  That faint support ensures that no European country will dare to attack Russian military planes over the Baltic.

In one of the two News X World interview segments, I expressed my surprise that NATO speaks of the Russian incursions as a violation of international law!  How remarkable, given that the Collective West had abandoned the notion of international law coming from the United Nations and replaced it with the ‘rules-based order’ set down and changed daily by Messrs Jake Sullivan and Tony Blinken in Washington. If NATO countries indeed once again are paying attention to international law, then they should rise up and put an end to Israel’s genocide in Gaza.         

                                                                   *****

I am told by a News X World producer that the full interview will be posted and sent to me. If and when that happens, I will repost here.

Transcript of ‘Sanchez Effect’ show

Transcript submitted by a reader

https://www.mgtow.tv/watch/sanchez-effect-dr-gilbert-doctorow-trump-s-playbook-a-masterclass-in-confusion_DXPcqxRBgbjUY3z.html

https://rumble.com/v6zbfxs-sanchez-effect-dr.-gilbert-doctorow-trumps-playbook–masterclass-in-confus.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CroGgJxPEbU

Orban: 11:55 (English voice over)
Europe, as we knew and loved it, is over. If we deny this, we lose time. If we say it out loud, we gain time.

Sanchez:
Wow, has the post-World War II model lost its way? Is it too late to get it back? That’s what Orban seemed to be saying, but in stronger words than I just repeated. Our guest today has written countless books on this subject. His books include War Diaries, Stepping Out of Line, Does the U.S. Have a Future, Does Russia Have a Future, and many, many more.

Here, historian, international thinker, and writer, Dr. Gilbert Doctorow is good enough to join us. Wow, that was quite a mouthful, not for me, but for Mr. Orban. Lilliputians, bankrupt, wars, they’re finished. Wow. Is he right about Europe, doctor?

Doctorow: 12:52
Yes and no. Under the present administration of von der Leyen, yes, this is a very apt description. However, she’s not going to remain in power forever. And there are some well-informed members of the European Parliament who have shared with me their view that she may not last six months. It’s also possible she may not last two weeks.

There are now pending two votes of no confidence against von der Leyen, one of them initiated precisely by Mr. Orban and his group of deputies in the European Parliament, the Patriots for Europe. These are accusing her of violating the Constitution, of having lack of transparency in the way she governs.

So if von der Leyen falls, which is, I wouldn’t say likely, but it’s possible in the near future, then she will be replaced by people who will be far more circumspect. I don’t mean to say that the balance of power within the European Parliament and in the European institutions will change overnight, but it will be on the way towards change, and it can virtually only change for the better.

14:07
As for Europe’s viability, I believe it’s there. But it’s possible only if Europe goes back to where it was in the 1990s as a peace project and not in the new millennium as a war project.

Sanchez: 14:22
Let me ask you the question that my editors would ask me when I told them that something is likely to happen and it’s going to be big news. How good are your sources that are telling you that von der Leyen is on the way out?

Doctorow:

Well, it’s not wild speculation. There were several weeks ago, and I forget, within the last two months, there was a vote of no confidence, which she survived.

Sanchez:
Yes.

Doctorow:
But she held on by her fingertips. I understand that there was a one-vote swing, which left her in power. And if the mood has continually deteriorated, with respect to her popularity, standing, credibility in the parliament, then she’ll lose the next vote. As I say, that’s not going to cure all, but it’s a good start, towards cure. And what is at issue is Europe being, as I say, a war project, because it has taken over geopolitics as its uniting factor, whereas in the 1990s it was the economics and cultural dimension which gave Europe unity.

Sanchez: 15:28
So essentially it’s become an entity that is into wars, Afghanistan, Belgrade, Iraq, et cetera. It has become aggressive and very tied to the military establishments that surround themselves with that entity. Is that part of what you’re intimating has been their downfall?

Doctorow:
Exactly. They have made the bogeyman Russia the uniting factor. It is meant to keep in power those who are now ruling Europe. Let’s be frank about it. We’re talking about a very common element of politics, and that is to hold on to the spoils of power at all price. European countries, by and large, are run by coalition governments, which are a formula for corruption and for incompetence, which, corruption and incompetence, are two sides of the same coin. Parties get together for the sake of grabbing and holding power, and they have no consistency in their policies, because they have dealt out to parties with conflicting interests and conflicting programs, ministerial portfolios, to have a majority of seats in the parliaments. So it is a situation where Europe, country by country, will have to reconsider the basis for elections and allocation of a formation of governments. That’s a separate but related issue.

Sanchez:
But when you hear Orban talk about it, he talks about layoffs and high inflation and wages are really low and migrants all over the place and the populace that’s unhappy. How did that become the overflow product of this situation that you were just describing to us. Did they, you know– there’s an expression in America, as you know, you and I are both Americans. The term is you “take your eye off the ball”. Have they taken their eye off the ball, the people that they’re supposed to serve?

Doctorow:
Well, it took some time to reach the dismal state they’re in now. As regards the illegal immigrants, refugees, as they were called at the time. This takes us back to 2014, 2015, and the gross mistake of Angela Merkel to open the doors of Europe to these supposedly kind ladies with little children who were fleeing the civil war in Syria. That was a very nice story for the progressive press in Western Europe.

It was now quite– lie. And the present Minister of Defense in the Belgian government, Theo Franken, he wrote a very fine book about 2016, _Europe Without Borders_, which described in great detail the fraud that was perpetrated on the European peoples, since it was not nice, kindly ladies with little children who came in. And it was not Syrians as such. It was Afghanis. It was North Africans. It was all kinds of very muscular young men who came as economic refugees, not war refugees.

Sanchez: 18:56
Before it’s all said and done, before we leave Europe– because I want to ask you about the United States, and I want to ask you about Russia and Ukraine. There’s so many things to talk about, including some of the things that are going on with India and Israel as well, but– maybe the final question when it comes to Europe is, will, if there is a change– and let us suppose that your sources and your sense of things is correct, and your sense of things is usually correct because you’re one of the most respected people in this business– and von der Leyen is out, what are the probabilities that whoever or whatever replaces her in the European power structure will be more level-headed and will not do things like wanting eternal war with Russia and wanting to constantly engage in more and more wars, etc.? What are the chances of that?

Doctorow: 19:57
There are several factors here. I started this discussion pointing to the European institutions. The opposition to von der Leyen is partly or even importantly on geopolitical considerations. And that is why it is of greatest interest to myself and to others who are following developments in Europe.

This is not the only factor that can bring about change. We have the two locomotive countries from the beginning of the European institutions, that is France and Germany, both are faltering. Both have the possibility of changing government in the foreseeable future, as opposed to the constitutionally recommended periods of service. England also has a very weak government.

20:47
So, if you put together the possibility the fall of Macron, he has royal powers under the French Constitution, but even royalty can find itself on the way out, even if they’re not facing a guillotine. The government of Macron is hanging by a hair. And if he cannot maintain his own position, then there will be a change, a dramatic change in France, which will bear upon the overall geopolitical stance of Europe.

In Germany, Mr. Merz looks very solid. He was very proud that in the West German Laender, the states, federal states of Germany, had elections in the last 10 days. His party held its own. However, his coalition partner, that is the socialist SPD, they lost significantly to the Right parties of the Alternative fur Deutschland.

Sanchez:
Or Russian.

Doctorow:
If you lose your coalition, then you lose your government.

Sanchez:
Yeah.

Doctorow:
And you’re out and have to face elections. And he will not survive a new election in Germany, because he’s very unpopular, as became apparent after he took office. So it is possible in both of these locomotive countries of the European Union that there will be changes of government in the foreseeable future, all of which would promote and redirect the European institutions, because these countries are leaders within the European Council, which is the second executive body alongside the commission within Europe.

Sanchez: 22:27
Yeah, all three of them have horrible approval numbers, by the way. I mean, not just horrible, dismal, like in the low 20s. And by the way, just to make sure I heard you correct, you said that Macron is not hanging by a thread, but hanging by a head?

Doctorow:

Hanging by a hair, well, might as well say by a thread, yes.

Sanchez:
Okay, I was thinking of French history there for just a moment. Good line either way. Let’s talk our country, the United States of America. What gives? I can’t help but look at the situation and scratch my head in a different place every day. I’m going to give myself a sore trying to figure out what is the intent? What is the actual strategy? Have you figured it out?

