‘Judging Freedom’ edition of 15 January 2025: Nikolai Patrushev and how Ukraine will ‘cease to exist’ in 2025

As usual, the discussion with host Judge Andrew Napolitano covered a number of different subjects, including the ‘farewell’ speeches by Jake Sullivan and Tony Blinken, bizarre statements from President Zalensky during an ongoing meeting with the press, and the latest comments by Polish President Tusk on how under his leadership the European Council and the broader EU Institutions will proceed with Kiev’s accession to the EU and NATO. 

However, the greatest time was devoted to a just published interview with Nikolai Patrushev, former Secretary of Russia’s National Security Council who now continues to serve as a close adviser to Vladimir Putin.  The interview appeared in Russian in the daily newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets, with an abbreviated English language summary in The Moscow Times. See

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/01/14/ukraine-may-cease-to-exist-in-2025-putin-aide-says-a87610

In this article we see one possible end result of the ongoing war in Ukraine. Another possible end result will come about in an eventual summit meeting between Putin and Trump at which they agree on a new security architecture for Europe based on Realpolitik considerations such as were practiced in Yalta at the conclusion of WWII.  Putin clearly has these and other possible denouements in mind which he juggles like so many balls in the air.

©Gilbert Doctorow, 2025

For the Russian voice-over version see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1oCsijXAUEo

Translation below into German (Andreas Mylaeus)

„Judging Freedom“-Ausgabe vom 15. Januar 2025: Nikolai Patrushev und wie die Ukraine 2025 „aufhören wird zu existieren“

Wie üblich wurden in der Diskussion mit Judge Andrew Napolitano verschiedene Themen behandelt, darunter die „Abschiedsreden“ von Jake Sullivan und Tony Blinken, bizarre Äußerungen von Präsident Selensky während einer laufenden Pressekonferenz und die jüngsten Kommentare des polnischen Präsidenten Tusk dazu, wie der Europäische Rat und die EU-Institutionen unter seiner Führung den Beitritt Kiews zur EU und zur NATO vorantreiben werden.

Die meiste Zeit wurde jedoch einem gerade veröffentlichten Interview mit Nikolai Patrushev gewidmet, dem ehemaligen Sekretär des Nationalen Sicherheitsrates Russlands, der nun weiterhin als enger Berater von Wladimir Putin tätig ist. Das Interview erschien in russischer Sprache in der Tageszeitung Moskowski Komsomolez und in einer gekürzten englischen Zusammenfassung in The Moscow Times. Siehe

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/01/14/ukraine-may-cease-to-exist-in-2025-putin-aide-says-a87610

In diesem Artikel sehen wir ein mögliches Endergebnis des andauernden Krieges in der Ukraine. Ein weiteres mögliches Endergebnis wird sich bei einem eventuellen Gipfeltreffen zwischen Putin und Trump ergeben, bei dem sie sich auf eine neue Sicherheitsarchitektur für Europa einigen, die auf realpolitischen Überlegungen basiert, wie sie in Jalta am Ende des Zweiten Weltkriegs praktiziert wurden. Putin hat diese und andere mögliche Ausgänge ganz klar im Sinn und jongliert mit ihnen wie mit Bällen in der Luft.

Sputnik Globe, like other Russian media assets, has been fighting a tough battle against US global media domination and censorship of all other voices. But, despite all, they remain afloat and for the moment their website is fully accessible here in Europe, though it was blocked in the recent past.

From time to time, they invite me to comment on some current breaking news, and yesterday I made my contribution to their article on Biden’s latest package of anti-Russian sanctions. 

https://sputnikglobe.com/20250114/did-anti-russian-sanctions-become-bidens-poison-chalice-for-trump-1121429139.html

Transcript submitted by a reader

Firstpost – Spotlight: 0:00
We begin with the fallout of the war raging in the heart of Europe between Russia and Ukraine, and its impact on the global oil trade. The war, which is just days away from its three-year mark, has brought Cold War rivals, Russia and the United States, to the edge of a direct conflict. In the latest, the United States has imposed its harshest sanctions yet on Russia’s oil industry. Two major Russian oil producers, along with 183 vessels that have shipped Russian oil, have been hit with severe sanctions. The move is aimed at targeting Moscow’s revenues that it uses to fund its war with Ukraine.

Biden: 0:44
They will have profound effect on the growth of the Russian economy and make it more difficult for Putin to conduct his wars. It is probable that gas prices could increase as much as three, four cents a gallon, but what it’s going to have a more profound impact on [is] Russia’s ability to continue to act in the way it’s acting in the conduct of war.

Putin’s in tough shape right now and I think it’s really important that he not have any breathing room to continue to do the god-awful things he’s continuing to do. And as I said, he’s got his own problems economically, significant problems economically, as well as politically at home.

Spotlight:
Not just Russia.These sanctions are also expected to directly impact Moscow’s top oil customers, India and China. Beijing is the world’s largest oil importer and New Delhi ranks third. The newly sanctioned tankers handled over 530 million barrels of Russian crude oil in 2024, about 42% of the country’s total seaborne crude exports. Out of these, around 300 million barrels were shipped to China, adding up to roughly 61% of China’s seaborne imports of Russian oil. And the bulk of the remainder went to India. India relies on Russia for about a third of its oil imports.

2:11
For the first 11 months of last year, India’s Russian crude imports rose 4.5% on year to 1.7 million barrels per day. This makes up 36% of India’s total imports. For China, the volume including pipeline supply was up 2% at 2.1 million barrels per day, which is about 20% of its total imports. Since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russia began diverting oil and fuel shipments from Europe to Asia, and both India and China have been the main beneficiaries of discounted Russian crude. But to step up in punitive measures including sanctions targeting Russian producers, insurers and vessels has thrown the trade of discounted crude into disarray.

3:03
Now these tougher sanctions on Russian oil will force Indian and Chinese refiners to diversify and to source more from the Middle East, Africa and the Americas. In December, India’s crude oil imports from West Asia, specifically Iraq and the United Arab Emirates, surged. New Delhi is already looking to replace the shortfall in supplies from its largest source market, Russia. In the same month, India’s imports of Russian crude dropped nearly 17%, sequentially to 1.4 million barrels per day, which is the lowest level in 2024. Now, harsh measures are also pushing both oil prices and freight costs up.

3:47
Earlier today, oil prices jumped after US announced new sanctions to curb Russian oil supply. Reports say that refiners, tankers, operators and traders across Asia were scrambling to manage the fallout from the latest round of sanctions that impact major importers in India and China too. So far hundreds of ships and many Russian oil traders managed to escape US sanctions. This is because the Biden administration sought to strike a balance between the case for tighter sanctions and averting a global oil price rally. But in a week from now, President-elect Donald Trump will take office and the Republican has promised to end the war in Ukraine.

4:32
Moscow depends on oil exports to not just sustain its economy but also to fund the ongoing conflict. So will harsher sanctions find a place in Trump’s strategy to achieve this goal? Now for more on this we have with us international relations and Russian affairs expert Dr. Gilbert Doctorow who is joining us live from Brussels. Welcome to Firstpost.

Gilbert Doctorow, PhD:
Yes, good day to you.

Firstpost:
Now Dr., how will the new US sanctions on Russian oil producers and maritime services affect India’s and China’s ability to secure stable oil supplies? And What challenges might they face in diversifying their supply chains to countries like the Middle East, Africa or the Americas?

Doctorow: 5:28
I appreciate the need to investigate alternative supplies. That is prudent and it may prove to be essential. However, there’s another side to the story. The sanctions that Mr. Biden has just imposed are difficult to remove. They are embedded in American legislation, and it would require an act of Congress for Mr. Trump to overturn these sanctions. However, it is also possible, and I’d say likely, that Mr. Trump will simply not enforce these sanctions. There is no ability of Congress or of any American entity to compel him to enforce these. If he were to go the way through Congress and override or reject the sanctions, then he would have a fight with Congress and he would be expending his political capital for an uncertain result.

6:32
If he simply doesn’t enforce them, then he has no problems, and he keeps on moving with the rest of his political agenda. The actions taken by Biden in the closing days of his administration are vicious, but they also are founded on very poor intelligence. It may sound peculiar to your audience, but the United States CIA and other intelligence agencies that are supplying the White House with the basic information that it uses to draw up tactical and strategic plans for its foreign affairs, foreign affairs management, they are faulty. The head of the CIA, Mr. Burns, has been denounced by CIA ex-experts, ex-employees, as lying through his teeth about the nature and status of the Ukraine war.

7:27
The plans that Mr. Biden has set down would make sense if this war will proceed to ’27 or later, which is what American plans are, as we saw at the meeting in Ramstein last week. However, the Russians will very likely complete the war in the coming months.

Spotlight: 7:46
Right. Doctor, with the sanctions targeting over 180 tankers and Russia-based maritime insurance providers, how significant is the anticipated rise in oil prices and freight costs likely to be for major consumers like India and China?

Doctorow: 8:06
I think that we have to wait a week or two. I understand that the market reacts, and must react to this very significant news that you have just described. The “Financial Times”, for example, gave a very lengthy and detailed explanation of the different aspects of these sanctions, both those that are intended to curtail Russian production by sanctioning the companies that are based in Russia, that is foreign companies that are acting in Russia, to facilitate production; and more importantly, to sanction the ships and the insurers, as you mentioned. The net result could be drastic, But I don’t believe that there will be such a net result, for the reasons I just mentioned. Mr. Trump wants to end the war.

Spotlight:
All right. Absolutely. Doctor, thank you very much for being with us on Firstpost and for your valued insights and analysis.

Doctorow: 9:04
Well, thanks for having me.

Transcript submitted by a reader

NewsX – Porteous: 0:00
Hello and welcome. I am Thomas Porteous, and today we will be diving into a discussion on the USA and the United Kingdom tightening sanctions on the Russian oil industry. Ukrainian President Vlodymyr Zelenskyy announced that Ukrainian forces in the Kursk region have captured two North Korean soldiers, marking the first time Kiev has detained North Korean military personnel. Despite being wounded, the soldiers survived and are currently in Kiev, where they are being interrogated by Ukraine’s security service. Meanwhile, the Biden administration has imposed stringent sanctions targeting Russia’s energy sector, aiming to cut off funding for Moscow’s ongoing war against Ukraine.

