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April 23, 2025 - Judging Freedom - Judge Andrew Napolitano
26:53
Prof. Glenn Diesen : Will Europe Accept Peace?
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Hi, everyone.
Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom.
Today is Thursday, April 24th, 2025.
Professor Glenn Deason joins us now.
Professor, a pleasure, my friend, and thank you very much for your time today and for accommodating my schedule.
Before we get into the nitty-gritty about peace talks in Ukraine or with Ukraine and Russia and the attitude of the Europeans, I've been asking All of our guests this week about the Pope and sort of getting surprising or not always anticipated answers.
In your view, is there any geopolitical significance to the death of Pope Francis?
That's a hard question.
It's too early to say.
I guess it depends who will take over.
No, I'm sorry.
I don't have anything to contribute.
No, that's all right.
I mean, is the Pope viewed in Europe, which of course at one point was all Catholic and another point was all Christian, it's hard to say what it is today, but is the Pope viewed as a secular leader who can bring about peace?
I guess less so now than before, but he still has an important voice.
But it's worth noting that he did call during the Ukraine war for talks and recognition that the Russians and the Ukrainians had a lot of common history, and this was immediately attacked effectively.
So he didn't enjoy the same authority as he would have had in the past.
He apparently...
He telephoned the pastor of the one remaining standing Catholic Church in Gaza, which was built in the 9th century, every day for the last month or so of his life.
When it was announced that he died, I didn't know about this until one of our guests, Max Blumenthal, told me.
When he died, the Israeli embassy in the Vatican immediately posted standard, Condolences.
And then Prime Minister Netanyahu ordered it removed.
I wasn't aware.
I don't know.
Is there anything to say about that?
That seems to me highly inappropriate.
The guy's dead.
In my opinion, I think the interaction and I guess you could call diplomacy between religious leaders can be very helpful and positive.
I'm not sure what the background was for Netanyahu.
Was this also part of the growing intolerance?
Well, he was involved in some Peronist activity before he was a priest, going back to Argentina in the 50s.
And I guess they were upset that he may have used the word genocide.
I don't even know.
I know Netanyahu is not going to be at the funeral.
I don't know if they're going to send anyone.
Moving on.
Witkoff-Rubio boycott of the London negotiations.
How do you read that, Professor Deason?
Well, it shouldn't become as too big of a surprise.
I think the main thing that triggered this was Zelensky, who argued that there was nothing to talk about because he rejected some of the key Well,
then where are they going to go?
Because that is the...
The sine qua non, without which there is nothing for the Russians.
If Zelensky agrees to it, he might very well be assassinated by the political forces around him.
Is this insoluble or is this only soluble by the force of arms?
That's a great question, because it has to be pointed out that Zelensky himself is in a very difficult position.
If he would accept this concession, then he could be strung up by the nationalists.
After he was elected as well, keep in mind that Zelensky was actually elected on a peace platform back in 2019.
He got 73% of the votes because he was pushing for peace with Donbass, implementing the Minsk agreement, making peace with Russia.
And the nationalist groups, they openly threatened his life.
Even Boris Johnson recognized this recently.
So there's not much in this sense he can do unless he wants to have the nationalist come after him.
On the other hand, if he doesn't accept this peace agreement...
Ukraine will be destroyed.
And I don't think that's an understatement.
I think the Americans are also put themselves in a difficult spot now because, again, Trump said this war would be over in 100 days.
If you can't get the war to be over, then what else can you do?
You know, he can continue to say this is not his war.
It was Biden's war.
But the United States continues now to fight against Russia.
Every day, its weapons and intelligence and targeting results in the killing of Russians.
If this just continues, then this is a continuation of Biden's policy.
It is Trump's war as well.
So either now he has to either make a peace or begin to move away.
And I think this is what Marco Rubio, J.D. Vance has indicated, that if there is no possibility for peaceful settlement, then America's done.
So I think this is why it's very dangerous not to accept the peace agreement as well, as this will lead to the...
