The Tucker Carlson Show - Vladimir Putin

00:00:00.000 the following is an interview with the president of russia vladimir putin shot february 6 2024

00:00:18.320 about 7 p.m in the building behind us which is of course the kremlin the interview as you will see

00:00:23.440 if you watch it is primarily about the war in progress the war in ukraine how it started what's

00:00:28.800 happening and most presently how it might end one note before you watch at the beginning of the

00:00:34.880 interview we asked the most obvious question which is why did you do this did you feel a threat an

00:00:39.680 imminent physical threat and that's your justification and the answer we got shocked us

00:00:45.680 putin went on for a very long time probably half an hour about the history of russia going back to

00:00:51.440 the 8th century and honestly we thought this was a filibustering technique and found it annoying and

00:00:58.000 interrupted him several times and he responded he was annoyed by the interruption but we concluded

00:01:04.080 in the end for what it's worth that it was not a filibustering technique there was no time limit on

00:01:08.000 the interview we ended it after more than two hours instead what you're about to see seem to us sincere

00:01:14.640 whether you agree with it or not vladimir putin believes that russia has a historic claim to parts

00:01:19.840 of western ukraine so our opinion would be to view it in that light as a sincere expression of what he

00:01:26.160 thinks and with that here it is mr president thank you on february 22nd 2022 you addressed your country

00:01:35.760 in a nationwide address when the conflict in ukraine started and you said that you were acting because

00:01:42.320 you had come to the conclusion that the united states through nato might initiate a quote surprise

00:01:50.320 attack on our country and to american ears that sounds paranoid tell us why you believe the united

00:01:56.160 states might strike russia out of the blue how did you conclude that

00:02:04.880 it's not that america the united states was going to launch a surprise strike on russia i didn't say

00:02:11.120 that are we having a talk show or a serious conversation here's the quote thank you it's a formidable

00:02:20.400 series because your basic education is in history as far as i understand yes

00:02:31.840 so if you don't mind i will take only 30 seconds or one minute to give you a short reference to history

00:02:38.320 for giving you a little historical background please let's look where our relationship with ukraine

00:02:47.200 started from where did ukraine come from the russian state started gathering itself as a centralized

00:02:56.000 statehood and it is considered to be the year of the establishment of the russian state in 862

00:03:04.480 when the townspeople of novgorod invited a varangian prince rurik from scandinavia to reign

00:03:17.360 in 1862 russia celebrated the 1000th anniversary of its statehood

00:03:25.040 and in novgorod there is a memorial dedicated to the 1000th anniversary of the country

00:03:30.000 in 882 rurik's successor prince oleg who was actually playing the role of regent

00:03:38.720 at rurik's younger son

00:03:43.440 because rurik had died by that time came to kiev

00:03:51.680 he ousted two brothers who apparently had

00:03:54.160 once been members of rurik's squad

00:04:01.840 so russia began to develop with two centers of power kiev and novgorod

00:04:08.880 the next very significant date in the history of russia was 988

00:04:15.440 this was the baptism of russia when prince vladimir the great-grandson of rurik baptized russia and

00:04:23.520 adopted orthodoxy or eastern christianity from this time the centralized russian state began to

00:04:31.520 strengthen why because of the single territory integrated economic ties one in the same language

00:04:40.560 and after the baptism of russia the same faith and rule of the prince the centralized russian state

00:04:47.440 began to take shape back in the middle ages prince yaroslav the wise introduced the order of succession to a throne

00:05:00.400 but after he passed away it became complicated for various reasons

00:05:08.560 the throne was passed not directly from father to eldest son but from the prince who had passed away to

00:05:14.800 his brother than to his sons in different lines

00:05:21.440 all this led to the fragmentation and the end of russ as a single state

00:05:28.320 there was nothing special about it the same was happening then in europe

00:05:32.480 but the fragmented russian state became an easy prey to the empire created earlier by king ishan

00:05:46.640 his successors namely batuhan came to ruse plundered and ruined nearly all the cities

00:05:52.960 the southern part including kiev by the way and some other cities simply lost independence while northern

00:06:00.160 russian cities preserved some of their sovereignty they had to pay tribute to the horde but they

00:06:07.360 managed to preserve some part of their sovereignty and then a unified russian state began to take shape

00:06:15.520 with its center in moscow the southern part of russian lands including kiev

00:06:21.280 began to gradually gravitate towards another magnet the center that was emerging in europe

00:06:33.200 this was the grand duchy of lithuania it was even called the lithuanian russian duchy

00:06:39.760 because russians were a significant part of this population they spoke the old russian language and

00:06:45.600 were orthodox but then there was a unification the union of the grand duchy of lithuania

00:06:54.720 and the kingdom of poland a few years later another union was signed but this time already in the

00:07:03.680 religious sphere some of the orthodox priests became subordinate to the pope thus these lands

00:07:11.120 became part of the polish lithuanian state during decades the poles were engaged in polonization of

00:07:22.160 this part of the population they introduced their language there tried to entrench the idea that this

00:07:29.200 population was not exactly russians that because they lived on the fringe they were ukrainians

00:07:35.920 originally the word ukrainian meant that the person was living on the outskirts of the state

00:07:44.480 along the fringes or was engaged in a border patrol service it didn't mean any particular ethnic group

00:07:52.720 so the poles were trying to in every possible way to polonize this part of the russian lands and

00:08:00.160 actually treated it rather harshly not to say cruelly all that led to the fact that this part of the

00:08:07.280 russian lands began to struggle for their rights they wrote letters to warsaw demanding that their

00:08:13.600 rights be observed and people be commissioned here including to kiev i beg your pardon can you tell us

00:08:19.920 what period i'm losing track of where in history we are the polish oppression of ukraine it was in the 13th

00:08:27.440 century now i will tell you what happened later and give the dates so that there is no confusion

00:08:46.000 and in 1654 even a bit earlier

00:08:49.040 the people who were in control of the authority over that part of the russian lands addressed warsaw i

00:09:02.240 repeat demanding that they send them to rulers of russian origin and orthodox faith when warsaw did not

00:09:10.080 answer them and in fact rejected their demands they turned to moscow so that moscow took them away

00:09:17.280 so that you don't think that i'm inventing things

00:09:29.520 i'll give you these documents well i it doesn't sound like you're inventing it i'm not

00:09:35.120 sure why it's relevant to what happened two years ago but still these are documents from the archives

00:09:42.080 copies here are the letters from bogdan chmielnitsky the man who then controlled the power in this

00:09:50.160 part of the russian lands that is now called ukraine he wrote to warsaw demanding that their rights be

00:09:57.600 upheld and after being refused he begun to write letters to moscow asking to take them under the strong

00:10:06.000 hand of the moscow tsar there are copies of these documents i will leave them for your good memory

00:10:12.640 there is a translation into russian you can translate it into english later russia would not agree to admit

00:10:19.040 them straight away assuming that the war with poland would start nevertheless in 1654 the pan russian

00:10:26.560 assembly of top clergy and landowners headed by the tsar which was the representative body of the power of

00:10:36.560 the old russian state decided to include a part of the old russian lands into moscow kingdom as expected

00:10:45.040 the war with poland began it lasted 13 years and then in 1654 a truce was concluded

00:10:57.360 and 32 years later i think a peace treaty with poland which they called eternal peace was signed

00:11:05.840 and these lands the whole left bank of dnieper including kiev went to russia

00:11:10.880 and the whole right bank of dnieper remained in poland under the rule of katharina the great russia

00:11:19.200 reclaimed all of its historical lands including in the south and west this all lasted until the

00:11:26.480 revolution before world war one austrian general staff relied on the ideas of ukrainianization and

00:11:35.360 started actively promoting the ideas of ukraine and the ukrainianization their motive was obvious

00:11:47.760 just before world war one they wanted to weaken the potential enemy and secure themselves favorable

00:11:53.520 conditions in the border area so the idea which had emerged in poland that people residing in that

00:12:00.400 territory were allegedly not really russians but rather belong to a special ethnic group ukrainians

00:12:07.760 started being propagated by the austrian general staff as far back as the 19th century theorists calling

00:12:16.160 for ukrainian independence appeared all those however claimed that ukraine should have a very good

00:12:23.920 relationship with russia they insisted on that after the 1917 revolution the bolsheviks sought to restore

00:12:38.160 the statehood and the civil war began including the hostilities with poland in 1921 peace with poland was

00:12:50.000 proclaimed and under that treaty the right bank of dnieper river once again was given back to poland

00:12:59.520 in 1939 after poland cooperated with hitler

00:13:05.440 he did collaborate with hitler you know hitler offered poland peace and a treaty of friendship

00:13:14.160 an alliance demanding in return that poland give back to germany

00:13:19.200 the so-called danzig corridor which connected the bulk of germany with east prussia and konigsberg

00:13:34.320 after world war one this territory was transferred to poland and instead of danzig a city of gdansk emerged

00:13:40.880 hitler asked them to give it amicably but they refused of course still they collaborated with hitler and

00:13:51.200 engaged together in the partitioning of czechoslovakia but may ask you you're making the case that that

00:14:00.640 ukraine certainly parts of ukraine eastern ukraine is in effect russia has been for hundreds of years why

00:14:06.480 wouldn't you just take it when you became president 24 years ago you have nuclear weapons they don't

00:14:13.360 if it's actually your land why did you wait so long sure i'll tell you i'm coming to that this

00:14:21.120 briefing is coming to an end it might be boring but it explains many things just don't know how it's

00:14:26.320 relevant good good i'm so gratified that you appreciate that thank you so before world war

00:14:37.040 ii poland collaborated with hitler and although it did not yield to hitler's demands it still

00:14:43.520 participated in the partitioning of czechoslovakia together with hitler as the poles had not given

00:14:49.360 the danzig corridor to germany and went too far pushing hitler to start world war ii by attacking

00:14:56.960 them why was it poland against whom the war started on first september 1939 poland turned out to be

00:15:05.680 uncompromising and hitler had nothing to do but start implementing his plans with poland

00:15:11.040 by the way the ussr i have read some archived documents behaved very honestly it asked poland's

00:15:21.360 permission to transit its troops through the polish territory to help czechoslovakia

00:15:28.160 but the then polish foreign minister said that if the soviet plans flew over poland they would be

00:15:34.560 downed over the territory of poland but that doesn't matter what matters is that the war began and poland

00:15:42.480 fell prey to the policies it had pursued against czechoslovakia is under the well-known molotov-ribbentrop

00:15:49.680 pact part of the territory including western ukraine was to be given to russia thus russia which was then

00:16:00.080 named this ussr regained its historical lands after the victory in the great patriotic war as we call

