John Mearsheimer: US Pullback, Alliance Breakdown and Wars

0:00Welcome back. We are joined today by John Meersheimer, a professor at the University of Chicago, to discuss what is happening now in the Middle East. I'm glad to see you, because this is quite confusing to me. We see Trump at United Nations threatening to annihilate Iran after the midterms. At the same time, we see huge movement of arms. The US just pulled out of Iraq after 23 years. What are you interpreting all of these events? Are we looking at an escalation or is there any other way of looking at this? Well, with regard to the question of escalation, it appears that the United States has no interest in escalation. And the best evidence of that is that the Iranians have been attacking ships in the state of war moves in a quite vigorous way over the past few days.

1:02And according to news reports today, the Iranians claimed that they hit four ships overnight. And yet the United States is not retaliating. In the past, this would have led to a tit for tat strategy, where the Iranians attacked vessels in the straight and the United States responded against targets in Iran. And then the Iranians responded against targets inside of countries like Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and so forth, and so on, where you had American military bases. But so far, we have not seen any evidence of that for quite a few weeks now, the United States has stayed away from going up the escalation ladder militarily. The Iranians themselves are a different question. There's all sorts of evidence that more oil is now coming out of the straight of war moves.

2:07And apparently that is somewhat weakening Iran's bargaining position. And many people are hypothesizing that the Iranians really don't have much choice but to escalate. For example, it's quite clear that a lot of oil is being loaded in Ras Tanura, which is the principal port in Saudi Arabia. Earlier in September, earlier in this month, there were about 1.5 million barrels a day being loaded onto tankers at Ras Tanura. That's 1.5 million in early September. It appears that now about 6.5 million barrels a day are being loaded onto tankers at Ras Tanura. Well, it is possible, I'm not saying that this is likely, but it is possible that the Iranians could decide to hit Ras Tanura to restore their leverage over the United States in this conflict.

3:12So what's going on here is that people do not see evidence that the Americans are interested in escalating, at least at this point in time. And they do see lots of evidence that the Iranians have an incentive, a powerful incentive to escalate, and that there are targets the Iranians can go after like Ras Tanura, or the pipeline that goes across Saudi Arabia that was shut down for a while. But now is operating at 40% capacity, and is on its way to being restored to full capacity. So the Iranians could go after the pipeline as well as Ras Tanura. And there are of course other targets in places like the UAE and Kuwait as well. And of course the Iranians will surely continue to target vessels that are trying to go through the straight-up war moves. So that's the basic situation as things stand today with regard to escalation. But as you know Glenn, what the situation will look like in a week's time is hard to say, because this war has great potential to escalate on both sides.

4:31That's a good point. Next week the world can look very different already. I was wondering how you see the wider US strategy, though, because you use concepts like a back passing that is to have, you know, shift the cost of war to someone else. And I was wondering if you see any of this now in the US strategy, because certainly in Europe, we've seen some of this. And this is the desire to essentially put the Ukraine war on the shoulders of your, your, your pains that they have to finance this. And we heard similar reports in the Middle East that the US been seeking for countries like Saudi Arabia to take more of a direct role. Do you, do you think there might be again, to be honest, the US also asks Europe to take great responsibility in the Middle East, but do you think this is something the US might try or is this option been exhausted by now? Let us make it front line states carry the weights. Yeah, just to talk about Europe for a second, what's going on there is that the United States is trying to buck pass to the Europeans and get the Europeans to be principally responsible for supporting Ukraine so that the Americans can back off as much as possible.

5:44And in that case, the Americans have a partner that they can buck pass to the Europeans are deeply committed to the Ukraine war. And they are willing to allow the United States to buck pass to them. So it works there. But the question you have to ask yourself with regard to the Gulf and the Iran war is who can the United States pass the buck to? I mean, the Saudis, the UAE, Kuwait, none of these countries are capable of picking a fight and winning a fight with Iran. Iran has much more military power than any of those countries, which is why they have long relied on the American security umbrella. So the Arabia understands it could not fight and win against Iran. It needs the United States. So buck passing just doesn't make a whole heck of a lot of sense for the United States.

6:50And in fact, what the United States is trying to do, as I said in my opening comments, is avoid getting into a shooting match with the Iranians. Remember, we started off with this 40-day bombing campaign. Then we had a number of tit-for-tat campaigns, which were limited military strikes by both sides against each other. That went on for a few weeks at a time. We stopped engaging in those tit-for-tat operations because number one, they didn't work. And number two, we were expending precious munitions. So what we're trying to do now is just sit on the sideline and not get involved in a military engagement with the Iranians and instead rely on economic pressure. It's the blockade plus the best-in strategy to strangle Iran economically, to cut off all Iranian economic intercourse with the rest of the world plus the blockade.

