WEBVTT - Interview Only w/ Anne Applebaum - Why Putin Won’t Stop, And Why Ukraine Won’t Settle 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:02.640 Do you hate hangovers, We'll say goodbye to hangovers. Out 0:00:02.640 --> 0:00:05.160 of Office gives you the social buzz without the next 0:00:05.240 --> 0:00:07.560 day regret. Their best selling out of Office gummies were 0:00:07.560 --> 0:00:10.479 designed to provide a mild, relaxing buzz, booster your mood, 0:00:10.560 --> 0:00:14.120 and enhance creativity and relaxation. With five different strengths, you 0:00:14.160 --> 0:00:16.360 can tailor the dose to fit your vibe, from a 0:00:16.440 --> 0:00:20.520 gentle one point five milligram micro dose to their newest 0:00:20.640 --> 0:00:24.599 fifteen milligram gummy for a more elevated experience. Their THHC 0:00:24.760 --> 0:00:28.159 beverages and gummies are a modern, mindful alternative to a 0:00:28.160 --> 0:00:30.680 glass of wine or a cocktail. 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Right now, Soul is offering my audience thirty 0:01:06.160 --> 0:01:09.240 percent off your entire order, So go to getsold dot 0:01:09.240 --> 0:01:13.319 Com use the promo code toodcast. Don't forget that code. 0:01:13.440 --> 0:01:22.240 That's getsold dot Com promo code toodcast for thirty percent off. Well. 0:01:22.319 --> 0:01:24.920 Joining me now is one of the journalists that I 0:01:25.080 --> 0:01:27.880 always learned something from when I read her stuff in 0:01:27.959 --> 0:01:32.280 The Atlantic and Apple Bomb, and in many ways I 0:01:32.319 --> 0:01:34.560 know what I turned to her for and what I 0:01:34.680 --> 0:01:38.120 read her most thoroughly about is whenever she's writing about 0:01:38.160 --> 0:01:42.120 Central and Eastern European and what's going on in that 0:01:42.280 --> 0:01:45.880 part of the world specifically. I want to timestamp this. 0:01:46.040 --> 0:01:50.960 We are talking midday, Wednesday, November nineteenth, and it's important 0:01:50.960 --> 0:01:55.160 to timestamp this because earlier this morning some news leak 0:01:55.280 --> 0:01:59.960 that there is a supposed potential piece deal of soort 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:05.000 it's being circulated that was, I guess negotiated by the 0:02:05.080 --> 0:02:09.480 President's personal on voice Steve Whitcoff, with an envoy of 0:02:09.520 --> 0:02:13.560 the Russians, and it is now they are supposedly shopping 0:02:13.600 --> 0:02:17.240 around to see if, in the words of the Axios reporting, 0:02:17.320 --> 0:02:20.880 essentially can they jam the Ukrainians to take this deal. 0:02:22.639 --> 0:02:25.000 Doesn't seem as if many people know about this deal, 0:02:25.040 --> 0:02:27.720 and if you does have the whiff for what it's 0:02:27.720 --> 0:02:31.560 worth of a leak in order to try to turn 0:02:31.600 --> 0:02:35.320 the page on stories perhaps this administration doesn't like on 0:02:35.400 --> 0:02:38.200 the front page. That's the cynic in me. But I'm 0:02:38.240 --> 0:02:40.120 not going to make an apple bomb day with that 0:02:40.280 --> 0:02:43.240 aspect of this story. And is also author of a 0:02:43.280 --> 0:02:48.280 brand new book, Autocracy inc. Right, it's it's new ish. 0:02:48.840 --> 0:02:50.960 It came out in paperback this year, and it has 0:02:51.000 --> 0:02:51.560 a new paper. 0:02:52.720 --> 0:02:55.960 Yes, yes, well, and I obviously want to talk about that, 0:02:56.000 --> 0:02:58.919 But let's start with I mean, look, at any given day, 0:02:58.919 --> 0:03:01.400 I would have asked you this, which is, you know, 0:03:03.160 --> 0:03:06.200 will I don't feel like the war between Russian and 0:03:06.240 --> 0:03:09.160 Ukraine is going to end even if there's a cease fire. 0:03:09.240 --> 0:03:11.560 But I guess that's the question. Are we going to 0:03:11.600 --> 0:03:15.200 have a period this year where there is no exchange 0:03:15.200 --> 0:03:17.280 of fire between the Russians and the Ukrainians. 