00:16:08.720 world war ii all those territories were ultimately enshrined as belonging to russia to the ussr

00:16:19.760 as for poland it received apparently in compensation the lands which had originally been german

00:16:31.040 the eastern parts of germany these are now western lands of poland

00:16:38.480 of course poland regained access to the baltic sea and danzig

00:16:44.800 which was once again given its polish name

00:16:49.440 so this was how this situation developed

00:16:54.240 in 1922 when the ussr was being established

00:16:57.680 the polshevik started building the ussr and established the soviet ukraine which had never

00:17:04.240 existed before right

00:17:10.960 stalin insisted that those republics be included in the ussr as

00:17:17.200 autonomous entities

00:17:18.320 for some inexplicable reason lenin the founder of the soviet state insisted that they be entitled to

00:17:28.400 withdraw from the ussr and again for some unknown reasons he transferred to that newly established

00:17:37.920 soviet republic of ukraine some of the lands together with people living there even though those lands had

00:17:44.560 never been called ukraine and yet they were made part of that soviet republic of ukraine

00:17:50.720 those lands included the black sea region which was received under catherine and the great and which

00:17:56.800 had no historical connection with ukraine whatsoever even if we go as far back as 1654

00:18:05.520 when these lands returned to russian empire that territory was the size of three to four regions of

00:18:12.000 modern ukraine with no black sea region that was completely out of the question in 1654

00:18:20.080 exactly i'm just you obviously have encyclopedic knowledge of this region but why didn't you make

00:18:26.400 this case for the first 22 years as president that ukraine wasn't a real country the soviet union was given a

00:18:38.560 great deal of territory that had never belonged to it including the black sea region at some point

00:18:47.520 when russia received them as an outcome of the russo-turkish wars they were called new russia or

00:18:55.280 nova russia but that does not matter what matters is that lenin the founder of the soviet state

00:19:02.480 established ukraine that way for decades the ukrainian soviet republic developed as part of the ussr

00:19:13.280 and for unknown reasons again the bolsheviks were engaged in ukrainianization it was not merely because

00:19:20.240 the soviet leadership was composed to a great extent of those originating from ukraine rather it was

00:19:26.720 explained by the general policy of indigenization pursued by the soviet union same things were done

00:19:33.440 in other soviet republics this involved promoting national languages and national cultures which is

00:19:39.280 not a bad in principle that is how the soviet ukraine was created after the world war ii ukraine received

00:19:46.240 in addition to the lands that had belonged to poland before the war part of the lands that had previously

00:19:52.240 belonged to hungary and romania so romania and hungary had some of their lands taken away and given to

00:19:58.880 the soviet ukraine and they still remain part of ukraine so in this sense we have every reason to affirm

00:20:05.280 that ukraine is an artificial state that was shaped at stalin's will do you believe hungary has a right to

00:20:11.040 take its land back from ukraine and that other nations have a right to go back to their 1654 borders

00:20:16.400 i'm not sure whether they should go back to the 1654 borders but given stalin's time so-called stalin's

00:20:31.440 regime which as many claim saw numerous violations of human rights and violations of the rights of other

00:20:38.320 states one may say that they could claim back those lands of theirs while having no right to do that

00:20:52.720 it is at least understandable have you told victor orban that he can have part of ukraine

00:20:57.440 i've never i've never told him not a single time we have not even had any conversation on that but i

00:21:12.800 actually know for sure that hungarians who live there wanted to get back to their historical land

00:21:21.200 moreover i would like to share a very interesting story with you i digress it's a personal one somewhere

00:21:33.440 in the early 80s i went on a road trip in a car from then leningrad across the soviet union through

00:21:41.600 kiev made a stop in kiev and then went to western ukraine i went to the town of bergavoye and all the

00:21:51.760 names of towns and villages there were in russian and in the language i did not understand in hungarian

00:21:58.800 in russian and in hungarian not in ukrainian in russian and in hungarian i was driving through some

00:22:07.120 kind of village and there were men sitting next to the houses and they were wearing black three-piece

00:22:13.520 suits and black cylinder hats i asked are they some kind of entertainers i was told no they were not

00:22:20.480 entertainers they're hungarians i said what are they doing here what do you mean this is their land

00:22:26.640 they live here this was during the soviet time in the 1980s they preserved the hungarian language

00:22:33.120 hungarian names and all their national costumes they are hungarians and they feel themselves to

00:22:39.040 be hungarians and of course when now there is an infringement well that that is and there's a lot

00:22:45.520 of that though i think many nations are upset about transylvania as well as you obviously know

00:22:49.360 but many nations feel frustrated by the redrawn borders of the wars of the 20th century

00:22:54.080 and wars going back a thousand years the ones that you mentioned but the fact is that you didn't

00:23:00.400 make this case in public until two years ago february and in the case that you made which i read

00:23:05.200 today you you explain at great length that you felt a physical threat from the west in nato including

00:23:12.240 potentially a nuclear threat and that's what got you to move is that a fair characterization of what

00:23:17.760 you said i understand that my long speeches probably fall outside of the genre of the

00:23:30.240 interview that is why i asked you at the beginning are we going to have a serious talk or a show you

00:23:38.480 said a serious talk so bear with me please we're coming to the point where the soviet ukraine was

00:23:46.960 established then in 1991 the soviet union collapsed and everything that russia had generously bestowed on

00:23:56.720 ukraine was dragged away by the ladder i'm coming to a very important point of today's agenda thank you

00:24:06.480 after all the collapse of the soviet union was effectively initiated by the russian leadership

00:24:14.720 no i do not understand what the russian leadership was guided by at the time but i suspect there were

00:24:20.880 several reasons to think everything would be fine first i think that then russian leadership believed

00:24:33.200 that the fundamentals of the relationship between russia and ukraine were in fact a common language

00:24:39.760 more than 90 percent of the population there spoke russian

00:24:43.120 family ties every third person there had some kind of family or friendship ties common culture common

00:24:53.680 history finally common faith coexistence with a single state for centuries and deeply interconnected economies

00:25:02.000 all of these were so fundamental all these elements together make our good relationships inevitable

00:25:16.320 the second point is a very important one i want you as an american citizen and your viewers to hear

00:25:23.600 about this as well the former russian leadership assumed that the soviet union had ceased to exist

00:25:31.280 and therefore there were no longer any ideological dividing lines russia even agreed voluntarily and

00:25:40.160 proactively to the collapse of the soviet union and believed that this would be understood by the

00:25:47.040 so-called civilized west as an invitation for cooperation and association that is what russia was expecting

00:25:57.040 both from the united states and the so-called collective west as a whole there were smart people including

00:26:04.880 in germany egon bar a major politician of the social democratic party who insisted in his personal

00:26:12.560 conversations with the soviet leadership on the brink of the collapse of the soviet union that a new

00:26:18.800 security system should be established in europe help should be given to unify germany but a new system

00:26:27.120 should be also established to include the united states canada russia and other central european countries

00:26:34.720 but nato needs not to expand that's what he said if nato expands everything would be just the same as

00:26:43.280 during the cold war only closer to russia's borders that's all he was a wise old man but no one listened

00:26:51.680 to him in fact he got angry once if he said you don't listen to me i'm never setting my foot in moscow once

00:27:02.240 again everything happened just as he had said well it of course it did come true and i and you've mentioned

00:27:10.320 this many times i think it's a fair point and many in america thought that relations between

00:27:16.240 russia and the united states would be fine with the collapse of the soviet union the end of the cold war

00:27:20.480 that the opposite happened but you've never explained why you think that happened except to say that the

00:27:26.720 west fears a strong russia but we have a strong china the west does not seem very afraid of uh what about

00:27:33.840 russia do you think convinced policymakers they had to take it down the west is afraid of strong china

00:27:44.720 more than it fears a strong russia because russia has 150 million people and china has 1.5 billion

00:27:52.480 population and its economy is growing by leaps and bounds or five percent a year it used to be even more

00:27:59.600 but that's enough for china as bismarck once put it potentials are the most important china's potential

00:28:06.560 is enormous it is the biggest economy in the world today in terms of purchasing power parity and the

00:28:13.200 size of the economy it has already overtaking the united states quite a long time ago and it is growing

00:28:19.680 at a rapid clip let's not talk about who is afraid of whom let's not reason in such terms and let's get

00:28:26.160 into the fact that after 1991 when russia expected that it would be welcomed into the brotherly family

00:28:33.200 of civilized nations nothing like this happened you tricked us i don't mean you personally when i

00:28:39.040 say you of course i'm talking about the united states the promise was that nato would not expand

00:28:44.800 eastward but it happened five times there were five waves of expansion we tolerated all that we were

00:28:51.200 trying to persuade them we were saying please don't we are as bourgeois now as you are we are market economy

00:28:58.640 and there is no communist party power let's negotiate moreover i have also said this publicly before

00:29:07.200 there was a moment when a certain rift started growing between us before that yields and came to the

00:29:16.640 united states remember he spoke in congress and said the good words god bless america everything he

00:29:23.120 said were signals let us in remember the developments in yugoslavia before the yeltsin was lavished with

00:29:30.320 praise as soon as the developments in yugoslavia started he raised his voice in support of serbs and

00:29:36.160 we couldn't but raise our voices for serbs in their defense i understand that there were complex processes

00:29:42.560 on the way there i do but russia could not help raising its voice in support of serbs because

00:29:47.760 serbs are also a special and close to us nation with orthodox culture and so on it's a nation that

00:29:54.400 has suffered so much for generations well regardless what is important is that yeltsin expressed his

00:30:01.120 support what did the united states do in violation of international law and the un charter it started

00:30:07.760 bombing belgrade it was the united states that led the genie out of the bottle moreover when russia

00:30:14.720 protested and expressed its resentment what was said the un charter and international law have become

00:30:21.600 obsolete now everyone invokes international law but at that time they started saying that everything was

00:30:28.000 outdated everything had to be changed indeed some things need to be changed as the balance of power has

00:30:35.200 changed it's true but not in this manner yeltsin was immediately dragged through the mud accused of

00:30:41.520 alcoholism of understanding nothing of knowing nothing he understood everything i assure you well

00:30:49.680 i became president in 2000 i thought okay the yugoslav issue is over but we should try to restore

00:30:56.400 relations let's reopen the door that russia had tried to go through and moreover i said it publicly

00:31:04.560 i can't reiterate at a meeting here in the kremlin with the outgoing president bill clinton right here

00:31:13.200 in the next room i said to him i asked him bill do you think if russia asked to join nato do you think

00:31:22.800 it would happen suddenly he said you know it's interesting i think so but in the evening when we met for

