Speaker 1: From Schwartz Media. I'm Ruby Jones. This is seven am.
Speaker 1: For two and a half years, Ukraine has been fighting
Speaker 1: Russia with the goal of total victory, to not only
Speaker 1: beat Putin's forces back to the border, but to reclaim
Speaker 1: all territory annexed by Russia since nineteen ninety one. But
Speaker 1: as both President Zelenski and Putin's popularity and resources fade,
Speaker 1: and as another winter approaches, it's possible that a different,
Speaker 1: more pragmatic end to the war could be in sight.
Speaker 1: Today Editor in chief of The Economist Zanni Minton vedos
Speaker 1: on what it would take for a permanent end to
Speaker 1: the fighting and the future for Ukraine if that can't
Speaker 1: be reached. It's Wednesday, October nine. So Zani, you recently
Speaker 1: traveled to Ukraine, close to the front lines of its
Speaker 1: war with Russia. Tell me about why you went there
Speaker 1: and what you were hoping to find out. So.
Speaker 2: I've been to Ukraine a couple of times since the
Speaker 2: beginning of the full scale war in twenty twenty two,
Speaker 2: but each time I'd only been to Kiev, the capitol,
Speaker 2: and I really wanted to get a sense for myself
Speaker 2: of what it was actually like to be in the
Speaker 2: parts of the country that were closer to the front.
Speaker 2: We're now in October twenty twenty four, two and a
Speaker 2: half years after the war began. Winter is coming, the
Speaker 2: country's under pressure on the eastern front. We've got the
Speaker 2: US elections coming, so there are lots of reasons why
Speaker 2: Ukraine is currently under a lot of pressure. And rather
Speaker 2: than just simply talking to politicians in Kiev, I wanted
Speaker 2: to get a sense for myself of what things were
Speaker 2: like across the country. So we crisscrossed the country. We
Speaker 2: went from Odessa to Harkiv, to Kramatausk, to Zaparisia, to
Speaker 2: all kinds of places that hitherto had only being names
Speaker 2: on a map. Somewhere near here, we've been given a
Speaker 2: drop pin to meet even very actively deputy commander of
Speaker 2: the twenty third Brigade. But it was a very sobering
Speaker 2: experience going to the east, going quite close to the
Speaker 2: front and getting a real sense of what life was
Speaker 2: like for people who lived in the towns near the
Speaker 2: front line. So they waiting for us. There's a vehicle
Speaker 2: there who would pick up truck.
Speaker 1: And one of the places that you visited was this
Speaker 1: secret location in the basement of a Soviet era building,
Speaker 1: and you were there to talk to the Ukrainians who
Speaker 1: were really on the front lines of drone warfare. So
Speaker 1: can you tell me about that and the people that
Speaker 1: you spoke to.
Speaker 2: I did. I can't tell you exactly where the building is,
Speaker 2: but it was, as you say, it was a nondescript
Speaker 2: Soviet era residential building and inside was the sort of
Speaker 2: headquarters of one of Ukraine's drone battalions. Walking along a
Speaker 2: darkened corridor from the commander's office, and as you went
Speaker 2: in and sort of into long dark corridors into the
Speaker 2: basement area, it felt like, frankly, going into a movie.
Speaker 2: There were huge numbers of screens all over the wall.
Speaker 2: There were young people with what looked like video game
Speaker 2: controllers and they were controlling drones. They started moving from
Speaker 2: this big forest threw our position over here, and it
Speaker 2: was a very surreal view of the battlefront. And I
Speaker 2: was watching one drone commander as he was maneuvering his
Speaker 2: reconnaissance drone. He told me twenty kilometers inside the Russian lines,
Speaker 2: and we saw it a large antenna and he swooped
Speaker 2: in onto this antenna, and it had been clear that
Speaker 2: something had been placed on it, and they were discussing
Speaker 2: amongst themselves and thought it must have been communication equipment
Speaker 2: or something, and so they were sending in a drone
Speaker 2: to try and take it out. What do you think
Speaker 2: they fixed to that anti? I think this is maybe
Speaker 2: communication between artillery and some flight you.
Speaker 3: Want to take.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2: And while I was there at this drone command center,
Speaker 2: I met with the commander of this battalion, a young
Speaker 2: man whose core sign is Achilles, but who was called Yuri.