0:38
These measures come as President-elect Donald Trump prepares to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Senior US officials hope to strengthen Ukraine’s position before Trump’s inauguration and ensure that the incoming administration continues to enforce these sanctions. Thank you for joining us for this debate. In this discussion we are joined by Professor Arvind Mahajan, Lamar Savings Professor of Finance at Texas A&M; Professor Rohan Gunaratna, international affairs expert from Singapore; Daniel Wagner, CEO of Country Risk Solutions from Portland, Oregon and Professor Madhav Nalapat, Editorial Director of The Sunday Guardian.

1:19
Thank you for joining us for this discussion. My first question to you is for Professor Arvind Mahajan. Do you see the sanctions from the US and the UK affecting Russia’s economy both in the short term and the long term?

Mahajan:
Well the jury is still out, primarily because we have a new administration coming in, in a couple of weeks, and it really will depend upon the attitude which the new administration takes against Russia in particular regarding the enforcement of these actions. If the enforcement is serious, I think it can have a meaningful impact on the cash flows generated by these oil exports to Russia. And in that case, there might be some meaningful marginal effect on the stance which Russia takes vis-a-vis Ukraine. But it’s unclear what the new administration’s attitude will be towards it.

NewsX: 2:20
Professor Gunaratna, I wanted to come to you next. How do these sanctions compare to the previous ones that were imposed on Russia?

Gunaratna:
Russia was able to overcome the impact of those sanctions. During a visit that I made to Russia, I did see the impact, But it did not in any way affect their capacity to sustain their military campaign in Ukraine. What is so important today is that with a new administration coming to office, they must try to resolve this conflict through dialogue and discussion. Even India can play a very important role, because India has very good relations with Russia and also with the United States. So we should look beyond the continuity of this conflict and try to resolve it because through, by sanctions and by war, this conflict is not going to end. It’s going to affect the entire world

NewsX: 3:34
Daniel Wagner, Professor Gunaratna was talking about resolution to this war, but do you think that these sanctions will make the situation harder to negotiate a peace deal?

Wagner:
No, to the contrary, I think these sanctions are going to make it easier to negotiate a peace deal, because the pressure that’s being put on Putin and the Russian government right now as a result of these sanctions is truly significant. And I think what in essence is happening is that the Biden administration is giving a gift to the Trump administration for its future negotiations to try to end this war. And I think it won’t take long for Putin to feel the pressure, because these sanctions are truly significant. You might ask why they weren’t done sooner and the reason is, of course, politics.

4:27
They didn’t, the Biden administration didn’t want to have a spike in oil and gas prices in America as a result of these sanctions during the election cycle, which basically means for the past two years, that was not going to be in the cards. So I think there’s every reason to believe that this will make a difference.

NewsX: 4:48
Professor Nalapat, Trump has spoken about a possible meeting with Putin. What can we expect from this and what actions do we expect President Trump to take within his first few days of office in regard to this conflict?

Nalapat:
Let me tell you quite clearly that in my view these sanctions are not going to make any impact on Russia’s war capacity. Ukraine is supposed to have been winning the war right from February 2022 onwards and it has lost people, it has lost territory continuously since then.

5:24
The small incursions that are made into Russia can be mopped up at any time. The reality of the situation is that if oil prices go up, it’s a gift to Putin. Putin is very dependent on oil and gas for a lot of the money that he is making and he would be delighted by it. And quite frankly, this war is creating a rift between the West and the rest of the world to the benefit of China. Again, this is– this war is because of an obsessive focus on Europe on the part of the Biden administration and I’m sorry to say by too many scholars in the United States and in other parts of North America.

6:05
The reality of the situation is, if Ukraine were that important to European security, during all the decades it was part of the USSR, was there an impact on European security? Nothing at all. The fact is, this is a Eurocentric approach to the world, and that approach could have been wonderful in the 17th and 18th, 19th century, but in the second half of 20th century the winds began shifting, and now it is firmly in the Indo-Pacific and firmly the main adversary is no longer Russia but China. By keeping on sounding the war drums against Russia, you are diverting the attention away from China to the benefit of China. So very frankly– and supposing let’s say that Trump comes in, and supposing some people say all right they’re going to increase. I mean, Britain and the US are gas exporters; other countries in Europe are importers. They will suffer. The German economy is already significantly weakened. Other European economies have been significantly weakened.

And every single political leader in the West, as Keir Starmer is going to find out in the next election, has been weakened if he has supported the Ukraine war, where you talk about Biden, you talk about Sunak, you talk about Johnson, you talk about Macron, you talk about Trudeau, you talk about any of these people. They’ve all been weakened, because the people of these countries have more common sense than some of the leaders have to have.

7:40
My point is, this is a trap laid for Donald Trump. This is a very clever trap laid for Donald Trump, a minefield that if he steps on, it will blow to bits any chance of a detente with Russia. And in the view of some of us, the fact is, Russian neutrality during this new ongoing Cold War 2.0 with China is essential. If you don’t get Russian support, just as the West got Chinese support during Cold War 1.0, if you don’t get Russian support, at least Russian neutrality. And by making it much more difficult to do so because of this obsession with the European country, Ukraine, which frankly makes very little strategic difference to either Europe or Asia or the United States, wherever it goes. I think quite frankly, the Biden, whoever in the Biden administration is behind this. And so far the UK is concerned. Kier Starmer is marching in lockstep with Boris Johnson and Sunak. And if he’s going to continue, he’ll go the same way.

8:45
Already the Reform Party is gathering speed in Britain. What I understand is, it’s got more people than the Conservatives. But the Conservatives also jumped on the Ukrainian bandwagon. And Labour is going to pay a price for it. So I just want to say this war has to be ended now. And if it’s not ended, the West is in danger of losing the rest to China, and that is to the benefit of only one country, the present biggest threat to the West, which is China.

NewsX: 9:17
Thank you. Gilbert Doctorow, Russian affairs expert, also joins us. How would you respond to Madame Nalepat’s statement there calling this a minefield for the upcoming Donald Trump administration?

Doctorow:
I don’t agree. In war, in politics, timing is everything. The timing is based, is useful when you have good intelligence and understand the world around you. The administration of Washington has bad intelligence. It has a defective CIA, defective other intelligence agencies within Washington, and they have been feeding the president and the Congress completely misleading information or disinformation about the conduct of the war. If this measure had been introduced two years ago, it might have had an impact on Russia’s ability to conduct the war. However, it is being introduced at a time when Russia is close to dealing a knockout blow to Ukraine.

10:21
We are at the war’s end, in terms of Ukraine’s ability to defend itself. We are close to a capitulation of the Ukrainian forces. The only possible practical effect of these new sanctions, should they be implemented by the Trump administration, which is questionable, the only possible impact would be to hasten the Russian move for the knockout blow and to motivate Mr. Putin to hasten the war and to finish it up. And it means that these measures have an escalatory impact.

Wars are fought not only on the ground, but by economics. And this economic approach is wrongly timed because of the misinformation, as I said, and because of the cowardice of the Biden administration, which is the other side of the viciousness of this administration. These people, Blinken, Sullivan, and Biden are hateful people, and they think that they are giving a poison chalice to Mr. Trump. But it’s only because they’re misled. You can fool the other party, but you should not fool yourself with propaganda. And regrettably for them, the Biden administration is subject to its own propaganda.

NewsX: 11:46
Gilbert, I wanted to track back a little bit on this, and I was wondering how ordinary Russians will respond to these sanctions and the feeling in Russia about the war currently.

Doctorow:
To give a certain response to that question, because Russia has been on vacation for two weeks. The Russian news agencies, the Russian prime talk shows, the indications of what the elites around the Kremlin think, are only coming back on air on Monday and Tuesday, after the Russian New Year.

12:21
But I can tell you from the latest news bulletins, it is evident that the Russians appreciate the seriousness of these sanctions, but they expect to muddle through and to continue to prosecute the war. No one in Russia has been enthusiastic for this war. Let us be clear, it is a major war. Anyone who thinks that the fighting forces of Ukraine have not been valiant and have not given it their best effort is mistaken. This is a serious war, the largest in Europe since World War II.

And yet [Russia], acting on their own with minor logistical support from their allies, has beaten back everything that the United States and NATO have been able to throw at it. Ukraine is simply the space in which this war between NATO and Russia is being fought. So the Russians have, in the last several weeks, have increased confidence that they are winning this war and the end is near.

NewsX: 13:33
Professor Arvind Mahajan, I wanted to ask you, Russia currently faces around 13,000 international sanctions. With all these sanctions, how might Russia redirect its exports?

Mahajan:
Well, I think– I’m not a huge fan of sanctions, because as a generality, I have not seen them work very effectively in most of the cases. And it’s unclear to me really how effective these sanctions might be, even though the Department of Treasury has certainly ratcheted up what it has been doing over the last couple of years. So, I mean, frankly, from my viewpoint, our view of this war, to a large extent, is dictated by where we are situated. Clearly, the American view is slightly different than the Russian view, slightly different than the Indian view, slightly different than the Ukrainian view. And we are subject to our own biases and perspectives.

14:38
Unfortunately, we don’t really get a clear, unbiased information. None of us get them clearly because it’s kind of colored by where we are located and the echo chamber in which we exist. So I think our views on the war accordingly are determined by our position. As a generality, like I said earlier, I don’t think sanctions are usually a very effective tool. In this case, a negotiated settlement really is the only solution here. I am not sure, as I said earlier, I’m not sure how vigorously the Trump administration is going to implement and enforce the changes proposed by the Department of Treasury.

