The Duran Podcast
UKRAINE ceasefire and the negotiation trap
All right, Alexander, let's talk about the trip from Modi's national security advisor to Moscow. He's going to be meeting with Russian president Vladimir Putin. According to various news outlets in India, he will be discussing a possible peace plan for the conflict in Ukraine. What is going on here? Well, you remember about, I think it was two weeks ago, we did a program, we said that the one thing that the Russians have to worry about in the war, they're now winning the war in Ukraine, nobody I think any longer has any real doubt about that. But the one thing that they have to worry about is their allies and the fact that they have been coming under pressure from their allies to try to find the negotiated end to the conflict in Ukraine. And we've now learnt that the Russians were indeed under significant pressure to begin negotiations or to agree to negotiations with the Ukrainians over the course of the summer. Then the Kursk Offensive, Ukraine launched its Kursk Offensive, which caused that pressure to be lifted for a while, but it looks as if the Indians are now coming back. And they're again, apparently talking about negotiations that they're trying to get negotiations or some sort of a dialogue going between the Russians and the Ukrainians. Now, everybody who has been following this knows that the Russians don't want this, Putin gave a press conference whilst he was in Vladivostok at the Far East Asian Economic Forum. He was asked about negotiations. I got the sense that he was very, very tired of the topic and very exasperated. He complained at one point that he's gone to great lengths many times to explain the origins of this conflict in the coup that took place in Ukraine in 2014, and the subsequent policies of the Ukrainian government, he says that people don't seem to want to listen. He was ambiguous as to who he meant, but I got the sense that he meant his allies, the Indians and the Brazilians. And he mentioned countries that he was asked who might be mediators that he spoke about China, India, and Brazil. China, I think we can discount the Chinese seem to be on very strong terms with the Russians. At the moment, I don't think that the Chinese are interested in inserting themselves with the Russians in this kind of way. But the Indians and the Brazilians have a joint position and they've been trying at various times to get negotiations going. And Modi, of course, went to Kiev about a week ago and met Zelensky there. So that's the background. Now, about this trip by Ajat Daval, who is Modi's national security advisor to Moscow, I think before we explore and discuss what's going on there, it is very important to understand that this meeting cannot be connected specifically with any plan or discussion to conduct negotiations. Because the Russians some time ago arranged a summit meeting in Moscow for this week of all the national security advisors of all 10 BRICS member countries. And Daval was, of course, invited to participate in this meeting and that is why he is going to Moscow. That is his reason for going to Moscow. And he's not only going to Moscow to discuss peace plans about Ukraine, he's undoubtedly going to be involved in this discussion with the other national security advisors where they're probably working on preparing a joint statement to be released by the various BRICS states on national security and foreign policy issues at the forthcoming BRICS summit meeting in Kazan. This is what this is all about. And there are also reports in the Indian media. The Daval is also going to be speaking to his Chinese counterpart in Moscow in order to try to arrange a summit meeting in Kazan, an actual bilateral meeting in Kazan between Modi and Xi Jinping. And that this is at least as important as everything else. But he will be going, obviously, to discuss peace in Ukraine. And he's going to apparently not propose an actual peace plan. This is what I've read in the Indian media, but he is going to talk about seeing ways to start negotiations. The Russians are not happy about this. They don't like it. Putin, again, went into this rear guard position that he took over the course of the summer. He's saying, right, we've never rejected negotiations. It was the Ukrainians who rejected negotiations. If there is a demand for negotiations, we've set out what our position is. It's the four regions and Istanbul plus. And the Ukrainians have to understand that it's the only basis upon which an agreement can be reached. If the Ukrainians want to negotiate in the meantime, they're free to do so. They can call us up, but there will be no ceasefire whilst those negotiations are underway, unless and until the Ukrainians withdraw completely from the four regions. See, he's fallen back on that position. And we can see that he's doing this not because he really wants to negotiate or because he has any belief in negotiations, but because he's faced with this pressure from the Indians and the Brazilians. And he feels he has to deal with it. [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] Let me do Medvedev put out a post, maybe two weeks ago, where he talked about the negotiation trap, because of the curse concursion. The negotiation trap has now been averted, but that doesn't look like that's the case. Two weeks ago, we were saying that or looked like that it was India and China. And specifically China, that was putting pressure on Putin to look for a search for a ceasefire and to go slow as far as the conflict was concerned. Why do you now believe that it's more India and Brazil and China is not putting as much pressure on Putin? Because of the list of countries that Putin identified, he mentioned China, India, and Brazil. China, I think-- and I've been reading their statements and their