Doctorow:
Well, I have. I’ve paid a price in terms of the general public reading my works or listening to me. I’m doing better these days than, say, six months ago. Six months ago, I was called an apologist for Putin. Now I’m called an apologist for Trump. I suppose that’s progress.

The point is that I see logic in Mr. Trump in what he does, not what he says. What he says is intended to confuse, to keep all of his opponents both domestically and foreign, off balance, and to avoid their coming at him with a hatchet. So he has successfully confused many of my peers in alternative media.

Sanchez:
Including me. Including me. Hands up over here, by the way.

Doctorow:
They point to the contradictions as if he is mindless and does what is proposed to him by the last person to whisper in his ear. I absolutely [disagree] with that. He has his priorities and his direction.

His first priority is establishing some normal relationship with Russia for a number of reasons, which we probably don’t have time to discuss, but they are rational, rational logic to this. And he is doing what he can in very difficult circumstances. By that I mean he is surrounded by opponents to his policy. The Congress basically is opposed to his policy of some kind of normalization with Russia. And of course, Europe is now all against it and has, in the last week, launched yet another program to draw to its side Mr. Trump.

25:06
And I mean now this discussion of the drone attacks on Poland, Romania; and the Estonian complaints that Russian fighter jets violated their airspace. All of this is nonsense. If you want to go back to basics, what those drones were, whether it was possible at all to fly across the Baltic without violating NATO space, given the realities of the narrowness of the Baltic Sea and the countries lining it, being NATO members. In any case, my point is that the Russians have been described as aggressors in the last week, all in an attempt to turn Mr. Trump around.

Well, they won’t. The man is not for turning, but he is for lying, for deceiving, and for giving hope to his enemies that he will do what they want, which he will not. So it is a waiting game. The message that I see from Mr. Trump to Mr. Putin is to get it over with quickly. That is the message.

Sanchez: 26:18
I’m wondering, in hearing you say that about Mr. Trump, whether you believe—and I think this is important, so let me just try and get it on the record from you, because a lot of people heard you mention as an aside what just happened with Poland, and I haven’t quite even figured it out.

Do you think it’s a canard, a red herring? Do you think it’s just errant drones that suddenly may or may not have been the fault of Russia that ended up in Polish airspace? And should we not then ask ourselves if Russia was really interested in doing something with Poland or to Poland, which I don’t think they are. I think they have no interest in Poland or Europe, who would? They would have done it full force, not with three or four errant drones.

27:10
That’s just what I’m thinking, not necessarily as a studied journalist on this issue who’s talked to sources, but rather as somebody who just looks at it and says, this doesn’t make sense to me. What’s your take?

Doctorow:
Well, to go back to the beginning, my own understanding of what was happening has changed over the last 10 days or so, as new information came out and as new accusations against Russia came on. Initially it looked like this was, these were drones sent by Ukraine into Polish territory for the sake of provoking a Russia-Polish war, and which would immediately become a broader Russia-NATO war, moving from proxy to genuine kinetic war.

That was over, that was bypassed by further information. First of all, we learned from Polish authorities, Polish news sources, that Belarus had communicated with the Polish military while those drones were flying over Belarus territory informing the– well, I have posted the links to the Polish news agencies– giving the Poles time to act. If Russia were the source of these, of the [drones] it is excluded totally that Belarus would be communicating information to warn them.

Sanchez:
They’re allies with Russia.

Doctorow:
We have to [assume].

28:40
Secondly, people have done research into what the drones were. They were found to be not kamikaze drones, but the type of drone that Russia has used in swarm attacks on various Ukrainian sites. These are to attract or distract the air defenses from the primary attack drones and missiles. It was known that the Ukrainians had been collecting downed drones of this variety.

And they did. Some of them do go down by electronic warfare they’re brought down, and or they crash. And since they had no explosives, which was the important fact, they would just fall and break up. They could be reassembled, were reassembled by the Ukrainians for use in this contingency. All of that was defined at the level of a Ukraine-Polish interaction.

However, the plot had thickened in the last week or so; then there were the so-called attacks on Romania, further aggravating the case against Russia as an aggressor. And now we have the culmination in the last few days, the supposed violation of Estonian airspace by Russian military jets.

Well, we have to look at the timing of all of this. All of this comes in the middle or at the end of Zapad 25, the West 25 military exercises of Belarus and Russia with very large-scale participation, more than 100, 000 Russian soldiers in action, sites all over the place from Murmansk in the north, down to the southwest of Russia, and in the [Baltic Sea].

30:30
This of course was an important event staged in part to show the military prowess of Russia to the 25 visiting delegations, many of them Global South, prospective security partners of Russia and purchasers of Russia military hardware.

Now, the West reacted. How did they react? By this canard, as you called it, false flag activity, which has a number of objectives. One of them has been to call for united Ukrainian, Polish dash NATO action, securing a wall against Russian drones using Ukrainian technology and hardware to help the West European countries defend themselves against Russian drones.

31:24
At a price less than what happened in this Polish incident, where the Poles sent aloft fighter jets that cost several million euros each, that fire missiles that cost $500,000 each to down drones that cost $20,000 each.

So this was one big end result of all of these various efforts, starting with the false flag drone attack on Poland. And now it reached the highest level in the case of the Estonian charges meant to influence Donald Trump.

Sanchez:
That’s amazing. The explanation that you just gave is the best that I’ve heard since I’ve been watching this situation. And I’m here in Moscow.

And sometimes, you know, things get muddy because a lot of people talk at once. But in the end, the takeaway from all of this is Russia was flexing its muscle, doing military exercises and inviting global south countries and countries from all over the world. They probably would have been happy to see even NATO countries come. Here’s what we got. We’ll be happy to show you. You can buy it if you want, for the right amount of money.

32:38
NATO, EU, that power structure saw what Russia was doing and said, we have to create a distraction. We have to create, as you said, a false flag. We have to create something to make people think that Russia is actually getting ready to invade Europe. If Biden had been president, he would have held a news conference and said, “We’ve got to be on the alert because Russia is getting ready to invade Europe.”

Instead, we heard it from Rutte, but we didn’t hear it from Donald Trump. Going back to your original point, maybe Donald Trump is a little smarter than we give him credit for.

Doctorow:
I think he has good advisors. In the memorial service for Charlie Kirk yesterday, we had a good glimpse of what kind of advisors and what quality advisors Trump has had around him. And that is first quality.

That is an extraordinarily capable man of great intelligence, who obviously was providing to Trump the information on what is going on at American universities, since he traversed the country many times each year and had installed his Turning Point units in 2,000 American universities and colleges. That is on that domain. I believe he had similar competence in his advisors for foreign policy and what is going on in Russia. I have taken issue with my peers and intelligence experts who appear on some very widely known programs based in Washington and elsewhere, and who keep on insisting that Trump is in the dark. He’s not in the dark at all. We’re more likely in the dark than he’s in the dark.

Sanchez: 34:13
So you’re talking about Jeffrey Sachs and Mearsheimer and Ritter and Napolitano and Daniels and some of these guys who are wonderful people, by the way, really good communicators, great shows, but they tend to lean on the side that Trump’s getting really, really bad information and he should have made Macgregor his defense secretary.

Doctorow:
Well, I won’t make any comments on Macgregor, who iss obviously a very competent and experienced man, but I’m not sure I would like to see him as the defense minister. As regards Mr. Sachs, I would put him apart from the other men you’ve mentioned, because he is a globalist. And that is something that everybody who praises him for his wonderful stance on US foreign policy and its violations of international law, they ignore the fact that Jeffrey Sachs is a backer of globalism, which is the reason why the United States is such a violator of international law.

Sanchez: 35:13
Can we talk Israel for a little bit? Canada, UK, Australia came out today and said they recognize officially Palestine as a state. I’m wondering whether they know that they’d already done that during the Oslo Accord, or at least that was my reading of it, so [I’m] kind of shocked that everybody’s making such a big deal out of it. So I guess my question to you, is it a big deal?

Doctorow: 35:38
Well, it cannot be a big deal if no one is taking any action against Israel to prevent the annexation of the West Bank. I think that’s a much bigger deal than these countries coming out and acknowledging the non-existent Palestinian government.