7:56Those are the sort of two aces in the hole for us at this point in time, or at least so we think. But we're not trying to, you know, buck pass to anyone to fight the war frost because again there's nobody there. Just one final point on buck pass scene. The real buck passers here, and they've done a brilliant job. The real buck pass is Israel. Israel dragged us into this war. They bamboozled Trump, got us into the war. They engaged in the 40-day bombing campaign with the United States, but once that was over with, the Israelis have largely remained on the sidelines. And they've turned the responsibility of dealing with Iran over to the Americans. But just to make a final point here, we cannot buck pass to the Israelis. I mean, if there is a military in the region that has the capability to engage the Iranians, it is the Israelis. But we're not buck passing to the Israelis. They're buck passing to us.

9:03I was going to say in the Middle East it looked, it went the other way. That is the Israelis buck pass to the United States. But do you see this economic strangulation as convincing because it could work? I mean, again, I think there's strong connections economic to other centers of power. They lived under sanctions for a long time. So I see that argument, but at the same time, you know, every state has a breaking point. Do you see any indicators that the US might be successful in this strategy? Well, there's no question that the United States and others are inflicting massive pain on the Iranians. And this has been happening for a long time. And we're ratcheting up the pain now. It's quite clear for that for the immediate future, the Iranians can withstand this pain. They have enough oil out on the open seas that they can sell to sustain them probably into December.

10:13But let's assume that we begin to push them toward the breaking point. The question you want to ask yourself then, Glenn, is what are they going to do? And we're assuming that they're going to throw up their hands. And that's the end of the story. But I don't think that's true. I think what they're going to do is escalate. And as I said before, they are operating in a target rich environment. There are places like the Saudi port at Rustin, where there's the Saudi pipeline. There are all sorts of targets in the UAE. And they can do a great deal to damage the flow of oil coming out of the Gulf and do damage to the international economy. And on top of all this, you want to understand that even though more oil is getting out today than was the case earlier this month, earlier in September, that is, the fact is that if you look at oil prices, especially the prices, you look at bond yields and assorted other economic indicators.

11:25The West is in real trouble. And there's no sign that our situation is improving in any meaningful way, despite the fact that more oil is coming out of the Gulf. So we're under tremendous pressure. And if the Iranians escalate and shutdown ports like Ross, Tenora, Fajira, and the UAE, and so forth and so on, which they can do and do quite easily, that will make our problems even greater. I would also add that this whole operation of blockcaiting Iran is putting huge pressure on the US Navy. And it's not clear how much longer the US Navy can sustain this blockade. The American Navy is not that large in size. And because the Bahrain naval base, with a fifth fleet, US fifth fleet was located, has effectively been eliminated.

12:32The logistic glitches of maintaining a blockade are quite significant. So the United States is under a lot of pressure. You don't see that when you listen to President Trump speak or Scott Besson speak. But I've met a lot of money that behind closed doors, the two of them and Trump's other advisors are deeply worried about where this is headed. It seems that many of the world's hotspots or other series of the United States. There's a recognition that there's a shift in world order. There has to be a rebalancing. You can't go from an international system where the US has essentially the final say to a new system where it's able to be confronted largely successfully by the Iranians balanced by the Russians and increasingly so by by the by the Chinese. So how do you see this rebalancing happening in well primarily in the Middle East because it looks as if the main allies of the United States would, if they're not backed, would at some point have to readjust to new realities that is it has to accommodate the Iran otherwise they're going to put themselves in a very difficult position.

13:50But so how can the United States what can it do because if it confronts Iran as you said the Iran has the possibility to essentially destroy a lot of these nations by going after the energy infrastructure. And if the US doesn't go after Iran, then these countries will have to adjust to new realities and begin to make deals, cut some deals with the Iranians. So well, it's a bit of a dilemma for the US here. How do you see a he is the way out of this dilemma. Well, let me make a general point and then answer your specific question. Just as a general point, I think it's important to keep in mind that both the Russians and the Iranians view the United States as an existential threat. I think the Russians have correctly understood from the beginning of this conflict and that goes back I think to 2014 when the conflict actually broke out, but it certainly goes back to 2022 when the war.