commentaries and the media there. I think the Chinese have completely lost patience with the Ukrainians. They've given up on this whole idea of negotiations. I think Cusk, for them, was the final straw. The Indians and the Brazilians are different. And the reason I think that Putin mentioned the Chinese, alongside the Indians and the Brazilians, is because he couldn't very much talk-- very well, talk about India and Brazil-- without mentioning China. The fact that he talked about India and Brazil tells us that it is from them now that the pressure, principally, is coming. So I think it is the Indians and the Brazilians that he's having to deal with at the moment. So that's, I think, where the pressure is. And you're absolutely right. The Russians see this as a negotiating negotiation. Trap, and they have to perform a very careful balancing act as they were doing over the course of the summer. They don't want-- they don't really believe in negotiations, as Medvedev said. If they start negotiations, that could evolve into a trap. But at the same time, they can't reject negotiations completely, because their friends, the Brazilians, and the Indians have clearly signaled that they want to see the Russians showing at least openness to the idea of negotiations. So Putin is taking his position. He says, this is the only basis that I'm prepared to talk with the Ukrainians about, which is Istanbul. Plus, if the Ukrainians want negotiations, they have to do two things. They have to accept that Zelensky's peace plan is over. It's hopeless. They have to agree, in other words, to discuss Istanbul. Plus, and of course, they have to cancel the decree that Zelensky published back in the autumn of 2022, in which he ruled out negotiations, unless Putin steps down. So this is-- it's his-- if you like, his rear guard position. It's the position he's created, because he knows-- and I'm sure he's right. There's been a really good article about this by the Indian commentator, M.K. Badrakuma. He knows that the Ukrainians will never agree to this. So he's telling his friends, the Indians, and the Brazilians. Look, I'm not saying no. I'm being very reasonable. But the Ukrainians are not being realistic. And until and unless that changes, the subject of negotiations is ultimately an academic one. Because if negotiations were to take place at the present time, they would lead nowhere. So India and Brazil must know this as well. I mean, why are they continuing to push for a negotiation, a piece based on Zelensky's piece formula, or not based on Putin's proposals? I mean, Putin has been saying, for the past two and a half years, that Russia is open to negotiations. I mean, he has been saying that. After the curse concursion, it seemed like the door had been closed on negotiations, even from Putin's side. And Putin has been offering various proposals for a negotiated settlement, negotiated settlement. They've all been rejected by Ukraine. India sees all of this playing out. They've seen the incursion intercursque. Modi has not had very good meetings with Zelensky. Zelensky's been very rude to Modi every time they have met. They must understand what's going on. They must understand the dynamics of what's happening in Ukraine. Why would India and Brazil want Russia to fall into a negotiation trap? And what exactly is the trap that Medvedev talks about? Right. Well, let's deal with the trap. First of all, the concern the Russians have, and it was explained very carefully by Medvedev, by Lavrov in various interviews that he has given. And it was repeated, by the way, to us, to Glenn Deissen and myself, by Ambassador Poliansky in a recent program that we did with him, which is that whenever you talk about anything with the Ukrainians on any issue, eventually what you discover is that the Ukrainians will try to bring you round to Zelensky, to try to bring you back to a discussion of Zelensky's peace formula. Zelensky's peace formula is that Russia would accept Ukraine's territorial integrity based on its 1991 borders, withdraw from the four regions and Crimea. In other words, capitulate, and then negotiate on Ukraine's further demands, which of reparations, war crimes, trials, and that sort of thing. The Russians do not want to be discussing with the Ukrainians anything like that. They have categorically ruled it out. So for that reason, the Russians are very, very unwilling to enter into discussions with the Ukrainians at the present time at all. They say that's why they insist that the only basis for negotiations must be Istanbul plus. Otherwise, the whole thing becomes a trap and it becomes pointless and the negotiations will go nowhere. But in the meantime, the Russians could find themselves in an awkward position. So that's the negotiation trap. The Indians and the Brazilians understand this very well. Or at least the Indians do. I don't know to what extent Lula does in Brazil. He's more distant from this conflict. But I think Modi, who has correctly said, has had difficult meetings with Zelensky. The two don't get on. His last meeting with Zelensky in Kiev, where his whole trip to Kiev lasted just seven hours. Just saying. So it was not particularly successful and a happy meeting. And apparently Zelensky refused to budge from his formulas. The peace formula, despite Modi trying to get him to shift on it. Well, the reason they are doing this is because India and Brazil are preparing to sign up to some very, very important long-range commitments at the BRIC Summit in Kazan. And they're about setting up financial systems, and trading systems, and agreeing foreign policy positions, and all of these things. At the same time, they are independent countries. Each has its relationship with the United States. Lula has a very strong relationship with some people in the United States. We've had