Speaker 1: Kyota.
Speaker 2: I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a
Speaker 2: daily podcast presented by The New Zealand Herald.
Speaker 1: The War in Ukraine.
Speaker 2: Has hit the one thousand daymark. On February twenty fourth,
Speaker 2: twenty twenty two, Russia invaded Ukraine and since then, hundreds
Speaker 2: of thousands of people have died, many more have been injured,
Speaker 2: and millions are displaced. It's been called the largest and
Speaker 2: deadliest war in Europe.
Speaker 1: Since World War II.
Speaker 2: This week, US President Joe Biden gave the green light
Speaker 2: for Ukraine to strike Russia with US made long range missiles.
Speaker 1: It comes just nine weeks.
Speaker 2: Before Donald Trump takes office, who on the election trail pledged.
Speaker 1: To put an end to the war.
Speaker 2: So after one thousand days, how all these missiles changed
Speaker 2: the war?
Speaker 1: And what will a Trump peace deal look like? Today?
Speaker 2: On the front Page, why cant Theo University International law
Speaker 2: professor Alexander Gillespie is with us to discuss if there's
Speaker 2: an end in sight for the conflict? First off, our
Speaker 2: one thousand days? Does it surprise you there hasn't been
Speaker 2: an end to this war yet? In fact, actually there
Speaker 2: doesn't appear to be an end in sight.
Speaker 1: Does there.
Speaker 3: A thousand days is a long time, and the war
Speaker 3: now has become almost like the First World War and
Speaker 3: the way we get used to it going on. But
Speaker 3: at some point you have to reach for peace because
Speaker 3: it is unsustainable in terms of the amount of actors
Speaker 3: on the side and the way it could escalate very quickly.
Speaker 3: I would have hoped it could have been solved before
Speaker 3: this point, but mister Putin has shown no willingness to negotiate,
Speaker 3: and he seems to almost have been waiting until mister
Speaker 3: Trump came to office.
Speaker 1: What is the state of the conflict at the moment.
Speaker 2: When we last covered it on the front page, soldiers
Speaker 2: had taken Cursk. Since then, has there been much ground
Speaker 2: covered or taken by either side.
Speaker 3: The momentum of the war is in favor of Russia
Speaker 3: right now. They have managed to sustain themselves against the
Speaker 3: economic sanctions of the West. They've managed to increase their
Speaker 3: military and their advancing. As it comes towards winter, you're
Speaker 3: likely to see more attacks on the energy infrastructure of
Speaker 3: the Ukraine as they try to bring the way to
Speaker 3: the war upon the Ukrainian people. On the battlefield, they
Speaker 3: are making incremental advances there is the possibility that up
Speaker 3: to twelve thousand North Korean troops may join them in
Speaker 3: the short term future if requested. And so the risk
Speaker 3: that you've got is that as the Russian side advances,
Speaker 3: that the Western support disintegrates, and that obviously is going
Speaker 3: to we'll talk about with mister Trump. But if mister
Speaker 3: Trump leaves, whether the Europeans will maintain a steadfast offense
Speaker 3: of the Ukraine is questionable, and that has implications for
Speaker 3: countries like US, because we are also not neutral and
Speaker 3: we support the Ukraine.
Speaker 2: Thousands of North Korean soldiers you mentioned have been sent
Speaker 2: to Russia in recent weeks.
Speaker 1: Has there been any updates on this?
Speaker 3: Part of the thinking seems to be that the allowance
Speaker 3: by mister Biden of the long range missiles is that
Speaker 3: it would be able to target the concentrations of these
Speaker 3: new troops if they came close to the battlefield, and
Speaker 3: so right now the intelligence would suggest that they are
Speaker 3: present and they are prepared, but they have not yet
Speaker 3: been deployed, and so normally that kind of step would
Speaker 3: be one if you were trying to escalate the conflict,
Speaker 3: which was quite possible. We may now.
Speaker 4: See United States and Great Britain now directly taken quite
Speaker 4: in against Russia. It means that all militaries or yes
Speaker 4: and Great Britain are become a legitimate goals for the
Speaker 4: Russian Newsterlitary aviation would be creased by Russian nami, and
Speaker 4: some of the satellite or United State it bit and
Speaker 4: also could be attacked would be crashed.