15:26
It’s also unclear to me how the OPEC countries are going to respond, in as far as changing the supply of oil in the markets is concerned. As was mentioned by someone else, there is enough oil in the market that this was an opportune time to put the sanctions on without the fear that the prices will spike up in a significant way, although we did see some increase in the price of oil yesterday. But it’s not going to be impactful as it would have been a couple of years ago when the global supplies were somewhat limited. So the long-winded answer to your clear question really is, one, the jury is out, and two, I don’t think these sanctions are going to be the determinant of how the war ends and on what terms it ends. I think these sanctions are a small part of the larger issues which the countries are dealing with to determine how it will be resolved. I just don’t see them as breaking the back of Russia, so that it will come running to the negotiating table.

NewsX: 16:33
Professor Gunaratna, I wanted to ask, as the UK and the US and Europe wean themselves off of Russian gas, how might Ukraine benefit from new energy deals or pipelines?

Gunaratna:
Ukraine certainly is challenged at this point. So my personal view is that it is so important for there to be a resolution to this conflict, because the threats are going to spread. Already Europe is witnessing so much of threats coming from Russia. And of course, Ukraine itself is mounting attacks deep into Russia.

So this escalation is going to cripple the economy of Europe, Ukraine and Russia. It’s going to create a big conflict and eventually the threat is going to spread beyond Ukraine. That is why I said that it is a great opportunity for the new administration to pursue a different path.

NewsX: 17:44
Daniel Wagner, I want to come to you on this next one. Let’s say this war does end after Trump takes office. How can the US and the UK assure that Ukraine won’t be threatened again?

Wagner:
Right, well, of course, we have to get to that point before we can have such a discussion. And a lot of people are very skeptical that this is actually going to be resolved quickly. It may take quite a few months to do so if all the parties are willing to go to the table. But at the end of the day, NATO is in a much better position than it was to protect itself.

It’s much better funded. It’s much better armed. And Ukraine itself, should it ever become a member of NATO, ultimately would be the best-experienced and best-armed country of NATO among them. So I think part of it will be to keep NATO armed, somehow keep it well funded in the recovery process, and for the NATO countries to step up to the plate and devote even a greater percentage of their GDP to NATO going forward. Two percent isn’t going to do it any more.

And as we know, Trump has talked about ramping that up to 5%. I don’t even think the US is gonna reach that point. So it all remains to be seen, but I do think Europe is in a much better position than it was previously.

NewsX: 19:19
Professor Nalapat, did these sanctions strengthen Russia’s push to build closer ties with countries like China and India?

Nalapat:
Well, I’m afraid the Russians have been pushed completely into the Chinese camp, thanks to these sanctions and thanks to this Ukraine war. And may I point out very, very, very respectfully that NATO has lost every single war it has fought. Frankly it has hardly fought a war in the European continent. There was no kinetic war between the USSR and the US and European countries. You take Libya, you take Iraq, you take Syria, you take Afghanistan, the NATO went in there and created a royal mess, a complete royal mess. So very frankly in Asia we are not very, what do I say, admiring of the great capabilities of NATO in conducting operations in actuality rather than computer simulations or battlefield simulations.

20:31
I think we’re very frankly, the record in Libya, the record in Afghanistan, the record in Syria, the record in Iraq, that all these records speak for themselves. I don’t know who is going to argue with these records. I want to say very clearly, we need to shift the focus back to the Indo-Pacific. We need to shift from Europe, we need to shift the focus back from Ukraine, I mean from Russia to China. And that is the reality that we are confronting today. So quite frankly we can do chest thumping about the immense strength of NATO. But try telling that to the people of Libya, to the people of Iraq, the people of Syria, to the people of Afghanistan and you may hear a bit of polite dissonance coming from them. Thank you.

NewsX: 21:23
Gilbert Doctorow, if Russia is shut out of Western markets, how might this reshape the global economic order, especially with Chinese involvement?

Doctorow:
Western markets, since shortly after the start of this special military operation in February 2022, that’s not a new development. They have found various ways of circumventing the sanctions and finding new markets. That took them perhaps four to six months from the start of the war till they found their feet and resolved the challenges that the United States was posing.

22:07
Those solutions are what are now being attacked by the latest sanctions that Yellen and others in the Biden administration have cooked up. I have in mind the question of the black fleet, the 150 ships or whatever that are being used by Russians to evade the sanctions concerning insurance requirements and other requirements on vessels carrying Russian oil around the world. They have succeeded, and I think they will be equally inventive in finding new solutions to counter the sanctions that are being produced. But the more important thing is not Russian evasion of the sanctions. They will be, as your first speaker mentioned, it will be the readiness and the ability of the incoming Trump administration to implement and to execute the intentions of these sanctions. And I don’t believe that the interest in Mr. Trump is to do that.

23:12
On the contrary, as I said a moment ago, full implementation of these sanctions, if they were to have the impact, the negative consequences for Russian exports of petroleum, would be, would push us in an escalatory direction. One has to remember that when countries are pressed in an existential way, as Japan was before World War II, what starts out economic becomes kinetic. And therefore the ultimate result, if Mr. Biden’s measures were to be successful, which they will not be, would be to escalate this war in the direction of a nuclear war. For that reason, I think we all should condemn what Biden has done. It is, as I said, a poison chalice and it comes from people who know no better.

NewsX:24:12
We have run out of time. That is all we have time for, unfortunately. Thank you very much [to] all our guests for joining us today in this discussion. We will continue to bring more news updates from the war and the rest of the world. Thank you for watching NewsX,

As they used to say at the betting parlors, ‘five will get you ten.’    Once you appear on one television station, the others also want some fresh blood.  And so I was not surprised to be invited this morning to appear on a new giant in Indian global broadcasting which calls itself Firstpost. They boast a subscriber base of over 13 million across leading platforms and in the past 90 days they reached over 350 million viewers worldwide.  Looking at the comments on my session with them today, it is clear that they have an open-minded audience: not a single viewer yet has complained that they are disseminating Putin propaganda…

As you expect from a global broadcaster Firstpost have operating centers in various major cities abroad. Indeed, the presenter for my interview was speaking to me from their Durban, South Africa offices. She opened our session with some well-chosen video spots from Joe Biden’s public announcement of the new drastic sanctions he imposed Friday on the Russian energy sector.

Since we all need a bit of comic relief in these difficult times, it was charming to hear Joe say his measures will work against ‘Putin’s wars.’ Note the plural coming from the mouth of a record-beating fomenter of wars and chaos during his own term in office.  Still better was Joe’s remark that ‘Putin is in tough shape.’ Seems that Joe spent too much time looking in the mirror when shaving this morning.

In my limited time on air, I focused attention on the wrong assumptions that underlie Joe Biden’s imposition of sanctions now, when the war is approaching its climax and conclusion, about which he knows nothing thanks to Lying Bill Burns at the CIA.

To calm the nerves of Indian oil traders who are now getting 32% of the country’s imports from Russia, I called out the likely refusal of Trump to enforce the unwanted sanctions which would only complicate his task of finding common language with Putin and bringing the war to closure.

There have been some readers questioning what I wrote earlier today about how Russian elites now believe that Trump will deliver a Yalta-like settlement with Moscow, as Vladimir Putin demands. Given that what I was citing came from the Vladimir Solovyov show and given that Solovyov has been deeply skeptical that anyone can overrule the Deep State and retrieve U.S.-Russian relations from the hell-hole where they now are trapped, I firmly believe that some kind of backchannel has been established between Trump and the Kremlin which accounts for the changed mood in Moscow and jollity that I saw on air.

See   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DPMzZ1tvFU

Translation below into German (Andreas Mylaeus)

Firstpost (Indien) Spotlight-Programm: US-Sanktionen gegen Russlands Öl treffen Indien

Wie man in den Wettbüros zu sagen pflegte: „Fünf werden dir zehn bringen.“ Sobald man in einem Fernsehsender auftritt, wollen auch die anderen frisches Blut. Und so war ich nicht überrascht, heute Morgen eingeladen zu werden, in einem neuen Giganten des indischen globalen Rundfunks aufzutreten, der sich Firstpost nennt. Sie verfügen über einen Abonnentenstamm von über 13 Millionen auf führenden Plattformen und haben in den letzten 90 Tagen weltweit über 350 Millionen Zuschauer erreicht. Wenn man sich die Kommentare zu meiner heutigen Sitzung mit ihnen ansieht, wird deutlich, dass sie ein aufgeschlossenes Publikum haben: Noch hat sich kein einziger Zuschauer darüber beschwert, dass sie Putin-Propaganda verbreiten …

Wie man es von einem globalen Sender erwarten kann, hat Firstpost Betriebszentren in verschiedenen Großstädten im Ausland. Tatsächlich sprach die Moderatorin meines Interviews mit mir aus ihrem Büro in Durban, Südafrika. Sie eröffnete unsere Sitzung mit einigen gut ausgewählten Videoclips von Joe Bidens öffentlicher Ankündigung der neuen drastischen Sanktionen, die er am Freitag gegen den russischen Energiesektor verhängt hatte.

Da wir in diesen schwierigen Zeiten alle ein wenig Aufheiterung brauchen, war es charmant zu hören, wie Joe sagte, dass seine Maßnahmen gegen „Putins Kriege“ wirken werden. Beachten Sie, dass der Plural aus dem Mund eines Rekordbrechers in Sachen Krieg und Chaos während seiner eigenen Amtszeit kommt. Noch besser war Joes Bemerkung, dass „Putin in einer schwierigen Verfassung ist“. Anscheinend hat Joe heute Morgen beim Rasieren zu viel Zeit damit verbracht, in den Spiegel zu schauen.

In meiner begrenzten Sendezeit habe ich mich auf die falschen Annahmen konzentriert, die Joe Bidens Verhängung von Sanktionen jetzt zugrunde liegen, wo der Krieg seinem Höhepunkt und Ende entgegengeht, worüber er dank des lügenden Bill Burns von der CIA nichts weiß.

Um die Nerven der indischen Ölhändler zu beruhigen, die inzwischen 32 % der Importe des Landes aus Russland beziehen, wies ich auf die wahrscheinliche Weigerung Trumps hin, die unerwünschten Sanktionen durchzusetzen, was seine Aufgabe, eine gemeinsame Sprache mit Putin zu finden und den Krieg zu beenden, nur erschweren würde.