information recently. And I don't know how true this is. But we've had information recently, which appears to come from American sources, that the Americans helped him to win the election against Bolsonaro, and to come back into power in Brazil. So he has to contend with all of that. In Modi's case, he's been triangulating between China and the United States, trying to keep a sort of balance between them. He's also got to contend with a very, very strong Atlanticist community, with opinions on the part of some of his principal financial backers in Mumbai. So Lula and Modi have to maintain a balance. They don't want the West. They don't want their own Atlanticists in their own countries, saying, look, you've gone over completely through the Russian and the Chinese side. And so for that reason, they're trying to maintain, preserve their freedom of maneuver in advance of the BRICS summit by saying, look, we're not fully committed to the Russians. We believe in peace. We want negotiations. We're trying to get the two sides to talk to each other. We're finding it very, very difficult to do so. And this is where the Russians are more sophisticated, because they're not slamming the door in Modi's or Lula's face. They're not saying, look, negotiation with this man here is impossible. We can't speak to him. The idea is ridiculous. They're saying, look, we are prepared to talk. We're prepared to put forward reasonable ideas. The problem always is that the Ukrainians are not. The Ukrainians cannot move from Zelensky's peace formula. And that works very much. That works, ultimately, in Moscow's favor, in Putin's favor. Now, that, of course, makes the question, if the Ukrainians were a little bit more sophisticated and were prepared to show more flexibility. If they were prepared to come along and say, look, we're prepared to move on NATO membership and neutrality. And what we're prepared to talk about rights for Russian speakers in Ukraine and were prepared to acknowledge territorial changes in Donghas, well, the Russians would be under a lot more pressure than they currently are. But by sticking to Zelensky's peace formula, the Ukrainians are making it much easier for the Russians than it might otherwise be. Yeah, Ukraine will never do that. No, Zelensky will never do that. And the Russians know that. And the Indians know that. And the Indians know that. So it's a complicated dance that all of these countries are playing. It's a tiresome one. The Russians, I think, are fed up with it. Now, that was very much my impression from Putin's comments, actually. I mean, he's tired of going over the same ground again and again and again. But he understands he has to do it. I think he and Modi understand each other very well on this issue. But each of them has their own pressures that they have to contend with and they have to go through the motions of looking for a negotiated solution. Even as each of them knows, it's never going to come. The Chinese have been there already. If you remember, last year, Xi Jinping, the Chinese came up with their principles on how a piece should be organized. Fairly, very detailed in some respects, very vague in others. It was never fully a piece proposal, but it was a set of ideas. They then appointed a representative, Li Hui, who was supposed to act as a broker and potential mediator. He went to Moscow. He regularly goes to Moscow. He's still around. He went to Moscow. He went to Kiev. He went to the European capitals. He found that the Russians were prepared to work with him. The Ukrainians were not, at least not on any rational basis. And I get the sense that the Chinese, after Kusk, have just had enough. And we hear a lot less about Li Hui anymore. And if you look at the Chinese media now and the way they're commenting, I think they've basically given up on Ukraine and they've come to the conclusion that their relations with the United States have now moved on to an altogether more difficult and more complex level. And there's no point any longer in pretending that they are seriously trying to mediate. And I think that they've given up on this. The Indians and the Brazilians are going to have the same education over the next few months. All right, so let's try to connect some dots here as to what's going on with the type of ceasefire. I guess you could say the peace plan, whatever that is. We have Zelensky in Germany saying that there has to be a peace to the conflict in Ukraine by this fall. That's what he said, this fall. We have Olaf Schulz saying recently that there has to be a peace. Fast, faster, he said. That's what Olaf Schulz said, faster. We need a faster solution, a peaceful solution to the conflict in Ukraine. Blinken is going to be meeting with his UK counterpart this week. And they're going to be talking about Ukraine, burned, and his UK MI6 counterpart were meeting the other day. And they were talking about Ukraine. What is going on? What do you think might be going on here? What they're trying to do is to get a ceasefire because that's the only thing that in that state of Ukraine. Ukraine is losing the walk. They had more news over the course of the last couple of hours. And they point to a further deteriorating situation for the Ukrainians on the battlefronts. We've had articles and I believe it was CNN talking about mass desertion from the Ukrainian army. So they have to bring the fighting in some way to a stop. But they're not prepared to agree to any terms that the Russians would demand. They're not prepared to go beyond a ceasefire, a ceasefire on the existing contact lines. And the Russians say no. And that's where we are. Again, we come back to this point. If you look at what Schulz says, if you look at what Zelensky says, if you look at what the intelligence chiefs of the Britain and the US said, they're not coming up