TRIGGERnometry - Is Ukraine Winning？ - Tom Cooper

00:00:00.000 What went wrong? It is the Putin system that went wrong.

00:00:04.160 In this Putin system, everything is based on actually one factor,

00:00:10.580 which is survival of Putin as president of Russia.

00:00:15.140 In most of cases, system Putin has doomed this part of the operation to failure.

00:00:22.000 Why? Because Putin has assigned his favorites into specific positions within the Russian armed forces.

00:00:28.420 So, nobody is going to challenge him if he's got a bad idea.

00:00:33.460 If he says, you know, I think this is what happens,

00:00:36.460 is it very unlikely that the generals are going to be like,

00:00:38.640 oh, hold on a second, because if we do this, then X is going to happen.

00:00:42.780 The problem is, this is the way you see it, and this is the way plenty of other people see it.

00:00:47.120 But Putin, in his own position, he's constantly seeing himself surrounded by competition,

00:00:53.180 by contrahands, by opposition or whatever, you know, some kind of threat for him.

00:00:57.560 It's different from his point of view, and this is what we have to keep in mind,

00:01:01.160 that Putin sees these things entirely differently than you do, than anybody else does.

00:01:05.920 Putin is Putin. He's not you, he's not me, he's not somebody else, he's just Putin.

00:01:10.340 For the West, it's better, or in the interest of politicians and the economy,

00:01:14.240 it's better to fight a war to profit, not to win.

00:01:17.140 Because if you fight to win, you, you know, you send 1,000 artillery pieces to Ukraine,

00:01:22.160 Ukraine defeats Russia tomorrow in the morning, and the war is over.

00:01:27.540 Party's over.

00:01:28.560 Yeah, and what then?

00:01:30.520 Nobody's earning anything from that. Nobody.

00:01:32.620 Hello, and welcome to Trigonometry.

00:01:45.480 I'm Francis Foster.

00:01:46.980 I'm Constantine Kissin.

00:01:48.020 And this is a show for you if you want honest conversations with fascinating people.

00:01:53.580 Our brilliant guest today is a military analyst and historian

00:01:56.880 who's been one of the most objective voices covering the conflict in Ukraine.

00:02:00.900 Tom Cooper, welcome to Trigonometry.

00:02:03.400 Thank you very much. Very nice to be with you.

00:02:05.580 Well, it's great to have you on the show.

00:02:07.240 So let's talk about the conflict.

00:02:08.920 We wanted to start by just recapping from the beginning for people who maybe saw the initial events,

00:02:15.180 didn't really follow everything that happened.

00:02:17.340 So can you just talk us through what happened in the initial phase of the Russian invasion?

00:02:24.580 Yeah, sure.

00:02:24.940 What happened early on was that there was an attempt, obviously not even properly planned,

00:02:33.100 but driven by Putin's demand for Russian or selected parts of the Russian armed forces

00:02:40.500 to overrun the Ukrainian leadership, to knock out specific parts of, or paralyze actually,

00:02:49.780 actually parts of Ukrainian armed forces, but foremost to overrun and to decapitate Ukrainian political leadership,

00:03:02.980 which means foremost government.

00:03:04.640 And the idea was obviously to land on four major airports around Kiev and from there to drive into downtown Kiev to

00:03:17.640 whether kill or at least arrest the government and replace it by somebody who would have been friendlier to Putin.

00:03:27.100 That was the original idea.

00:03:28.300 And because of this, the initial ballistic and cruise missile strikes were not as intensive or as effective as they might have been

00:03:44.060 if there was a wish to really knock out the Ukrainian armed forces right from the start

00:03:49.240 and to destroy them, so to say, their leadership as well.

00:03:53.300 So the idea was obviously to capture the government and that everything was depending on the dissolution,

00:04:00.240 capturing the government, on removing it.

00:04:03.140 And obviously there was a lot of illusion about Ukrainians, so to say, rising to greet the Russians coming in

00:04:13.240 and eventually three days later to hold military parades in Kiev and Kharkiv and everything is fine and great

00:04:20.880 and Ukraine is now Russia again.

00:04:25.280 It's really interesting the way you put that because it's in very simple terms.

00:04:31.260 Now I'm going to ask you a layman question, Tom, and take this as broadly as you want to.

00:04:39.660 But what went wrong?

00:04:41.240 Because when the invasion started, I think there were a lot of people thinking,

00:04:46.820 well, this is, you know, this is a mighty power of Russia against Ukraine.

00:04:51.200 They've got this huge army.

00:04:52.580 They've got the weaponry.

00:04:53.880 They've got the men.

00:04:55.280 Why hasn't it gone to plan?

00:04:58.200 What went wrong?

00:05:01.340 It is the Putin system that went wrong.

00:05:04.060 In this Putin system, everything is based on actually one factor,

00:05:11.000 which is survival of Putin as president of Russia,

00:05:15.960 retaining him in power so he can continue collecting cuts from,

00:05:21.340 or the cut from all the possible enterprises from the state and so on.

00:05:26.580 So enriching himself, maintaining himself in power and his friends in power.

00:05:30.340 So in order for this system to survive, they have to lie all the time.

00:05:36.000 One of the lies is that Ukrainians would be some sort of, well,

00:05:42.560 more than brotherly people to Russia, and because of this,

00:05:45.740 they would be looking forward to be very unschlussed, so to say,

00:05:52.280 or rejoined with modern Russia,

00:05:57.540 and that they would greet the Russian troops,

00:06:02.420 and that they are controlled by some sort of Nazi regime,

00:06:09.200 which is suppressing them, terrorizing and genociding Russians, and so on.

00:06:13.280 So this basic idea was a big lie.

00:06:17.500 And it came so far that even Putin lied to himself.

00:06:23.420 He fell for his own illusions.

00:06:25.000 This is what went wrong.

00:06:26.340 And because of his own illusions, he sent the Spetsnaz and the VDV, 1.00

00:06:32.880 this is airborne, Russian airborne troops,

00:06:35.580 into Ukraine under entirely wrong conditions.

00:06:40.500 He has sent them in, expecting them to meet only light resistance, if at all,

00:06:47.380 and, you know, to rapidly achieve their aims.

00:06:54.340 And this is what didn't work, because the Ukrainians rose, 1.00

00:06:57.320 and even if there was lots of chaos,

00:06:59.420 and even if there was, you know, shock and surprise by this initial attack,

00:07:03.580 they took up arms and defended and fought back.

00:07:08.700 This is what was unexpected for the Russians.

00:07:12.140 And Tom, when you talk about things going wrong,

00:07:14.560 when you describe the initial phase of the attack,

00:07:17.020 which is attempting to take over the airport and decapitate the regime,

00:07:20.860 it sounds a little bit to me like what a superpower might do

00:07:25.760 to a small country in the Middle East.

00:07:27.960 You come in, you remove the head of the regime,

00:07:30.400 and then you take over, and it obviously didn't go down that way.

00:07:34.160 But after that, we obviously saw these columns coming in from the north

00:07:38.560 and the big attack in the south, and obviously the push in the east.

00:07:42.560 And those haven't, even in the initial phase,

00:07:45.700 they made some progress, but they were repelled.

00:07:48.700 Can you talk to us about that phase of the invasion as well?

00:07:51.720 Yes, of course.

00:07:52.300 Yes, it was an idea, you know, of a quick takeover

00:07:58.400 that was fundamental to the entire plan, if there was really a plan.

00:08:03.700 The way the things looked like, Putin didn't even discuss this plan

00:08:07.120 with Shoigu and Gerasimov.

00:08:08.840 He simply ordered specific field commanders,

00:08:12.460 commanders of combined arms armies of the Russian ground forces,

00:08:17.280 to, let's say, for example, move to Brigade A from Place B to Place C

00:08:24.720 and capture the government.

00:08:28.540 It was that simple.

