1 00:00:02,120 --> 00:01:01,960 The. So new series entitled Then and 2 00:01:01,960 --> 00:01:05,960 now. The hope of the series is to 3 00:01:05,960 --> 00:01:08,920 sell you some books, I try to warn you by Jim Jotris. 4 00:01:09,000 --> 00:01:12,480 That'd be nice. The other, the other aim of the 5 00:01:12,760 --> 00:01:17,760 of the the other The other aim of the series is to do some 6 00:01:17,800 --> 00:01:23,880 analysis of the Russian Ukraine crisis situation, war, special 7 00:01:23,880 --> 00:01:29,000 military operation, as you wish to call it, as it's unfolding in 8 00:01:29,000 --> 00:01:31,600 2025. We're recording this on 9 00:01:31,600 --> 00:01:38,200 Australian time and on the January 29th, 2025 S this idea 10 00:01:38,200 --> 00:01:42,120 is to give a snapshot of what's going on right now and talk 11 00:01:42,120 --> 00:01:48,120 about some news stories and and some possible data analysis 12 00:01:48,600 --> 00:01:49,960 that's stemming out of those news stories. 13 00:01:50,480 --> 00:01:55,720 And then because we have Jim Jatras, who is a retired 14 00:01:55,720 --> 00:02:00,240 diplomat and what's the, what's the official term for, for your 15 00:02:00,240 --> 00:02:03,960 position with the with the Republican advisory? 16 00:02:04,480 --> 00:02:09,199 I always mess this up. The I was a senior policy 17 00:02:09,759 --> 00:02:12,400 analyst for the Senate Republican Leadership. 18 00:02:12,720 --> 00:02:14,680 There you go, for that was called the Senate Republican 19 00:02:14,680 --> 00:02:17,400 Policy Committee. Is there an acronym we can use, 20 00:02:17,400 --> 00:02:18,920 Jim, to make it a bit more easier? 21 00:02:20,800 --> 00:02:22,480 No. RPC was the name of the 22 00:02:22,480 --> 00:02:23,800 committee. There we go, RPC. 23 00:02:24,880 --> 00:02:27,480 Was an I was an FSO at the State Department. 24 00:02:27,600 --> 00:02:29,400 There we go. LSMFT. 25 00:02:32,760 --> 00:02:34,960 We're doing the intelligence exam again, Jim. 26 00:02:35,160 --> 00:02:36,880 Like can you sit in the yellow chair, please? 27 00:02:38,040 --> 00:02:41,920 So, so, yeah, so because we, because we have Jim Joshua's on 28 00:02:41,920 --> 00:02:48,360 who's who has many, many decades of experience inside of the, 29 00:02:49,120 --> 00:02:53,000 the, the machine that is the, the, the American government 30 00:02:53,440 --> 00:02:57,600 specifically sitting on the Russia desk and is a Eastern 31 00:02:57,600 --> 00:03:00,760 European expert. So brought Jim on to do some 32 00:03:00,760 --> 00:03:04,800 historical analysis as well from his time there and looking back 33 00:03:04,800 --> 00:03:10,040 at certain flashpoints in, in Russia, Ukraine and let's say 34 00:03:10,040 --> 00:03:14,200 Russia American relationships. And we'll see how where the 35 00:03:14,200 --> 00:03:16,840 series goes. So thank you so much, Jim. 36 00:03:18,040 --> 00:03:20,320 Maybe do a brief introduction. I know you just said where you 37 00:03:20,560 --> 00:03:24,000 were, were you working in the government, but let the people 38 00:03:24,000 --> 00:03:26,200 know a little bit about you and then we'll get in some news 39 00:03:26,200 --> 00:03:28,200 stories. Not much to tell that you 40 00:03:28,200 --> 00:03:31,080 haven't mentioned. Came from military family. 41 00:03:31,640 --> 00:03:35,560 My father was a career fighter pilot is one of his last 42 00:03:35,560 --> 00:03:37,960 postings was as the Air Force attitude in Moscow. 43 00:03:37,960 --> 00:03:39,840 That was after I was already grown up and gone. 44 00:03:39,840 --> 00:03:42,080 I was actually then at the Soviet Union desk at the State 45 00:03:42,680 --> 00:03:46,760 Department during the time he was in Moscow, and then served 46 00:03:46,760 --> 00:03:50,080 in the Office of the Under Secretary for Political Affairs. 47 00:03:50,080 --> 00:03:54,440 And then later on for 17 years I worked in the US Senate and the 48 00:03:54,440 --> 00:03:58,240 senior leadership for the Republican side in the US 49 00:03:58,240 --> 00:04:00,560 Senate. So and then after that I was an 50 00:04:00,560 --> 00:04:02,240 evil Washington lobbyist for several years. 51 00:04:02,240 --> 00:04:08,200 So I got to see the from the outside with the the input from 52 00:04:08,200 --> 00:04:12,240 the private sector. So I think I've seen things from 53 00:04:12,480 --> 00:04:14,360 several different angles in Washington. 54 00:04:14,360 --> 00:04:17,160 It's it's not a pretty picture, Jason. 55 00:04:17,880 --> 00:04:21,120 Well, you know, we're, we're not here to, to paint landscapes, 56 00:04:21,120 --> 00:04:22,280 Sir. We're here to, we're here to 57 00:04:22,280 --> 00:04:24,520 investigate data and, and wherever it leads. 58 00:04:25,480 --> 00:04:27,880 One of the things I've been trying to do fairly 59 00:04:27,880 --> 00:04:30,040 unsuccessfully for the last three years since the start of 60 00:04:30,040 --> 00:04:36,200 the Ukraine Russia conflict is remove my remove myself from 61 00:04:36,200 --> 00:04:40,760 from the data as much as possible and just examine it as 62 00:04:40,760 --> 00:04:45,440 coldly as possible. But of course, being at least my 63 00:04:45,440 --> 00:04:48,840 part of my family is Ukrainian descent, I consider myself a 64 00:04:48,840 --> 00:04:52,440 Ukrainian nationalist for for well on 30 years. 65 00:04:52,840 --> 00:04:56,920 And so this has been a bunch of bitter white pills or a bunch of 66 00:04:56,920 --> 00:05:00,760 bitter pills in general to swallow over the last few years. 67 00:05:01,600 --> 00:05:04,760 Realizing that, you know, Ukrainian independence in one 68 00:05:04,760 --> 00:05:07,000 way or another is pretty much off the table. 69 00:05:07,320 --> 00:05:11,000 And, and I, I doubt she'll return, but we'll get into all 70 00:05:11,000 --> 00:05:12,960 that as we as we go on with the series. 71 00:05:13,240 --> 00:05:15,560 Here's some, here's some news from the last week. 72 00:05:16,120 --> 00:05:18,040 One of the things I was saying to Jim before we used to press 73 00:05:18,040 --> 00:05:21,920 record was that one of the challenges in setting up this 74 00:05:21,920 --> 00:05:26,240 show this week was keeping abreast of all the developments. 75 00:05:26,240 --> 00:05:30,000 There's been quite a few on the war fronts. 76 00:05:30,120 --> 00:05:36,920 We've had Chasevyar, Valeka, Novosilka and Toretsk all 77 00:05:36,920 --> 00:05:42,120 essentially becoming falling to the to the Russians and the now 78 00:05:42,120 --> 00:05:44,880 the Russians are preparing a major offensive to see Pavrosk. 79 00:05:45,640 --> 00:05:48,760 This is all in the Donetsk Oblask region. 80 00:05:49,120 --> 00:05:53,400 Essentially the once the once the southern Donetsk region is 81 00:05:53,400 --> 00:06:00,120 taken, then the Russians are free to move, move more freely 82 00:06:00,120 --> 00:06:02,280 throughout throughout the South southeast. 83 00:06:04,600 --> 00:06:07,600 So that's quite alarming. This is of course, there's make 84 00:06:07,600 --> 00:06:10,520 they're seizing territory in the middle of winter, which is a 85 00:06:10,520 --> 00:06:14,360 little bit when Russians start taking territory in winter, you 86 00:06:14,360 --> 00:06:18,400 know that the the end is nigh. Povrovsk is to give you a little 87 00:06:19,480 --> 00:06:23,320 to give a little bit of context about the importance of Povosk. 88 00:06:23,320 --> 00:06:28,040 Povosk is a center of one of the major iron mines in in Ukraine. 89 00:06:28,480 --> 00:06:31,720 It can actually single handedly produce enough iron ore to 90 00:06:31,720 --> 00:06:35,520 satisfy most of the steel needs of of Ukraine both domestically 91 00:06:35,520 --> 00:06:39,160 and in through export. So when Russia takes takes that 92 00:06:39,160 --> 00:06:44,680 city, Ukraine's economic future is is looking quite bleak, even 93 00:06:44,680 --> 00:06:48,760 if even if they do manage to retain any territory after the 94 00:06:48,760 --> 00:06:53,040 war. Another news story that broke is 95 00:06:53,040 --> 00:06:58,960 Ursula van Leyland, the EU chief is now claiming that Putin is at 96 00:06:58,960 --> 00:07:02,680 fault for cutting off oil and gas supplies to Europe as EU 97 00:07:02,680 --> 00:07:05,520 prices are now soaring across across the continent. 98 00:07:06,160 --> 00:07:08,400 Left out of her statements with the E US pledge to eliminate 99 00:07:08,400 --> 00:07:11,920 Russian oil and gas and coal trade back in 2022, which they 100 00:07:11,920 --> 00:07:15,520 finally succeeded into at the start of the year in 2025 when 101 00:07:15,520 --> 00:07:19,040 they allowed the the transit deal between Ukraine and Russia, 102 00:07:19,040 --> 00:07:21,560 which was established in 2019 to expire. 103 00:07:22,120 --> 00:07:24,360 Any thoughts on that, Jim? Because I mean it, some of the, 104 00:07:24,360 --> 00:07:28,040 some of the reports, I, I, I read a lot of the Kiev 105 00:07:28,040 --> 00:07:31,120 Independent just to kind of get a sense of what they're saying 106 00:07:31,120 --> 00:07:34,840 over there. And the reports are are crazy 107 00:07:34,840 --> 00:07:37,120 because you read them and you're like, this is straight up 108 00:07:37,120 --> 00:07:39,480 propaganda, Like there's no other way to reading it. 109 00:07:41,160 --> 00:07:45,920 Well, it's, it's, I think her name Ursula, fond of lions, says 110 00:07:45,920 --> 00:07:48,840 it all. I mean, she tells one string of 111 00:07:48,840 --> 00:07:51,680 lies after another, and somehow it's all Putin's fault. 112 00:07:51,960 --> 00:07:55,280 But it's it's the yeah. And it's not just this one 113 00:07:55,440 --> 00:07:57,720 instant instance. It's what they've been doing 114 00:07:57,840 --> 00:08:01,480 since the beginning of the conflict by putting sanctions on 115 00:08:01,480 --> 00:08:05,720 Russia energy export that disproportionately hurt the 116 00:08:05,720 --> 00:08:07,920 European Union, don't hurt Russia. 117 00:08:07,920 --> 00:08:11,720 And then they come up all these dog and pony in runs of their 118 00:08:11,720 --> 00:08:15,120 own sanctions so they can import Russian oil without calling it 119 00:08:15,120 --> 00:08:19,080 Russian oil at a substantial markup, whether it's being 120 00:08:19,160 --> 00:08:21,600 handled by the Indians or where else the middleman is. 121 00:08:21,600 --> 00:08:25,160 So I, you know, frankly, I have trouble falling all the 122 00:08:25,160 --> 00:08:29,680 different gyrations and stories they tell themselves to explain 123 00:08:29,680 --> 00:08:32,400 how they're damaging themselves, but it's really all their fault. 124 00:08:33,120 --> 00:08:35,120 Yeah, it's, it's pretty stunning. 125 00:08:35,919 --> 00:08:39,360 I've heard some reports or some people speculating that part of 126 00:08:39,360 --> 00:08:45,320 the reasoning for cutting off the the transit was to hurt 127 00:08:45,320 --> 00:08:48,400 Hungary and and Slovakia. There are two countries that 128 00:08:48,400 --> 00:08:51,160 would get damaged the most by the by this as well as Germany, 129 00:08:51,160 --> 00:08:53,640 obviously. But of course, then we find out 130 00:08:53,640 --> 00:08:57,280 that Slovakia has been has been donating the majority of its 131 00:08:57,280 --> 00:09:01,200 excess electricity to Ukraine and that Ukraine itself has been 132 00:09:01,200 --> 00:09:05,480 siphoning off oil and gas and coal exports from Europe that 133 00:09:05,480 --> 00:09:07,400 who's been importing it from Russia. 134 00:09:07,880 --> 00:09:14,680 So it's still hurting Ukraine. So none of this makes any sense 135 00:09:14,680 --> 00:09:20,720 other than APR victory for one headline, which then continues 136 00:09:20,720 --> 00:09:24,200 to punch themselves in the own in their own in their own face. 137 00:09:24,200 --> 00:09:26,120 It's it's literally the definition of cutting off your 138 00:09:26,120 --> 00:09:29,120 nose to shame your face. I this seems, and this seems to 139 00:09:29,120 --> 00:09:32,080 be, we'll touch on this more in some, maybe some other stories, 140 00:09:32,080 --> 00:09:37,680 but this seems to be a consistent, thorough line from 141 00:09:37,680 --> 00:09:39,480 the both the Biden administration to the Zelensky 142 00:09:39,480 --> 00:09:43,160 administration to pretty much all the EU is they're, they're 143 00:09:43,160 --> 00:09:47,560 more concerned with winning these PR war battles victories 144 00:09:47,560 --> 00:09:49,440 than actually winning the war on the ground. 145 00:09:52,240 --> 00:09:54,040 That's right. And look, you know, there's all 146 00:09:54,040 --> 00:09:56,160 sorts of collateral damage, you know, what about Moldova? 147 00:09:56,160 --> 00:09:59,240 What about Transnistria, which I guess they don't. 148 00:09:59,720 --> 00:10:03,720 You mentioned Slovakia and Hungary, as I understand it, 149 00:10:03,720 --> 00:10:08,160 they're going to be able to get some oil, also Russian oil, but 150 00:10:08,160 --> 00:10:10,640 via Turk stream from the South coming up from Bulgaria and 151 00:10:10,640 --> 00:10:15,120 Serbia into Hungary that way and Slovakia, so and I even Austria 152 00:10:15,120 --> 00:10:17,080 may be able to benefit from that. 153 00:10:17,080 --> 00:10:20,640 So, I mean, there's so many workarounds here that the way 154 00:10:20,680 --> 00:10:22,720 the ones we know are not going to be hurt by the Russians. 155 00:10:23,520 --> 00:10:25,800 So why they do this is exactly like you said. 156 00:10:25,800 --> 00:10:27,720 They need to have the headline, you know, for what? 157 00:10:27,720 --> 00:10:29,320 Then what's important is the narrative. 158 00:10:29,320 --> 00:10:32,200 You know, this is, you know, Ghost of Kiev stuff all over 159 00:10:32,200 --> 00:10:33,680 again, except in the energy sector. 160 00:10:34,840 --> 00:10:40,760 Yeah, the the the situation on the ground is finally coming to 161 00:10:40,760 --> 00:10:44,720 light and it's even coming through the Ukrainian media, 162 00:10:44,720 --> 00:10:47,920 which I find very interesting. 2 reports have come out of 163 00:10:47,920 --> 00:10:52,680 Ukrainian sources, both from from the Ukrainian version of 164 00:10:52,680 --> 00:10:57,480 Pravda and and the Kiev, Kiev Independent. 165 00:10:58,760 --> 00:11:01,360 One was a transfer of Ukrainian Air Force servicemen. 166 00:11:01,360 --> 00:11:04,520 It's a confirmation to the front lines infantry. 167 00:11:04,960 --> 00:11:08,920 Some 5 to 6000 Ukrainian Air Force servicemen have already 168 00:11:08,920 --> 00:11:12,280 been transferred to the to the infantry just the starting this 169 00:11:12,280 --> 00:11:13,880 year. There's been reports that this 170 00:11:13,880 --> 00:11:18,120 has been, this has been happening since 2024 at least. 