00:31:32.880 dinner he said you know i've talked to my team no no it's not possible now

00:31:41.520 you can ask him i think he will watch our interview he'll confirm it

00:31:46.080 i wouldn't have said anything like that if it hadn't happened okay were you since it's impossible now

00:31:52.640 would you have joined nato

00:31:54.240 look i asked the question is it possible or not and the answer i got was no if i wasn't sincere in

00:32:03.200 my desire to find out what the leadership position was but if he had said yes would you have joined nato

00:32:12.480 if he had said yes the process of rapprochement would have commenced and eventually it might have

00:32:18.000 happened if we had seen some sincere wish on the other side of our partners but it didn't happen

00:32:24.400 well no means no okay fine why do you think that is just to get to motive i know you're clearly bitter

00:32:30.640 about it um i understand but why do you think the west rebuffed you then why the hostility why did the

00:32:38.400 end of the cold war not fix the relationship what motivates this from your point of view

00:32:47.600 you said i was bitter about the answer no it's not bitterness it's just a statement of fact

00:32:54.640 we're not bride and groom bitterness resentment it's not about those kind of matters in such

00:33:00.400 circumstances we just realized we weren't welcome there that's all okay fine but let's build relations

00:33:08.960 in another manner let's look for common ground elsewhere why we received such a negative response

00:33:15.840 you should ask your leaders i can only guess why too big a country with its own opinion and so on

00:33:22.320 and the united states i have seen how issues are being resolved in nato i will give you another

00:33:30.960 example now concerning ukraine the u.s leadership exerts pressure and all nato members obediently vote

00:33:41.360 even if they do not like something now i'll tell you what happened in disregard with ukraine in 2008

00:33:49.040 although it's being discussed i'm not going to open a secret to you say anything new nevertheless

00:33:57.200 after that we tried to build relations in different ways for example the events in the middle east in

00:34:04.400 iraq we were building relations with the united states in a very soft prudent cautious manner i repeatedly

00:34:12.880 raised the issue that the united states should not support separatism or terrorism in the north

00:34:18.400 caucuses but they continue to do it anyway and political support information support financial

00:34:27.680 support even military support came from the united states and its satellites for terrorist groups in the

00:34:34.400 caucuses i once raised this issue with my colleague also the president of the united states he says it's

00:34:43.520 impossible do you have proof i said yes i was prepared for this conversation and i gave him that proof

00:34:51.600 he looked at it and you know what he said i apologize but that's what happened i'll quote he says well

00:34:59.200 i'm gonna kick their ass we waited and waited for some response there was no reply

00:35:05.840 i said to the fsb director write to the cia what is the result of the conversation with president

00:35:14.080 he wrote once twice and then we got a reply we have the answer in the archive the cia replied we have

00:35:22.960 been working with the opposition in russia we believe that this is the right thing to do and we will keep on

00:35:29.040 doing it just ridiculous well okay we realized that it was out of the question forces in opposition to

00:35:37.760 you so you're saying the cia is trying to overthrow your government of course they meant in that

00:35:44.240 particular case the separatists the terrorists who fought with us in the caucuses that's who they

00:35:51.840 called the opposition this is the second point the third moment is a very important one is the moment

00:36:01.760 when the u.s missile defense system was created the beginning we persuaded for a long time not to do it

00:36:10.960 in united states moreover after was invited by bush junior's father bush senior to visit his place on

00:36:23.280 the ocean i had a very serious conversation with president bush and his team i proposed that the united

00:36:32.160 states russia and europe jointly create a missile defense system that we believe if created unilaterally

00:36:40.240 threatens our security despite the fact that the united states officially said that it was being

00:36:46.240 created against missile threats from iran that was the justification for the deployment of the missile

00:36:52.480 defense system i suggested working together russia the united states and europe they said it was very

00:37:00.160 interesting they asked me are you serious i said absolutely mask what year was this

00:37:07.200 i don't remember i don't remember it is easy to find out on the internet when i was in the usa at the

00:37:16.880 invitation of a bush senior it is even easier to learn from someone i'm going to tell you about

00:37:24.080 i was told it was very interesting i said just imagine if we could tackle such a global strategic

00:37:31.040 security challenge together the world will change we'll probably have disputes probably economic and

00:37:38.720 even political ones but we could drastically change the situation in the world he says yes and asks are you

00:37:46.800 serious i said of course we need to think about it i'm so i said go ahead please then secretary of defense

00:37:56.000 gates gates former director of cia and secretary of state rice came in here in this cabinet right here

00:38:03.840 at this table they sat on this table me the foreign minister the russian defense minister on that side

00:38:11.680 they said to me yes we have thought about it we agree i said thank god great no but with some exceptions

00:38:20.640 so twice you've described u.s presidents making decisions and then being undercut by their agency

00:38:28.400 heads so it sounds like you're describing a system that's not run by the people who are elected in your

00:38:34.720 telling that's right that's right in the end they just told us to get lost i'm not going to tell you

00:38:45.040 the details because i think it's incorrect after all it was confidential conversation but our proposal

00:38:51.920 was declined that's a fact it was right then when i said look but then we will be forced to take

00:38:59.040 countermeasures we will create such strike systems that will certainly overcome missile defense systems

00:39:05.840 the answer was we are not doing this against you and you do what you want assuming that it is not

00:39:12.720 against us not against the united states i said okay very well that's the way it went and we created

00:39:20.480 hypersonic systems with intercontinental range and we continue to develop them we are now ahead of

00:39:26.720 everyone the united states and the other countries in terms of the development of hypersonic strike

00:39:32.880 systems and we are improving them every day but it wasn't us we proposed to go the other way and we were

00:39:40.640 pushed back now about nato's expansion to the east well we were promised no nato to the east not an inch

00:39:49.440 to the east as we were told and then what they said well it's not enshrined on paper so we'll expand

00:39:59.280 so there were five waves of expansion the baltic states the whole of eastern europe and so on

00:40:04.960 and now i come to the main thing they have come to the ukraine ultimately in 2008 at the summit in

00:40:13.120 bucharest they declared that the doors for ukraine and georgia to join nato were open now about how

00:40:20.640 decisions are made there germany france seemed to be against it as well as some other european countries

00:40:27.360 but then as it turned out later president bush and he's such a tough guy a tough politician as i was

00:40:35.120 told later he exerted pressure on us and we had to agree it's ridiculous it's like kindergarten where

00:40:43.680 are the guarantees what kindergarten is this what kind of people are these who are they you see they

00:40:51.520 were pressed they agreed and then they say ukraine won't be in the nato you know i say i don't know

00:40:59.920 i know you agreed in 2008 why won't you agree in the future well they pressed us then i say why won't

00:41:08.320 they press you tomorrow and you'll agree again well it's nonsensical who's there to talk to i just don't

00:41:16.480 understand we're ready to talk but with whom where are the guarantees none so they started to develop

00:41:25.040 the territory of ukraine whatever is there i have told you the background how this territory developed

00:41:32.400 what kind of relations they were with russia every second or third person there has always had some

00:41:38.640 ties with russia and during the elections in already independent sovereign ukraine which gained its

00:41:45.200 independence as a result of the declaration of independence and by the way it says that ukraine

00:41:51.200 is a neutral state and in 2008 suddenly the doors or gates to nato were open to it oh come on this is

00:42:00.560 not how we agreed now all the presidents that have come to power in ukraine they relied on electorate

00:42:09.040 with a good attitude to russia in one way or the other this is the southeast of ukraine this is a

00:42:16.960 large number of people and it was very difficult to dissuade this electorate which had a positive

00:42:23.920 attitude towards russia victor yanukovych came to power and how the first time he won after president

00:42:32.080 kuchma they organized the third round which is not provided for in the constitution of ukraine this is

00:42:39.280 a coup d'etat just imagine someone in the united states wouldn't like the outcome in 2014

00:42:48.560 before that no this was before that after president kuchma victor yanukovych won the elections

00:42:55.520 however his opponents did not recognize that victory the u.s supported the opposition and the third

00:43:01.680 round was scheduled what is this this is a coup the u.s supported it and the winner of the third round

00:43:09.120 came to power imagine if in the u.s something was not to someone's liking and the third round of election

00:43:16.720 which the u.s constitution does not provide for was organized nonetheless it was done in ukraine

00:43:23.680 okay victor yushchenko who was considered a pro-western politician came to power

00:43:28.640 fine we have built relations with him as well he came to moscow with visits we visited kiev i visited

00:43:41.200 we met in an informal setting if he's pro-western so be it it's fine let people do their job the

00:43:49.280 situation should have developed inside the independent ukraine itself as a result of kuchma's leadership

00:43:55.040 things got worse and victor yanukovych came to power after all maybe he wasn't the best president

00:44:02.240 and politician i don't know i don't want to give assessments however the issue of the association

00:44:08.400 with the eu came up we have always been lenient to this suit yourself but when we read through the

00:44:18.080 treaty of association it turned out to be a problem for us since we had a free trade zone and open customs

00:44:24.320 borders with ukraine which under this association had to open its borders for europe which could

00:44:30.000 have led to flooding of our market we said no this is not going to work we shall close our borders with

00:44:39.920 ukraine then the customs borders that is yanukovych started to calculate how much ukraine was going to

00:44:46.400 gain how much to lose and said to his european partners i need more time to think before signing

00:44:53.680 the moment he said that the opposition began to take destructive steps which were supported by the

00:44:58.880 west it all came down to maidan and a coup in ukraine so he did more trade with russia than with the eu

00:45:08.320 ukraine did of course it's not even the matter of trade volume although for the most part it is

00:45:16.480 it is the matter of cooperation size which the entire ukraine economy was based on the cooperation

00:45:24.000 ties between the enterprises were very close since the times of the soviet union one enterprise there used

00:45:30.880 to produce components to be assembled both in russia and ukraine and vice versa they used to be very close

00:45:38.080 ties a coup that was committed although i shall not delve into details now as i find doing it

00:45:46.240 inappropriate the u.s told us calm yanukovych down and we will calm the opposition let the situation

00:45:54.480 unfold in the scenario of a political settlement we said all right agreed let's do it this way

00:46:00.720 as the americans requested yanukovych did use neither the armed forces nor the police yet the armed

00:46:08.400 opposition committed a coup in kiev what is that supposed to mean who do you think you are i wanted

00:46:16.560 to ask the then u.s leadership with the backing of cia of course the organization you wanted to join

00:46:30.240 back in the day as i understand we should thank god they didn't let you in although it is a serious

00:46:37.600 organization i understand my former vis-a-vis in the sense that i served in the first main directorate

00:46:44.800 soviet union's intelligence service they have always been our opponents a job is a job