0:03:18.200 --> 0:03:21.720 So to be clear right now on this, you've just 0:03:21.840 --> 0:03:26.920 time stamped the date one of the things that's been 0:03:26.919 --> 0:03:29.359 true about this war since the very very beginning is 0:03:29.400 --> 0:03:33.480 still true, and that is that Vladimir Putin has never 0:03:33.600 --> 0:03:37.240 said that he will give up his original war aims, 0:03:37.840 --> 0:03:41.640 and his original war aims remain the conquest or the 0:03:41.720 --> 0:03:44.720 occupation or the or just the control of all of 0:03:44.840 --> 0:03:48.920 Ukraine and the prevention of the existence of a Ukrainian 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:51.840 government that would have sovereignty and would be able to 0:03:51.920 --> 0:03:54.800 make trade deals with the European Union, and would be 0:03:54.800 --> 0:03:56.760 able to run the country the way they want to 0:03:56.800 --> 0:04:00.000 run it. And so he's never said that, he's never 0:04:00.640 --> 0:04:06.119 acknowledged the legitimous legitimacy of President Zelenski. He's never said 0:04:06.120 --> 0:04:10.760 he wants to stop fighting. He's never acknowledged, as I said, 0:04:10.800 --> 0:04:13.520 the right of Ukrainians to be Ukrainians. He's continued to 0:04:13.560 --> 0:04:15.680 talk about them as if they were part of Russia. 0:04:16.320 --> 0:04:19.800 And it seems to me that until he gives that up, 0:04:20.560 --> 0:04:23.279 and it's and he would have to do it publicly, 0:04:23.320 --> 0:04:24.520 I mean, he would have to do it in some 0:04:24.800 --> 0:04:28.000 way where he says it, then it's very hard to 0:04:28.080 --> 0:04:30.560 see how we get to the end of the war. 0:04:31.920 --> 0:04:35.560 The war will end when the Russians stop fighting and 0:04:35.600 --> 0:04:38.279 when they say we're not going to conquer all of Ukraine, 0:04:38.320 --> 0:04:40.640 and then we can talk about ceasefires, or we can 0:04:40.680 --> 0:04:43.320 talk about where the border's going to be, and there 0:04:43.360 --> 0:04:45.560 are a lot of other things we could negotiate, but 0:04:45.600 --> 0:04:49.360 we haven't reached that moment. What worries me about the 0:04:49.400 --> 0:04:52.040 news that we heard today, aside from the piece of 0:04:52.080 --> 0:04:53.800 it that you mentioned that it feels a little bit 0:04:53.880 --> 0:04:58.160 like let's haul an old story out of the you know, 0:04:58.320 --> 0:05:00.159 out of the trash can and put it back on 0:05:00.200 --> 0:05:03.040 the front pages so that we can distract from stuff 0:05:03.040 --> 0:05:04.880 we don't want to talk about. I mean, what what 0:05:05.040 --> 0:05:09.840 worries me is the is the persistence of the two 0:05:09.920 --> 0:05:13.240 main negotiators, and this is Steve Witkoff and Kirol Dimitriev. 0:05:13.279 --> 0:05:17.080 We know who Witkof is. He's Trump's friend from the 0:05:17.080 --> 0:05:21.560 real estate agency, was involved in Gaza. He's someone who 0:05:21.640 --> 0:05:24.600 doesn't know Russia and Ukraine very well. He doesn't know 0:05:24.640 --> 0:05:26.440 any of the history or any of the people. 0:05:26.480 --> 0:05:29.040 Well, I think he would now dispute that. 0:05:29.720 --> 0:05:31.719 He might he might now dispute it. But his main 0:05:31.760 --> 0:05:35.640 interlocutor has been Kirol Dimitriev, who's the head important because 0:05:35.640 --> 0:05:39.440 he's the head of the Russian Sovereign Wealth Fund, and 0:05:39.520 --> 0:05:42.040 a lot of what Wikoff and Demetria have apparently been 0:05:42.040 --> 0:05:44.760 talking about is not so much peace in Ukraine but 0:05:44.880 --> 0:05:47.520 business deals that might be done between the United States 0:05:47.520 --> 0:05:51.040 and Russia. And that's not really