Speaker 2: Can I ask him how old you are? So just
Speaker 2: three years old? Now ninety three years old? And how
Speaker 2: long have you been commander? For you start since the
Speaker 2: start of the war. He was a young man, short,
Speaker 2: dark haired, dark eyebrows. He had a single earring, a
Speaker 2: kind of Cossacks style earring with an engraved bellbottom, and
Speaker 2: he joined the National Guard at eighteen. He fought in
Speaker 2: eastern Ukraine when the Russians first invaded in twenty fourteen,
Speaker 2: but in twenty twenty two, when the full scale invasion happened,
Speaker 2: he went back and is now fighting alongside his friends,
Speaker 2: and he's become one of the most sort of one
Speaker 2: of the most highly regarded Ukrainian drone hotshots and yours
Speaker 2: is a one of the most effective drone battalions the
Speaker 2: top three.
Speaker 1: Yes, and can you tell me just a little bit
Speaker 1: more about the extent to which this war is being
Speaker 1: fought using drones and what these drones actually do on
Speaker 1: the battlefield.
Speaker 2: I think this is the way in which the Ukrainian
Speaker 2: War has really changed modern warfare the most. It is
Speaker 2: a war which is absolutely dominated by drones at the battlefront.
Speaker 2: There are reconnaissance drones which are high above the battlefield,
Speaker 2: There are strike drones. There are even land drones now
Speaker 2: and both sides are making and delivering huge, unfathomable quantities
Speaker 2: of drones a.
Speaker 1: Force fromand flying more one million and three hundred thousand
Speaker 1: flying for a Plyne.
Speaker 2: Million, three hundred thousand drone flights in one And actually
Speaker 2: I went to see one of these drone producers in
Speaker 2: Kiev and it's a sort of a factory essentially making drones.
Speaker 2: And the drones at some level look like ordinary civilian drones,
Speaker 2: but then onto them explosives are strapped and some are
Speaker 2: very simple, some are very very sophisticated. The Ukrainians have
Speaker 2: developed incredibly sophisticated long range drones sea drones which have
Speaker 2: effectively pushed the Russian fleet out of the Black Sea.
Speaker 2: It's a very strange feeling to see this war being
Speaker 2: fought like a cat and mouse game between drones on
Speaker 2: both sides, and so the actual battlefield seems very still
Speaker 2: and very quiet, because the minute anything moves, any soldier moves,
Speaker 2: any vehicle moves the other sides, drones see it and
Speaker 2: come an attack, and so it affects all kinds of
Speaker 2: aspects of this war. So, for example, wounded soldiers in
Speaker 2: the battlefields of eastern Ukraine, often soldiers have to remain
Speaker 2: where they were wounded for hours until it is safe.
Speaker 2: For if the light change is just at doors and dusk,
Speaker 2: you could get people out, and until then soldiers have
Speaker 2: to stay because everywhere are these drones, so they're behind us,
Speaker 2: the twelve kilometers behind us. And I was talking to
Speaker 2: a Ukrainian commander at the top of a hill approximately
Speaker 2: twelve kilometers from the Russians, and we were on what
Speaker 2: seemed to me to be one of the only sort
Speaker 2: of naturally raised points, so we had an extremely good view,
Speaker 2: but at the same time it was very exposed. And
Speaker 2: that was the one moment where I asked him. I said,
Speaker 2: which way the Russians and he pointed, and I said
Speaker 2: can they see us? And he said not with the
Speaker 2: naked eye? And I said, but can their drones see us?
Speaker 2: He said, yes, of course, Let's move before they see
Speaker 2: us too much. It suddenly struck me that maybe we
Speaker 2: shouldn't be hanging around there too long.
Speaker 1: And so for those soldiers who are physically on the
Speaker 1: front lines in trench warfare, as you say, I mean,
Speaker 1: their lives are in danger at every moment. Was there
Speaker 1: a time in your reporting trip where the reality of
Speaker 1: that hit you.
Speaker 2: We were in a place Pavlograd, which is the largest
Speaker 2: town in Denikro Province, which is about one hundred kilometers
Speaker 2: from the front line from Pokrofsk, which is the city
Speaker 2: at eastern Ukraine that is currently under the greatest pressure
Speaker 2: from the Russians.
Speaker 3: Pavagad also has an explosives factory, the military complex there,
Speaker 3: what is interesting about it still has.
Speaker 2: And we were picking up fuel at a petrol station
Speaker 2: there and I saw a very very large bus with
Speaker 2: flashing lights go past, and I asked my colleagues, I said,
Speaker 2: what is that? What was that bus that just went by?
Speaker 2: It looked like a kind of police bus. It was
Speaker 2: a bus with police. They looked at the number on
Speaker 2: the front and it said three hundred.
Speaker 3: That bus was the sign three hundred. Now, in military terms,
Speaker 3: three hundred means severely wounded.
Speaker 2: They said, that's a bus with wounded soldiers. Any bus
Speaker 2: that has three hundred on the front has severely wounded soldiers.