There is no government. It’s a nice statement. It is certainly hurtful to Israel, but it does not contribute to ending the genocide in Gaza or to downing Mr. Netanyahu. I think a much more important development in the last couple of days, was the Pakistan-Saudi agreement, a mutual defense, which, if I were sitting in West Jerusalem in Israeli offices, I would be much more worried about.

36:27
That gives to the Gulf states, and to one Gulf state in particular, Saudi Arabia, finally an equalizer to Israel and its nuclear weapons.

Sanchez:
That’s a great point. Everybody talks about the Israel situation in Gaza. Everybody criticizes what Israel is doing, and by everybody I mean everybody but the United States and a few others. But nobody ever can definitively say that any of this, no matter how ruffian Israel may appear, is going to eventually affect them in a negative way.

I alluded to this earlier, I think you heard me say, props to Netanyahu, he basically is thumbing his nose at the rest of the world and said, “I don’t care what you think, and I don’t care what you say about me.” My tendency is then to ask you, what can they do to him? What can happen to him? How can he be affected by any of this?

Doctorow: 37:32
None of the great powers [has] taken any significant action against Israel, and that is China, it is Russia.

Sanchez:
Right.

Doctorow:
And I understand why. If the neighbors, if the Gulf states do nothing, except jawbone, then there is no room for outside powers to come in and do something. So that is the real state, the real situation. As for Mr. Trump, since I’ve said some very positive things about him, I’d like to put the negative side. This is a balance, of course. The negative side is his support for Israel, which enables the genocide, and not only the genocide. For example, the very widely discussed Israeli attack on Qatar. Yes, as I understand, it was enabled by American refueling of their jets, not a small detail.

38:32
The problem here is that Mr. Trump lives in a world that he didn’t make in Washington, and there are certain rules that he is stuck with. And one is not to go against the pro-Zionist Congress. If he were to act out of conscience and take any measures against Netanyahu and the genocide, he would be politically broken the next day. Therefore, in a world that has both good and evil in it, you have to make compromises.

Mr. Trump has compromised on relations with Israel, and he is seeking to accomplish something on a global level by putting aside the risk of a war with Russia.

Sanchez: 39:23
There are those who say, and I only mention this because it’s become part of the national conversation these days in the United States, that what you just said is true, but actually worse. Mr. Trump would not be broken politically, to use your words, as a result of taking on Israel in the United States. He could actually be broken physically for taking on Israel, if you get my gist. What do you think of that?

Doctorow: 39:54
I think if he doesn’t do something stupid again, that is not going to happen. What he did stupid was called out on Russian television two weeks ago, when he and J.D. Vance and much of the cabinet took a stroll over to a Washington restaurant to demonstrate how safe Washington is.

That was a very stupid thing to do. Vladimir Solovyov’s program mentioned anyone with a bomb among that group of protesters in the restaurant could have ended the US government right then and there. Now, the reason why Mr. Trump, aside from that very strange and inexplicable risk-taking that I just described in that restaurant, Mr. Trump’s best life insurance policy is called JD Vance.

40:45
Nobody in his right mind, among political malefactors, will try to remove Trump knowing that he would be replaced by a man who is still more obnoxious in the opposition to America’s conventional foreign policy than J.D. Vance.

Sanchez:
Yeah, he’s a non-Neocon. He’s a non-Neocon, right? That’s what you mean, yeah.

Doctorow:
That’s right.

Sanchez:
Huh, I’ve never looked at it that way. That’s absolutely fascinating. His best insurance is in fact JD Vance.

I got, what I got left in my mind in this feeble little tiny Cuban mind of mine. Why don’t we go to why don’t we go to India? I was fascinated last night. I was obviously watching football because it’s Sunday night in America. But I was fascinated by what Mr. Modi did. Just to all of a sudden call this emergency national address where he told his people, Swadesha, we have to do this. And he didn’t say, don’t go to McDonald’s, don’t go to Burger King, don’t drive a Chevy. But he didn’t have to. I kind of got the gist.

He was telling people, don’t buy American products. We’re going to make our own products. We might buy some stuff from the Chinese and the Russians. That was my take. What was yours?

Doctorow: 42:12
Well, he was just repeating Mahatma Gandhi. This was the basic method, don’t buy British textiles. Buy Indian hand-woven textiles. That’s where it all began. That’s where the Indian liberation movement found its footing.

So I think within India, this would have been recognized immediately, that he’s positioning himself in the tradition of Mahatma Gandhi as regards the self-, the production of goods and the purchase of goods within the country. However, that is much easier to recommend than to enforce. Russia has been through this. It was only in wartime conditions of drastic economic sanctions that Russia adapted to that type of policy of import substitution. And, of course, it was furthered by the military prowess on display, which gave a great deal of confidence to Russians that they can make things and do things.

43:25
And that is one of the big points in my book, which you made reference to, _The War Diaries_, which is largely about coming from my visits to Russia at a time when nearly all Western correspondents were not there due to the, first the covid and then to the sanctions imposed on Russia at the start of the special military operation. And what I saw was, step by step, how this was achieved, how there was the making of a nation that had confidence in itself.

And I thought back to the 1990s when I was, my wife and I were taking a taxi down the main boulevards of St. Petersburg and the driver said, “And by the way, we Russians make very cute kids, but not such good cars.” That self-deprecation, that inferiority complex, which was well established in the broad Russian public, has evaporated.

Sanchez:
It has.

Doctorow:
And there’s great pride in Russia’s ability to produce very good consumer good products.

Sanchez:
Yeah.

Doctorow:
And of course to feed itself magnificently as it is doing now. So India has to have a bit more pressure on it for the public to follow Mr. Modi’s advice.

Sanchez:
I, it’s interesting. So in many ways, what you’re saying is the United States has replaced the British in the mindset of the contemporary situation that we’re undergoing or that India is undergoing right now. If you haven’t had a chance to look at it, I would direct you to go look at my files of this show to my interview with Mr. Solyonov, who was the finance minister of Russia, because he said the very same thing.

45:11
We were having a conversation, he was sitting right here to the right of me, came in to say hi, spent a long interview, and at one point I asked him, I said, “what are you gonna do about McDonald’s?” And he says, we’ve learned to make the burgers and the cheeseburgers and the Big Macs better than theirs, and they ain’t getting them back. So anyway, it was a pride of ownership. I don’t know if you can brag about pride of ownership over a Big Mac or a Juicy Burger, whatever the hell they’re called, but it was interesting to hear him say that. To your point.

45:42
Hey, let’s finish off, doctor, with what can happen in Ukraine. My take watching this and reporting on it and doing interviews on it is that the Europeans have not moved one inch. They’ve not moved one inch in understanding what the positions of the Russians are. I think if they did give the Russians, I don’t know, 60, 75 percent of what they’re asking for, this thing could be done in– this thing could be over in 24 hours.

But they haven’t, as far as I can tell. First of all, what do you think of my take on that? And second of all, is there room for movement at some point, maybe post-von der Leyen and Rutte, you know, Merz, Macron, these other people? What do you think?

Doctorow: 46:41
Well, I think that some kind of patching up between Europe and Russia will take place. I wouldn’t want to put an exact timeline on it, but the logic is compelling, the economic logic. Also, if the locomotive countries have this collapse of the present leadership, that will give further room to the smaller countries to make their own accommodation with Russia. I’m speaking to you from Brussels. I’m a longtime resident in Brussels, long time, meaning more than 40 years. And I’ve seen a few people here and have a sense of how the country is suffering right now economically.

47:23
When you go down the main boulevards at Brussels, you see a lot of vacant retail and restaurants. The economy is suffering. People who are associated with marketing, which is the first budgetary item in all company business to be sacrificed, they tell me that the companies have slashed their marketing budget, which is an indication that Belgium is suffering from the German recession, as are the other smaller countries around Central Europe. These countries will certainly break with the von der Leyen-imposed restrictions and cancel Russia policies — as soon as von der Leyen goes, which could be very soon, and as soon as a country like France has a change of government, which is also very possible. So, but that is a very near term.

48:16
In the medium term, it is so obvious that Europe needs very badly the hydrocarbons, the gas and oil, at affordable prices, which Russia was providing, in order to be, once again, economically competitive in global markets. So, this will patch up. The Russians, that’s for the Russians. I know that many Russians who might listen to this will say I’m wrong, that they have had their fill of Europe. However, my own reading of the situation is that Russia is part of Europe intellectually, culturally, in every way.