00:08:31.000 And then the idea was to follow up, you know,

00:08:35.140 because these light airborne troops and special troops,

00:08:37.620 they cannot hold any kind of area for an extended period of time.

00:08:42.800 They cannot do that on their own because they are lightly armed,

00:08:45.100 and they cannot do that without supplies.

00:08:47.600 This meant that they have to follow the light troops,

00:08:51.540 and this is also part of standard Russian warfighting doctrine,

00:08:56.380 so to say, to be followed by ground troops,

00:09:03.640 which in the case of Russia is always mechanized units.

00:09:07.080 They do not call them mechanized, they call them tank units,

00:09:09.380 or they call them motorized infantry or whatever else,

00:09:12.120 but they are mechanized units,

00:09:13.360 and they were to follow and to secure,

00:09:15.860 to help the special forces and airborne forces

00:09:19.420 to secure the areas they have taken during the initial strike.

00:09:26.380 And then came again,

00:09:28.360 what happened was next was twofold, so to say.

00:09:33.380 In most of cases, system Putin has doomed this part of the operation to failure.

00:09:39.500 Why? Because Putin has assigned his favorites into specific positions within the Russian armed forces.

00:09:48.140 Favorites who were permitted to enrich themselves on condition of unaccountability to anybody except for Putin,

00:09:58.280 and on condition of providing him with his cut from all the money they were pocketing all the time.

00:10:07.660 This is how Putin system, system Putin works.

00:10:10.340 It works so that you appoint your friends and less of family members,

00:10:16.340 but foremost friends or aides or associates or whoever into specific positions

00:10:22.300 where they are cashing from huge contracts.

00:10:27.540 They are signing with the state and then they are overpricing all the time and from this income they are financing Putin.

00:10:37.220 And when he needs something, he just needs to call and he's getting his money or his favors or whatever else

00:10:43.540 in return for this, for appointing people to such positions.

00:10:47.640 And it's the same in the, in the army on the other side, because of this, the army has never completed its reforms.

00:10:54.120 It's, it has never really converted itself into a professional force and the, the, the, the generals commanding it are incompetent.

00:11:03.780 They are Putin's favorites, but they are not there because they, because of merits of, because of their skills or capabilities,

00:11:09.480 but because they are Putin's favorites. Sorry for this reason.

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00:12:53.320 Tom, isn't it also part of the problem as well?

00:12:56.100 Like, you've got a guy like Putin at the top, who, to put it mildly, is a little bit ruthless, right?

00:13:02.200 So, nobody is going to challenge him if he's got a bad idea.

00:13:06.360 If he says, you know, I think this is what happens,

00:13:09.600 is it very unlikely that the generals are going to be like,

00:13:11.740 Oh, hold on a second, because if we do this, then X is going to happen.

00:13:16.820 The problem is, this is the way you see it.

00:13:19.080 And this is the way plenty of other people see it.

00:13:21.340 But Putin, in his own position, he's constantly seeing himself surrounded by competition,

00:13:29.100 by contrahands, by opposition, or whatever, you know, some kind of threat for him.

00:13:34.480 And this is why he has established, for example, the Rosgardia.

00:13:37.540 The Rosgardia is a paramilitary force, which is responsible solely to Putin.

00:13:42.120 It is not responsible to the Ministry of Defense in Moscow,

00:13:45.800 but it is responsible solely to Putin.

00:13:48.160 Why?

00:13:48.580 Because he wanted to make sure that in the case that the armed forces would stage a coup against him,

00:13:53.840 he has his own military force to counter such an operation.

00:13:57.680 So you have the Rosgardia as a sort of Praetorian guard for Putin, responsible solely to Putin.

00:14:06.520 You don't, you do not, you barely see it fighting on the front lines in Ukraine,

00:14:10.640 but it's always in the rear, securing the back, the rear areas, you know,

00:14:14.860 towns behind the front line, villages behind the front line,

00:14:18.080 checking what is the local population doing,

00:14:20.040 but also keeping an eye on the Russian armed forces fighting on the front line.

00:14:26.020 So, therefore, you know, it's different from his point of view.

00:14:29.040 And this is what we have to keep in mind,

00:14:30.620 that Putin sees these things entirely differently than you do,

00:14:34.280 than anybody else does.

00:14:37.040 Putin is Putin.

00:14:38.020 He's not you, he's not me, he's not somebody else.

00:14:40.260 He's just Putin.

00:14:41.020 Well, Tom, as someone who's from Russia, I hear everything you're saying,

00:14:45.420 and it's very familiar to me, both about Putin and the military hierarchy and so on.

00:14:51.560 But people would argue that, while obviously there were failures from the Russian invasion at the beginning,

00:14:57.220 they did manage to capture significant territory in the northeast around Kharkov.

00:15:02.360 They managed to capture a huge swathe of land in the south.

00:15:06.180 That's the point, yes.

00:15:07.000 Yes, they managed to eventually grind down the resistance in Mariupol,

00:15:11.800 in the southeast, on the Sea of Azov, and capture that.

00:15:15.000 They've made significant progress in the Donbass.

00:15:20.020 It's cost them a lot, but they have over the last six months.

00:15:24.440 Yes, eventually they had to withdraw from Kiev and so on.

00:15:28.460 But they've still made a lot of progress, I think a lot of people would credibly argue.

00:15:33.880 Why were they able to do that?

00:15:36.020 That's the point.

00:15:37.000 There was a part of, the only part of the Russian,

00:15:42.180 of this initial Putin's plan for takeover of Ukraine that did work, was in the south.

00:15:49.760 There are also the most combat experienced element of the Russian ground forces was deployed.

00:15:56.020 This is the 58th combined arms army.

00:15:59.000 And next to it, there was the 49th combined arms army.

00:16:01.820 These two armies stormed from the occupied Crimean peninsula towards the north.

00:16:09.740 And now the 58th had a very important task, which was to reach Zaporozhia and to reach Mariupol from the west.

00:16:18.960 And the 49th had at least as an important task, which was to take Kherson, take Mykolaiv, and then advance all the way to the border with Moldova.

00:16:33.820 And in that way, Putin was aiming not only to take away the entire Ukrainian coast away from Ukraine, to bring it under his control, but also to establish land connection to Transnistria.

00:16:57.380 And these two armies have, thanks to treachery, obvious treachery, on the part of, I don't know exactly which.

00:17:06.100 Treason.

00:17:07.100 Treason, yes.

00:17:07.960 Treason, but on the part of higher ranking officers in the Ukrainian armed forces, it has worked flawlessly, really.

00:17:17.600 They have reached Kherson within two or three days.

00:17:19.760 No problem.

00:17:20.560 They have closed the siege of Mariupol within two days.

00:17:24.720 The only thing that didn't work was the capture of Zaporozhia.

00:17:29.480 But otherwise, this is what brought the biggest conquest.

00:17:34.660 In comparison to this advance in the south, you have advance in Kiev area and Chernihiv areas, in the north and in Kharkiv.

00:17:43.460 All of them failed.

00:17:45.680 The 35th Combined Arms Army did manage to reach outskirts of Kiev, but in turn was almost cut off from its supply lines.

00:17:56.040 And there was this huge, because there was only one highway it could use to reach Kiev.

00:18:01.520 So it was slowed down, bogged down by its own supply problems.

00:18:05.940 The 41st Combined Arms Army, which was advancing on Chernihiv, fell apart in the process of advancing on Chernihiv,

00:18:13.680 in the face of relatively light resistance by one and a half, something like one and a half Ukrainian brigades.

00:18:20.560 So it fell apart while advancing for 70 to 80 kilometers to Chernihiv.

00:18:25.840 You have the 1st Guards Tanks Army, the elite of the Russian Armed Forces.

00:18:33.480 It fell apart while passing by Sumy and trying to advance towards Kiev from the east.

00:18:39.820 And worst of all, the two armies that were advancing, that were tasked with capturing Kharkiv, they also actually fell apart in the process.