Speaker 2: You mentioned Joe Biden's decision to allow Ukraine to strike
Speaker 2: Russia with long range US missiles. First off, how significant
Speaker 2: is this step and what does it even mean.
Speaker 3: It's a bit of a hard situation to explain because
Speaker 3: when we talk about long range, we're only talking two
Speaker 3: hundred to three hundred kilometers, and so these are not
Speaker 3: missiles that would be able to strike Moscow or Saint Petersburg.
Speaker 3: These are missiles that will only be able to strike
Speaker 3: a couple hundred compters over the border. And when I
Speaker 3: say over the border, I mean into Russia proper, not
Speaker 3: the annex territory or the occupied territory, but into actual Russia.
Speaker 3: And so the targets are likely to be placed with
Speaker 3: your troop concentrations, where there are fuel stop files, where
Speaker 3: are the command bunkers. This will not alter the flow
Speaker 3: of the war. That this will not stop Russia. You
Speaker 3: will also see that if America makes this authorization that
Speaker 3: France and Britain, who have similar munitions, will probably love
Speaker 3: the Ukrainians to do the same as well. Again, it
Speaker 3: won't alter the scale of the war, but it will
Speaker 3: escalate the war. And the risk here is that mister
Speaker 3: Putin sees this is an egregious act which is directly
Speaker 3: threatening Russia itself with weapons which are made in the West,
Speaker 3: and so we can expect a response from mister Putin,
Speaker 3: although we don't know what that will be. Part of
Speaker 3: the problem is that mister Trump, now that he is
Speaker 3: the incumbent president, has said, mister Putin, do not escalate
Speaker 3: this war. He has specifically requested that until he's in office.
Speaker 3: But mister Biden now seems to have taken that step
Speaker 3: for him and escalated it before mister Trump can come
Speaker 3: into power.
Speaker 2: So Washington's being accused of escalating the conflict by doing this.
Speaker 1: Do you agree with that?
Speaker 3: Yes, at some point you've got to reach for peace,
Speaker 3: and it's going to be a very difficult negotiation, and
Speaker 3: because there's a lot of concerns you've got to think about,
Speaker 3: like on what terms you would make peace. But before
Speaker 3: we get to the merits of what peace looks like,
Speaker 3: trying to de escalate the conflict, especially when you know
Speaker 3: any president is coming in whether you voted for him
Speaker 3: or not, is a sensible step. This is creating a
Speaker 3: scenario whereby the situation could get worse in the short
Speaker 3: term future. And we don't know how it could get worse,
Speaker 3: but we can expect a reaction from mister Potin, and
Speaker 3: that may be the delivery of those twelve thousand North
Speaker 3: Korean soldiers.
Speaker 2: Even though the missiles had already been sent to Ukraine.
Speaker 2: Why haven't they been allowed to use them? Why is
Speaker 2: there this authorization to use them?
Speaker 3: The conflict, which is one of the most risky points
Speaker 3: that Europe has been in since the Second World War,
Speaker 3: is contained if you keep the amount of countries involved
Speaker 3: in the fighting to a minimum and you do not
Speaker 3: let the fighting go over the borders once it expands
Speaker 3: in terms of the number of belligerent or it expands
Speaker 3: in terms of geography, especially into Russia, the risk that
Speaker 3: you will get a bigger reaction, and so you're staying
Speaker 3: at that point where you will now provoke Russia to
Speaker 3: do something more. One of the considerations that Russia may
Speaker 3: have is trying to strike these weapons systems before they
Speaker 3: reach the Ukraine over international waters or international airspace. I
Speaker 3: think that's very unlikely, but we don't know how mister
Speaker 3: Putin would react. If that did occur, then the whole
Speaker 3: ball game changes, or if he decides to strike them
Speaker 3: in a NATO country, it becomes a much larger conflict
Speaker 3: which could not be controlled.
Speaker 2: So is it like an international law thing that if
Speaker 2: a country sends another country weapons made in the US
Speaker 2: or wherever, that they then need permission to use them.