48:59
And to say that– to deny that, is to deny the obvious. When I was, again, studying, looking over my diary entries when I was living and working in Russia in the 1990s, in the midst of destitution, the high culture performing arts, museums, symphonies, they were reconstructed, readapted to market conditions and flourished. And they are flourishing today. And let us remember that these high culture institutions, they are European institutions.

Russia was an essential contributor to European culture. Therefore, to deny this is to deny the obvious. Of course, they’ll patch up.

Sanchez: 49:43
I get a sense. I’ve been here now, I don’t know, four and a half, five months or something like that since I got here and I started covering stories, though I’ve done a lot of traveling, different parts.

My sense is, I love what you just said. I think Russians like American culture, but are born of European culture. And they can’t take that suit off. They wear it. It’s visible to me when I see it.

So that’s my take, you know, just based on observation. And it comes to me as I hear you say those words. So, wow, what a great interview. You are such a brilliant person. And your thoughts, your ideas are so provoking in so many ways.

And it seems like obviously you’re imperfect and so am I and so are we all, but So much of what you have said, doctor, has been on the money in terms of understanding these situations that we’re all embroiled in right now. Thank you so much for being my guest. You’ve been so kind to spend so much time with us talking about these things. I hope to be able to talk to you again.

Doctorow: 50:57
It was very kind of you to invite me, and I’ve enjoyed this as much as you have.

Sanchez:
Oh, thank you so much, Dr. Gilbert Doctorow. What a pleasure. What a great author. Buy his books, my God. Listen to that man.

That’s it from us. I got a podcast. It’s called Journalistically Speaking because I believe in journalism, because I am a journalist and because I think it’s an important craft and it’s about truth. Also, oh yeah, we’re on X a lot, all over X these days.

I mean, I’m also on Apple and Spotify. I’m all over the place, but we do a lot of really good stuff on X, and our crew’s really commanding some unbelievable conversations with you. Thank you for all you do. Thank you for letting us into your home. God bless.

51:42
Take care. We’ll see you next time.

RT International:  Sanchez Effect – Dr Gilbert Doctorow – “Trump’s playbook, a master class in confusion”

https://www.mgtow.tv/watch/sanchez-effect-dr-gilbert-doctorow-trump-s-playbook-a-masterclass-in-confusion_DXPcqxRBgbjUY3z.html    

Today’s wide-ranging discussion on one of RT’s most popular interview programs will no doubt raise hackles among those who seek conformism in independent media even as they reject the conformism of mainstream.

After all, I dare to question here the consistency of thinking of Jeffrey Sachs, the most eloquent critic of U.S. foreign policy who at the same time, in his role as economist, is an unapologetic Globalist, and Globalism is an instrument of American hegemony which breeds the violence that Sachs condemns.

But then again, I take a lesson from the honorable Charlie Kirk who promoted debate and sought truth wherever it led him. Truth, after all, is not a popularity contest.

I take my hat off to RT International for its encouragement of diversity.

The interview begins at minute 12 and runs to the end at 52 minutes. The topics discussed include Modi’s call upon his citizenry to “buy Indian,” Trump’s prioritization of normalizing relations with Russia in his foreign policy, Trump’s support for Netanyahu’s genocide in Gaza, the key importance for the Middle East of the Pakistani-Saudi mutual defense agreement announced late last week, phony Western accusations of Russian aggression involving the overflight of Estonian air space late last week and the drone attacks on Poland two weeks ago

Transcript of Press TV panel discussion, 19 September

Transcript submitted by a reader

http://www.urmedium.net/c/presstv/134610

Bardia Honardar, PressTV: 0:04
Hello and welcome to “Spotlight”. The UN Security Council has rejected a bid to keep sanctions relief for Iran, paving the way for renewed UN sanctions within days. Iran has slammed the move, calling any attempt by the European trio to reimpose sanctions baseless and a direct assault on international law. Iran’s ambassador to the UN, Amir Saeedi Ravani, emphasized that in a striking display of hypocrisy, the European trio and the US claim that Tehran must be punished for the reciprocal measures it took years after enduring violations by the other side. The three European countries triggered the snapback process last month, accusing Iran of breaching its obligations under the 2015 nuclear deal. That mechanism will expire on October the 18th.

0:54
And if no deal is reached by September 28th, international sanctions suspended under the nuclear deal will automatically return. Allow me to introduce my guests for tonight’s show. Security and political analyst Avi Rizk, joining us from the Lebanese capital Beirut. And we also have independent international affairs analyst Gilbert Doctorow joining us from Brussels.

1:25
Gentlemen, welcome to the program. Let’s start off with Mr. Rizk in Beirut. Iran’s ambassador to the UN, Amir Said Ravani, said today’s action was hasty, unnecessary and unlawful. The Iranian foreign minister also highlighted that the push to revive sanctions lacked consensus and faced serious opposition from several council members. What were your expectations for today’s session, Mr. Risk?

Rizk: 1:51
I think that the expectations were that indeed that this measure wouldn’t pass and that the sanctions are going to be implemented or imposed. In fact, the French president Emmanuel Macron said as much during an interview with Israeli television when he was asked about this topic. He was asked, are you certain, I think, that the sanctions are going to impose? He responded in the affirmative.

So I don’t think it comes as a big surprise. And I think that a lot of it’s related to European animosity towards Iran, specifically over Russia. In other words, there’s a lot of hostility and animosity between the Europeans and the Russians over Ukraine. And we know that Iran has drawn closer to Russia in recent years.

2:41
And so that’s made Iran more of an enemy in Europe’s eyes. I think that is one or possibly the major factor, not the only one, but a major factor behind the European approach to Iran and the fact that they’ve decided to impose these sanctions.

PressTV:
Gilbert Doctorow, Iran’s ambassador to the UN said any attempt by the European trio to reimpose sanctions is baseless and a direct assault on international law and the Council’s credibility. Give us your perspective on this route that the E3 decided to pursue ultimately.

Doctorow: 3:20
I believe that the underlying reasons for this action have nothing to do with Iran. I agree with the remarks of my fellow panelist that they are to be understood in reference to Europe’s positions on Russia. And this action against Iran is in its own way similar to Donald Trump’s attacks on boats in the Caribbean, allegedly coming from Venezuela and carrying narcotics. This is the action of a bully, a cowardly bully, who looks for a weak spot to flex his muscles and show his strength. And that is what the European Troika is doing. They are picking on Iran because they don’t have the guts to go directly after Russia. That’s what it’s all about.

PressTV:
All right, Ali Rizk, China and Russia who backed today’s proposal, they condemned further sanctions on Tehran as counterproductive, illegal and invalid. They also released a joint statement regarding the anti-Iran sanctions. The two countries said that the reinstatement of the sanctions [was] illegal. They will not comply with or abide by these renewed sanctions. So break down the response from China and Russia. What message do you think this sends to the other side, to those who are pushing for the renewal of the sanctions and for cranking up pressure on Iran?

Rizk: 5:01
Well, I think it was very clear during the recent summits which were held in Beijing, if you remember, Chinese President Xi Jinping hosting a number of world leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, also Iranian President Masoud Pazhashkian, and the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. I think that this show– by the way, another very important development during that summit, perhaps the most important, was the participation of the Indian Prime Minister Modi. I think that was a major, major development.

So I think that that particular summit showed that there’s a emerging block which is taking shape. And the reason why I focused on India is that India’s traditionally seemed to be on the Western or in the Western camp. But what happened in Beijing, I think, proved that something different is taking shape, because I think of Trump’s own policies.

6:02
And I also believe that this also brings me to another important issue. For example, India didn’t commit to the sanctions which were imposed on Russia. That’s why Trump chose to increase the tariffs. But that just goes to tell you that even if the Western camp doesn’t tend to increase the maximum pressure on Iran, a lot of the countries aren’t going to commit to that, regardless of this resolution or regardless of the European intentions to reactivate the snapback mechanism. So China and Russia, yes they won’t commit to it, but I think also countries like India, it’s quite possible that they might not also commit to it.