171 00:11:19,640 --> 00:11:24,320 So we're talking everything from junior pilots to to technicians 172 00:11:24,320 --> 00:11:27,600 to pretty much everyone who makes the airplanes go. 173 00:11:28,760 --> 00:11:32,720 And this is this is still continuing after a condemnation, 174 00:11:32,720 --> 00:11:36,080 a pledge to halt such transfers from Zelenski himself. 175 00:11:36,440 --> 00:11:40,880 So Zelenski came out, it was on the 15th of of this month and 176 00:11:40,880 --> 00:11:43,400 said, yes, this is horrible. We're going to stop all this. 177 00:11:43,760 --> 00:11:46,520 And reports from the ground is that no, they haven't stopped 178 00:11:46,520 --> 00:11:49,240 anything. The transfers are continuing and 179 00:11:49,240 --> 00:11:52,840 now they're just draining out servicemen, you know, skilled 180 00:11:52,840 --> 00:11:55,400 servicemen to basically basically serve in the meat 181 00:11:55,400 --> 00:11:59,240 grinder. The others leaked admission, 182 00:11:59,560 --> 00:12:03,040 which is very interesting, comes from the intelligence chief 183 00:12:03,200 --> 00:12:10,360 Kurido Bunov, who's essentially the the the chief war 184 00:12:10,360 --> 00:12:14,040 propagandist. Apparently it was leaked out of 185 00:12:14,680 --> 00:12:18,400 out of a closed door meeting held in the Rata when he when 186 00:12:18,880 --> 00:12:23,280 when Bernoff was asked how much time Ukraine has left, he said 187 00:12:23,280 --> 00:12:25,440 something to the effect of if there is are no serious 188 00:12:25,440 --> 00:12:28,880 negotiations before the summer, very dangerous process 189 00:12:28,880 --> 00:12:31,200 threatening Ukraine's existence could begin. 190 00:12:31,800 --> 00:12:35,080 And now, of course, the Ukraine military intelligence has issued 191 00:12:35,080 --> 00:12:38,520 statements saying that quote is does not does not correspond to 192 00:12:38,520 --> 00:12:42,160 reality and has urged the media to stop spreading 193 00:12:42,160 --> 00:12:44,360 disinformation. I find this really interesting, 194 00:12:44,360 --> 00:12:50,360 Jim, because this this whole peace process by the spring or 195 00:12:50,360 --> 00:12:53,320 summer keeps coming back up and we'll see something that Trump's 196 00:12:53,320 --> 00:12:57,560 been saying and some other supplementary articles that you 197 00:12:57,560 --> 00:12:59,160 pointed to that you've also written. 198 00:12:59,520 --> 00:13:00,760 What are your what are your thoughts? 199 00:13:00,760 --> 00:13:04,360 Initial thoughts on this whole wrap it up by the spring, which 200 00:13:04,360 --> 00:13:09,800 seems to be a constant reiteration from from different 201 00:13:09,800 --> 00:13:14,040 sources. Well, as far as what what Donald 202 00:13:14,040 --> 00:13:17,560 said, maybe he was spreading misinformation in the form of a 203 00:13:17,560 --> 00:13:20,560 giddy optimist to think that they're going to last till this 204 00:13:20,560 --> 00:13:23,280 summer the way things are going. Because as you pointed out, with 205 00:13:23,280 --> 00:13:27,840 these Air Force personnel throwing skilled personnel into 206 00:13:27,840 --> 00:13:32,800 the meat grinder because I guess their skill are not as useful to 207 00:13:33,080 --> 00:13:36,440 Zelensky and company as this more warm bodies they can throw 208 00:13:36,440 --> 00:13:38,200 in there and have the Russians kill. 209 00:13:38,200 --> 00:13:42,960 I mean, it's the inhumaneness of this is just beyond belief. 210 00:13:42,960 --> 00:13:45,320 I mean, as you know, there's been a lot of suggestions, 211 00:13:45,320 --> 00:13:48,720 including I believe from General Kellogg, Trump's designated 212 00:13:48,720 --> 00:13:52,320 negotiator, that as the Biden administration was also saying, 213 00:13:52,440 --> 00:13:56,120 to try to get them to lower their draft age down to 18, 214 00:13:56,360 --> 00:13:59,600 which means, you know, not, you know, basically untrained kids 215 00:13:59,800 --> 00:14:02,720 with no military experience who will not have any time to get 216 00:14:02,720 --> 00:14:05,080 military experience when I tend to send out there. 217 00:14:05,640 --> 00:14:10,520 And by the way, a an age cohort that's already pitifully small 218 00:14:10,840 --> 00:14:15,520 given Ukraine's demographic problems for the last couple of 219 00:14:15,520 --> 00:14:17,880 decades. I mean, you take an 1819 year 220 00:14:17,880 --> 00:14:21,400 old kid who was born, you know, less than 20 years ago, that's 221 00:14:21,400 --> 00:14:25,240 already a small cohort given how low the fertility rate was at 222 00:14:25,240 --> 00:14:27,800 the time that they were born. So this is, you know, this is 223 00:14:27,800 --> 00:14:31,040 really, really, you know, the word genocide is so overused in 224 00:14:31,040 --> 00:14:33,400 the in recent years, but this is getting close to that. 225 00:14:33,400 --> 00:14:36,520 It's like, it's like an auto genocide being inflicted on 226 00:14:36,520 --> 00:14:40,360 Ukraine by its own regime. We can talk about why the 227 00:14:40,360 --> 00:14:42,720 Russians are fighting this war this way, but I think that 228 00:14:42,720 --> 00:14:44,720 that's what they're looking at. You know, you mentioned 229 00:14:44,720 --> 00:14:47,840 Pakrovsk, as I recall a couple weeks ago, there was, I believe, 230 00:14:47,840 --> 00:14:51,960 an entire brigade friend by trained by the French that was 231 00:14:51,960 --> 00:14:54,280 going to be sent to Pakrov and it just sort of melted away. 232 00:14:54,280 --> 00:14:57,520 Everybody deserted. And and I heard another story 233 00:14:57,520 --> 00:15:01,040 today of a similar occurrence. So, you know, at this point, I 234 00:15:01,040 --> 00:15:02,160 think they're going through the motion. 235 00:15:02,800 --> 00:15:06,080 The Russians are expanding an economy of forcing casualties on 236 00:15:06,080 --> 00:15:08,800 their side. But the, the, the, if anything, 237 00:15:08,800 --> 00:15:11,520 the Ukrainian casualties are increasing at a, at a 238 00:15:12,280 --> 00:15:15,800 accelerating rate. And it is just obscene. 239 00:15:15,800 --> 00:15:17,960 It really is obscene. And that's the one thing I do 240 00:15:17,960 --> 00:15:20,760 credit Mr. Trump with. He's got the numbers all wrong 241 00:15:20,960 --> 00:15:23,200 and so forth. But I do think there's a genuine 242 00:15:23,200 --> 00:15:27,400 desire on his part that this, this slaughter has got to stop. 243 00:15:27,760 --> 00:15:29,400 It just has to stop one way or the other. 244 00:15:29,680 --> 00:15:34,480 Yeah, I agreed. I we with our first conversation 245 00:15:34,480 --> 00:15:38,280 or our conversation last year, which was part of the Tales of 246 00:15:38,280 --> 00:15:41,440 the Shadow Empire, we, I opened with that, with that statement 247 00:15:41,440 --> 00:15:45,720 was from was from Tony Blinken, who was essentially trying to 248 00:15:45,720 --> 00:15:50,760 pressure Zolensky at that time to lower the draft age to 18 and 249 00:15:50,760 --> 00:15:52,920 basically go into full mobilization. 250 00:15:54,320 --> 00:16:00,800 And I had comment at that point how evil that that concept is. 251 00:16:02,040 --> 00:16:03,720 And it hasn't stopped. Yeah. 252 00:16:03,720 --> 00:16:06,120 I was kind of hoping that that means Zelensky, for whatever 253 00:16:06,120 --> 00:16:09,440 reason, has seemed to be resisting that idea, maybe 254 00:16:09,440 --> 00:16:11,600 because he thought it was unpopular enough that he didn't 255 00:16:11,600 --> 00:16:15,320 want to go that direction or who knows, right, with it's just too 256 00:16:15,320 --> 00:16:17,400 many speculations. But it hasn't stopped under 257 00:16:17,400 --> 00:16:21,320 Kellogg. And I think if this continues 258 00:16:21,320 --> 00:16:24,320 the way it's continuing, that's what they're that's what he will 259 00:16:24,320 --> 00:16:31,800 end up doing is doing a full mobilization last push and for 260 00:16:31,800 --> 00:16:34,200 absolutely no benefits, as you're saying. 261 00:16:34,200 --> 00:16:36,880 And what's the one of the interesting and stunning things 262 00:16:36,880 --> 00:16:41,080 this this past two weeks has been showing is that the 263 00:16:41,080 --> 00:16:43,280 fighting over Chasse VR in a few of these territories have been 264 00:16:43,280 --> 00:16:46,360 going on for quite some time, really in some cases since since 265 00:16:46,360 --> 00:16:50,960 2022, since 2022. And now it's open doors like the 266 00:16:50,960 --> 00:16:52,800 Russians are getting no resistance. 267 00:16:53,080 --> 00:16:58,240 The news I'm getting out of Pavrovsk is, is essentially, you 268 00:16:58,240 --> 00:17:02,920 know, and again, this is a high value target for the Russians 269 00:17:02,920 --> 00:17:04,240 and for the Ukrainians to defend. 270 00:17:04,599 --> 00:17:06,800 And it's sounding like the Russians are more or less 271 00:17:06,800 --> 00:17:09,720 walking in. They've they've done aerial 272 00:17:09,720 --> 00:17:12,400 gliding, bomb bombs to the city. They've the city's been 273 00:17:12,400 --> 00:17:14,599 evacuated and they're kind of moving in. 274 00:17:14,599 --> 00:17:18,160 And all the reports I'm seeing on a daily on an almost updating 275 00:17:18,160 --> 00:17:23,200 on the hour is just them just eating up territory without, 276 00:17:23,200 --> 00:17:26,119 with very little resistance. I saw pictures and I can't 277 00:17:26,119 --> 00:17:29,760 exactly remember which front it was on, but of like locals 278 00:17:29,760 --> 00:17:36,280 digging trenches and the the trenches are like, you know, 279 00:17:36,360 --> 00:17:37,920 chest high. I'm like, what are you, what are 280 00:17:38,760 --> 00:17:42,920 we doing? Like that's a murder hole. 281 00:17:43,720 --> 00:17:47,720 You're just you're just you're you're, you're just digging very 282 00:17:47,720 --> 00:17:53,680 long trench cemeteries. I don't I don't get it. 283 00:17:54,400 --> 00:17:58,800 And you know, so maybe it's a make work project. 284 00:17:58,800 --> 00:18:01,120 I have no idea. Or maybe it just makes them feel 285 00:18:01,120 --> 00:18:04,000 better that they're they're part of the resistance or part of the 286 00:18:04,000 --> 00:18:05,840 movement, part of the war effort. 287 00:18:06,360 --> 00:18:11,080 It doesn't make any sense. And so into your to your point, 288 00:18:11,080 --> 00:18:16,360 we'll get him to to some of Trump's statements, But what do 289 00:18:16,360 --> 00:18:19,680 you think, Jim? Why are why? 290 00:18:19,680 --> 00:18:24,040 Why the meat grinder? Because it's, it's, it's a meat 291 00:18:24,040 --> 00:18:26,400 grinder on both ends, right? The the Russians are are 292 00:18:26,560 --> 00:18:29,120 providing the grinder and the Ukrainians are providing the 293 00:18:29,120 --> 00:18:33,240 meat. The Grindees. 294 00:18:33,240 --> 00:18:40,880 Yeah, you know, this, this is what worries me, that, you know, 295 00:18:40,920 --> 00:18:44,400 the piece I wrote in the Ron Paul Institute site a month ago 296 00:18:44,400 --> 00:18:47,560 and then the the news out earlier today about some kind of 297 00:18:47,800 --> 00:18:51,200 a outline of what a plan is being suggested by the American 298 00:18:51,560 --> 00:18:55,240 side. My, my concern has been all 299 00:18:55,240 --> 00:18:59,400 along that the Russians are going to fall into the trap of 300 00:18:59,400 --> 00:19:00,800 Charlie Brown kicking the football again. 301 00:19:00,800 --> 00:19:03,040 They'll, they'll get another deal, another set of promises 302 00:19:04,000 --> 00:19:06,560 that will not be honored and will and will not end the 303 00:19:06,640 --> 00:19:09,600 hostilities on a permanent basis, will just set the stage 304 00:19:09,600 --> 00:19:12,680 for another and maybe worse for in the not too distant future. 305 00:19:14,840 --> 00:19:17,440 And, and I hear smart people say, well, you know, better to 306 00:19:17,440 --> 00:19:19,640 have a deal to end the war than a military into the war. 307 00:19:19,640 --> 00:19:21,000 And I, I, I go all the reasons why. 308 00:19:21,000 --> 00:19:23,240 I don't think that's actually a good observation, but I do think 309 00:19:23,240 --> 00:19:24,640 that's what the Russians are thinking. 310 00:19:24,800 --> 00:19:28,720 I think they're also thinking that they don't want to do 311 00:19:28,720 --> 00:19:34,240 anything precipitous that would cause the West's NATO to 312 00:19:34,240 --> 00:19:38,360 intervene directly into the war, not because they couldn't defeat 313 00:19:38,360 --> 00:19:42,080 NATO, but because the dangers of escalation to the nuclear level 314 00:19:42,080 --> 00:19:44,920 and we all die are are not inconsequential. 315 00:19:44,920 --> 00:19:47,360 In fact, I think the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists just 316 00:19:47,360 --> 00:19:51,600 raised their their what is now 89 seconds to 9 or something 317 00:19:51,600 --> 00:19:53,720 right now. So it's, you know, this is this 318 00:19:53,720 --> 00:19:56,080 is deadly serious. This is more dangerous than the 319 00:19:56,080 --> 00:19:58,200 Cuban missile crisis. So I can appreciate their 320 00:19:58,200 --> 00:20:02,440 caution in that respect. But at the same time, what that 321 00:20:02,440 --> 00:20:05,760 does has been has led the other side to become a more and more 322 00:20:05,760 --> 00:20:08,720 adventurous to, you know, pull another rabbit out of its hat 323 00:20:08,920 --> 00:20:11,000 all the time, you know, start shooting attack of missiles. 324 00:20:11,320 --> 00:20:15,720 Into into back of his missiles, into the course offensive into 325 00:20:15,720 --> 00:20:19,000 Russian territory. I, I think the Russians are 326 00:20:19,000 --> 00:20:22,120 inadvertently bringing about the same dangers of escalation 327 00:20:22,120 --> 00:20:27,920 they're trying to avoid rather than taking decisive action to 328 00:20:27,920 --> 00:20:30,360 destroy the Kiev regime. You know, get rid of Mr. 329 00:20:30,360 --> 00:20:32,720 Zelensky and his administration, get rid of the rod to get rid of 330 00:20:32,720 --> 00:20:35,520 the SVU, destroy the bridges over the neighbor. 331 00:20:35,520 --> 00:20:38,200 Look, I'm not, I'm not a military strategist. 