Speaker 3: The permission is already implicit in the way that they
Speaker 3: have been given. And so the Americans, the French, the
Speaker 3: British have all set have given them a number of
Speaker 3: munitions and weapons, and they have said, you cannot use
Speaker 3: these in Russia. You can use them in the occupied
Speaker 3: territory or the annex territory, but you cannot take that
Speaker 3: war over the ball because the risk is that Putin
Speaker 3: will respond in a way which is unexpected and may
Speaker 3: provoke an escalation, almost a Domino type situation. Like one
Speaker 3: of the things that he has talked about, which I
Speaker 3: think is unlikely, is a nuclear reprisal. But we don't
Speaker 3: know how he will respond. But the point is right
Speaker 3: now is that there was a chance to calm it down,
Speaker 3: and Putin has been requested by Trump do not escalate this,
Speaker 3: and that meant do not deploy the North Korean soldiers.
Speaker 3: And what you may see now is that as these
Speaker 3: missiles go and start hitting the Russian territory, he might decide, actually,
Speaker 3: I will use North Koreans, or I may use a
Speaker 3: new type of attack system, or I may target different
Speaker 3: areas in the Ukraine. None of this is calming the
Speaker 3: war down.
Speaker 2: Donald Trump repeatedly pledged during his election campaign he'll be
Speaker 2: able in a goiate and put an end to the
Speaker 2: Ukraine War.
Speaker 1: What are the actual chances of him doing this.
Speaker 3: It's easy to make a deal within twenty four hours
Speaker 3: about what you want peace to look like. The difficulty
Speaker 3: is whether the belligerents on the ground are willing to
Speaker 3: accept those terms. If you accept that, the another of
Speaker 3: the issue is whether you accept the Ukraine to be
Speaker 3: divided and whether the remaining part of the rump of
Speaker 3: the Ukraine is allowed to join NATO. If it's allowed
Speaker 3: to join NATO, what remains of the Ukraine will become secure.
Speaker 3: But if you allow the annex territory to be removed,
Speaker 3: you may have a chance perhaps a type of peace.
Speaker 3: The problem you've got is that to allow annexations that
Speaker 3: are done in war to exist, you've got to override
Speaker 3: the United Nations Charter, you've got to ignore the International
Speaker 3: Court of Justice, and you've got to put the International
Speaker 3: Criminal Court to one side. And so there's no discussion
Speaker 3: about war crimes, there's no discussion about territorial sovereignty, there's
Speaker 3: no discussion about international law. But you make a deal,
Speaker 3: and so mister Trump could do that deal. Mister Putin
Speaker 3: may or may not accept that deal. It will depend
Speaker 3: with the NATO is part of the package. But what
Speaker 3: we have a concern with is the precedent value, because
Speaker 3: if you allow one country to annex territory military and
Speaker 3: violent means, it could spread. And so other countries in
Speaker 3: the world right now, which are interested in this debate,
Speaker 3: like Israel, will be following it very closely.
Speaker 2: Right So in the short term it could be perceived
Speaker 2: as creating peace, but in the long term you've got
Speaker 2: other countries, like you said, watching very closely and thinking
Speaker 2: if it worked for Russia.
Speaker 1: It might work for us, and all.
Speaker 3: You got to do is hold out long enough. The
Speaker 3: way international law works is via negotiation, diplomacy, and peaceful
Speaker 3: resolution of disputes. You can't annex someone else's territory, and
Speaker 3: this principle has been clear since the Second World War.
Speaker 3: If you're going to have peace, you can't allow one
Speaker 3: country to take someone else's territory, force them to negotiate
Speaker 3: and then acquire it, because that becomes instability, and the
Speaker 3: global order would be integrain.
Speaker 2: Your reporters asked me if I thought President Putin was small, right,
Speaker 2: I said, of course, he's smart, to which I was
Speaker 2: greeted with all that's such a terrible thing to say.
Speaker 1: The problem is not that Putin is smart, which of
Speaker 1: course he's smart.
Speaker 2: But the real problem is that our leaders are dumb.
Speaker 1: Dumb, so dumb.
Speaker 2: Trump was known during his last term as president, has
Speaker 2: been quite friendly with Russia. He's also nominated Tulsi Gabbard
Speaker 2: to be his Director of National Intelligence, a woman described
Speaker 2: by one Democrat as being likely a Russian asset. What
Speaker 2: would a Trump negotiated peace deal look like?
