WEBVTT - Rushed and Flustered. Felix Light Talks To Armstrong & Getty. 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:01.880 And welcome back to the Armstrong and get a show. 0:00:01.920 --> 0:00:05.160 Felix Light, our man in London with CBS Radio News 0:00:05.160 --> 0:00:08.640 in the Moscow at times. Felix, how are you? I'm 0:00:08.760 --> 0:00:10.960 very well. Thank you to be here as always. Yeah, 0:00:11.000 --> 0:00:12.959 thank you. You're a great reporter and that's why we 0:00:13.080 --> 0:00:15.360 like to have you on. So, speaking of reporting, does 0:00:15.400 --> 0:00:17.840 that seem to be accurate? Are are are people that 0:00:18.079 --> 0:00:21.560 desperate to flee ending up being some of the three 0:00:21.640 --> 0:00:26.200 hundred thousand men that are going to be sent to war? Oh, absolutely, 0:00:26.239 --> 0:00:28.319 you know, I think you know, it's it's kind of 0:00:28.320 --> 0:00:31.800 hard to understate the gravity and the sort of the 0:00:31.800 --> 0:00:33.879 scale of what's going on. You know, I you know, 0:00:33.920 --> 0:00:35.840 speaking sort of from my own personal experience, I would 0:00:35.880 --> 0:00:38.440 say that pretty much every young man of sort of 0:00:38.479 --> 0:00:43.120 military age that I know in Moscow is making plans 0:00:43.560 --> 0:00:45.720 or has already left. You know, it is making plans 0:00:45.760 --> 0:00:47.559 to leave or has already left, and so, you know, 0:00:47.920 --> 0:00:50.280 sometimes that's, you know, taking them from sort of some 0:00:50.440 --> 0:00:53.680 really sort of you know securities and and and long 0:00:53.720 --> 0:00:56.960 and sort of roundabout roots. You know. So as as 0:00:57.000 --> 0:00:58.840 you said in the in the segment at the start, 0:00:59.480 --> 0:01:02.080 all the you know, for four or five six days 0:01:02.080 --> 0:01:04.200 are booked up. You know, it is literally impossible to 0:01:04.240 --> 0:01:05.840 get a flight out of Moscow right now. So you know, 0:01:05.880 --> 0:01:08.440 you see people sitting on trains to go over the 0:01:08.480 --> 0:01:11.440 border into Kazakhstan or into Mongolia or anything, you know, 0:01:11.840 --> 0:01:13.679 any sort of way to get out. Because you know this, 0:01:14.520 --> 0:01:16.720 you gotta sort of realize what you know the Russian 0:01:16.800 --> 0:01:19.039 army is. You know this is not the U S Army, 0:01:19.200 --> 0:01:20.800 is not the British army. You know, a place where 0:01:20.840 --> 0:01:23.520 you know you're obviously trained to kill and be killed, 0:01:24.000 --> 0:01:26.800 but you know you're you're treated with a modicum of 0:01:26.800 --> 0:01:28.839 dignity and a modicum of respect. You know, the Russian 0:01:28.880 --> 0:01:30.440 army and, more to the point, you know a conscript 0:01:30.440 --> 0:01:32.840 in the Russian army, you're not going to be treated 0:01:32.840 --> 0:01:35.039 well and you're going to be used as cannon fodder, 0:01:35.080 --> 0:01:36.800 an award that lots of these people don't agree with, 0:01:37.360 --> 0:01:39.279 and so I think, you know, people are pretty desperate 0:01:39.319 --> 0:01:41.720 to get out of that, whatever it may cost. Okay, 0:01:41.760 --> 0:01:43.800 that's a really interesting angle you just brought up. So 0:01:44.040 --> 0:01:46.040 I was one. I was wondering if this is an 0:01:46.120 --> 0:01:49.960 indication how desperate these men are to get out of 0:01:50.000 --> 0:01:52.640 the country that they know what's up. They're getting the 0:01:52.720 --> 0:01:55.120 real story somehow. We we've talked a lot with you 0:01:55.240 --> 0:01:58.440 and others about the state controlled media is still telling 0:01:58.480 --> 0:02:01.240 the story that it's, you know, where we're liberating Ukrainians 0:02:01.360 --> 0:02:03.600 from Nazis and all the difference sort of stuff. So 0:02:04.040 --> 0:02:05.880 I was thinking, well, most of these young men must 0:02:05.960 --> 0:02:08.720 know the real story. But part of it is, you're saying, 0:02:09.919 --> 0:02:13.440 just the the idea of being in the Russian military 