298. Will Ukraine be affected by events in Iran?
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Hello and welcome to the Battleground podcast with me, Saul David and Patrick Bishop. It's been another week in which the war in Ukraine has been overshadowed by dramatic events elsewhere. In this case, Israel's astonishing assault on Iran's military leadership and nuclear bomb-making capability.

But that conflict might have far-reaching consequences for Russia's war in Ukraine, which we'll discuss in a moment. Yeah, meanwhile, so we've had the usual Trump theatre, haven't we? Will he, won't he, you know, teasing his audience again.

with the notion that he's somehow weighing everything up and then he'll move at the right time with his decision, giving some credence to the idea that some actual thought is going into this. I think he'll act on instinct. But the point is that he's at least willing to consider going on Israel's side. And that's very much the direction he's taking at the moment, which, of course, is in stark contrast to his nakedly pro-Russian stance.

in Ukraine, and particularly with regard to Russia's determination to kill as many Ukrainian civilians as possible. So it was a particularly callous wave of attacks, hundreds of drones and missiles raining down earlier this week on 28 people were killed and 134 were injured in Kiev alone. So not many signs of

protest about that. The State Department put out a kind of boilerplate condemnation, and the U.S. Embassy in Kiev came out with a rather meek statement saying, this census attack runs counter to President Trump's call to stop the killing and end the war. Yeah, well, we've all heard that many times. But when Trump was actually questioned about the attack at the G7 summit, just as he was leaving, just hours after it had taken place, he claimed he

had no knowledge of it. Well, I'm not sure I believe that. And there's been no official response to the strike from the White House as we speak. Yeah, that's right, Patrick. But could we really have expected anything different after Trump had enraged his fellow G7 leaders at the start of the conference in Canada earlier this week by saying the decision to axe Russia from what had been the G8 for its illegal invasion of Crimea in 2014 had been a mistake?

Trump added, you wouldn't have a war right now if you had Russia in and you wouldn't have a war right now if Trump were president four years ago. But it didn't work out that way. Now, there was quite rightly pushback from some of the other leaders of the G7, including German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who's rapidly becoming the most robust in his defense of Ukraine on issues like this and others. And he said the decision to exclude Russia was correct.

Referring to Putin, he said, there is no place for war criminals in a group composed of the world's largest economies and democracies. Therefore, it is natural that there is no place for Putin at this table.

Yeah, it was also during Trump's brief appearance that he refused once again to announce new economic sanctions on Russia and really battered the ball back over the net to Europe saying, let's see them do it first. He says, when I sanction the country, it costs the US a lot of money. You're talking about billions and billions of dollars. So once again, a mercantile approach. He had been Trump, that has been the schedule to

meet Vladimir Zelensky at the G7, but that never happened because, of course, he left early to deal with the Iran crisis. But there was some good news for the Ukrainian leader. He met with the remaining G7 leaders and managed to secure a new 1.47 billion military assistance package from the new Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, who also said he was going to impose fresh financial sanctions on

on Russia. And the British Prime Minister Keir Starmer also announced a new wave of sanctions targeting that shadow fleet of oil tankers and military suppliers and individuals operating from Britain. Once again, you have to ask yourselves, why hasn't this done before? Okay, well, as we mentioned at the top, Israel's attack on Iran might have profound implications for the war in Ukraine. So what are they? Well, I think there are two issues to consider.

First, one of Russia's closest allies, the provider of huge quantities of military equipment, particularly drones and missiles, and that, of course, is Iran, is currently on its knees militarily after just five or six days of military strikes. Secondly, the ease with which Israel has taken out Iran's Russian-supplied air defenses, including upgraded S-300s,

would have, I suggest, serious implications for the effectiveness of Russian military hardware and its ability to sell it on the open market. And the winner in all of this, I suspect, is China. This was the view taken by defence analyst Justin Crump, who told The Telegraph this week, if people are looking at results and thinking the Russian stuff hasn't performed as advertised, I suspect a lot of nations might shift towards seeing what China can offer them. Now, the

counter-argument to this being good news, that is Israel's attack on Iran being good news for Ukraine, is that the instability in the Middle East and Iran's threat to close the Straits of Hormuz will almost certainly lead to a rise in oil prices, which will benefit Russia, of course. And in fact, those first rises have already taken place. So if we balance it out, Patrick, do you see Israel's attack on Iran as being a good thing for Ukraine or not?

