July 15, 2025 • 34 mins
Donald Trump says he's 'disappointed' that Vladimir Putin keeps knocking down buildings in Kyiv despite all the great conversations they are having about ending the war in Ukraine, as the First Lady Melania Trump keeps pointing out to him.
So the president is ramping up the threats, offering 'top-of-the-line' weaponry to Ukraine and promising severe tariffs on Russia if there's no ceasefire within 50 days.Is that enough to get Putin to the negotiating table? Or just escalating an intractable conflict? And is Trump even serious about bumping his bestie in Moscow?On the latest episode of The Fourcast, Matt Frei is joined by Channel 4 News’ International Editor Lindsey Hilsum and historian and author Anne Applebaum.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
This fiction that Trump was somehow negotiating A ceasefire
has never had any basis in fact.Putin has never gone along with.
He's never given up his war aims, which are the conquest of
all of Ukraine. And maybe Trump has realized.
That the Russians are bit by bit, advancing.
When President Putin finally feels that maybe it's time to
sue the peace, he's determined to have done whatever he can to
(00:22):
put the Ukrainians into an abject position where, to use a
famous phrase from President Trump, they have none of the
cards. If the Ukrainians now get the
weapons to hit Moscow, to hit Saint Petersburg with, does that
change the nature of this war fundamentally?
Hello and welcome to the forecast.
(00:43):
So is the big bromance between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump
now truly over? We know the president in the US
has been rather frustrated with his Russian counterpart of
Leighton Melania. The first lady had told them
that they keep bombing civilian targets, as if he hadn't learned
that already from watching the nightly news.
Now a new weapons programme has been announced that there's a
(01:04):
threat of severe sanctions, secondary sanctions against any
country that helps Russia. And we'll have to see whether
this is really truly a turning point in this war that seemed to
be going in Russia's direction of late.
With me here to discuss this is our international editor,
Lindsay Hilsum, who's currently in the Haqib in Ukraine, and
(01:24):
Anne Alpervan, the Pulitzer Prize winning author and
journalist who is in Poland. Welcome to you both.
So let me start with you, Anne. Obvious question today, Is the
bromance truly over now? So unfortunately, I didn't think
so. Trump made a big announcement
saying that he was going to havea have lots of things to say on
Monday. And then actually what he said
(01:46):
was rather less than what was expected.
He was expected to say that he would he would agree to sell
weapons to NATO, which would be given to Ukraine.
That's been in the works for a long time.
And he but he said, well, maybe if Putin doesn't come to some
kind of ceasefire agreement in 50 days, then maybe he'll put
some sanctions on. And actually he was very vague
(02:08):
about what that meant, whether it was tariffs or sanctions or
something else. And meanwhile, the US has been,
in practice, de facto lifting sanctions because sanctions are
something that have to be renewed.
New companies keep picking up the slack.
And the US has actually been releasing and loosening
sanctions on Russia over the last several months.
(02:29):
So it was, it was actually fairly underwhelming, I would
say. And Lindsay, we know from Donald
Trump that when he comes up withanything detailed like numbers
or days or percentages, you haveto look at them with a lorry of
salt, don't you? Absolutely.
And here in Ukraine there is certainly enough salt for them
to to pinch. I was out with an anti drone
(02:52):
unit last night. It was very interesting.
They have the most modern technology on their iPads for
tracing where the drones are andtheir trajectory.
But then they were bringing out this great lumbering anti
aircraft artillery from the Soviet era to shoot them down.
And so when I asked, you know, what about the Patriots, which
(03:13):
is not really for shooting down drones, but for shooting down
missiles, of which many are coming in every night here to
Kharkiv, to Kiev, to a desert, to many cities, the guy I was
with said, yeah, look, fine, great.
But when are they going to come?We, of course, we need more help
from the Russia, from the from the Americans.
Of course we need this from Donald Trump.
(03:35):
Yes, thank you. We want this.
But when? Now, now, now.
Before we get on to the kind of weapons they need and, you know,
the nature of air defence in this, you know, very
technological war with Jones. And it's a bit weird, isn't he,
that it keeps mentioning the first lady, Melania's kind of
channelling any kind of empathy.Did she change his mind about
(03:57):
the nature of the targets used by the Russians?
You know, on a nightly basis? So obviously, I have no insider
knowledge of the president's relationship with his wife, so I
can't really say what it was that she said.
But actually the implication of what he said in public at least,
was not so much that she was showing empathy, but that she
(04:17):
was contradicting him. That he would come home and say,
I just had this great phone callwith my friend Vladimir, and she
would say, yeah, and he's just bombed another city 5 minutes
ago. And so it's more that she was
showing up, that he was being, you know, taken for a ride by
Putin, which has, of course, been the case for many months
now. From the very beginning.
(04:38):
Exactly. Yeah, Well, Putin, Putin has
made clear that he that he is not ready for a ceasefire.
He doesn't want a ceasefire. When there were talks in
Istanbul, they sent a historian who who, who ranted about the
history of Kiev and Russia rather than somebody who was
prepared to actually have a havea ceasefire conversation.
And so, you know, the idea that there would be a ceasefire or
(04:59):
something that's come from Trumpand some Western think tankers,
Putin has never gone along with it.
He's never agreed to it. He's never given up his war
aims, which are the conquest of all of Ukraine.
And maybe Trump has realized that.
I mean, certainly some people around him might have done, but
if you know, or or maybe Melaniaeventually convinced him, who
(05:20):
knows? But can I say something which I
think is really interesting, which is of course, Melania was
brought up in a Warsaw Pact country, wasn't she?
So she, her family come from Eastern Europe, so she must have
a much greater sense of what it was like under the Soviet Union
and what it was like with Russian domination in that time.
(05:42):
So presumably she does bring a particular sensibility to to all
of this. But I mean, Donald Trump has
been on one hell of a journey, hasn't he?
Since that 90 minute phone call soon after he actually took over
power in the Oval Office when everything seemed to be hunky
Dory. Isn't this a journey that you
and trust? Do you think that he's actually,
you know, got more and more fed up and, you know, has realized
(06:04):
that Putin is making a fool of him, which is one thing that
Trump really, really hates, You know, is that now the new
reality of this relationship andcan it swing back again?
Honestly, I have very little trust or faith in this supposed
presidential change of heart. Trump's Trump's interests in
(06:25):
Russia are I, I believe, financial.
We know that Steve Witkoff, who is his representative in Moscow,
has been talking business deals with, with the Russians.
We know there are connections between some of Trump's
entourage and some of Putin's entourage along these lines.
I, I'm, I'm not convinced that he's, he's given up.
And remember, he has a, a whole kind of mythical fantasy idea
(06:49):
about the relationship that they're friends, that they
somehow went through a lot together, that they that they've
exchanged many experiences and they have a lot in common.
And of course, this is fiction. And it maybe, maybe it's the
result of Putin, who's a, who's a trained KGB agent, KGB
officer. Maybe it's the result of Putin's
fantastic ability to manipulate him.
I don't know. But but he, he has, he has this
(07:13):
idea that he's been very, very reluctant to give up, even
though, as I say, since January,the Russians have never said
that they want a ceasefire and they have never said that they
want to stop the war. And this fiction that that that
we were, that Trump was somehow negotiating A ceasefire, which I
have to say a lot of the Westernpress corps believed has has
(07:33):
never had any basis in fact. There's this weird fantasy,
isn't there, that all, all wishful thinking that American
presidents have about looking into the soul of Vladimir Putin.
George W Bush famously said so when he was president and it
seems that they seem they keep looking at the wrong soul.
Lindsay on on the 50 day deadline, you know, Trump's
(07:54):
deadlines are famously squishy. But on the 50 day deadline that
he's, you know, that he's laid out there for Vladimir Putin.