00:46:55.200 technically they did everything right they achieved their goal of changing the government

00:46:59.600 however from political standpoint it was a colossal mistake surely it was political leadership's

00:47:06.000 miscalculation they should have seen what it would evolve into

00:47:09.440 so in 2008 the doors of nato were opened for ukraine in 2014 there was a coup they started

00:47:21.120 persecuting those who did not accept the coup and it was indeed a coup they created the threat to crimea

00:47:27.920 which we had to take under our protection they launched the war in donbas in 2014 with the use of

00:47:34.720 aircraft and artillery against civilians this is when it all started there's a video of aircraft

00:47:42.240 attacking donetsk from above they launched a large-scale military operation then another one

00:47:50.240 when they failed they started to prepare the next one all this against the background of military

00:47:56.160 development of this territory and opening of nato's doors how could we not express concern over what

00:48:07.360 was happening from our side this would have been a culpable negligence that's what it would have been

00:48:16.720 it's just that the u.s political leadership pushed us to the line we could not cross because doing so

00:48:22.880 could have ruined russia itself besides we could not leave our brothers in faith in fact a part of

00:48:32.320 russian people in the face of this war machine what was the so but that was eight years before the

00:48:38.800 current conflict started so what was the trigger for you what was the moment where you decided you had

00:48:45.280 to do this initially it was the cool in ukraine that provoked the conflict by the way back then the

00:48:58.800 representatives of three european countries germany poland and france arrived they were the guarantors of

00:49:06.240 the signed agreement between the government of yanukovych and the opposition they signed it as guarantors

00:49:13.120 despite that the opposition committed a coup and all these countries pretended that they didn't

00:49:19.760 remember that they were guarantors of the peaceful settlement they just threw it in the stove right

00:49:26.160 away and nobody recalls that i don't know if the u.s know anything about the agreement between the

00:49:33.840 opposition and the authorities and its three guarantors who instead of bringing this whole situation back in

00:49:40.560 the political field supported the coup although it was meaningless believe me because president

00:49:48.160 yanukovych agreed to all conditions he was ready to hold an early election which he had no chance of

00:49:54.000 winning frankly speaking everyone knew that then why the coup why the victims why threatening crimea

00:50:02.160 why launching an operation in donbas this i do not understand that is exactly what the miscalculation is

00:50:12.560 cia did its job to complete the coup i think one of the deputy secretaries of state said that it cost a

00:50:20.880 large sum of money almost five billion but the political mistake was colossal why would they have to do

00:50:28.640 that all this could have been done legally without victims without military action without losing crimea

00:50:37.200 we would have never considered to even lift a finger if it hadn't been for the bloody developments on

00:50:42.320 maidan because we agreed with the fact that after the collapse of the soviet union our borders should be

00:50:50.880 along the borders of former unions republics we agreed to that but we never agreed to nato's expansion and

00:50:58.640 moreover we never agreed that ukraine would be in nato we did not agree to nato basis there without any

00:51:08.800 discussion with us for decades we kept asking don't do this don't do that

00:51:18.000 and what triggered the latest events firstly the current ukrainian leadership declared that it would

00:51:24.080 not implement the minsk agreements which had been signed as you know after the events of 2014 in

00:51:30.400 minsk where the plan of peaceful settlement in donbas was set forth but no the current ukrainian

00:51:38.000 leadership foreign minister all other officials and then president himself said that they don't like

00:51:44.080 anything about the minsk agreements in other words they were not going to implement it a year or a year

00:51:56.000 and a half ago former leaders of germany and france said openly to the whole world that they indeed

00:52:02.720 signed the minsk agreements but they never intended to implement them they simply led us by the nose was

00:52:08.960 there anyone for you to talk to did you call a us president secretary of state and say if you keep

00:52:13.680 militarizing ukraine with nato forces this is going to get this is going to be a we're going to act

00:52:20.640 we talked about this all the time we addressed the united states and european countries leadership to stop

00:52:34.640 these developments immediately to implement the minsk agreements frankly speaking i didn't know how we

00:52:42.080 were going to do this but i was ready to implement them these agreements were complicated for ukraine

00:52:48.400 they included lots of elements of those donbas territories independence that's true however i was

00:52:56.080 absolutely confident and i'm saying this to you now i honestly believe that if we managed to convince

00:53:02.880 the residents of donbas and we had to work hard to convince them to return to the ukrainian statehood

00:53:09.680 then gradually the wounds would start to heal when this part of territory reintegrated itself into

00:53:16.480 common social environment when the pensions and social benefits were paid again all the pieces

00:53:22.880 would gradually fall into place no nobody wanted that everybody wanted to resolve the issue by military

00:53:32.720 force only but we could not let that happen and the situation got to the point when the ukrainian side

00:53:40.400 announced no we will not do anything they also started preparing for military action it was

00:53:49.040 they who started the war in 2014 our goal is to stop this war and we did not start this war in 2022

00:53:58.880 this is an attempt to stop it do you think you've stopped it now

00:54:02.640 you mean have you achieved your aims

00:54:10.560 no we haven't achieved our aims yet because one of them is the nazification this means the prohibition

00:54:18.800 of all kinds of neo-nazi movements this is one of the problems that we discussed during the negotiation

00:54:25.520 process which ended in istanbul early this year

00:54:35.200 and it was not our initiative because we were told by the europeans in particular that it was

00:54:41.040 necessary to create conditions for the final signing of the documents

00:54:44.960 my counterparts in france and germany said how can you imagine them signing a treaty with a gun to

00:54:55.200 their heads the troops should be pulled back from kiev i said all right we withdrew the troops from kiev

00:55:05.840 as soon as we pulled back our troops from kiev our ukrainian negotiators immediately threw all our

00:55:12.080 agreements reached in istanbul into the bend and got prepared for a long-standing armed confrontation

00:55:20.480 with the help of the united states and its satellites in europe that is how the situation has developed

00:55:29.200 and that is how it looks now but what is part of my ignorance what is denazification what would that

00:55:36.000 mean that is what i want to talk about right now it is a very important issue denazification

00:55:53.520 after gaining independence ukraine began to search as some western analysts say its identity

00:56:00.160 identity and it came up with nothing better than to build this identity upon some false heroes who

00:56:10.000 collaborated with hitler i have already said that in the early 19th century when the theorists of

00:56:22.160 independence and sovereignty of ukraine appeared they assumed that an independent ukraine should have

00:56:29.200 very good relations with russia but due to the historical development those territories were part of the polish

00:56:40.080 lithuanian commonwealth poland where ukrainians were persecuted and treated quite brutally as well as were

00:56:47.680 subject to cruel behavior they were subject to cruel behavior there were also attempts to destroy their identity

00:57:00.880 all this remained in the memory of the people when world war ii broke out part of this extremely

00:57:07.280 the nationalist elite the nationalist elite collaborated with hitler believing that he would bring them freedom

00:57:17.280 the german troops even the ss troops made hitler's collaborators do the dirtiest work of exterminating

00:57:23.840 the polish and jewish population hence this brutal massacre of the polish and jewish population as well as the russian

00:57:31.840 population too this was led by the persons who are well known bandera shukiewicz it was those people who

00:57:45.760 were made national heroes that is the problem and we are constantly told that nationalism and neo-nazism exist in

00:57:54.000 other countries as well yes they are seedlings but we approved them and other countries fight against them

00:58:02.720 but ukraine is not the case these people have been made into national heroes in ukraine monuments to

00:58:09.040 those people have been erected they are displayed on flags their names are shouted by crowds that walk with torches

00:58:16.240 as it was in nazi germany these were people who exterminated pols jews and russians it is necessary

00:58:35.760 to stop this practice and prevent the dissemination of this concept

00:58:39.280 i say that ukrainians are part of the one russian people they say no we are a separate people

00:58:48.320 okay fine if they consider themselves a separate people they have the right to do so but not on

00:58:55.520 the basis of nazism the nazi ideology would you be satisfied with the territory that you have now

00:59:01.520 i will finish answering the question you just asked a question about neo-nazism and denazification

00:59:17.520 look the president of ukraine visited canada this story is well known but being silenced in the western

00:59:24.800 countries the canadian parliament introduced a man who as the speaker of the parliament said fought

00:59:32.720 against the russians during the world war ii well who fought against the russians during the world

00:59:38.720 war ii hitler and his accomplices it turned out that this man served in the ss troops he personally

00:59:46.720 killed russians poles and jews the ss troops consisted of ukrainian nationalists who did this dirty work

00:59:55.120 the president of ukraine stood up with the entire parliament of canada and applauded this man how

01:00:01.840 can this be imagined the president of ukraine himself by the way is a jew by nationality

01:00:09.440 really my question is what do you do about it i mean hitler's been dead for 80 years nazi germany no

01:00:14.640 longer exists and so true and so i think what you're saying is you want to extinguish or at least

01:00:22.640 control ukrainian nationalism but how how do you do that listen to me your question is very subtle

01:00:37.920 and i can tell you what i think do not take offense of course this question appears to be subtle

01:00:51.200 it is quite pesky you say hitler has been dead for so many years 80 years but his example lives on

01:01:02.480 people who exterminated jews russians and poles are alive and the president the current president of

01:01:09.680 today's ukraine applauds him in the canadian parliament gives a standing ovation can we say

01:01:16.800 that we have completely uprooted this ideology if what we see is happening today that is what

01:01:23.680 denazification is in our understanding we have to get rid of those people who maintain this concept

01:01:30.560 and support this practice and try to preserve it that is what denazification is that is what we mean

01:01:38.400 right my question is a little more specific it was of course not a defense of nazis neo or otherwise

01:01:44.480 it was a practical question you don't control the entire country you don't control kiev you don't seem

01:01:48.720 like you want to so how how do you eliminate a culture or an ideology or feelings or a view of history

01:01:57.680 in a country that you don't control what do you do about that

01:02:07.840 you know as strange as it may seem to you during the negotiations in istanbul we did agree that

01:02:14.320 we have it all in writing neo-nazism would not be cultivated in ukraine including that it would

01:02:22.560 be prohibited at the legislative level mr carson we agreed on that this it turns out can be done

01:02:30.880 during the negotiation process and there's nothing humiliating for ukraine as a modern civilized state

01:02:37.360 it is any state allowed to promote nazism it is not is it that is it um will there be talks and why

01:02:50.640 haven't there been talks about resolving the conflict in ukraine peace talks

01:02:56.000 they have been they reached a very high stage of coordination of positions in a complex process

01:03:12.800 but still they were almost finalized but after we withdrew our troops from kiev as i have already said

01:03:21.040 the other side threw away all these agreements and obeyed the instructions of western countries european