00:18:52.300 I mean, there were only two Ukrainian brigades offering serious resistance in the Kharkiv area during the first week of war.

00:18:58.460 And they didn't manage to drive around the city.

00:19:02.940 They didn't even manage to drive.

00:19:04.100 They did manage to drive into the city for a few hours and they were destroyed to the last almost.

00:19:08.960 So this part, northern part of the invasion, failed miserably.

00:19:13.820 This is where the Russian Armed Forces fade on Putin, from Putin's point of view.

00:19:18.640 And this is why he's terribly mad about them already since months.

00:19:24.540 Also, why he's punishing them by these constant orders for assaulting heavily fortified urban areas of eastern Ukraine ever since.

00:19:36.420 On the contrary, in the south, he just, you know, ordered, OK, you have taken what you have, secure it, and that's fine with me.

00:19:42.760 They are not punished so much.

00:19:44.280 They are even reinforced by airborne troops now in August.

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00:20:18.640 So, Tom, looking at the situation now, do you think the Russians are going to be happy with what they have, or would they regard this invasion as a failure at this particular moment?

00:20:31.620 OK.

00:20:32.820 When we talk about Russians, I'm again, I'm a little bit insistent in this regards. 1.00

00:20:39.420 There is Putin, and there are Russian, let's say, nationalists, chauvinists, extremists, whatever you want to call them, and then there are Russians, OK?

00:20:47.100 Now, Putin is not happy, but because he's all the time forced to downsize his aims for what he wants to do in Ukraine.

00:20:58.600 Initially, he wants to take over all of the country, then just the country east of the Dnipro River, then now, you know, just secure Luhansk and Donetsk and Kherson and Zaporozhia.

00:21:10.100 Meanwhile, he is even to less than this, and so on and so on.

00:21:14.620 Then you have the Russian extremists who are actually misused by Putin for his purposes.

00:21:22.240 This is where you get the story about the history of Russia and Ukraine is so complex and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

00:21:27.340 They are daydreaming about things, you know, and have actually no other purpose but keeping or helping keep Putin in power.

00:21:38.860 Most of them have actually no say in any kind of decision making.

00:21:42.940 They are just, you know, led to cash their income from TV appearances and so on, or by being representatives in the Duma, in the Russian parliament.

00:21:52.280 Then you have the rest of the Russians. 1.00

00:21:53.700 What is this rest of the Russians actually doing? 1.00

00:21:56.840 This is the majority of the population, over 90%.

00:21:59.680 Nobody really knows because Putin wouldn't let us know, wouldn't even let them know what do they want.

00:22:06.700 Some of them are probably pro-Putin or at least pro-Russia, against Ukraine, and really convinced that Ukraine is controlled by some kind of Nazi regime.

00:22:16.320 Others apparently do not care.

00:22:18.440 They want to survive.

00:22:19.500 They are fighting their everyday life for survival, fighting their everyday struggle for survival, nothing else, you know.

00:22:27.220 So it is making quite distinctions between this.

00:22:30.840 But the crucial point is Putin is not happy with what he has achieved or failed to achieve so far.

00:22:37.040 And he is definitely determined to continue, you know, holding as much of Ukraine as possible.

00:22:43.300 And Tom, this brings us nicely onto last week's events where there was a huge counterattack.

00:22:50.800 There was a small counterattack in the south, Niherson, and a big counterattack, which was very successful in the north.

00:22:57.560 And I am someone who's observing this conflict, and I have my loyalties, but I also try to be objective about it as well, of course.

00:23:07.420 And while I was very happy to see the counterattack succeed in the way that it did, I was a bit concerned that people in the west got overexcited about it.

00:23:17.080 Because, yes, the Russians abandoned a lot of military equipment, yes, ammunition, yes, land, but they didn't lose huge numbers of troops.

00:23:26.080 There was no major encirclements.

00:23:28.580 How significant, first of all, was the counterattack?

00:23:31.640 What should people in the west who are lay people like us watching this take away from it?

00:23:36.680 Is this some, a lot of people seem to think this is like the end of the war.

00:23:40.160 Can you tell us what this actually means?

00:23:42.900 It is just another episode in this war, nothing else.

00:23:45.660 I have to, even if trying to explain this to a layman, I have to go into a little bit of technical details.

00:23:56.520 For example, the number of brigades deployed in Kherson for this counteroffensive in late August is the same like the number of brigades deployed for this counteroffensive in eastern Kharkiv a few days later.

00:24:09.500 So the force is not that different or anything.

00:24:14.420 Where there is a difference is that in eastern Kharkiv, the Ukrainians have managed to find a sector of front line where the Russian artillery was not that overwhelming them as it is on other important parts of the front line.

00:24:30.100 And this enabled them to concentrate, particularly lots of forces, which is some seven or eight brigades on a very small area to overpower, quickly overpower the Russian front line and punch through to get into the rear of the Russian front line.

00:24:47.000 In Kherson, they didn't manage that yet in Kherson, they are all the time trying to breach the Russian front line, but so far have, with a few temporary exceptions, they have not managed to reach this breakthrough at operational level, as it's called in military vocabulary.

00:25:08.740 So what happened then?

00:25:09.740 So what happened then?

00:25:10.740 In Kherson, they have moved the front lines, they have pushed the Russians back, they have liberated a lot of places, but overall, the Russian armed forces in Kherson are still, well, depleted but intact.

00:25:21.740 They are still operational.

00:25:22.740 They are still operational.

00:25:23.740 What happened in eastern Kharkiv is that once they have breached the front line, which was a sector of front line, which was poorly occupied by the Russians, they have managed to drive through very deep into the Russian back.

00:25:39.740 What then happened was inertia, so called inertia, in response to several Russian counter attacks, all of which came from the north.

00:25:48.740 The Ukrainian troops moved, or involved Ukrainian brigades moved towards the north too.

00:25:53.740 It is also so that by trying to move from Balakleya towards the south, towards the Izium, they were slowed down by ever stronger units of Russian army.

00:26:05.740 So instead, on Izium, they went for Kupiansk instead.

00:26:10.740 This has collapsed the entire northern section of the Russian front line, really threw everybody into chaos.

00:26:17.740 And this is what resulted in this massive retreat and lots of vehicles being abandoned and so on.

00:26:23.740 And Ukrainians liberating, you know, dozens, 30, 40, 50, 60 villages, Kupiansk, and everything else, reaching the Oskil River.

00:26:32.740 But the actual aim of that operation, which is a guess, I do not have any kind of evidence for this, but this is logical, was actually to drive into the rear, into the back of the first guards tank army in the Izium area.

00:26:45.740 And this is what they have, they have not initially managed.

00:26:50.740 First, there was too much resistance.

00:26:52.740 And second, the road network between Kupiansk and Izium, there's only one highway.

00:26:58.740 It is not a direct highway.

00:27:00.740 It is not running around the Oskil River.

00:27:03.740 So they had a problem to approach this, this area.

00:27:05.740 And when they finally approached Izium, they have passed by the town, because there were too many Russian forces inside the town.

00:27:14.740 They were still resisting too fiercely.

00:27:17.740 And at that point in time, it would have been crucial for the Ukrainian troops on the southern side of the resulting bulge, so to say, to punch through the Russian front lines and to close the trap, so to say, around the first guards army.

00:27:35.740 They have attempted to do so, but they didn't manage that.

00:27:38.740 And this is why the first guards army actually managed to run away, to escape.

00:27:43.740 Of course, it has lost, what, 100, 150 tanks, and around 100 armored fighting vehicles, and so on.

00:27:51.740 But if you check the losses, you can see that Russia has lost very few artillery during this operation.

00:27:58.740 It is something like 18, 20 artillery pieces.

00:28:00.740 This is nothing.

00:28:01.740 One should keep in mind that the entire Russian front line is held together, de facto, by their artillery, by their superior artillery.