I think it's pretty much a bad thing, just for two obvious reasons. It diverts attention away from that conflict. We've got a whole new shifting of the geopolitical tectonic plates going on here. And so I think going forward, Ukraine's going to be slipping down the news agenda and the amount of attention that world leaders give to it is going to be correspondingly diminished. I think it's pretty likely. Of course, we don't know. We're recording on Thursday, but...

So we're in the dark at the moment as to what Trump will do. But I think all the indications are that he will side with Israel on this. And this is certainly the view of someone who knows quite a lot about these things. And now Ferguson, who's a historian, but also a political player, a fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford. And he told the Times, my Israeli sources and some of my sources in Washington think it's going to happen tonight. Well, that didn't turn out to be.

True, but everything's pointing that way, don't you, Saul, in that direction. You've got to wonder why Trump is doing this. I think if he does decide to go to war, it will be another conspicuous failure to deliver what he promised. Just a quick tally of what those failures are. Ukraine, we all remember the, I'm the man that's going to deliver peace. Well, there's no peace and no further US effort.

to bring it about. China, that was the real point of the Ukraine deal, was to clear the decks for a showdown with China on trade. Well, after the initial bluster, it looks very much like China is going to come out of this as the winner in the arm wrestling that's gone on so far.

On Iran, massive failure on two fronts. The US, we've always got to remember, had its own approach to getting Iran to give up its nuclear weapons program. And that was via diplomacy. And the talks were actually in progress when the crisis occurred.

However, that in turn was blown up literally by the Israeli Unilateral Declaration of War on Iran. But far from being outraged at Netanyahu sabotaging his peace plan, Trump is now apparently on the brink of joining in. Indeed, if these reports too about the B-2 bombers delivering the bunker buster, a weapon that will actually get at the heart of the nuclear facilities,

thereby finishing the job for Israel, that would make Trump the warmonger that he's always professed not to be. You mentioned earlier, Saul, there was one very strong wing of the MAGA movement who totally opposed it for a military intervention.

and who are aghast at the U.S. being dragged into another of the forever wars that Trump promised not to get America stuck in again. So another massive U-turn, another one of his boastful promises has evaporated. So he's been suckered first by Putin, now by Netanyahu,

Israel is the tail wagging the dog. So it's made a big dent in what remains, I think, of his credibility. He's claimed to be some sort of global titan who really understands the world and whose great wisdom is going to set the course of history for the better.

It's fascinating, Patrick, isn't it, that he seems so willing to risk splitting his MAGA base by supporting Israel in its war against Iran, and yet he won't do the right thing in Ukraine. And we get a few hints to why that might be actually in questions, which we'll come to after the break.

Meanwhile, what's Russia up to? Well, Sergei Shoigu, listeners will remember that he was the formerly and effectively disgraced Minister of Defense, who is now head of Russia's Defense Council. Well, this week he went to North Korea and there he agreed a deal with the North Koreans that will see thousands of

of North Korean D-miners and military construction workers sent to rebuild the Kursk region after Ukraine's incursion. And listeners will also remember, of course, that a lot of troops were sent by North Korea to fight in Kursk. So none of these North Koreans are actually going onto Ukraine's soil at the moment. But Shoigu also expressed when he made this statement of what was going to happen, hope that flights between the two countries will resume for the first time in 30 years.