0:02:13.639 --> 0:02:16.280 at all is so miserable you might want to leave 0:02:16.320 --> 0:02:19.480 the country because the history of the Russian military, that 0:02:19.639 --> 0:02:23.440 that's that's the deal. Well, yeah, you know, it's both. 0:02:23.520 --> 0:02:25.480 I think. You know these people who are talking about 0:02:25.480 --> 0:02:27.079 who are leaving. You know, these are people, I think, 0:02:27.120 --> 0:02:29.080 who are not, you know, on board with the idea 0:02:29.120 --> 0:02:31.440 of the war in Ukraine. You know people who, you know, 0:02:31.680 --> 0:02:34.520 not endorsing sort of Vladimir Putin's ideas. You know, Russia, 0:02:34.800 --> 0:02:36.919 you know, has a very sort of strict and vary 0:02:36.960 --> 0:02:40.320 sort of, you know, authoritarian political system with, you know, 0:02:40.800 --> 0:02:42.960 very little free media. But you know you know people 0:02:43.000 --> 0:02:44.880 in the sort of advanced cities. You know young people, 0:02:45.000 --> 0:02:47.000 educated people. You know they know the scholar, as you say. 0:02:47.080 --> 0:02:48.799 You know they know what's upset. You know, it's not 0:02:48.880 --> 0:02:51.440 impossible to find sort of, you know, accurate news on 0:02:51.560 --> 0:02:54.119 the Internet and whatever, if you know sort of where 0:02:54.200 --> 0:02:55.919 to look. So you know these people are not done. 0:02:56.280 --> 0:02:58.600 You know they know what they're thinking about. But also, 0:02:58.680 --> 0:03:00.959 you know, yeah, you know they've invested a lot in 0:03:01.080 --> 0:03:03.440 not going to the war, you know, and especially a 0:03:03.480 --> 0:03:05.840 war they don't agree with. You know, Russia has the 0:03:06.240 --> 0:03:08.600 draft for one year. You know, you get concerted for 0:03:08.680 --> 0:03:11.080 one year when you leave school and you're not supposed 0:03:11.120 --> 0:03:13.240 to be half to fight in wars as a concert 0:03:13.840 --> 0:03:16.000 but you know there's a really sort of roaring black 0:03:16.080 --> 0:03:18.400 market trade and sort of you know, doctors to get 0:03:18.440 --> 0:03:20.679 people out of that sort of you know, year of 0:03:20.760 --> 0:03:23.160 service in the military. So there's a huge sort of war, 0:03:23.760 --> 0:03:26.040 you know, sector of the economy around sort of getting 0:03:26.040 --> 0:03:27.959 people out of the military. So you know, when something 0:03:28.040 --> 0:03:30.200 like this happens, then there's a much bigger call up 0:03:30.200 --> 0:03:32.160 and when it's actually to a war, I think that 0:03:32.200 --> 0:03:34.120 sort of stuff really goes into overdrive. You know, those 0:03:34.200 --> 0:03:36.080 kind of instincts. You know, people are just you know, 0:03:36.160 --> 0:03:37.960 I'm not going to die for Poutin I'm not going 0:03:38.000 --> 0:03:39.440 to die in a war that I don't agree with. 0:03:40.000 --> 0:03:43.600 You know, I get a head out of friendship. Yeah, well, 0:03:43.600 --> 0:03:47.520 I've seen videos of guys being hugged, hugged by their 0:03:47.600 --> 0:03:50.440 mothers is before they get on a bus that are going. 0:03:50.800 --> 0:03:54.560 So how many people seem to actually be sticking around 0:03:54.560 --> 0:03:57.680 and going as far as you can tell? Well, you know, 0:03:57.920 --> 0:04:01.000 Russia is a you know, a very sort varied in 0:04:01.040 --> 0:04:03.400 complex country. You know, in sort of the big cities, 0:04:03.440 --> 0:04:05.200 the Moscows, you know, the Saint Petersburg, you know, a 0:04:05.240 --> 0:04:06.480 lot of people are just going to be going with 0:04:06.520 --> 0:04:09.040 their seating, getting out, you know, going to wherever they can. 0:04:09.120 --> 0:04:11.400 But you know, if you're like a young kid in 0:04:11.480 --> 0:04:13.200 a little village somewhere, you know you've got a very 0:04:13.240 --> 0:04:15.880 different life experience. You know, it's more likely that sort 0:04:15.920 --> 0:04:18.080 of you know, your your dad's already served in the army, 0:04:18.160 --> 0:04:20.320 you know, or your grandfather has already