00:28:10.740 So, if they would have suffered a loss of 100 heavy guns, that would have been a massive loss for the Russians.

00:28:18.740 But tanks and infantry fighting vehicles and armored personnel carriers, Putin cannot care less, because it's not hurting him.

00:28:25.740 He has 10,000 of these stored somewhere, you know, around Russia.

00:28:29.740 He can always replace them.

00:28:31.740 But artillery pieces, this would have been much harder to replace.

00:28:35.740 And on the contrary, they have managed to extract most of their artillery towards the Svatovy area.

00:28:41.740 And those, as much as an immense success, because, especially because, you know, it is the first major Ukrainian offensive that has really been successful on its own, so to say.

00:28:55.740 The Ukrainians have really beaten the Russians. 0.71

00:28:58.740 This is why it is important.

00:28:59.740 This operation is far from ending this war.

00:29:02.740 It is just another episode in this war.

00:29:05.740 The First Guards Army has restarted itself.

00:29:07.740 The Russians have established a new front line along the Oskil River.

00:29:10.740 That's it.

00:29:11.740 You know, now the Ukrainians have to find another place where they are going to attack again and perhaps achieve something similar. 1.00

00:29:19.740 In the meantime, we shouldn't forget that the Russians remain on offensive, on initiative, all the way further down south, you know, southeastern Ukraine.

00:29:29.740 They are still attacking Bakhmut. 0.94

00:29:31.740 They are still attacking along the former line of control and so on and so on.

00:29:35.740 So it is far away, far away from ending this war.

00:29:40.740 And Tom, are there causes for optimism?

00:29:44.740 Because I was reading some of your articles on Medium, there's a lot of, I think it's weaponry that the Ukrainians haven't yet received yet.

00:29:55.740 Which means that they'll be strengthened when it comes to the battles in the coming months.

00:30:01.740 For cautious optimism.

00:30:04.740 The point is that, yes, the USA has promised yet more weaponry, but most of that is ammunition.

00:30:11.740 Ukraine is not about to receive yet more heavy artillery.

00:30:16.740 And that is the problem.

00:30:18.740 Russia remains superior in regards of artillery and vastly superior to Ukraine.

00:30:24.740 Just like before these two operations.

00:30:26.740 This is what is holding Kherson together, Russian forces in Kherson together.

00:30:30.740 This is why their front line is not collapsing, because they still have more artillery than Ukrainians over there. 0.98

00:30:35.740 Which means they are still capable of hampering Ukrainian attempts to drive between their Russian fortifications, between Russian strongholds, and outflank them and cut them off from their supply lines.

00:30:48.740 This is the reason why that's so important, the artillery.

00:30:52.740 The West hasn't, still hasn't taken care to provide enough artillery to Ukraine.

00:31:02.740 And this is not going to change anytime soon.

00:31:05.740 And why not, Tom?

00:31:07.740 Why not?

00:31:08.740 Well, as we can see, it's a little bit complex issue.

00:31:13.740 For example, the United States and the European part of the NATO have lots of old artillery pieces, caliber 155mm, in their reserve.

00:31:23.740 They are stored for 20 years, sometimes longer, and so on.

00:31:27.740 They're not in use, but they're not delivering them.

00:31:30.740 What they do deliver are artillery pieces or weapon systems which are currently in production.

00:31:36.740 Why?

00:31:37.740 Because this is bringing profit.

00:31:39.740 It means that governments, whether the US or governments of the European part of the NATO, can spend to buy yet more weapons that are currently in production from the defense sector.

00:31:56.740 This is pure profit, nothing else.

00:31:59.740 This is the sole reason.

00:32:01.740 Why is that so?

00:32:02.740 This is because the defense sector, the companies which are selling these weapons, which are manufacturing them, sorry, this is like in every other aspect of our economic life.

00:32:14.740 They are bribing governments to buy weapons, not to deliver old ones from the reserve.

00:32:20.740 That's how it works.

00:32:21.740 What I was going to ask you then, I suppose the obvious question is, does the West actually want Ukraine to win?

00:32:28.740 Yes, but the West does want Ukraine to win, but in the West you do not have, the politicians in the West, they do not have this clear idea of fighting war to win.

00:32:44.740 For them, fighting a war is an opportunity to profit for companies, for private and corporate interests, supporting them, paying their election campaigns and so on, for such interest to profit.

00:33:01.740 So you have the same situation like all the time since Vietnam already, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, you know, for the West, it's better in the interest of politicians and the economy, it's better to fight a war to profit, not to win.

00:33:14.740 Because if you fight to win, you, you know, you send 1000 artillery pieces to Ukraine, Ukraine defeats Russia tomorrow in the morning, which is now hyperbola.

00:33:25.740 And the war is over.

00:33:28.740 Party is over.

00:33:29.740 Yeah.

00:33:30.740 And what then?

00:33:31.740 Nobody's earning anything from that.

00:33:33.740 Nobody.

00:33:34.740 But if you, you know, keep Ukraine afloat and supply it with weapons, which are currently under production, your sponsors in the rear, the guys in the shade, in the shadow, they are profiting, everything is fine, you know, and we go on just like nothing happened.

00:33:50.740 The only thing disturbing all of this, the party is, is this story with, with gas deliveries and high energy prices.

00:33:58.740 Oh, gosh, this is a little bit disturbing because, you know, the population is against this and we have to do something and curb the high energy prices.

00:34:06.740 We have to keep this under, under control, you know, at least to pretend we are trying to keep them under control and so on, although it would be very easy.

00:34:14.740 But well, that's liberal democracy and economy.

00:34:20.740 And Tom, what difference is winter going to make to this conflict?

00:34:24.740 Because it's around the corner in a couple of months and Ukrainian winters are notoriously bitter.

00:34:30.740 Yeah.

00:34:31.740 Well, what is making, it's going to bring bigger advantages for Ukraine.

00:34:35.740 The primary reason so far why the Russian armed forces were relatively successful, which is actually just one segment of Russian armed forces.

00:34:44.740 This is the ground forces have been successful the last, let's say, since April, since it, since it got warmer in Ukraine,

00:34:52.740 is the combination between their, their UAVs, Orlan 10 in particular, and their artillery.

00:35:00.740 Orlan 10 is a very rather, or rather primitive military system.

00:35:08.740 It's not even military.

00:35:09.740 It's actually only the, the fuselage and wings are military grade.

00:35:13.740 Everything else is actually bought on, on open market.

00:35:15.740 You know, Canon cameras and Canon video cameras and, and ECM systems.

00:35:20.740 Everything they install into these UAVs is civilian grade equipment, which means that it cannot work at temperatures below five degrees centigrade.

00:35:31.740 Which in turn means as soon as it's freezing outside, the Russians are going to be blind along the battlefield. 0.65

00:35:39.740 Then they are going to have huge problems with finding the Ukrainians along with that. 0.94

00:35:44.740 This is why Russians have now rushed to buy UAVs from, from Iran, because Iran, thanks to, to Chinese support and, and technical support and know-how, 0.86

00:35:53.740 and even organizational production in Iran, Iran is capable of delivering military grade UAVs.

00:36:00.740 So the Russians are obviously planning to replace their, their, their own UAVs, which are useless in winter, by Iranian UAVs. 0.91

00:36:07.740 We're going to see if this is going to be effective or not.

00:36:10.740 But generally, Ukraine should be on advantage.

00:36:14.740 So that's very interesting because I would have thought that it would, you know, it would help the Russians because they push them back and they can. 1.00

00:36:22.740 And look, again, I'm a layman, but you know, you can restrict, you know, the flow of goods and whatever else.

00:36:27.740 He just thinks the Russians are invulnerable to the cold.

00:36:30.740 Yeah.

00:36:31.740 Yeah, exactly.

00:36:32.740 He spent a lot of time around me.

00:36:33.740 Yeah.