So it's interesting in the week that when Russia loses another strategic ally or at least another strategic ally is seriously weakened. And that, of course, is Iran. And he's beginning to run out of those authoritarian allies. Syria is out of the game. And Iran, as I just say, supplier of much of Russia's drone technology is on its knees now.

Moscow is desperately trying to strengthen ties with another pariah regime, Kim Jong-un's North Korea. And I suppose you could say he's running out of allies and he's getting desperate. Is that how you see it, Patrick? Yeah, I think that's absolutely right. I mean, if you're judged by the company you keep, like who your friends are, then, you know, they're not keeping very good company, the Russians at the moment, are they? They're actually forced to go to North Korea, a basket case, as most people believe.

except shored up by China, essentially, then you're right. So they really are running out of supporters, which is, I suppose, good news for Ukraine in that respect. But of course, it's the question of time is always important.

paramount in all this. And looking at the battlefield, Russia's ability to keep grinding forward doesn't seem to have wavered in recent weeks or recent days. They're grinding forward on several fronts, usual mixed results. So you get a report from Konstantin Yivka the other day, a company-sized Russian assault was repulsed and they left behind 15 pieces of heavy equipment, eight motorized vehicles,

etc. But on the other hand, they're making small gains in northern Sumy. Of course, this is across the border where they're trying to ultimately capture Sumy, open up a new front there, and also the same in Kharkiv, Oblast, and yeah, Cheskivya and Toresk. But there is some pushback from the Ukrainians. They managed to inch forward near Vorova and also in some parts of Zagorizhia, Oblast.

Okay, we'll take a break there. Do join us in a moment for a cyber security update and listeners questions. Hi there, Rory Stewart here from the Restless Politics. I just wanted to tell you that we have now released the first episode of our mini series on the real JD Vance. Here's a clip. If Donald Trump dropped dead, this guy is automatically president.

How he has become what he's become from this background. I'm sitting in the back of this police cruiser. They've just arrested my mom. The relief of having survived another day. This is a story about something which we don't often talk about in America, which is class. Trump, I think that he's leading the white working class to a very dark place. I'm a never Trump guy. I never liked him. But in the end, the main thing you need to understand about J.D. Gantz is given the choice between his intellectual statements and power,

He chooses power every time. I was wrong about Donald Trump. We're seeing migrants kidnap our dogs and cats. He needs to prove absolute loyalty. I think the election was stolen from Trump. But there's a bigger story, which is the story about this whole alt-right movement. Vance does not exist, really, without Thiel, either financially or politically. Because this guy believes that America should be led by a monarch, which, of course, Trump believes as well. He sees him

frankly, as a future king, because his advance can tell the story of America. And in doing so, he crosses the cusp into a whole new vision of the world at the centre of which is not democracy, but the CEO, the authoritarian, the monarch. You can hear episode one right now. Just search The Rest Is Politics wherever you get your podcasts.

Welcome back. Well, it would be remiss of us not to mention the fact that today, according to the UNHCR, it's World Refugee Day, an international day designated by the United Nations to honour refugees around the globe. It falls every year on the 20th of June and has done since 2001. And in the words of the UN officials,

It honors the strength and courage of people who have been forced to flee their home country to escape conflict or persecution. And it's right that we do that, Patrick. But it is kind of depressing to think in the context of the hostilities between Israel and Iran that actually we're going to be getting more refugees rather than fewer.

Absolutely. And it's also worth remembering, given the amount of anti-immigrant feeling there is in the Aether Amendment, that a lot of these people are genuinely fleeing from violence and from oppression. So good for the UN for flagging it up and keeping that truth alive.

Okay, brief cyber security update from our good friend David Alexander. And one of the most interesting points he makes is that AI, he points to an article in the Financial Times, which makes the claim that AI helped to guide the drones in the spider web attack.