14:54broke out that's now taking place. The Russians understand that the United States is out to knock Russia out of the ranks of the great powers. And this is just another way of saying that the United States is an existential threat. And if you're Russian, you're facing an existential threat. You're not going to surrender. You're going to fight to the last person. And if you have to use nuclear weapons, you'll use nuclear weapons. And I think a lot of people just don't or are not willing to recognize that basic fact of life. That means there are limits to what you can do to post the Russians around. And that means you could end up in a nuclear war if you're not careful. Now to switch to the war against Iran. It's absolutely clear that Iran is facing an existential threat. Trump has on seven occasions according to my count threatened to wipe Iran off the face of the earth.

15:59And he did just recently at the United Nations. The Iranians are not going to surrender. They're going to do everything they can to prevent the United States from winning. And this means that there are just real limits to what we can achieve in the Gulf. And that's been manifestly clear since February 28th. We are putting enormous pressure on the Iranian economy and on the Iranian people. We are punishing them in truly significant ways. But do you see any evidence that the Iranians are throwing up their hands? We're getting ready to throw up their hands and surrender. There's no evidence whatsoever. Any more than there's any evidence that the Russians are getting ready to throw up their hands and surrender. Again, these countries are facing an existential threat. And when you face an existential threat, you don't quit.

16:59You escalate. You look for every opportunity you can find to inflict pain on the other side. So this is what we are up against. Now to get to your more specific question, what can the United States do? What do the United States do in the future to protect countries like Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the other Gulf states? And the answer is very clear, not much. As you pointed out before Glenn, today represents our final day in Iraq. We're pulling out of Iraq. We're finally getting out of Iraq. In November in 2003, March 19th, and by memories correct, we went to the war against Iraq. And we've been there pretty much all the time since March 19th. We did have a significant drawdown for a while, but we then put significant numbers of troops back in in 2014.

18:02And we've been there since, but now we're out. We're leaving Iraq. I think what you're going to see is a great reduction in American forces in other states in that region. Because the United States cannot provide security for countries like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait and the UAE in ways that it thought it could. And they thought it could before February 28th. I've said this before, I didn't realize before February 28th how vulnerable all those bases were. I knew there was some vulnerability for sure. I understood that the Iranians have lots of ballistic missiles and drones, but I did not fully recognize how effective they would be. And the fact is they have been deadly effective. And it makes very little sense for us to rebuild those bases in any meaningful way.

19:05And even if we do rebuild those bases, Glenn, the fact is that over time the Iranians are going to build more missiles, more accurate missiles, and more lethal missiles, and more drones, and more lethal drones. And those bases, if we rebuild them, will be more vulnerable than ever. So I don't think it makes much sense from our point of view to rebuild the bases. And I don't think it makes much sense from the perspective of the Gulf States to depend on the United States to defend them. And by the way, when you talk about the Gulf States depending on the United States, you want to remember that the United States has not only failed to defend the Gulf States, it dragged the Gulf States into this war. So if you're, you know, the head of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, you should be thinking long and hard about how close a relationship you want to have with the United States. So anyway, I think moving forward, our security posture in the Gulf is going to be much different than it was before February 28th.

20:12And our military presence is going to be greatly reduced. And the states in the region, I believe, will depend less on us than they have in the past. But this, of course, raises the question, what do you do if you're Saudi Arabia moving forward? How do you provide for your own security? It's quite clear you can't rely heavily on the United States. You may be able to rely a bit on the United States moving forward. There may still be something of a security relationship with the Americans. But it's not going to be like the old days. And you can't really rely on the Russians or the Chinese to provide security in any meaningful way. They can help on the margins, but not that much. So I think if you're Saudi Arabia or any other country in the region, you really have two options. One is to work out some sort of motives for the end-eye with the Iranians.

21:14And this, of course, is quite easy for the Iraqis because they're both sheer countries. And they have been operating pretty much on the same page in recent years. But for the other countries, it's much trickier because they're basically Sunni states. But even there, I think if you're Saudi Arabia, this might think to do his work out some sort of motives for the end-eye, some sort of daytime with Iran. And then the other option is to develop nuclear weapons. I would imagine that the Saudis are spending lots of time these days thinking about developing a nuclear deterrent of their own. I would imagine that the Iranians are doing the same thing. If I were any state in the Persian Gulf region at this point in time, I was thinking about how to maximize my prospects for survival moving forward, thinking about nuclear weapons would be high up on my agenda.