I mean, 50 days when you've got these massive bomb, you know,
barrages of Jones and missiles every night is a hell of a long
time. Well, it certainly is if you're
living in Kiev or if you're a soldier on the frontline.
But I think the point is that the the Russians are now
(08:17):
embarked on a major summer offensive.
The front lines have not moved much for about a year.
And that is because of technology, because both sides
have these drones. And so the the battlefield is
this wasteland with fibre optic cables draped everywhere from
the drones and nobody can reallymove on either side without
(08:37):
being picked off by a drone. But in this summer offensive,
these Vladimir Putin is doing two things.
One is this relentless bombardment of the cities and
that is meant to SAP the will ofthe Ukrainian people.
And that is why those patriot anti air defences, those which
the which the Americans now say they're going to sell to NATO
(09:00):
countries to give to Ukraine. That's why they are so
essential. And then the other thing is the
actual front line. And we do see now that because
of the use of these drones, Russians are bit by bit
advancing, finding gaps in the Ukrainian defenses.
And so 50 days, 100 days a year,whatever it is, when President
(09:21):
Putin finally feels that maybe it's time to sue the peace, he's
determined to do it from a position of strength.
And he is determined to have done whatever he can to put the
Ukrainians into an abject position where they really have
nothing to defend themselves andwhere, to use a famous phrase
from President Trump, they have none of the cards.
(09:44):
And Lindsay, I mean, you've spent some, you know, again some
time now in Ukraine. Do you think that the air war
from the Russians has worked when it comes to undermining
morale? I'm really struck that every
night, you know, lots and lots of people, more than ever before
apparently, are spending a lot of time in those, you know,
metro stations that are deep underground, especially in Kiev.
(10:04):
Yes, and I went to see the ballet of Snow White underground
under the Khaki Opera House on Sunday.
Lots of little girls and their mothers watching absolutely
wrapped the stage. It was extraordinary.
But yes, there is a whole underground life, I think that
Ukrainians are very reluctant tosay to a foreigner like me that,
(10:25):
you know, they have any problem with their will.
Everybody says, no, we're going to fight and we have the
motivation and we're developing our own technology and this is
what we're going to do. But sure, it must be very, very
hard and very wearing. We're talking about 3 1/2 years
of war. And no population can endure
something like that without having some kind of
(10:46):
psychological impact. And do you think that the air
war is now more important than the ground war?
Because the frontline on the ground is a bit like the First
World War frontline. It's barely advanced in in
months if not the years. Yeah, I think it's worth
focusing just for a second on that frontline and why the
Russians can't move forward. The Ukrainian drone defence has
(11:08):
now developed so much that essentially they can see the
whole frontline all the time in real time.
I've actually been in a basementoutside of Kiev where you could
see it on screen. So there was a couple 100 people
in a room watching it. They can see everything.
Every time the Russians try to advance or come into the, you
know, into the, into the front line, they, they hit them.
(11:29):
And the Russians, of course, arewilling, as we know, to lose
hundreds and thousands, maybe of, of people every week or
every month in, in order to achieve really very, very small
amounts of territory, you know, a few a kilometer here or a few
100 yards there. I mean, it's very, it's, it's,
it's not very much. I saw one statistic that said if
the Russians keep going at this pace, they'll conquer all of
(11:52):
Ukraine in about 85 years. So it's, you know, it's not as
if they're doing really well. And it seems to me that the air
war is, is a sign of their frustration.
You know, they can't advance on the frontline.
They can't win the war that way.And so they're trying to win it
from the air. And that, of course, is why air
defense is so important. And the US is still produces the
(12:14):
world's best air defense and still has more of it than
anybody else. And that that's really the main
reason why the US is still important to Ukraine.
Ukrainians now make all their own, most of their own drones.
They, they have other sources ofammunition and other sources of
weaponry, but it's just this onething, which is air defense,
which is, which is so, so crucial.
So yes, you're right, the Russians are trying to win that
(12:35):
way. But, you know, there isn't any
evidence that anybody has ever won a war but through the air.
You know, that's how the, the, you know, the, the Germans tried
to win the war, the Battle of Britain in the air and that
didn't succeed. And the, you know, the, the,
the, the, the British tried to defeat Germany that way.
And actually that is didn't succeed.
(12:55):
That's not why. That's not why the Allies won
the war. So I'm not sure that it can win.
I mean, it can do a lot of damage.
It can destroy people's lives. It can, you know, it can create
a lot of trauma for later on, but it's, it isn't actually
going to win. And at some point, yes, the
Russians will figure that out. And it would help if we were
able to arm Ukraine and give them the defenses they need now
(13:17):
so that the Russians came to that realization sooner.
That's really been the, you know, for the last six months.
It's been, or really for the last three years, it's been
clear that that is the way the war will eventually end.
The Russians will understand that they can't win.
And at that point, the war's over.
And then we can discuss where the border is and we can have
lots of other conversations. But this idea that there would
(13:38):
be some kind of trade or some kind of, you know, we'll give
you Crimea in exchange for something else, I mean, that's
not going to happen. That's that, that was always a
myth. The the The war will end when
the Russians understand that they can't win.
And Lindsay, it's a strange way,isn't it?
Because it's both incredibly modern and technological.
You know, you've covered that just now the, you know, the
drone warfare that's being developed all the time and it
(14:00):
really doesn't allow the soldiers to move anywhere
without being, you know, being spotted by a German, possibly
killed by 1. And at the same time, it's
unbelievably old fashioned, you know, trenches, mud, boots on
the ground and advancing a few inches on either side.
Absolutely, though there are very few men in those trenches
these days because of the of thedrones, as as Anne was saying.
(14:23):
I think that one of the things which is really interesting is
you is because the basic problemthat the Ukrainians have, it's
just that they don't have as many soldiers.
They're a much smaller country and the Russians fight in a
particular way because they don't care about losing a lot of
soldiers. Now you can say that that is a
military culture because they'recruel and so on.
(14:43):
Or you can also say because their soldiers are expendable
from a practical point of view. And from the Ukrainian point of
view, they're not expendable because there are so few here
and they're very short of them. So one of the things that the
Ukrainians are working on, and Iwent to one of the places where
they're developing, these are these unmanned ground vehicles.
So they're like drones, but they're on the ground and these
(15:05):
can be used now. They're robots.
They're they're little vehicles that can bring in ammunition to
a frontline unit. They can bring out a casualty,
somebody who's been injured. They can do all of the
logistics. The Third Assault Brigade who I
was with say that they actually took a Russian position the
other day in entirely with unmanned vehicles both in the
(15:26):
air and on the ground. So what that means is that it
saves soldiers lives because if your soldiers are not right
there where it's happening, but a couple of kilometers back, you
know, using these video game console type things in order to
work these vehicles, then you can save a lot of lives.
So that kind of technology is really important to the
Ukrainians. But the other thing that they
(15:47):
really want are long range cruise missiles which the
Americans could give and apparently or sell, which
apparently they're thinking of because if they had these Jassam
long range cruise missiles, thenthey can fire more and more
effectively into Russia. And that I think is one thing
that the Ukrainians think that they need to do.
(16:07):
They need to take the war to Russia more effectively.
But there's a story in the Financial Times actually just
now that they had Privy to a conversation between Trump and
Zelensky on the 4th of July of all days, where Trump then asked
Zelensky, can you hit Moscow? Can you hit Saint Petersburg?
(16:28):
And Zelensky said, yes, I can ifyou give me the weapons to do
so. You know, if the war really was
brought very closely to, you know, the not just Russians, you
know, in outlying areas, you know, obviously they went into
Kursk last year, but, you know, into the capital or the cultural
capital, Saint Petersburg, that would make a big difference,
wouldn't it? It would make a big difference.