So obviously the drones had to be got there. We talked about the logistics. They flew out of the back of those trucks and then towards the strategic bombers. Now that's the point at which the defensive systems on the airfield could have come into play, particularly the jamming devices. And what AI will help to do, of course, is you can train those drones to identify the targets. They don't need to be taken there. In other words, they can get to their targets automatically. And one of the ways they did that apparently is that they used an

AI model which was trained on images of models of Russian aircraft found at museums in Ukraine. And they may also have used open source autopilot systems. Great stuff. Yeah, I mean, an amazing ingenuity that Ukrainians have demonstrated is quite uplifting, isn't it? We have a first question here from Keith

Cook in New Zealand, he says, I wish to ask your advice, given your context and knowledge of the war in Ukraine. A broad inquiry as to the use of chemical weapons by the Russian army and an interest. So Keith's interest really is in how widespread is the use of chemical weapons today?

by the Russian military. And he's been inspired to ask the question really by a contact he's had with a young woman by a sub-stack who's currently serving in the Ukrainian army. And she got in touch after Keith made a pro-Ukrainian comment about the war in Ukraine. And she told me, he says, that she volunteered five months after the invasion. He's convinced this is a genuine Ukrainian female soldier.

And back in, actually only a couple of days ago, 15th of June, he got a message from her saying that her unit was under constant bombardment by some chemical agent which she did not specify. Now, he's been looking into this and saying, are we aware of this? And his correspondent said that they don't have the right gear to deal with this, masks to deal with these chemical attacks anymore.

And he was asking me, what do we know about this? He knows the identity of the woman soldier, but of course, we're not going to put it out over the air. Well, from memory, Saul, we carried several reports, haven't we, in the past on the development of or the use of chemical weapons by Russians. That's been going on pretty much as far as I recall since the beginning. And it's something, obviously, that the Ukrainians have focused on, even as far as actually carrying out the assassination operations.

I think it was last year, was it, of General Kirilov, Igor Kirilov, who was commander of Russia's radiation, chemical and biological protection forces as an act of revenge, but also to highlight the fact that chemical agents are being used in denial or in contravention of numerous international agreements.

not to use and what the weapons actually are is a bit vague, isn't it, Saul? Do you remember much about this? Yeah, I do. We have mentioned it a number of times. First thing I'd say to Keith is be a little bit wary about these sort of unsolicited contacts. It might be entirely genuine, but it could also be Russians trying to spread disinformation about whether or not the Ukrainians have the right sort of kit to combat this. I mean, you could say that would be a bit

counterintuitive to actually admit the use of chemical weapons. But as you pointed out, Patrick, it's pretty widespread, that knowledge already. We've mentioned it a number of times on the programme. The Russians don't seem to be going the whole hog and using any serious type of chemical agent like sarin or something of the type. What they are using is the equivalent of CS gas. That is still banned by international law, but it's

it's an attempt to disable the defenders of any particular location for long enough for the attackers to reach their position. So it's low level use of chemical agents, but nevertheless, still something that deserves to be called out. So thanks to Keith again for bringing this to our mind. Yes, your contact is probably genuine, but be a little bit cautious in future when you have these sort of unsolicited contacts.

One here from Joe in London, which adds a little bit to what you were saying, Saul, about the consequences for Russia of Iran's current humiliation. I think he makes a couple of points that are definitely worth airing. He obviously points out that Russia will get some benefit from the increasing oil prices, and that might even improve from their position if Iran decides to go ahead and

try and close the Strait of Hormuz, which is, you know, this very narrow entrance to the Gulf, which historically actually is a bit of a choke point. I remember back in the days of Saddam Hussein when we actually sent warships and the Americans sent warships to keep the Strait open to allow Iraqi oil to get out. In those days, Saddam Hussein was our ally. We have to remember that things do change.