Speaker 3: I imagine if you were going to have a deal,
Speaker 3: which was this would be a deal which we have
Speaker 3: to be accepted by Russia and by America, and then
Speaker 3: the Ukraine would have to get dragged along, and then
Speaker 3: it creates difficulty for the Europeans of what they will do.
Speaker 3: But the essen to the deal would be that the
Speaker 3: occupied territory, especially in the East, would become Russian territory.
Speaker 3: Charges of war crimes against Russians and including mister Putin,
Speaker 3: who is indicted at the International Criminal Court, would have
Speaker 3: to all be dropped. And then the third and most
Speaker 3: critical issue is whether the remaining part of the Ukraine
Speaker 3: is allowed to join NATO. Mister Putin says no, they
Speaker 3: can't join NATO and that was one of the major
Speaker 3: reasons for the war. But the Ukrainians will say that
Speaker 3: is the primary condition of their if there was going
Speaker 3: to be a peace, because if they aren't allowed to
Speaker 3: join NATO, they will never have peace and security on
Speaker 3: their border. Well.
Speaker 2: Trump famously isn't a fan of NATO or at least
Speaker 2: how much money the US pays to fund the military alliance.
Speaker 2: Are there bigger issues and concerns in.
Speaker 1: Europe about what his presidency might mean for their security.
Speaker 3: He is ambiguous about NATO and he appreciates the importance
Speaker 3: of purity, but he expects all countries to spend more
Speaker 3: on their defense. In every country, and that includes New
Speaker 3: Zealand will need to spend more than than two percent.
Speaker 3: The problem the Europeans have is that the American support
Speaker 3: for the Ukraine is over fifty five percent of the
Speaker 3: military aid, and so if America suddenly pulls itself back,
Speaker 3: then the retreat and the difficulties that the Ukrainians have
Speaker 3: now could become much worse. In the short term, you'd
Speaker 3: have to fill that gap. And so the European to
Speaker 3: have to work out if America walks away and stops
Speaker 3: giving made will we increase our aid or will we
Speaker 3: follow America's lead? And that's a question that New Zealand,
Speaker 3: like Australia, must also face as well, because we will
Speaker 3: either follow the Europeans and keep given with the Ukrainians assistance,
Speaker 3: or will follow the Americans and withdraw what we've gone.
Speaker 2: Well, there is that concern come January, isn't there that
Speaker 2: the US will discontinue its support in sending military support
Speaker 2: And it's Ukraine's biggest arms provider, isn't it.
Speaker 3: Fifty five percent at least of what's gone into is
Speaker 3: coming from America. If mister Trump walks away from the Ukraine,
Speaker 3: and at the moment he's not legally obliged to protect
Speaker 3: the Ukraine. The Ukraine is not a NATO member, But
Speaker 3: if he walks away, then the defense of the Ukraine
Speaker 3: will crumble, or a large part of it will crumble.
Speaker 3: And that means that the other countries which are currently
Speaker 3: holding up the Ukraine and have a much stronger interest
Speaker 3: in it, like the Europeans, will have to nearly double
Speaker 3: what they're doing just to maintain the status quote. Whether
Speaker 3: there's that kind of appetite is questionable.
Speaker 2: What do you make of Biden giving the green light
Speaker 2: for those missiles to be used just nine weeks before
Speaker 2: Trump takes office a.
Speaker 3: Very unuseful and dangerous provocation. Even though mister Trump may
Speaker 3: not have been the preferred candidate for many people, he
Speaker 3: is the victor of the American election and he has
Speaker 3: a pathway towards peace, and so a good faith effort
Speaker 3: would have been not to undermine that. Even though we
Speaker 3: may not agree with the resultant election, we have to
Speaker 3: support that presidency, give it the best chance. There will
Speaker 3: be peace eventually, and it will be difficult. But what
Speaker 3: mister Biden has done is escalate a difficult situation and
Speaker 3: made it worse. Had the Russians utilized the North Korean troops,
Speaker 3: then maybe that would have been arguable. You could have
Speaker 3: expanded it, but they were not. At that point, Putin
Speaker 3: was under a strict request from mister Trump, do not escalate.