Einige Leser haben meine heutige Aussage in Frage gestellt, dass die russischen Eliten nun glauben, Trump werde eine Jalta-ähnliche Einigung mit Moskau erzielen, wie Wladimir Putin es fordert. Da das, was ich zitiert habe, aus der Sendung von Wladimir Solowjow stammt und Solowjow zutiefst skeptisch ist, dass irgendjemand den Schattenstaat ausschalten und die amerikanisch-russischen Beziehungen aus dem Höllenloch befreien kann, in dem sie jetzt gefangen sind, glaube ich fest daran, dass es eine Art Geheimkanal zwischen Trump und dem Kreml gibt, der für die veränderte Stimmung in Moskau und die Heiterkeit, die ich in der Sendung gesehen habe, verantwortlich ist.

During an on-air conversation last Thursday with Judge Andrew Napolitano on ‘Judging Freeedom,’ I was asked how the Kremlin and Russian elites view the announcement by Donald Trump at his Mar a Lago press conference that he plans to take possession of Greenland and is prepared to use military force or economic pressure, as necessary, to wrest the island from its legal owner, Denmark.  I replied that no definitive answer is yet possible, because Russian news and commentary programming was shut down for the country’s two-week winter break that began on 31 December and will mostly return following the celebration of New Year’s according to the Gregorian calendar, 14 January as the world reckons today.

However, several Russian shows have returned to life ahead of their ‘old style’ New Year’s. Sixty Minutes was back on Friday, and the widely watched Evening with Vladimir Solovyov was again on air last night, Sunday. That show was almost entirely devoted to discussion of Trump’s Mar a Lago press conference and to the latest antics of Elon Musk operating as Trump’s attack dog against Left-leaning governments in Europe and Canada. The several panelists and the host were all delighted with Trump and confident that he will quickly drive a stake through the heart of the Biden legislative and policy legacy, leading to a 180 degree turn from hostile confrontation to live and let live in U.S. relations with Russia.

Last night’s Solovyov show took me back down memory lane. In November 2016, both before and after the U.S. presidential election, I was in Moscow. Just ahead of the election I was invited on to the Solovyov show to comment on Trump for the benefit of his Russian audience which was keen to hear from a Russian-speaking American who happened to be a Trump backer. In the break during that show, when Solovyov circulates among panelists while they take coffee, I asked him directly what he thought about Trump and he replied without a moment’s hesitation that he preferred for Hillary to win:  ‘better to get the devil we know than this volatile and unpredictable Trump.’

Of course, following the election, Russian state television suppressed doubts and celebrated Trump’s victory.  I joined RT host Peter Lavelle in his Cross Talk studio for a round table discussion of the good days to come.

For their part, as 2017 arrived Vladimir Solovyov and other representatives of Russia’s chattering classes were willing to give Donald the benefit of the doubt and see if he could implement the Russia-friendly policies he talked about in the electoral campaign.  As we now know, from the get-go Trump did not deliver on those promises. Indeed, bilateral relations deteriorated during the entire period of his presidency.

Heading into this year’s American elections, Solovyov and other Russian commentators took the position that it would make no difference who wins because the Deep State controls American policy so that the venomous hostility to Russia that has flourished during the Biden years will continue. The main thing, they all said, was for Russia to continue down its own path, smash Ukraine and NATO, and look after its own security by armed force.

Following the election, there was no change in the skepticism with which Russian elites met the Trump victory. In the first weeks, the nomination by Trump of numerous hawks and Neocons to man the top security, foreign policy and military posts in his administration did not augur well.  But then two weeks ago one remark by Trump when speaking to reporters caught Moscow’s attention.  He had called the decision by Joe Biden to allow Ukrainian strikes deep inside Russia using American made ATACMS missiles ‘foolish and dangerous.’ Moreover, other little signs indicated that perhaps the new administration would make changes in policy from the outset. Moscow perused with interest the invitation list to the inauguration, which did not include either Volodymyr Zelensky or EU commission president Ursula von der Leyen, the Ukrainian’s greatest supporter.

Then in this past week, Trump’s Mar a Lago remarks to the assembled press changed entirely Moscow’s estimation of what the Trump presidency may bring.

Russia’s experts are very happy to see Trump espousing a policy of naked aggression, of pure imperialism to further American interests, which is what his plans for Greenland and for retaking the Panama Canal illustrate. This marks a stark departure from the sweet talk of values based foreign policy that the Democrats have used as their smoke screen to spread chaos globally and enforce American hegemony. It is pure Realpolitik, or interests based foreign policy, and is music to the ears of the Russians.

Accordingly, Biden’s ‘rules-based order’ is kaput, spheres of influence are back in favor. The Russian ‘invasion’ of Ukraine assumes an entirely legitimate nature if, as Trump was saying at Mar al Lago, it had been provoked by Biden’s crossing red lines that had been set down back in 2008 by pushing for Ukraine’s admission to NATO.

Panelists on the Solovyov show said last night that they expect Trump to diminish or entirely cut off aid to Kiev. Talk about defending Ukraine’s 1992 borders, about it dealing a humiliating blow to Russia on the battlefield has ceased. From Trump’s words, Moscow believes that the USA will be indifferent to that actual borders that Ukraine retains at the conclusion of a peace, nor does it wish to provide security guaranties to Ukraine or to envisage its joining NATO at some date in the future.  All that counts is for there to be some semblance of sovereignty in the remaining territory when the Russians are through with it that will call itself Ukraine.

Obviously, from the words of the panelists, they do not expect Trump to enforce the crushing sanctions that Biden has just imposed on the Russian energy sector.

Most importantly, they expect that the eventual Trump – Putin summit, which may come soon or may come in April or in August, will not be about Ukraine but about a revision of the global security architecture. The word was not used, but they are clearly looking for a kind of Yalta-2 negotiation. The negotiation will be with Russia, and not with China, because it is Russia that has been the first to directly challenge U.S. global hegemony and it is Russia that remains the intellectual leader of the Global South towards BRICS and a multipolar world.

As for Elon Musk, Vladimir Solovyov’s panelists have greatly enjoyed his blunt and insulting words addressed to heads of government in Europe and further afield who have been Biden’s willing agents in the hybrid and kinetic war against their country over Ukraine. Musk’s publicly calling German chancellor Olaf Scholz a ‘stupid fool.’  His addressing Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau as ‘a little girl’, which is a snide reference to his ambiguous sexual orientation. Moscow takes great pleasure in such scandalous treatment of its enemies. Moreover, the Solovyov panelists see in all of Musk’s recent doings, including his X interview with Alternative for Germany co-chair Alice Weidel, an exercise in regime change that has a clear ideological dimension: to replace corrupt and cowardly Left-oriented governments in the European Union with friendly to Russia Rightist and populist led governments.  All of this they see as closely coordinated with Donald Trump, and it reinforces their newfound enthusiasm for Donald.

Let us hope that Russia’s elites are not mistaken this time about Trump. Their confidence appeared to be so solid that it is tempting to believe that some backchannel between the incoming American president and the Kremlin has been established, confirming the radical policy changes ahead. In the meantime, let us breathe easier.

©Gilbert Doctorow, 2025

Translation below into German (Andreas Mylaeus)

Russische Eliten sind begeistert von Donald Trumps Pressekonferenz in Mar a Lago

Während eines On-Air-Gesprächs mit Judge Andrew Napolitano am vergangenen Donnerstag in der Sendung „Judging Freedom“ wurde ich gefragt, wie der Kreml und die russischen Eliten die Ankündigung von Donald Trump auf seiner Pressekonferenz in Mar a Lago sehen, dass er plant, Grönland in Besitz zu nehmen und bereit ist, militärische Gewalt oder wirtschaftlichen Druck einzusetzen, um die Insel ihrem rechtmäßigen Eigentümer Dänemark zu entreißen. Ich antwortete, dass eine endgültige Antwort noch nicht möglich sei, da die russischen Nachrichten- und Kommentarsendungen wegen der zweiwöchigen Winterpause des Landes, die am 31. Dezember begann, eingestellt wurden und größtenteils nach den Feierlichkeiten zum Neujahrstag nach dem Gregorianischen Kalender, dem 14. Januar, wie die Welt ihn heute festlegt, wieder ausgestrahlt werden.

Einige russische Sendungen sind jedoch vor ihrem Neujahrsfest im „alten Stil“ wieder auf Sendung gegangen. Sechzig Minuten war am Freitag wieder auf Sendung, und die vielgesehene Sendung Abend mit Vladimir Solovyov war gestern Abend, am Sonntag, wieder auf Sendung. Diese Sendung war fast ausschließlich der Diskussion über Trumps Pressekonferenz in Mar a Lago und den jüngsten Eskapaden von Elon Musk gewidmet, der als Trumps Kampfhund gegen linksgerichtete Regierungen in Europa und Kanada agiert. Die verschiedenen Diskussionsteilnehmer und der Moderator waren alle begeistert von Trump und zuversichtlich, dass er Bidens politisches und legislatives Erbe schnell zunichte machen und zu einer 180-Grad-Wende von feindseliger Konfrontation zu einem „leben und leben lassen“ in den Beziehungen der USA zu Russland führen wird.

Die Solowjow-Sendung von gestern Abend hat mich in Erinnerungen schwelgen lassen. Im November 2016, sowohl vor als auch nach der US-Präsidentschaftswahl, war ich in Moskau. Kurz vor der Wahl wurde ich in die Solowjow-Sendung eingeladen, um Trump zu kommentieren, und zwar zum Nutzen seines russischen Publikums, das unbedingt von einem russischsprachigen Amerikaner hören wollte, der zufällig ein Trump-Anhänger war. In der Pause während dieser Sendung, als Solowjow sich unter den Diskussionsteilnehmern bewegt, während sie Kaffee trinken, fragte ich ihn direkt, was er von Trump halte, und er antwortete ohne zu zögern, dass er es vorziehen würde, wenn Hillary gewinnt: „Besser den Teufel, den wir kennen, als diesen launischen und unberechenbaren Trump.“

Natürlich unterdrückte das russische Staatsfernsehen nach der Wahl jegliche Zweifel und feierte Trumps Sieg. Ich schloss mich RT-Moderator Peter Lavelle in seinem Cross Talk-Studio zu einer Diskussionsrunde über die guten Tage, die vor uns liegen würden, an.

