Transcription
Welcome back. We have the great pleasure of being joined today by Professor Jeffrey Saxs. So, thank you very much for joining in.
Of course. Great. Always great to be with you, Glenn. Thank you.
So, the NATO summit in Anchor uh is over now and um well, it's been let's say interesting that is uh the militarism uh and also the hostility against NATO's enemies was seemingly dialed up and even within NATO there were great tensions. Trump, which is also known as Mark Rut's daddy, turned out to be quite a deadbeat dad. He's very abusive against his uh well so-called allies in Europe. Uh again, quite incredible to watch. Uh I want to get your take though. What was what did you take away from this uh NATO summit?
I think basically the NATO alliance as it were is mostly in disarray. This is uh not a a serious group. Uh not seriously strategizing. It was two days of Trumpisms. Uh he's absolutely mentally uh unstable. It's we can normalize it. We can laugh about it. We can uh say that it's a a tactic. He's a he's really uh something uh awful and everyone plays along with it. So you watch two days that are quite bizarre. Uh he says that Spain is awful. We should cut off all trade with Spain. Spain's response is we have very nice relations with the United States. All is well. We had a charming chat. Uh the United States president says basically Greenland needs to be ours. Okay, that's fine. Uh uh no, it won't be. This is not really an alliance right now. And these are not meetings of serious people. I'm sorry to say. Of course, a lot of the talk was about military spending, and it's a club to encourage everybody to spend more, especially on US weaponry uh and to talk about war. But there used to be a time when uh great issues were discussed in a serious way. Uh and that time is long over. The United States is uh basically uh without leadership. It flails around. Trump, as I said, is is obviously the emperor without clothes. Uh and um I would say that it this is just bizarre life. Every day is something bizarre. And that's maybe Trump's survival tactic. Every day crowds out the day before. Uh and now we're on to the renewed uh fighting in uh with Iran. Uh and the the NATO meeting uh will soon be forgotten. That's that's my basic take. But it's not harmless. It's uh a whole western world that is pretty much a drift without strategy, quite nasty, uh engaged in a lot of the deadly war. Uh without anyone uh seemingly aware of the real risks of all of this, uh these people distinguish themselves by and large as being fools.
Yeah. For the US president refers to the Iranian negotiators as scum. It's quite extraordinary that this has become the the new normal, if you will. But als but also the rhetoric against.
Sorry. Go ahead.
I was just going to say that the fact that this is normalized that we shrug and well that's just Trump is not an adequate response to this. We are in hot wars. They're extremely dangerous. People are being killed in large numbers. Life is not a joke, but it's treated as a shrug or a joke, and it is not. So, it's on the one side quite serious, but the serious point is that nothing serious is actually discussed by these people. Nothing honest, nothing serious. Uh and uh that is shocking in a world at war.
Yeah. And uh well the European leaders they continue to call for deeper strikes into Russia with well their own weapons based on their own intelligence and targeting. And the the objective is apparently to force the Russians to the negotiation table. But this is by European leaders who still after 4 and a half years still boycott the diplomacy. So, it is it's quite strange and no one seemingly can call them out because nobody wants to be seen as being, you know, pro-Russian by referring to objective reality. But now we see the American side as well. Marco Rubio argued that um attacking Russia will help to advance peace. Trump made a casual reference to a s um imposing a nofly zone and also of course they will now allow uh well the licensing of um Patriot missiles to be manufactured in Ukraine. Is the US now getting into this war again or deeper into this war? Because uh this is very different than the rhetoric we saw from Trump after his uh well taking over power uh the second time. Trump campaigned on the basis of the end of these useless wars. But the American wars are driven by the militaryindustrial digital complex. I think it's important to add digital now because uh big tech is absolutely a party and a profit center of these wars. And um when Trump uh would take any kind of move to uh find a diplomatic uh solution uh most of the US political class, most of Washington uh in both houses of Congress uh and throughout the uh the Pentagon, maybe not the generals so much, but uh uh a lot of former generals who are now in the uh military contracting uh companies uh they strongly objected and then Trump would change course because he's a a weak and bullish man to to begin with and he does not have a strategy and he does not understand the job that he has almost at all. So, I would say Glenn that uh you could say that there was a a change of rhetoric because Trump thought it's just fine. Uh that the war is escalating. Yes, Trump said whether it's meaningful or not that uh Ukraine will be able to uh produce Patriot missile systems and so forth. But the truth is that rhetoric never went away in Washington. Uh Trump seemed to be trying to chart a slightly different course, but it was always ineffectual. It it was always bouncing around back to sanctions and deadlines and uh and threats to Russia. So this latest round is not some kind of decisive turn of US policy. Basically the US government and I would say uh the governments of the major countries are driven by a profit center war machine. Uh this is the dominant part of US politics. Uh, it would take a strong president with a clear vision and a capacity to talk to the American people other than in idiotic posts on True Social to be able to make a change because the president would have to talk over this powerful lobby. Trump can't do that. He doesn't have much interest in doing it. Silicon Valley uh especially led by the likes of Palunteer, but almost all of big tech right now is uh making a lot of money putting its new models to work in these wars. Uh they like these wars because they also get to test their weapon systems. They get to upgrade the systems. They get big military contracts and so forth. So what happened in the last couple of days is I would say par for the course. uh and the fact that Trump failed to uh end the war as he promised he would. The war in Ukraine with the phone call and within 24 hours is a sign of uh the underlying uh dynamics of US politics on the one side and the sheer incompetence, ignorance and foolishness of this man on the other side. He can't really do anything that reaches a level of strategy as opposed to uh hourly tactics. Tactics he can do hour to hour, though not consistently, but strategy he's unable to do.