But he also makes the point that the Shaheed drones that we've mentioned many, many times that Iran provides for Russia, well, initially they were just selling them to Russia, but according to Joe, they're now actually producing their own under license in Russia. So in that respect, there won't be a big difference to their drone inventory as a result of what's going on. Yeah, Joe also makes the point that they've now lost two major allies in the region following the fall of Assad in Syria. And I think that's the

bigger point here. I mean, he's absolutely right to make the... I've already mentioned the oil prices. He

he's added the information that actually they can produce their own drones. They're doing it under license and therefore the tap won't be turned off in that sense. They've already got the technology and they're using it. But I think the bigger picture is this fracturing of Russia's axis of evil, as we might dub it, across the Middle East, which is where it wants to have influence. He's already lost Assad, as Joe's pointed out. And now Iran has,

It hasn't entirely gone, but it's been severely weakened. And this is the point made by another listener, Phil in Melbourne, Australia, who writes, surely Israeli strikes against Iran are a good thing in terms of the anti-Russian geopolitics. Russia now has a weakened ally, which by default has further diminished Russia's influence over the broader Middle East region after Afghanistan.

Assad's demise in Syria. Furthermore, the embarrassment must be further reinforced by the fact that a substantial amount of military kit the Iranians have lost was Russian made and proved to be pretty much useless in comparison to the US made Israeli kit. Well, that's the point I made earlier. Phil goes on to conclude, I can't help but feel in the light of this that giving more

high-spec military aid to Ukraine would really aid the Ukrainians massively. And that's absolutely true. And I think in the broader point about NATO kit generally, particularly the best American stuff, is that it is being supplied to Israel and it's making a real difference. I mean, the F-35 fighters are running amok over Iran as

as we speak. And yet the best the Ukrainians have got are F-16s, which have made some difference. There's no doubt about it. Again, another point made by another of our listeners, Ben, who says, good old-fashioned air superiority. It seems Israel has demonstrated there's still a lot of merit for gaining air superiority. I mean, we'll let you answer this in the second patch. Just the broader point here is that the F-16s

are beginning to fly in areas where you might have imagined the Russians would take them out. And is this partly a result of the fact that actually their anti-air kit, as has been shown in Iran and also in Ukraine to a certain extent, is actually not very good?

Yeah, and we saw, we mentioned that last week, didn't we, of the ability of fast jets to get in and strike targets, which was something that was deemed to be very, very risky not so long ago because of the supposed tightness of the anti-air defences on the Russian side. But there are clearly gabing holes in it. Just moving on to one here, which is a sort of broad cultural political subject, really, and this comes from

Tracy Dallison, who's been in touch with us several times before, and I used to hear your thoughts again, Tracy. And she's clearly very concerned about the Christian nationalist threat to Ukraine and to Europe and saying that the coherence of their thinking is too often underestimated in our conversations about how to ensure that Russia does not win in Ukraine.

And she points us in the direction of an analysis by Heather Cox Richardson, who's a professor at Boston College, and has given us the link to that. It's a very good point to raise, Tracy, because it does play into another question we'll come to later on about why is the American right so enamored of Russia?

when to us it appears to be the enemy, stark and easy to recognize. I think a lot of it, of course, is driven by the American Christian fundamentalist nationalists, and they've swallowed the idea that Russia, the idea of holy Russia, which is propagated by Putin and his propagandists, they seem to be taking that at face value. And of course, the reason for it is that there's a lot in what

Russian orthodoxy advances and what the Christian right in America believes. So it's a shared outlook, a very illiberal outlook, vehemently hostile to gays, female equality, and racism.

Also, a kind of worship of authoritarian leadership. The Russian Orthodox Church has always been a Rastian in outlook. That means that they're devoted to the interests of political leadership, be it the Tsars or be it Vladimir Putin. And, of course, American politics.