Als das Jahr 2017 anbrach, waren Wladimir Solowjow und andere Vertreter der russischen Klatschpresse ihrerseits bereit, Donald im Zweifelsfall zu vertrauen und abzuwarten, ob er die russlandfreundliche Politik, von der er im Wahlkampf gesprochen hatte, umsetzen würde. Wie wir heute wissen, hat Trump diese Versprechen von Anfang an nicht eingehalten. Tatsächlich haben sich die bilateralen Beziehungen während seiner gesamten Präsidentschaft verschlechtert.

Im Vorfeld der diesjährigen amerikanischen Wahlen vertraten Solowjow und andere russische Kommentatoren die Ansicht, dass es keinen Unterschied machen würde, wer gewinnt, da der Schattenstaat die amerikanische Politik kontrolliert und die giftige Feindseligkeit gegenüber Russland, die in den Biden-Jahren aufgeblüht ist, anhalten wird. Das Wichtigste sei, so sagten sie alle, dass Russland seinen eigenen Weg weitergeht, die Ukraine und die NATO zerschlägt und seine eigene Sicherheit mit Waffengewalt gewährleistet.

Nach der Wahl änderte sich nichts an der Skepsis, mit der die russischen Eliten dem Sieg von Trump begegneten. In den ersten Wochen ließ die Ernennung zahlreicher Falken und Neokonservativer durch Trump für die obersten Posten in den Bereichen Sicherheit, Außenpolitik und Militär in seiner Regierung nichts Gutes ahnen. Doch dann erregte vor zwei Wochen eine Bemerkung Trumps in einem Gespräch mit Reportern die Aufmerksamkeit Moskaus. Er hatte die Entscheidung von Joe Biden, ukrainische Angriffe tief in Russland mit in den USA hergestellten ATACMS-Raketen zuzulassen, als „dumm und gefährlich“ bezeichnet. Darüber hinaus deuteten andere kleine Anzeichen darauf hin, dass die neue Regierung möglicherweise von Anfang an Änderungen in der Politik vornehmen würde. Moskau nahm die Einladungsliste zur Amtseinführung mit Interesse zur Kenntnis, auf der weder Wolodymyr Selenskyj noch die Präsidentin der EU-Kommission Ursula von der Leyen, die größte Unterstützerin der Ukraine, standen.

In der vergangenen Woche haben Trumps Äußerungen gegenüber der versammelten Presse in Mar a Lago die Einschätzung Moskaus darüber, was die Präsidentschaft Trumps bringen könnte, völlig verändert.

Russische Experten sind sehr erfreut darüber, dass Trump eine Politik der nackten Aggression und des reinen Imperialismus zur Förderung amerikanischer Interessen befürwortet, wie seine Pläne für Grönland und die Rückeroberung des Panamakanals zeigen. Dies ist eine deutliche Abkehr von dem Gerede über eine wertebasierte Außenpolitik, das die Demokraten als Vorwand benutzt haben, um weltweit Chaos zu verbreiten und die amerikanische Hegemonie durchzusetzen. Es ist reine Realpolitik oder interessenbasierte Außenpolitik und Musik in den Ohren der Russen.

Dementsprechend ist Bidens „regelbasierte Ordnung“ kaputt, und Einflusssphären sind wieder in Mode. Die russische „Invasion“ der Ukraine ist völlig legitim, wenn sie, wie Trump in Mar al Lago sagte, durch Bidens Überschreitung der roten Linien provoziert wurde, die 2008 durch das Drängen auf die Aufnahme der Ukraine in die NATO festgelegt worden waren.

Die Diskussionsteilnehmer in der Solowjow-Sendung sagten gestern Abend, dass sie erwarten, dass Trump die Hilfe für Kiew verringern oder ganz einstellen wird. Die Rede davon, die Grenzen der Ukraine von 1992 zu verteidigen und Russland auf dem Schlachtfeld eine demütigende Niederlage zuzufügen, ist verstummt. Aus Trumps Worten geht hervor, dass Moskau glaubt, dass die USA gleichgültig gegenüber den tatsächlichen Grenzen sein werden, die die Ukraine nach Abschluss eines Friedensabkommens behält, und dass sie auch keine Sicherheitsgarantien für die Ukraine abgeben oder einen NATO-Beitritt zu einem späteren Zeitpunkt in Betracht ziehen wollen. Alles, was zählt, ist, dass sich auf dem verbleibenden Territorium, das sich Ukraine nennen wird nachdem die Russen die militärischen Aktionen abgeschlossen haben, einen Anschein von Souveränität gibt.

Aus den Worten der Podiumsteilnehmer geht eindeutig hervor, dass sie nicht erwarten, dass Trump die vernichtenden Sanktionen durchsetzen wird, die Biden gerade gegen den russischen Energiesektor verhängt hat.

Am wichtigsten ist, dass sie erwarten, dass es bei dem möglichen Trump-Putin-Gipfel, der bald oder im April oder August stattfinden könnte, nicht um die Ukraine, sondern um eine Überarbeitung der globalen Sicherheitsarchitektur gehen wird. Das Wort wurde nicht verwendet, aber sie streben eindeutig eine Art Jalta-2-Verhandlung an. Die Verhandlungen werden mit Russland und nicht mit China geführt, da Russland das erste Land war, das die globale Hegemonie der USA direkt in Frage gestellt hat, und Russland nach wie vor der intellektuelle Anführer des globalen Südens gegenüber den BRICS-Staaten und einer multipolaren Welt ist.

Was Elon Musk betrifft, so haben die Diskussionsteilnehmer von Wladimir Solowjow seine unverblümten und beleidigenden Worte an die Regierungschefs in Europa und darüber hinaus, die Bidens willige Agenten im hybriden und kinetischen Krieg gegen ihr Land wegen der Ukraine waren, sehr genossen. Musk bezeichnete den deutschen Bundeskanzler Olaf Scholz öffentlich als „dummen Narren“. Den kanadischen Premierminister Justin Trudeau nannte er „ein kleines Mädchen“, was eine abfällige Anspielung auf seine zweideutige sexuelle Orientierung ist. Moskau hat große Freude an einer solch skandalösen Behandlung seiner Feinde. Darüber hinaus sehen die Solowjow-Panelisten in allen jüngsten Handlungen von Musk, einschließlich seines X-Interviews mit der Co-Vorsitzenden der Alternative für Deutschland, Alice Weidel, eine Übung in Sachen Regimewechsel, die eine klare ideologische Dimension hat: korrupte und feige linksorientierte Regierungen in der Europäischen Union durch Russland-freundliche rechtsgerichtete und populistisch geführte Regierungen zu ersetzen. All dies wird von ihnen als eng mit Donald Trump abgestimmt angesehen und bestärkt sie in ihrer neu entdeckten Begeisterung für Donald.

Hoffen wir, dass sich die russischen Eliten dieses Mal in Bezug auf Trump nicht irren. Ihr Vertrauen schien so gefestigt zu sein, dass man geneigt ist zu glauben, dass es einen geheimen Draht zwischen dem neuen amerikanischen Präsidenten und dem Kreml gibt, was die bevorstehenden radikalen politischen Veränderungen bestätigen würde. In der Zwischenzeit können wir aufatmen.

In a posting yesterday, I said that I would present the link to the debate over Biden’s latest sanctions from hell imposed on the Russian energy sector as soon as that link became available.

Here it is:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Mucw9iJmhA

I am hopeful that viewers will find this discussion with 5 participants as refreshing as I did when participating in it.  My own contributions begin at the 9 minute mark and resume at the 21 minute mark. But I do recommend watching my fellow panelists for a reminder that the ‘truth will win out’ as Jan Hus once said in Prague and that ‘you  cannot fool all of the people all of the time,’ as Abraham Lincoln famously quipped.

Translation below into German (Andreas Mylaeus)

News X World: USA verhängen Sanktionen gegen Russland | Debatte mit Thomas Porteus

In einem gestrigen Posting sagte ich, dass ich den Link zur Debatte über Bidens neueste Sanktionen aus der Hölle, die dem russischen Energiesektor auferlegt wurden, präsentieren würde, sobald dieser Link verfügbar ist.

Hier ist er:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Mucw9iJmhA

Ich hoffe, dass die Zuschauer diese Diskussion mit fünf Teilnehmern genauso erfrischend finden werden wie ich, als ich daran teilnahm. Meine eigenen Beiträge beginnen bei Minute 9 und werden bei Minute 21 fortgesetzt. Ich empfehle jedoch, meine Mitdiskutanten zu beobachten, um sich daran zu erinnern, dass „die Wahrheit siegen wird“, wie Jan Hus einst in Prag sagte, und dass „man nicht alle Menschen immer zum Narren halten kann“, wie Abraham Lincoln einst sagte.

In its closing weeks before the Trump inauguration, the Biden administration is doing its very best to present its successor with a poisoned chalice, meaning to push relations with Russia to the point where it is politically impossible to pursue the path of peace that Trump has made his priority upon taking office.

At the latest meeting at Ramstein, Germany, Secretary of Defense Austin announced a further tranche of $500 million in armaments to Kiev.  In the past few days there were further Ukrainian attacks on the interior regions of the Russian Federation using American precision missiles, repeatedly crossing what the Russians have declared to be a red line that triggers escalation. And now on Friday Washington issued new sanctions on the Russian energy sector which, from all appearances could have a devastating impact on Russia’s export earnings.

The latest sanctions have received extensive coverage in major Western media. A Financial Times article yesterday details the various points of attack in the sanctions. These include measures against the Russian oil producers Gazprom Neft and Surgutneftegas and measures against the 183 oil tankers in what is called the ‘shadow fleet’ Russia created over the past 18 months to evade Washington’s restrictions on its traditional shippers of crude oil and insurers. Other new sanctions will be applied to petroleum traders. And new measures also seek to cut Russia’s production capacity by sanctions on Russia-based oilfield service providers.