00:36:34.740 But I, I would have thought that they, it would, it would help them to kind of not starve the Ukrainians out, but certainly make things far more uncomfortable for them. 1.00

00:36:43.740 I mean, we have to distinguish between Ukrainian armed forces and Ukrainian civilians.

00:36:47.740 We have, there are millions and millions of Ukrainians in Eastern Ukraine feeling this war on their, you know, direct impact upon their everyday life.

00:36:57.740 They are going to be freezing.

00:36:59.740 They are going to be hungry and so on.

00:37:01.740 And they are not going to survive without extensive aid from, from the West and from Kiev and so on.

00:37:07.740 This is one part of the story, but Ukrainian armed forces, they have no problem.

00:37:11.740 They are already in the process of distributing winter clothing and winter equipment on their, to their troops.

00:37:18.740 So this is not going to be that much of a problem.

00:37:21.740 Clothing, food, fuel, as you can see, the Ukrainian supply system is working perfectly.

00:37:27.740 And the Russians have massive problems just trying to find it, you know, in order to hit it, for example, from the air with, with, with cruise missiles, ballistic missiles and so on.

00:37:38.740 They're not successful in this regards.

00:37:40.740 So this is not a problem for the Ukrainian armed forces.

00:37:44.740 On the contrary, because of the system put in and because of all the lies with which they are feeding their people for, for decades already.

00:37:51.740 And because now they're starting to realize the extension of these lies, the morale is very low.

00:38:00.740 And then you have the system put in in regards of command system, where the, where the Putin is bypassing all the normal chain of command in the armed forces.

00:38:09.740 And all the issue, issuing direct orders upon field commanders, which is spoiling everything.

00:38:16.740 He's throwing, you know, every single day, he's throwing the Russian military doctrine and strategy out of the window, ignoring them completely and issuing.

00:38:24.740 Issuing ever new orders for assaults on specific objects and so on, which result in heavy casualties.

00:38:32.740 But he can't care about this.

00:38:34.740 Why? Because he thinks that his favorites owe him a favor or returning a favor, all the favors he has granted to them.

00:38:44.740 And so this is a vicious circle inside Russia, which is going to result, you know, in further debacles like this one in Eastern Kharkiv now.

00:38:54.740 This is going to happen time and again.

00:38:56.740 However, in between of this or such debacles, there are going to be, you know, periods of many months,

00:39:03.740 where the Ukrainians will have to maneuver to find such big spots in Russian frontlines in order to exploit them.

00:39:11.740 That is going to be crucial for the coming winter.

00:39:14.740 Hey, Konstantin, do you want better mental health?

00:39:18.740 I'm from Russia. We don't have mental health.

00:39:20.740 So how do you deal with mental health?

00:39:22.740 You drink vodka, then go out and wrestle bear.

00:39:25.740 If you live, you feel better. If you die, you're not real man.

00:39:29.740 What about the bear's feelings?

00:39:31.740 It's Russian bear. It has no feelings.

00:39:33.740 People don't always realize that physical symptoms like headaches, teeth grinding,

00:39:38.740 and even digestive issues can be indicators of stress.

00:39:42.740 And let's not forget about doom scrolling.

00:39:44.740 Not sleeping enough, sleeping too much, under eating and overeating.

00:39:49.740 Sleeping too much, under eating. This is Western disease. 1.00

00:39:53.740 Therapy has really helped me in my life to concentrate and focus.

00:39:57.740 It's really important to have someone impartial who you can talk to about the tricky issues that you're struggling to deal with.

00:40:04.740 Therapy has played a really important role in helping me to deal with my ADHD and become better in all areas of my life.

00:40:13.740 Why is he telling them how weak he is? Drink vodka, feel better.

00:40:17.740 BetterHelp is customized online therapy that offers video, phone, and even live chat sessions with your therapist.

00:40:25.740 So you don't have to see anyone on camera if you don't want to.

00:40:29.740 Trigonometry funds get 10% off their first month at BetterHelp.com forward slash trigger, especially if they're not real men.

00:40:37.740 That's B-E-T-T-E-R-H-E-L-P dot com slash trigger.

00:40:44.740 Tom, just a very quick question before I move on the conversation.

00:40:49.740 What is your estimate for casualties on both sides?

00:40:53.740 I prefer not to mix into such discussions because we do not have any kind of firm figures.

00:41:01.740 We do have official claims, de facto, from Ukraine.

00:41:06.740 We have, next to nothing from the Russian side, but we have nothing really dependable in these regards.

00:41:14.740 I do estimate that Ukrainian casualties are actually higher than Russian.

00:41:19.740 I don't know how much, but it plays in the nature of things.

00:41:23.740 They were lightly armed and they are poorly protected, especially early during the war.

00:41:29.740 And as much as more combat experience than the Russians. 0.72

00:41:32.740 Meanwhile, they are offensive.

00:41:34.740 When you are in offensive, you are automatically suffering heavy casualties and so on and so on.

00:41:39.740 But generally, I'm sorry for people who have died.

00:41:45.740 I'm sorry for those who, even more for those who are maimed or injured in whatever other way.

00:41:53.740 But I find it pointless to talk about casualties because it's leading nowhere.

00:41:58.740 We are discussing propaganda from both sides and discussing propaganda is pointless.

00:42:03.740 Sorry for that.

00:42:04.740 No, no, of course, I agree. That makes sense.

00:42:06.740 Does that make sense?

00:42:07.740 That's why I asked you, because I have no idea, even though I keep a pretty close eye on the conflict,

00:42:12.740 because you like you say, both sides, you know, they have the point of communication and war is to win.

00:42:19.740 It's not to communicate the truth.

00:42:21.740 So you talked about you talked about the civilian infrastructure and so on.

00:42:28.740 And one of the things we saw as it seems to me, at least correct me if I'm wrong, is the immediate reaction from Russia to the Kharkiv counter assault has been to attack civilian infrastructure, power lines, water supply lines, etc.

00:42:43.740 Yeah.

00:42:44.740 What do you make of that? Is that just, you know, the Russian regime being angry and lashing out?

00:42:49.740 Is it more strategic? What's going on there?

00:42:52.740 It's part of that, you know, primarily, it's a punishment.

00:42:57.740 We shouldn't forget that as ex-KGB, Putin is a foremost an extortionist.

00:43:03.740 He's going to blackmail everybody and everything.

00:43:05.740 He is ruling by blackmail.

00:43:07.740 He came to power by blackmail.

00:43:09.740 He's ruling by blackmail.

00:43:10.740 And his sole political program is, you know, whom can I blackmail today?

00:43:14.740 And it is the same in this case.

00:43:17.740 Okay, you Ukrainians are resisting me, then have something of this. 1.00

00:43:21.740 Here is your resistance.

00:43:22.740 I'm destroying your infrastructure.

00:43:24.740 It's as simple as that. 0.57

00:43:26.740 Punishment.

00:43:27.740 I see.

00:43:28.740 And one of the things we talked about earlier in the conversation that I really wanted to discuss with you is you mentioned that in addition to Putin's regime and ordinary Russians,

00:43:37.740 there are also another sliver of people in between who are actually protesting against Putin privately or in their private telegram channels and whatever,

00:43:48.740 who are saying that Putin is weak and he's not doing enough.

00:43:52.740 And what he needs to do is announce full mobilization, put the economy on a war footing, mobilize every man between 18 and 45 or whatever it would be, 35,

00:44:05.740 and announce that this is no longer a special military operation.

00:44:10.740 This is a full war.

00:44:11.740 Russia is at war.

00:44:12.740 And use the entirety of the Russian economy and military to defeat Ukraine.

00:44:18.740 That's what they're calling for.

00:44:20.740 That hasn't happened so far.

00:44:22.740 Do you think it will?

00:44:23.740 No, it's not going to happen.

00:44:25.740 Why not?

00:44:26.740 There are plenty of reasons for this.