Is it likely that the United States will turn off the spigot of arms?
Like always, it's a bit hard to say with Trump.
He seems to be very impulsive, and he changes his mind from day to day.
But I think if this war just keeps going from bad to worse...
I don't think he wants to have ownership over this.
If he can walk away, this huge mess before it all falls apart.
It would be a bit like handing over Afghanistan before it collapsed to the Europeans.
So essentially they can take over the mess.
Go ahead.
No, I was just going to say, I think it's too much.
Because there are other political forces within Ukraine who are very willing to make a deal.
That is, the majority of Ukrainians want negotiations.
And again, the former advisor of Zelensky, Alexei Arstovich, he recently made this comment that Ukraine should accept the loss of these four oblasts.
The alternative isn't to restore everything.
The alternative is to lose atoblasts.
And I think this is common sense.
Everyone knows that the war is being lost.
Nothing can be won.
But the hardliners around Zelensky are not rational.
They'll never accept this.
They believe, I think, correct me if I'm wrong, you have a better finger on this pulse than I do.
They would prefer to fight to the death, wouldn't they?
Well, there's many different groups within Ukraine, but definitely some of the more radical nationalists, you know, they definitely do prefer just to continue the war and continue fighting.
Even if the outcome is obvious and not to their liking, presumably when Vice President Vance says something, he's running past the president.
Tell me if you think he did here.
Cut number two.
We've issued a very explicit proposal to both the Russians and the Ukrainians, and it's time for them to either say yes or for the United States to walk away from this process.
But it's now time, I think, to take, if not the final step, one of the final steps, which is at a broad level, the party's saying, we're going to stop the killing, we're going to freeze the territorial lines at some level close to where they are today, and we're going to actually put in place the kind of long-term diplomatic settlement that hopefully will lead to long-term peace.
We'll walk away, that courtesy of CBS News.
I don't know, do you actually see Trump turning off the spigot?
Yeah, it remains to be seen, again, what's in this concept of walking away, because will they still supply weapons, intelligence, again, continue the Biden policies?
It's hard to say, because if they do, I think a lot of people will say, Over what happens in Ukraine.
So I guess it fits into the wider strategic reorientation of the United States.
Is it readjusting effectively to a multi-polarity in which the US recognizes it doesn't have the same strategic interests everywhere, so it's just willing to accept, well, this is not our part of the world, this is none of our interest?
Or will the more neocons win over who suggest that every corner of the planet is our interest?
What about the European elites?
A, will they even accept a peace agreement?
Or B, will they dispatch someone to play the role Boris Johnson played three years ago?
To talk Zelensky out of the peace agreement that had been negotiated?
Or C, will they try to replace the United States as the financier of the war?
Well, the Europeans actually echoed what Zelensky said.
They argued that they also will not accept Crimea becoming Russian.
So they reject the peace, and also they continue to send the weapons for the Explicit purpose that Ukraine shouldn't have to make any compromises or settlement.
So I think, again, when they talk about sending peacekeepers to help any peace agreement, this is to sabotage it, because they know very well that the Russians would never accept a peace deal where the Europeans or soldiers from NATO countries would be stationed in Ukraine.
So I see this as being...
An effort to sabotage it.
But again, I can understand why they see this as a bad deal, because it is a humiliating piece.
That is, Russia gets what it wants.
It gets no NATO, and it gets the territorial concessions.
Again, my main problem is similar to what Rostovich said, that the alternative is much, much worse.
I think this is the best of all terrible deals.
But the Europeans, they don't have an alternative plan, but they're very strict that they do not want this peace agreement.
Do they have the wherewithal to replace the flow of American arms and intel?
I guess they have intel because they have MI6, which is apparently superb.
I would imagine the Germans have good intel as well.
You would know better.
But do they have the wherewithal and the political will to supply the wherewithal, if they have it—sorry, this is such a long-winded question—to replace what the Biden and Trump administrations have been sending?
Well, I think the problem is twofold.