The new sanctions package has been jointly developed and will be jointly applied with the U.K., whose foreign secretary David Lammy explained the intent: ‘Taking on Russian oil companies will drain Russia’s war chest – and every rouble we take from Putin’s hands helps save Ukrainian lives.’

As to why the sanctions on Russia’s energy sector are being tightened drastically now, the FT has an answer for us: ‘because oil markets are expected to be oversupplied in 2025.’ That is to say, removal of Russian oil from the global market could not be pursued earlier because it would have driven up prices at the pump in the USA to politically unacceptable levels given the presidential and Congressional elections anticipated in 2024. But now that the elections are past, now that the Democrats have lost both the presidency and Congress, and now that new sources of crude oil have come onto the market, the attitude is ‘bombs away’ and let Mr. Trump deal with the fall-out.

As the FT tells us slyly: ‘…The last-minute move creates a challenge for President-elect Trump, who campaigned on ending the war between Russian and Ukraine quickly and has expressed scepticism of imposing additional sanctions…’  They remind us that Biden’s sanctions are now embodied in law and that it would require an act of Congress to undo them, which is unlikely even under circumstances of Republican control of both houses.

The FT believes that the new measures may cost the Russian government billions of dollars per month, putting in jeopardy its continued financing of the war in Ukraine.

                                                                             ****

So far, so good. The FT has set out as a stenographer would what are the basic elements of the new sanctions package and what are the expectations of the Biden administration and of its friends in London. What is missing is journalistic questioning of how, why the logic of Washington might be faulty and the results might differ considerably from the expectations, as has been the case with all of the myriad sanctions imposed on Russia from the start of the Special Military Operation. Let us give that a try now.

But first, let’s look at how Moscow reacted to the new package of sanctions. Friday evening’s edition of Sixty Minutes, a featured news and analysis program of Rossiya 1 freshly back on air after the nearly two week-long winter break, spent some time discussing the sanctions. The mood was one of consternation but not alarm. The feeling was that Russia had one way or another overcome the thousands of sanctions already imposed and would somehow work around the new ones.

Indeed, that may be the case, but there are other considerations which may be more relevant to the case at hand.

First, although the new sanctions would be difficult, even impossible for Trump to repeal by legislative action, there is nothing to prevent his simply not enforcing them. That would be all the easier given that the United States would have to proactively threaten and punish many actors based in third countries for the sanctions to bite, so that a wink and a nod to them would suffice to negate the effect of sanctions.

Second, this all-out attack on Russia’s oil production and export simply comes too late. In war, as in all other human endeavors, timing is critical.  We are told that such severe sanctions were not applied earlier because until 2025 the global petroleum markets were tight and withdrawing Russian supplies would have led at once to high spikes in energy costs that would be felt in all consumer countries, starting with the United States itself. However, to think such sanctions will be useful in forcing Russia to bend the knee and accept American terms to end the war is to ignore the realities of the present situation on the battlefield.

Washington is gaming on the war in Ukraine extending into 2027 and beyond. This timeline was used in the past week’s gathering of Ukraine supporters in Ramstein, Germany as they discussed continuing military and financial aid to Kiev through that year. However, the game is going to be up in 2025 and perhaps fairly early in this year if the ongoing Russian offensive all across the 1200 km line of confrontation achieves its mission of crushing the Ukrainian forces and achieving capitulation. With or without the new deliveries of arms and munitions from the West, Ukraine lacks the men to continue the war for long at its present level of intensity. Kiev admits to 500,000 men not showing up after receiving their draft notices and to a further 100,000 deserters from the armed forces. The reduction of the draft age to 18 for purposes of general mobilization is unlikely to ameliorate the situation given the universal resistance to what is perceived as ‘robbing the cradle.’

Ignorance of the relative positions of the warring parties on the battlefield is precisely the problem that the American administration has made for itself by relying for its tactical and strategic plans on the corrupted information sources of the CIA. The Agency is simply passing along to the Oval Office the propaganda it wants to hear coming from Kiev.  My good colleague and ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern, and his colleague Larry Johnson who has years of both CIA and State Department service behind him, have both been saying publicly that the CIA under the direction of William Burns is daily lying through its teeth about this war.

On the other hand, let us assume for a moment that the new sanctions should have a sudden and extreme impact on Russia’s petroleum exports, depriving the Kremlin of needed funds to continue the war. What then?

Yes, in such circumstances, Moscow might pull in its horns and enter negotiations for a ceasefire and possibly for a peace while compromising on some of its objectives.  However, it is also possible that the reaction in the Kremlin would be the direct opposite of what the Biden administration expects, namely to escalate the war, sharply and immediately, putting us all at risk of a nuclear exchange.

For strange reasons, the masters of the universe in Washington are ignoring the message of the recently commemorated 7 December Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The Japanese demonstrated that at a certain point, when the pain of economic warfare becomes unbearable, the response is to unleash kinetic war, the more devastating, the better.  Have Messrs. Jake Sullivan, Tony Blinken and Joe Biden given that any thought? I doubt that in their collective hubris they have given any thought to such a scenario.

But let us not be overly gloomy. Mr. Putin never overreacts. It is more likely that the effect of the newest sanctions will prompt President Putin to merely accelerate his schedule for complete victory on the ground in Ukraine.

There is reason to believe that a big push to smash the Ukrainians is already under way. Today’s Financial Times reports that to everyone’s surprise the Russians have decided against frontal assault on the key logistics hub of Pokrovsk and are avoiding time consuming and hazardous urban fighting there. Instead they are sweeping past Pokrovsk and cutting off the highways and rail links supplying it from the west and north by moving their own forces in the direction of Dnepropetrovsk (Dnipro), Ukraine’s fourth largest city. As they say, where there is a will, there is a way. As they run out of supplies, the Ukrainian troops in Pokrovsk will be compelled to retreat, and the Russian advance to the Dniepr river will go that much faster.

©Gilbert Doctorow, 2025

Translation below into German (Andreas Mylaeus)

Neue US-Sanktionen gegen russische Ölexporte: ein lähmender Angriff auf die Kriegswirtschaft des Kremls?

In den letzten Wochen vor der Amtseinführung von Trump tut die Biden-Regierung ihr Bestes, um ihrem Nachfolger einen vergifteten Kelch zu überreichen, d.h. die Beziehungen zu Russland so weit zu belasten, dass es politisch unmöglich sein soll, den Weg des Friedens zu beschreiten, den Trump bei seinem Amtsantritt zu seiner Priorität gemacht hat.

Auf dem jüngsten Treffen in Ramstein, Deutschland, kündigte Verteidigungsminister Austin eine weitere Tranche von 500 Millionen Dollar an Rüstungsgütern für Kiew an. In den vergangenen Tagen gab es weitere Angriffe der Ukraine auf die inneren Regionen der Russischen Föderation mit amerikanischen Präzisionsraketen, die wiederholt eine von den Russen als rote Linie bezeichnete Eskalationsschwelle überschritten. Und nun hat Washington am Freitag neue Sanktionen gegen den russischen Energiesektor verhängt, die allem Anschein nach verheerende Auswirkungen auf die Exporteinnahmen Russlands haben könnten.

Über die jüngsten Sanktionen wurde in den großen westlichen Medien ausführlich berichtet. Ein Artikel der Financial Times von gestern beschreibt die verschiedenen Angriffspunkte der Sanktionen. Dazu gehören Maßnahmen gegen die russischen Ölproduzenten Gazprom Neft und Surgutneftegas sowie Maßnahmen gegen die 183 Öltanker der sogenannten „Schattenflotte“, die Russland in den letzten 18 Monaten aufgebaut hat, um die von Washington verhängten Beschränkungen für seine traditionellen Rohöl-Spediteure und Versicherer zu umgehen. Weitere neue Sanktionen werden gegen Erdölhändler verhängt. Und neue Maßnahmen zielen auch darauf ab, die Produktionskapazität Russlands durch Sanktionen gegen in Russland ansässige Ölfelddienstleister zu verringern.

Das neue Sanktionspaket wurde gemeinsam mit dem Vereinigten Königreich entwickelt und wird auch gemeinsam mit diesem angewendet. Der britische Außenminister David Lammy erklärte die Absicht: „Die russischen Ölkonzerne zu treffen, wird Russlands Kriegskasse leeren – und jeder Rubel, den wir Putin aus der Hand nehmen, hilft, ukrainische Leben zu retten.“

Auf die Frage, warum die Sanktionen gegen den russischen Energiesektor jetzt drastisch verschärft werden, hat die FT eine Antwort für uns: „Weil die Ölmärkte im Jahr 2025 voraussichtlich überversorgt sein werden.“ Das heißt, die Entfernung des russischen Öls vom Weltmarkt hätte nicht früher erfolgen können, weil dies die Preise an den Zapfsäulen in den USA angesichts der für 2024 erwarteten Präsidentschafts- und Kongresswahlen auf ein politisch inakzeptables Niveau getrieben hätte. Aber jetzt, da die Wahlen vorbei sind, jetzt, da die Demokraten sowohl die Präsidentschaft als auch den Kongress verloren haben, und jetzt, da neue Rohölquellen auf den Markt gekommen sind, lautet die Devise: „Bomben abwerfen“ und Herrn Trump mit den Folgen fertig werden lassen.

Wie die FT uns verschmitzt mitteilt: „… Der Schachzug in letzter Minute stellt den designierten Präsidenten Trump vor eine Herausforderung, der sich im Wahlkampf für eine schnelle Beendigung des Krieges zwischen Russland und der Ukraine eingesetzt und sich skeptisch gegenüber der Verhängung zusätzlicher Sanktionen geäußert hat…“ Sie erinnern uns daran, dass Bidens Sanktionen nun gesetzlich verankert sind und dass es eines Beschlusses des Kongresses bedürfte, um sie aufzuheben, was selbst unter den Umständen, dass beide Häuser von den Republikanern kontrolliert werden, unwahrscheinlich ist.

Die FT geht davon aus, dass die neuen Maßnahmen die russische Regierung monatlich Milliarden Dollar kosten und damit die weitere Finanzierung des Krieges in der Ukraine gefährden könnten.