(16:50):
And I think one of the reasons that I'm told that the
Ukrainians have been holding back on that is because they
worry that it would anger President Trump because they
feel that he would be, he would,you know, be annoyed if they
were taking the war right to President Putin.
So they have held back on that, partly because the technology
and partly because diplomatically they think that
(17:12):
that wouldn't be such a good idea.
So we'll have to see in the coming weeks whether that
changes. Now the President Trump seems to
have altered his policy. And I wonder just briefly on
this, whether this will bring back the old ogre that of
course, has been concerning Europeans, whether, you know,
pushing Putin into a corner likethat by bringing the war much
closer to the the people of Moscow, St.
(17:32):
Petersburg would actually, you know, escalate it to another
level. Because, of course, the Russians
even today are threatening that this could become a nuclear
conflict. I think I'm hearing far less of
that now than I was. The German government is much
more is much more belligerent onthe part of Ukraine, the current
Mertz as opposed to Schultz and I think Mark Rousser, the the
(17:55):
head of NATO is much more hawkish.
So I think there's much less talk of that in European
capitals now than there was six months or a year ago.
If the Ukrainians now get the weapons to hit Moscow, to hit
Saint Petersburg with, you know,and if there is a temptation for
them to hit civilian targets, which is something that I know
the Biden administration was always worried about, does that
(18:17):
change the nature of this war fundamentally?
I'm not sure it changes it fundamentally because the
Ukrainians have been hitting targets very deep inside Russia
for a long time, including usinga, a very, a kind of Trojan
horse drone technique to smuggledrones inside to the country and
to hit aircraft at A at an airport quite far away from
(18:40):
Ukraine. So I'm not, I'm not 100% sure it
would make a difference. I mean, there might be a an
interesting diplomatic situationif it were to be US weapons with
which the Ukrainians were hitting important sites in
central Russia or or indeed in Moscow.
And that would then create a brand new situation between
(19:00):
Russia and the United States. I'm not sure that it changes the
war that much. I mean, the Russians have known
for a long time that the Ukrainians can hit targets in
Russia and, and the Ukrainians hit them all the time, actually.
I mean, it's not always reported.
It's, we've become so used to itthat it's not in the news.
But I mean, almost every week the Ukrainians hit a factory or
they hit a, some kind of production site or some kind of
(19:21):
military installation. So it doesn't, it doesn't
necessarily change the, the, thefighting.
But yes, it would create that. That would then be a new
situation between Trump and Putin, one that would that would
be much more fundamental change than what we've seen so far.
I mean, because even today we heard very spokesman for the
Kremlin speaking on behalf of the Kremlin, one assumes saying,
(19:41):
you know, now that Trump has said he's going to supply these
weapons and plus the sanctions that this is going to raise the
nuclear question one again, you're effectively, we are
effectively at war with NATO andwe've heard this talk ever since
the war started in February of 2022.
But do we need to take that? Do European capitals need to
take that talk more seriously now, if indeed these long range
(20:02):
weapons are supplied? I really don't think so.
I mean, I don't want to be too definitive because you never
know. And within the case of Putin,
you're dealing with someone who's unpredictable and paranoid
and has all kinds of complexes about his role in history and so
on. From everything we know, we know
that his his Chinese allies put a lot of pressure on him not to
(20:23):
use nuclear weapons. The Indian leadership have also
made it clear they don't want him to use nuclear weapons and
they're important customers of of Russian oil.
We know that the, the, it would be actually very difficult for
them to use tactical weapons in Ukraine because of the closeness
of the two armies of the, the, there would inevitably be
(20:44):
blowback into Russia. And it's, it's hard to see how
they could use them in a way that would help them win the
war. So I, I, I don't think so.
And it's also true that Putin has used this language of, you
know, this nuclear threat language whenever he believes
that the US is entering the conflict in any kind of way.
And it's so far been successful at keeping the US out or the US
(21:07):
restrained. And, and so I, I, I think it's
makes much more sense at this point to see it as a tactic
rather than, rather than a real threat.
And, and also, you know, how many times can you threaten
something before people start tonot believe you?
He's he, he actually has been talking repeatedly about using
nukes in, in, against Poland, against the UK, you know,
(21:27):
against Scandinavia for years now.
You know, we just, we all kind of choose not to hear it, but
but it's, it really isn't new. And it's part of their talk.
It's part of how they speak about the outside world.
And so and and so, I'm not sure it represents some big change at
this point. It's very hard for any of us who
haven't been to Russia for some time and we haven't been given
(21:48):
visas for years now to, to really know what's going on on
the ground, what ordinary Russians think and actually what
people even close to the regime think the war aims are.
But Lindsay, first you, what do you think Russians feel that
they're fighting for in this war?
And and if you're in Sabinas war, can you just, you know,
carry on regardless because lifeseems to be still pretty
(22:11):
pleasant in those cities compared to what Ukrainians are
having to put up with. Look, when you talk to Ukrainian
soldiers, they, their line is the Russians are fighting for
money and we're fighting for freedom.
I'm not sure that it is quite assimple as that.
Now, obviously, the Russians have brought in the North
Koreans and we're expecting moreNorth Korean fighters in the
(22:31):
next couple of months, another 25 or 30,000 apparently.
So they, they need those extra, extra men.
But I think, you know, from everything I read, this idea,
which is the fundamental issue of this war, that President
Putin says that Ukraine is not acountry, that Ukraine is not a
place that exists, that Ukraine is somewhere that should be
(22:51):
under the control of Russia. A lot of Russians, as far as I
know, have bought into that ideaand would know much more than me
about that. The propaganda, as we know, is
very strong. And it seems to be almost and at
the moment, and of course the mood changes depending on the
amount of weapons being deployed.
And, you know, you know, how theair war is going, but it seems
(23:13):
at the moment as if Vladimir Putin's aim of subjugating
Ukraine, making it, you know, it's ceasing to exist as an
independent sovereign nation state that's quite far from
reality at the moment. And then what the Ukraine's
might end up with is something that's, you know, quite a bit
smaller than what they had, you know, in, you know, I don't
(23:36):
know, in 2010, but but independent, democratic, yes,
sovereign and able to defend itself.
Well, we'll see. I mean, I, I think Putin's aim
is to, is to change the government of Ukraine and to
make, to put in some kind of proRussian government.
So, I mean, it may, it may be that he hopes to achieve the
subjugation of Ukraine, not through conquering the whole
(23:57):
country, which you're right, that seems pretty unlikely.
It's hard to see how that would happen given the given, given
the way the way this war is going.
But they do hope, I think, to use some kind of political
manipulation or propaganda to achieve that kind of aim.
And I think they originally hoped that Trump would help them
with that, too. I mean, I think Trump's attacks
on Zelensky and his language about, you know, we need
(24:19):
election in Ukraine. You remember that back from kind
of February, March. I mean, I think all that was
coming from Putin. He was hearing that in his
conversations with Putin. And I think they they hope that
that might work. But but you're right, it seems
right now as if they didn't. I mean, I would make one little
corrective, just a little comment to what Lindsay just
said about, about the Russians if Putin were to declare
(24:40):
tomorrow that the war is over and we won or, you know, the war
is over and, you know, it's, we're, we're doing something
else now. I, I, I actually do think the
Russians would be OK with that. I mean the, you know, remember
that we're now dealing with a country that doesn't really have
anything that you could call a public sphere.
There's no independent conversation.
(25:00):
There are no debates about what should happen that are that are
real and not staged or manipulated.