Speaker 2: If it has two hundred on the front written on
Speaker 2: the front, it means it dead soldiers. It was an
Speaker 2: enormous bus, and those buses go through this town of
Speaker 2: paflo Grade very very frequently.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I got really really sad seeing this.
Speaker 2: Busy, And it was a moment where you suddenly got
Speaker 2: a sense of the scale of the suffering, the scale
Speaker 2: of the horror of this when you realize that that
Speaker 2: scale of bus was just going past several times a day.
Speaker 1: Coming up after the break a possible path to piece Zanny.
Speaker 1: You spoke to many people in Ukraine about their support
Speaker 1: or lack of support for the war at this moment
Speaker 1: in time. Can you tell me a bit about those
Speaker 1: conversations and what people said to you about how they
Speaker 1: were feeling this far.
Speaker 2: In so, I was really trying to get a sense
Speaker 2: of that, because if you look at opinion polls in Ukraine,
Speaker 2: the over the whelming majority of Ukrainians are reluctant to
Speaker 2: give up any territory. The definition of victory in Ukraine,
Speaker 2: the official definition of what it will be to be victorious,
Speaker 2: is that Ukraine must win back all the territory that
Speaker 2: Russia has stolen since nineteen ninety one, So not just
Speaker 2: the land it's occupied since twenty twenty two, but the
Speaker 2: Crimea and the entirety of the donbas So, the bit
Speaker 2: that they went into in twenty fifteen. But if you
Speaker 2: look at the opinion polls, a growing shared it's still
Speaker 2: a minority, but a growing share of people are willing
Speaker 2: to consider some kind of trade off that they lose
Speaker 2: some land in exchange for peace. And I wanted to
Speaker 2: kind of get a sense of that from people through
Speaker 2: individual conversations. I did. Then, while we were in Pavlo Bad,
Speaker 2: we went just to talk to people in a market.
Speaker 2: So you're selling your apartment, and I spoke to Tachiana,
Speaker 2: who is a wonderful elderly woman selling flowers, and I
Speaker 2: asked her what she would do if the Russians came,
Speaker 2: and she was absolutely categorical that she would become a partisan.
Speaker 2: She would she would cook pies for the soldiers. Partisan
Speaker 2: hestivari soda, I would cook for the soldiers. She had
Speaker 2: this kind of glint in her eye, and it was
Speaker 2: a reference to the fact that, you know, Ukrainian grandmothers
Speaker 2: have been known to poison Russian soldiers with pies. So
Speaker 2: she was very very clear that she said, I'm a
Speaker 2: Ukrainian nationalist. I will fight to the last person. I
Speaker 2: will never accept this. But my colleague talked to a
Speaker 2: young woman, nineteen year old young woman who said something
Speaker 2: along the lines of I just want this to stop.
Speaker 2: I don't care who runs this place, I just want
Speaker 2: water to be over. And he talked to another elderly
Speaker 2: lady who had lost her husband, who had two sons
Speaker 2: were fighting, one had died just nine days earlier, and
Speaker 2: she was also this has to stop. I can't bear
Speaker 2: this any longer. And I think between the two it
Speaker 2: sort of epitomized the they want to push the Russians out,
Speaker 2: They don't want to allow Russia to get away with this.
Speaker 2: On the other hand, the reality is that I think
Speaker 2: everyone knows increasingly that it's going to be impossible militarily
Speaker 2: in the short term to push the Russians out of everywhere,
Speaker 2: and that the sort of political dynamic of how as
Speaker 2: if your president's Lenski or the politicians think key of
Speaker 2: how you manage this is really difficult.
Speaker 1: What do you think the chances are of some sort
Speaker 1: of peace still being struck where Russia keeps all of
Speaker 1: the territory that it has taken so far and Ukraine
Speaker 1: accepts that, but perhaps you know, draws a line around
Speaker 1: what it has and fortifies those defenses.
Speaker 2: So I am not sure that there will be a
Speaker 2: formal peace deal because that requires Russia also to agree
Speaker 2: to its terms. But what I was what was very
Speaker 2: clear to me after my trip there is one that
Speaker 2: it was important that Ukraine's own definition of victory shifted
Speaker 2: to being defending credibly and durably the territory it now has.
Speaker 2: And for that, in my view, it needs not just
Speaker 2: more Western weaponry, it needs durable Western financial support. And
Speaker 2: I think, and it's a controversial one, but it's one
Speaker 2: that we are now clearly arguing for. So I think
Speaker 2: the best guarantee of Ukraine's long term security is to
Speaker 2: be a member of NATO. And the reason this guarantee
Speaker 2: is so credible is that if Ukraine were to join NATO,
Speaker 2: it would be covered by what's called Article five, which
Speaker 2: is the fundamental underpinning of NATO, that an attack on
Speaker 2: one is an attack on all, and that, of course
Speaker 2: is the kind of ultimate guarantee. It means that were
Speaker 2: Vladimir Putin to attack a Ukraine that was part of NATO,
Speaker 2: then he would risk the entire membership of NATO, the
Speaker 2: entire Western Alliance being at.