                                                                             ****

So weit, so gut. Die FT hat wie ein Stenograf dargelegt, was die Grundelemente des neuen Sanktionspakets sind und welche Erwartungen die Biden-Regierung und ihre Freunde in London haben. Was fehlt, ist eine journalistische Untersuchung, wie und warum die Logik Washingtons fehlerhaft sein könnte und die Ergebnisse erheblich von den Erwartungen abweichen könnten, wie es bei allen unzähligen Sanktionen der Fall war, die seit Beginn der militärischen Spezialoperation gegen Russland verhängt wurden. Versuchen wir es jetzt.

Aber zuerst wollen wir uns ansehen, wie Moskau auf das neue Sanktionspaket reagiert hat. In der Freitagsausgabe von Sixty Minutes, einer Nachrichten- und Analysesendung von Rossiya 1, die nach einer fast zweiwöchigen Winterpause wieder auf Sendung ist, wurde einige Zeit lang über die Sanktionen diskutiert. Die Stimmung war von Bestürzung, aber nicht von Alarm geprägt. Man hatte das Gefühl, dass Russland die Tausenden von bereits verhängten Sanktionen auf die eine oder andere Weise überwinden und die neuen Sanktionen irgendwie umgehen würde.

Das mag in der Tat der Fall sein, aber es gibt andere Überlegungen, die für den vorliegenden Fall möglicherweise relevanter sind.

Erstens: Auch wenn es für Trump schwierig, wenn nicht gar unmöglich wäre, die neuen Sanktionen durch gesetzgeberische Maßnahmen aufzuheben, hindert ihn nichts daran, sie einfach nicht durchzusetzen. Dies wäre umso einfacher, da die Vereinigten Staaten viele Akteure in Drittländern proaktiv bedrohen und bestrafen müssten, damit die Sanktionen greifen, sodass ein Wink und ein Nicken ausreichen würden, um die Wirkung der Sanktionen zu negieren.

Zweitens kommt dieser umfassende Angriff auf die Ölproduktion und den Ölexport Russlands einfach zu spät. Im Krieg, wie bei allen anderen menschlichen Unternehmungen, ist das Timing entscheidend. Uns wird gesagt, dass solche schweren Sanktionen nicht früher verhängt wurden, weil die globalen Erdölmärkte bis 2025 angespannt waren und ein Entzug der russischen Lieferungen sofort zu einem starken Anstieg der Energiekosten geführt hätte, der in allen Verbraucherländern zu spüren gewesen wäre, angefangen bei den Vereinigten Staaten selbst. Wer jedoch glaubt, dass solche Sanktionen nützlich sein werden, um Russland dazu zu zwingen, sich zu beugen und die amerikanischen Bedingungen zu akzeptieren, um den Krieg zu beenden, ignoriert die Realität der gegenwärtigen Situation auf dem Schlachtfeld.

Washington setzt darauf, dass der Krieg in der Ukraine bis 2027 und darüber hinaus andauert. Diese Zeitachse wurde in der vergangenen Woche bei einem Treffen von Unterstützern der Ukraine in Ramstein, Deutschland, verwendet, bei dem über die Fortsetzung der militärischen und finanziellen Hilfe für Kiew in diesem Jahr diskutiert wurde. Das Spiel wird jedoch 2025 oder vielleicht schon ziemlich früh in diesem Jahr vorbei sein, wenn die anhaltende russische Offensive entlang der 1.200 km langen Konfrontationslinie ihr Ziel erreicht, die ukrainischen Streitkräfte zu zerschlagen und eine Kapitulation zu erreichen. Mit oder ohne die neuen Waffen- und Munitionslieferungen aus dem Westen fehlen der Ukraine die Männer, um den Krieg auf dem derzeitigen Intensitätsniveau noch lange fortzusetzen. Kiew gibt zu, dass 500.000 Männer nach Erhalt ihrer Einberufungsbescheide nicht zum Dienst erschienen sind und dass weitere 100.000 Deserteure aus den Streitkräften desertiert sind. Die Herabsetzung des Einberufungsalters für die allgemeine Mobilmachung auf 18 Jahre wird die Situation angesichts des allgemeinen Widerstands gegen das, was als „Raub der Wiege“ empfunden wird, wahrscheinlich nicht verbessern.

Die Unkenntnis der relativen Positionen der Kriegsparteien auf dem Schlachtfeld ist genau das Problem, das sich die amerikanische Regierung selbst geschaffen hat, indem sie sich bei ihren taktischen und strategischen Plänen auf die korrupten Informationsquellen der CIA verlässt. Die Agentur gibt lediglich die Propaganda an das Oval Office weiter, die sie aus Kiew hören möchte. Mein geschätzter Kollege und ehemaliger CIA-Analyst Ray McGovern und sein Kollege Larry Johnson, der jahrelang sowohl für die CIA als auch für das Außenministerium tätig war, haben beide öffentlich erklärt, dass die CIA unter der Leitung von William Burns täglich Lügen über diesen Krieg verbreitet.

Nehmen wir andererseits für einen Moment an, dass die neuen Sanktionen einen plötzlichen und extremen Einfluss auf die Erdölexporte Russlands haben sollten, wodurch dem Kreml die benötigten Mittel für die Fortsetzung des Krieges entzogen würden. Was dann?

Ja, unter solchen Umständen könnte Moskau einlenken und in Verhandlungen über einen Waffenstillstand und möglicherweise über einen Frieden eintreten, wobei es bei einigen seiner Ziele Kompromisse eingehen würde. Es ist jedoch auch möglich, dass die Reaktion im Kreml genau das Gegenteil von dem ist, was die Biden-Regierung erwartet, nämlich eine scharfe und sofortige Eskalation des Krieges, die uns alle der Gefahr eines nuklearen Schlagabtauschs aussetzt.

Aus seltsamen Gründen ignorieren die Herren des Universums in Washington die Botschaft des kürzlich mit einer Feier bedachten japanischen Angriffs auf Pearl Harbor am 7. Dezember. Die Japaner haben gezeigt, dass ab einem bestimmten Punkt, wenn der Schmerz des Wirtschaftskrieges unerträglich wird, die Reaktion darin besteht, einen kinetischen Krieg vom Zaun zu brechen, je verheerender, desto besser. Haben die Herren Jake Sullivan, Tony Blinken und Joe Biden darüber nachgedacht? Ich bezweifle, dass ihnen in ihrer kollektiven Selbstüberschätzung überhaupt ein solches Szenario in den Sinn kommt.

Aber wir sollten nicht zu pessimistisch sein. Herr Putin neigt nicht zu Überreaktionen. Es ist wahrscheinlicher, dass die Wirkung der neuesten Sanktionen Präsident Putin dazu veranlassen wird, seinen Zeitplan für den vollständigen Sieg in der Ukraine vor Ort zu beschleunigen.

Es gibt Grund zu der Annahme, dass bereits ein großer Vorstoß zur Zerschlagung der Ukrainer im Gange ist. Die heutige Ausgabe der Financial Times berichtet, dass die Russen zur Überraschung aller beschlossen haben, auf einen Frontalangriff auf den wichtigen Logistikknotenpunkt Pokrowsk zu verzichten und zeitaufwändige und gefährliche Kämpfe in der Stadt zu vermeiden. Stattdessen umgehen sie Pokrowsk und schneiden die Autobahnen und Bahnverbindungen ab, die die Stadt aus dem Westen und Norden versorgen, indem sie ihre eigenen Truppen in Richtung Dnepropetrowsk (Dnipro), der viertgrößten Stadt der Ukraine, verlegen. Wie man so schön sagt: Wo ein Wille ist, ist auch ein Weg. Wenn die Vorräte der ukrainischen Truppen in Pokrowsk zur Neige gehen, werden sie sich zurückziehen müssen, und der Vormarsch der Russen bis zum Dnepr wird umso schneller voranschreiten.

Transcript submitted by a reader

NewsX: 0:00
Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro has sworn in for a controversial third term, sparking global backlash. The US has announced an increased 25-million-dollar reward for his arrest on narcotics and corruption charges. Similar bounties target close allies, including interior minister Diostado Cabello and defense minister Vladimir Ppadrino. The UK, EU and Canada have also imposed fresh sanctions, accusing Maduro’s regime of human rights abuses and undermining democracy. Venezuela has dismissed these claims, blaming its economic woes on what it called US-led imperial sanctions. Maduro, meanwhile, insists his new term will bring peace and prosperity, but critics say the July election was rigged, with international observers rejecting the results. The US calls Maduro’s leadership fraudulent, offering a 65- million-dollar bounty for him and his key allies. Aditya, with this recent news from Venezuela, why is there so much international attention on this case?

Aditya Wadhawan: 1:06
Well, you know, as you rightly pointed out, the US has also placed a $25-million bounty upon this Nicolás Maduro. You know, in the past, he has been sworn in as a Venezuelan president for the third time and you know many reports suggest that you know this voting hasn’t been fair because the opposition leaders have been arrested and there is a whole sort of autocracy that exists in Venezuela. That is why you know this protest with this particularly this particular Nicolás Maduro is getting international attention you know that is why you know America has also put this bounty of 25 million dollars it needs to be seen you know. Earlier also America you know have threatened this Maduro because you know his governance hasn’t been well, you know. During his last term, the inflation in Venezuela has reached to about 400% inflation. So that needs to be seen as to what steps are taken in this regard and what the build-up, how will the international community respond to this further. Yes, Tom, back to you in the studio.

NewsX: 2:11
Thank you, Aditya. For further discussion on this we are joined by Professor AK Pasha, international affairs expert, live from New Delhi; Gilbert Doctorow, russian affairs expert, live from Brussels. Thank you for joining us. My first question is for you, Professor AK Pasha. The US has a long history of getting involved in socialist Latin America. What is their– what did they want the outcome to be in this case, now they’re offering this bounty?