a very good starting 0:05:51.040 --> 0:05:54.280 point as far as I'm concerned, or as anybody Ukrainians 0:05:54.320 --> 0:05:57.000 are concerned, or the Europeans are concerned. That's not really 0:05:57.040 --> 0:05:58.960 a good starting point for talking about how to end 0:05:59.000 --> 0:06:01.400 the war, because because the thing that will in the 0:06:01.480 --> 0:06:06.520 war is expressions of American European commitment to Ukraine. Well, 0:06:06.520 --> 0:06:09.440 you know, Putin has to be persuaded that Ukraine will 0:06:09.800 --> 0:06:11.880 be able to continue fighting for a long time, and 0:06:11.920 --> 0:06:15.120 then maybe he will rethink his maynaim. And that's not 0:06:15.360 --> 0:06:17.080 the role that would Cough is playing. 0:06:18.279 --> 0:06:20.200 I'm just going to cut to the chase here. If 0:06:21.040 --> 0:06:24.120 I just think about this as game theory. But if 0:06:24.120 --> 0:06:33.000 I'm Vladimir Putin, I have the most supportive, malleable American 0:06:33.040 --> 0:06:39.400 president that I'll ever have, probably right, and he knows 0:06:39.560 --> 0:06:42.680 he can, and he continues. It feels as if he 0:06:42.800 --> 0:06:45.960 gets to put he has pushed Trump further closer and 0:06:46.000 --> 0:06:52.200 closer to him. As this is dragged on, and now 0:06:52.240 --> 0:06:56.320 they've negotiated without the Europeans and without the Ukrainians. Here 0:06:58.440 --> 0:07:03.000 is there a point where where where Putin is overreaching 0:07:03.040 --> 0:07:06.040 Here and even even Trump will realize he's being played. 0:07:08.400 --> 0:07:12.000 Trump seems to be resistant to the idea that he's 0:07:12.040 --> 0:07:17.200 being played. He he continually it's it's and it's strange 0:07:17.320 --> 0:07:21.440 because he's so easily offended by everybody else, by other leaders, 0:07:21.960 --> 0:07:27.840 by journalists. But there are particular people. Actually, the Saudi 0:07:28.240 --> 0:07:30.920 crown Prince was one of them. We saw that in 0:07:31.040 --> 0:07:34.880 Washington also yesterday. Putin is another who seemed to have 0:07:34.920 --> 0:07:37.440 a special status for him. And my guess is it's 0:07:37.480 --> 0:07:40.240 because they're very rich, and he thinks that he can 0:07:40.280 --> 0:07:44.320 do business deals with them, and he doesn't want them insulted, 0:07:44.440 --> 0:07:47.200 and he doesn't seem to take what he doesn't take 0:07:47.240 --> 0:07:51.640 their insults as as seriously as he does others. And 0:07:51.680 --> 0:07:54.920 so it doesn't it doesn't feel like he's close to that. 0:07:55.000 --> 0:07:58.600 I mean, he may be miscalculating in another way, though, 0:07:58.640 --> 0:08:01.560 which is that you know, point in the war, the 0:08:01.640 --> 0:08:05.160 Europeans are supporting the Ukrainians far more than the US is, 0:08:05.440 --> 0:08:09.200 certainly in sheer monetary terms. They definitely are. And the 0:08:09.280 --> 0:08:13.360 Ukrainians themselves, also, as the President would have put it, 0:08:13.440 --> 0:08:16.040 have their own cards, they have their own weapons industry. 0:08:16.200 --> 0:08:19.080 They made two million drones last year and they're going 0:08:19.120 --> 0:08:21.000 to make four million drones this year, and they've been 0:08:21.120 --> 0:08:26.040 using them to effectively hit Russian oil refineries and other 0:08:26.160 --> 0:08:30.000 targets connected to the oil and gas industry. And you know, 0:08:30.080 --> 0:08:34.200 it's not clear that Trump has control over this war. 0:08:34.240 --> 0:08:37.360 In other words, a decision that he makes will end it. 0:08:37.400 --> 0:08:40.120 So it's a it's an odd moment where we're still 0:08:40.120 --> 0:08:42.920 playing the game putin talking to Trumpell and the war, 0:08:43.440 --> 0:08:45.920 but there are so many other factors now that he 0:08:45.960 --> 0:08:47.760 doesn't seem to be taking into account. 