The Bill Walton Show March 8, 2024
While Americans have become preoccupied with other things – the election, the border, the economy – events in Ukraine are spinning out of control. People have been talking hopefully about a ceasefire and a truce. Instead, with a couple of more blunders we could be heading for a World War III.
To learn where this might be headed next, I’m back talking in this episode with my go to guru on all things national security Stephen Bryen – Senior Fellow at the Center for Security Policy
Some takeaways from our conversation:
- The head of NATO Jen Stoltenberg’s reckless statements and actions are escalating the situation in Ukraine and increasing the risk of a full-scale war.
- The Biden Administration’s objective of regime change in Moscow has failed. Russia seems certain to prevail. At this point, they have few incentives to stop the fighting.
- Ukraine has suffered massive casualties, perhaps up to 800,000 killed, and is on its third army. Ukraine President Zelensky is on the way out, we just don’t know how or when.
- Sanctions against Russia haven’t worked. China has replaced the European Union as Russia’s top energy buyer and goods supplier, giving Russia both the cash and the manufactures it needs to sustain itself.
- Total trade between China and Russia has reached $240 billion in 2023, more than double what it was in 2018. Russia now has become China’s biggest supplier of crude oil, second for coal and third for natural gas.
- Stephen predicted that Victoria Nuland would be out as acting Deputy Secretary of State. She resigned this week.
- The Biden administration aims to drag the war out as long as possible. Biden doesn’t want Ukraine to collapse while he’s running for president.
- Sending more money to Ukraine for ammunition and armaments doesn’t address its real issues: its lack of manpower and low morale.
Finding a peaceful solution and stabilizing the situation in Ukraine should be our highest priority. Up to now, it hasn’t been.
As always, Stephen provides a deep and informed take on events. Definitely worth a listen.
That radar facility is mainly there to monitor Israeli operations and raise the alarm if Israel were to take off to bomb Iran. That’s not new or news.
It’s merely a radar facility. That doesn’t change my point that Israel does its own fighting without the use of American troops.
Hi, Laura.
Unfortunately, this is not true:
“Two months before Hamas attacked Israel, the Pentagon awarded a multimillion-dollar contract to build U.S. troop facilities for a secret base it maintains deep within Israel’s Negev desert, just 20 miles from Gaza. Code-named “Site 512,” the longstanding U.S. base is a radar facility that monitors the skies for missile attacks on Israel.
“On October 7, however, when thousands of Hamas rockets were launched, Site 512 saw nothing — because it is focused on Iran, more than 700 miles away.”
— https://theintercept.com/2023/10/27/secret-military-base-israel-gaza-site-512/
Also cf
https://www.axios.com/2023/10/31/american-troops-middle-east-israel-palestine
Altogether, we have 45,000 troops stationed in the Israel theater of operations (plus thousands more offshore), some of which have already come under fire from Iranian proxies in Iraq, Jordan and off Yemen. On top of this,we are sending troops directly to Gaza to build a port that Israel may or may not want built.
American escalation in Israel resembles the way the US got entangled in Vietnam; and with Joe Biden in charge of the operation, I am not confident that the results will be good.
@Laura
So crazy you can’t respond beyond saying “it’s crazy”? Nice try, but I think we can call that a clearly non-responsive response. But I guess we can just add that one to the list of your other non-responsive responses. Good enough.
This is simply a crazy claim on its face.
You are quite wrong. American taxpayer dollars are not squandered on Israel. In fact Israel must use the money to purchase American munitions, planes and tanks etc. Furthermore, Israel provides valuable intelligence. This is not outright aid. Another thing is that Israel fights its own battles, we don’t have troops or bases in Israel unlike most of our other allies. Out of all of our allies, Israel is the most productive investment.
@Michael
So you THINK two completely contrary beliefs at the same time. Well, that at least might explain why you also are able to support the Neocon narrative in Ukraine at any rate.
Peloni,
I said I THINK you and Ted can be reasoned with on the issue. I didn’t state it as provable fact. As for being shills, “If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck…”
@Michael
These two statements are quite at odds with eachother, and yet you make them in the same thread.
A fair definition of a shill is as follows:
Hence, shilling describes someone as being more than simply wrong, but being a peddler of bad faith arguments. Consequently, as you have described Ted and myself as shills, you are indicating that our positions are not just in error, but are actually bad faith arguments. This contradicts your belief that we could actually be reasoned with on this issue. In fact, such derogatory as labeling someone a shill without any basis in fact or reason is nothing more than a rather routine ad hominem attack, and specifically made to delegitimize those who hold opposing views to obviate the need of any logical arguments. In fact, I have no bias predisposing me to support the Russians on this or any issue, besides the reality that the facts have lead me to conclude what I have shared as my views. Your second statement would support this conclusion, while your first statement would not.