Well, uh, Mark Ruted, NATO Secretary General, he seemingly threw NATO's weight behind the US war on Iran by arguing that this, uh, America's decision to go back to war against Iran was totally justified and essentially, yeah, giving his full support. Um, uh, however, it also um sends a very direct signal to the Russians that is that NATO is not talking about peace anymore, only war. And we saw now that uh the the Kremlin spokesperson uh Dimmitri Pescov was arguing that uh well before this summit as well that the that the special military operation uh it has now become a war because of NATO's involvement. There doesn't seem to be much effort anymore to prevent uh this march towards World War II. But I I did want to ask you though, how do you see this statement by the Russians? How will this change? uh um are they simply have they given up on uh the US uh diplomacy? Do they see it as a fraud like in Iran? Or how do you make sense of these uh new developments?
I don't think anyone in the Russian leadership gives any heed whatsoever to the US or to US diplomacy. I think that they try not to antagonize Trump unnecessarily, but nobody uh in the Russian leadership is expecting Trump in any way to play a a a decisive or even an active role in uh stopping this war. Um that's over. I think they had some hope early on, but I think what's happened proves Putin's famous adage from a 2017 interview when he famously said uh that he had by then worked with several presidents. They come into office with ideas, but then men in dark suits uh and uh blue ties and briefcases come and explain how the world really is to these presidents and you never hear of those ideas again. So Putin had a lot of experience and I've spoken to Russian leaders over the years. They have a lot of experience knowing that presidents come and go. But the US security state, the military industrial digital complex is the the deeper part of American policy. So, I don't think that they ever uh absolutely were uh betting on the US to resolve this conflict, but I think they were hoping that maybe Trump would do something. And I think that they put some effort into that the first year, but by uh already the end of 2025, I think they had really given up on this. And the statements that they're making now are basically again not to uh go out of their way to antagonize Trump, but on the other hand are very clear to say we're basically at war. We don't think diplomacy is going to solve anything. We're going to win this war. And I think Russia has largely already for years, but certainly now uh given up on the west so-called meaning uh the European Union, Britain and uh the United States and Canada and it views its future uh basically as a Eurasian uh future and a future with other parts of the developing world as well. And my view is that that's essentially China's view. Uh it's essentially Iran's view. Uh it's essentially the view of uh most of Eurasia outside of Europe. Um, and this is, I think, where we're heading, which is a a a western world which is dug in to try to protect ancient and disappearing prerogatives and advantages that they don't have anymore. uh and uh the rest of the world uh saying we don't expect anything from you uh except maybe war and we'll meet that uh if necessary. Of course, the disaster in all of this is that uh the war kills vast numbers of Ukrainians. It solves absolutely nothing. And there is no way possible for Russia to be defeated other than uh bringing us to nuclear war because Russia is not going to surrender to uh strikes of uh Western support uh into deep Russia. it's going to escalate and if pushed hard enough and if those strikes were costly enough it will escalate to nuclear war. And so the whole idea of these uh western governments is a kind of profound uh ignorance uh and gratuitousness and recklessness that is astounding. Now, one thing that should give us some perspective and and pause is that all of these governments, Trump, uh, Mcronone, Mertz, uh, all of them are unpopular. Uh, the publics in the United States and Europe don't want these wars. They don't want the military escalation. The latest Gallup poll show the Ukrainians want this war to end, even if it means the kinds of concessions that would end the war. This is very clear. So what we have is a class of political leaders that uh operate um in an anacronistic way believing in western dominance and western power not understanding the changes of the world and not uh following or understanding their own public opinion. So there are I suppose three ways that all of this can break in the end. One is that Russia can outright achieve its military objectives. This is certainly quite possible. Uh some would say quite probable. The other is that this escalates to a nuclear war. I think that this is absolutely possible because we are led by the most incompetent people imaginable right now from Trump and Mertz and Mcronone and many others. And the third is that finally these wararmongering governments and wararmongering lobbies are thrown out by publics that are completely disgusted by them. So Mertz's approval rating is at an all-time low for German chancellors. The same with the president Mcronone. Trump's approval rating somehow still is above 35%. uh but it's under 40% and his disapproval rating is around 60%. And we have an election coming up that if it's actually run fairly and counted fairly is still with all of the shenanigans going on and there are many of them and all of the Supreme Court rulings in Trump's favor still likely to put uh the opposition into a majority in at least one of the houses of Congress. So maybe, just maybe, our very weak uh and uh seemingly failing democratic institutions could end up being a check uh on this uh quite miserable political class that we have and that would be the peaceful way out in the end.