People will say to a pollster orto an interviewer, whatever is
the line of the of this, of the government of the state, you
know, so, so you can't really what people say to on TV or what
they say to Steve Rosenberg of the BBC or whoever.
(25:21):
I'm not sure that represents anydeep feelings.
And I think if the line were to change from above, then I think
probably the Russians would accept it.
I mean, there may be people in the inner circle who would be
angry. But, but I'm not sure about
ordinary Russians. I I'm not sure that they're
really a a factor here in the way that we imagine them to be a
factor. And Anne, it's not a war, it's a
(25:42):
special military operation, right?
So it's a different kind of thing.
So so maybe that maybe that sortof obfuscation will, you know,
make it easier for him to kind of call it quits or maybe that's
also the reason why people haven't been fully engaged in
it. Lindsay, I mean, you know, our
own Prime Minister here, Sir Keir Starmer has been, you know,
saying, you know, to the public,you know, we need to be ready
(26:04):
for any eventuality with the Russians.
We're in a pre war setting. You know, some senior generals
here in Britain were talking about we're already in World War
Three in the foothills of it. This is used to justify, you
know, massively increased defense spending at the expense
of, you know, social programs, benefits, all that kind of
stuff. If the Russians don't actually,
you know, if that threat doesn'tcome true either by them trying
(26:26):
to nibble away at Poland or the Baltic republics, it's kind of
difficult to maintain that degree of threat awareness and
sacrifice for quite a long time,Especially with, you know, the
new generation people like my kids who are literally who
couldn't can't imagine anything like that ever happening in
their lives. Yeah, but it's more complicated
(26:47):
than that, isn't it? Because warfare now is
asymmetric warfare and grey zonewarfare.
It's already happening. We've already got, you know,
warehouses being blown up in theUK, which, according to a case
last week, the people who carried this out were saboteurs
who were employed by the Russians.
We already have, you know, submarines around British
(27:09):
waters. We already have them cutting
cables. All of this kind of grey zone
warfare is already happening. Now the idea that they're going
to start launching ballistic missiles at the UK, well, one
has to hope that they're not since British air defences are
not in as good a state even as the Ukrainians, from what I
(27:29):
understand. But certainly I, I think that
what's key is if you transfer itfrom the Ukrainian experience,
President Trump seems to think this is about real estate.
It's not about real estate. It's about sovereignty.
It's about the government of Ukraine.
It's about Ukrainians having theright to choose their own
governments and their own system.
(27:50):
Yeah. And then and that transfers out.
So I don't think anybody is thinking that, you know,
President Putin is going to wakeup one day and fire a ballistic
missile into Poland where Anne is right now.
It's much more that kind of asymmetric warfare and bits of
sabotage and so on, which could go on in the Baltic States and
(28:10):
so on. And that's much more of a
challenge to NATO because at what point do you say this
really is warfare? And at what point do you say,
well, this is just a bit of, youknow, criminality and, and
sabotage? It's it's extremely difficult.
And just on the question of whatyou, Ukraine might, you know,
regard as victory at the end of this, I mean, part of that is
just surviving and not being completely rolled over by the
(28:33):
Russians. But the other price that was
that was always held out to themby Brussels was membership of
the EU if, especially if they can't get NATO membership,
especially in Poland, where there's a very strong
agricultural lobby that doesn't like the idea of the
agricultural superpower Ukraine kind of depressing prices and
and undercutting their markets. What's the feeling in Poland
(28:53):
like about Ukraine becoming a member of the EU at the end of
this process? I mean, we had, there hasn't
really been a serious debate about it yet, believe it or not.
I mean, it's still, it's still feels here far away.
My, my guess is that you, that Ukraine will be a member of the
EU. It won't probably be as fast as,
as the Ukrainians hope, but there will be a way to negotiate
(29:17):
a, you know, a, a, you know, a syncopated or a drawn out access
to the agricultural markets as there has been with accession of
other, other states. I mean, the, just, just the,
the, the strength of Ukraine andthe industrial possibilities of
Ukraine and the high level of technology that there's going to
be in Ukraine at the end of thiswar are going to be an enormous
(29:39):
advantage to Europe. And actually, I would say this
is a part of the answer to the point that you made a, a moment
ago about the UK not being readyfor it or not wanting to spend
the money. I mean, there is a, there is a
technological leap that is happening in Ukraine and the UK
definitely wants to be part of that.
And actually, far as I know, British soldiers and British
(29:59):
observers are on the ground in Ukraine all the time looking at
it and trying to understand it. And, you know, the UK should be
so lucky that that technology transfer happens and, and the,
and the UK is able to take advantage of it.
So, so it's, it's, it's, it's definitely not, it's not, it's
not that it's not one sided. You know, there are there are
advantages that Ukraine brings to Europe and to Britain as
(30:22):
well. That brings us back to the
technology because Anne's completely right.
I mean, I've come across UK companies and people from UK
companies who are here working with Ukrainian companies,
particularly on drone technology, but other
battlefield technology as well. Because the point is that the
Ukraine, let's say you have a new kind of drone, well, in this
country, you develop it, your prototype in your factory in
(30:44):
maybe here in Khaki, maybe in Kiev, wherever.
And then you go to the front line and you test it
immediately. And within 10 days, you can turn
a prototype into something that actually works.
And because that's how long it takes to battlefield test
something, this would take yearsin the UK or in any other
European country or in America. And so there's no question that
(31:04):
at the end of this war, Ukraine will be the defence powerhouse
of Europe, for better or for worse, rightly or wrongly,
depending on people's views of this.
But in it is leading the way in certain kinds of battlefield
technology. And it is changing warfare
forever. And definitely I think that the
European countries, including Britain, already understand that
(31:26):
and are coming in. But the Ukrainians I speak to
say, I basically say, oh, you guys are so slow, you're so
slow. Eventually we'll teach you,
we'll help you, you come along and you have things that we can
learn as well in terms of, you know, your in terms of
technology. But we are the ones who are
testing things out. And in that sense, you are the
ones who are learning from us. And who knows, Lindsay, because,
(31:49):
you know, by the time, I mean, you know, this war comes to some
kind of conclusion, Ukraine willbe such a defence powerhouse in
Europe, maybe NATO will change its mind, you know, and maybe
the Russians both be in a position to object about having
it even as a member of NATO. Final question to both of you.
I mean, it's, you know, in when we're deep in the weeds about
this and we discuss the diplomacy and, you know,
(32:11):
whether, you know, what Melania was whispering into Trump's ear
and so on. It's really easy to forget which
one shouldn't that this has beengoing on for a hell of a long
time, 3 1/2 years, that maybe a million people have been killed,
soldiers have been killed or maimed on the Russian side, God
knows how many on the Ukrainian side.
I mean, this is a colossal, colossal conflict for Russia.
(32:33):
It is hard not to see that it will reach some degree of
exhaustion, you know, on the Russian side, especially
sometime this year, especially, you know, if Trump is as good as
his word and these new weapons keep coming in.
But maybe not. So finally, first to you, then,
then Lindsay, what's your feeling, your gut feeling about
(32:54):
how long this, this wretched thing will carry on for?
I mean, you know, it's a colonial war and the as like all
other colonial wars like France and Algeria, you know, or the
British and India, it will end when the capital, the imperial
capital is exhausted and doesn'tsee the point anymore.
(33:14):
So you're right about that. And whether that that happens
this year or next year or the year after, I don't know, but it
will happen. Lindsay.
When I talk to Ukrainians about this, and I've been talking to
defence entrepreneurs and soldiers, they're expecting to
have to fight for at least another year.
They can see no way that this comes to an end in the near
(33:36):
term. They're hoping they can hold on
and that when there is some kindof settlement that they have
been holding the line well enough that they can negotiate
from a position of strength and that Ukraine will retain its
sovereignty. That is what's important to
them. OK.