served in the army. 0:04:20.760 --> 0:04:22.479 So you know, it's it's sort of much more normal 0:04:22.560 --> 0:04:24.120 and I think you know those people they don't really 0:04:24.160 --> 0:04:25.840 have the resources to sort of get out of the 0:04:25.880 --> 0:04:27.800 country and get out of the way. So I think, 0:04:27.839 --> 0:04:30.280 you know, what we see is that, you know, if 0:04:30.320 --> 0:04:32.200 you get away from the big cities to sort of 0:04:32.400 --> 0:04:35.960 especially sort of ethnic minority areas, you know, parts of Siberia, 0:04:36.120 --> 0:04:37.720 parts of the south of Russia, where, you know, a 0:04:37.800 --> 0:04:40.240 lot of the people aren't actually sort of, you know, European, 0:04:40.360 --> 0:04:43.000 sort of ethnic Russians. You know they're they're Muslims or 0:04:43.000 --> 0:04:45.680 their sort of Asians or whatever. You know, these people 0:04:45.720 --> 0:04:47.920 are really getting called up. You know there's a lot 0:04:48.000 --> 0:04:52.320 of sort of, you know, military recruitment going on there 0:04:52.400 --> 0:04:54.800 now and a lot of the burden of this mobilization 0:04:54.920 --> 0:04:58.520 is really falling on these people, I think. Um, what 0:04:58.760 --> 0:05:00.840 is your take on how long it's going to take 0:05:00.920 --> 0:05:04.080 before these guys are actually in the field fighting Ukrainians, 0:05:04.120 --> 0:05:08.080 trying to liberate them from the Nazis? Yeah, right, well, 0:05:08.279 --> 0:05:09.560 you know it's not going to take long. You know 0:05:09.920 --> 0:05:11.480 these people are not going to get the sort of 0:05:11.600 --> 0:05:13.640 the red carpet treatment in the merchant. You know you're 0:05:13.640 --> 0:05:16.000 going to get sort of, you know, two weeks, two 0:05:16.000 --> 0:05:17.600 and a half weeks of training. You know, because you're 0:05:17.600 --> 0:05:19.840 already theoretically a member of the reserves. You know, you're 0:05:19.839 --> 0:05:22.120 already theoretically a member of the Russian army. You've been 0:05:22.160 --> 0:05:24.840 trained before and now you're getting sent off to war. 0:05:25.000 --> 0:05:26.760 So you know, these people are going to be putting 0:05:26.760 --> 0:05:29.839 a pretty down fast combat may belts, you know, to Ukraine. 0:05:29.920 --> 0:05:31.320 So these people are going to be showing up on 0:05:31.360 --> 0:05:35.039 the front of the end very quickly. Wow. One final 0:05:35.160 --> 0:05:37.640 question for Felix Light, who is in London but he's 0:05:37.680 --> 0:05:41.520 a a reporter on all things Russian, has been for 0:05:41.560 --> 0:05:47.120 a while. Um, how seriously are Europeans taking the nuclear 0:05:47.240 --> 0:05:52.480 threat that putting put out the other day? Well, you know, 0:05:52.880 --> 0:05:55.080 I think the war obviously feels a bit closer to us, 0:05:55.120 --> 0:05:57.320 but you know, when you're talking nuclear, you know it's 0:05:57.360 --> 0:05:59.400 it's almost so bad that you can't imagine it. You know, 0:05:59.520 --> 0:06:02.440 and I think for the you know, for the moment, 0:06:03.240 --> 0:06:05.000 people do worry a lot about the war. You know, 0:06:05.040 --> 0:06:08.040 they worry about gas prices, they worry about energy costs here, 0:06:08.080 --> 0:06:10.680 which are really going up in Europe. You know, America, 0:06:10.720 --> 0:06:13.040 obviously you can get it's it's gas and it's it's 0:06:13.040 --> 0:06:15.240 still from other sort of sources, from Europe is really, 0:06:15.279 --> 0:06:17.640 really dependent on Russia, and so you know, that's a 0:06:17.720 --> 0:06:20.320 big worry, I think here right now. You know, nuclear 0:06:20.440 --> 0:06:22.720 is obviously terrifying, but you know, it's it's almost bad 0:06:22.760 --> 0:06:24.160 thing that you don't want to think about because it's 0:06:24.160 --> 0:06:26.560 too bad to think about. So I wouldn't say people 0:06:26.560 --> 0:06:30.480 worry about day level. Right, okay, cool, always good. Felix 0:06:30.640 --> 0:06:34.600 light from London. Thank you, Felix. Always pleasure of cheers.