332 00:20:38,200 --> 00:20:41,720 I but it seems to me there is a way they could end this quicker, 333 00:20:41,720 --> 00:20:44,800 probably with a lot fewer guys getting killed because, you 334 00:20:44,800 --> 00:20:47,880 know, you got a feel for these poor Ukrainian fellow as they're 335 00:20:47,880 --> 00:20:51,760 being, you know, Shanghai off the street and said, said to 336 00:20:51,760 --> 00:20:54,200 their deaths. And yeah, I guess from the 337 00:20:54,200 --> 00:20:56,040 Russian point of view, at that point, what else can you do but 338 00:20:56,040 --> 00:20:57,720 kill them? And, you know, it's just, it's 339 00:20:57,720 --> 00:21:02,560 just, it's so ugly. And I, I just like to see some 340 00:21:02,560 --> 00:21:04,040 way out of this. But I don't think it's going to 341 00:21:04,040 --> 00:21:07,880 be a negotiation, unfortunately, unless the Russians are foolish 342 00:21:07,880 --> 00:21:12,040 enough to do what they say they will not do, which is to fall 343 00:21:12,040 --> 00:21:14,840 for another truce, another set of promises, kind of a Minsk 344 00:21:14,880 --> 00:21:17,440 free kind of thing. And I think that's there's still 345 00:21:17,440 --> 00:21:18,960 a constituency for that in Moscow. 346 00:21:19,680 --> 00:21:21,600 Well, OK, let's talk about negotiations for a second, 347 00:21:23,120 --> 00:21:26,480 because Trump has now said a few things over the last week, which 348 00:21:26,480 --> 00:21:29,960 I find my notes here say bizarre. 349 00:21:30,520 --> 00:21:32,480 I think that's being that's being kind. 350 00:21:32,720 --> 00:21:35,360 He claims that Russia stole its hypersonic missile tech from 351 00:21:35,360 --> 00:21:39,080 Americans from Americans during the Obama administration vows to 352 00:21:39,080 --> 00:21:43,680 make a super duper hypersonic missile, which I, I appreciated 353 00:21:43,680 --> 00:21:48,120 and I was like, oh, super duper good because Wiley Coyote going 354 00:21:48,120 --> 00:21:50,000 to be riding it as well. That's, that's fantastic. 355 00:21:50,200 --> 00:21:52,320 That's just, you know, called the Roadrunner. 356 00:21:53,560 --> 00:21:56,720 The he also claims that Russia has lost over 1,000,000 men in 357 00:21:56,720 --> 00:22:00,440 the conflict and Ukraine has lost over 700,000 men. 358 00:22:01,120 --> 00:22:04,280 This is kind of peeved off the Russians who have contested that 359 00:22:04,320 --> 00:22:08,040 the Russian numbers are not anywhere near that. 360 00:22:08,040 --> 00:22:10,880 And considering that the best numbers I've seen throughout the 361 00:22:11,200 --> 00:22:17,480 throughout the war has never been over 300,000 troops on the 362 00:22:17,480 --> 00:22:20,160 ground anyways. So I don't know where where 363 00:22:20,160 --> 00:22:23,920 1,000,000 would come from. I mean, maybe a million. 364 00:22:24,520 --> 00:22:27,080 Russia might have a million people involved in the war 365 00:22:27,080 --> 00:22:31,200 effort, but I don't think. But that's doesn't mean people 366 00:22:31,200 --> 00:22:35,480 on the field. And it also disputes Zelensky's 367 00:22:35,480 --> 00:22:39,520 claims because Zelensky up until recently has said that Ukraine's 368 00:22:39,520 --> 00:22:43,000 only lost 43,000 troops. And I think he he I think he 369 00:22:43,000 --> 00:22:47,640 just updated it to 8080 thousand, which is generous 370 00:22:47,840 --> 00:22:50,160 because he was like, oh, OK, you got me. 371 00:22:50,920 --> 00:22:53,720 I said 43. It's more like 85. 372 00:22:54,200 --> 00:22:55,240 You know, what are you going to do? 373 00:22:57,160 --> 00:23:01,840 Yeah. The other thing that Trump has 374 00:23:01,880 --> 00:23:07,080 has said recently is that he that he loves the Russian 375 00:23:07,080 --> 00:23:10,600 people, but he's prepared to destroy the Russian economy via 376 00:23:10,600 --> 00:23:14,520 more sanctions if Putin doesn't agree to negotiate on any of the 377 00:23:14,520 --> 00:23:15,720 war. Of course, some of the some of 378 00:23:15,720 --> 00:23:19,160 the American sanctions against Russian oil and gas and other 379 00:23:19,360 --> 00:23:25,040 products and etcetera are coming due for renew very soon. 380 00:23:25,040 --> 00:23:27,440 I don't have the date in front of me, but I know it's I know 381 00:23:27,440 --> 00:23:32,520 it's soon in the calendar year 2025 S I'm interested to know 382 00:23:32,520 --> 00:23:36,880 what your what your what your feelings are on this. 383 00:23:37,400 --> 00:23:40,440 My initial response when I read this is that Trump is getting 384 00:23:40,440 --> 00:23:43,560 trying to get leverage now. He surrounded himself with two 385 00:23:43,560 --> 00:23:47,040 notable people who are concerning Kellogg, who seems to 386 00:23:47,040 --> 00:23:50,720 be based in an extinction, sorry, extinction, an extension 387 00:23:51,000 --> 00:23:55,080 of of Tony Blinken, at least on the Russia front. 388 00:23:55,480 --> 00:24:00,720 And and Gorka, who I don't know what to make of Gorka. 389 00:24:01,440 --> 00:24:04,280 I've written him. I wrote him off as sort of a 390 00:24:04,880 --> 00:24:08,840 wannabe Alex Jones type figure for a very long time. 391 00:24:09,240 --> 00:24:13,160 And now, of course, he's sitting, you know, sitting with 392 00:24:13,280 --> 00:24:15,720 a with a ear Trump, with a Direct Line of Trump, which I 393 00:24:15,720 --> 00:24:18,920 find disturbing. And I don't know how much of 394 00:24:18,920 --> 00:24:24,000 that is him doing media, how much of that he really believes 395 00:24:24,000 --> 00:24:26,040 in. I have no idea. 396 00:24:26,320 --> 00:24:28,720 But he's been, he's because he's been, Gorka says, has said some 397 00:24:28,800 --> 00:24:30,640 outrageous things over the last few years as well. 398 00:24:31,120 --> 00:24:35,680 And so, yeah, maybe let's get your feelings on that, Jim, 399 00:24:35,680 --> 00:24:38,760 because my, my first initial response to that is that Trump's 400 00:24:38,760 --> 00:24:40,480 trying to get leverage where he doesn't have it. 401 00:24:40,960 --> 00:24:43,240 And either he doesn't have the information in front of him 402 00:24:43,240 --> 00:24:46,120 that's accurate, or he does and he's and he's fronting. 403 00:24:46,680 --> 00:24:50,560 Because if, and we're I guess now the hope is that Tulsi 404 00:24:50,560 --> 00:24:53,920 Gabbard gets in and she's better at this. 405 00:24:53,920 --> 00:24:56,200 Or is she? You know, he starts getting a 406 00:24:56,200 --> 00:24:59,560 better brain trust of information, but he's also got 407 00:24:59,560 --> 00:25:01,360 Elon Musk. He's also got a few other people 408 00:25:01,360 --> 00:25:05,960 who are very good with data. I'm, I'm, yeah, I'm, I'm, I'm 409 00:25:05,960 --> 00:25:08,720 really not believing the whole he doesn't know what's going on 410 00:25:08,720 --> 00:25:12,360 or couldn't, couldn't know if he wanted to, let's put it that 411 00:25:12,360 --> 00:25:15,360 way. And it's, I mean, it's all over 412 00:25:15,360 --> 00:25:16,720 X. It's really easy to get that 413 00:25:16,720 --> 00:25:21,000 information that Russia's taking tremendous amounts of territory, 414 00:25:21,000 --> 00:25:24,760 incurring very little losses, if any in many of those exchanges 415 00:25:25,080 --> 00:25:27,040 and Ukraine's running out of men. 416 00:25:27,880 --> 00:25:31,360 So initial thoughts on what Trump's been been saying, we can 417 00:25:32,520 --> 00:25:35,480 pick it, pick it apart or do a a general comment. 418 00:25:35,720 --> 00:25:41,120 I know you shared some commentary on Trump's Hundred 419 00:25:41,120 --> 00:25:42,720 Day plan that we can get into as well. 420 00:25:45,000 --> 00:25:47,640 Yeah, or reported to be. I mean, we don't know that it's 421 00:25:47,640 --> 00:25:50,640 genuine, although it seems quite plausible to me based on my 422 00:25:50,640 --> 00:25:53,680 speculations a month ago. Well, let me give you the 423 00:25:53,760 --> 00:25:58,160 absolute best, best, most optimistic scenario I possibly 424 00:25:58,160 --> 00:26:00,920 can. And that is that Trump realizes 425 00:26:00,920 --> 00:26:03,920 that there's no way out of this. That as some have said, what 426 00:26:03,920 --> 00:26:09,040 what he just needs to do is, is recognize the Russians have won, 427 00:26:09,280 --> 00:26:11,360 signed an agreement that ratifies whatever terms they 428 00:26:11,360 --> 00:26:14,080 want, essentially a capitulation, and walk away. 429 00:26:14,080 --> 00:26:16,920 So it's all Biden's fault. And maybe he can't do that or 430 00:26:17,480 --> 00:26:20,560 feels he can't do that because then it would look like his 431 00:26:20,560 --> 00:26:22,200 loss. So what he's doing is he's 432 00:26:22,200 --> 00:26:26,880 throwing out all this chaff so he can say I, I, I, I threaten 433 00:26:26,880 --> 00:26:28,760 them. I, I, I grabbed them by the 434 00:26:28,760 --> 00:26:31,320 scruff of the neck and, and they had to sign the deal. 435 00:26:31,320 --> 00:26:33,440 And of course, the deal really is a capitulation. 436 00:26:33,760 --> 00:26:36,520 Maybe that's all it is, smoke and mirrors to hide and defeat. 437 00:26:36,800 --> 00:26:38,480 Unfortunately, I don't think that's what it is. 438 00:26:38,480 --> 00:26:42,200 I think what it is, is that he is woefully misinformed. 439 00:26:43,040 --> 00:26:45,760 I can't give you the details, but I heard somebody talking 440 00:26:45,760 --> 00:26:49,200 about a conversation with a Direct Line with somebody in the 441 00:26:49,200 --> 00:26:54,520 operation who was utterly, totally clueless about what is 442 00:26:54,520 --> 00:26:57,720 going on on the ground and what the Russians might or might not 443 00:26:57,720 --> 00:26:59,720 do. And that is really grounds for 444 00:26:59,720 --> 00:27:02,440 concern. You know, Trump, you know, 445 00:27:02,680 --> 00:27:05,800 again, I don't know the man personally, but I do know people 446 00:27:05,800 --> 00:27:08,520 who do. And my understanding is he is as 447 00:27:08,520 --> 00:27:12,360 narcissistic as he seems to be. He is as uninformed as he seems 448 00:27:12,360 --> 00:27:15,920 to be, and he doesn't care. He trusts all the wrong people, 449 00:27:15,920 --> 00:27:18,840 gets all the wrong information, and he doesn't have the presence 450 00:27:18,840 --> 00:27:20,800 of mind to question what he's hearing. 451 00:27:21,040 --> 00:27:23,440 So what do you do with that? Does he actually? 452 00:27:23,600 --> 00:27:26,520 And this is the other big problem I think we have, is that 453 00:27:26,720 --> 00:27:28,640 what does he think he wants to do? 454 00:27:28,760 --> 00:27:32,480 I think in his mind, this isn't the proxy war between the United 455 00:27:32,480 --> 00:27:34,880 States and Russia or United States, NATO and Russia. 456 00:27:35,200 --> 00:27:39,600 It's a war and Russia and he's going to come in as the big man 457 00:27:39,720 --> 00:27:42,320 and knock their heads together and say, OK, you boys settle 458 00:27:42,320 --> 00:27:44,240 this. And he doesn't really seem to 459 00:27:44,240 --> 00:27:46,240 understand that he's not not an onlooker. 460 00:27:46,240 --> 00:27:50,880 He is a combat. Our country is the driving force 461 00:27:50,880 --> 00:27:53,960 behind this war with the Russians, not Ukraine. 462 00:27:53,960 --> 00:27:57,560 Ukraine, Who's Lenski? He's just a a a puppet for the 463 00:27:57,560 --> 00:27:59,960 CIA and MI 6. That's all he is. 464 00:28:00,360 --> 00:28:02,680 You know, if you wanted to deal with him, you could take a leaf 465 00:28:02,680 --> 00:28:06,120 from our Vietnam experience and put on, put him on the per diem 466 00:28:06,120 --> 00:28:09,320 plan, if you catch my drift. So they could get rid of him 467 00:28:09,320 --> 00:28:13,120 anytime they want. So and the other thing is I 468 00:28:13,120 --> 00:28:17,720 don't think he understands that the unipolar moment has ended, 469 00:28:17,720 --> 00:28:20,120 that if the United States, if he wants to make America great 470 00:28:20,120 --> 00:28:23,520 again, he's got to get out of the global empire business. 471 00:28:23,600 --> 00:28:25,320 And it really needs to start with Ukraine. 472 00:28:25,520 --> 00:28:27,120 I don't think he understands that. 473 00:28:27,120 --> 00:28:30,160 I think he thinks he can maintain our hegemony in Europe. 474 00:28:30,320 --> 00:28:32,760 He can make us still the big winner in Ukraine if we can get 475 00:28:32,760 --> 00:28:36,320 a deal, the force of the Russians feed to the fire and 476 00:28:36,320 --> 00:28:39,840 saves the Ukrainian state, as that outline said, leaves open 477 00:28:39,840 --> 00:28:42,960 the question that they will be in NATO at some future date or 478 00:28:42,960 --> 00:28:46,320 they'll be in the EU. And I mean, I still think he 479 00:28:46,320 --> 00:28:50,880 thinks he can win this if he throws something that looks like 480 00:28:51,240 --> 00:28:53,760 a compromise plan on the table and the Russians will either be 481 00:28:53,760 --> 00:28:56,080 desperate enough or maybe stupid enough to take it. 482 00:28:56,720 --> 00:28:59,080 I think that's where we are, but I'm not sure. 483 00:28:59,760 --> 00:29:01,920 I'll just read down this this plan that you shared me. 484 00:29:03,640 --> 00:29:07,560 This is Trump's 100 day plan for Ukraine ceasefire promised by 485 00:29:07,560 --> 00:29:09,200 Easter. Report reportedly. 486 00:29:10,800 --> 00:29:12,360 Reportedly. Yeah, yeah, reportedly. 487 00:29:12,360 --> 00:29:14,960 And we don't know. Let me just, I'll just read the 488 00:29:14,960 --> 00:29:17,240 headline and then I'll, I'll, I'll do some mental on this 489 00:29:17,240 --> 00:29:19,960 because this isn't this this isn't just from this piece here 490 00:29:19,960 --> 00:29:22,040 that you sent me. I'm seeing this in Turkish 491 00:29:22,040 --> 00:29:23,720 media. I'm seeing this in the Ukrainian 492 00:29:23,720 --> 00:29:25,400 media. I'm seeing this, I'm seeing this 493 00:29:25,400 --> 00:29:29,400 pop up all over the place. Different basic versions of this 494 00:29:29,720 --> 00:29:32,600 more or less the timeline. So the timeline I find very 495 00:29:32,600 --> 00:29:34,160 interesting. It's always about about April, 496 00:29:34,160 --> 00:29:38,880 May, April May is heavily referenced in all the reports 497 00:29:38,880 --> 00:29:42,320 I've heard and then variations of of things. 498 00:29:42,320 --> 00:29:45,680 But I'll just read this down and stop me where if you if you want 499 00:29:45,680 --> 00:29:48,800 to add any color on color commentary on it. 500 00:29:50,120 --> 00:29:53,120 So this is Trump's 100 day plan for Ukraine's ceasefire promise 501 00:29:53,120 --> 00:29:56,880 by Easter, peace by May 9th. It's impossible to say with 502 00:29:56,880 --> 00:30:00,120 certainty that the plan corresponds to reality. 