Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
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Welcome to The World in 10. In an increasingly uncertain world, this is The Times' daily podcast dedicated to global security. Today with me, Tom Noonan, and Laura Cook. The German Defence Minister, Boris Pistorius, seemed to summarise the international mood well when he said attacks on civilian infrastructure...
In the first night after this supposedly pivotal and great phone call have not abated, Putin is playing a game here. Halting attacks on energy and civilian infrastructure for 30 days was the outcome of his conversation with Donald Trump.
Our guest today is Hamish de Breton-Gordon, a former commanding officer of the UK and NATO's chemical and nuclear defence forces and now a defence commentator. Hamish, it looks like there have been further attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure overnight. Now, to all the world, that looks like an immediate violation of what he'd agreed with Donald Trump yesterday. If Putin is playing a game here...
How risky is that kind of move? Well, I think certainly I am not at all surprised by what's happened over the last 24 hours. In my opinion, you know, the last thing on Putin's mind at the moment is any sort of ceasefire or peace deal. You know, he thinks he's winning and he is advancing on all fronts in Ukraine.
So this much vaunted talk between Trump and Putin, and of course, lest we forget that Trump
has said that he would sort the war out in 24 hours. And the last 24 hours, if that's anything to go by, unfortunately, I don't think that Trump is going to bring this ceasefire and peace deal that everybody apart from Putin wants. So when we look at what happened yesterday, an hour and a half between the President of the United States and the President of the Russian Federation,
to come up with, you know, a sort of ceasefire. You know, I wonder what on earth they were discussing for all those 90 minutes. But what we understand is that Ukraine had agreed to a 30-day ceasefire. That would be pretty much total. And they would be happy to move forward there. What was agreed yesterday, we understand, is...
is that Putin has said that he would not attack the power infrastructure and infrastructure in Ukraine.
Virtually before he had put his telephone down, I was talking to people in Kiev who were under air raid warnings and Russian missiles and drones seemed to have been launched even before Putin had stopped talking to Trump. So, you know, it is a real sort of two fingers, if you like, from Putin to Trump absolutely.
And the West, and I'm afraid I'm just not surprised at all. I think Trump has been Putin has been telling us exactly his position for the last two or three years. And it's only recently that Europe has woken up to understand that, you know,
that the US is no longer the reliable ally that we always thought it was and that we must take care of our own defence. So, yeah, I'm not surprised at all. And I think it's really sad that perhaps we've been slightly hoodwinked
by Trump and his ability or what he tells us, his ability to do deals. But actually, when you sort of unpick some of the things he's been saying, we should not be too surprised. So it's really up to Europe now, I think, with Britain and France that lead to make a difference in this case and hopefully force a ceasefire rather than just wait for it to happen. Yes.
Many believe, and indeed we've had people say on this podcast too, that Putin is trying to stall and buy time, given that each week that passes Russia's position on the battlefield gets a tiny bit stronger, and that ultimately he doesn't want a ceasefire at all. He doesn't want peace because it doesn't achieve Russia's aims. At what point do you think Donald Trump will realise that too? Well...
Let's hope it's sooner rather than later. You know, I rather thought last night when I was reading about this on The Times, it was a real 1939 moment. Unfortunately, Trump is acting like Chamberlain and sadly not like Churchill, who he claims to be.
And I think that is absolutely, you know, how it is at the moment. There is no way that Trump, that Putin wants to ceasefire. Let's not forget that the Russians have just passed a million casualties, you know, and the proportion of those are actually dead Russians. And let's not forget that it was the mothers of Russia back in 1984 when Russia lost 17,000 people
in Afghanistan that forced the Kremlin to withdraw. Putin knows he's in for a massive awakening once that becomes a fact. Putin also knows that his economy, apart from building tanks and making weapons, is in a dire position. You know, if peace does break out,
it's not going to just be the mothers of Russia that are going to damn Putin. It's going to be his economy that is going to crumble. So there are so many reasons why Putin does not want peace and will keep going and thinks that he will be successful. And with the US backing off, and we all know the US military power, military might, is the thing that has kept Putin back and held him back.
But now with a sympathetic ear of Trump...
I put my military hat on, and if I was making military decisions and I was Putin, I would absolutely be doing what he's doing, you know, pushing forward, because he knows that the European military, although we are very powerful, but at the moment we're sort of disjointed and not acting together. You know, this is his opportunity. And Hamish, in terms of what Europe will do now, there are plans among European nations to arm Ukraine in defiance of Putin...
If Europe were to do that, would we then be in a scenario where Europe's actively frustrating Donald Trump and his attempts to get a peace deal? And then where does that take international relations with the US? Well, I think, first of all, Trump is and Putin are really changing the world order and the rules-based order that we've all become used to, which has sort of kept the peace. So it is a fine balance.
I think we've got to realise in Europe that we are very much low down Trump's list of things to do, unless it's to do with some economic deal. The only thing that really seems to interest Trump in Ukraine is rare earth materials, minerals. But again, Putin's told Trump he can have them anyway. So I think we just need to absolutely face reality here.
When it comes to what we do next, collectively, the NATO European countries are actually militarily very significant. But hitherto, we've been disjointed. But with the addition of Finland and Sweden in particular, it does give us the military might and mass that can really match Russia. And I hope when the generals meet in London tomorrow, they were originally going to war game
how they'd run a peacekeeping force in Ukraine, although, of course, Putin has said no NATO troops in Ukraine at all. They now need to work out how they're going to try and enforce a ceasefire with Trump staying his side of the Atlantic, as it were. And that's going to be a real challenge. But there's talk of some sort of air shield, air power, European air power of about 120 plus fighter jets,
which, you know, if we can bring that together, I personally believe that that would be sufficient to create the air superiority over Ukraine that is required. The US says there will be more peace talks with Russia in Saudi Arabia over the weekend, and President Zelensky says he needs to be part of those discussions. How likely do you think that that is going to happen? Well, I hope the discussions will happen. How likely that Zelensky will be involved...
It doesn't seem very likely at the moment because he hasn't been included, which is incredible arrogance, I think, from both sides. It is the Ukrainian people and their president. They are the ones who are attacked most.
Let's not forget Russia is the aggressor. It was 24th of February 2022. Russia invaded from Belarus. Russia has been attacking Ukraine, apart from a small incursion into Kursk in Western Russia in the summer of last year.
the Ukrainians have been absolutely on the defensive. So to not include Ukraine at the heart of the discussions, to me, is the height of ignorance and arrogance. Hamish, thank you. That's Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, a former commanding officer of the UK and NATO's chemical and nuclear defence forces.
Now, the context and the fundamental reasons for Putin's manoeuvres at the moment were what we looked into on last Thursday's episode called Putin Faces the Zungsvarg Chess Move. Our guest, the Russia specialist Dr Stephen Hall, also predicted how Putin could even break a full ceasefire if he agreed to one and use it to his own advantage. So we would recommend listening back to that. It's very pertinent today.
For now, though, that is it from us. Thank you for taking 10 minutes to stay on Top of the World with the help of The Times. We'll see you tomorrow. Hey, guys.
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