01:03:27.520 countries and the united states to fight russia to the bitter end moreover the president europe grain has

01:03:35.600 legislated a ban on negotiating with russia he signed a decree forbidding everyone to negotiate with russia

01:03:42.880 but how are we going to negotiate if he forbade himself and everyone to do this

01:03:51.680 we know that he is putting forward some ideas about the settlement but in order to agree on something

01:03:57.600 we need to have a dialogue is that not right well but you wouldn't be speaking to the ukrainian

01:04:02.880 president you'd be speaking to the american president when was the last time you spoke to joe biden

01:04:09.120 i cannot remember when i talked to him i do not remember we can look it up you don't remember

01:04:16.720 no why do i have to remember everything i have my own things to do we have domestic political affairs

01:04:24.240 well he's funding the war that you're fighting so i would think that would be memorable

01:04:30.880 well yes he funds but i talked to him before the special military operation of course and i said to

01:04:36.880 him then by the way i will not go into details i never do but i said to him then i believe that

01:04:43.680 you are making a huge mistake of historic proportions by supporting everything that is happening there

01:04:49.680 in ukraine by pushing russia away i told him told him repeatedly by the way i think that would be correct

01:04:57.760 if i stop here what did he say ask him please it is easier for you you are a citizen of the united

01:05:07.360 states go and ask him it is not appropriate for me to comment on our conversation but but you haven't

01:05:13.600 spoken to him since before february of 2022 no no we haven't spoken certain contacts are being

01:05:26.880 maintained though speaking of which do you remember what i told you about my proposal to work together on

01:05:35.360 a missile defense system yes you can ask all of them all of them are safe and sound thank god the

01:05:46.160 former president kandaleesa is safe and sound and i think mr gates and the current director of the

01:05:53.360 intelligence agency mr burns the then ambassador to russia in my opinion are very successful ambassador

01:06:01.200 they were all witnesses to these conversations ask them same here if you are interested in what mr

01:06:09.920 president biden responded to me ask him at any rate i talked to him about it i'm i'm definitely

01:06:17.040 interested but from the outside it seems like this could devolve or evolve into something that brings

01:06:23.840 the entire world into conflict and could um initiate some a nuclear launch and so why don't you just call

01:06:30.480 biden and say let's work this out what's there to work out it's very simple i repeat we have contacts

01:06:45.280 through various agencies i will tell you what we are saying on this matter and what we are conveying to

01:06:52.560 the u.s leadership if you really want to stop fighting you need to stop supplying weapons it will be

01:07:00.160 over within a few weeks that's it and then we can agree on some terms before you do that stop what's

01:07:09.280 easier why would i call him what should i talk to him about or beg him for what and and what messages

01:07:16.160 do you get back you're going to deliver such and such weapons to ukraine oh i'm afraid i'm afraid please

01:07:25.360 don't what is there to talk about do you think nato is worried about this becoming a global war or a

01:07:33.200 nuclear conflict

01:07:38.000 at least that's what they're talking about and they're trying to intimidate their own population

01:07:44.000 with an imaginary russian threat this is an obvious fact and thinking people not philistines but thinking

01:07:52.480 people analysts those who are engaged in real politics just smart people understand perfectly

01:07:59.200 well that this is a fake they're trying to fuel the russian threat the threat i think you're referring

01:08:05.520 to is a russian invasion of poland latvia expansionist behavior is can you imagine a scenario where you

01:08:14.400 send russian troops to poland only in one case if poland attacks russia why because we have no interest

01:08:27.040 in poland latvia or anywhere else why would we do that we simply don't have any interest it's just

01:08:34.800 threat mongering well the argument i know you know this is that well he invaded ukraine

01:08:40.640 he has territorial aims across the continent and you're saying unequivocally you don't

01:08:54.880 it is absolutely out of the question you just don't have to be any kind of analyst

01:09:00.880 it goes against common sense to get involved in some kind of a global war

01:09:04.560 and a global war will bring all humanity to the brink of destruction it's obvious

01:09:15.520 there are certainly means of deterrence they have been scaring everyone with us all along

01:09:21.840 tomorrow russia will use tactical nuclear weapons tomorrow russia will use that no the day after tomorrow

01:09:29.360 so what in order to extort additional money from u.s taxpayers and european taxpayers in the confrontation

01:09:40.000 with russia in the ukrainian theater of war the goal is to weaken russia as much as possible

01:09:50.960 one of uh our senior united states senators from the state of new york chuck schumer said yesterday i

01:09:56.560 believe that we have to continue to fund the ukrainian effort or u.s soldier citizens could wind up

01:10:05.680 fighting there how do you assess that

01:10:09.280 this is a provocation and achieve provocation at that i do not understand why american soldiers should

01:10:23.200 fight in ukraine there are mercenaries from the united states there the bigger number of mercenaries comes

01:10:29.760 from poland with mercenaries from the united states in second place and mercenaries from georgia in third

01:10:36.000 place well if somebody has the desire to send regular troops that would certainly bring humanity to the

01:10:44.080 brink of very serious global conflict this is obvious do the united states need this what for

01:10:55.440 thousands of miles away from your national territory

01:10:58.160 don't you have anything better to do you have issues on the border issues with migration issues with

01:11:07.360 the national debt more than 33 trillion dollars you have nothing better to do so you should fight in

01:11:14.080 ukraine wouldn't it be better to negotiate with russia make an agreement already understanding the situation

01:11:23.520 that is developing today realizing that russia will fight for its interests to the end

01:11:30.400 and realizing this actually return to common sense start respecting our country and its interests

01:11:36.880 and look for certain solutions

01:11:40.720 it seems to me that this is much smarter and more rational who blew up nordstrom

01:11:45.360 you for sure i was busy that day nate do you have uh i did not blow up north stream uh thank you though

01:12:02.800 you personally may have an alibi but the cia has no such alibi

01:12:06.960 you know i won't get into details but people always say in such cases look for someone who is

01:12:24.640 interested but in this case we should not only look for someone who is interested but also for someone

01:12:31.040 who has capabilities because there may be many people interested but not all of them are capable of

01:12:36.800 sinking to the bottom of the baltic sea and carrying out this explosion these two components should

01:12:43.440 be connected who is interested and who is capable of doing it but i'm confused i mean that's the biggest

01:12:49.120 act of industrial terrorism ever and it's the largest emission of co2 in in history okay so if you had

01:12:56.000 evidence and presumably given your security services rental services you would that nato the us cia the west

01:13:02.560 did this why wouldn't you present it and win a propaganda victory

01:13:13.200 in the war of propaganda it is very difficult to defeat the united states

01:13:18.160 because the united states controls all the world's media and many european media

01:13:23.680 the ultimate beneficiary of the biggest european media are american financial institutions

01:13:28.800 don't you know that so it is possible to get involved in this work but it is cost prohibitive so to

01:13:37.040 speak we can simply shine the spotlight on our sources of information and we will not achieve results

01:13:45.280 it is clear to the whole world what happened and even american analysts talk about it directly

01:13:51.360 it's true yes but here's a question you may be able to answer you worked in germany famously um the

01:13:57.840 germans clearly know that their nato partner did this but they and it damaged their economy greatly

01:14:04.560 it may never recover why are they being silent about it that's very confusing to me why wouldn't the germans

01:14:11.760 say something about it this also confuses me but today's german leadership is guided by the interests

01:14:22.560 of the collective west rather than its national interests otherwise it is difficult to explain the

01:14:28.560 logic of their action or inaction after all it is not only about nordstrom one which was blown up

01:14:36.160 and the north stream too was damaged but one pipe is safe and sound and gas can be supplied to europe

01:14:43.040 through it but germany does not open it we are ready please there's another route through poland called

01:14:52.720 yamal europe which also allows for large flow poland has closed it but poland packs from the german hand

01:15:01.040 it receives money from the pan-european funds and germany is the main donor to these pan-european funds

01:15:08.400 germany feeds poland to the certain extent and they close their route to germany why i don't understand

01:15:17.360 ukraine to which the germans supply weapons and give money germany is the second sponsor of the united

01:15:24.960 states in terms of financial aid to ukraine there are two gas routes through ukraine they simply closed

01:15:32.960 one route the ukrainians open the second route and please get gas from russia they do not open it

01:15:41.360 why don't the germans say look guys we give you money and weapons open up the valve please let the gas

01:15:48.800 from russia pass through for us we're buying liquefied gas at exorbitant prices in europe which brings the

01:15:57.200 level of our competitiveness and economy in general down to zero do you want us to give you money let

01:16:05.120 us have the decent existence make money for our economy because this is where the money we give you

01:16:11.200 comes from they refuse to do so why ask them that is what is like in their heads those are highly incompetent

01:16:21.760 people well maybe the world is breaking into two hemispheres one with cheap energy the other without

01:16:28.160 and i want to ask you that if if we're now a multi-polar world obviously we are can you describe

01:16:33.920 the blocks of alliances who who is in each side do you think listen you have said that the world is

01:16:44.560 breaking into two hemispheres a human brain is divided into two hemispheres one is responsible for

01:16:53.360 one type of activities the other one is more about creativity and so on but it is still one in the same head

01:17:01.040 the world should be a single hole security should be shared rather than a meant for the golden billion

01:17:10.640 that is the only scenario where the world could be stable sustainable and predictable until then

01:17:17.520 while the head is split in two parts it is an illness a serious adverse condition it is a period

01:17:24.240 of severe disease that the world is going through now but i think that thanks to honest journalism this

01:17:32.480 work is akin to work of the doctors this could somehow be remedied well let's just give one example the

01:17:39.120 the u.s dollar which has kind of united the world uh in a lot of ways maybe not to your advantage but

01:17:44.800 certainly not ours is that going away as the reserve currency that become the universally accepted

01:17:50.560 currency how have sanctions do you think changed the dollar's place in the world you know to use the

01:18:02.640 dollar as a tool of foreign policy struggle is one of the biggest strategic mistakes made by the u.s

01:18:10.080 political leadership the dollar is the cornerstone of the united states power i think everyone understands

01:18:22.480 very well that no matter how many dollars are printed they are quickly dispersed all over the world

01:18:28.240 inflation in the united states is minimal it's about three or three point four percent which is i think

01:18:44.240 totally acceptable for the u.s but they won't stop printing what does the debt of 33 trillion dollars tell

01:18:52.720 us about it is about the emission nevertheless it is the main weapon used by the united states to preserve

01:19:05.680 its power across the world as soon as the political leadership decided to use the u.s dollar as a tool of

01:19:12.800 political struggle a blow was dealt to this american power i would not like to use any strong language but

