JR Afternoon with Chris Renwick
An Update On The War In Ukraine
December 4, 2024 ~ Chris speaks with Adjunct Professor at Wayne State University's Center for Peace and Conflict Studies, Vincent Artman about the state of the conflict, the reports on Zelenskyy being willing to talk with Russia and the overal morale of the Army and the Ukrainian people.
- Duration:
- 10m
- Broadcast on:
- 04 Dec 2024
- Audio Format:
- other
So, an escalation over two years ago, as Russia invaded Ukraine, has left thousands and thousands of people of dead. The United States and other European allies trying to support Ukraine financially with munitions, and we've seen an escalation. On the Russian side, North Korean troops coming over to fight on behalf of the Russian army, and most recently, President Joe Biden's decision to allow the Ukrainian army to use long-range missiles provided by the United States inside Russian territory. And we've seen a medium-range ballistic missile essentially fired into Ukraine from Russia as a result. And so it leaves a lot of questions, particularly now that Donald Trump has won the presidency. So there continue to be a level of funding that we've seen over the last couple of years, that aid that the United States is sending. Vladimir Zelensky spoke with Donald Trump since it was a good conversation. But really, what does it look like on the ground level? Let's head on out to Austria, where Vincent Artman, the adjunct professor at Wayne State University Center for Peace and conflict studies finds himself. He's leaving Ukraine coming home. Sounds like he's already got a trip planned to go back. Vincent, it's good to have you. Thank you very much. It's an honor to be here. I want to start a little bit with what is the feeling amongst the Ukrainian people as we stand today? You know, I think right now, morale is about what you can expect. It's been a very long year. I think you just mentioned the political changes here in the United States. And that has definitely put a lot of people into an anxiety because they don't know, as you quite rightly said, what's coming next. But at the same time, Ukrainians aren't going to give up. They know the costs of what capitulation would mean. And even though the situation at the front lines is quite difficult, I still know several people personally, who really just within the last couple of months have gone from doing humanitarian volunteering to joining the armed forces out of a sense of patriotic duty. But again, there's fear and concern over the political shifts in the West. And of course, now with the winter coming on, the strikes on Ukraine's power grid are escalating once again. This was a big deal during the summer. It sort of tapered off for a while, and now Russia is really striking the power grid again in an attempt to sort of freeze Ukrainians over the winter. And this is difficult, but it's not something that Ukrainians have not dealt with before. And so people try to go on with their life as best they can, but particularly for young kids and the elderly and people with mobility issues, this can be very difficult because people sometimes are trapped in their apartments because the elevators don't work in the power out and there's no heat and no light and so, you know, people try to get on as best as they can. And even in cities closer to the front line like Harky's, which has really been relentlessly pounded over the last few months with glide bombs that are much larger than anything that can hit a cave right now, people remain defiant. Again, life goes on and I don't think Ukrainians are thinking about giving up any time. So, you know, the escalations recently, North Korean troops have come down to support Russia and fight on their behalf. The United States has joined a list of countries in Europe in particular that have said, you know, we need to allow the Ukrainian army to use our munitions inside Russian territory. It can provide a boost to their offensive and really start to push the Russians back. And then, of course, as a result of that, as President Biden has joined those calls that have been growing for seemingly the better part of a year and a half or so, you've got Vladimir Putin basically altering and amending how they're going to, how they could consider using nuclear weapons. What are these kind of rampups on all of these fronts? What does that mean for the Ukrainian forces fighting? Well, I think you bring up some very interesting points. And I want to say, I guess I'll take this in two parts. The long-range weapons that the U.S. and Great Britain and other countries have finally begun to allow the Ukrainians to use are very, very helpful. Today, there's been this slogan among Ukrainians now and advocates here in the U.S. for a few months strike the archer, not the arrow. And what this means is that Russia all along has been able to hit Ukraine with impunity, with missiles and with bombers that are based far, far away from the front lines where Ukraine can't hit them. So Ukraine, every night, is hit with cruise missiles and ballistic missiles that Ukraine has not been able here to for, to strike back. So being able to do this is really quite important. I also though want to say that there are no wonder weapons. Sometimes people get caught up in this idea that there's this one weapon that's just going to single-handedly change the course of the war, and that will be that. And there's no such wonder weapon. Every weapon that we send, whether it's F-16s, tanks, artillery shells, long-range missiles, all of these in aggregate can help turn the tide. And in many ways, a lot of these weapons are much more than a match for their Russian counterparts, and this is why Russia is so keen to try to prevent them from being used. The way that they're trying to prevent them from being used is, as you quite rightly mentioned, trying to sow dissent and hysteria and panic in the West, particularly these of the nuclear war. Now, I couldn't even possibly go down the list of all of the times since the 1990s that Russia has rattled its nuclear savor, but it's done so many, many times. And while it's very important, hello? Yes, gotcha. Yep. Oh, sorry. I heard a beep. Oh, that's okay. I thought I got disconnected. We gotcha. Yeah. So, while it's very important to keep in mind that nuclear war is quite dangerous, I really don't think that it's much more than savor rattling. This rich, medium-range ballistic missile that you mentioned, I actually just read a report in the Moscow Times today that revealed that this was more or less just a publicity stunt. Russia does not have very many of these things. Its economy is not equipped to mass produce these things. It was really meant as a publicity stunt to try to scare people in the West to be afraid of nuclear war and to avoid this supposed cycle of escalation. Well, and then there were reports that Zelensky was willing to talk and find some sort of resolve to this and end to this conflict, at least the one over the last couple of years. Is there any indication that that's true or what would need to happen for that to happen? Yes and no. Ukraine has been, quote unquote, willing to talk all along, as long as the talks were held in good faith and would lead to a just peace which would at the very bare minimum require Russian troops to leave Ukraine and restore Ukraine's 1991 borders. The reason for this is that Ukrainians know quite well what the costs of occupation are and they're grisly. I won't go into all the horrible details but I think we all kind of know the kinds of things that happen in the areas that are occupied by the Russian army. And so Ukrainians do not want to give up the fight because it's not just losing territory. You understand it's losing their families and it's losing their friends and it's losing their fellow citizens to potentially generations' worth of oppression. And so there have really within the last week been some weird suggestions that Ukraine might be able to or be willing to temporarily see some territory to be gotten back diplomatically sometime in the future as long as the unoccupied parts of Ukraine were given NATO protection sort of a West Germany situation back in the Cold War where Germany was divided between the Soviet and the Western allied and the West Germany was protected with by NATO. That said, Zelensky himself has pointed out that NATO hasn't actually suggested any such thing. So it's really kind of a non-starter. No, no, and I think that things like that make a lot of sense. And there's obviously a lot still to be hashed out and we're going to have to see if that all happens. Vincent Armin, thank you so much. Really appreciate your time. I hope we catch up down the road. Stay in touch. Thank you so much. Take a break. Come back for more next. Thanks. You You
December 4, 2024 ~ Chris speaks with Adjunct Professor at Wayne State University's Center for Peace and Conflict Studies, Vincent Artman about the state of the conflict, the reports on Zelenskyy being willing to talk with Russia and the overal morale of the Army and the Ukrainian people.