22:18That's not to say I would get nuclear weapons because, as you know, getting nuclear weapons is not an easy matter. The United States and the Israelis would go to enormous lengths to prevent that. But nevertheless, nuclear weapons are the ultimate deterrent. And given what we just said about the viability of the American security umbrella, nuclear weapons are something that I think you have to at least countenance. But I think the key here for these countries moving forward is to work out a motorist, the end-eye, with the Iranians. I will walk a little bit into my next question because I didn't want to wonder how you see the risks now that the US out of necessity has to begin to pull back a bit. It's security commitments. Because, you know, if one of the US was a hegemon, it makes sense to well, in all way, the divide and conquer if you will, you know, divide the regions into dependent allies or balanced adversaries. That is in Europe, you know, you have loyalty from the Europeans, who's the security dependent and the balanced the Russians, the Arabs or Gulf states are loyal and the balanced Iranians and similar security arrangements in East Asia.

23:31What happens when the US pulls back though? You know, it looks like, well, if you look at East Asia, Japan either has to learn how to balance China itself, it has to get nuclear weapons, it could spiral out of control. Otherwise, you have to make some deal with the Chinese. You can say the same in Europe. If the US pulls back, what do the Europeans do? Because some of the Europeans are saying, we need a new NATO, but without the US. So this is militarism without a military. So it does make much sense. Alternatively, we have to make peace with the Russians, which is going to be difficult at this point. And you describe the similar situation in the Middle East. So what is the risk? Because again, back to this theme, whenever there's a massive shift in power, there's a hegemon repositioning itself. It will disrupt a lot of regions all at the same time, which is, you know, at least in my opinion, part of the chaos we're currently seeing. And, you know, what would it say to you? What should the US do? I know this is a lot of things packed into one question, but it's kind of speaks a bit to our time, I think.

24:39Well, we should put China aside and we can talk about that later in the program. And I'm more than willing to do that. And that's a very important area. And we just had this big summit between Xi Jinping and Donald Trump in Washington, DC. So we should talk about China, but let's leave that aside. Let's bracket that issue for the moment. And let's just stay with the Middle East. Here's the problem that the United States faces. And by the way, we were talking about a few minutes ago, had more to do with how the Gulf States should react to a reduced American presence in the region moving forward. But let's talk about what the US policy should be in the region. And I think it's quite clear, as we were saying, that our military presence will be greatly reduced. I mean, think about the importance of the naval base that we had in Bahrain, as with the fifth fleet was located.

25:41That really mattered greatly for us, for purposes of projecting power. It's hard for me to imagine at this point in time that that naval base is going to come back to life and the United States is going to be able to operate in Bahrain in the future the way it did before February 28th. And I think that that world has gone away. I think our bases are going to be greatly reduced. And as we were saying before, our security umbrella over these various Gulf states is not going to be the same as it was before February 28th. So how should the United States think about dealing with Iran? It seems to me that the smart thing to do would be for the United States to work out some sort of modus, the Vendai with the Iranians, to really alter its relationship with the Iranians.

26:45I know this is not a popular argument to make in the mainstream media, but the Iranians are not an aggressive state in the sense that they are running around starting wars, initiating wars all the time. And in fact, in its history, in the history of the Iranian nation state, there is no evidence of it ever initiating a war. And it's never indicated that it was interested in initiating a war against any of its neighbors. So this is despite the rhetoric in the West, not a highly aggressive state. It's been highly aggressive when it's responding to aggression from the United States and the Israelis. There's no question about that. It has no choice. But the idea that it's bent on initiating conflict, initiating wars and conquering territory, I don't see any evidence of that.

27:46So I think the United States could work out a modus, the Vendai of some sort with the Iranians. But the fly in the ointment, Glenn, is Israel. Israel does not want to work out any kind of modus, the Vendai, with Iran. The Israelis are basically bent on wrecking Ukraine. It shouldn't be wrecking Iran. They want to break Iran into a handful of states. They want to do to Iran what was done to Syria. The Israelis, rightly or wrongly, view Iran as a mortal threat. And they have their gun sites on Iran. And my argument is that that's not going to change. The Israelis are going to remain committed to wrecking Iran. And that means the United States is going to remain committed to wrecking Iran.

28:46Because when it comes to the U.S. Middle East policy, we all know the Israelis have enormous influence over our policy. It may be a bit too strong to say that they control our foreign policy, but they come very close to controlling our foreign policy in the Middle East, for sure. And I think therefore it's going to be extremely difficult for the United States to work out a modus, the Vendai, with Iran. But at the same time, I think it's going to be almost impossible for the United States to maintain a formidable military in the Middle East along the lines with the one that's existed really right up to now. So I think we're in a real quandary moving forward in terms of how we are going to think about the Middle East.