01:19:21.200 it is a stupid thing to do and a grave mistake

01:19:32.320 look at what is going on in the world even the united states allies are now downsizing their dollar

01:19:38.080 reserves seeing this everyone starts looking for ways to protect themselves but the fact that the united

01:19:45.440 united states applies restrictive measures to certain countries such as placing restrictions on

01:19:50.720 transactions freezing assets etc causes grave concern and sends a signal to the whole world

01:19:59.760 what did we have here until 2022 about 80 percent of russian foreign trade transactions were made in us

01:20:07.200 dollars and euros u.s dollars accounted for approximately 50 percent of our transactions with third countries

01:20:19.520 while currently it is down to 13 percent it wasn't us who banned the use of the us dollar

01:20:25.760 we had no such intention it was decision of the united states to restrict our transactions in u.s dollars

01:20:38.240 i think it is complete foolishness from the point of view of the interest of the united states itself

01:20:44.080 and its taxpayers as it damages the u.s economy undermines the power of the united states across the world

01:20:51.120 by the way our transactions in yuan accounted for about three percent

01:20:58.960 today 34 percent of our transactions are made in rubles and about as much a little over 34 percent in yuan

01:21:10.400 why did the united states do this my only guess is self-conceit they probably thought it would lead

01:21:17.360 to full collapse but nothing collapsed moreover other countries including oil producers are thinking

01:21:23.760 of and already accepting payments for oil in yuan do you even realize what is going on or not

01:21:31.840 does anyone in the united states realize this what are you doing you are cutting yourself off all

01:21:40.080 experts say this ask any intelligent and thinking person in the united states what the dollar means

01:21:49.040 for the u.s but you're killing it with your own hands i think that's a i think that's a fair assessment

01:21:56.400 the question is what comes next and maybe you trade one colonial power for another much less sentimental

01:22:03.280 and forgiving colonial power i mean are is the the bricks for example in danger of being completely

01:22:09.520 dominated by the chinese the chinese economy uh in a way that's not good for their sovereignty

01:22:16.480 do you worry about that

01:22:22.160 we have heard those boogeyman stories before it is a boogeyman story

01:22:28.080 we're neighbors with china you cannot choose neighbors just as you cannot choose close relatives

01:22:34.640 we share a border of thousand kilometers with them this is number one second we have a centuries long

01:22:42.800 history of coexistence we're used to it third china's foreign policy philosophy is not aggressive

01:22:50.880 its idea is to always look for compromise and we can see that

01:22:54.720 the next point is as follows we are always told the same boogeyman story and here it goes again through

01:23:05.280 an euphemistic form but it is still the same boogeyman story the cooperation with china keeps increasing

01:23:12.640 the pace at which china's cooperation with europe is growing is higher and greater than that of the

01:23:19.360 growth of chinese russian cooperation ask europeans aren't they afraid they might be i don't know but

01:23:27.680 they are still trying to access china's market at all costs especially now that they are facing

01:23:34.560 economic problems chinese businesses are also exploring the european market

01:23:41.680 do chinese businesses have small presence in the united states

01:23:45.760 yes the political decisions are such that they are trying to limit their cooperation with china

01:23:52.160 it is to your own detriment mr tucker that you are limiting cooperation with china you are hurting

01:23:57.920 yourself it is a delicate matter and there are no silver bullet solutions just as it is with the dollar

01:24:05.360 so before introducing any illegitimate sanctions illegitimate in terms of the charter of the united nations

01:24:16.720 one should think very carefully for decision makers this appears to be a problem

01:24:24.720 so you said a moment ago that the world would be a lot better if it weren't broken into

01:24:29.120 competing alliances if there was cooperation globally one of the reasons you don't have that is because

01:24:36.560 the current american administration is dead set against you do you think if there were a new

01:24:41.760 administration after joe biden that you would be able to re-establish communication with the u.s

01:24:47.520 government or does it not matter who the president is i will tell you but let me finish the previous

01:25:00.480 thought we together with my colleague and friend president jing ping set a goal to reach 200 billion

01:25:08.480 dollars of mutual trade with china this year we have exceeded this level according to our figures our

01:25:16.080 bilateral trade with china totals already 230 billion and the chinese statistics says it is 240 billion

01:25:26.640 one more important thing our trade is well balanced mutually complementary in high-tech energy scientific

01:25:34.240 research and development it is very balanced as for bricks where russia took over the presidency this year

01:25:43.440 the bricks countries are by and large developing very rapidly look if memory serves me right back in 1992

01:25:53.920 the share of the g7 countries in the world economy amounted to 47 percent whereas in 2022 it was down to

01:26:04.400 i think a little over 30 percent the brics countries accounted for only 16 percent in 1992 but now their

01:26:16.400 share is greater than that of the g7 it has nothing to do with the events in ukraine this is due to the

01:26:23.280 trends of global development and world economy as i mentioned just now and this is inevitable this will

01:26:30.960 keep happening it is like the rise of the sun you cannot prevent the sun from rising you have to adapt

01:26:38.320 to it how do the united states adapt with the help of force sanctions pressure bombings and use of armed

01:26:47.520 forces this is about self-conceit your political establishment does not understand that the world is

01:26:56.000 changing under objective circumstances and in order to preserve your level even if someone aspires pardon

01:27:03.600 me to the level of dominance you have to make the right decisions in a competent and timely manner

01:27:11.520 such brutal actions including with regard to russia and say other countries are counterproductive

01:27:17.680 this is an obvious fact it has already become evident you just asked me if another leader comes

01:27:28.640 and changes something it is not about the leader it is not about the personality of a particular person

01:27:36.480 i had a very good relationship with say bush i know that in the united states

01:27:42.080 he was portrayed as some kind of a country boy who does not understand much i assure you that this

01:27:50.480 is not the case i think he made a lot of mistakes with regard to russia too i told you about 2008 and

01:27:58.000 the decision in bucharest to open the nato's doors to for ukraine and so on that happened during his

01:28:05.360 presidency he actually exercised pressure on the europeans but in general on a personal human level

01:28:13.280 i had a very good relationship with him he was no worse than any other american or russian or european

01:28:20.240 politician i assure you he understood what he was doing as well as others i had such personal

01:28:28.160 relationship with trump as well it is not about the personality of the leader it is about the elite's

01:28:36.960 mindset if the idea of domination at any cost based also on forceful actions dominates the american

01:28:46.720 society nothing will change it will only get worse but if in the end one comes to the awareness that

01:28:55.920 the world has been changing due to the objective circumstances and that one should be able to

01:29:02.160 adapt to them in time using the advantages that the u.s still has today then perhaps something may change

01:29:13.840 look china's economy has become the first economy in the world in purchasing power parity

01:29:19.600 in terms of volume it overtook the u.s a long time ago the usa comes second then india one and a half

01:29:28.880 billion people and then japan with russia in the fifth place russia was the first economy in europe last

01:29:36.480 year despite all the sanctions and restrictions is it normal from your point of view sanctions restrictions

01:29:44.320 impossibility of payments in dollars being cut off from swift services sanctions against our ships

01:29:51.120 carrying oil sanctions against airplanes sanctions in everything everywhere

01:30:00.720 the largest number of sanctions in the world which are applied are applied against russia

01:30:06.000 and we have become europe's first economy during this time

01:30:09.360 the tools that u.s uses don't work well one has to think about what to do

01:30:18.160 if this realization comes to the ruling elites then yes then the first person of the state

01:30:23.760 will act in anticipation of what the voters and the people who make decisions at various levels

01:30:30.400 expect from this person then maybe something will change but you're describing two different systems you

01:30:37.280 say the the leader acts in the interest of the voters but you also say these decisions are not made by

01:30:41.680 the leader they're made by the ruling classes you've run this country for so long you've known all these

01:30:47.360 american presidents what are those power centers in the united states do you think like who actually makes

01:30:53.680 the decisions i don't know america is a complex country conservative on one hand rapidly changing on the other

01:31:08.560 it's not easy for us to sort it all out who makes decisions in the elections is it possible to understand this

01:31:16.320 when each state has its own legislation each state regulates itself someone can be excluded from elections at

01:31:24.000 the state level it is a two-stage electoral system it is very difficult for us to understand it certainly

01:31:32.560 there are two parties that are dominant the republicans and the democrats and within this party system the

01:31:39.120 centers that make decisions that prepare decisions then look why in my opinion after the collapse of

01:31:47.360 the soviet union such an erroneous crude completely unjustified policy of pressure was pursued against

01:31:54.320 russia after all this is a policy of pressure nato expansion support for the separatists in caucuses

01:32:02.960 creation of a missile defense system these are all elements of pressure pressure pressure

01:32:08.880 pressure pressure then dragging ukraine into nato is all about pressure pressure pressure why i think

01:32:20.080 among other things because excessive production capacities were created

01:32:26.800 during the confrontation with the soviet union there were many centers created and specialists on the

01:32:32.720 soviet union who could not do anything else they convinced the political leadership that it

01:32:38.720 is necessary to continue chiseling russia to try to break it up to create on this territory several

01:32:46.000 quasi-state entities and to subdue them in a divided form to use their combined potential for the future

01:32:53.520 struggle with china this is a mistake including the excessive potential of those who worked for the

01:32:59.920 confrontation with the soviet union it is necessary to get rid of this there should be new fresh forces

01:33:07.760 people who look into the future and understand what is happening in the world look at how indonesia is

01:33:14.560 developing 600 million people where can we get away from that nowhere we just have to assume that

01:33:22.240 indonesia will enter it is already in the club of the world's leading economies no matter who likes it or

01:33:29.040 dislikes it yes we understand and are aware that in the united states despite all the economic problems

01:33:37.760 the situation is still normal with the economy growing decently the gdp is growing by 2.5 percent if i'm not

01:33:46.720 mistaken but if we want to ensure the future then we need to change our approach to what is changing

01:33:55.120 as i already said the world would nevertheless change regardless of how the developments in ukraine end

01:34:02.080 the world is changing in the united states themselves experts are writing that the united states are

01:34:08.640 nonetheless gradually changing their position in the world it is your experts who write that i just read

01:34:15.120 them the only question is how this would happen painfully and quickly or gently and gradually

01:34:22.880 and this is written by people who are not anti-american they simply follow global development trends

01:34:29.280 that's it and in order to assess them and change policies we need people who think

01:34:36.880 look forward can analyze and recommend certain decisions at the level of political leaders

01:34:44.000 i just have to ask you you've said clearly that nato expansion eastward is a violation of the promise

01:34:49.600 you all were made in 1990 it's a threat to your country right before you sent troops into ukraine the

01:34:57.360 vice president united states with munich security conference and encouraged the president of