0:08:48.559 --> 0:08:51.760 According to this report in Xios, there was a sense 0:08:51.800 --> 0:08:55.880 that and you could hear it that the that certain 0:08:55.920 --> 0:08:59.800 members of the administration think that Zelenski's politically weak at 0:08:59.800 --> 0:09:02.360 the moment because of the scandal that just sort of 0:09:02.360 --> 0:09:06.320 forced out a few of his cabinet ministers, and that 0:09:06.400 --> 0:09:10.199 they essentially can jam him. I know you've got particular 0:09:10.280 --> 0:09:13.480 insight on that on the ground domestically with Ukraine. What 0:09:13.600 --> 0:09:17.200 kind of what kind of political peril is Zelenski in 0:09:17.280 --> 0:09:18.559 at the moment domestically. 0:09:20.040 --> 0:09:24.200 So remember that the reason there is a corruption scandal 0:09:24.320 --> 0:09:27.560 right now in Ukraine is that the Ukrainian state, a 0:09:27.679 --> 0:09:32.680 state institution, is investigating the operations of the state. In 0:09:32.720 --> 0:09:37.800 other words, this is the Ukrainian government acting. And although 0:09:37.840 --> 0:09:40.640 it has identified a couple of ministers who one or 0:09:40.640 --> 0:09:44.760 two of whom are close to Zelenski, it's doing so 0:09:44.960 --> 0:09:46.520 within the law. It's not as if, you know, the 0:09:46.559 --> 0:09:49.160 IMF has come in and said you're corrupt, or even 0:09:49.240 --> 0:09:51.920 Germans we have or something there or right, or the 0:09:52.040 --> 0:09:56.160 US has. This is actually internal to the Ukrainian political 0:09:56.200 --> 0:09:59.640 system and it's part of Ukrainian democracy and it's supported 0:09:59.679 --> 0:10:06.720 by most Ukrainians. And so assuming that Zelenski you know, 0:10:06.840 --> 0:10:09.840 doesn't try to block it or stop it, and so 0:10:09.920 --> 0:10:12.920 far he hasn't. So far, he done nothing like that. 0:10:13.000 --> 0:10:18.040 He said, you know, let the investigations continue. Assuming that continues, 0:10:18.120 --> 0:10:23.200 then he may emerge more strongly from this scandal actually 0:10:23.280 --> 0:10:26.120 because he would then be seen to have presided over 0:10:26.200 --> 0:10:29.920 something that Ukrainians want, which is a kind of clean government. This, 0:10:30.000 --> 0:10:32.640 by the way, the nature of the scandal is not 0:10:32.720 --> 0:10:36.000 to do with US or European AID, so at least 0:10:36.040 --> 0:10:38.000 not as far as we know so far. It's to 0:10:38.080 --> 0:10:42.360 do with kickbacks on contracts, which is more which is 0:10:42.360 --> 0:10:43.040 more internal. 0:10:43.080 --> 0:10:45.440 I hate to call it this. It felt like running 0:10:45.480 --> 0:10:48.720 the mill government graft when I read the story, right, like, 0:10:48.760 --> 0:10:51.560 you're like, oh, well, this happens pretty much everywhere around 0:10:51.559 --> 0:10:54.600 the world. There's always somebody's skimming something off the top 0:10:54.720 --> 0:10:55.720 or are getting up. 0:10:56.280 --> 0:10:56.480 Yeah. 0:10:56.520 --> 0:10:59.959 And also, of course it's something that you can't imagine 0:11:00.080 --> 0:11:04.320 in cash Betel's FBI doing like you can't imagine this 0:11:04.440 --> 0:11:07.199 happening now in the United States. So cash Betel's FBI 0:11:07.320 --> 0:11:12.040 investigating Trump administration deals for example, or or or Trump 0:11:12.080 --> 0:11:15.320 cabinet members. So this is evidence of the strength of 0:11:15.400 --> 0:11:18.600 Ukrainian democracy and of transparency and so on. So you 0:11:18.600 --> 0:11:20.720 have to you have to keep that in mind. 0:11:21.679 --> 0:11:25.320 Do you think it's a miscalculation that there's a moment 0:11:25.360 --> 0:11:29.240 to jam Zelensky here that the US may be misreading 0:11:29.240 --> 0:11:29.800 the situation. 