29:46Well, you would think that the relationship between the U.S. and Israel would begin to shift, or given that the overlapping interests, well, they're becoming less overlapping interests. So for example, after 67, the Israelis proved themselves to be a real force amplifier. Suddenly the U.S. larger dominance, it kind of overlaps perfectly with the Israel's desire for part of the region dominance at least. But then you see the United States beginning to rethink because well, the Arab states, that relationship is kind of being hurt by the partnership with Israel. But now we seem to be entering another stage where the U.S. has an interest, as you say, in at some point finding a new arrangement with Iran, if you can't be defeated. But at that point, that that would be seen as a possibly existential threat for the Israelis. So, do we see, as the U.S. has to begin to pull back, is that does a signify a more severe split between the Americans in the Israelis?

30:53I probably put that explain that in awkward ways. I understand exactly what you're saying. I think there's no doubt, Glenn, that Israel's interests, and America's interests, in the case of how to deal with Iran, are at odds with each other. And as you know, the United States and Israel have had conflicting interests on a number of issues in the past, including the Palestinian issue. But the point is, given the power of the lobby in the United States, the United States invariably ends up dancing to Israel's tune. And the question is, will that be the case here? I think, Glenn, for the foreseeable future, the Israelis were to put it slightly differently. The Israel lobby and the Israelis have a hammer lock on U.S. policy. And it's going to be very hard for the United States to go in a different direction than the one Israel wants us to go in over Iran.

31:58I know public opinion in the United States on Israel has changed drastically. There's no question about that. And that may manifest itself in a change at the policy level at some point down the road. But I don't see that happening anytime soon. I may be wrong. I hope I'm wrong, but I don't see it. So I think the Israelis will keep us deeply engaged, at least politically, or in terms of our articulated strategy. But in terms of the forces in the region, as I was saying before, I don't think we're going to be able to keep forces in the region in the future the way we have in the past. That's not to say we're going to leave the Middle East all together because that's not going to happen. But it's going to be a very tricky issue for us. Now, let me throw one other issue on the table that I think will matter a lot moving forward. And that's the nuclear issue.

32:59It is possible that we will not get a nuclear deal between Iran and the United States. We will not get a new JCPOA. And it is also possible that the Iranians will decide to build nuclear weapons. Or even if they don't decide to build nuclear weapons, it will look like they're building nuclear weapons from the Israeli and the American point of view. And give it how deeply committed both the United States and especially Israel are to preventing Iran from becoming a nuclear weapon state. The incentives for both the United States and Iran to, excuse me, both the United States and Israel to attack Iran to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear deterrent will be very great. And we can do that with bombers and missiles that are deployed far away from the Middle East. In other words, we can fly B2 bombers at a Diego Garcia and use them against Iran.

34:15Or we can use missiles shot at great distance. And the Israelis, of course, can use their Air Force to attack Iran. So what I'm saying to you is I think working out a modus, the vendai with Iran, from our point of view, would be a good thing. But it may be the case that it's very hard, if not impossible, to do that because of the nuclear issue. All of this is to say, it's very hard to see, Glenn, how do you get some sort of meaningful peace agreement or meaningful agreement between the United States on one side and Iran on the other side that produces stability in the region and allows the United States to significantly draw down its forces and pivot to Asia, which is long been our principal goal. And the foreign policy realm. It just is hard to see how we do that at this point in time.

35:21Well, that's what meant when the US pulls back, there's going to be a lot of in that vacuum, the Saudi Arabia might feel very insecure. It might want nuclear weapons Iran, as you said, if I was advising Darani some of the problem, maybe not the nuclear, get nuclear weapons as that would trigger its rivals to do the same, but at least a threshold state, make sure, make sure you have the material, the know how so you can put it together if it would be required. So no, this is the tricky part because I think for the US to pull back, it would have to put something else together, which means almost seeking a settlement between the Gulf States and Iranians. And after decades of essentially organizing an alliance system against Iran, it seems to be, that would be a difficult thing to get an entire political class on board with. It would be, you know, because we've been narratives about good guys and bad guys when we want to push our policies forward. Let me just ask you about, do you see a similar dynamic in Europe though, because again, in Europe, we, I think also the Cold War, we went on board with, you know, let's expand NATO instead of having an inclusive security architecture, because we needed to keep America on the continent.