503 00:30:00,440 --> 00:30:04,960 The Ukrainian publications Strana reports that the document 504 00:30:04,960 --> 00:30:08,960 was transferred from the US to to the Europeans, and they in 505 00:30:08,960 --> 00:30:13,600 turn transferred it to Ukraine. So here's the main Trump plans 506 00:30:13,600 --> 00:30:16,920 to have a telephone conversation with Putin in late January, 507 00:30:16,920 --> 00:30:19,400 early February. He also wants to discuss the 508 00:30:19,400 --> 00:30:23,360 situation in Ukraine with its authorities and based on the 509 00:30:23,360 --> 00:30:27,040 results of the negotiations, a decision may be made to continue 510 00:30:27,040 --> 00:30:31,000 or suspend the dialogue. Vladimir Zelensky must cancel 511 00:30:31,000 --> 00:30:34,160 the the decree that prohibits negotiations with Putin. 512 00:30:34,160 --> 00:30:40,560 You think meeting Hopefully, Putin also cancels his decision 513 00:30:40,560 --> 00:30:43,800 not to talk to Zelensky and not and because he doesn't recognize 514 00:30:43,800 --> 00:30:47,760 him as a head of state. It's, it's, it's the details, 515 00:30:47,760 --> 00:30:48,800 folks. It's the little things. 516 00:30:51,560 --> 00:30:55,080 A meeting between Trump, Putin and Zelensky may take place in 517 00:30:55,080 --> 00:30:57,440 February or the first half of March. 518 00:30:57,640 --> 00:31:02,280 Is not yet clear whether this will be a trilateral meeting or 519 00:31:02,280 --> 00:31:04,720 two separate ones. The meeting is planned to 520 00:31:04,720 --> 00:31:10,320 discuss the main parameters of the peace plan starting April 521 00:31:10,320 --> 00:31:13,280 20th. This is a very specific date. 522 00:31:13,280 --> 00:31:14,880 So this this is what I find very interesting. 523 00:31:15,280 --> 00:31:18,000 A ceasefire is planned to be declared along the entire 524 00:31:18,000 --> 00:31:21,440 frontline and all Ukrainian troops will be withdrawn from 525 00:31:21,440 --> 00:31:24,480 the Kirk's region. An international peace 526 00:31:24,480 --> 00:31:26,440 conference. This is set to begin at the end 527 00:31:26,440 --> 00:31:29,560 of April to formalize an agreement between Russia and 528 00:31:29,560 --> 00:31:33,080 Ukraine to end the conflict. The United States, China, and a 529 00:31:33,080 --> 00:31:36,880 number of of countries in the Europe and global S will act as 530 00:31:36,880 --> 00:31:42,440 mediators. I This one bugs me a bit because 531 00:31:42,440 --> 00:31:44,760 I again don't understand why I'm not. 532 00:31:45,320 --> 00:31:48,760 I'm not saying he won't do it, but I don't understand why Putin 533 00:31:49,200 --> 00:31:53,520 would allow essentially that many countries to act as 534 00:31:53,520 --> 00:31:57,720 mediators for a situation that he more or less has under 535 00:31:57,720 --> 00:32:01,200 control. That really boggles my mind. 536 00:32:02,960 --> 00:32:05,640 Also, this time, the exchange of prisoners will begin according 537 00:32:05,640 --> 00:32:09,280 to the formula All for all by a May 9th declaration, the 538 00:32:09,280 --> 00:32:12,200 conference at the end of the conflict should be published. 539 00:32:12,400 --> 00:32:15,760 Martial law and mobilization will not be will will not be 540 00:32:15,760 --> 00:32:18,480 extended in Ukraine, and presidential elections will be 541 00:32:18,480 --> 00:32:22,520 held at the end of August. What is what is to be included 542 00:32:22,520 --> 00:32:26,440 in the in the agreement, Ukraine does not seek to return to the 543 00:32:26,440 --> 00:32:29,960 territories that were liberated by Russia, either militarily or 544 00:32:29,960 --> 00:32:32,920 diplomatically, but at the same time does not officially 545 00:32:32,920 --> 00:32:35,800 recognize Russia's sovereignty over these territories. 546 00:32:36,920 --> 00:32:41,120 Ukraine. Ukraine will not become a member 547 00:32:41,120 --> 00:32:43,160 of NATO and declares its neutrality. 548 00:32:43,480 --> 00:32:46,320 This decision, the decision that Ukraine will not be accepted 549 00:32:46,320 --> 00:32:49,480 into the alliance, must be confirmed at the NATO summit. 550 00:32:50,080 --> 00:32:52,920 Ukraine will become a member of the European Union by 20-30. 551 00:32:53,160 --> 00:32:55,440 The EU is committed to rebuilding the country after the 552 00:32:55,440 --> 00:32:57,960 war. The number of Armed Forces of 553 00:32:57,960 --> 00:33:00,960 Ukraine is not decreasing and the United States is modernizing 554 00:33:00,960 --> 00:33:04,080 the Ukraine army. After the conclusion of the 555 00:33:04,080 --> 00:33:06,840 peace agreement, some anti Russian sanctions will be lifted 556 00:33:07,160 --> 00:33:10,120 and restrictions of the import of Russian energy resources to 557 00:33:10,120 --> 00:33:15,720 the EU will be lifted. I'm going to have some notes. 558 00:33:16,160 --> 00:33:19,120 Parties. Parties that defend the Russian 559 00:33:19,120 --> 00:33:22,720 language and advocate peaceful relations with Russia should 560 00:33:22,720 --> 00:33:25,040 participate in the elections in Ukraine. 561 00:33:25,360 --> 00:33:28,880 The persecution of of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox 562 00:33:28,880 --> 00:33:32,320 Church will also cease and separate consultations will be 563 00:33:32,320 --> 00:33:34,680 held on the issue of EU peacekeepers. 564 00:33:35,080 --> 00:33:38,360 This really sounds like it was written by the EU. 565 00:33:38,600 --> 00:33:41,560 You know, at the start here it says that this is apparently 566 00:33:41,600 --> 00:33:44,280 written up by the by the Americans and handed to you to 567 00:33:44,280 --> 00:33:47,520 the Europeans. This sounds more like a this was 568 00:33:47,520 --> 00:33:49,640 written by the Europeans and handed to the Europeans. 569 00:33:49,640 --> 00:33:51,360 And maybe they let the Americans know. 570 00:33:51,400 --> 00:33:56,200 Maybe they let them do a byline. Just some of these things, like 571 00:33:56,880 --> 00:34:02,480 my favorite one here is at the at the conclusion of the peace 572 00:34:02,480 --> 00:34:05,840 agreement, some anti Russian sanctions will be lifted. 573 00:34:05,840 --> 00:34:07,880 Oh, some. A few occasion. 574 00:34:07,880 --> 00:34:09,800 You know, a handful, some. Yeah, we, we. 575 00:34:09,800 --> 00:34:11,719 We promise. Don't worry about it. 576 00:34:12,080 --> 00:34:15,280 And and the restrictions on the import of Russian energy 577 00:34:15,280 --> 00:34:19,600 resources to the EU will be lifted as a grace, as a grace to 578 00:34:19,600 --> 00:34:21,760 the Russians. You know, we're doing a we're 579 00:34:21,760 --> 00:34:23,800 doing a favor, Vlad, We're going to let you. 580 00:34:23,800 --> 00:34:25,199 We're going to let you. Do the goodness of our heart. 581 00:34:25,480 --> 00:34:27,120 Yeah, we're going to let you make sure we don't starve to 582 00:34:27,120 --> 00:34:30,360 death, freeze to death. Isn't it nice? 583 00:34:30,840 --> 00:34:32,159 Freeze, please. OK. 584 00:34:32,280 --> 00:34:36,000 So, well, you, you, you, you, you asked me for color 585 00:34:36,000 --> 00:34:38,080 commentary. I'm not sure if I should do 586 00:34:38,320 --> 00:34:41,040 Howard Cosell or in my case, Jimmy the Greek, but in any 587 00:34:41,520 --> 00:34:46,480 case, it's I I just had a chill run up my spine because it 588 00:34:46,480 --> 00:34:50,159 occurs to me this is so similar to what I speculated in my piece 589 00:34:50,159 --> 00:34:52,239 a month ago. I wonder if they stole it from 590 00:34:52,239 --> 00:34:54,440 me. That would be a terrifying 591 00:34:54,440 --> 00:34:55,560 thought. I hope not. 592 00:34:55,960 --> 00:34:58,120 You know, it's certainly plausible that, you know, you 593 00:34:58,200 --> 00:34:59,560 say this came from the Europeans. 594 00:35:00,400 --> 00:35:04,240 I I could, I could see Keith Kellogg being on board with this 595 00:35:04,240 --> 00:35:07,920 and his his partner Fred Fleitz is the one who wrote that plan 596 00:35:07,920 --> 00:35:12,000 way back in sometime last year. But you know, it reminds me of 597 00:35:12,000 --> 00:35:16,160 something that Alexander Mercouris says is that the West 598 00:35:16,160 --> 00:35:19,120 is always negotiating with itself without bothering to talk 599 00:35:19,120 --> 00:35:21,480 to the Russians. And they come up with an idea of 600 00:35:21,480 --> 00:35:24,480 what be a good peace plan. And then they seem surprised 601 00:35:24,480 --> 00:35:26,640 when it's a non starter and you can almost hear it. 602 00:35:26,640 --> 00:35:28,760 No. Well, Keith, how does this look 603 00:35:28,760 --> 00:35:30,280 to you? Well, Sebastian, I think it 604 00:35:30,280 --> 00:35:31,840 looks pretty good. What does Marco think? 605 00:35:32,080 --> 00:35:33,920 And they all agree on what is a good plan. 606 00:35:33,920 --> 00:35:37,480 And of course it means nothing to anybody but themselves in a 607 00:35:37,480 --> 00:35:40,920 little hot house atmosphere where it's only themselves, 608 00:35:41,000 --> 00:35:42,480 themselves talking to each other. 609 00:35:42,720 --> 00:35:44,880 So I think that's sort of what's going on here. 610 00:35:45,040 --> 00:35:48,160 But unfortunately, it has a certain kind of internal logic 611 00:35:48,160 --> 00:35:52,000 to it if you accept certain premises, which is we can keep 612 00:35:52,800 --> 00:35:56,120 Ukraine from being entirely defeated, preserve more or less 613 00:35:56,120 --> 00:36:00,520 the Ukrainian state that has consisted from 1991 and build it 614 00:36:00,520 --> 00:36:05,840 up again into another quasi NATO army, even if it's not formally 615 00:36:05,840 --> 00:36:07,800 a member of NATO. And that's what really it would 616 00:36:07,800 --> 00:36:10,560 be all about. Preserve NATO, preserve Ukraine, 617 00:36:10,560 --> 00:36:12,560 preserve American hegemony over Europe. 618 00:36:12,800 --> 00:36:15,000 And that's what they're trying to do with a plan like this. 619 00:36:15,120 --> 00:36:21,240 Yeah, even the idea of a ceasefire to me seems crazy. 620 00:36:22,120 --> 00:36:25,800 Again, I don't know how more clear Putin and Lavrov have to 621 00:36:25,800 --> 00:36:28,120 be. Again, maybe they're lying, 622 00:36:28,200 --> 00:36:32,440 Maybe they're not as 100% on those things as as they say they 623 00:36:32,440 --> 00:36:34,160 are. But just judging from their 624 00:36:34,160 --> 00:36:38,120 language for the last, well, two years at least, they've they've 625 00:36:38,120 --> 00:36:42,760 said very, very clearly we will not accept any ceasefire. 626 00:36:43,000 --> 00:36:46,840 We will not even if we are, even if we enter into negotiations, 627 00:36:47,080 --> 00:36:51,720 the war will continue until we come up to a conclusion of the 628 00:36:51,720 --> 00:36:55,000 negotiations. Now again, maybe that's bluster, 629 00:36:55,000 --> 00:36:58,920 maybe that's maybe that's their horse trading, but it seems 630 00:36:58,920 --> 00:37:01,480 reasonable in this situation where they've been the Russians 631 00:37:01,480 --> 00:37:05,880 been lied to, betrayed, lied to, betrayed continuously. 632 00:37:06,240 --> 00:37:07,800 NATO will not be expanding its borders. 633 00:37:07,800 --> 00:37:12,120 NATO expands its borders. This whole, the the whole Minsk 634 00:37:12,320 --> 00:37:15,640 agreements that that should never have even include Russia. 635 00:37:15,640 --> 00:37:19,080 It was an internal, it was an internal agreement to, to end a 636 00:37:19,080 --> 00:37:23,640 civil war between, between Kiev and the, the separatist parties. 637 00:37:24,200 --> 00:37:28,280 And then Zelensky tries to name Putin and, and, and Russia and 638 00:37:28,280 --> 00:37:30,200 into the, into the conflict. And Russia's like, whoa, whoa, 639 00:37:30,200 --> 00:37:31,760 whoa, whoa, whoa, what what are you talking about? 640 00:37:31,760 --> 00:37:37,440 Like it's not even involving us. The, the entire premise up to 641 00:37:37,440 --> 00:37:41,000 now has been just lies and deceits and betrayals. 642 00:37:41,320 --> 00:37:45,280 So, I mean, I don't know, I maybe, maybe you have a better 643 00:37:45,280 --> 00:37:49,440 idea of, of, of Putin's support in the Duma or with the internal 644 00:37:49,440 --> 00:37:51,280 oligarchs. But I think that would be asking 645 00:37:51,280 --> 00:37:53,600 Putin to basically put his, put his head on the chopping block. 646 00:37:53,760 --> 00:37:56,360 He's already, he's already on thin ice. 647 00:37:56,360 --> 00:37:58,720 So there's a lot of people who are vocally saying that he's not 648 00:37:58,720 --> 00:38:02,760 doing enough. I, I, I can't imagine him 649 00:38:02,760 --> 00:38:07,960 capitulating on anything, let alone, you know, coming up with 650 00:38:07,960 --> 00:38:09,760 a, with a, a ceasefire peace plan. 651 00:38:09,760 --> 00:38:12,600 Oh, don't worry. You can, you get to continue to 652 00:38:12,600 --> 00:38:17,080 hold 60% of the country and we'll just go back home. 653 00:38:17,840 --> 00:38:20,880 Like we'll just keep our areas, keep these 4 provinces, which 654 00:38:20,880 --> 00:38:25,800 are massive by the way, and allow you allow you Odessa and 655 00:38:25,800 --> 00:38:28,480 CX is why I don't, I don't get it. 656 00:38:28,520 --> 00:38:32,000 Like, talk me through it because I mean, you, you've, you 657 00:38:32,000 --> 00:38:34,480 speculated that that Putin might actually go along with it. 658 00:38:37,040 --> 00:38:39,720 I, I I. Speculated he might. 659 00:38:39,760 --> 00:38:42,480 I'm not predicting that he will and I can see reasons why he 660 00:38:42,480 --> 00:38:43,840 might not for the reasons you stayed. 661 00:38:43,840 --> 00:38:47,160 And I mean, OK, he's gotten fairly high approval rating, 662 00:38:47,160 --> 00:38:49,480 that's at 70%, maybe higher range. 663 00:38:49,640 --> 00:38:52,040 But most of the people who disapprove are saying exactly 664 00:38:52,040 --> 00:38:56,440 what you say that they're he's not being, he's not pushing the 665 00:38:56,680 --> 00:38:59,400 prosecuting this war fiercely enough to bring it to a 666 00:38:59,400 --> 00:39:01,760 conclusion. And even though the, you know 667 00:39:01,880 --> 00:39:05,000 what, what did Trump say? They've lost a million men or 668 00:39:05,000 --> 00:39:07,960 something like that. It is not true. 669 00:39:08,320 --> 00:39:11,280 They probably lost somewhere between 90 and 100,000 men, 670 00:39:11,640 --> 00:39:15,200 which is, you know, for a country of 140 million people, 671 00:39:15,400 --> 00:39:18,440 that's a lot. You know, we lost 50,000 in Viet 672 00:39:19,160 --> 00:39:21,680 Nam in a country of 200 million people. 