Zionist Christian nationalists are also uncritical supporters of Israel and hostile to Islam, which it struck me actually is rather strange, isn't it? Because Islam recognizes Jesus Christ as a prophet, Issa in Arabic, whereas Judaism by and large doesn't. But I don't think we should expect too much intellectual consistency from these quarters. No, and you mentioned another listener's contribution, and that's from Dennis in Berlin. And his message to us is,

titled Why MAGA Wants Ukraine to Lose. And he goes on to say that he'd heard it best explained by Aaron McLean on the School of War podcast. He gives us a kind of summary of Aaron McLean's argument, and it is along these lines. There are people in the US government who are just genuinely hostile to the Ukrainian cause.

And I think there are people in Washington who want the Russians to win. I've tried to explain this on a number of occasions, particularly to Europeans, and they're sort of aghast. They literally don't understand how could this be. So his explanation is, if you believe that global liberalism is the threat, the great threat, there is a kind of idea of a MAGA international in which Russia is comparatively one of the good guys because...

Putin is also, you know, in this theory, opposed to the liberals. And Ukraine is a kind of extension of liberal imperium. And so we advance the broader political goals of the international through seeking their defeat. I mean, it's fascinating and quite chilling stuff, Patrick, isn't it? Because it does fit into the Christian nationalist argument. It ties it up all very nicely, actually.

in fact. But is this really what's going on in Trump's own mind, do you think? I mean, he's certainly been influenced, of course, by the MAGA movement, of course, by Christian nationalism. But it's always seemed to me to be something that he's kind of latched onto rather than he really believes in an ideological sense. What's your feeling? I think you're spot on, Saul. I mean, he's got a kind of

smorgasbord, hasn't he, of beliefs which actually, ultimately, their interest to him is really kind of electoral politics, isn't it? Will, if I press this button, will I get a good response from these people if I press that one? And he's put together a sort of package of beliefs, which I think you have to be a real Trumpist to think that he sincerely believes himself.

And of course, there are people, there are ideologues out there that genuinely do think that they ought to unite. People of a similar mind ought to unite across the globe against the combined enemy, which has been pointed out here is liberalism and secularism. So in that, if you look at it through that prism, then yeah, Russia's a pretty good ally as is Israel.

So that's where you get to that point. Whether Trump sees it in those terms, I think you're right. So I think it's highly unlikely. OK, we've got an anonymous question about Operation Downfall, which was the subject of the Battleground 45 episode this week. And just to remind listeners if they didn't hear the episode, Operation Downfall was the plan put in place for the invasion of Tokyo in the autumn of 1945 and the spring of 1946.

And the assumption was, which is one of the reasons why it played into the decision to use atomic weapons, the Allies were going to lose an awful lot of people, which is without question if that operation had actually taken place. Now, the question that goes on to say in the episode of Downfall, that's the podcast episode, what do you think about the effect of the direct threat

posed by the atomic nuclear weapons to the person of the emperor. Unlike conventional weapons, this is something the military were unable to protect Hirohito from. Do you think this influenced a relatively quick turnaround from a never-surrendered position to unconditional surrender? I don't personally think the personal threat to his physical well-being posed by nuclear weapons made much difference. Personally, as I mentioned on the podcast, I

I think it gave Hirohito the opportunity to turn the tables on the military hardliners. Now, let's not kid ourselves. Hirohito, as we mentioned on the podcast, had long been a person who had agency in the Japanese government and was very much on board with the earlier decision to create a Japanese empire. But when it all went horribly wrong and he could see Japan being hollowed out from the inside, literally its cities burned, he knew he needed to

find a way to not necessarily save his own skin, but to save the whole imperial idea. And of course, ultimately, he was able to do that by convincing the Allies that the one element of unconditional surrender that they were prepared to bargain on was

which was his retention as emperor. I mean, I think it was a sensible decision ultimately, Patrick, because it allowed the allies to effectively get the cooperation of the Japanese military, whereas there could have been a lot of last-ditch fighting, even with a decision by central government, if Hirohito hadn't been on board. But he was on board. He saved his own skin. He saved the imperial project. And we still have an emperor of Japan today for, you know, with all the potential consequences for Japanese...