0:11:30.240 --> 0:11:32.559 So given that we I don't know any of the details, 0:11:33.160 --> 0:11:37.560 well none of us, right, I mean, the Ukrainians you know, 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:41.720 have no interest in ending the war, or I should 0:11:41.760 --> 0:11:43.760 say that differently, they have they have no interest in 0:11:44.160 --> 0:11:47.480 how creating a ceasefire for the sake of a ceasefire. 0:11:47.600 --> 0:11:51.080 In other words, having a ceasefire that will just kick 0:11:51.160 --> 0:11:53.240 the problem down the road a little while, give the 0:11:53.280 --> 0:11:57.160 Russians time to rearm h and start the war again. 0:11:58.400 --> 0:12:00.640 That's not something that they find use. I mean, there's 0:12:00.640 --> 0:12:02.760 a there's a problem actually with the way wit Coff 0:12:02.840 --> 0:12:05.320 and Trump negotiate, which is that they want a big headline, 0:12:05.360 --> 0:12:07.320 just like the same thing has just happened in Gaza, 0:12:07.360 --> 0:12:12.880 big headline, end of the war, ceasefire, hostages returned forgetting 0:12:12.960 --> 0:12:15.440 that loss of hostages were returned by the Biden administration 0:12:15.520 --> 0:12:19.240 as well. And then actually there is no solution, and 0:12:19.280 --> 0:12:20.760 we don't know how the war is going to end, 0:12:20.800 --> 0:12:24.559 and actually the fighting is continuing in new ways, and 0:12:24.600 --> 0:12:27.920 I think the Ukrainians are afraid of that. And there, 0:12:28.080 --> 0:12:30.880 you know, so there's no you know, there's you know, 0:12:31.160 --> 0:12:34.560 unless they're going to be offered something that has some substance, 0:12:34.640 --> 0:12:37.199 in other words, stop fighting right now, which, by the way, 0:12:37.200 --> 0:12:40.000 they've said they would do, stop fighting right now on 0:12:40.160 --> 0:12:44.880 the current you know, on the current battle front lines. Uh. 0:12:44.920 --> 0:12:49.319 And you know, then we will ensure that we reinforce 0:12:49.400 --> 0:12:51.800 you and then we can begin negotiations with some kind 0:12:51.840 --> 0:12:55.400 of guarantee that the Russians won't use this uh to 0:12:55.640 --> 0:12:58.080 to start fighting again. I mean, unless there's something that 0:12:58.200 --> 0:13:01.600 offers them something real, then I don't see how you 0:13:01.720 --> 0:13:03.960 can jam them. As I said, they have their own agency, 0:13:04.000 --> 0:13:05.160 they have their own sources of. 0:13:05.120 --> 0:13:09.479 Money, and at this point the war itself has changed 0:13:09.559 --> 0:13:13.120 in that it's not using as many It's a drone 0:13:13.160 --> 0:13:15.880 war more or less. 0:13:16.160 --> 0:13:18.960 Right now, this is a really important point, and I 0:13:19.000 --> 0:13:21.400 don't think it's really understood by most Americans. This is 0:13:21.440 --> 0:13:24.080 a completely different kind of war from the kind of 0:13:24.120 --> 0:13:26.320 war it was at the beginning, and it's also a 0:13:26.360 --> 0:13:30.559 different kind of war from any war in history. So 0:13:30.600 --> 0:13:34.560 there is a there is a kind of ten twenty 0:13:34.600 --> 0:13:37.040 miles on either side of the front line which are 0:13:37.080 --> 0:13:40.440 now completely transparent. Everything can be seen because there's so 0:13:40.480 --> 0:13:43.480 many drones in the air, and that means that old 0:13:43.840 --> 0:13:46.480 kinds of military tactics whereby you know you did a 0:13:46.520 --> 0:13:50.840 secret raid or you've got are all visible. And it's 0:13:51.040 --> 0:13:53.760 very very hard in that situation to move forward because 0:13:53.760 --> 0:13:57.160 as soon as any Russian trucks or tanks or people 0:13:57.240 --> 0:14:00.760 move into this visible zone, the Ukrainians can hit them. 0:14:01.520 --> 0:14:03.920 And so the tactics of the war have been about 0:14:04.080 --> 0:14:07.559 electronic warfare, how the drones are being used, and the 0:14:07.679 --> 0:14:12.199 Ukrainians also now have a system whereby the drone industry 0:14:12.360 --> 0:14:15.240 is connected directly to the front line, so as the 0:14:15.240 --> 0:14:18.640 situation changes on the front line, they radio back to 0:14:18.720 --> 0:14:21.840 the factory not far away, and they change the way 0:14:21.880 --> 0:14:23.920 the drone is being built, or they change the software 0:14:24.000 --> 0:14:26.560 whatever needs to be changed. So there's a kind of 0:14:26.720 --> 0:14:32.320 constant updating of the technology, which I mean is also 0:14:32.360 --> 0:14:34.360 the speed of it is something that I don't think 0:14:34.400 --> 0:14:35.960 we've seen anywhere else before. 0:14:36.680 --> 0:14:39.720 So it's such a strange war. And you're right, I've 0:14:39.720 --> 0:14:41.880 been trying to get my I had Dexter focus on 0:14:42.040 --> 0:14:44.280 recently and he was he had just been there trying 0:14:44.320 --> 0:14:47.240 to explain and how frankly, how the Pentagon now is 0:14:47.280 --> 0:14:52.120 studying rights, everyone is studying what's happening here, because obviously 0:14:52.200 --> 0:14:54.840 warfare is going to change with the with the advent 0:14:54.840 --> 0:14:59.440 of drones. But that so if you if you need 0:14:59.560 --> 0:15:06.200 fewer human soldiers, but there are now more defenseless civilians, 0:15:06.440 --> 0:15:09.480 and both the Ukrainians and the Russians are using their 0:15:09.560 --> 0:15:12.880 drones to go to try to write I assume the 0:15:12.920 --> 0:15:15.600 new pressure points are civilian population. 0:15:16.720 --> 0:15:20.280 So what the Russians are doing is hitting civilian cities 0:15:20.480 --> 0:15:23.120 very very hard. Actually, there was one this morning in Tarnopol. 0:15:23.280 --> 0:15:27.880 There was a something like seven miss cruise missiles that 0:15:27.960 --> 0:15:31.640 may not be precise, but a very strong attack hit 0:15:32.160 --> 0:15:34.840 a Ukrainian city that's pretty far from the front line. Actually, 0:15:34.880 --> 0:15:38.560 it's kind of in western Ukraine. And that's how the 0:15:38.640 --> 0:15:43.000 Russians have been seeking to terrorize and demoralize Ukrainians. Ukrainians 0:15:43.000 --> 0:15:45.680 are doing something different, which is the Ukrainians, as I said, 0:15:45.720 --> 0:15:51.400 are hitting Russian energy export infrastructure and oil refineries, and 0:15:51.440 --> 0:15:55.000 they're doing so pretty effectively, so much so that they've 0:15:55.040 --> 0:15:59.560 taken out about a quarter of Russia's refining capability. In 0:15:59.600 --> 0:16:03.440 the recent they hit a very important export port on 0:16:03.480 --> 0:16:06.480 the Black Sea, which is where oil goes through. And 0:16:06.520 --> 0:16:09.760 so their calculation is that the Russians don't care about men, 0:16:09.920 --> 0:16:12.080 you know, so they don't care how many people die, 0:16:12.600 --> 0:16:15.080 they're not bothered by that. But they do care about money, 0:16:15.320 --> 0:16:17.480 as one put it to me, and so they're trying 0:16:17.520 --> 0:16:20.440 to you know, their effort to stop the war is 0:16:20.480 --> 0:16:23.360 going that way. You know, they need to make the 0:16:23.400 --> 0:16:26.440 cost of the war so high that, as I said, 0:16:26.480 --> 0:16:31.600 the point being that Putin changes his mind and you know, 0:16:31.800 --> 0:16:34.480 and begins to think it's unwinnable or it's not worth winning, 0:16:34.760 --> 0:16:37.240 which is, by the way, how colonial wars, which is 0:16:37.240 --> 0:16:41.480 what this is, usually end, is that the capital decides 0:16:41.520 --> 0:16:44.640 that it's not worth it anymore and the colony is 0:16:45.000 --> 0:16:47.240 allowed to go. If you look at the Algerian French 0:16:47.240 --> 0:16:48.640 