Well, thank you very much to both of you for your time.
Lindsay Hilsum and Hakib and AbuBam and Poland, thanks so much
(33:58):
for joining us. That's it.
That's been this edition of the Forecast.
I hope you enjoyed it. See you next time.
This fiction that Trump was somehow negotiating A ceasefire
has never had any basis in fact.Putin has never gone along with.
He's never given up his war aims, which are the conquest of
all of Ukraine. And maybe Trump has realized.
That the Russians are bit by bit, advancing.
When President Putin finally feels that maybe it's time to
sue the peace, he's determined to have done whatever he can to
(00:22):
put the Ukrainians into an abject position where, to use a
famous phrase from President Trump, they have none of the
cards. If the Ukrainians now get the
weapons to hit Moscow, to hit Saint Petersburg with, does that
change the nature of this war fundamentally?
Hello and welcome to the forecast.
(00:43):
So is the big bromance between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump
now truly over? We know the president in the US
has been rather frustrated with his Russian counterpart of
Leighton Melania. The first lady had told them
that they keep bombing civilian targets, as if he hadn't learned
that already from watching the nightly news.
Now a new weapons programme has been announced that there's a
(01:04):
threat of severe sanctions, secondary sanctions against any
country that helps Russia. And we'll have to see whether
this is really truly a turning point in this war that seemed to
be going in Russia's direction of late.
With me here to discuss this is our international editor,
Lindsay Hilsum, who's currently in the Haqib in Ukraine, and
(01:24):
Anne Alpervan, the Pulitzer Prize winning author and
journalist who is in Poland. Welcome to you both.
So let me start with you, Anne. Obvious question today, Is the
bromance truly over now? So unfortunately, I didn't think
so. Trump made a big announcement
saying that he was going to havea have lots of things to say on
Monday. And then actually what he said
(01:46):
was rather less than what was expected.
He was expected to say that he would he would agree to sell
weapons to NATO, which would be given to Ukraine.
That's been in the works for a long time.
And he but he said, well, maybe if Putin doesn't come to some
kind of ceasefire agreement in 50 days, then maybe he'll put
some sanctions on. And actually he was very vague
(02:08):
about what that meant, whether it was tariffs or sanctions or
something else. And meanwhile, the US has been,
in practice, de facto lifting sanctions because sanctions are
something that have to be renewed.
New companies keep picking up the slack.
And the US has actually been releasing and loosening
sanctions on Russia over the last several months.
(02:29):
So it was, it was actually fairly underwhelming, I would
say. And Lindsay, we know from Donald
Trump that when he comes up withanything detailed like numbers
or days or percentages, you haveto look at them with a lorry of
salt, don't you? Absolutely.
And here in Ukraine there is certainly enough salt for them
to to pinch. I was out with an anti drone
(02:52):
unit last night. It was very interesting.
They have the most modern technology on their iPads for
tracing where the drones are andtheir trajectory.
But then they were bringing out this great lumbering anti
aircraft artillery from the Soviet era to shoot them down.
And so when I asked, you know, what about the Patriots, which
(03:13):
is not really for shooting down drones, but for shooting down
missiles, of which many are coming in every night here to
Kharkiv, to Kiev, to a desert, to many cities, the guy I was
with said, yeah, look, fine, great.
But when are they going to come?We, of course, we need more help
from the Russia, from the from the Americans.
Of course we need this from Donald Trump.
(03:35):
Yes, thank you. We want this.
But when? Now, now, now.
Before we get on to the kind of weapons they need and, you know,
the nature of air defence in this, you know, very
technological war with Jones. And it's a bit weird, isn't he,
that it keeps mentioning the first lady, Melania's kind of
channelling any kind of empathy.Did she change his mind about
(03:57):
the nature of the targets used by the Russians?
You know, on a nightly basis? So obviously, I have no insider
knowledge of the president's relationship with his wife, so I
can't really say what it was that she said.
But actually the implication of what he said in public at least,
was not so much that she was showing empathy, but that she
(04:17):
was contradicting him. That he would come home and say,
I just had this great phone callwith my friend Vladimir, and she
would say, yeah, and he's just bombed another city 5 minutes
ago. And so it's more that she was
showing up, that he was being, you know, taken for a ride by
Putin, which has, of course, been the case for many months
now. From the very beginning.
(04:38):
Exactly. Yeah, Well, Putin, Putin has
made clear that he that he is not ready for a ceasefire.
He doesn't want a ceasefire. When there were talks in
Istanbul, they sent a historian who who, who ranted about the
history of Kiev and Russia rather than somebody who was
prepared to actually have a havea ceasefire conversation.
And so, you know, the idea that there would be a ceasefire or
(04:59):
something that's come from Trumpand some Western think tankers,
Putin has never gone along with it.
He's never agreed to it. He's never given up his war
aims, which are the conquest of all of Ukraine.
And maybe Trump has realized that.
I mean, certainly some people around him might have done, but
if you know, or or maybe Melaniaeventually convinced him, who
(05:20):
knows? But can I say something which I
think is really interesting, which is of course, Melania was
brought up in a Warsaw Pact country, wasn't she?
So she, her family come from Eastern Europe, so she must have
a much greater sense of what it was like under the Soviet Union
and what it was like with Russian domination in that time.
(05:42):
So presumably she does bring a particular sensibility to to all
of this. But I mean, Donald Trump has
been on one hell of a journey, hasn't he?
Since that 90 minute phone call soon after he actually took over
power in the Oval Office when everything seemed to be hunky
Dory. Isn't this a journey that you
and trust? Do you think that he's actually,
you know, got more and more fed up and, you know, has realized
(06:04):
that Putin is making a fool of him, which is one thing that
Trump really, really hates, You know, is that now the new
reality of this relationship andcan it swing back again?
Honestly, I have very little trust or faith in this supposed
presidential change of heart. Trump's Trump's interests in
(06:25):
Russia are I, I believe, financial.
We know that Steve Witkoff, who is his representative in Moscow,
has been talking business deals with, with the Russians.
We know there are connections between some of Trump's
entourage and some of Putin's entourage along these lines.
I, I'm, I'm not convinced that he's, he's given up.
And remember, he has a, a whole kind of mythical fantasy idea
(06:49):
about the relationship that they're friends, that they
somehow went through a lot together, that they that they've
exchanged many experiences and they have a lot in common.
And of course, this is fiction. And it maybe, maybe it's the
result of Putin, who's a, who's a trained KGB agent, KGB
officer. Maybe it's the result of Putin's
fantastic ability to manipulate him.
I don't know. But but he, he has, he has this
(07:13):
idea that he's been very, very reluctant to give up, even
though, as I say, since January,the Russians have never said
that they want a ceasefire and they have never said that they
want to stop the war. And this fiction that that that
we were, that Trump was somehow negotiating A ceasefire, which I
have to say a lot of the Westernpress corps believed has has
(07:33):
never had any basis in fact. There's this weird fantasy,
isn't there, that all, all wishful thinking that American
presidents have about looking into the soul of Vladimir Putin.
George W Bush famously said so when he was president and it
seems that they seem they keep looking at the wrong soul.
Lindsay on on the 50 day deadline, you know, Trump's
(07:54):
deadlines are famously squishy. But on the 50 day deadline that
he's, you know, that he's laid out there for Vladimir Putin.
I mean, 50 days when you've got these massive bomb, you know,
barrages of Jones and missiles every night is a hell of a long
time. Well, it certainly is if you're
living in Kiev or if you're a soldier on the frontline.
But I think the point is that the the Russians are now
(08:17):
embarked on a major summer offensive.