01:35:00.960 ukraine to join nato do you think that was an effort to provoke you into military action

01:35:13.920 i repeat once again we have repeatedly repeatedly proposed to seek a solution to the problems that arose in

01:35:21.680 ukraine after 2014 coup d'etat through peaceful means but no one listened to us and moreover the ukrainian

01:35:30.400 leaders who were under the complete u.s control suddenly declared that they would not comply with the minsk agreements

01:35:37.840 they disliked everything there and continued military activity in that territory

01:35:43.040 and in parallel that territory was being exploited by nato military structures under the guise of various

01:35:57.920 personnel training and retraining centers they essentially begun to create bases there that's all

01:36:06.320 ukraine announced that the russians were a non-titular nationality while passing the laws that limit the

01:36:12.480 rights of non-titular nationalities in ukraine ukraine ukraine having received all these southeastern

01:36:20.000 territories as a gift from the russian people suddenly announced that the russians were a non-titular

01:36:25.920 nationality in that territory is that normal all this put together led to the decision to end the war that

01:36:37.600 neo-nazis started in ukraine in 2014. do you do you think zelensky has the freedom to negotiate a settlement to this conflict

01:36:54.000 i don't know the details of course it's difficult for me to judge but i believe he has in any case

01:37:01.120 he used to have his father fought against the fascists nazis during world war ii i once talked to him about

01:37:09.520 this i said volodya what are you doing why are you supporting neo-nazis in ukraine today while your

01:37:17.760 father fought against fascism he was a frontline soldier i will not tell you what he answered this is

01:37:24.800 a separate topic and i think it's incorrect for me to do so but as to the freedom of choice why not

01:37:32.000 he came to power on the expectations of ukrainian people that he would lead ukraine to peace he

01:37:38.400 talked about this it was thanks to this that he won the elections overwhelmingly but then when he came

01:37:45.920 to power in my opinion he realized two things firstly it is better not to clash with neo-nazis and

01:37:53.200 nationalists because they are aggressive and very active you can expect anything from them and secondly

01:38:00.560 the us-led west supports them and will always support those who antagonize with russia it is

01:38:07.040 beneficial and safe so he took the relevant position despite promising his people to end the war in

01:38:14.000 ukraine he deceived his voters but do you think at this point as of february 2024 he has the latitude the

01:38:21.040 freedom to speak with you or your government directly about putting an end to this which clearly isn't

01:38:25.760 helping his country or the world can he do that do you think why not he considers himself head of state

01:38:38.960 he won the elections although we believe in russia that the coup d'etat is the primary source of power for

01:38:46.080 everything that happened after 2014 and in this sense even today government is flawed but he

01:38:53.520 considers himself the president and he is recognized by the united states all of europe and practically the

01:39:00.080 rest of the world in such a capacity why not we can we negotiated with ukraine in istanbul we agreed he was

01:39:09.840 aware of this moreover the negotiation group leader mr argemija is his last name i believe still

01:39:18.000 heads the faction of the ruling party the party of the president in the rada he still heads the

01:39:24.400 presidential faction in the rada the country's parliament he still sits there he even put his

01:39:31.280 preliminary signature on the document i am telling you about but then he publicly stated to the whole

01:39:37.680 world we were ready to sign this document but mr johnson then the prime minister of great britain

01:39:44.720 came and dissuaded us from doing this saying it was better to fight russia they would give everything

01:39:51.120 needed for us to return what was lost during the clashes with russia and we agreed with this proposal

01:39:57.840 look his statement has been published he said it publicly can they return to this or not the question

01:40:05.600 is do they want it or not further on president of ukraine issued a decree prohibiting negotiations with

01:40:13.680 us let him cancel that decree and that's it we have never refused negotiations indeed we hear all

01:40:22.640 the time is russia ready yes we have not refused it was them who publicly refused well let him cancel his

01:40:31.440 decree and enter into negotiations we have never refused and the fact that they obey the demand or

01:40:40.480 persuasion of mr johnson the former prime minister of great britain seems ridiculous and very sad to me

01:40:48.000 because as mr arakamiya put it we could have stopped those hostilities with war a year and a half ago

01:40:55.280 already but the british persuaded us and we refused this where is mr johnson now and the war continues

01:41:05.680 that's a good question where do you think he is and why did he do that

01:41:14.000 hell knows i don't understand it myself there was a general starting point for some reason everyone had

01:41:23.680 the illusion that russia could be defeated on the battlefield because of arrogance because of a pure

01:41:31.200 heart but not because of a great mind you've described the connection between russia and ukraine

01:41:40.320 you've described russia itself a couple of times as orthodox that's central to your understanding of

01:41:44.480 russia you've said you're orthodox what does that mean in for you you're a christian leader

01:41:51.440 by your own description so what effect does that have on you

01:42:01.520 you know as i already mentioned in 988 prince vladimir himself was baptized following the example of his

01:42:10.400 grandmother princess olga and then he baptized his squad and then gradually over the course of several

01:42:18.320 years he baptized all the russ it was a lengthy process from pagans to christians it took many years

01:42:28.160 but in the end this orthodoxy eastern christianity deeply rooted itself in the consciousness of the

01:42:34.320 russian people when russia expanded and absorbed other nations who profess islam buddhism and judaism russia has

01:42:45.200 always been very loyal to those people who profess other religions this is her strength this is

01:42:51.840 absolutely clear and the fact is that the main postulates main values are very similar not to say

01:42:59.200 the same in all world religions i've just mentioned and which are the traditional religions of the russian

01:43:04.960 federation russia by the way russian authorities were always very careful about the culture and religion of

01:43:14.240 those people who came into the russian empire this in my opinion forms the basis of both security

01:43:24.160 and stability of the russian statehood all the peoples inhabiting russia basically consider it their

01:43:30.640 motherhood if say people move over to you or to europe from latin america an even clearer and more

01:43:39.680 understandable example people come but yet they have come to european countries from the historical

01:43:46.800 homeland and people who profess different religions in russia consider russia their motherland they have no

01:43:55.760 other motherland we are together this is one big family and our traditional values are very similar

01:44:05.520 similar i've just mentioned one big family but everyone has his her own family and this is the basis of our

01:44:13.840 society and if we say that the motherland and the family are specifically connected with each other

01:44:21.520 it is indeed the case since it is impossible to ensure a normal future for our children and our families

01:44:32.400 unless we ensure a normal sustainable future for the entire country for the motherland that is why

01:44:40.720 patriotic sentiment is so strong in russia but can i say that the one way in which the religions are

01:44:48.720 different is that christianity is specifically a non-violent religion jesus says turn the other cheek

01:44:53.760 don't kill how can a leader who has to kill of any country how can a leader be a christian how do you

01:45:02.160 reconcile that to yourself it is very easy when it comes to protecting oneself and one's family

01:45:18.240 one's homeland we won't attack anyone when did the developments ukraine start

01:45:29.280 since the coup d'etat and the hostilities in donbas begun that's when they started

01:45:34.800 and we're protecting our people ourselves our homeland and our future

01:45:38.800 as for religion in general

01:45:47.440 you know it's not about external manifestations it's not about going to church every day or

01:45:53.120 banging your head on the floor

01:45:58.960 it is in the heart and our culture is so human oriented

01:46:04.320 dostoevsky who was very well known in the west and the genius of russian culture russian literature

01:46:11.360 spoke a lot about this about the russian soul

01:46:20.640 after all western society is more pragmatic russian people think more about the eternal about moral values

01:46:29.200 i don't know maybe you won't agree with me but western culture is more pragmatic after all

01:46:39.520 i'm not saying this is bad it makes it possible for today's golden billion to achieve good success

01:46:45.280 in production even in science and so on

01:46:47.920 there's nothing wrong with that i'm just saying that we kind of look the same

01:46:57.600 so do you see the supernatural at work as you

01:47:02.000 look out across what's happening in the world now do you see god at work do you ever think to yourself

01:47:06.480 these are forces that are not human

01:47:16.720 no to be honest i don't think so

01:47:20.400 my opinion is that the development of the world community is in accordance with the inherent laws

01:47:26.480 and those laws are what they are

01:47:31.520 it's always been this way in the history of mankind some nations and countries rose became stronger and

01:47:38.240 more numerous and then left the international stage losing the status they had accustomed to

01:47:44.560 there's probably no need for me to give examples but we could start with the king ishan and horde

01:47:52.640 conquerors the golden horde and then end with the roman empire it seems that there has never been

01:47:59.920 anything like the roman empire in the history of mankind

01:48:05.600 nevertheless the potential of the barbarians gradually grew as did their population

01:48:11.520 in general the barbarians were getting stronger and begun to develop economically as we would say today

01:48:19.840 this eventually led to the collapse of the roman empire and the regime imposed by the romans

01:48:28.080 however it took five centuries for the roman empire to fall apart

01:48:34.720 the difference with what is happening now

01:48:36.640 is that all the processes of change are happening at the much faster pace than in roman times

01:48:46.880 so when does the ai empire start do you think

01:48:57.840 you're asking increasingly more complicated questions

01:49:01.920 to answer them you need to be an expert in big numbers big data and ai

01:49:08.480 mankind is currently facing many threats due to the genetic researches it is now possible to create

01:49:15.280 a superhuman a specialized human being a genetically engineered athlete scientist military man

01:49:23.040 there are reports that elon musk has already had a chip implanted in the human brain in the usa

01:49:34.000 what do you think of that

01:49:39.760 well i think there's no stopping elon musk he will do as he sees fit nevertheless you need to find some

01:49:48.960 common ground with him search for ways to persuade him i think he's a smart person i truly believe he is

01:49:56.800 so you need to reach an agreement with him because this process needs to be formalized

01:50:02.160 and subjected to certain rules

01:50:04.000 and subjected to certain rules

01:50:11.280 humanity has to consider what is going to happen due to the newest development in genetics

01:50:17.520 or in ai

01:50:20.000 one can make an approximate prediction of what will happen

01:50:22.960 what is going to happen

01:50:28.640 once mankind felt an existential threat coming from nuclear weapons

01:50:33.600 all nuclear nations begun to come to terms with one another since they realized the negligent use of

01:50:39.920 nuclear weaponry could drive humanity to extinction

01:50:48.320 it is impossible to stop research in genetics or ai today just as it was impossible to stop the use of gunpowder back in the day

01:50:56.720 but as soon as we realize that the threat comes from unbridled and uncontrolled development of ai

01:51:08.000 or genetics or any other field the time will come to reach an international agreement on how to regulate these things

01:51:17.760 i appreciate all the time you've given us i just got to ask you one last question and that's about