War in Algeria or something like that. 0:16:49.240 --> 0:16:55.120 Look, you can't go a week without seeing a headline 0:16:55.120 --> 0:16:59.120 whether it's in the Financial Times, but somewhere in Europe 0:16:59.160 --> 0:17:02.120 that does try to some reporting out of Russia. I mean, 0:17:02.360 --> 0:17:06.199 the economy seems to be in just wretched shape in 0:17:06.280 --> 0:17:09.960 Russia that all of this is finally having is taking 0:17:10.000 --> 0:17:15.840 a toll. I mean, at what point does domestic pressure 0:17:15.920 --> 0:17:16.880 play a role here? 0:17:17.640 --> 0:17:21.040 Well, Putin has constructed his political system so that he 0:17:21.200 --> 0:17:24.359 feels very little domestic pressure. You know, there isn't a 0:17:24.400 --> 0:17:26.920 pathway for domestic pressure to express itself. 0:17:27.000 --> 0:17:30.000 Sure, but if people are not happy with that, the 0:17:30.040 --> 0:17:32.600 economy they start to get I mean it feels as 0:17:32.680 --> 0:17:34.840 if they're talking more and more. Put it that way, 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:36.159 because there's more reports about this. 0:17:36.520 --> 0:17:39.840 People are talking more, people are angrier. Actually, there isn't 0:17:39.880 --> 0:17:42.480 real polling in Russia, but there are some opposition groups 0:17:42.520 --> 0:17:45.960 who do kind of measuring of sentiment online and that 0:17:46.160 --> 0:17:50.119 certainly swung against the war. I mean. Another kind of 0:17:50.200 --> 0:17:55.080 grim statistic is the number of people who commit suicide 0:17:55.480 --> 0:17:59.119 in the Russian lead mysteriously or fall out of windows 0:17:59.760 --> 0:18:03.560 or somehow or other disappear. And that number has also 0:18:03.640 --> 0:18:06.240 been pretty high recently, And so that means that those 0:18:06.280 --> 0:18:10.560 are people who are expressing in their circles some kind 0:18:10.600 --> 0:18:12.760 of descent or who are otherwise not going along with 0:18:12.800 --> 0:18:18.400 the program. And that's evidence that there is that You're right, 0:18:18.440 --> 0:18:20.199 there is this pressure. I mean, just the question is 0:18:20.240 --> 0:18:24.760 when at what point it really reaches Putin enforces this. 0:18:26.520 --> 0:18:29.439 You know, it's actually a political change, a change in 0:18:29.520 --> 0:18:32.439 language and rhetoric that either he has to make or 0:18:32.520 --> 0:18:33.680 his successful. 0:18:36.320 --> 0:18:39.399 There's a reason results matter more than promises, just like 0:18:39.440 --> 0:18:42.520 there's a reason. Morgan and Morgan is America's largest injury 0:18:42.600 --> 0:18:45.360 law firm. For the last thirty five years, they've recovered 0:18:45.480 --> 0:18:48.640 twenty five billion dollars for more than half a million clients. 0:18:49.200 --> 0:18:52.760 It includes cases where insurance companies offered next to nothing 0:18:53.040 --> 0:18:55.840 just hoping to get away with paying as little as possible. 0:18:55.920 --> 0:18:59.000 Morgan and Morgan fought back ended up winning millions. 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Their fee is free 0:19:34.119 --> 0:19:41.840 unless they win the killing off Progosion, I mean Putin 0:19:41.960 --> 0:19:45.400 was probably saved himself on that because there is nobody 0:19:45.440 --> 0:19:49.520 that can sort of challenge him internally if someone chose to, 0:19:49.600 --> 0:19:49.920 but he. 0:19:49.880 --> 0:19:57.200 Could have well Progosion. Yeah, Progosion had a real constituency 0:19:57.240 --> 0:19:59.560 and his constituency if you for those who don't remember, 0:19:59.600 --> 0:20:01.280 he was the lead leader of the Wagner group who 0:20:01.320 --> 0:20:05.120 staged this extraordinary which was a kind of paramilitary mercenarif 0:20:06.320 --> 0:20:08.480 that's right. He had originally