Speaker 1: War with him.
Speaker 2: You would move beyond a kind of kinetic war of
Speaker 2: the sort you've got now, to a Ukraine that had
Speaker 2: an aspiration to regain all of its territory through diplomatic
Speaker 2: means rather than through fighting for them and Zandi.
Speaker 1: At the beginning of the war, it seemed like Lord
Speaker 1: Bea Zelenski was this kind of rock star figure hero
Speaker 1: to his people. So has that changed as the war
Speaker 1: has continued on? Has the way that his country views
Speaker 1: him shifted?
Speaker 2: I think it has shifted almost inevitably. Right after two
Speaker 2: and a half years of war, he is I mean,
Speaker 2: if you just look at the polls, he's less popular
Speaker 2: than he was, but I think he's still seen as
Speaker 2: the avatar of Ukraine, and he's still seen as someone
Speaker 2: who can most effectively deliver the message of what Ukraine needs.
Speaker 2: But I think the problem that he has is how
Speaker 2: does he shift his own people to a definition victory
Speaker 2: that is not this absolutist we will regain all of
Speaker 2: our territory, all the way to our nineteen ninety one borders.
Speaker 2: And he's been saying that, and it's become a kind
Speaker 2: of mantra in Kiev, even though I think very few
Speaker 2: people really believe it, and he's been assisted in not
Speaker 2: doing that, I think by Ukraine's Western partners, who have
Speaker 2: been doing Ukraine somewhat of a disservice because they have
Speaker 2: said consistently Ukraine must win and only Ukraine can decide
Speaker 2: what victory is, and so they've both been able to
Speaker 2: hide behind what is increasingly becoming a fiction. It's going
Speaker 2: to take a lot of political courage and deftness to
Speaker 2: shift the conversation to say to Ukrainians, actually, we need
Speaker 2: to think about this differently.
Speaker 1: And if that doesn't happen, what is at stake for Ukraine?
Speaker 2: So I think a lot, a huge amount is at
Speaker 2: stake here. It always has been in this war. You
Speaker 2: could see the Russians moving further, you could see a
Speaker 2: political fragmentation of Ukraine, society fracturing. It's now remember a
Speaker 2: heavily armed country with a lot of weapons and a
Speaker 2: lot of soldiers brigades, all of which could become kind
Speaker 2: of you know, partisan brigades. You could see a growing anger,
Speaker 2: a sense that the country had been abandoned by the West.
Speaker 2: So it could be very grim. You could see the
Speaker 2: Russians roll on through a long way. Ukraine could be
Speaker 2: you know, at least large parts of it could be lost,
Speaker 2: and I think it would be not just catastrophic for Ukraine,
Speaker 2: but also an incredible loss for the West and gain
Speaker 2: for Vladimir Putin, which would then of course risk him
Speaker 2: wanting and going further. It really is important that to
Speaker 2: put it too simplistically, that the good guys win, but
Speaker 2: that means framing victory in a way that is you know,
Speaker 2: achievable and realistic.
Speaker 1: Zanny, thank you so much for your time.
Speaker 2: You're very welcome. Nice to do it to you again.
Speaker 1: You can hear Zani's full report from Ukraine on the
Speaker 1: Economist podcast. The episode is called Crunch Time for Ukraine.
Speaker 1: Also in the News Today, Australia's former Defense chiefs awarding
Speaker 1: the country remains unprepared to navigate the security threats arising
Speaker 1: from climate change. The report from the Australian Security Leaders
Speaker 1: Climate Group is condemning of government in action, saying the
Speaker 1: issue is the biggest security threat facing Australia. The report
Speaker 1: has also put forward recommendations to increase action on climate
Speaker 1: change and insure Australia is better prepared and a series
Speaker 1: of speakers addressed a press conference in Parliament House yesterday
Speaker 1: to accuse Israeli committing genocide in Gaza and demand the
Speaker 1: government imposed sanctions. The conference was organized by crossbenchers who
Speaker 1: were joined by Palacednians, doctors and activists. Meanwhile, Opposition Leader
Speaker 1: Peter Dutton condemned the Prime Minister for putting forward a
Speaker 1: motion in Parliament to mark a year since October seven,
Speaker 1: saying the motion's calls for ceasefire and de escalation went
Speaker 1: too far. I'm Ruby Jones, this is seven am it'
Speaker 1: see you tomorrow.