673 00:39:21,920 --> 00:39:25,120 And that that, that that hurt us, that that was a lot for us. 674 00:39:25,400 --> 00:39:27,800 And so this is something that it can't be just sneezed away. 675 00:39:27,800 --> 00:39:30,320 You got to figure there's probably three times that that 676 00:39:30,320 --> 00:39:33,600 are we're badly wounded, you know, the usual portions of 677 00:39:33,600 --> 00:39:36,000 wounded to dead. So this is something that I 678 00:39:36,000 --> 00:39:40,120 think Russians want to feel, however much they may trust him 679 00:39:40,120 --> 00:39:44,320 in general, that this brought to a successful conclusion. 680 00:39:44,360 --> 00:39:49,240 And if he gets hoodwinked as he did in Minsk, I, I look, I, I 681 00:39:49,240 --> 00:39:50,960 think there's a lot of pressure back from the, from the 682 00:39:50,960 --> 00:39:53,640 professional military not to do this. 683 00:39:54,000 --> 00:39:55,600 There is public opinion in Russia. 684 00:39:55,640 --> 00:39:58,120 It actually does matter. So I don't, I don't know what 685 00:39:58,120 --> 00:40:00,760 they're going to do. I, I guess the real question is, 686 00:40:00,760 --> 00:40:03,680 is whether he thinks that somehow having Trump on the 687 00:40:03,680 --> 00:40:07,040 scene makes things different. I mean, everybody publicly, 688 00:40:07,280 --> 00:40:10,160 including Putin and Medvedev and Lavrov are saying that's not 689 00:40:10,160 --> 00:40:12,880 going to make any difference. I, I don't, I just don't know. 690 00:40:12,880 --> 00:40:14,640 I really, I really don't know. And and getting to the 691 00:40:14,640 --> 00:40:17,200 territorial thing. You, you know, you pointed out 692 00:40:17,200 --> 00:40:19,720 Perkovsk. Perkovsk is basically surrounded 693 00:40:19,880 --> 00:40:22,280 when it falls. That's really the last big 694 00:40:22,280 --> 00:40:23,600 stronghold before the de neighbor. 695 00:40:23,600 --> 00:40:27,400 But people forget the Russians are on the the neighbor already 696 00:40:27,400 --> 00:40:29,800 in Herzon Oblaz. They had been on the other side 697 00:40:29,960 --> 00:40:33,920 holding Herzon city. They're also now moving into the 698 00:40:33,920 --> 00:40:39,320 name Petrovsk Oblast and also into Herzon, excuse me, into 699 00:40:40,080 --> 00:40:44,840 into Kharkov Oblast. So, I mean, this could get a lot 700 00:40:44,840 --> 00:40:47,480 worse for the Ukrainians a lot sooner than they think. 701 00:40:48,080 --> 00:40:51,160 And this could move toward some sort of collapse of the 702 00:40:51,160 --> 00:40:53,040 Ukrainian front. I don't know. 703 00:40:53,040 --> 00:40:55,320 The Russians are pulling back to avoid that because they don't 704 00:40:55,320 --> 00:40:58,960 want this to spoil a peace deal. You know, there's so much going 705 00:40:58,960 --> 00:41:03,440 on, so many moving parts here, both militarily and politically 706 00:41:03,440 --> 00:41:06,440 and, and, and the personnel involved, it's hard to really 707 00:41:06,440 --> 00:41:10,760 know what, what the most likely outcome is, you know? 708 00:41:11,440 --> 00:41:15,400 I want to get to something that you said to me offline a week or 709 00:41:15,400 --> 00:41:16,920 two ago that I found really, really interesting. 710 00:41:16,920 --> 00:41:20,960 And that's something that I think when we get to 1991 might 711 00:41:20,960 --> 00:41:24,240 be interesting for people to, to get their head around 'cause 712 00:41:24,240 --> 00:41:26,840 it's a hard one. It's it's one of those, it's one 713 00:41:26,880 --> 00:41:29,920 of those things when you hear it, you know it's true and you 714 00:41:29,920 --> 00:41:32,400 don't want it to be true. But we'll get to that. 715 00:41:34,640 --> 00:41:38,600 Novoroskia has been mentioned now more and more. 716 00:41:38,840 --> 00:41:42,560 I made a prediction about two years ago saying that when you 717 00:41:42,560 --> 00:41:46,920 start to hear Novorosia being mentioned and being publicized, 718 00:41:47,240 --> 00:41:50,000 that's the end game. Like that's when Putin's going 719 00:41:50,000 --> 00:41:54,320 to be saying, OK, this is over. This is what I want. 720 00:41:54,320 --> 00:41:58,280 This is what's going to happen. And Novorossia for those who 721 00:41:58,280 --> 00:42:03,880 don't know is is pre Soviet was Azarist Azarist term as Azaris 722 00:42:03,880 --> 00:42:08,800 region that basically linked Russia, Belarus, Novorossia into 723 00:42:08,800 --> 00:42:13,000 the into a holy triumphant and it was taking over areas of Kiev 724 00:42:13,000 --> 00:42:16,880 and Odessa were very prime areas of of Novorossia. 725 00:42:17,680 --> 00:42:20,680 Putin's been saying this now for the last year, six months, a 726 00:42:20,680 --> 00:42:25,600 year, very publicly and it's being, it's now being picked up 727 00:42:26,160 --> 00:42:28,720 by Western press or by European press as well. 728 00:42:30,920 --> 00:42:33,920 Thoughts on that? Because if we're talking about 729 00:42:33,920 --> 00:42:38,280 Northrosia and what those borders look like, and I've said 730 00:42:38,280 --> 00:42:42,600 this now for many years, I don't see how Odessa is I, I, I see 731 00:42:42,600 --> 00:42:46,480 Odessa as the jewel, like almost everything else. 732 00:42:46,480 --> 00:42:50,000 Doesn't matter if he gets Odessa, because that's complete 733 00:42:50,000 --> 00:42:53,160 control of the Black Sea. That's then now he puts pressure 734 00:42:53,160 --> 00:42:54,920 on Moldovia, he puts pressure on Romania. 735 00:42:54,920 --> 00:42:59,840 He he controls pipelines. That's, that's the and, and 736 00:42:59,840 --> 00:43:03,040 historically as well, Odessa has a significance. 737 00:43:03,360 --> 00:43:06,920 So what are your thoughts on on Novorossi in general? 738 00:43:07,040 --> 00:43:10,320 And that's sort of like the the coming awareness of of that 739 00:43:10,320 --> 00:43:15,120 term. You know if there's any way 740 00:43:15,120 --> 00:43:16,840 this? War ends with the Russians not 741 00:43:16,840 --> 00:43:19,880 taking Odessa. I don't see how the Russians can 742 00:43:19,880 --> 00:43:24,280 call that a success because then you are preserving a rump 743 00:43:24,280 --> 00:43:27,440 Ukrainian state that's going to be just a a sort of Damocles 744 00:43:27,440 --> 00:43:31,000 over their head for the future. I would add Kharkov to that as 745 00:43:31,000 --> 00:43:32,800 well. But Odessa, I think is even more 746 00:43:32,800 --> 00:43:37,320 important. And and that's where, again, are 747 00:43:37,320 --> 00:43:40,080 they going to put their faith in diplomacy or are they going to 748 00:43:40,080 --> 00:43:42,760 put their faith in the military advantage they have? 749 00:43:42,760 --> 00:43:45,440 I mean, I've seen the speculations that, oh, Putin 750 00:43:45,440 --> 00:43:48,160 needs to have a time out, he needs a truce so he can, he can 751 00:43:48,160 --> 00:43:50,640 rearm and re equip his army. And well, they're not the ones 752 00:43:50,640 --> 00:43:53,080 that need to do that. It's the, the West that needs to 753 00:43:53,080 --> 00:43:54,760 do that. So why would they allow them 754 00:43:54,760 --> 00:43:58,840 that breathing space? I, I, I guess it really just 755 00:43:58,840 --> 00:44:02,160 comes down to, well, something be put on the table that is more 756 00:44:02,160 --> 00:44:06,160 plausible than that plan. You just read that they actually 757 00:44:06,160 --> 00:44:09,400 might go for it. Or do they, you know, Hey, the 758 00:44:09,480 --> 00:44:12,680 other other side to this is that they are so stupid. 759 00:44:12,680 --> 00:44:14,880 I'm talking about the West now and the way they approach this, 760 00:44:15,240 --> 00:44:18,600 that they didn't put a plausible deception on the table and 761 00:44:18,600 --> 00:44:22,160 essentially forced to do what's in their self-interest anyway. 762 00:44:22,800 --> 00:44:24,360 Maybe that's the way it ends now. 763 00:44:24,920 --> 00:44:26,840 Is that intentional on the Western side? 764 00:44:26,840 --> 00:44:28,080 I don't think so. I don't think they're that 765 00:44:28,080 --> 00:44:30,560 clever. No, I and I think. 766 00:44:31,520 --> 00:44:35,240 Going back to Putin's interview with Tucker Carlson, one of the 767 00:44:35,240 --> 00:44:38,520 big takeaways I thought from there one he's he's presenting 768 00:44:38,520 --> 00:44:42,520 the the Muscovite ruse history versus the Kiev ruse history, 769 00:44:42,520 --> 00:44:46,880 which I thought was interesting. But that aside, one of the 770 00:44:47,160 --> 00:44:49,800 things I think he was very clear about is, is historical 771 00:44:49,800 --> 00:44:54,120 precedents that lays the groundwork for no Croatia and 772 00:44:54,360 --> 00:44:58,080 also lays the groundwork for other statements he made after 773 00:44:58,080 --> 00:45:00,720 that saying or maybe during the interview, I can't remember 774 00:45:00,720 --> 00:45:02,600 exactly. But he said something along the 775 00:45:02,600 --> 00:45:06,560 lines of, look, we don't make any claims for a lot of Western 776 00:45:06,640 --> 00:45:10,880 Ukraine that used to belong to Poland and Latvia and other 777 00:45:10,880 --> 00:45:13,000 places, and they're free to fight over it. 778 00:45:13,200 --> 00:45:15,280 Or will the Austrian Empire. Yeah. 779 00:45:15,560 --> 00:45:18,000 Right live of. Parts of Hungary, you know, 780 00:45:18,000 --> 00:45:20,640 Hungary had parts of western Ukraine as well at certain 781 00:45:20,640 --> 00:45:22,640 points. And Putin's basically was 782 00:45:22,640 --> 00:45:27,560 saying, hey, have at it. If you if you want to fight over 783 00:45:27,560 --> 00:45:29,320 the scraps, you're more than welcome. 784 00:45:30,520 --> 00:45:35,760 It's it speaks directly to other intuitions I had about him. 785 00:45:37,000 --> 00:45:41,120 His empire of lies speech I don't believe was targeted 786 00:45:41,120 --> 00:45:43,440 towards the West. I believe his empire of lies 787 00:45:43,440 --> 00:45:45,920 speech was targeted towards other Eastern Europeans, 788 00:45:46,720 --> 00:45:50,960 specifically Poles, Hungarians, Romanians, people. 789 00:45:50,960 --> 00:45:54,720 He's basically saying careful, like watch out. 790 00:45:54,880 --> 00:45:58,480 These guys don't, these guys aren't your friends and they're 791 00:45:58,480 --> 00:46:00,520 going to take your religion and they're going to, they're going 792 00:46:00,520 --> 00:46:02,480 to prune your kids and they're going to do this and they're 793 00:46:02,480 --> 00:46:04,960 going to do that. And you can't trust them. 794 00:46:05,280 --> 00:46:07,480 And lo and behold, all these things are happening and we're 795 00:46:07,480 --> 00:46:09,920 starting to see resistance, cultural resistance in places 796 00:46:09,920 --> 00:46:14,440 like Poland, Romania, Hungary, all these post European states 797 00:46:14,720 --> 00:46:20,960 who have no interest in the progressive woke agenda at all. 798 00:46:21,920 --> 00:46:26,040 And that I find very, very interesting because I think if 799 00:46:26,040 --> 00:46:28,920 you're thinking about the long game, Putin might be trying to 800 00:46:28,920 --> 00:46:32,960 expand his sphere of influence, not just geographically, but 801 00:46:33,040 --> 00:46:38,200 almost cultural psychologically. Like he's playing, he's playing 802 00:46:38,200 --> 00:46:40,320 slot. He's he's, he understands, maybe 803 00:46:40,320 --> 00:46:45,720 Slavics a whole lot better than the EU and the West combined. 804 00:46:47,840 --> 00:46:49,080 Yeah, that's what it puts some to. 805 00:46:49,200 --> 00:46:53,680 Some real vulnerabilities of Ukraine on the other side maybe 806 00:46:53,680 --> 00:46:56,880 you mentioned this guy Madonna, he's from Osgorod, which is way 807 00:46:56,880 --> 00:46:59,560 on the West, was part of Czechoslovakia before war 808 00:46:59,560 --> 00:47:01,760 two-part of Austrian Empire before that. 809 00:47:01,760 --> 00:47:05,560 It's got a mixed population of Blovaks and Hungarians. 810 00:47:05,960 --> 00:47:09,200 And in fact, his code name is Madhyar, which means Hungarian. 811 00:47:09,200 --> 00:47:12,080 I mean, so there you, you've got a lot of the western part of the 812 00:47:12,080 --> 00:47:17,320 country that is only in Ukraine. It wasn't even part of the 813 00:47:17,320 --> 00:47:19,440 Russian Empire. It was in the Austrian Empire 814 00:47:19,640 --> 00:47:23,120 before War One and then in Poland mostly between the world 815 00:47:23,120 --> 00:47:26,760 wars. And you know, the Ukrainians are 816 00:47:27,240 --> 00:47:30,640 what's the part about glass houses and throwing stones? 817 00:47:30,640 --> 00:47:33,960 I mean, they're in a glass house and, and right now the eastern 818 00:47:33,960 --> 00:47:36,400 side of the house is shattering, but there's a western side of 819 00:47:36,400 --> 00:47:37,760 the house that's pretty fragile too. 820 00:47:38,200 --> 00:47:43,080 And I don't know at what point maybe a collapse militarily in 821 00:47:43,080 --> 00:47:45,640 the east causes the whole thing to come crashing down. 822 00:47:45,640 --> 00:47:48,560 I mean, we saw the rapid collapse of a state in Syria 823 00:47:48,800 --> 00:47:52,880 just a few weeks ago. I don't rule out that it's at 824 00:47:52,880 --> 00:47:54,960 some point, and I don't know where that is. 825 00:47:55,120 --> 00:47:57,040 The Ukrainian state could shatter the same way. 826 00:47:57,120 --> 00:47:58,640 Doesn't mean there won't be Ukraine as a country. 827 00:47:58,640 --> 00:48:01,480 There won't be Ukrainians as a people, but the state itself, 828 00:48:02,040 --> 00:48:05,880 unfortunately, has been very fragile and corrupt from the 829 00:48:05,880 --> 00:48:10,960 very beginning in 1991, and I think a lot of its fundamental 830 00:48:11,200 --> 00:48:13,400 fault lines are starting to catch up with it. 831 00:48:14,360 --> 00:48:16,240 Let's let's use it as a. Transition point. 832 00:48:16,480 --> 00:48:20,400 Let's talk about 1991 a little bit because you know, we just 833 00:48:20,400 --> 00:48:23,640 said that Syria was a country one day and the next day it 834 00:48:23,640 --> 00:48:29,720 wasn't December and December 1st of 1991, Ukraine declares its 835 00:48:29,720 --> 00:48:33,920 independence by December 8th of the same same year, the Soviet 836 00:48:33,920 --> 00:48:39,000 Union is no longer. So this entire mega power super 837 00:48:39,000 --> 00:48:45,840 state, you know, 7580 year experiment, just one day didn't 838 00:48:45,840 --> 00:48:50,000 exist and basically had a whole bunch of people living on 839 00:48:50,000 --> 00:48:53,960 different borders and didn't know where they were in the 840 00:48:53,960 --> 00:48:55,280 world. I mean, this is part of the 841 00:48:55,280 --> 00:48:58,920 reason why we have these problems in eastern Ukraine 842 00:48:58,920 --> 00:49:02,040 because, you know, I think it's difficult for people to 843 00:49:02,040 --> 00:49:06,480 understand maybe anyone who doesn't who didn't live in 844 00:49:06,480 --> 00:49:09,320 Quebec, Canada. It's hard to understand how 845 00:49:09,320 --> 00:49:11,600 people could be living in a country and feel like they're 846 00:49:11,600 --> 00:49:16,160 not part of the country, that they are distinct and different 847 00:49:16,920 --> 00:49:20,360 because of cultural, language, heritage, etcetera. 