never really accepting their war guilt from the Second World War. But nevertheless, that was the case. It is a fascinating subject, Operation Downfall, though. What might have happened if the Allies had invaded in 1945 and 1946? Well, the Second World War does seem to be on listeners' minds this week, as we've got another one here from Zalman saying, Greetings, gentlemen. I hope you're familiar with me by now. I've been a committed and loyal listener.

of both fleets that was initially drawn in because of Battleground 44. But all my commentary, we've had several from that, from you, Selma, thanks very much for those, has been on Ukraine. But he's now, he had to talk about World War II. He said he recently heard someone say, I think Hitler was an okay person. There was nothing wrong with him. The circle around him was the real problem.

He says, now I know this is absolutely not true as someone obsessed with the subject, but do you, us two, fear that such revisionism can take a serious hold and eventually lead us back to a position like that of the 1930s and 40s?

Well, there's always been a tradition, hasn't there, sort of denial of the Holocaust, etc. You know, Hitler wasn't at the Banzi conference, the one in January 1942, where the actual nuts and bolts of the final solution were assembled.

David Irving, do you remember David Irving, saw this British historian who, you know, great delver in the archives who said, well, there's no documentary proof that Hitler actually ever approved of the mass murder of the Jews. There's no signature on a document or anything like that. Well, I think that's always been around and it's never got a kind of momentum that put it into this public sphere as a kind of reasonable thought to hold in your head.

But I think I see something else here, which is possibly more worrying, which is the kind of knowing nod and a wink type hint at Nazi sympathies. I'm thinking particularly of that Hitler salute that was offered by the MAGA mouthpiece Steve Bannon.

when he was talking, giving a speech to the American Conservative Political Action Conference back in February. That was a big event for rightists the world over. So I think that kind of signaling from someone who's an important right-wing influencer is, well, disgraceful, but also...

very troubling. Yeah, and there are certainly people, Germans today, Patrick, who might suggest, you know, if that history had stopped in 1939, Hitler would have been remembered as a great German leader, and he probably would have been. But the point here is that his ideas, his ideology was there in plain sight. He'd written everything he was planning to do in Mein Kampf.

including the discussion on how to deal with the Jewish problem. No, he didn't lay out in bold terms that they were eventually going to be murdered because that hadn't been the decision he'd taken up to that point. He was very much someone who had an ultimate

But how to get there was, you know, very much open to question. It would depend on circumstances. So I think that is slightly concerning that people are looking at him and thinking, yes, strong leader. He got his country back on his feet, you know, not so much God fearing. I don't think the God fearing came into it with him.

with Hitler. He was sensible enough to make some accommodation with the Catholic Church, but was not a believer per se himself. But certainly there's this admiration, like there is, of course, as we've already discussed among the Christian nationalists today, that this robust nationalist, this patriot who didn't suffer any of the kind of liberal elements and the left-wing elements and put his country first. So that sort of element, I think, is slightly concerning. But that

that Hitler will ever be rehabilitated, given what we know about him in the Second World War. No, there's no chance of that. But on the other hand, Stalin has been thoroughly rehabilitated in Putin's Russia, hasn't he? And there's not much to choose in terms of the evil they do in the world. There's very little to choose between them, I would say.

Okay, that's all we have time for. Before we go, just to remind you that we are in two minds as to what to do with the Battleground 45 podcast when the end of the war finally comes around. That is the 80th anniversary of the end of the war, which of course will be early September. So do send in your ideas. We're going to conduct a poll and the favourites may well be the one we go with. We...

Absolutely haven't decided. We're getting various thoughts. We think we might do something on special forces. Is that something, is that an idea that would meet your approval? But anyway, let us know what you would like to hear. And you can find the poll in the podcast episode description. Okay, that's it for this week. Do join us on Wednesday for another episode of Battleground 45. And of course, on Friday again, when we'll be bringing you all the latest from Ukraine. Goodbye. Bye.