The front lines have not moved much for about a year.
And that is because of technology, because both sides
have these drones. And so the the battlefield is
this wasteland with fibre optic cables draped everywhere from
the drones and nobody can reallymove on either side without
(08:37):
being picked off by a drone. But in this summer offensive,
these Vladimir Putin is doing two things.
One is this relentless bombardment of the cities and
that is meant to SAP the will ofthe Ukrainian people.
And that is why those patriot anti air defences, those which
the which the Americans now say they're going to sell to NATO
(09:00):
countries to give to Ukraine. That's why they are so
essential. And then the other thing is the
actual front line. And we do see now that because
of the use of these drones, Russians are bit by bit
advancing, finding gaps in the Ukrainian defenses.
And so 50 days, 100 days a year,whatever it is, when President
(09:21):
Putin finally feels that maybe it's time to sue the peace, he's
determined to do it from a position of strength.
And he is determined to have done whatever he can to put the
Ukrainians into an abject position where they really have
nothing to defend themselves andwhere, to use a famous phrase
from President Trump, they have none of the cards.
(09:44):
And Lindsay, I mean, you've spent some, you know, again some
time now in Ukraine. Do you think that the air war
from the Russians has worked when it comes to undermining
morale? I'm really struck that every
night, you know, lots and lots of people, more than ever before
apparently, are spending a lot of time in those, you know,
metro stations that are deep underground, especially in Kiev.
(10:04):
Yes, and I went to see the ballet of Snow White underground
under the Khaki Opera House on Sunday.
Lots of little girls and their mothers watching absolutely
wrapped the stage. It was extraordinary.
But yes, there is a whole underground life, I think that
Ukrainians are very reluctant tosay to a foreigner like me that,
(10:25):
you know, they have any problem with their will.
Everybody says, no, we're going to fight and we have the
motivation and we're developing our own technology and this is
what we're going to do. But sure, it must be very, very
hard and very wearing. We're talking about 3 1/2 years
of war. And no population can endure
something like that without having some kind of
(10:46):
psychological impact. And do you think that the air
war is now more important than the ground war?
Because the frontline on the ground is a bit like the First
World War frontline. It's barely advanced in in
months if not the years. Yeah, I think it's worth
focusing just for a second on that frontline and why the
Russians can't move forward. The Ukrainian drone defence has
(11:08):
now developed so much that essentially they can see the
whole frontline all the time in real time.
I've actually been in a basementoutside of Kiev where you could
see it on screen. So there was a couple 100 people
in a room watching it. They can see everything.
Every time the Russians try to advance or come into the, you
know, into the, into the front line, they, they hit them.
(11:29):
And the Russians, of course, arewilling, as we know, to lose
hundreds and thousands, maybe of, of people every week or
every month in, in order to achieve really very, very small
amounts of territory, you know, a few a kilometer here or a few
100 yards there. I mean, it's very, it's, it's,
it's not very much. I saw one statistic that said if
the Russians keep going at this pace, they'll conquer all of
(11:52):
Ukraine in about 85 years. So it's, you know, it's not as
if they're doing really well. And it seems to me that the air
war is, is a sign of their frustration.
You know, they can't advance on the frontline.
They can't win the war that way.And so they're trying to win it
from the air. And that, of course, is why air
defense is so important. And the US is still produces the
(12:14):
world's best air defense and still has more of it than
anybody else. And that that's really the main
reason why the US is still important to Ukraine.
Ukrainians now make all their own, most of their own drones.
They, they have other sources ofammunition and other sources of
weaponry, but it's just this onething, which is air defense,
which is, which is so, so crucial.
So yes, you're right, the Russians are trying to win that
(12:35):
way. But, you know, there isn't any
evidence that anybody has ever won a war but through the air.
You know, that's how the, the, you know, the, the Germans tried
to win the war, the Battle of Britain in the air and that
didn't succeed. And the, you know, the, the,
the, the, the British tried to defeat Germany that way.
And actually that is didn't succeed.
(12:55):
That's not why. That's not why the Allies won
the war. So I'm not sure that it can win.
I mean, it can do a lot of damage.
It can destroy people's lives. It can, you know, it can create
a lot of trauma for later on, but it's, it isn't actually
going to win. And at some point, yes, the
Russians will figure that out. And it would help if we were
able to arm Ukraine and give them the defenses they need now
(13:17):
so that the Russians came to that realization sooner.
That's really been the, you know, for the last six months.
It's been, or really for the last three years, it's been
clear that that is the way the war will eventually end.
The Russians will understand that they can't win.
And at that point, the war's over.
And then we can discuss where the border is and we can have
lots of other conversations. But this idea that there would
(13:38):
be some kind of trade or some kind of, you know, we'll give
you Crimea in exchange for something else, I mean, that's
not going to happen. That's that, that was always a
myth. The the The war will end when
the Russians understand that they can't win.
And Lindsay, it's a strange way,isn't it?
Because it's both incredibly modern and technological.
You know, you've covered that just now the, you know, the
drone warfare that's being developed all the time and it
(14:00):
really doesn't allow the soldiers to move anywhere
without being, you know, being spotted by a German, possibly
killed by 1. And at the same time, it's
unbelievably old fashioned, you know, trenches, mud, boots on
the ground and advancing a few inches on either side.
Absolutely, though there are very few men in those trenches
these days because of the of thedrones, as as Anne was saying.
(14:23):
I think that one of the things which is really interesting is
you is because the basic problemthat the Ukrainians have, it's
just that they don't have as many soldiers.
They're a much smaller country and the Russians fight in a
particular way because they don't care about losing a lot of
soldiers. Now you can say that that is a
military culture because they'recruel and so on.
(14:43):
Or you can also say because their soldiers are expendable
from a practical point of view. And from the Ukrainian point of
view, they're not expendable because there are so few here
and they're very short of them. So one of the things that the
Ukrainians are working on, and Iwent to one of the places where
they're developing, these are these unmanned ground vehicles.
So they're like drones, but they're on the ground and these
(15:05):
can be used now. They're robots.
They're they're little vehicles that can bring in ammunition to
a frontline unit. They can bring out a casualty,
somebody who's been injured. They can do all of the
logistics. The Third Assault Brigade who I
was with say that they actually took a Russian position the
other day in entirely with unmanned vehicles both in the
(15:26):
air and on the ground. So what that means is that it
saves soldiers lives because if your soldiers are not right
there where it's happening, but a couple of kilometers back, you
know, using these video game console type things in order to
work these vehicles, then you can save a lot of lives.
So that kind of technology is really important to the
Ukrainians. But the other thing that they
(15:47):
really want are long range cruise missiles which the
Americans could give and apparently or sell, which
apparently they're thinking of because if they had these Jassam
long range cruise missiles, thenthey can fire more and more
effectively into Russia. And that I think is one thing
that the Ukrainians think that they need to do.
(16:07):
They need to take the war to Russia more effectively.
But there's a story in the Financial Times actually just
now that they had Privy to a conversation between Trump and
Zelensky on the 4th of July of all days, where Trump then asked
Zelensky, can you hit Moscow? Can you hit Saint Petersburg?
(16:28):
And Zelensky said, yes, I can ifyou give me the weapons to do
so. You know, if the war really was
brought very closely to, you know, the not just Russians, you
know, in outlying areas, you know, obviously they went into
Kursk last year, but, you know, into the capital or the cultural
capital, Saint Petersburg, that would make a big difference,
wouldn't it? It would make a big difference.
(16:50):
And I think one of the reasons that I'm told that the
Ukrainians have been holding back on that is because they
worry that it would anger President Trump because they
feel that he would be, he would,you know, be annoyed if they
were taking the war right to President Putin.