848 00:49:21,400 --> 00:49:27,760 Something you said to me, Jim, privately really hit me was that 849 00:49:28,720 --> 00:49:33,280 when you were working inside the government, you realize that, 850 00:49:34,320 --> 00:49:38,000 and maybe I misquote you and so please correct me here, but you 851 00:49:38,000 --> 00:49:40,520 realize that the, the US government at the time or the 852 00:49:40,840 --> 00:49:43,720 the State Department wasn't really against communism. 853 00:49:43,720 --> 00:49:49,280 They just hated the Russians and that coloured the entire 854 00:49:49,280 --> 00:49:55,200 relationship and maybe is also why America veered into this 855 00:49:55,200 --> 00:49:57,800 quasi. I hate using the word communist 856 00:49:57,800 --> 00:50:01,960 because I think it's an empty term now, but sure, whatever. 857 00:50:01,960 --> 00:50:04,960 Like Janet Yellen, I'm I'm very it's very easy for me to say 858 00:50:04,960 --> 00:50:06,320 that Janet Yellen is a communist. 859 00:50:06,360 --> 00:50:08,680 I'm fine with that. I'm very fine with the idea that 860 00:50:08,760 --> 00:50:15,040 that that Kamala Harris had some sort of communist wizzle wazzle 861 00:50:16,880 --> 00:50:19,400 muffin top stuff floating around in her head. 862 00:50:19,720 --> 00:50:24,640 So who knows? But maybe expand on that if you 863 00:50:24,640 --> 00:50:26,600 wouldn't mind, Jim, because I think that's really important. 864 00:50:26,600 --> 00:50:30,920 And then we'll get into 1991. Because I think understanding 865 00:50:30,920 --> 00:50:35,520 the American response specifically to Russia and to 866 00:50:35,520 --> 00:50:41,480 this post Soviet empire and to Ukraine and Balkans and 867 00:50:41,480 --> 00:50:44,400 etcetera, that I think really comes down to it is that they 868 00:50:44,400 --> 00:50:47,800 didn't hate communism, they just hated the Russians. 869 00:50:48,200 --> 00:50:50,320 Yeah. Yeah, Yeah. 870 00:50:50,760 --> 00:50:53,520 Well, you know, it's just a brief note on 1991 because he's 871 00:50:53,520 --> 00:50:57,040 a point out. In December of 1991, there was a 872 00:50:57,040 --> 00:50:59,960 referendum in Ukraine where the country voted pretty heavily. 873 00:50:59,960 --> 00:51:03,840 I'd like I think 8590% in favor of a sovereign and independent 874 00:51:03,840 --> 00:51:06,840 Ukraine when the writing was already on the wall. 875 00:51:06,840 --> 00:51:09,880 The Soviet Union was coming apart and the only part of 876 00:51:09,880 --> 00:51:12,240 Ukraine that did not vote in majority for that I believe was 877 00:51:12,240 --> 00:51:14,240 Crimea. The rest of the Ukraine voted in 878 00:51:14,240 --> 00:51:19,120 favor of that and of course the far West, almost 100% in favor 879 00:51:19,120 --> 00:51:21,120 of that. People forget though, the 880 00:51:21,120 --> 00:51:23,280 earlier that same year, I think it was March or April, there was 881 00:51:23,280 --> 00:51:27,880 an earlier referendum in Ukraine about Ukraine remaining as an 882 00:51:27,880 --> 00:51:32,400 associate in a, in a federative Republic together with Russia 883 00:51:32,400 --> 00:51:36,320 and the other Soviet states. And that passed by about 80%. 884 00:51:36,880 --> 00:51:39,000 And that was of course was very popular in Crimea. 885 00:51:39,240 --> 00:51:42,600 The far West voted against it and everybody in between voted 886 00:51:42,600 --> 00:51:45,480 in the majority for it. So you can see that there was 887 00:51:45,800 --> 00:51:48,800 not a, you know, kind of a hardening of Ukrainian opinions 888 00:51:48,800 --> 00:51:52,880 about independence of versus a continued association and 889 00:51:52,880 --> 00:51:56,160 federation with the rest of what had been the Soviet Union and 890 00:51:56,160 --> 00:52:01,680 still was at that time. The I, I think I think what the 891 00:52:01,680 --> 00:52:03,200 way you described it is about, right. 892 00:52:03,200 --> 00:52:06,600 The sense that working at the Soviet desk and the overall 893 00:52:06,600 --> 00:52:09,680 attitude during the State Department and this is during 894 00:52:09,680 --> 00:52:13,160 the Reagan years was that it hadn't really changed much under 895 00:52:13,160 --> 00:52:17,120 Reagan, that the attitude was essentially one of, you know, 896 00:52:17,120 --> 00:52:20,480 globalism, secularism, kind of soft socialism. 897 00:52:20,760 --> 00:52:22,960 There were probably, I don't think there were too many actual 898 00:52:22,960 --> 00:52:26,440 communists there, but they weren't anti communist either. 899 00:52:26,440 --> 00:52:30,360 They didn't see communism as necessarily a bad thing that 900 00:52:30,360 --> 00:52:33,080 maybe it took on bad forms in Russia because Russians are bad 901 00:52:33,080 --> 00:52:36,240 people. But the overall idea of progress 902 00:52:36,240 --> 00:52:40,080 and, and getting away from tradition and religion and, and, 903 00:52:40,080 --> 00:52:42,280 and so on and so forth, those, those are values that we 904 00:52:42,280 --> 00:52:44,600 basically share. That's why people talked about 905 00:52:44,600 --> 00:52:48,320 convergence back in those days that, you know, capitalism and 906 00:52:48,320 --> 00:52:50,960 communism going to meet in the middle somewhere and some kind 907 00:52:50,960 --> 00:52:54,640 of mushy social democracy and, you know, the, the Francis 908 00:52:54,640 --> 00:52:59,520 Fukuyama's end of history kind of notion before he wrote about 909 00:52:59,520 --> 00:53:02,040 that just everyone. Bernie Sanders. 910 00:53:04,520 --> 00:53:06,400 Yeah, basically Bernie. Sanders world, Yeah. 911 00:53:06,760 --> 00:53:09,000 And you know, I don't I don't want to say he's actually so 912 00:53:09,000 --> 00:53:12,360 much a communist, but a not an anti communist, Sir. 913 00:53:12,400 --> 00:53:13,640 Yeah, world. Worldwide. 914 00:53:13,680 --> 00:53:15,400 Maine. Imagine if the world could just 915 00:53:15,400 --> 00:53:18,840 be Maine would be fine. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 916 00:53:19,000 --> 00:53:21,520 Exactly. Or, or John Lennon's imagine, 917 00:53:21,520 --> 00:53:24,560 you know, that's, that's the world that they all were sort of 918 00:53:24,760 --> 00:53:26,800 hoping for, you know, free Ben and Jerry. 919 00:53:26,800 --> 00:53:30,800 'S for everybody, all the time. Well, well, well for. 920 00:53:30,800 --> 00:53:32,680 Example. You know, Strobe Talbot, who was 921 00:53:33,760 --> 00:53:37,440 Bill Clinton's house at, at, at Oxford and later I, I forget 922 00:53:37,440 --> 00:53:40,200 what you did at the State Department, he, he wrote a piece 923 00:53:40,600 --> 00:53:43,600 called, what was it called about something about being the 924 00:53:43,600 --> 00:53:46,560 citizen of the world coming New world order where everybody's 925 00:53:46,560 --> 00:53:49,080 going to be 1 country. There'll be no borders, no 926 00:53:49,200 --> 00:53:51,840 nationalities, no religion, none of that kind of stuff. 927 00:53:52,120 --> 00:53:55,000 And then I think it came as a shock to them when communism 928 00:53:55,000 --> 00:53:57,920 fell and there were nations there, people who still 929 00:53:57,920 --> 00:54:00,840 remembered that they're Russians or Ukrainians or Georgians or 930 00:54:00,840 --> 00:54:02,800 Serbs or Poles or whatever it is. 931 00:54:03,480 --> 00:54:09,200 And then that's where I think then that a, a real pronounced 932 00:54:09,280 --> 00:54:11,640 Russophobia boiled up to the surface. 933 00:54:11,640 --> 00:54:13,720 I mean, there's also Cerbophobia and things like that. 934 00:54:13,960 --> 00:54:16,080 But Russophobia in particular, which I think has several 935 00:54:16,080 --> 00:54:18,280 sources. One is we've got a very long 936 00:54:18,280 --> 00:54:24,720 history of Anglo-Saxon, specifically British Russophobia 937 00:54:24,880 --> 00:54:29,320 that goes, you know, back before the Crimean War and and somehow 938 00:54:29,320 --> 00:54:33,800 a lot of Americans with, let's say, more of an Anglo-Saxon kind 939 00:54:33,800 --> 00:54:36,400 of pedigree sort of stepped into those shoes. 940 00:54:36,800 --> 00:54:38,800 But then of course, you all be obviously have, you know, the 941 00:54:38,800 --> 00:54:41,680 Victoria Newlands and the Bob Kagan's and the the kind of the 942 00:54:41,680 --> 00:54:46,600 neo con Jewish kind of, you know, I remember the pogroms 943 00:54:46,600 --> 00:54:49,080 back in kitchen Yelp and all that other kind of stuff that 944 00:54:49,080 --> 00:54:50,720 had their own ethnic acts to grind. 945 00:54:51,120 --> 00:54:53,280 And I think all that. And of course, then you also 946 00:54:53,280 --> 00:54:57,560 had, you know, and this includes the West Ukrainians, you know, 947 00:54:57,560 --> 00:54:59,720 the Croats, the Hungarian, you know, I can remember there were 948 00:54:59,720 --> 00:55:03,880 these these what were they called Captain nations groups 949 00:55:04,280 --> 00:55:06,160 that met in Washington. There was something called the 950 00:55:06,160 --> 00:55:10,960 Anti Block of nations, which was run by again and Yaroslav 951 00:55:10,960 --> 00:55:13,000 Stetsko. They were originally was created 952 00:55:13,000 --> 00:55:15,560 by MI 6 and later it was taken over by the CIA. 953 00:55:15,880 --> 00:55:18,600 And then what they basically think, well, it was kind of like 954 00:55:18,600 --> 00:55:20,640 a World War 2 losers association. 955 00:55:21,000 --> 00:55:23,600 These the people who had sided with the Axis during the war 956 00:55:23,720 --> 00:55:26,800 didn't like the territorial arrangements that had been made 957 00:55:26,920 --> 00:55:31,520 at the end of the war and wanted revised back to what they had 958 00:55:31,520 --> 00:55:34,440 been in 1943. And in the Balkans, by the way, 959 00:55:34,440 --> 00:55:37,040 they pretty much got their way. If you look at the the borders 960 00:55:37,040 --> 00:55:41,680 today compared to 1943, the long and the short of it is a lot of 961 00:55:41,840 --> 00:55:46,000 things were had a lot of thumbs were in the pie, including a lot 962 00:55:46,000 --> 00:55:49,480 of ethnic prejudices, religious prejudices, long standing 963 00:55:49,480 --> 00:55:54,440 historical revisionist attitudes, coupled with the 964 00:55:54,440 --> 00:55:59,040 failure of this big globalist, you know, Bernie Sanders vision 965 00:55:59,200 --> 00:56:03,280 for how history ought to end. And then when history came back 966 00:56:03,280 --> 00:56:07,360 with a vengeance, all these knives came out and, and, and, 967 00:56:07,440 --> 00:56:09,920 and one of the big ones in there, especially with with 968 00:56:10,040 --> 00:56:14,640 Putin having been perceived to revive, well, not not quite the 969 00:56:14,640 --> 00:56:17,400 Russian Empire the way it was before World War One, but 970 00:56:17,400 --> 00:56:20,480 something that's recognizably Russian national and Christian. 971 00:56:20,720 --> 00:56:23,760 That's just that's just impermissible that that that's 972 00:56:23,760 --> 00:56:26,880 like the devil Incarnate. And that's sort of where we are 973 00:56:26,880 --> 00:56:30,160 right now. I'm comfortable blaming the 974 00:56:30,160 --> 00:56:31,080 polls by. The way. 975 00:56:33,800 --> 00:56:35,080 You know, I think there are a lot of. 976 00:56:35,120 --> 00:56:39,760 Poles who feel that way. I, I, I, I know, but I've talked 977 00:56:39,760 --> 00:56:41,760 to a lot of Poles who don't feel that way. 978 00:56:41,760 --> 00:56:44,000 I mean, they're not necessarily friendly toward the Russians, 979 00:56:44,280 --> 00:56:46,240 but they understand is a little more complicated than the 980 00:56:46,240 --> 00:56:48,240 standard narrative. And by the way, they're not real 981 00:56:49,080 --> 00:56:51,640 on the Banderas either, especially after what happened 982 00:56:51,800 --> 00:56:55,080 in Volvia in 1943 and all that. So, you know, there's, there's a 983 00:56:55,080 --> 00:56:57,720 lot of, lot of ugliness to go around. 984 00:56:58,600 --> 00:57:02,160 Let's get to 1991 a little bit. And I know we're we're testing 985 00:57:02,160 --> 00:57:04,240 some time. I see, I see a chat. 986 00:57:04,240 --> 00:57:07,520 I'm not ignoring you completely. Buck Johnson would like to ask 987 00:57:07,520 --> 00:57:10,680 you, Jim, why you're always so optimistic. 988 00:57:15,720 --> 00:57:17,360 He's cheerful, Buck. He's. 989 00:57:17,400 --> 00:57:18,960 Cheerful. What else would you want from 990 00:57:18,960 --> 00:57:22,560 the man? Well, well, optimist is. 991 00:57:22,560 --> 00:57:25,200 A definition of an Optimus is a pessimist. 992 00:57:25,200 --> 00:57:29,640 It doesn't have all the facts. And once you have the facts, you 993 00:57:29,640 --> 00:57:31,800 can be pessimistic about the short run. 994 00:57:31,800 --> 00:57:35,640 But any good Christian should be optimistic about the long, long 995 00:57:35,640 --> 00:57:37,120 run. There we are. 996 00:57:37,920 --> 00:57:42,440 See, Jim, Jim might be Greek, but he but he, he has a soul of 997 00:57:42,440 --> 00:57:44,680 a of a Slav. He understands these things 998 00:57:44,720 --> 00:57:47,040 where there is no there is no prolonged joy. 999 00:57:47,040 --> 00:57:49,560 It is all suffering really at the end of at the end of the 1000 00:57:49,560 --> 00:57:53,640 day, the So let's get to 911991 a little bit. 1001 00:57:54,360 --> 00:57:57,320 Where were you in 1981? What what are your memories of 1002 00:57:57,320 --> 00:58:02,560 1991, both professionally and me in your own private life? 1003 00:58:02,560 --> 00:58:04,240 You want to share any of those stories? 1004 00:58:04,240 --> 00:58:09,560 But certainly what was the mood in December of 1991 inside the 1005 00:58:09,560 --> 00:58:12,680 government? You know, some narratives say 1006 00:58:12,680 --> 00:58:14,800 that everyone was completely unprepared for this. 1007 00:58:14,840 --> 00:58:18,600 Obviously there was preparations for this eventual happening. 