6:47
So this era of Western hegemony and the West being able to impose its own will, I think that slowly is breaking down. And I think Trump’s policies, by the way, are speeding up the process of it breaking down. So yes, it is considered to be, I think, an escalatory step, but I think that other countries do have their own incentives to try and stop or limit how effective these measures will be, not just for the sake of Iran, I think, but also because they want to prove their own points that there’s a new world order which is emerging, and that the US can no longer use these sanctions in such a way.

PressTV: 7:31
And Mr. Doctorow, about the reactions and responses coming in following the UN Security Council session, if you’d like to add anything to China and Russia’s response. Also, Pakistan said invoking snapback complicates the situation. Iran’s cooperation with the IAEA could be an area which gets complicated.

Doctorow:
I subscribe completely to the remarks of my fellow panelist. We respect the positions of China and Russia on the snapback. I just remember that going back 10 years, the Russians and other countries that had been subjected to sanctions went along with the dictat coming from the United States and its allies to impose sanctions on a country X, Y, and Z. That game is over, and it has been declared invalid from the highest possible point, that is Russia and China.

8:39
And for that reason, the notion that a Gemini is unraveled, or has unraveled already, and cannot be put back in place is a very important development to which we are witnesses. Having said that, of course I appreciate that imposing or reimposing sanctions on Iran will be very painful for your country. And I am hopeful that understanding in places like Russia and China will enable mitigation of the pain that the troika in Europe intend to impose.

Let us also consider that they’re acting in the hope, one more action in the hope of currying favor with Donald Trump. Trump, of course, is much tougher on Iran than he dares to be on Russia. So this is a situation in which Iran is an unwilling victim and a innocent victim, one can say. It is being punched for the simple reason that those who are imposing these sanctions believe that they can do to Iran what they cannot do to a country like Russia. And then that is sad.

PressTV:
So Mr. Rizk, Gilbert Doctorow believes that the trail leads back to Russia. Iran’s foreign minister, however, he has accused the European Troika, France, Germany and the UK of colluding with Israel and the United States to maliciously pressure the Iranian people. Your reaction to that accusation, and do you agree with the Iranian foreign minister?

Rizk: 10:34
I think that part of it is about the United States, but again, I think the Europeans have their own hostility towards Iran, which is separate than the issue of the United States. And it wouldn’t be the first time, by the way. If you go back to when Obama wanted to reach the agreement or when he did reach the agreement with Iran, France objected strongly initially. It was the most hawkish player out of all of the G5-plus-1.

And at the initial phase, it obstructed the American efforts, Obama’s efforts to reach an agreement. This time around, I think that the European stance is even more hawkish, as I said, due to the developments that have taken place between Iran and Russia. By that, I mean the closer ties between the two countries. But regarding Israel, I think that’s an interesting point. And this brings me to the issue of the European intentions to recognize a Palestinian state. And we hear now about potential European sanctions against Israel.

11:36
Now I think possibly, possibly, the Europeans, in order to satisfy the Israelis, they might be following the strategy in such a way, in the following way, that we recognize a Palestinian state, we might sanction some Israeli right-wing figures, but at the same time, we impose sanctions against Iran. That way, they might make up for Israel.

So they take some anti-Israeli measures on the one hand, but they make up for that by escalating against Iran. And I think many Western countries do pursue these kinds of policies in order to gain the satisfaction of Israel, because Israel still, I think, wields enormous influence over political decision making in the West.

PressTV: 12:25
Gilbert Doctorow, along the lines of the same issue, a guest that we spoke to earlier here following today’s UN Security Council session said that there is a constant effort to undermine Iran at every turn. Please tell us whether you agree with that or not; and who benefits from this?

Doctorow:
Well the beneficiary of course is Israel. Any restrictions on Iran that cause economic harm, any restrictions that cause a weakening of some sort in the military capabilities of Iran all serve the purposes of Israel.

As regards Israeli influence on this decision, I’m rather skeptical. The decision to reimpose or use this snapback, I’m rather skeptical that they played any significant role. I still say the issues are more on the United States, currying favor with the United States, and doing to Iran what they would like to do to Russia, but don’t have the ability or the force of will to do.

PressTV: 13:40
Sure. And Ali Rizk, just chronologically looking at everything that led up to the situation we are right now, the E3, they also severely failed in carrying out their obligations under the JCPOA. So what about all of Europe’s shortcomings in the implementation of the nuclear deal? And why did Iran have to do all the heavy lifting all these years? Why has Iran always been the one to shoulder the responsibility of keeping the JCPOA afloat?

Rizk:
Well, I think that’s been the issue all along. I have to emphasize here, I must slightly disagree with my colleague. I still think Israel wields enormous influence over the West, and I think this goes a long way in giving an answer to what you just asked.

PressTV:
Absolutely.

Rizk:
Israel is viewed as a natural ally of the West, of Europe and of the United States, and as a result of Israel being viewed as this natural ally, that leads to these double standards which you just referred to. The Europeans weren’t able to live up to their own pledges of the deal simply because Trump introduced this mechanism of secondary sanctions, meaning that if the EU were to continue with business deals with Iran after the US withdrew under Trump, they would be subject to sanctions. And I think the EU economies are just too weak to withstand that.

But again, I think the major, the basic point is that Israel continues to be viewed despite everything which is happening and the horrors of Gaza, it’s still viewed as a natural Western ally, and that’s translated into these policies which appear to be illogical and place all of the onus on Iran without looking at how other parties have not lived up to their commitments or pledges.

PressTV: 15:42
Mr. Doctorow, would you like to respond to that?

Doctorow:
Well, if we look at this old question of the smaller devil and the bigger devil, the smaller devil being Israel and the bigger devil being the United States, I put my money on the bigger devil. This is– what we are now engaged in, my fellow panelists and myself, is a debate over whether Israel is the tail wagging the dog or whether the head is wagging the tail. I opt for the head wagging the tail.

Israel does what the United States wants. And it’s not because Israel dominates the United States, but because the United States dominates, or can dominate Israel, if and when, at any moment, it wants to. Everyone knows full well that the moment the United States pulls the plug on its economic support to Israel, Israel will fold. So the situation is a bit different from my perspective from the presentation that Israel is calling the shots and the United States falls into line.

PressTV:
All right, and staying with you, Mr. Doctorow, Iran has been calling out a serious double standard here, where Tehran has demonstrated its peaceful intentions, pointing to years of cooperation with the IAEA and the transparency it has shown under the NPT. But Israel, which is carrying out a genocide as we speak, it possesses nuclear weapons without scrutiny, and Iran here is being punished for its civilian nuclear technology.

Doctorow: 17:24
Well, unfortunately, the world we’re living in has more than double standards to worry about. It is very sad that the Gulf states have done nothing to save the Palestinians and to put pressure, military pressure, as well as political pressure, on Israel to desist.

That is the world we live in. It’s a much more complicated world than we have been discussing till now. And it is regrettable that none of the great powers can move in. It’s logical they can’t move in if the neighbors of Israel and Palestine are doing nothing other than Iran. Iran is very active. The Houthis are very active. But the rest of the region is quiet.

PressTV:
And same question to you Mr. Rizk about this double standard and hypocrisy that we’re seeing with regards to the Israeli regime.

Rizk: 18:25
If you just give me a minute to respond to that point, I know we’re going off script here, but I have to emphasize that the recent strike on Doha, Qatar, the Israeli attack, I think that proves in my humble opinion beyond any doubt that it’s Israel which directs US policy in the way it wishes more than the other way around. I’m not saying it dominates or it always decides, but it does have significant influence.

Look at the pro-Israeli lobby, look at the evangelicals, and the US, it can, if it pulls the plug on economic aid to Israel, yes, Israel wouldn’t survive. But I don’t think that there’s any US president who has the political will to do so, because of the dangers that would expose. The strike on Qatar, you’re talking about Centcom, the base of Centcom. Now how that strike serves American interests, I fail to see.

19:22
Regarding the double standards, look, again, this is standard Western policy. There are certain players which are signified as national allies. [4 sec. no sound] And that’s the way the policies are pursued, despite the fact that this sometimes is contradictory to Western interests, but they continue to pursue that. And it seems to want to be rather illogical, not based on any strategic or rational calculations.

PressTV: 19:56
Gilbert Doctorow, let’s talk about the credibility of the United Nations Security Council in its entirety as well. Do you think that the Security Council is a body for peace, or is it the exact opposite? Because we have to also allude to the constant resolutions for a ceasefire in Gaza that have been vetoed at the Security Council.