00:44:28.740 The first is it would cost Putin lots of his money, which means what he is extracting from the Russian economy and state every single day.

00:44:38.740 That would cost him too much for this.

00:44:41.740 But Tom, how much money can a man need?

00:44:43.740 He's already one of the richest people in the world.

00:44:45.740 I don't know.

00:44:46.740 I mean, there are stories about him bunkering, what, 800 billion somewhere in the West or in China and wherever.

00:44:55.740 I don't know how much more he needs.

00:44:57.740 I don't know.

00:44:58.740 But he obviously has no end of needs in this regard.

00:45:01.740 Okay.

00:45:02.740 But let's get back to your earlier question.

00:45:05.740 The next problem is that the Russian state and administration is, as we call it in German, kaput.

00:45:12.740 It's broken down.

00:45:13.740 I mean, it's bordering on collapse.

00:45:16.740 It's not working.

00:45:17.740 So let's say you try to, he announces general mobilization.

00:45:21.740 First of all, he would have a massive problem just with, you know, how many people would actually follow that call.

00:45:27.740 There are well-informed Russians who say more than 50% would ignore it.

00:45:34.740 It would be an absolute catastrophe for Putin.

00:45:38.740 Then secondly, this would result in huge gutterings of armed people around Russia, which is, which is a threat for Putin.

00:45:48.740 Sorry.

00:45:49.740 Whether they are controlled or not by officers of his armed forces is secondary.

00:45:54.740 It is a threat for Putin.

00:45:56.740 Thirdly, what would the Russian armed forces get from that?

00:46:01.740 They would get, let's say, 1 million, perhaps 2 million of recruits.

00:46:06.740 Okay.

00:46:07.740 And who would train all these people?

00:46:09.740 Who would keep them supplied?

00:46:10.740 Who would keep them, you know, warm?

00:46:12.740 Who would tell them where to sleep by night?

00:46:15.740 There are too few officers and non-commissioned officers left in the Russian armed forces to do this kind of job, organization and logistics for such a huge army.

00:46:27.740 So it would take, you know, they would get millions of people into the army and these would stand around the barracks and we don't know what to do.

00:46:35.740 Because there are too few commanders to command them, actually.

00:46:38.740 Just to command them, not to talk about training them.

00:46:41.740 And then you have, you know, all of this is rolling further.

00:46:46.740 Who is going to issue them with weapons?

00:46:48.740 Who is going to train them on weapons?

00:46:49.740 Who is going to form coherent units from them, you know, from platoon up to company level, to battalion level, to brigade level, to divisionary level?

00:46:58.740 There is not enough of officers.

00:47:01.740 There is not enough of non-commissioned officers left in the Russian armed forces to do the job.

00:47:06.740 So what they are doing is to recruit from different associations, veteran associations.

00:47:13.740 These are people who are already trained and they have the history of service in armed forces.

00:47:20.740 And they are already, you know, it's easier to refresh their training in two or three weeks and send them to the front line.

00:47:25.740 This is what they are doing.

00:47:26.740 Most of such people are ending serving in private military companies, which is one of the things which that is, I would say, quite ignored in the rest.

00:47:37.740 Just how many battalion tactical groups, for example, Redout, private military company or Wagner, which is much better known, have on the front lines.

00:47:47.740 How dependent on their operations is Putin meanwhile.

00:47:52.740 This is something nobody is talking about.

00:47:54.740 Everybody is talking about Russian armed forces.

00:47:56.740 But whenever you check all the major advances of Russia over the last four or five months, it's always a private military company that led the advance,

00:48:06.740 that led to penetration of the Ukrainian front lines.

00:48:09.740 So it's working a different way.

00:48:13.740 There is a mobilization already.

00:48:15.740 I want to come back to the PMC.

00:48:18.740 Yeah, I want to come back to the PMC, but go ahead, Francis.

00:48:20.740 No, but Tom, see, maybe I take a romanticized approach to this and I think to myself, you know, nobody is going to fight harder for their country than a Ukrainian soldier or a Russian soldier.

00:48:32.740 What you're saying is these people are effectively mercenaries.

00:48:35.740 Yeah.

00:48:36.740 But doesn't that mean that they're going to have less allegiance to the cause that they're fighting for because they're there to get paid, essentially?

00:48:44.740 What should an average Russian fight for in Ukraine?

00:48:47.740 It's as simple as that.

00:48:50.740 I mean, okay, Putin is promising, you know, you can take loot with you and if you get killed, your family is going to get a new larder.

00:48:58.740 Oh, great.

00:48:59.740 Would you like to go fighting somewhere for a new larder?

00:49:01.740 I wouldn't.

00:49:02.740 It's as simple as that.

00:49:03.740 So, you know, what Putin is getting is some, so to say, outcasts in his armed forces or weapons freaks, you know, such people.

00:49:16.740 They are already serving in armed forces.

00:49:18.740 When they get shot away, he has to find some kind of replacements.

00:49:22.740 So the easiest way to finding a replacement is not a mass or general mobilization, but recruiting veterans.

00:49:29.740 And this is what he is doing.

00:49:31.740 And this is how he come already so far that even veterans of the war of the Soviet war in Afghanistan in 1980s are serving on the front lines.

00:49:39.740 I mean, these are people in the 60s.

00:49:40.740 Wow.

00:49:41.740 Yeah.

00:49:42.740 And this is how it works in Russia because normal way doesn't work. 0.70

00:49:46.740 What is normal to you or to me here in Europe, in the UK or in the United States is not normal in Russia. 0.94

00:49:53.740 Russia has its own normality.

00:49:55.740 This is entirely different than in our case.

00:49:57.740 You shouldn't forget that 50% of Russians do not even have a water closet inside their home. 0.98

00:50:01.740 They have to go outside into some kind of cabin.

00:50:06.740 Okay.

00:50:07.740 What should they fight for in Ukraine?

00:50:11.740 It's either for loot or for larder in the case.

00:50:14.740 They can get killed or something else.

00:50:16.740 Or for money.

00:50:17.740 Or for money in a private military company, as you say.

00:50:20.740 So this is what I was going to ask you about because I agree with you.

00:50:22.740 I've been following.

00:50:23.740 And it seems to me that all the breakthroughs certainly in the Donbass are being made by these private military companies.

00:50:29.740 So why is their combat effectiveness higher?

00:50:32.740 Because I see videos of Evgeny Prigozhin, the head of Wagner, recruiting people from prisons now.

00:50:38.740 That's what they're doing.

00:50:41.740 How are they having such success relative to the rest of the Russian armed forces?

00:50:45.740 Well, relative success.

00:50:47.740 Because they are drafting, they are recruiting veterans, people who have combat experience, who have served.

00:50:53.740 Whether you take Wagner or Redut, these are the leading private military companies in Russia.

00:51:01.740 But let's ignore Wagner, which is well known for a while, and let's take Redut.

00:51:07.740 Redut is based right next to major airborne units in Peskov area.

00:51:15.740 So this means they are neighbor.

00:51:17.740 As soon as you, the day after you have quit your service in the airborne forces, you exit your barracks.

00:51:25.740 And vis-a-vis there is a base of Redut PMC.

00:51:30.740 So what shall you do?

00:51:33.740 Russia is huge.

00:51:35.740 Perhaps you have already some other job.

00:51:37.740 Perhaps you are going to find a job in some kind of private security company inside Russia or not.

00:51:44.740 But let's say in a significant percentage of cases, you're not going to find any kind of job.

00:51:51.740 Or at least nothing better paid, but what Redut is offering.

00:51:56.740 So you go to private military company.

00:51:58.740 And by serving such a company at earlier times, you had an outlook of, you know, seeing something of the world.

00:52:05.740 Serving in Syria, Libya, in Central African Republic.

00:52:10.740 Excuse me.