36:37So we can at least it seemed like we're willing to make Russia an enemy to some extent in order to keep this Europe. But now the US is pulling back at least it's passing it once the Europeans to take care of themselves. How do you see, how can Europe adjust to this though, because again, you have some of them talking now about nuclear weapons, they want to do the nuclear sharing, they talk about war with Russia. Would the US have an interest then instead of reviving, you know, what we were discussing in the early 90s, that of having common security, because if it does, and the conflict ends between the Europeans and the Russians, why would the Europeans, I guess, give the US so much influence on the continent, it just seems like the whole system on gravels. Well, just to talk about what I think is going on in Europe, is I've long argued Glenn, I think the Russians will win an ugly victory.

37:43In other words, at some point the shooting will stop and you'll get a frozen conflict and you'll have a dysfunctional Ukrainian rub state. And very importantly for your question, as I've long argued, you will have poisonous relations between the Russians on one side and the Ukrainians and the Europeans on the other side, and even the Americans on the other side. I don't think the Americans will be able to completely divorce themselves from Europe, and the Europeans will certainly go to great lengths to make sure that doesn't happen. So it'll be the Russians on one side, the Ukrainians and the Europeans for sure, and to some extent the Americans on the other side. And there'll be poisonous relations between those two sides. Now, as you know better than I do, if you look at what's happening today in your Ukraine, in terms of how they talk about Russia and how they talk about the future, those poisonous relations are going to be poisonous relations on steroids.

38:48It's really quite remarkable how hostile people in the West, especially in Europe, especially in countries like Britain, are to the Russians. And if the Russians win this ugly victory, as I think they will, this is not something that's going to sit well with the Europeans or the Ukrainians. So you're going to have big trouble in Europe for as far as the eye you can see. If you think about what we're saying here Glenn, is that there's really kind of no way to shut down the troubles in the Middle East, and there's no way to shut down the troubles in Europe. And in both cases, but especially in Europe, you could imagine a war starting up again between not just Ukraine and Russia, but between Europe and Russia. It's a very real possibility.

39:48And I think by the way, as you well know, the Europeans are doing a lot of things that make this more rather than less likely. You would think that the Europeans, after everything that's happened since 2014, would be working overtime to stabilize the situation and create a situation moving forward with a prospect of war, is greatly reduced. But exactly the opposite is happening. I find it hard to understand what the Europeans are thinking given how little military capability they have. Do you really want to pick a war against Russia, which has much more conventional military capability than you do? And by the way, has many, many nuclear weapons, and will probably use them if it feels it's in desperate straits. If I were to European as the last thing I'd want to do is pick a war with the Russians, but they appear bent on doing that.

40:48So what this is to say, I think you're going to have trouble in Europe as far as the eye can see. And I think the Americans will greatly reduce their presence in Europe, as even talk about having the size of the American troop levels in Europe at this point in time. But nevertheless, I think the Americans will remain engaged somewhat. They won't pull out completely. So what you see here is the trouble will continue in the Gulf. The trouble will continue in Europe, even once the shooting stops in both cases. And the Americans will be involved, but not as much as they were in the past. So it's a very bleak picture. When you think about the situation in these two strategically important regions. Even if the Ukraine war would be a result tomorrow, or Ukraine would sink into the ocean, or whatever it would be, the root causes are still there, though.

41:51That is, we still have a divided Europe. We're still trying to decide where the new dividing lines are. So this could just replay itself in Moldova, Georgia. Should they be east or west, the requires domestic manipulation and also foreign involvement. But not only this, over the past years, we celebrated to a large extent NATO expansion to Finland and Sweden. But again, I should say, I'm in Moscow now. And I asked Cereganavo, how did this expansion of NATO to Finland and Sweden impact the future? Sweden impact the strategic calculations of Russia. And he went on pointing out the pressures on Kaliningrad. And he says, this gives me, he used to work goosebumps because we have no chance to fight for this. This is our soil. Million Russians living there. By the way, it's nuclear armed. It didn't point that out, but that's kind of important. But also said with Finland, they used to be the largest neutral state there in the North.

42:54Now he, you know, hear the president of Finland talking about striking in Russia and all this war rhetoric. So they, they, he used a very harsh language. I would say, you know, the getting sick of, of Europeans becoming a bit too comfortable. It's, it signifies that Russia's deterrence is no longer respected. When, when smaller countries like Finland can talk about striking Russia, go to war, let's put pressure on Kaliningrad. I mean, all of this kind of, the, the, the, the Russians feel that they are being pushed into a corner now and, and this is not going to continue anymore for much longer. It's, I just want to, how do you see this overall situation? Because I think the Europeans just thought, oh, we can ask a little bit more, a little bit more because the Russians never push back. And, you know, no one told them that, no, they won't push back until they decide to do so. But I just feel like we're reaching a very dangerous point here.