Doctorow:
There’s no question that the UN Security Council is not functioning as designed. But it was always from the very beginning intended to be a place of dispute and failure to resolve issues. That was foreseen when the veto was given to the permanent members.

So I don’t see a very great deterioration in the efficacy of UN resolutions or in the actions of the Security Council itself. The Security Council is a talking body. And it is a place where some debates of importance take place, which can be useful for informing the broad public across the world. However, when matters are critical, as they are in the Palestinian issue, on the issue of Iran today, we can expect that the various interests work against any effective resolution. That’s where we are today. And I’ll say the issue is in the region, and the region is doing nothing.

PressTV: 21:45
Okay, final question to Mr. Rizk. Same issue about the United Nations Security Council. Do you think there’s a big question mark over the credibility of the likes of the UNSC? Is it a force for good or is it a force to stifle good?

Rizk:
I’m not sure if we can say it’s a force for good or a force for evil. The UN Security Council, it’s a result of World War Two, basically, whereby you have the most powerful countries that emerge after World War II, which have veto power. Each country, yesterday for example, it turned out to be a force of sheer evil when the US used that veto against the resolution regarding genocide, which is taking place in [Gaza]. So there are certain powers who exercise their own domination if you would like, in order to push through their own policies. And I think that more and more we’re approaching the law of the jungle, if you would like, outside the framework of the UN.

One very good example of that is not only the genocide in Gaza, but also what the guests referred to, the current US campaign against Venezuela, the attack on boats and fishermen, which is happening. Also how the George Bush administration launched the war on terror without going back to the Security Council. So I think that quite some time, the UN Security Council has been only able to do so much.

PressTV: 23:16
All right, thank you, gentlemen. We’re going to leave it there. Security and political analyst Avi Rizk, joining us from Beirut. And independent international affairs analyst Gilbert Doctorow, joining us from Brussels. Than you, gentlemen, and a special thanks to you our viewers for staying with us on tonight’s edition of “Spotlight”. It’s good night for now. We’ll see you next time.

Press TV (Iran): Snapback mechanism – UNSC Meeting on anti-Iran Sanctions

The focus of this panel discussion was the meeting just held in the United Nations Security Council at which three European signatories to the 2015 Iran Nuclear Deal (JCPOA), France, the U.K. and Germany, effectively set the way for reimposition of harsh sanctions against Iran, claiming that Teheran was in violation of the conditions of the JCPOA as regards inspections of its nuclear facilities and other measures to ensure that it was not enriching uranium to weapons grade. This means that international sanctions on Iran will automatically return in October.  However, China and Russia have both declared that they will not apply sanctions on Iran, whatever others may do.

My fellow panelist in this program was Beirut-based Ali Rizk, a Security and Political analyst who clearly is well informed on the issues and provided stimulating commentary that I partially agreed with. We disagreed principally on who was the greater influencer of the European decision – Israel or the United States. Rizk suggests that the European Troika decided to reinstate sanctions on Iran as an offset to their recognition of the Palestinian State.

We both believe that the reimposition of sanctions has little or nothing to do with what Iran has done. We both see this affair as relating to the Russia-Ukraine war, whether because Europe is punishing Iran for its support to Russia (Rizk) or because for the cowardly European (and U.S.) bullies, it is easier and safer to pick on Iran than to go head-to-head against Russia in a military confrontation.

http://www.urmedium.net/c/presstv/134610

Transcript of conversation with Glenn Diesen,18 September

Transcript submitted by a reader

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsAk2E2YWl0

Diesen: 0:00
Hi everyone and welcome back. We are joined today by Gilbert Doctorow, historian, international affairs analyst, and also author of
_War Diaries: the Russia-Ukraine War_. So welcome back to the program.

Doctorow:
Well, very good to be with you.

Diesen:
So China, they used to be a leading power in the world for a few thousands of years until the mid-19th century when they were defeated by the British and they went from being the leading power to a country pillaged and purged by others, great powers. So this is what the Chinese refer to as a century of humiliation from the mid-19th century to the mid-20th.

0:44
Now, we’ve had now Europeans being quite powerful for some would put it as 500 years, if not dominant. And it appears that Europe is falling down pretty quickly. That is some concern that Europe might be entering its own century of humiliation. I’m not sure how you see the situation, what is going on in Europe these days, because one can look at the security problems, one can look at the economics not going well, the political stability, but in the overarching picture, one gets the impression that Europe no longer has a seat at the table, but it’s looking at the risk of becoming mere pieces moved across a board. How do you see the situation of Europe at the moment?

Doctorow:
It is lamentable. And for a number of reasons, a number of dimensions, the ones that you touched upon, of course, are highly relevant. The question that we discussed in the weeks gone by was the low level, low political intelligence, the low level of competence, which is very distressing. I’m speaking now of the leadership.

There’s 25 of the 27 member states of the European Union plus the United Kingdom where you have the same display of very low level people running the show. Institutions that were built, but I’m thinking now of the European institutions, going back to the 1990s, when you had brilliant socialist-minded, let’s be open about it, intellectuals like Jacques Delors who were working to create a united Europe, a future-looking Europe, a harmonized Europe, and they created institutions without paying– to my understanding today– without paying enough attention to balance of powers and to ensuring a genuine democracy. They assumed that people like themselves, highly intelligent, highly educated, well-meaning, outgoing, would succeed them. And here’s where there’s a great fallacy. We had institutions in Europe which can be abused and which violate all the principles of democracy. And that’s what we have today, when someone like von der Leyen has grabbed all the power, and around her there is silence.

3:19
And there’s reason for the silence. Sadly, it comes from the way that the European institutions were engineered in the early new millennium to sacrifice the sovereignty of individual member states. That was done consciously to the point where, as one former Belgian prime minister said publicly, the level of power of a head of state in Europe today is equivalent to the powers of a mayor in the past.

Now that is bad enough within Europe. What we see currently, what is particularly, say discouraging, is that Europe as a whole has given up its sovereignty, not just individual member states passing to Brussels decision-making, which had in the past been at this national level, but the whole of Europe has given up sovereignty to the United States, in the hope of buying off Trump and ensuring the backing, the military defense backing of the United States for Europe against Russia, since all of these gentlemen and ladies were scared out of their boots at the start of the Special Military Operation, when they realized, very correctly, that they had no armies, that they had no air defense, that they were totally at the mercy of Russia if the United States did not step in and provide all of the equipment that Europe doesn’t have to protect Europe.

5:14
So that is the present situation. That explains the economic damage that we see as well. Because in sacrificing everything to keep Mr. Trump on board, the leaders of Europe have compromised the future prosperity of the whole continent.

Diesen: 5:41
The French, though, for a long time, for many years, they talked about the prospect of a common army as a reason for the point of integrating Europe.

And they called for greater autonomy from the United States, again, something that they did all the way since the 1990s. They did recognize that if they wanted stability, they would have to find a role for Russia in Europe, not simply say that they have to stand on the sideline even though they’re the largest country and they shouldn’t have a say. So they seemed to recognize all the right things. But these days, they seem to have gone a bit off the rails. They no longer pursue a clear policy of strategic autonomy or European independence. And how do you see the political crisis raging now in France? Because it’s hardly stable. Is this rooted in economics or is it internal politics? Is it a security issue? How can we understand these tremendous changes?

Doctorow: 6:51
There are fragile governments in the locomotive countries of Europe, both France and Germany, and in the now outsider, but still very important partner in European defense in the UK.

All three countries have fragile situations, but they are fragile largely for domestic reasons. Domestic fight for power, for banned policies that are unpopular and have brought down, in the case of France, brought down several governments and probably will soon bring about the newest government that Macron installed, for his defense minister to replace Beyrou after that prime minister faced and lost the vote of confidence.

7:41
What is the volatility in France is largely on domestic issues. And the same can be said in Germany. The only area where geopolitics and what interests you and me and most of the viewers of this program, the only weak spot, but a very important weak spot in Europe right now is the European institutions, and particularly the European Commission.

There is now pending, I believe it’s a few weeks from now, one or possibly two different votes of confidence against Ursula von der Leyen. And the most important one was introduced by Viktor Orban, by his group called the Patriots for Europe. I think about a quarter of the members of the European Parliament are, announced themselves, as members of this bloc.

