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| THE INTERVIEW of the CENTURY . Tucker Carlson may have opened up the can of worms , all the western lies about the Ukraine war. AND the current Situation between Russia and the United States. |
It was interesting but none of it was surprising. I think Tucker did a good job as pushing back about the historical borders question. That isn't fair. We have had amazing journalist interview world leaders and push back before. Even Barbara Walters famously pushed hard. Christine Amapour, Larry King.. That NOW the DEEP STATE , and the Deep Media is having a meltdown over the anticipated INTERVIEW of the CENTURY . I thought it was GREAT how much Putin talked about the history of the Russia and Ukraine, going back 1200 years ago, how Ukraine was consistently part of Russia, if not legally, at least linguistically, culturally, same people, etc.... More than anything else, Carlson seemed surprised: by the fact that he got to interview Putin in the Kremlin and even film himself sharing some post-interview impressions in a room full of lacquer and gold leaf; by what Putin said during the interview; and by the man himself. Putin used the interview to deliver a lengthy lecture on the history of the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union, and its aftermath, meant to convince viewers that Ukraine never had a right to exist. Ukraine was as Putin said a "by product of the Soviet era " .The world and borders hundreds of years ago are not fixed for eternity, the people of Ukraine is what Ukraine is today. To be brief, the territory of what's now modern Ukraine was then embedded in a tumultuous political landscape and competition between multiple great powers in various stages of rise and decline and Khmelnytsky leads a people that is not independent, but not without significant military force, but not so significant that he can fight any battle of his choosing without allies. Those allies shift over time, and alliance with Muscovy is one in a long series of calculated political decisions. While not an academic history (which may be good if you're looking for something detailed but still accessible), Mikhail Zygar's War and Punishment goes into this story (chapter 1) and others commonly raised by the Russian government as justification for their position. So it was very strange he spent so much time talking about history.He touched on how Russia was previously interested in joining NATO, it's previous close ties to the EU, how after the fall of the USSR, it's somewhat close ties to the US.With how the Russian government and media are covering the conflict, I'm hesitant to say for sure what most Russians actually think/don't think, but I'd hazard this guess: In general they wouldn't say that Yeltsin "lost" Ukraine, more that Gorbachev is ultimately to blame for the breakup of the USSR. But after the breakup I'm not sure most people in Russia would really consider Ukraine a fully separate country, rather than part of the "Near Abroad". There were still a lot of cross border connections until 2014, in any case - really things have accelerated apart in the past 10 years. Before that time I wouldn't even really say the Russian government even had any particularly coherent outlook as to how to consider Ukraine (besides "basically the same place as us"). He slightly talked about the case that Ukraine had a coup in 2014.... but he didn't go into much detail on these points.I would have found it much more interesting if he talked in detail about the points above, and also to discuss what the future holds. How a safe and cooperative relationship could one day again be achieved, what is Russia's view on that, why does Russia think things fell apart? The most charitable reading one can give to Putin on this count is that there were verbal promises made in 1990 to Gorbachev and by Clinton to Yeltsin in 1993 that NATO would not expand or add new members. That's the most charitable reading though, and really what was said or not said is disputed (the 1990 discussion from the American perspective was that NATO would not station troops in East Germany, and the American perspective on the Clinton statement was that NATO would not add new members at that time).From watching the whole video I got the impression that Putin, since he got in office in 2000 was trying to join the western club, but was not taken seriously by the Americans and Europeans, due to the way he runs things. Seems like every time he tried to make deals with US presidents they initially thought it would work, but after consulting with advisers they've backed away for some reason. Which leads me to conclude he's got a lot of bad skeletons in his closet and the US doesn't want to deal with him. Also the lack of phone calls between him and Biden suggests they both don't think any direct talks will achieve anything. I get the feeling it's like a mob boss trying to make deals with a real Government that just frowns at the prospects. I can see the US and Russia being allies within our future lifetime, but very recently many European nations were friendly with Russia, they had cooperation and good relationships... I think it's possible that Europe and Russia to one day become more cooperative again. People look at the current conflict and think no, but long term we should aim for peace and cooperation, so it's important to consider how we can reach a solution one day, even if in the distant future.