43:54I think we have reached a very dangerous point here already. When I listened to Radislav Sarkorsky talk about putting pressure on the Russians in Kaliningrad, you know, I was just thinking of helping troops on the border of Kaliningrad. I'd just shake my head and say, is he lost his mind? This is not what you should be doing. This could have catastrophic consequences. You know, I'm a hardcore realist as you know, Glenn. It's not like I'm some sort of pussycat analyzing international politics. I understand full well, you know, the importance of military force, the importance of deterrence that threats are sometimes necessary. sometimes necessary. But when I listen to people like Sikorsky talk, I just think that I think he's lost his mind. I kind of don't get it. If anything, what people should be doing is trying to damp down these tensions and do everything possible to end the Ukraine war sooner rather than

44:56later, but that's not happening. And by the way, when you listen to the rhetoric coming out of Britain, it's really quite shocking the extent to which the British seem to be committed to fighting a major war with the Russians. Quite amazing. But I'm going to make a general point here on what's going on. I think that a lot of what we see today can be explained by how you think about the causes of the war. And you and I both believe that this war was caused by NATO expansion, EU expansion, and the color revolutions. Of course, NATO expansion is the key because NATO was bent after April of 2008 in bringing, it's committed to bringing Ukraine into the alliance. And this, of course,

45:57is what precipitated the war that took place today. So the basic cause of the war, in our view, was turning Ukraine into a western bulwark on Russia's border. The alternative view is that, and when I say alternative view, this is the conventional wisdom in the West. The alternative view is that Russia's an imperial power. Putin is an imperialist. There's not much difference between him and eight-off Hitler. And he's bent on not only conquering all of Ukraine and making it part of a greater Russia. But he's also interested in effect in reestablishing the Soviet empire in Eastern Europe. That means that when he's done with Ukraine, he will move into the Baltic states, Poland, Romania, countries like that. He is a threat to all of Europe. And he therefore has to be contained. Now, if you have that worldview, and the Russians win an ugly victory, or win any kind of

47:03victory, that tells you that what you have to do is prepare for the next Russian aggression, because the Russians, in this particular story, are bendering, bent on conquering more territory beyond Ukraine. Well, the problem here is that the vast majority of people in Europe buy the conventional wisdom, which is why it is the conventional wisdom. And they think Putin is, he's bent on conquering territory all across Europe. And he has to be stopped. And this is why we think war with Russia is inevitable. You and I believe, and I think the evidence supports us almost completely, that this conventional wisdom is poppycock. Putin has never once, never once said he had any interest in conquering all of Ukraine. And he's never once,

48:06never once said he was interested in conquering territory, beyond Ukraine, in Eastern Europe. Furthermore, if you look at the capabilities of the Russian military, it should be evident to everybody that the Russians have spent many years trying to conquer the Eastern one-fifth of Ukraine. And they've had a devil of a time doing that. Does this look like an army that's poised to conquer all of Ukraine? Does this look like an army that's poised to strike into Eastern Europe? Certainly, it doesn't look like that to me. I don't know what people are talking about. And of course, in the West, you get all this rhetoric about the massive Russian casualties that they're suffering every month and the problems that the Russian army is having here there and everywhere. And you then say to yourself, well, if that's true, why do you believe that the Russian army is the second coming to the Vermok, and it's poised to

49:08conquer huge swaths of territory in Europe? Doesn't seem to make sense. But you make those arguments and they just don't stick. People continue to believe that we're dealing with an imperialist who has a lot of capability. And when he's done with Ukraine, he's going to continue his march westward. So you and I have a very different view. And that matters for how you think about the future. For all the obvious reasons, I think it's clear to you and me that Ukraine is not going to become a part of NATO. It's not going to be integrated into the alliance. That ship is sailed. And therefore, it's time to end this war and do everything possible to bring Ukraine back to life and make sure that another war between Ukraine and Russia doesn't start out and certainly a war between Russia and any European country doesn't break out, whether it's Finland, the Baltic States, Poland, or

50:10what have you. That's our view, right? And it's consistent with our view that this was about NATO expansion. And now that NATO expansion is off the table, it's possible to work out some sort of deal, maybe not a meaningful peace deal, but some sort of agreement that greatly minimizes the possibility of another war. That's our view. But that's not the view of others because they buy the conventional wisdom on why this started. So you can see that the debate on why the war started is not merely history. It continues to plague us and it will continue to plague us moving forward. And the fact that the European elites discord facts and logic and make these arguments about Hitler, I mean, about Vladimir Putin being the second coming of NATO Hitler, right? Which is certainly not true.