And it comes from– his confidence in making this direct attack on von der Leyen– comes from a victory he was given by the European Court of Justice over the punishments, withholding funds, the kind of blackmail that von der Leyen has used against Hungary to punish them for violating Brussels’-made rules on immigration, which are very lax and which Hungary, the Orban government disagrees with, and has established in Hungary much harsher rules for admitting immigrants or refugees or whatever you want to call them.

9:38
He won that. And this was quite dramatic. And since this is not the first time I mention this, nor is it the first time I’m mentioning on air the pending votes of confidence, I want to explain since people have asked, “Oh, Mr. Doctorow, where’s your source? The _Financial Times_. So I’m not relying on alternative media for these basic facts, that he won a victory, Orban, and that he’s pursuing her. It’s not the only case, but having spoken about 10 days ago with a very well-informed and non-aligned– that limits the possible people I’m talking about to 30 in the European Parliament. One of them spoke with me and said that he believes that Ursula will be thrown out of office within six months.

It could be she’ll be thrown out of office within two weeks or three weeks. What that means is the whole Commission will go. Now, I don’t mean to say that the European Parliament would change from its present globalist anti-Russian, very censorious policies to something more civilized and looking for peace on the continent. That isn’t going to happen overnight. But Ursula von der Leyen has assembled a group of incompetents who are coming from the most viciously anti-Russian part of Europe, the Baltic states, and who are totally dependent on protection from her, which she deals out in good measure.

11:28
Therefore, these people will be swept away. And perhaps in the fighting for commissioned seats, the larger members of the European community who are less radical and more reasonable will assume seats. That isn’t a dramatic change in Europe, but it’s an important step towards revival of common sense and a less hostile view towards the neighbor to the east, and perhaps a step back from the militarization that is now the official policy of the EU as led by von dert Leyen.

Diesen:
Well, we always have to look at the extent to which some of these policies are coming from the EU institutions or the member states. But to have people like Kallas, so in a key position as the EU foreign policy chief, is quite concerning.

I’m sure you watched the recent speech she made where she argued that the Russians and the Chinese believe that they defeated fascism, that they had a leading role in this. And she was saying, well, this is what people think when they don’t read books. I mean, it’s quite extraordinary that you can have a person in such a prominent position who doesn’t seem to be aware of the leading role that the Chinese and the Russians had in defeating the fascists.

But I did want to ask you though about von der Leyen, and to what extent her involvement in the EU is, for example, influencing the efforts of stealing, or seizing they say, Russian sovereign funds. Because what we read now in the _Financial Times_ and other papers is that the EU would like to take the money, but they want to pretend to still abide by international law and not stealing the assets of the Russian central bank.

So they are looking at what they call creative legality or legally creative measures, which entails taking the Russian money, but using it to buy zero interest EU bonds. And somehow this will make it legal, the theft. So, I mean, this is, again, a great exercise in self-harm, but is this coming from the von der Leyens, or is this something that is being pushed by member states?

Doctorow: 14:19
Well, some member states indeed have been behind this, but I would look at von der Leyen. She is a law unto herself. And I say not just because she is so ambitious, but because everyone around her are cowards.

They are cowards. They’re the leaders of Europe by and large are cowards. Now when you mentioned the policies in Europe, and we’re speaking about EU member states, I want to take a step aside and what is the UK doing? And I want to reflect on what King Charles said in the banquet, the state banquet with 160 invitees that took place yesterday in honor of Donald Trump. King Charles said that we, Britain and the United States, have stood shoulder to shoulder, well, I’m not, I’m paraphrasing what he said, in two world wars.

15:16
Now we stand together to protect Europe from, well, what was his word? Tyranny. Tyranny, exactly right. Tyranny. There you have it in a nutshell.

England, this is the coming from Starmer, but it’s not just from Starmer. Most of the British elites and governing class, whether they call themselves Laborer or call themselves Conservative, they have this deeply distorted propagandistic approach to security in Europe.

So when you look at von der Leyen, she is not unique, except that she has the authority, absent any protests or challenges, to direct where Europe is headed, in the absolutely wrong direction, of course. And that is what– the fulcrum may shift if she loses a vote of no confidence. I’m told that she held on by her fingernails in the last vote of confidence, which is over her handling of contracts for the covid vaccine.

And then lack of transparency in negotiations and actually the violation of her authority as Commission President. So this vote which will also have transparency among the non-transparency as a fundamental accusation against her, It may go against her. We’ll see. But looking at France, yes, the French government may fall and indeed, even Mr. Macron, who according to the French constitution has royal powers essentially for five years, theoretically he cannot be removed.

17:18
But he may go, because his unpopularity is so overwhelming. It all depends on the intensity of the demonstrations that have begun in France over the new government and over policy, the budget and so forth. They will not name militarism and his increase, his budgetary plans to increase spending on arms and on Ukraine while everything else in the budget is slashed, it may not be over that. But at the end of the day, who cares? If he falls, he will not be replaced by anyone who is so pigheaded and unrealistic as he is. And that can only be to the good.

18:10
As for Mr. Merz, he is, of course, doing better. They just had state elections in Germany, in the Western Lander. And for his party, they claimed great satisfaction that they hadn’t lost any seats. They held their own in percentage of the votes. However, their coalition partners, the SPD, the socialists, took a beating. And the main beneficiary of the lost seats of the socialists was the Alternative for Deutschland, Ms. Alice Weidel, who was picking up more power. And the question is, at what point will the fragility of the coalition be its downfall and the Chancellor be forced to call new elections, as a result of which it is very likely we’ll see him removed from office, simply because it became apparent not long after his taking power that he is deeply unpopular.

19:20
So a change in Germany, of course, would also be a great benefit to those of us who are hoping for a return to samity, as opposed to what he’s been saying of late about Russia, generally, about Europe’s needs, defense needs. Indeed, Europe needs defense needs. And going back to your remarks, the question of European Army, indeed, that goes back decades. I was looking not long ago at, I think it was 2014, 2015, there was a study by CEPs, a think tank, a major think tank in Brussels, which had Solana, the former head of diplomacy and military policy of the EU, he headed it and other people of great experience in the EU institutions were on the team performing this study of a European army. A result of which was the conclusion that, yes, we can try to proceed with this, but we don’t have the money.

20:35
This sounds very familiar judging from 2025. They don’t have the money and they also didn’t have a consensus of what they need because going back several decades, the issues in Europe over a united army were who’s the enemy, where the threats coming from? Spain and France looked south traditionally. Germany looked east traditionally. And the needs, the military needs for these different threats [are] entirely different.

That was a major impediment back then to creating a European-wide army. And I don’t know that has been resolved or can be resolved.

Diesen: 21:18
Well, that is a key problem though for Europe. I mean, this, the unity or relative unity we’ve had across Europe since World War II, it is unusual for our continent. And it’s worth looking at the distribution of power it actually happened because in the bipolar world the Europeans had to unite under the leadership of the United States because of the obvious threat from the Soviet Union.

And then that was replaced with a unipolar world after the Cold War. And this, I think, was organized around the principle of collective hegemony or unipolarity for the United States with the Europeans aspiring to be its equal partner through the collective bargaining power in the European Union. And also this was the reason for the United States to prioritize Europe and its foreign policy, which would prolong the relevance for Europe. But I guess it looks as if one of the key challenges for Europe is how can it have a role in a multipolar world where the key centers of power are the United States, Russia, China, lesser extent India. And did Americans want to pivot away from Europe?

22:34
I mean, in such a system, what actually unites Europe? Can we live without a Russian bogeyman or even in the security issue, as you said, they see threats from different areas. But if we would unite around economic issues, collective bargaining power, do we even have the same economic interests? Surely if the Germans would look at their national interests, they would seek to patch up with Russia very quickly. While, yeah, the polls will be more concerned about both the German and Russian power. You would have the Spanish Portuguese looking in completely different directions.

I mean, did you see Europe surviving without, Russian bogeyman? I mean, what happens after this war is over? Is this the end of the European unity?

Doctorow: 23:23
No, I think Europe can survive very well without the Russian bogeyman. It has to take a step back. The idea of Europe playing a geopolitical role is new. The European uniting forces were economic. Now if that sounds weak, let’s remember that until the United States started poking the Chinese in the eye, China was very happy to be an economic force and not a military force. Now, same thing with Europe. There is nothing to be embarrassed about by not looking to be a self-standing worldwide policeman and to be one of the world’s largest economies and most attractive and vital economies.