01:51:23.120 someone who's very famous in the united states probably not here evan gershkovitz who's the wall street journal reporter he's 32

01:51:31.120 um and he's been in prison for almost a year

01:51:34.160 this is a huge story in the united states and i just want to ask you directly

01:51:37.920 without getting into the details of it or your version of what happened if as a sign of your decency

01:51:43.440 you would be willing to

01:51:45.440 release him to us and we'll bring him back to the united states

01:51:53.120 we have done so many gestures of what good will out of decency that i think we have run out of them

01:52:09.360 no we have never seen anyone reciprocate to us in a similar manner

01:52:13.600 however in theory we can say that we do not rule out that we can do that

01:52:22.480 if our partners take reciprocal steps

01:52:27.600 when i talk about the partners i first of all refer to special services

01:52:34.000 special services are in contact with one another they are talking about the matter in question

01:52:39.360 there is no taboo to settle this issue we are willing to solve it

01:52:48.320 but there are certain terms being discussed via special services channels

01:52:55.200 i believe an agreement can be reached

01:52:58.960 so typically i mean this stuff has happened for obviously centuries one country catches another spy

01:53:04.320 within its borders it trades it for one of its own intel guys in another country

01:53:08.800 i think what makes it and it's not my business but what makes this difference is the guy's obviously

01:53:13.360 not a spy he's a kid and maybe he was breaking your law in some way but he's not a super spy and

01:53:18.320 everybody knows that and he's being held hostage in exchange which is true with respect it's true and

01:53:22.960 everyone knows it's true so maybe he's in a different category maybe it's not fair to ask

01:53:29.520 for you know somebody else in exchange for letting him out maybe it degrades russia to do that

01:53:33.760 you know you can give different interpretations to what constitutes a spy but there are certain

01:53:47.520 things provided by law if person gets secret information and does that in conspiratorial manner

01:53:54.880 then this is a qualified as espionage and that is exactly what he was doing he was receiving classified

01:54:02.880 confidential information and he did it covertly maybe he did that out of carelessness

01:54:10.000 or his own initiative considering the sheer fact this is qualified as espionage the fact has been

01:54:17.840 proven as he was caught red-handed when he was receiving this information if it had been some

01:54:24.240 far-fetched excuse some fabrication something not proven it would have been different story then

01:54:30.720 but he was caught red-handed when he was secretly getting confidential information what is it but

01:54:38.320 are you suggesting that he was working for the us government or nato or he was just a reporter who

01:54:43.040 was given material he wasn't supposed to have those seem like very different very different things

01:54:48.560 i don't know who he was working for but i would like to reiterate that getting classified information

01:55:03.760 in secret is called espionage and he was working for the u.s special services some other agencies

01:55:12.720 i don't think he was working for monaco as monaco is hardly interested in getting that information

01:55:22.160 it is up to special services to come to an agreement some groundwork has been laid there are people who

01:55:29.840 in our view are not connected with special services let me tell you a story about a person serving a

01:55:37.120 sentence in an allied country of the u.s that person due to patriotic sentiments eliminated a bandit in

01:55:46.400 one of the european capitals during the events in the caucasus do you know what he was doing

01:55:56.800 i don't want to say that but i will do it anyway he was laying our soldiers taken prisoner on the road

01:56:04.080 and then drove his car over their heads what kind of person is that can he even be called human

01:56:16.000 but there was a patriot who eliminated him in one of the european capitals

01:56:22.880 whether he did it of his own volition or not that is a different question

01:56:27.200 he committed something different

01:56:40.320 he's not just a journalist i reiterate he's a journalist who was secretly getting confidential

01:56:46.800 information yes it is different but still i'm talking about other people who are essentially

01:56:53.680 controlled by the u.s authorities wherever they are serving a sentence there is an ongoing dialogue

01:57:01.600 between the special services this has to be resolved in a calm responsible and professional manner

01:57:09.040 they are keeping in touch so let them do their work

01:57:14.160 i do not rule out that the person you refer to mr gerskowitz may return to his motherland

01:57:19.680 by the end of the day it does not make any sense to keep him in prison in russia we want the u.s special

01:57:26.800 services to think about how they can contribute to achieving the goals our special services are pursuing

01:57:34.320 we are ready to talk moreover the talks are underway and there have been many successful examples of

01:57:41.840 these talks crowned with success probably this is going to be crowned with success as well

01:57:49.680 but we have to come to an agreement i hope you let him out mr president thank you

01:58:01.440 i also want him to return to his homeland at last i'm absolutely sincere but let me say once again

01:58:09.840 the dialogue continues the more public we render things of this nature the more difficult it becomes

01:58:16.560 to resolve them everything has to be done in calm manner i wonder if that's i wonder if that's true

01:58:22.720 with the war though also i mean i just want to i guess i want to ask one more question which is

01:58:28.320 and maybe you don't want to say so for strategic reasons but are you worried that what's happening in

01:58:35.040 ukraine could lead to something much larger and much more horrible and how motivated are you

01:58:41.440 just to call the u.s government and say let's come to terms

01:58:54.480 i already said that we did not refuse to talk we're willing to negotiate it is the western side and

01:59:01.920 ukraine is obviously a satellite state of the u.s it is evident i do not want you to take it as if i'm

01:59:10.000 looking for a strong word or an insult but we both understand what is happening

01:59:18.880 the financial support 72 billion u.s dollars was provided germany rings second then other european

01:59:27.280 countries come dozens of billions of u.s dollars are going to ukraine there's a huge influx of weapons

01:59:36.320 in this case you should tell the current ukrainian leadership to stop and come to negotiating table

01:59:42.720 rescind this absurd decree we did not refuse sure but you already said it i didn't think you meant it

01:59:49.200 as an insult because you already said correctly it's been reported that ukraine was prevented from

01:59:54.800 negotiating a peace settlement by the former british prime minister acting on behalf of the

01:59:58.800 biden administration so of course there's a satellite big countries control small countries that's not

02:00:02.800 new and that's why i asked about dealing directly with the biden administration which is making these

02:00:08.080 decisions not president zelensky of ukraine

02:00:20.080 well if the zelensky administration in ukraine refused to negotiate i assume they did it under the

02:00:27.360 instruction from washington if washington believes it to be the wrong decision let it abandon it let it find

02:00:34.960 a delicate excuse so that no one is insulted let it come up with the way out it was not us who made

02:00:42.960 this decision it was them so let them go back on it that is it however they made the wrong decision and

02:00:52.400 now we have to look for a way out of the situation to correct their mistakes they did it so let them

02:00:59.120 corrected themselves we support this so i just want to make sure i'm not misunderstanding what you're

02:01:04.480 saying i don't think that i am i think you're saying you want a negotiated settlement to what's

02:01:08.960 happening in ukraine right and we made it we prepared the huge document in istanbul that was initialed by the

02:01:22.720 the head of the ukrainian delegation he affixed his signature to some of the provisions not to

02:01:28.560 all of it he put his signature and then he himself said we were ready to sign it and the

02:01:35.360 war would have been over long ago 18 months ago however prime minister johnson came talked us out of

02:01:42.480 it and we missed that chance well you missed it you made a mistake let them get back to that that is all

02:01:50.880 why do we have to bother ourselves and correct somebody else's mistakes i know one can say it

02:01:57.280 is our mistake it was us who intensified the situation and decided to put an end to the war

02:02:04.560 that started in 2014 in donbas as i have already said by means of weapons let me get back to furthering

02:02:13.200 history i already told you this we were just discussing let us go back to 1991 when we were promised that

02:02:22.720 nato would not expand to 2008 when the doors to nato opened to the declaration of state sovereignty of

02:02:30.800 ukraine declaring ukraine a neutral state let us go back to the fact that nato and u.s military bases

02:02:38.480 started to appear on the territory ukraine creating threats to us let us go back to coup d'etat in

02:02:45.520 ukraine in 2014 it is pointless though isn't it we may go back and forth endlessly but they stopped

02:02:53.840 negotiations is it a mistake yes correct it we are ready what else is needed do you think it's too

02:03:02.320 humiliating at this point for nato to accept russian control of what was two years ago ukrainian territory

02:03:11.360 i said let them think how to do it with dignity there are options if there is a will

02:03:27.040 up until now there has been the uproar and screaming about inflicting a strategic defeat

02:03:32.240 and russia on the battlefield now they are apparently coming to realize that it is difficult to achieve

02:03:41.280 if possible at all in my opinion it is impossible by definition it is never going to happen it seems to

02:03:50.160 me that now those who are in power in the west have come to realize this as well

02:03:55.360 if so if the realization has set in they have to think what to do next we are ready for this dialogue

02:04:05.440 would you be willing to say congratulations nato you won and just keep the situation where it is now

02:04:18.560 you know it is a subject matter for the negotiations no one is willing to conduct or

02:04:24.640 to put it more accurately they are willing but do not know how to do it i know they want to it is

02:04:33.280 not just i see it but i know they do want it but they are struggling to understand how to do it

02:04:40.560 they have driven the situation to the point where we are at it is not us who have done that it is our

02:04:47.440 partners opponents who have done that well now let them think how to reverse the situation

02:04:54.800 we're not against it it would be funny if it were not so sad

02:05:03.840 this endless mobilization in ukraine the hysteria the domestic problems sooner or later it will result

02:05:11.360 in agreement you know this probably sounds strange given the current situation

02:05:18.240 but the relations between the two peoples will be rebuilt anyway

02:05:29.920 it will take a lot of time but they will heal

02:05:36.720 i'll give you very unusual examples

02:05:39.040 there is a combat encounter on the battlefield here's specific example ukrainian soldiers got

02:05:49.440 encircled this is an example from real life our soldiers were shouting to them there is no chance

02:05:57.200 surrender yourselves come out and you will be alive

02:06:00.800 you will be alive suddenly the ukrainian soldiers were screaming from there in russian perfect russian

02:06:08.000 saying russians do not surrender and all of them perished

02:06:15.360 they still identify themselves as russian

02:06:17.600 what is happening what is happening is to a certain extent an element of a civil war

02:06:28.240 everyone in the west thinks that the russian people have been split by hostilities forever

02:06:32.800 no they will be reunited the unity is still there

02:06:44.240 why are the ukrainian authorities dismantling the ukrainian orthodox church

02:06:51.200 because it brings together not only the territory it brings together our souls

02:06:56.320 no one will be able to separate the souls

02:07:06.960 shall we end here or is there anything else

02:07:12.560 no i think that's great thank you mr president

02:07:26.320 so

02:07:38.640 it's

02:07:45.440 you

The Tucker Carlson Show - February 09, 2024

Vladimir Putin

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