1008 00:58:18,840 --> 00:58:21,600 We'd already had glasnos and pedestroika being being 1009 00:58:21,640 --> 00:58:26,760 relatively disastrous, Gorbachev trying to re modernize or trying 1010 00:58:26,760 --> 00:58:31,240 to change the Russian economy on the fly. 1011 00:58:31,240 --> 00:58:35,160 And that of course was not working and possibly because 1012 00:58:35,160 --> 00:58:39,920 people didn't want it to work. And certainly we get to December 1013 00:58:40,080 --> 00:58:46,120 and within within a few short days, the Soviet Union is is 1014 00:58:46,120 --> 00:58:49,320 completely gone. What's the mood inside of 1015 00:58:49,320 --> 00:58:50,720 Washington at that point? Were you? 1016 00:58:51,280 --> 00:58:53,160 I'm assuming you were, you were still working in Washington at 1017 00:58:53,160 --> 00:58:55,360 that time. Where was Jim? 1018 00:58:55,400 --> 00:58:59,800 Yeah, I. I was working at the Senate at 1019 00:58:59,800 --> 00:59:04,400 that time, and part of my job was to write analysis for the 1020 00:59:04,840 --> 00:59:07,880 republican offices, for the senators and staff, so they 1021 00:59:07,880 --> 00:59:09,640 would know what the Hell's going on. 1022 00:59:09,640 --> 00:59:13,280 And remember, we talked about 1991, before the dissolution of 1023 00:59:13,280 --> 00:59:15,160 the Soviet Union. What came before that in June of 1024 00:59:15,160 --> 00:59:17,760 1991, the dissolution of Yugoslavia. 1025 00:59:18,160 --> 00:59:23,480 And then that was in some ways kind of a preview of what was 1026 00:59:23,480 --> 00:59:28,720 going to happen in in the Soviet Union, except that that one was 1027 00:59:28,720 --> 00:59:33,680 much more violent initially initially than the Soviet Union 1028 00:59:33,680 --> 00:59:36,440 was initially. And that's where I started to 1029 00:59:36,440 --> 00:59:39,680 run afoul with the establishment because I was doing my best 1030 00:59:39,680 --> 00:59:42,800 simply to try to describe the facts as they are. 1031 00:59:42,800 --> 00:59:46,200 I, I was doing briefing papers like, oh, the Soviet Union, it's 1032 00:59:46,200 --> 00:59:47,520 composed to these various republics. 1033 00:59:47,520 --> 00:59:49,840 There's a Ukrainian Republic and a Russian republican. 1034 00:59:49,840 --> 00:59:52,200 And because people did not know those things in the Senate, I 1035 00:59:52,200 --> 00:59:55,760 mean, you can imagine the kind of knowledge about the outside 1036 00:59:55,760 --> 00:59:57,160 world you tend to find in the Senate. 1037 00:59:57,320 --> 01:00:01,280 So I was trying to write a, you know, AC spot run level of of of 1038 01:00:01,440 --> 01:00:04,760 analysis of saying who here's who all these people are. 1039 01:00:05,360 --> 01:00:08,200 And here's why they're going to be behaving the way they are. 1040 01:00:08,480 --> 01:00:11,840 And that was particularly a problem in Yugoslavia, where I 1041 01:00:11,920 --> 01:00:14,640 ran afoul of Bob Dole's office. He was the majority of the 1042 01:00:14,640 --> 01:00:18,040 Republican leader at the time. Because I tried to write as 1043 01:00:18,040 --> 01:00:20,840 neutrally as I can. OK, here's where the Serbs are. 1044 01:00:20,840 --> 01:00:22,560 Here's where the Croats are. Here's how they bet. 1045 01:00:22,800 --> 01:00:25,000 And here's why each of them distrust the other. 1046 01:00:25,000 --> 01:00:26,880 And here's what happened in history and so on and so forth. 1047 01:00:27,280 --> 01:00:30,120 And I was basically called on the carpet and told, no, you 1048 01:00:30,120 --> 01:00:32,440 can't write it that way. The Serbs are communists and 1049 01:00:32,440 --> 01:00:34,240 they're bad and everybody else is good because they're 1050 01:00:34,240 --> 01:00:37,880 Democrats and pro American. And at that point I was starting 1051 01:00:37,880 --> 01:00:41,800 to realize this is, it's not going to be as easy as I 1052 01:00:41,800 --> 01:00:45,120 thought. My, my naive hope was that, you 1053 01:00:45,120 --> 01:00:48,080 know, 'cause I'm, I'm a lifelong anti communist, that communism 1054 01:00:48,080 --> 01:00:53,120 is ending and that we can go back to a kind of a normal pre 1055 01:00:53,120 --> 01:00:56,320 1914 world where, you know, hopefully we've learned 1056 01:00:56,320 --> 01:00:58,200 something in the course of the 20th century. 1057 01:00:58,200 --> 01:00:59,520 Don't start killing each other again. 1058 01:00:59,520 --> 01:01:01,960 But least we're rid of that crazy ideology. 1059 01:01:02,320 --> 01:01:06,720 And, and unfortunately, I was rather naive at the time. 1060 01:01:06,720 --> 01:01:09,880 In 1991, December, when the Soviet Union broke up, my first 1061 01:01:09,880 --> 01:01:11,720 thought was, OK, the red flag's down. 1062 01:01:11,760 --> 01:01:15,680 The Russian tricolor is back up. I used to have that on my desk 1063 01:01:15,680 --> 01:01:18,440 at this, at the State Department at the Soviet desk back in the 1064 01:01:18,440 --> 01:01:20,240 1980s. And people didn't even know what 1065 01:01:20,240 --> 01:01:22,360 that flag was. I'd say, oh, it's the Russian 1066 01:01:22,360 --> 01:01:23,360 flag. I think it's going to be back 1067 01:01:23,360 --> 01:01:24,640 soon. Oh, you what are you crazy? 1068 01:01:25,080 --> 01:01:30,240 And so I, I guess I was hoping we were re entering normal 1069 01:01:30,240 --> 01:01:34,720 history after the ideological insanity of the 20th century. 1070 01:01:35,240 --> 01:01:39,680 I wasn't as focused on the territorial breakup of the 1071 01:01:39,680 --> 01:01:43,920 Soviet Union as I should have been and as I was at the time of 1072 01:01:43,920 --> 01:01:46,440 the Yugoslav breakup. But that's mostly what I was 1073 01:01:46,440 --> 01:01:52,080 focused on at the time, trying to explain to people as much as 1074 01:01:52,080 --> 01:01:55,280 possible who the actors are, why they're behaving in a certain 1075 01:01:55,280 --> 01:01:58,280 way and what the consequences would be for the United States. 1076 01:01:58,280 --> 01:02:02,600 What I was slow to pick up on was how that establishment that 1077 01:02:02,600 --> 01:02:05,600 was never particularly anti communist simply looked at this 1078 01:02:05,600 --> 01:02:08,760 as an opportunity to say, great, now we can pick up all the 1079 01:02:08,760 --> 01:02:10,720 marbles and run the whole world ourselves. 1080 01:02:10,720 --> 01:02:14,000 And that's really where the neo con direction came in. 1081 01:02:14,240 --> 01:02:17,880 Yeah, I. Found it interesting doing doing 1082 01:02:17,880 --> 01:02:22,040 background on that time period. You know, one of the things that 1083 01:02:22,320 --> 01:02:25,920 the new Ukrainian government did immediately was declare that is 1084 01:02:26,000 --> 01:02:29,000 the the primary language is going to be English and not 1085 01:02:29,000 --> 01:02:30,360 Russian. Even though the majority of 1086 01:02:30,360 --> 01:02:33,440 people there spoke Russian, they had been speaking Russian for 1087 01:02:33,440 --> 01:02:35,760 over 250 years. Catherine the Great famously 1088 01:02:35,760 --> 01:02:39,760 annexed the majority of Ukraine and outlawed Ukrainian language 1089 01:02:39,760 --> 01:02:44,040 etcetera. And it, it was in, they had to 1090 01:02:44,040 --> 01:02:49,120 import people from Canada and Chicago and a few other enclaves 1091 01:02:49,680 --> 01:02:52,720 in the West to go back to Ukraine to teach Ukrainians how 1092 01:02:52,720 --> 01:02:57,800 to speak Ukrainian. And so this has been a 30 year 1093 01:02:57,800 --> 01:02:59,480 process. I mean, the country itself is 1094 01:02:59,480 --> 01:03:02,600 really only 30 years. I, I thought 91 would be a good 1095 01:03:02,600 --> 01:03:05,200 starting point. And we'll maybe pick this up in 1096 01:03:05,200 --> 01:03:10,400 in, in in the the next episode because I mean, we could go back 1097 01:03:10,400 --> 01:03:13,040 1000 years and maybe the series we will have going back 1000 1098 01:03:13,040 --> 01:03:14,720 years. But excuse me, can I? 1099 01:03:14,880 --> 01:03:15,560 Can I? Interrupt. 1100 01:03:15,560 --> 01:03:18,080 Can I interrupt slightly there 'cause I know a couple people 1101 01:03:18,080 --> 01:03:23,080 who grew, grew up in Kiev and, and learned in during the Soviet 1102 01:03:23,080 --> 01:03:25,560 period, late Soviet period. And they learned Ukrainian and 1103 01:03:25,560 --> 01:03:28,360 school, even though the primary instruction was in Russian. 1104 01:03:28,360 --> 01:03:30,040 But they also learned the Ukrainian language as part of 1105 01:03:30,040 --> 01:03:33,160 their studies. And they said they cannot 1106 01:03:33,160 --> 01:03:35,720 understand the Ukrainians being spoken today because as you 1107 01:03:35,720 --> 01:03:38,160 point out, a lot of these people were coming from the West, 1108 01:03:38,160 --> 01:03:41,320 particularly Canada and Argentina, and these were 1109 01:03:41,320 --> 01:03:43,560 overwhelmingly people from West Spain. 1110 01:03:43,880 --> 01:03:46,600 So what became then the standard Ukrainian language in 1111 01:03:46,600 --> 01:03:50,440 independent Ukraine was even by Ukrainian standards, a far 1112 01:03:50,440 --> 01:03:53,800 Western dialect, but that became the standard Ukrainian because 1113 01:03:54,480 --> 01:03:57,280 that's as different from Russian as you can possibly get. 1114 01:03:57,440 --> 01:04:00,520 Whereas, you know, in in Kiev, First off, Kievan is, is 1115 01:04:00,640 --> 01:04:04,200 basically a Russian speaking city, but also Ukrainian spoken 1116 01:04:04,320 --> 01:04:07,520 in the center part of the country is not the same thing as 1117 01:04:07,520 --> 01:04:09,920 the Ukrainian spoken in the western part of the country. 1118 01:04:09,920 --> 01:04:12,800 And you know, it's like any country, like you go to Germany. 1119 01:04:12,800 --> 01:04:15,880 I mean, people obviously speak different local language in 1120 01:04:15,880 --> 01:04:19,160 Bavaria or Saxony and so forth. You could say the same thing 1121 01:04:19,160 --> 01:04:22,040 about Italy. Ukraine is a complex country in 1122 01:04:22,040 --> 01:04:25,440 relation to linguistically and historically to the rest of what 1123 01:04:25,440 --> 01:04:28,000 had been the Soviet Union before that the the Russian Empire. 1124 01:04:28,400 --> 01:04:32,680 All of this stuff gets spat out and, and simplified as never 1125 01:04:32,680 --> 01:04:35,960 mind all that. Ukraine good, Russia bad W good, 1126 01:04:35,960 --> 01:04:38,000 E bad. It's, it's, it's this kind of 1127 01:04:38,000 --> 01:04:42,160 bizarre Manichaean way of looking at the world and putting 1128 01:04:42,160 --> 01:04:46,040 people into boxes based on very simplistic notions. 1129 01:04:46,680 --> 01:04:47,880 So you mentioned before that, Bob? 1130 01:04:47,880 --> 01:04:51,240 Dole is basically saying anti Serbia prover when I was because 1131 01:04:51,240 --> 01:04:55,160 Serbia, Serbia communist Serbia, Serbia bad and we we've already 1132 01:04:55,160 --> 01:04:58,200 covered that. That may not be totally accurate 1133 01:04:58,200 --> 01:05:02,880 in terms of communism. Not really the big bad so much. 1134 01:05:03,080 --> 01:05:05,160 Why do you think they had a bugaboo about Serbia? 1135 01:05:05,160 --> 01:05:08,480 I mean, I can speculate, but I found that really interesting 1136 01:05:08,520 --> 01:05:14,440 that Serbia itself was the, you know, versus Croatia versus 1137 01:05:14,720 --> 01:05:18,240 Bosnia or, or who are whoever else in that we want to pick 1138 01:05:18,240 --> 01:05:19,280 apart. What? 1139 01:05:19,280 --> 01:05:21,800 Why do you think the Why do you think Serbia got pegged? 1140 01:05:23,680 --> 01:05:28,080 Oh, I know why exactly. I'd rather not say in public 1141 01:05:28,080 --> 01:05:31,120 what all the details are, but remember I mentioned the World 1142 01:05:31,120 --> 01:05:35,680 War 2 Losers Association and the very ethnic lobbies in the in 1143 01:05:35,680 --> 01:05:37,960 Washington. Well, some of those were very 1144 01:05:38,040 --> 01:05:43,240 well placed in order to further their agenda in the in places 1145 01:05:43,240 --> 01:05:46,560 where a lot of the, you might call regular Americans had 1146 01:05:46,560 --> 01:05:48,840 absolutely no idea. In other words, they thought 1147 01:05:48,840 --> 01:05:52,520 they were just pursuing democracy and freedom and 1148 01:05:52,520 --> 01:05:55,080 American values. They had no idea they were 1149 01:05:55,080 --> 01:05:57,880 carrying water for somebody's ancient ethnic feud. 1150 01:05:58,480 --> 01:05:59,440 Right. Yeah. 1151 01:06:00,280 --> 01:06:06,320 That's kind of what I figured also if if people are holding 1152 01:06:06,320 --> 01:06:10,680 grudges all the way back to, you know, whoever, whatever time, 1153 01:06:11,480 --> 01:06:15,760 certainly World War One might be might not have completely 1154 01:06:16,400 --> 01:06:20,440 dissipated from people's minds. I think really what I've been 1155 01:06:20,440 --> 01:06:23,480 seeing is this sort of transference that the, the 1156 01:06:23,480 --> 01:06:27,640 mortal Hun, you know, the eternal Hun has been transferred 1157 01:06:27,640 --> 01:06:31,480 over to to the Russians in general. 1158 01:06:31,880 --> 01:06:39,000 And you know, growing up Eastern European or certainly being 1159 01:06:39,000 --> 01:06:40,640 tagged as an Eastern European in Canada. 1160 01:06:40,920 --> 01:06:44,120 I mean, my mother had had had stories of being, you know, 1161 01:06:44,120 --> 01:06:46,600 being called a Hungie and being mistreated. 1162 01:06:46,600 --> 01:06:50,360 There was concentration camps for for Hungies, Hungarians and 1163 01:06:50,360 --> 01:06:53,840 East vaguely Eastern Europeans. A lot of a lot of Ukrainians got 1164 01:06:53,840 --> 01:06:56,000 rounded up for that as well in Canada. 1165 01:06:56,200 --> 01:06:57,280 Yeah, Bo hunks. Exactly. 1166 01:06:57,280 --> 01:07:03,680 Yeah, There's a term I haven't heard in a while, so this isn't 1167 01:07:03,680 --> 01:07:09,520 new, you know, this sort of strange fetitization of the East 1168 01:07:09,560 --> 01:07:15,680 and and this sort of Saturday morning cartoon logic with it. 1169 01:07:15,920 --> 01:07:19,440 One of my aims maybe for this series and certainly everyone 1170 01:07:19,440 --> 01:07:22,120 who's interested to go buy Jim's book, I tried to warn you. 1171 01:07:22,640 --> 01:07:26,480 Collection of essays and and stories and and writings by 1172 01:07:26,480 --> 01:07:30,680 George James, George Chatris. One of the things I, I hope to 1173 01:07:30,680 --> 01:07:35,360 maybe do in the series is to demystify the, the Russian or 1174 01:07:35,360 --> 01:07:37,880 the Slav, the Eastern European, whatever you want, whatever term 1175 01:07:37,880 --> 01:07:40,720 you like to use. Because I feel that there's 1176 01:07:40,840 --> 01:07:44,080 depending on who you talk to or maybe depending on the day, the 1177 01:07:44,080 --> 01:07:48,320 Russians are either these Barbarians, uncouths, you know, 1178 01:07:48,320 --> 01:07:53,240 gas station with, with guns out in the middle of nowhere of no 1179 01:07:53,240 --> 01:07:57,520 concern or great Machiavellian evil. 1180 01:07:58,040 --> 01:08:02,560 These plotters and their people are cut from the stone and all 1181 01:08:02,560 --> 01:08:04,280 this stuff. And it's very, you know, it's, 1182 01:08:04,600 --> 01:08:08,920 it's terribly romantic, but doesn't really apply to reality 1183 01:08:08,920 --> 01:08:11,440 at all. It may be in parts, but not, but 1184 01:08:11,440 --> 01:08:13,480 certainly. Let me, let me, let me. 1185 01:08:13,880 --> 01:08:16,920 Let me, let me jump in here if I can, because one of the essays 1186 01:08:16,920 --> 01:08:19,760 in there is one called Pravoslavophobia. 