00:52:11.740 I'm smiling about this or laughing about this because, you know, for average Russian, it is a lot. 0.98

00:52:16.740 They do not manage to travel around.

00:52:18.740 They do not have the money for that.

00:52:20.740 It's true.

00:52:21.740 Yeah.

00:52:22.740 So what do you have now?

00:52:24.740 You have incentives.

00:52:25.740 Okay, let's go serving in Redut.

00:52:27.740 And Redut is full of former airborne troops.

00:52:30.740 Veteran airborne troops.

00:52:32.740 And they are sent to Kyiv together with airborne troops and Spetsna at the start of the war.

00:52:40.740 Nobody's talking about this.

00:52:41.740 I don't know why.

00:52:42.740 But they were there.

00:52:43.740 They lost an entire battalion tactical group in Kyiv or on approaches to Kyiv.

00:52:49.740 Nobody's talking about that.

00:52:50.740 Not even Ukrainians. 1.00

00:52:51.740 I don't know why.

00:52:52.740 So it's a strange situation, actually.

00:52:55.740 I think we are not paying enough attention to this aspect of Russian war effort, so to say.

00:53:02.740 But if you check the associations of such, of veteran associations, of paratroopers,

00:53:08.740 airborne troops, of Cossacks, of this and that, this is over a million of people.

00:53:12.740 So this is enough, you know, huge enough pool for Putin to recruit from them.

00:53:16.740 I love shopping for new jackets and boots this season.

00:53:19.740 And when I do, I always make sure I get cash back with Rakuten.

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00:53:48.740 And Tom, why isn't it, if you say that winter is going to favour Ukraine more,

00:53:53.740 why isn't Putin just going to go all in and just go, right, we need to make the gains now.

00:54:00.740 Let's go all in. Let's demoralise them. Let's defeat them.

00:54:04.740 And let's get this over with as soon as possible.

00:54:07.740 He's doing this all the time. He's doing this all the time.

00:54:11.740 The problem is just that due to system Putin, it's not working.

00:54:16.740 He was, you know, he was promising this Kinzhal hypersonic missile,

00:54:22.740 which is going to destroy any kind of enemy against which there are no defences.

00:54:26.740 Half the NATO is crying about we don't have these defences against this weapon.

00:54:30.740 And what happens? Eventually, Kinzhal is impossible to make operational without Western information technologies.

00:54:43.740 So what happens then? He fires one in, what was it, April or something or March.

00:54:49.740 He fires another one about a few weeks later.

00:54:51.740 And then now he has ordered a third deployment and the missile just crashed inside Russia.

00:54:58.740 It's not working. And why is it not working? Again, because of system Putin.

00:55:04.740 Imagine running a high technology enterprise under Putin's rule.

00:55:09.740 You can't do that because you need a huge investment of money.

00:55:12.740 But Putin is not investing into the Russian economy.

00:55:15.740 He's bunkering his money somewhere in the West or in China or wherever.

00:55:19.740 So you are now a CEO of, let's say, a small enterprise.

00:55:23.740 You launch something in a garage and you want to develop ITs and you want to make a hardware.

00:55:32.740 You need hardware for such an enterprise.

00:55:34.740 Where do you get this hardware? Russia is not manufacturing it.

00:55:37.740 You have to import everything from the West. 0.99

00:55:40.740 And this is already the crucial, crucial moment.

00:55:43.740 You constantly need an intake of Western high technology in order to develop Russian high technology.

00:55:51.740 And you have a massive problem with this.

00:55:53.740 This costs a lot of money, which you don't have because you all the time have to pay Putin his share.

00:55:59.740 As soon as you are successful as an entrepreneur in Russia, you have to pay Putin his cut.

00:56:05.740 Otherwise, you lose your enterprise and he appoints one of his favourites.

00:56:09.740 This is what's happening all the time under Putin's rule.

00:56:12.740 Actually, even earlier.

00:56:14.740 So it's not working.

00:56:16.740 The system is not working.

00:56:17.740 It's collapsing all the time.

00:56:18.740 It takes ages to collapse completely, but it's collapsing in the best way.

00:56:23.740 And I suppose the question leading on from that, Tom, is how long is Putin and the Russian forces,

00:56:30.740 how long are they going to have the stomach for this fight?

00:56:33.740 Because this can't carry on forever.

00:56:35.740 Surely.

00:56:36.740 I don't know.

00:56:37.740 I'm not into predicting future.

00:56:39.740 I don't have any kind of a crystal ball to say.

00:56:41.740 But you know, sooner or later, there is going to be a big collapse.

00:56:45.740 Right now, the situation is still so that Russia is a fatalist, or how else to describe them, 0.87

00:56:55.740 enough to follow their orders.

00:56:57.740 The mass of Russian troops are, you know, they are like that.

00:57:00.740 Okay.

00:57:01.740 You know, I don't have my own opinion.

00:57:03.740 My superior commander told me this.

00:57:05.740 Let's go do that.

00:57:06.740 You know, what he says.

00:57:08.740 Let's follow his orders.

00:57:09.740 That's the way they think.

00:57:10.740 And when you check some of the interviews of Russian prisoners of war taken by Ukrainian journalists,

00:57:17.740 there is one who is specialized in such interviews.

00:57:20.740 And you even hear from Russian soldiers, they say,

00:57:23.740 I'm surprised how much are your troops, Ukrainian troops,

00:57:26.740 free to decide for themselves what they are going to do.

00:57:29.740 We don't have this.

00:57:30.740 We don't even think that way in Russia.

00:57:34.740 You receive your order and you follow your order.

00:57:37.740 Period.

00:57:38.740 That's it.

00:57:39.740 That's what you do.

00:57:40.740 In Ukraine, you discuss your order with your superior officer.

00:57:43.740 You don't like something, you post a video on Facebook and say,

00:57:47.740 unit so-and-so.

00:57:48.740 We are refusing to fight because our officer is corrupt or incompetent

00:57:53.740 or sending us into combat without necessary support.

00:57:57.740 This is Ukrainian concept and it works.

00:58:00.740 Actually, you don't have such a concept at all.

00:58:04.740 And Tom, you were talking about the military technology side of things,

00:58:08.740 which brings us onto an issue we haven't discussed yet, which is, of course, sanctions.

00:58:12.740 And I think the lay people in the West think of sanctions as one thing.

00:58:19.740 So military technology and oil and gas, and it all kind of just blends into one thing.

00:58:26.740 And there's a lot of people saying sanctions have been counterproductive

00:58:30.740 because Russia's oil revenues are going up.

00:58:33.740 Talk to us about sanctions.

00:58:35.740 Are they working?

00:58:36.740 Which ones are good?

00:58:37.740 Which ones are bad?

00:58:38.740 You know, what is the future of all of that?

00:58:40.740 What is the impact on Russia today?

00:58:42.740 For the start, matter of fact is that Putin's entire military buildup,

00:58:47.740 it's a big show actually, but let's call it a military buildup,

00:58:50.740 was financed by the West.

00:58:52.740 So there's a difference, you know, to the last 20 years and now.

00:58:56.740 From this point of view, it's more important considering that the mass of Western customers

00:59:02.740 for Russian oil and gas have signed long-term contracts stipulate that either you buy it

00:59:09.740 or you don't buy it, but you have to pay.

00:59:12.740 So you have to pay no matter how much have you imported from Russia.

00:59:17.740 So in that, in that regards, you know, even if, let's say, let's say, let's take Austria's example.

00:59:24.740 Austria now would say, okay, I'm, I'm canceling my contract signed last year by our Holy Chancellor.

00:59:32.740 Who is now working for Google, by the way.

00:59:36.740 And let's now stop importing Russian gas.

00:59:40.740 Austria would still have to pay several billions a year.

00:59:43.740 Even if not importing a single ounce of Russian gas.

00:59:47.740 And that until 2040, which is, what, 18 years from now.

00:59:52.740 So, ideal situation for Putin.