51:11Just makes a bad situation worse, moving forward. Even if Russia had the material capabilities to restore the Soviet Union, conquer Western Europe, whatever it is, I mean, forget about all of that. Imagine only Poland. I see some problems here. Even if they had the material capabilities, first of all, they would enter, they would add 40 million Polish, not a single one of them would run under the Russians. That's a nightmare. It's in Russia society as well. They can see don't bus, they kind of see the get the humanitarian argument for why they intervene, but they also see the argument that you can't have NATO in Ukraine, this next essential threat. So this is the source of support. You can't get more than 5% of the Russian population who support invading Poland, like incorporating into a Russian empire makes no sense. What about Russia's friends, which has been keeping it afloat? The Chinese, the Indians, none of them would support this. They understand now the Russian position. No, I have to agree with

52:16invasion, but this will understand it. None of this makes any sense. You would think this will be part of the discussion. Now, I guess that's the final point. What you suggest, if Russia has this expansionist, then we have to send weapons and stop it because it's the new Hitler, all of this nonsense. But if Russia sees this as NATO expansion as an essential threat and they're responding, then we should talk and put this thing to a halt instead of sending more weapons. We would just go up to the escalation ladder. You would think, though, which one of these two is it that this would be put all our greatest minds together and discuss it, debate it. But the fact that you can't even discuss it now because if you argue that they're actually seeing this as a defensive war, they see this next essential threat, then you're legitimizing it. You're supporting them. You're spreading Russia propaganda. You can't even discuss the most important thing of our time. We have to discuss it is quite remarkable. Anyways, the final thoughts. Two points, there's some evidence

53:22that in Britain, there are people who are interested in locking individuals like you and me up. Yeah, never making these kinds of arguments. It's really quite remarkable. Just one other point, Glenn, your arguments about Poland, which are right on the money, apply to Western Ukraine as well. This is why the Russians have never shown any interest in conquering all of Ukraine because they understand full well that the Western half and maybe even a bit more of Ukraine than just have is filled with ethnic Ukrainians who would fight like wild dogs against a Russian occupation. Look, the most powerful political ideology on the planet, as I always emphasize, is nationalism. If you're a country like Russia and you invade a country like Poland or you

54:23invade Western Ukraine, you're going to run into tremendous resistance from the local population. This is what the Russians found in Afghanistan. It's what the Americans found in Afghanistan is what we found in Iraq. It's why Trump has no interest in invading Iran. What would happen if we invaded Iran? The Iranians would fight like wild dogs because nationalism is a remarkably powerful force. Local populations don't want to foreign or come in and try to run their politics. One final point on this is I always remind people, the Soviet Union, which is the precursor of Russia, once occupied a huge swath of territory in Eastern Europe. It was basically a nightmare. They had their hands full with the Czechs, the Hungarians, the East Germans, the Romanians,

55:24the Albanians, the Yugoslavs, and so forth and so on. Remember they had to put down a major insurrection in East Germany in 53. They had to go into Hungary in 56. They had to go into Czechoslovakia in 68. They almost went into Poland a handful of different times. It was a nightmare. As I like to say, they'd been there, done that, and it did not work out very well. The Russians understand full well that nationalism is a remarkably powerful force. And the idea that they would want to conquer Western Ukraine or Poland or the Baltic States is a nonsensical argument. It just makes no sense from their point of view. And there is nothing, and there is nothing the Russians have said that indicates that they don't understand the logic that you laid out and I just big back on. They have never said we want to invade any of these countries and we think it will be easy.

56:30They have events no interest in invading these countries because they fully understand what would happen. Let's not point on what you said. In the past century, the Europe was a key center of power in the world. It would have some wider strategic purpose, but these days with the economic shifting to the east and the Russians are reorienting their economy accordingly. If they marched from Berlin, what are they going to do there? This is the main gravitational force of the world. It's shifting very fast to Asia. If it made sense, that would be one thing. As you say, it does make any sense at all. Before you go, I want to tell our listeners that they should definitely go and check out your own YouTube channel because you started it recently. You put out this excellent episodes

57:30very clearly, specific topics and it's very informative and at least I make sure to follow it. Go to John Mearshimmer's website if not YouTube and also the substacks. Thank you very much for taking time. Thank you for the kind words, Glenn, about my YouTube channel and thank you for having me on the show. As always, I thoroughly enjoyed our conversation.