Perhaps you could explain why you believe that a shill might be reasoned with, or why you have charged me with shilling for Russia at all. I am quite able to explain my positions on this topic in some depth and detail, and have done so repeatedly to demonstrate that the basis of my views, such as they are, are not in fact based on bad faith, but are instead based upon simple logic, and Ted has done the same as well.
@Laura
Quite untrue. Reason, however, requires facts, and fair arguments rather than derogatory insults and bad faith claims which makes up the bulk of most responses which support the Neocon narrative with which I find great fault and little value. I have made a fair effort to demonstrate the flaws which I find your claims to be based in this recent thread, and your responses fail to address the substance of any single point I raised. Instead you chose to move into two other areas of the Neocon narrative, both of which I also addressed and upon which you failed to respond.
Now it is your own choice as to what and how you may or may not respond, but when you choose not to respond and later charge that it is impossible to reason with me on this issue, it demonstrates a rather large contradiction which I felt obliged to address.
You also have never responded to the basis of Ted’s views on this topic as are summarized and discussed in his essay Clearly, the US is the aggressor in the Ukraine war.
If you have more than the passion of your beliefs with which to argue these matters, please do respond to the points which have been raised in support of the views which Ted and I have made. Whether or how you choose to do so, are your own choices to make, but I assure you that you will not be faced with bad faith claims nor personal abuses as a response from either myself or Ted, specifically because we can be reasoned with, but only with a fair argument based on actual facts.
Hi, Laura. You said,
The answer is simple: I DO care about Israel; and that, as you note, is one reason I “bother with this site”. The other reason, is that Ted has been gracious enough to let me post here — making him unique, perhaps, in the whole world 🙂
I think Ted and Peloni can be reasoned with on this issue; but their biases amaze me.
Concerning American taxpayer dollars being squandered on Israel, as well as Ukraine, here’s the latest I’ve read:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5cRQiTW9vs
Look at the chaos in Gaza, even in that biased YouTube report, and try to tell me this is a wise adventure by Joe Biden! I believe Israel can handle its own problems better than the US can — especially when our own border looks like this:
https://www.cnn.com/videos/us/2023/03/13/el-paso-texas-migrant-surge-contd-orig-llr.cnn
It’s impossible to reason with them on this issue.
Michael, I agree with you 100% about Putin, however I disagree with you on this. I’m curious as to why you bother with this site if you don’t care about Israel.
Ted,
You and Peloni have been shilling for Putin for two years now. Nothing Bryen is saying disputes that. I have been against the Ukraine War AND Putin, who started it, from the beginning. I also have been saying from the first, that Biden would eventually completely flub the thing and throw our friends under the bus. There is nothing new here.
Putin is a murdering, tyrranical war criminal.
“Back Vicky”??? What have you been eating? When have I said anything of the sort — or for that matter, even mentioned her name except in passing? You and Peloni ARE Putin lovers, and nothing I have said or done is to blame. The only country and leader I “love” is the USA and its leader, Donald J. Trump. As for Israel, Russia and Ukraine, they have their own problems. Our problem is defending our own people from an invasion of MILLIONS of military-aged men from Communist China and Muslim nations. You and Peloni can’t be bothered with these things, you’re so full of hate for the Ukrainians. That’s your problem. We have our own problem, and his name is Joe Biden. We should not be wasting one penny on Israel OR Ukraine; we simply don’t have the money to throw around. But stop praising a man who bullies and kills his neighbors, poisons his rivals and pushes them out windows.
Are you denying, that Putin said, flat-out, that it was Poland and not Germany that started WWII? Does he deny that he thinks Khmielnitsky, who murdered thousands of Jews, is a Russian national hero? And all the time, he claims to be “denazifying” his neighbor? Do you deny that Putin doesn’t even recognize the existence of Ukrainians as a people? And you expect me to sympathize with the creep? Pardon me, I’m not interested.
Treatment of prisoners of war in the Russian invasion of Ukraine
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treatment_of_prisoners_of_war_in_the_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine
Stephen Bryen is as American as you can get. He totally vindicates what Pelone and I have been saying ansd writing for the last two years.
Is Laura and Michael and Adam and the others going to call him a “Putin Lover” or worse. Or they going to admit we were right all along?
And are they going to continue to back Vicky.