Speaker 3: Putin seems to have done that, although he was starting
Speaker 3: to expand his drone attacks. But now Biden has given
Speaker 3: that escalation, and that increases the risk because we don't
Speaker 3: know how Russia will respond.
Speaker 2: Now, is there really more of a chance of ending
Speaker 2: the war under Trump? And if not, what comes next?
Speaker 3: You can end the war, but the question is on
Speaker 3: what terms you're willing to end the war. You know,
Speaker 3: if if Zelenski just said, okay, you can have the
Speaker 3: eastern part of the country and I won't pursue considerations
Speaker 3: of compensation or war crimes, and I won't sue trying
Speaker 3: to join NATO, you would have an agreement by Christmas.
Speaker 3: But for the Ukrainians who have been fighting for the
Speaker 3: last thousand days, who want their independents, who want the
Speaker 3: territory bank, who want international law to be respected, who
Speaker 3: have lost thousands of soldiers and thousands of civilians. They're
Speaker 3: going to say, well, what was it all for? What
Speaker 3: have we been fighting for? What have we tried to defend?
Speaker 3: And so for them, making a peace deal will become harder.
Speaker 3: But at the same time, if Trump walks away from them,
Speaker 3: they've got to make a peace deal, and that may
Speaker 3: be a very difficult deal to swallow, not just for
Speaker 3: them but for us, because it's not just the Ukrainians.
Speaker 3: It's the principle of what peace looks like. Because if
Speaker 3: you can annex other people's land, if you can start
Speaker 3: to take territory which isn't yours, your opening a floodgates,
Speaker 3: and ultimately where you are is a world of power
Speaker 3: not law.
Speaker 2: Do you think Putin thought that Ukraine would last any
Speaker 2: longer than a thousand days.
Speaker 3: I think Putin thought that the whole invasion would be
Speaker 3: over within a few weeks, and he attempted that strike
Speaker 3: very quickly at KI. I don't think he envisaged that
Speaker 3: the West would be so strong and united in its
Speaker 3: solidarity to defend the Ukraine. The Ukraine defense is important
Speaker 3: not just in terms of military defense, but also ideological
Speaker 3: defense against these types of autocratic actions. I think, though,
Speaker 3: he's played a much longer game, and that that game
Speaker 3: has involved not just the military reaction, but also economic realignment.
Speaker 3: And so this means that due to the sanctions, Russia
Speaker 3: has managed to break itself off from the West. It's
Speaker 3: now pivoting towards much more other countries, and it doesn't
Speaker 3: need the West so much more in the future, and
Speaker 3: so much of that glue that gives peace in terms
Speaker 3: of economic globalization, whereby we trade and we become friendly
Speaker 3: and we exchange between countries, is starting to disappear. And
Speaker 3: that means that in the future, I think Russia is
Speaker 3: more likely to be aggressive than it has been in
Speaker 3: the past because it doesn't need the West as much
Speaker 3: as it did. So even if you make peace now
Speaker 3: with Russia, the question is what happens next. Who's the
Speaker 3: next neighbor who'll be targeted? And the Europeans feel that,
Speaker 3: and that's why you're seeing this expansion of Sweden and
Speaker 3: Finland joining NATO. Countries which for decades felt that they
Speaker 3: could live with a strong and slightly aggressive Russia no
Speaker 3: longer feel that safety, and that's why they're reaching for
Speaker 3: the alliance. And the big question is will the Ukraine
Speaker 3: and are under a peace steel be allowed to join NATO.
Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us, al.
Speaker 3: You're welcome, Chelsea.
Speaker 2: That's it for this episode of the Front Page. You
Speaker 2: can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage
Speaker 2: at enzadherld dot co dot nz. The Front Page is
Speaker 2: produced by Ethan Sills and Richard Martin, who is also
Speaker 2: a sound engineer.
Speaker 1: I'm Chelsea Daniels.
Speaker 2: Subscribe to the Front Page on iHeartRadio or wherever you
Speaker 2: get your podcasts, and tune in tomorrow for another look
Speaker 2: behind the headlines.