AK Pasha, PhD: 2:42
The recent announcement, increase in bounty for capture of the Venezuelan president and the interior minister and others, you know, it is a continuation of the regime-change agenda by the United States and its allies, you know, who have become used to changing regimes who don’t toe the US line. It is not the first time or the last time. They have done it plenty of times, not only in Latin America but elsewhere. But what makes this case unique is the continuation of the socialist regime there and how they have survived years of sanctions and deprivation and the confiscation of their gold reserves, so on and so forth. Although there is high inflation, but from what I hear from one of my students who is an ambassador there, that life goes on normally there for most Venezuelans, even though it is tough. But the kind of propaganda which America and its allies have been unleashing has not undermined Maduro and Socialist Party to a very large extent, like the Iranian regime also which has been under sanctions, or Russia.

4:18
You know, it is a systematic policy pursued by the United States and its allies to undermine and overthrow the regimes which it doesn’t like. On the one hand, you have $10 million on the head of the new Syrian administration, HTS, which has been ignored. It is a terrorist organization, declared by the State Department. But since he collaborated with the United States and its allies, you know, that will not see the light of the day. So this double standard is part of the US policy to undermine its own propagation of rules-based order, whether it is Venezuela or Russia or Iran or even Nicaragua or Cuba or for that matter many other countries which have become victims.


And increasingly countries in the global south are looking for break away from this so-called rules-based order and steering towards the BRICS which is emerging as an alternative power block to challenge the US attempts to strangulate countries which don’t toe the American line.

NewsX: 5:37
Gilbert, I wanted to come on to you in this next one. Is offering a bounty for a head of state an appropriate use of foreign policy?

[speaking simultaneously]
… Sorry.

Gilbert Doctorow, PhD: 5:50
I agree with the speaker who has just completed his remarks, in every respect. I’d like to put a new title on. We’re talking about naked imperialism. This term has come up in discussion in international news in the last several days, thanks to Donald Trump’s stating what he would like to do to Greenland and what he’d like to do to Panama Canal. Some of that, that bravado, that macho foreign policy has been applauded by people like the “Financial Times”, who said, on his remarks, “Oh, we thought that Trump is an isolationist. No, he’s actually an expansionist. And bravo.”

So there are people in the G7 and UK as foremost in this who applaud imperialism. That is not true of the global South, and I think it’s probably not true of many of your listeners. After all, the kind of sanctions and penalties that Joe Biden is now imposing on the Venezuelan leader, well, you have a recollection of that in India. After all, the United States had imposed sanctions on Modi, before he took power, for their disagreement with his treatment of minorities within India.

7:18
So the United States is an imperialist state, whether it’s run by Mr. Joe Biden in the name of a rules-based order and values-driven foreign policy, or whether it’s driven by a man who is unafraid of positioning himself as promoting naked aggression, like Mr. Trump.

NewsX: 7:40
Professor AK Pascha, they have accused– this bounty is for a 2020 arrest warrant for him being accused of narco terrorism and flooding the United States with cocaine. Is this the right time to use this arrest warrant, and what do you think of America and the UK being involved in this?

Pasha:
You see, this is the typical State Department, I mean the rule passed by the US Congress to use State Department to accuse leaders who don’t toe the US line of corruption and narcotic involvement. You know, this has been done for a number of leaders, including former Panamanian head of state, who was abducted, to many other leaders in Latin America. So this is well known.

8:42
You know, this is just a cover, a pretext for the US administration to accuse the popular leaders of involvement in drug charges and corruption charges, whereas they overlook their own support to whether it is the Pakistani leaders or the innumerable dictators America supports in Africa or even in Latin America and elsewhere. So this charge of undermining the democratic process itself is questionable, because America has never respected the democratic elections. For example, the Hamas elections, Palestinian elections in 2006 which brought Hamas to power in Gaza was never respected, and they declared it as a terrorist organization. Or even the involvement of the full line Lebanese politics, you know, they look at it as a terrorist organization.

9:43
So anybody who genuinely participates in the political process and wins due to popular electoral support, you know, this legitimacy is questioned selectively, and this is what is a big question mark for American foreign policy. And the British also toe the American line. And this is undermining the credibility of the United States as a leader of democracy. And the rules-based order is being pulled down brick by brick by themselves, and pushing the global South countries to look with suspicion [on] what they do, whether it is against Venezuela or Iran or Russia or Nicaragua or South Africa also. And even including India, you know, they try to question a number of issues, domestic issues, with which America has nothing to do. So in that way, the color revolutions in Central Asia or in the Caucasus, all these including in Ukraine, where many were through the CIA and its regime-change agenda.

10:55
And this is isolating the Americans, if you see the voting pattern in the United Nations General Assembly. On many of these issues, America is isolated. More than two-thirds of the members of the United Nations disapprove of what America has been pursuing for its narrow national interest, ignoring the aspirations, expectations of the global South who want a better life, who want development, who want less exploitation, and the kind of strangulating sanctions imposed on any issue if you don’t buy the American language. So in that way, you know, the American leaders themselves have been isolating and affecting its own credibility in the short term and in the long run.

NewsX: 11:50
Gilbert Doctorow, election observers in Venezuela claim they have credible evidence that Gonzalez, his opponent, won the election. Western countries and countries all around the world have all called Maduro’s win illegitimate. What does, do you think once President Trump comes to power, can you see him getting involved in this like the Biden administration has?

Doctorow: 12:17
Oh very likely he will be, though he has other issues that are foremost in his policy plans. But this would fall in line completely with Trump’s view of America’s policeman role within the Western hemisphere. I applaud the mention by my colleague, fellow panelist, of the Noriega case, that is the abduction of the president of Panama, and his being taken to the United States where he died in prison after many years.

This is also, you need a sense of irony to appreciate what these charges of narco traffic mean when they’re addressed to the Venezuelan president. I think the biggest trader in narcotics in the last two decades was the United States, the United States government, which encouraged the cultivation of poppy in Afghanistan and facilitated the heroin trade. It was only when the Taliban took over that they snuffed out within two years what the United States seemed to be unable to touch for the whole time that it was resident in Afghanistan. So there’s a lot of hypocrisy here.

And when you say that the members of the G7 and other allies of the United States condemn the elections, there’s a British expression which summarizes very efficiently the response to that: “You would say that, wouldn’t you.”

NewsX: 13:49
Thank you very much for joining us on this discussion.

News X (India):  a genuine voice of the Global South?

To my surprise and pleasure, each new invitation to participate in panel discussions of breaking news on this Indian English-language global broadcaster shows the increasingly confident commitment of their producers to present a broad variety of expert views to their audience. While the News X presenter introduces the given subject for discussion reading from Western mainstream accounts, and while their own in-house analyst, when present, does not stray far from that mark, their guests are impressive for their well-informed critical view of the Global Hegemon and its lackeys in the EU and G7.

The video imbedded below dealing with Western repudiation of the electoral results in the latest Venezuelan presidential election and announcement by the United States of a $25 million bounty on the head of Nicolas Maduro was taped at noon today Brussels time. My fellow panelist, an Indian professor, is quite extraordinary and I commend his remarks to my community.

I add as a side comment that this evening’s television news on Rossiya 1 showed images of the Duma president Volodin attending President Maduro’s inauguration in Caracas and extending warm congratulations from Vladimir Putin.

Late in the afternoon, I was invited back by News X for a discussion of the latest package of harsh sanctions directed against Russian oil exports that the Biden Administration has just imposed. Here I was joined by 4 other panelists, including one American based in the States who delivered the Washington narrative on the state of the Ukraine war and prospects for the sanctions crippling the Russian economy, while the three Indian experts who spoke were much better connected to the political and economic realities of Russia as it approaches the culmination point in its destruction of the Ukrainian armed forces.  I will post the link to that discussion as soon as it becomes available.

Translation below into German (Andreas Mylaeus)

News X (Indien): eine echte Stimme des globalen Südens?

Zu meiner Überraschung und Freude zeigt jede neue Einladung zur Teilnahme an Podiumsdiskussionen über aktuelle Nachrichten dieses indischen englischsprachigen globalen Senders das zunehmend selbstbewusste Engagement seiner Produzenten, ihrem Publikum eine breite Vielfalt an Expertenmeinungen zu präsentieren. Während der Moderator von News X das jeweilige Diskussionsthema anhand von westlichen Mainstream-Berichten einführt und der hauseigene Analyst, sofern anwesend, nicht weit von diesem Thema abweicht, beeindrucken die Gäste durch ihre gut informierte kritische Sicht auf den globalen Hegemon und seine Lakaien in der EU und den G7.

Das unten eingebettete Video, das sich mit der Ablehnung der Wahlergebnisse der letzten Präsidentschaftswahlen in Venezuela durch den Westen und der Ankündigung der Vereinigten Staaten, ein Kopfgeld in Höhe von 25 Millionen US-Dollar auf Nicolas Maduro auszusetzen, befasst, wurde heute Mittag Brüsseler Zeit aufgenommen. Mein Mitdiskutant, ein indischer Professor, ist wirklich außergewöhnlich und ich empfehle seine Ausführungen meiner Gemeinschaft.

Ich möchte noch anmerken, dass in den Fernsehnachrichten auf Rossiya 1 heute Abend Bilder des Duma-Präsidenten Wolodin gezeigt wurden, der an der Amtseinführung von Präsident Maduro in Caracas teilnahm und herzliche Glückwünsche von Wladimir Putin überbrachte.

Am späten Nachmittag wurde ich von News X zu einer Diskussion über das jüngste Paket harter Sanktionen gegen russische Ölexporte eingeladen, das die Biden-Regierung gerade verhängt hat. Hier wurde ich von vier weiteren Diskussionsteilnehmern begleitet, darunter ein Amerikaner, der in den USA lebt und die Sichtweise Washingtons zum Stand des Ukraine-Krieges und zu den Aussichten für die Sanktionen, die die russische Wirtschaft lahmlegten, darlegte, während die drei indischen Experten, die sprachen, viel besser mit den politischen und wirtschaftlichen Realitäten Russlands vertraut waren, das sich dem Höhepunkt der Zerstörung der ukrainischen Streitkräfte nähert. Ich werde den Link zu dieser Diskussion posten, sobald er verfügbar ist.