So they have held back on that, partly because the technology
and partly because diplomatically they think that
(17:12):
that wouldn't be such a good idea.
So we'll have to see in the coming weeks whether that
changes. Now the President Trump seems to
have altered his policy. And I wonder just briefly on
this, whether this will bring back the old ogre that of
course, has been concerning Europeans, whether, you know,
pushing Putin into a corner likethat by bringing the war much
closer to the the people of Moscow, St.
(17:32):
Petersburg would actually, you know, escalate it to another
level. Because, of course, the Russians
even today are threatening that this could become a nuclear
conflict. I think I'm hearing far less of
that now than I was. The German government is much
more is much more belligerent onthe part of Ukraine, the current
Mertz as opposed to Schultz and I think Mark Rousser, the the
(17:55):
head of NATO is much more hawkish.
So I think there's much less talk of that in European
capitals now than there was six months or a year ago.
If the Ukrainians now get the weapons to hit Moscow, to hit
Saint Petersburg with, you know,and if there is a temptation for
them to hit civilian targets, which is something that I know
the Biden administration was always worried about, does that
(18:17):
change the nature of this war fundamentally?
I'm not sure it changes it fundamentally because the
Ukrainians have been hitting targets very deep inside Russia
for a long time, including usinga, a very, a kind of Trojan
horse drone technique to smuggledrones inside to the country and
to hit aircraft at A at an airport quite far away from
(18:40):
Ukraine. So I'm not, I'm not 100% sure it
would make a difference. I mean, there might be a an
interesting diplomatic situationif it were to be US weapons with
which the Ukrainians were hitting important sites in
central Russia or or indeed in Moscow.
And that would then create a brand new situation between
(19:00):
Russia and the United States. I'm not sure that it changes the
war that much. I mean, the Russians have known
for a long time that the Ukrainians can hit targets in
Russia and, and the Ukrainians hit them all the time, actually.
I mean, it's not always reported.
It's, we've become so used to itthat it's not in the news.
But I mean, almost every week the Ukrainians hit a factory or
they hit a, some kind of production site or some kind of
(19:21):
military installation. So it doesn't, it doesn't
necessarily change the, the, thefighting.
But yes, it would create that. That would then be a new
situation between Trump and Putin, one that would that would
be much more fundamental change than what we've seen so far.
I mean, because even today we heard very spokesman for the
Kremlin speaking on behalf of the Kremlin, one assumes saying,
(19:41):
you know, now that Trump has said he's going to supply these
weapons and plus the sanctions that this is going to raise the
nuclear question one again, you're effectively, we are
effectively at war with NATO andwe've heard this talk ever since
the war started in February of 2022.
But do we need to take that? Do European capitals need to
take that talk more seriously now, if indeed these long range
(20:02):
weapons are supplied? I really don't think so.
I mean, I don't want to be too definitive because you never
know. And within the case of Putin,
you're dealing with someone who's unpredictable and paranoid
and has all kinds of complexes about his role in history and so
on. From everything we know, we know
that his his Chinese allies put a lot of pressure on him not to
(20:23):
use nuclear weapons. The Indian leadership have also
made it clear they don't want him to use nuclear weapons and
they're important customers of of Russian oil.
We know that the, the, it would be actually very difficult for
them to use tactical weapons in Ukraine because of the closeness
of the two armies of the, the, there would inevitably be
(20:44):
blowback into Russia. And it's, it's hard to see how
they could use them in a way that would help them win the
war. So I, I, I don't think so.
And it's also true that Putin has used this language of, you
know, this nuclear threat language whenever he believes
that the US is entering the conflict in any kind of way.
And it's so far been successful at keeping the US out or the US
(21:07):
restrained. And, and so I, I, I think it's
makes much more sense at this point to see it as a tactic
rather than, rather than a real threat.
And, and also, you know, how many times can you threaten
something before people start tonot believe you?
He's he, he actually has been talking repeatedly about using
nukes in, in, against Poland, against the UK, you know,
(21:27):
against Scandinavia for years now.
You know, we just, we all kind of choose not to hear it, but
but it's, it really isn't new. And it's part of their talk.
It's part of how they speak about the outside world.
And so and and so, I'm not sure it represents some big change at
this point. It's very hard for any of us who
haven't been to Russia for some time and we haven't been given
(21:48):
visas for years now to, to really know what's going on on
the ground, what ordinary Russians think and actually what
people even close to the regime think the war aims are.
But Lindsay, first you, what do you think Russians feel that
they're fighting for in this war?
And and if you're in Sabinas war, can you just, you know,
carry on regardless because lifeseems to be still pretty
(22:11):
pleasant in those cities compared to what Ukrainians are
having to put up with. Look, when you talk to Ukrainian
soldiers, they, their line is the Russians are fighting for
money and we're fighting for freedom.
I'm not sure that it is quite assimple as that.
Now, obviously, the Russians have brought in the North
Koreans and we're expecting moreNorth Korean fighters in the
(22:31):
next couple of months, another 25 or 30,000 apparently.
So they, they need those extra, extra men.
But I think, you know, from everything I read, this idea,
which is the fundamental issue of this war, that President
Putin says that Ukraine is not acountry, that Ukraine is not a
place that exists, that Ukraine is somewhere that should be
(22:51):
under the control of Russia. A lot of Russians, as far as I
know, have bought into that ideaand would know much more than me
about that. The propaganda, as we know, is
very strong. And it seems to be almost and at
the moment, and of course the mood changes depending on the
amount of weapons being deployed.
And, you know, you know, how theair war is going, but it seems
(23:13):
at the moment as if Vladimir Putin's aim of subjugating
Ukraine, making it, you know, it's ceasing to exist as an
independent sovereign nation state that's quite far from
reality at the moment. And then what the Ukraine's
might end up with is something that's, you know, quite a bit
smaller than what they had, you know, in, you know, I don't
(23:36):
know, in 2010, but but independent, democratic, yes,
sovereign and able to defend itself.
Well, we'll see. I mean, I, I think Putin's aim
is to, is to change the government of Ukraine and to
make, to put in some kind of proRussian government.
So, I mean, it may, it may be that he hopes to achieve the
subjugation of Ukraine, not through conquering the whole
(23:57):
country, which you're right, that seems pretty unlikely.
It's hard to see how that would happen given the given, given
the way the way this war is going.
But they do hope, I think, to use some kind of political
manipulation or propaganda to achieve that kind of aim.
And I think they originally hoped that Trump would help them
with that, too. I mean, I think Trump's attacks
on Zelensky and his language about, you know, we need
(24:19):
election in Ukraine. You remember that back from kind
of February, March. I mean, I think all that was
coming from Putin. He was hearing that in his
conversations with Putin. And I think they they hope that
that might work. But but you're right, it seems
right now as if they didn't. I mean, I would make one little
corrective, just a little comment to what Lindsay just
said about, about the Russians if Putin were to declare
(24:40):
tomorrow that the war is over and we won or, you know, the war
is over and, you know, it's, we're, we're doing something
else now. I, I, I actually do think the
Russians would be OK with that. I mean the, you know, remember
that we're now dealing with a country that doesn't really have
anything that you could call a public sphere.
There's no independent conversation.
(25:00):
There are no debates about what should happen that are that are
real and not staged or manipulated.
People will say to a pollster orto an interviewer, whatever is
the line of the of this, of the government of the state, you
know, so, so you can't really what people say to on TV or what
they say to Steve Rosenberg of the BBC or whoever.
(25:21):
I'm not sure that represents anydeep feelings.
And I think if the line were to change from above, then I think
probably the Russians would accept it.