been a chef. He ran 0:20:08.640 --> 0:20:10.240 actually he was the one who yeah, he was the 0:20:10.240 --> 0:20:14.400 one who ran the online influence operations during the twenty 0:20:14.440 --> 0:20:18.760 sixteen election here so, and he then became the head 0:20:18.800 --> 0:20:21.800 of this mercenary force and he had a real constituency, 0:20:21.840 --> 0:20:24.720 so the mercenaries were very devoted to him. So he 0:20:24.800 --> 0:20:28.320 actually had armed men who were on his side and 0:20:28.400 --> 0:20:31.679 who were becoming at that time very critical of the 0:20:31.720 --> 0:20:33.920 war and of why it was being fought and why 0:20:33.960 --> 0:20:36.920 it had started in a lot I mean speaking of corruption, 0:20:37.040 --> 0:20:40.840 the enormous amount of corruption around defense in the military there, 0:20:41.119 --> 0:20:44.919 and so he expressed it by making this critical statements. 0:20:45.480 --> 0:20:49.679 And then he launched this march on Moscow that he boarded, 0:20:50.960 --> 0:20:54.080 and then afterwards he had a plane accident. So he 0:20:54.200 --> 0:20:57.760 was he was an example of someone who had a constituency. 0:20:57.760 --> 0:21:00.400 And the problem with other opponents of Putin that they 0:21:00.400 --> 0:21:03.720 don't have that they don't have, you know, a team 0:21:03.800 --> 0:21:07.240 of armed guys that they can count on who might 0:21:07.480 --> 0:21:10.160 who might scare the president. But you know, it's also 0:21:10.640 --> 0:21:13.480 one of the lessons of Russian history, and I have 0:21:13.520 --> 0:21:18.320 written about it my whole life, almost is that, you know, 0:21:18.520 --> 0:21:24.639 the regime seems inevitable and eternal until the day it falls. 0:21:24.800 --> 0:21:26.440 I mean, if you look at the Zaris. 0:21:26.280 --> 0:21:29.000 You're describing bankruptcy, right, you know, first it's slowly and 0:21:29.000 --> 0:21:31.320 then all of a sudden it's quickly. 0:21:30.960 --> 0:21:33.560 But you look at the way the Czarist Revolution happened, 0:21:33.560 --> 0:21:36.920 you know that was totally unexpected. If you look at 0:21:36.920 --> 0:21:40.680 the way the Soviet Union fell months before that, nobody 0:21:40.680 --> 0:21:42.800 thought that was going to happen, you know. And so 0:21:43.200 --> 0:21:46.719 I'm always hesitant to make predictions about about Putins Russia, 0:21:46.760 --> 0:21:48.440 to say that it's you know, it's going to last 0:21:48.480 --> 0:21:52.640 forever or it's going to end next week, because the 0:21:52.800 --> 0:21:56.359 system is very strong in that he controls all these 0:21:56.480 --> 0:21:59.480 levers of power, He controls the media, the military, the 0:22:00.119 --> 0:22:03.240 of me and so on. But it's also very weak 0:22:03.640 --> 0:22:07.760 in that once his authority is questioned, it's not clear 0:22:08.119 --> 0:22:12.520 who comes next. So there's no there's no successor there's 0:22:12.560 --> 0:22:16.520 no succession process. There's no pollt bureau, you know there 0:22:16.800 --> 0:22:19.160 you know, so as soon as something happens to him 0:22:19.240 --> 0:22:21.680 or there's lacks of faith in him, then you might 0:22:21.720 --> 0:22:22.720 get changed very quickly. 0:22:23.680 --> 0:22:27.320 How much does he need China right now? And is 0:22:27.359 --> 0:22:30.040 there a point where China is just like it's not 0:22:30.119 --> 0:22:31.399 worth the cost. 0:22:31.840 --> 0:22:34.880 He is totally dependent on China. He's dependent on China 0:22:34.920 --> 0:22:37.960 for trade, He's dependent on China as the market for 0:22:38.160 --> 0:22:42.400 oil and gas. He's dependent on China politically. The Chinese 0:22:42.440 --> 0:22:45.959 have stood up for him in various international fora and 0:22:46.040 --> 0:22:51.160 so on. The Chinese seem to be defending me, even 0:22:51.160 --> 0:22:53.880