00:59:55.740 Wait, would Austria honor that contract in the current situation?

00:59:59.740 Would Austria, sorry? 0.68

01:00:01.740 Honor the contract.

01:00:02.740 Would they pay?

01:00:03.740 Well, Austria would have to pay, yes.

01:00:05.740 It would have to honor it, yes.

01:00:07.740 What else?

01:00:08.740 You guys take the rules too seriously.

01:00:10.740 It is the way the world is made.

01:00:13.740 There is no reason.

01:00:14.740 There is no superior reason that God didn't show himself up and said, oh, you're Austria.

01:00:18.740 I'm not going to import Russian oil anymore.

01:00:21.740 What else should happen?

01:00:22.740 A huge, massive supernatural or natural catastrophe, destroying whatever.

01:00:28.740 But Russia, but Austria has to continue importing.

01:00:32.740 And foremost, it has to continue paying.

01:00:34.740 Germany is the same case.

01:00:36.740 France, Italy in front of France, the same case.

01:00:40.740 This is why Putin hasn't canceled these contracts yet.

01:00:43.740 He could cancel them, like he has canceled in the case of the Netherlands.

01:00:47.740 In this case, he didn't cancel the contracts because he's profiting anyway from this.

01:00:53.740 And, of course, our government could now say, well, okay, we are going to cancel this contract,

01:00:59.740 but then we have to pay penalties.

01:01:01.740 Even more so because the contract stipulates that we have to pay, continue paying, whether we buy or whether we import or not.

01:01:08.740 So, you know, it's…

01:01:10.740 Okay.

01:01:11.740 So those sanctions, I'm assuming, are not going to have the effect the West wants.

01:01:15.740 What about military technology transfer and all of that?

01:01:17.740 This is hurting very much.

01:01:18.740 It is, for example, the freezing of federal Russian reserves hurt Putin massively.

01:01:26.740 It took away sometimes 25% of his money.

01:01:30.740 Then high technology, freezing high technology.

01:01:33.740 This is by far not exploited enough, this field.

01:01:37.740 One could really penalize Russia much more in these regards. 0.95

01:01:41.740 They are still managing to buy, if nothing else, from Japan and from China, you know.

01:01:45.740 Okay.

01:01:46.740 China is even more reluctant to sell high technology to Russia these days than Japan is or South Korea is.

01:01:52.740 So there is still a lot of opportunity in these regards.

01:01:56.740 One could still hit Russians much harder in these regards.

01:01:59.740 But it shouldn't mean that sanctions are not hurting Russia.

01:02:02.740 They are hurting it badly.

01:02:04.740 And we are going to see how much just during this winter when it starts hurting the Russian population as well.

01:02:11.740 What's that going to look like, Tom?

01:02:13.740 When you say it's hurting, what are we going to see in Russia?

01:02:17.740 Well, in worst case, war is sometimes around 1917 that Russians do not like to be hungry and freezing in winter.

01:02:26.740 It could happen the same.

01:02:27.740 It could be the same, exactly the same, like in 1917, where it was women working in ammunition factories, which rose us first. 0.68

01:02:38.740 And then the October revolution began.

01:02:44.740 We are going to see.

01:02:45.740 Perhaps it's going to happen.

01:02:46.740 Perhaps not.

01:02:47.740 I don't know.

01:02:48.740 But it could happen.

01:02:49.740 Let's say this way.

01:02:50.740 So, are you optimistic about the future, Tom?

01:02:55.740 Has this gotten better?

01:02:57.740 Generally, I am.

01:02:58.740 Generally, I am.

01:02:59.740 Because, generally, I see humanity as a positive, how should I say this, positively developing appearance in the nature. 0.98

01:03:12.740 I mean, we are doing lots of idiotic things and killing each other and killing the nature and so on. 0.78

01:03:19.740 But sooner or later, at least 5 before 12, you usually get sane, you know, after hitting the wall with our foreheads some 500 to 1,000 times. 0.98

01:03:28.740 You usually get sane and reasonable and start doing things the right way.

01:03:33.740 So, I think it's going to be this way in this case as well.

01:03:36.740 As I said, generally, I am optimistic about the future.

01:03:41.740 Well, on that happy note, at least, Tom, we will wrap it up there.

01:03:46.740 We're going to ask you a couple of questions for our supporters that they've already submitted for our locals.

01:03:51.740 But before we let you go, and by the way, thank you so much for this.

01:03:54.740 I'm sure we would love to have you back when there's more developments in this conflict in the future.

01:03:59.740 But the question we always ask our guests before we let them go is,

01:04:03.740 what is the one thing that we're not talking about as a society that you think we really should be?

01:04:08.740 Except for this war.

01:04:13.740 No, I mean this seriously.

01:04:15.740 I think we should generally be discussing Putin's involvement in subverting the anti-Western democracies.

01:04:25.740 There are several books, at least one of which I could recommend right away, discussing this, but it's still not enough.

01:04:35.740 But he has seriously subverted our societies.

01:04:38.740 I mean, from inside out.

01:04:40.740 And we are feeling this every single day.

01:04:43.740 And it's not just in the UK, not just in France, not just in Austria or Germany.

01:04:47.740 It's really everywhere.

01:04:49.740 He has the presence behind the curtain, so to say.

01:04:53.740 And he's still pulling strings around.

01:04:55.740 This is one of the things.

01:04:56.740 And the other thing is...

01:04:57.740 Well, Tom, what does that look like?

01:04:58.740 What are you talking about?

01:05:00.740 Putin has a massive, they call this black cash, massive amounts of money on accounts owned by his favourites in the West.

01:05:12.740 And he's, with the help of this cash, he's influencing even the justice systems of entire countries.

01:05:20.740 UK in between of this.

01:05:21.740 Not only USA, but UK and France and Austria and so on.

01:05:26.740 So these are immense volumes of money which he's using to subvert our societies.

01:05:31.740 And this is what I think should be intensely discussed and sorted out.

01:05:37.740 You know, nothing happened so far to anybody in these regards.

01:05:41.740 Nobody was, you know, made responsible for letting himself or herself being bribed by all this money.

01:05:50.740 It is actually destructive for our societies.

01:05:53.740 I agree with you.

01:05:55.740 Tom Cooper, thank you so much.

01:05:56.740 Where can people read your updates, tell everybody where to find your work online?

01:06:02.740 Well, it's the easiest, it's on medium.com.

01:06:06.740 If you check Ukraine war and Tom Cooper, you can easily find the link.

01:06:12.740 I mean, if I check the link, just a second.

01:06:15.740 Precisely.

01:06:17.740 Medium.com, flash at Tom Cooper.

01:06:22.740 Tom, it's been an absolute pleasure.

01:06:27.740 We're going to have some questions from our local supporters just afterwards.

01:06:32.740 But thank you so much for coming on the show.

01:06:35.740 You've been a wonderful guest and very illuminating.

01:06:38.740 Very much my pleasure.

01:06:39.740 Thank you very much for inviting me to the show.

01:06:42.740 And if you've enjoyed our episodes, they always go out on Wednesdays and Sundays,

01:06:48.740 7pm UK time, 2pm Eastern Standard.

01:06:52.740 Our Raw shows go out Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

01:06:56.740 And for those of you who like your trigonometry on the go, it's also available as a podcast.

01:07:01.740 Take care and see you soon, guys.

01:07:03.740 Barton Cessna says, how significant are China to Russia and Russia to China military relations?

01:07:11.740 And could they become more significant given attrition in the Russian military at the moment?

01:07:26.740 But that's a good idea.

01:07:27.740 I'll see you soon.

01:07:28.740 It's the one I'll see you soon.

01:07:29.740 We'll see you soon.

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01:07:48.740 A Beautiful Noise, April 28th through June 7th, 2026, the Princess of Wales Theatre.

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TRIGGERnometry - September 19, 2022

Is Ukraine Winning？ - Tom Cooper

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