1187 01:08:20,520 --> 01:08:25,600 And it, it, it, it, it, it, I, I think this is a, a part of the 1188 01:08:25,600 --> 01:08:29,240 mix too that I didn't mention is that, you know, during the first 1189 01:08:29,240 --> 01:08:33,600 thousand years of Christianity, the real center of culture, 1190 01:08:33,600 --> 01:08:36,880 civilization, so forth was in the East, the East Roman Empire, 1191 01:08:36,880 --> 01:08:39,359 Byzantium, if you will. And the West was, you know, 1192 01:08:39,359 --> 01:08:44,080 after the collapse of the West Roman Empire, the, you know, 1193 01:08:44,479 --> 01:08:46,600 under barbarian rule. I mean, it was, it was in the, 1194 01:08:47,439 --> 01:08:49,359 the dark ages could be overstated, but there is an 1195 01:08:49,359 --> 01:08:52,040 element of truth to that. And it really only started to 1196 01:08:52,240 --> 01:08:56,240 recreate what we might call a high civilization during the 1197 01:08:56,240 --> 01:08:59,439 Carolingian era and, and, and, and ultimately what we get into 1198 01:08:59,439 --> 01:09:01,720 the scholastic era, which is when the, the split between the 1199 01:09:01,720 --> 01:09:04,359 churches occurred. And then after that, partly 1200 01:09:04,359 --> 01:09:08,680 because of the the, the very perilous situation in the East 1201 01:09:08,800 --> 01:09:12,600 at the hands of Islam, things shifted where the West became 1202 01:09:12,600 --> 01:09:15,880 the powerful driver for European crystal civilization. 1203 01:09:15,880 --> 01:09:17,960 And it was kind of on the back foot. 1204 01:09:18,160 --> 01:09:20,920 And that's when you got things like the 4th Crusade or the 1205 01:09:21,120 --> 01:09:24,439 Teutonic Knights of the Swedes trying to invade Novgorod and so 1206 01:09:24,439 --> 01:09:25,920 forth. There was always the sense that 1207 01:09:26,160 --> 01:09:29,920 somehow we were wrong. We were backward because we 1208 01:09:29,920 --> 01:09:33,319 weren't scholastic. We weren't under the Pope, we 1209 01:09:33,319 --> 01:09:35,800 weren't Baroque culture. We know we didn't have all these 1210 01:09:36,240 --> 01:09:42,520 Western intellectual and rationalist the ideas and and I 1211 01:09:42,520 --> 01:09:45,520 think that's something that's carried on into the present day, 1212 01:09:45,680 --> 01:09:48,560 long after it became just a sort of a Roman Catholic, Orthodox 1213 01:09:48,760 --> 01:09:53,800 thing where the the Western European culture, which of 1214 01:09:53,800 --> 01:09:56,640 course includes America, tends to look down on what we might 1215 01:09:56,640 --> 01:10:00,000 call the Byzantine skull cultural sphere as something 1216 01:10:00,000 --> 01:10:04,640 backward and dark and eastern and all those, you know, bad 1217 01:10:04,640 --> 01:10:06,920 thing words. And I think that's part of the 1218 01:10:06,920 --> 01:10:09,360 subtext maybe more about a gut level rather than more of a 1219 01:10:09,520 --> 01:10:14,600 conscious thought on most people from a Western European cultural 1220 01:10:14,600 --> 01:10:15,920 heritage. Yeah. 1221 01:10:15,920 --> 01:10:18,680 I mean, look. To be fair, I don't think 1222 01:10:18,680 --> 01:10:22,880 Eastern Europeans make it easy or you know, fight against this 1223 01:10:22,880 --> 01:10:27,720 the stereotype too much. But we can maybe get into some 1224 01:10:28,280 --> 01:10:31,000 cultural discussions as the series continues. 1225 01:10:31,280 --> 01:10:33,720 I just put out the question to the chat. 1226 01:10:33,720 --> 01:10:38,200 If anyone has any questions, we can do a little brief Q&A before 1227 01:10:38,200 --> 01:10:40,400 we end it here. Thank you so much, Jim. 1228 01:10:41,080 --> 01:10:44,760 We'll be back next week, I believe, to do Episode 2. 1229 01:10:45,720 --> 01:10:48,000 This has been streamed to the members chat. 1230 01:10:48,600 --> 01:10:51,120 We'll continue to do that. What I'll end up doing once 1231 01:10:51,120 --> 01:10:56,320 we're done here is do some light edits and get a, a more YouTube 1232 01:10:56,320 --> 01:11:00,480 and Spotify and yadda, yadda optimized version out to the 1233 01:11:00,480 --> 01:11:04,040 people. So I will be looking forward to 1234 01:11:04,040 --> 01:11:05,880 doing that. And to keep an eye out, follow 1235 01:11:05,880 --> 01:11:09,360 me on X and all the places to, to get any announcements. 1236 01:11:09,440 --> 01:11:13,960 Anybody in the chat who's still there, Buck, anybody who has any 1237 01:11:13,960 --> 01:11:19,320 questions, we can ask them now or forever hold your peace. 1238 01:11:19,960 --> 01:11:24,440 Any last thoughts, Jim? Any last any last thoughts on 1239 01:11:24,440 --> 01:11:27,560 Trump's announcements or any of the other things we've covered 1240 01:11:27,560 --> 01:11:32,040 so far? No, at this point I think that 1241 01:11:32,040 --> 01:11:33,840 the. Situation is so fluid and we 1242 01:11:33,840 --> 01:11:36,480 have so little information what's really, for example, 1243 01:11:36,480 --> 01:11:39,280 these reports we've heard over the last week about aid being 1244 01:11:39,280 --> 01:11:42,040 cut off, being cut off to Ukraine that have been so 1245 01:11:42,280 --> 01:11:45,320 contradictory and partial and just uncertain what really is 1246 01:11:45,320 --> 01:11:49,560 going on and out. We're all just speculating right 1247 01:11:49,560 --> 01:11:51,960 now, I think. Yeah, the aid thing was very. 1248 01:11:51,960 --> 01:11:55,760 Interesting to me, I saw the headline in my basically leaned 1249 01:11:55,760 --> 01:12:00,400 right forward in my chair because the wording was so vague 1250 01:12:00,400 --> 01:12:03,280 that it might well this is going to be applied anyway which way 1251 01:12:03,280 --> 01:12:06,960 they want to. I think because initially it 1252 01:12:06,960 --> 01:12:09,760 sounded like they were cutting off all foreign aid, including 1253 01:12:09,760 --> 01:12:11,760 military support. And then I looked into it a bit 1254 01:12:11,760 --> 01:12:13,560 more. Obviously some of the support 1255 01:12:13,560 --> 01:12:16,640 had been and people. I think I forgot all. 1256 01:12:16,640 --> 01:12:21,520 About this was, it was, it was a bit of a news topic that, but 1257 01:12:21,520 --> 01:12:25,480 the Biden regime had set up funding for Ukraine well into 1258 01:12:25,480 --> 01:12:29,120 Trump's or, you know, whoever. I think maybe, I don't know if 1259 01:12:29,120 --> 01:12:30,400 Trump had won the election at that point. 1260 01:12:30,400 --> 01:12:33,520 But regardless, it was going to be set up well into 2025. 1261 01:12:33,840 --> 01:12:36,960 And there's no way to disrupt that easily. 1262 01:12:37,000 --> 01:12:39,880 Who knows? So we already knew there was 1263 01:12:39,880 --> 01:12:41,920 going to be a stream of money going into there anyways. 1264 01:12:42,960 --> 01:12:46,720 And so, yeah, the, the, the wording on it was very vague. 1265 01:12:46,720 --> 01:12:52,560 We're not sure if it's aid money or supplemental packaging or we 1266 01:12:52,560 --> 01:12:55,400 have no idea. I think it's just more the Trump 1267 01:12:55,400 --> 01:12:59,160 administration is, is reserving the ability to to send money or 1268 01:12:59,160 --> 01:13:03,240 not depending if they like your face today or not, which you 1269 01:13:03,320 --> 01:13:06,640 know. It's it's a tactic I. 1270 01:13:07,160 --> 01:13:11,360 I'm, you know, I'm, I'm neutral on the whole, on the whole Trump 1271 01:13:11,360 --> 01:13:13,720 phenomena. What's your feelings so far with 1272 01:13:14,160 --> 01:13:18,600 with your new president? Is this far into into his into 1273 01:13:18,600 --> 01:13:23,000 his four year, 4 year run? I I I like. 1274 01:13:23,000 --> 01:13:26,080 Some of the initial indications on things like sending troops to 1275 01:13:26,080 --> 01:13:29,400 the border, stepping up deportations, things of that 1276 01:13:29,400 --> 01:13:32,760 sort. You know, I guess he's wants to 1277 01:13:32,760 --> 01:13:34,720 do some again. I don't know what those really 1278 01:13:34,720 --> 01:13:37,280 amount to at the end of the day. I mean, as I understand it, the 1279 01:13:37,280 --> 01:13:40,080 troops are just being sent as support for CBP. 1280 01:13:40,360 --> 01:13:44,560 The deportations are stepping up a big hit over what they were. 1281 01:13:44,560 --> 01:13:47,720 But I think these flights do Columbia or wherever Guatemala 1282 01:13:47,720 --> 01:13:50,640 are more demonstrative than actually big numbers. 1283 01:13:51,120 --> 01:13:53,480 But I think it shows an impulse in the right direction. 1284 01:13:53,880 --> 01:13:57,840 Some of the executive orders, hey, look, release of the J 1285 01:13:57,840 --> 01:14:01,920 Sixers for me that was big and I and frankly went beyond what I 1286 01:14:02,080 --> 01:14:03,800 expected. I was working with some people 1287 01:14:03,800 --> 01:14:06,760 that are trying to bring some aid to those people as they get, 1288 01:14:06,840 --> 01:14:10,160 you know, thrown out of jail, some of them without any warning 1289 01:14:10,160 --> 01:14:13,160 or any support system in place. So yeah, there's some good stuff 1290 01:14:13,160 --> 01:14:15,560 going on. Clearly compared to a openly 1291 01:14:15,560 --> 01:14:20,680 anti American, anti Christian regime under Biden or Kamala 1292 01:14:20,680 --> 01:14:22,680 Harris. Yeah, I'll take Trump any day of 1293 01:14:22,680 --> 01:14:24,600 the week. How that will translate into the 1294 01:14:24,800 --> 01:14:29,800 foreign sphere, I don't know. I, I don't, I don't, I don't 1295 01:14:29,800 --> 01:14:33,280 know if we're really going to annex Canada or, or Greenland or 1296 01:14:33,280 --> 01:14:37,040 the Gulf of America or, I mean, who knows, Who knows where he's 1297 01:14:37,040 --> 01:14:39,560 going with that stuff. I found it very interesting. 1298 01:14:39,600 --> 01:14:43,280 That France came out and said that they offered offered their 1299 01:14:43,280 --> 01:14:48,160 military to defend Greenland from America if if necessary, if 1300 01:14:48,600 --> 01:14:53,080 if the Danes called upon them, France would answer the call. 1301 01:14:53,360 --> 01:14:56,160 Very nice of the French. Didn't offer for Canada though. 1302 01:14:56,320 --> 01:14:58,960 Just I found that very insulting a little bit. 1303 01:15:01,760 --> 01:15:06,120 As as someone. Yeah, that's from. 1304 01:15:06,120 --> 01:15:08,720 A I'm from a French product. My goodness. 1305 01:15:08,720 --> 01:15:10,880 Secular beer. Come on, ASD. 1306 01:15:11,280 --> 01:15:13,720 What the what? Well, Greenland is all right. 1307 01:15:13,720 --> 01:15:16,240 You like the Greenland, but you don't like to come over and save 1308 01:15:16,240 --> 01:15:17,440 us a little bit. What the what? 1309 01:15:17,440 --> 01:15:20,280 What about the French over here? Very. 1310 01:15:20,280 --> 01:15:24,040 It's very, very insulting. It's very on brand for the 1311 01:15:24,040 --> 01:15:28,280 French, I think. Yeah, I, I think, yeah, you 1312 01:15:28,280 --> 01:15:30,920 know, I think, I think. I think, I think General de 1313 01:15:30,920 --> 01:15:34,320 Gaulle would have offered to defend Quebec, though, I mean. 1314 01:15:35,400 --> 01:15:42,000 At least send a boots, a dinghy, something, some baguettes, a 1315 01:15:42,520 --> 01:15:45,480 care package, perhaps you know, some cheese. 1316 01:15:45,480 --> 01:15:47,080 We would, we would appreciate it. 1317 01:15:48,640 --> 01:15:52,480 OK, Jim, we all love cheese. Yes, thank you. 1318 01:15:53,400 --> 01:15:55,240 Thank you, Jim. Thank you everyone for 1319 01:15:55,240 --> 01:15:57,840 listening, Jim. Let the people. 1320 01:15:57,840 --> 01:16:01,280 Know where they can, where they can get more of your work or get 1321 01:16:01,280 --> 01:16:06,640 access to you. The only place really is on. 1322 01:16:06,640 --> 01:16:09,840 X Twitter, whatever we call now at Jim Jatras. 1323 01:16:09,840 --> 01:16:13,160 That's my only social media. I don't really write much 1324 01:16:13,160 --> 01:16:15,520 anymore, but when I do, on occasion I do write that. 1325 01:16:15,520 --> 01:16:18,840 And of course, my book you have there you can get, I think the 1326 01:16:18,840 --> 01:16:21,720 hardcover is out on Amazon, but they should be reordering. 1327 01:16:22,160 --> 01:16:24,520 I think Barnes and Noble still has it or you can get on 1328 01:16:24,520 --> 01:16:26,640 lulu.com directly from the printer. 1329 01:16:27,400 --> 01:16:29,320 I, I I. Think I mentioned this too 1330 01:16:29,320 --> 01:16:31,960 before, you know, to get this shipped out to Australia. 1331 01:16:31,960 --> 01:16:35,680 This was a very expensive book, so I've been treating it very 1332 01:16:35,680 --> 01:16:37,240 well. I was, I, I contemplated on 1333 01:16:37,240 --> 01:16:40,160 getting the hardcover 'cause I do like hardcovers when I can, 1334 01:16:40,480 --> 01:16:43,600 but I was like, no, I don't need to remortgage my house for a 1335 01:16:43,600 --> 01:16:45,400 book. I like a book with Jim but. 1336 01:16:47,800 --> 01:16:49,640 There are limitations. I don't want. 1337 01:16:50,200 --> 01:16:52,200 I didn't want to have to. I'm sorry I didn't set the 1338 01:16:52,200 --> 01:16:54,200 prices. No, no, no, it's not your fault. 1339 01:16:54,200 --> 01:16:56,520 It's, it's, it's getting anything shipped out here to 1340 01:16:56,520 --> 01:17:00,800 Australia sometimes gets a little bit silly, but, but it is 1341 01:17:00,800 --> 01:17:02,440 a very good read. I, I highly recommend it to 1342 01:17:02,440 --> 01:17:04,600 anybody. And of course, hopefully as we 1343 01:17:04,960 --> 01:17:08,760 go on this series, people get to know you more and be more 1344 01:17:08,760 --> 01:17:11,760 interested in, in reading more about what you'll just say. 1345 01:17:11,760 --> 01:17:13,320 Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, I am Jason 1346 01:17:13,320 --> 01:17:15,480 Merenchuk, and it is later than you think.