with any proposal that goes beyond Zelensky's proposal. And the Russians have said they won't deal and speak to the Ukrainians on the basis of Zelensky's proposal. So they need peace or at least they need a ceasefire. They can't, however, come to a position where they're prepared to take the substantive moves that would end the war. I wonder if there's just a wrap up the video if there's two competing forces in the Biden White House in the US, where you have the one, the one side is, is trying to get Ukraine. Through the election, through the inauguration, whoever wins, doesn't matter, just get Ukraine through the inauguration without it collapsing, and just let's not, let's not entertain the whole piece piece plan thing. And I wonder if there's another part of the of the Biden White House, the deep state, whatever that that may be saying, you know, let's try to get a ceasefire, or a season in the fighting something, a freeze in the fighting something that can give Kamala Harris a foreign policy win, before the election, because maybe you accomplish. Well, one thing you accomplish is you remove a talking point of Trump's, which she says at every rally he talks about the conflict in Ukraine and how he would stop it. And you do give Kamala Harris some sort of a foreign policy win because she's very thin, very weak when it comes to the foreign policy so maybe you give Biden Harris Harris Biden, some sort of foreign policy win. Maybe not even a ceasefire just some kind of a freeze or some kind of a stop in the conflict. I mean, do you think that there might be some some forces there may be associated with the with the Harris campaign that are starting to think along these lines, and they may be pressuring Schultz and Zelensky to talk about peace this fall. No, absolutely no doubt that there are. I mean, I, my own senses, by the way, that Kamala is much less sold on this whole Ukraine project than Biden is. This is not because she has different perspectives or more sophisticated understanding of this conflict. She doesn't have this visceral loathing of Putin and Russia that some people as some other people than the Biden administration do, because she's had less contact with them and she doesn't have quite the same backstory as they have. Yes, that's that's all there is there. So from her point of view getting this problem away, you know, getting some big diplomatic victory before the election, that would be great if they can manage that that would that would be a real, you know, success. I think, deal with it in the election. She's, and yes, I think that probably there is that pressure within the White House, or at least within the administration between, you know, the Kamala supporters who would like to see some kind of, you know, enter the conflict for that reason. And sooner rather than later, similar people who think the same thing, but for completely different reasons because they want to bring the conflict to an end, but they don't really intend the underlying war if you like to end. And they see it just as a ceasefire so that they can rearm Ukraine and start all over again. Anyway, all of that. So, that's, I think, I think that there is that difference. I think that there are pressures in Europe as well. We see that with what things that Scholz said, we've seen that with what Maloney said. And here it's not getting difficult to understand Scholz has to deal with the fact that anti war parties are now winning elections. And they've just won elections as we've discussed in Thuringia and came very close to winning elections in Saxony. The mood in Germany has shifted decisively against the wall. We've had an astonishing economic breakdown of the situation in Europe from Mario Draghi, he says, we've got to invest twice as much proportionate as we did to the Marshall aid plan to try and rescue Europe. And one of the reasons is because we've got, we're paying so much in energy costs now, so we've got to find some way around all of that. They tried, they got to disentangle themselves of this terrible mess. But they're not prepared to make the substantive concessions. This is true of the various fractions in Washington. It is true of the European leaders as well. And I'm going to make a further suggestion. I think that in terms of India and Brazil and the various brick states. I think this is probably only going to be a temporary thing. I think once the bricks summit is out of the way in October. And that's for Putin, the priority at the moment, keeping the bricks show on the road until October, dealing with these concerns that the Indians and the Brazilians have. Once that summit meeting is out of the way, I think that the Indians and the Brazilians will be able to relax and start talking about other things, because the deals will have been done, the big deals will have been done in Kazan. You won't have to tell the Americans and your own domestic constituencies that you're at risk of selling out, because it'll all be historic by that point. And from that moment on, the pressure for negotiations will will abate. Having said that, I think that Putin is annoyed that he's had to start explaining this all over again. I think he felt that after course, the pressure had been lifted, and he doesn't welcome the fact that he's having to explain it now once more to the Indians and the Brazilians. But anyway, he's immensely experienced political leader. I think he knows what he has to do. He has to accept it and work with it and go with the flow until he gets to Kazan. And then he's, he's in the clear as to what the Europeans and the Americans are going to do and the Ukrainians. I don't think they're going to get past first base. That's my own view. All right, we will end the video there. The Duran dot Locos dot com. 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