Yeah, I would like to see that. But uh it appears that the worse the war the the war goes uh the more they rely on the war. That is uh when the economies of Europe gets weaker they look towards more militarism for economic and technological development. When uh the our leaders lose support from their public because of the war. They then use the war to crush the scent by essentially dismissing all opposition as being you know some pro Kremlin conspiracy. And also when we see the west fragmenting we hear that you know we essentially get the message that fighting Russia is the new unifying idea. So, it's u I I don't see the course correction just yet, but hopefully.
Glenn, I think all of that is exactly right, of course, except that the public is not being pulled along uh in France with Maria Lean now contesting the presidency next year, that will become France's major political drama, not Ukraine. uh uh in Russia with the IFD uh surging in the polls and saying uh that Germany needs a completely different approach based on diplomacy visa to be Russia that is a potential break and in the United States the overwhelming opposition of the public to Israel and what h happened the genocide in Gaza and now to The war in Iran is also uh potentially uh a change of direction in American politics. I grant you none of this is simple uh because the deep military war machine is extremely powerful in the US and Europe. uh and uh these politicians are basically operating mouthpieces for a much deeper uh set of narrow interests but quite powerful narrow interests. But I think that it is encouraging that the public does not accept this. And um that means that even with all of the absolutely clear resistance of the political class, and you're completely right on it, there's nothing that's changing the dynamics within this group of politicians. But what might change it is political defeat uh by outside parties that are tapping into the true public opinion. Uh I know you have to run so let me just ask a very quick brief question that is uh the absence of strategy as you said is quite evident but uh what what do you think are the objectives now of the Americans and versus the Europeans in terms of well their main rival as we saw at the summit which is Russia. Uh what is it that they actually want to achieve here? Is it simply to bring the Americans into the deeper into the war or how are you reading this? Because um it doesn't seem rational to push this hard for a war with the world's largest nuclear power.
We should uh of course start from the proposition that since 1945 and certainly since 1991 at the supposed end of the Cold War, the deep state uh or militaryindustrial complex intention has been to weaken Russia in any opportunistic way possible to support whatever uh insurgencies on Russia's periphery. to surround Russia in the Black Sea with NATO enlargement to try to create unrest by so-called economic tools, the unilateral sanctions, uh the confiscation of Russia's money and so forth. And I don't think those goals have changed in again uh the basic driver of foreign policy in the United States, the CIA uh and the military contractors and now the palunteers and others uh of the world. They don't count lives. They don't count money. Uh they uh are out to sell their goods. Uh and uh if the US goes broke in the process, that's just fine. We've uh created a class of uh wararmongering billionaires uh that speak publicly about how important these wars of by the western world are. Uh so th this is really our uh ongoing situation. uh and uh it is the basic motivation that is either going to drive us to complete disaster which is brewing right now um or to some kind of break in the politics because the public can finally is able to use the tools of democracy to make their views heard. Admittedly, that hasn't happened. And the United States, you know, for decades pleased Western European politics to make sure that no anti-American politics could survive. And um that kind of placing continues until today. But I would say most of our western countries are in political crisis right now because of the divergence of the dominant interests uh class interests of this military militarized state and the broader public opinion which understands that this is this is a disaster. So I think um we we will continue to flounder. Don't expect anything from Trump. Uh anything sensible, any direction that is sustained. Uh he becomes uh more and more incoherent and less and less relevant actually except that he loves to dominate the media and the media love to pay attention to every idiotic utterance of this man.
Well, Jeff, thank you so much for taking the time and um yes, I know you have a busy day there in Usbekistan. So, thanks again.
Yeah, great to be with you. Thanks.