I mean, there may be people in the inner circle who would be
angry. But, but I'm not sure about
ordinary Russians. I I'm not sure that they're
really a a factor here in the way that we imagine them to be a
factor. And Anne, it's not a war, it's a
(25:42):
special military operation, right?
So it's a different kind of thing.
So so maybe that maybe that sortof obfuscation will, you know,
make it easier for him to kind of call it quits or maybe that's
also the reason why people haven't been fully engaged in
it. Lindsay, I mean, you know, our
own Prime Minister here, Sir Keir Starmer has been, you know,
saying, you know, to the public,you know, we need to be ready
(26:04):
for any eventuality with the Russians.
We're in a pre war setting. You know, some senior generals
here in Britain were talking about we're already in World War
Three in the foothills of it. This is used to justify, you
know, massively increased defense spending at the expense
of, you know, social programs, benefits, all that kind of
stuff. If the Russians don't actually,
you know, if that threat doesn'tcome true either by them trying
(26:26):
to nibble away at Poland or the Baltic republics, it's kind of
difficult to maintain that degree of threat awareness and
sacrifice for quite a long time,Especially with, you know, the
new generation people like my kids who are literally who
couldn't can't imagine anything like that ever happening in
their lives. Yeah, but it's more complicated
(26:47):
than that, isn't it? Because warfare now is
asymmetric warfare and grey zonewarfare.
It's already happening. We've already got, you know,
warehouses being blown up in theUK, which, according to a case
last week, the people who carried this out were saboteurs
who were employed by the Russians.
We already have, you know, submarines around British
(27:09):
waters. We already have them cutting
cables. All of this kind of grey zone
warfare is already happening. Now the idea that they're going
to start launching ballistic missiles at the UK, well, one
has to hope that they're not since British air defences are
not in as good a state even as the Ukrainians, from what I
(27:29):
understand. But certainly I, I think that
what's key is if you transfer itfrom the Ukrainian experience,
President Trump seems to think this is about real estate.
It's not about real estate. It's about sovereignty.
It's about the government of Ukraine.
It's about Ukrainians having theright to choose their own
governments and their own system.
(27:50):
Yeah. And then and that transfers out.
So I don't think anybody is thinking that, you know,
President Putin is going to wakeup one day and fire a ballistic
missile into Poland where Anne is right now.
It's much more that kind of asymmetric warfare and bits of
sabotage and so on, which could go on in the Baltic States and
(28:10):
so on. And that's much more of a
challenge to NATO because at what point do you say this
really is warfare? And at what point do you say,
well, this is just a bit of, youknow, criminality and, and
sabotage? It's it's extremely difficult.
And just on the question of whatyou, Ukraine might, you know,
regard as victory at the end of this, I mean, part of that is
just surviving and not being completely rolled over by the
(28:33):
Russians. But the other price that was
that was always held out to themby Brussels was membership of
the EU if, especially if they can't get NATO membership,
especially in Poland, where there's a very strong
agricultural lobby that doesn't like the idea of the
agricultural superpower Ukraine kind of depressing prices and
and undercutting their markets. What's the feeling in Poland
(28:53):
like about Ukraine becoming a member of the EU at the end of
this process? I mean, we had, there hasn't
really been a serious debate about it yet, believe it or not.
I mean, it's still, it's still feels here far away.
My, my guess is that you, that Ukraine will be a member of the
EU. It won't probably be as fast as,
as the Ukrainians hope, but there will be a way to negotiate
(29:17):
a, you know, a, a, you know, a syncopated or a drawn out access
to the agricultural markets as there has been with accession of
other, other states. I mean, the, just, just the,
the, the strength of Ukraine andthe industrial possibilities of
Ukraine and the high level of technology that there's going to
be in Ukraine at the end of thiswar are going to be an enormous
(29:39):
advantage to Europe. And actually, I would say this
is a part of the answer to the point that you made a, a moment
ago about the UK not being readyfor it or not wanting to spend
the money. I mean, there is a, there is a
technological leap that is happening in Ukraine and the UK
definitely wants to be part of that.
And actually, far as I know, British soldiers and British
(29:59):
observers are on the ground in Ukraine all the time looking at
it and trying to understand it. And, you know, the UK should be
so lucky that that technology transfer happens and, and the,
and the UK is able to take advantage of it.
So, so it's, it's, it's, it's definitely not, it's not, it's
not that it's not one sided. You know, there are there are
advantages that Ukraine brings to Europe and to Britain as
(30:22):
well. That brings us back to the
technology because Anne's completely right.
I mean, I've come across UK companies and people from UK
companies who are here working with Ukrainian companies,
particularly on drone technology, but other
battlefield technology as well. Because the point is that the
Ukraine, let's say you have a new kind of drone, well, in this
country, you develop it, your prototype in your factory in
(30:44):
maybe here in Khaki, maybe in Kiev, wherever.
And then you go to the front line and you test it
immediately. And within 10 days, you can turn
a prototype into something that actually works.
And because that's how long it takes to battlefield test
something, this would take yearsin the UK or in any other
European country or in America. And so there's no question that
(31:04):
at the end of this war, Ukraine will be the defence powerhouse
of Europe, for better or for worse, rightly or wrongly,
depending on people's views of this.
But in it is leading the way in certain kinds of battlefield
technology. And it is changing warfare
forever. And definitely I think that the
European countries, including Britain, already understand that
(31:26):
and are coming in. But the Ukrainians I speak to
say, I basically say, oh, you guys are so slow, you're so
slow. Eventually we'll teach you,
we'll help you, you come along and you have things that we can
learn as well in terms of, you know, your in terms of
technology. But we are the ones who are
testing things out. And in that sense, you are the
ones who are learning from us. And who knows, Lindsay, because,
(31:49):
you know, by the time, I mean, you know, this war comes to some
kind of conclusion, Ukraine willbe such a defence powerhouse in
Europe, maybe NATO will change its mind, you know, and maybe
the Russians both be in a position to object about having
it even as a member of NATO. Final question to both of you.
I mean, it's, you know, in when we're deep in the weeds about
this and we discuss the diplomacy and, you know,
(32:11):
whether, you know, what Melania was whispering into Trump's ear
and so on. It's really easy to forget which
one shouldn't that this has beengoing on for a hell of a long
time, 3 1/2 years, that maybe a million people have been killed,
soldiers have been killed or maimed on the Russian side, God
knows how many on the Ukrainian side.
I mean, this is a colossal, colossal conflict for Russia.
(32:33):
It is hard not to see that it will reach some degree of
exhaustion, you know, on the Russian side, especially
sometime this year, especially, you know, if Trump is as good as
his word and these new weapons keep coming in.
But maybe not. So finally, first to you, then,
then Lindsay, what's your feeling, your gut feeling about
(32:54):
how long this, this wretched thing will carry on for?
I mean, you know, it's a colonial war and the as like all
other colonial wars like France and Algeria, you know, or the
British and India, it will end when the capital, the imperial
capital is exhausted and doesn'tsee the point anymore.
(33:14):
So you're right about that. And whether that that happens
this year or next year or the year after, I don't know, but it
will happen. Lindsay.
When I talk to Ukrainians about this, and I've been talking to
defence entrepreneurs and soldiers, they're expecting to
have to fight for at least another year.
They can see no way that this comes to an end in the near
(33:36):
term. They're hoping they can hold on
and that when there is some kindof settlement that they have
been holding the line well enough that they can negotiate
from a position of strength and that Ukraine will retain its
sovereignty. That is what's important to
them. OK.
Well, thank you very much to both of you for your time.
Lindsay Hilsum and Hakib and AbuBam and Poland, thanks so much
(33:58):
for joining us. That's it.
That's been this edition of the Forecast.
I hope you enjoyed it. See you next time.
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