24:14
Not to mention the cultural factor. I’m speaking to you today from Venice, and the cultural factor is all around me, and it’s not bad. It’s brought in hordes of American tourists right now, even at the end of the season. That’s what Europe was until they got into their heads, and this is partly the achievement of Ursula van der Leyen, that Europe has to be a geopolitical force. Wrong.

They don’t need a bogeyman in Russia. They can do very well just being one of the world’s biggest economies, biggest and most attractive markets and a center of global civilization. That’s my answer to your question.

Diesen: 25:09
Well, one of my favorite scholars on European integration is David Mitrani, who wrote back in the 1960s that, well he predicted that Europe could take two paths towards integration. He called one the functionalist, where they would integrate in areas where it delivered specific benefits in terms of good governance, security or economic competitiveness.

And in other words, the form would be dictated by the purpose and then the alternative model he called the federalism, where he already had a goal in terms of form. He would want to centralize power and create the United States of Europe. And in this area, you would look for areas to integrate for the mere purpose of integrating, irrespective of serving economic or security interests.

And I guess his, well, his prediction was that many of the Europeans, especially the Germans, would push for the federalist model, that is the United States of Europe. And his prediction was this would not actually look like the United States of America, but more like Soviet Union, because it would force the integration through.

So if it doesn’t make sense, if you can’t convince the public that this delivers better economic benefits or security benefits or better governance, then it would have to be more or less forced and not responding to the national interests. And this would then fuel a lot of resistance over time. It seems at least to me that some of these predictions seem kind of fair. But do you see any signs of a pre-revolutionary moment in Europe, that is, the political leadership lacking in legitimacy, people willing to experiment with radical alternatives? I’m not sure I put AfD necessarily in radical, but what are you expecting, I guess, over the months ahead?

Doctorow:
When you read the literature, the federalists that you’ve mentioned in passing, it all seems reasonable and may sound very progressive. That’s how they position themselves, as being progressive, to take Europe one step higher and one step further. But when you look at how that plays out in practice, these are our class enemy. They are, all of these, they are globalists. Who are they?

To name names. All right. My home state is Belgium, and one of its former prime ministers, Kiefer Hofstad, was one of the leading personalities in the Federalist movement, and head of a group, a bloc within the EU that was called Aldi. And that group, after Mr. Macron came to power, merged with Macron’s reform group, forming a very significant block in the present day parliament, and they are all federalists.

28:25
Now, when you look at what those federalists want to do and what Kiefer Hofstad wanted to do, he and their group are [a keyword] who are talking exactly the talk of von der Leyen. It’s a continuum of all of the ideologically driven, anti-Russian, uniting around the enemy, about opposition to that enemy, that we see around us today. So these principles, which sound very nice to a political scientist, are not self-standing. They are attached to a whole worldview in other domains. Economics and sovereignty and open immigration, as no borders.

29:21
All of these things come together in the persons of the champions of federalism. Now it may be an accident or maybe there’s something deeply philosophical uniting these trends.

Diesen:
Well, I’m glad before you mentioned Britain, because it takes me to my last question that is with this comment of tyranny, we see that, well, historically when countries are ramping up for war, they like to present conflicts very much in one-dimensional terms of black and white, good versus evil, to rally support and discredit any dissent. But once there’s defeat or doesn’t look like it’s going our way, you would expect the rhetoric to change a bit along the lines of the United States now, now that the recognizing the war hasn’t gone that well.

30:23
You would then begin to humanize your opponent. You would identify legitimate security concerns of the other side and look for ways to harmonize interests, because you can’t really harmonize when it’s a struggle between good and evil. Yet as you mentioned from the United Kingdom that they’re still talking about tyranny, the fight against tyranny as if this is some cosplay or replay of World War II. How do you see the possibility of, I guess, new political forces emerging in this climate? Because at the moment, anything is seen as treasonous. Any political force coming up opposing the war rhetoric would be seen as more or less traitors, Putinists, apologists for Russia.

They don’t care enough about Ukraine. Do you see anyone in Europe possibly breaking through this? Because anyone who seems to want to have a serious chance of challenging the status quo kind of has to fall in line with this rhetoric, that they’re fighting against the most recent reincarnation of Hitler.

Doctorow: 31:39
Well, we know that there are at least two personalities. I spoke of 25 out of 27 European leaders who are incompetent or caught happily living in a bubble of propaganda, I didn’t include two. That is Mr. Urbán and Fico. So they are sane people who appreciate what you’re just saying. Coming back though to Britain, it is a really sad case. They are the biggest foot-draggers in a return to realism. And the remarks which King Charles was hand-fed by his government, which is normal, that’s the way it goes.

It’s been going in Britain for a couple of hundred years, and the speeches are written by the government. But I suspect that Charles himself deeply feels the same way. And this is, they are going to be last to be pulled screaming and shouting into the new world which is possibly coming rather quickly, if the Russians continue their acceleration of their offensive against, in Ukraine. I am hopeful that these things will come together, but as I said there are different levels of the cause for optimism. The greatest one, because it’s directly on a geopolitical issue, is in the EU institutions.

33:09
The luck element of Europe turning away from its present policies to something more reasonable and realistic [is] in the three key countries that we discussed. I really have nothing further to add on that issue. We keep our fingers crossed, but then frankly speaking, I’ve been keeping my fingers crossed on various hopeful signs, either in the US or in Europe, for the whole duration of the special military operation. These hopeful things have not panned out, but I think we’re coming to the end where this optimism will finally be rewarded.

Diesen:
Well, on that, let me just add the last follow-up question here, because I’ve listened to people like Alastair Crook, who’s also been a British diplomat for a long time.

And people like him, they expect that what is required for Europe to essentially wake up from its 30-year slumber or dreaming away about this end of history and its enduring central role in the world is an actual, well, a big defeat or at least feeling the consequences of its wrong policies. Essentially forcing some of the key politicians to have to be held accountable and to reconsider some of the policies. [He] and others suspect that this would likely come from defeat in the proxy war in Ukraine.

34:54
So since you mentioned that we might be reaching the end of this, do you see a critical shift on the battlefield? Given, I mean, there’s been this gradual disintegration or collapse or weakening at least of the Ukrainian army, but it does appear that this, what we’re witnessing now is something quite fatal.

Doctorow:
Well yes, I’ve said for some time, that I expect the war to end in a political collapse in Ukraine, not in the whole army running the other way and or holding up white flags.

I don’t think that’s going to happen. But the losses are so considerable, the inability to cover the holes in the front are so obvious to everyone now, that I think the end of the war is nigh. How the war ends, in what kind of a document, to what extent there will be general recognition of Russia’s basic objectives as legitimate, that remains to be seen. It is very hopeful that Mr. Trump has done as you said, has begun to humanize the enemy and has denied the latest false flag operations, these drone attacks in Poland and Romania.

36:23
This is all to the good. It doesn’t solve all problems. But just to take a step back, just looking at European history and the Dickens’ famous line about the French Revolution, the best of times and the worst of times, it always was that way and probably always will be that way, so long as human beings are around. And again, what I see around here in this hub of European culture is something so attractive and so sublime that it addresses all people who have open ears and open eyes. The collapse of European civilization is certainly exaggerated as an issue.

And I believe even in Russia, of course, any Russian viewers watching this will immediately attack me over this. But it’s not just fifth- column people in Russia who have great love for European culture and feel themselves to be Europeans. That is an absolute truth. So it’ll take time to heal the wounds, but they will be patched up. And therefore I’m not pessimistic for the long run about Europe coming to its senses and saving for itself a place in the world, not a geopolitical place in the world. That’s clear.

Diesen:
Well, I hope you’re correct. I would like to see some revival in Europe, but I do think that the secret, though, is to start with, look for, ways of reviving Europe as a non-hegemonic power, not out of some idealist aspirations, but simply as a recognition of reality, because I think this ignoring reality is coming at an increasingly high cost.

38:28
But I’m, rarely we end on a very positive note, so on the possible revival of Europe, it looks like a good place to wrap up.

Doctorow:
Well, we’re in completely agreement.