One, they don't have the same capabilities as the United States in terms of the weapons.
The logistics as well as the intelligence.
Now, obviously, they do have some, but nowhere near what the United States have.
The other problem, as you alluded to, is the solidarity.
Europe is not one entity.
It's easier for Europe to act as one entity under U.S. leadership, but the Europeans aren't united on this.
The EU works very hard to marginalize dissenters such as...
Hungary or Slovakia, but there's more countries now who are growing very critical, be it Italy, for example.
So it's going to be very hard to form this coalition of the willing, which is a very unfortunate term.
It's really a terrible term crafted by people either ignorant or willing to ignore recent history.
That was the George Bush.
As if Afghanistan or Iraq were successful from the American point of view.
I don't know why they picked that terminology.
But who's in the coalition of the willing besides Wanderley and Starmer and Macron?
Well, the whole thing is very weak already.
They can't really agree on anything.
And I think even the ones who are most pushing hardest for this, the British.
I don't think it's realistic.
I think they realize this because even within Britain, there's a huge pushback against Starmer because what exactly would be the idea?
You send in British troops that would be annihilated by the Russians.
And then what?
Without an American backstop, it doesn't really make any sense.
They don't have the troops.
So, no, I think this is a lot of bluster.
Essentially, they don't know exactly what to do.
And this is, I guess, the main frustration within Europe, because there's a lot of contradictions here.
If you, for example, look at the French under Macron, he has been arguing for years that at some point we have to recognize that constructing a Europe without Russia would lead to security problems.
We need to reconsider the European security architecture.
It's arguing that NATO is not part of the problem.
You know, after 2022, when the Russians invaded, he tried to have some diplomatic efforts with Putin, and when the other Europeans put pressure on him to instead go for boycotting diplomacy, he argued that the main threat would be that non-European powers would then be the ones who would negotiate peace in Europe.
And, of course, he was correct on this, but now...
He doesn't want to talk to Putin, at least not yet.
So there's a lot of contradictions among the Europeans where they say one thing one day and then something very different on the next.
Putin has made a rather sweet statement about his desire for peace.
Cut number four.
As we've always said, we look positively at any peace initiatives.
We hope that the representatives of the Kyiv regime will also feel the same way.
However, we have seen the initial reaction.
I think everyone has noticed it.
There was a statement published according to which our proposal was seen as a game with fates, with people's lives and so on.
But apparently there was someone smarter there who suggested, most likely from foreign overseers, that rejecting such initiatives is a losing position for the Kyiv regime.
And they quickly agreed.
That's an understatement, isn't it?
Yeah, but I wanted to add there, though, that even in the Western media, also American media, there's been recognized that as Washington pushed this peace proposal forward, that the Russians were willing to accept huge concessions.
That is, you know, the next is for territories, but they don't control all...
All parts of these four oblasts.
So, you know, the fact that they would be willing, at least according to Financial Times, to freeze the front lines where they are in return for a political agreement, of course, this would effectively, well, de facto means to change the administrative borders of the territories.
Now, I think this will be quite big.
Again, things that we want to negotiate, we want to lead to a neutral Ukraine,
This is seen as a necessity to avoid this existential threat.
And the second is these territorial concessions.
But the fact that they're willing to negotiate over where the borders go, this is recognized also by the media to be a huge concession.
So this goes back to the idea that it was a very bad idea by Zelensky to just blow off the whole proposal altogether.
Because the day after, of course, he rejected this deal.
The Russians saw, well, we give these great concessions.
If he doesn't want this, well, then we'll just bomb them heavily and show them the alternative.
And this is why they had this very powerful strike against Kiev.
this, the night, last night that is.
Right, right.
Let's move on to Israel.
What is the view?
Of EU leaders on the genocide in Gaza?
Well, again, the Europeans are hardly an entity.
They're very divided.
But within the European Union, they tend to take the position of Israel as well as the Germans.
I think this forms the EU, Germany, Britain.
I think they form their...
Yeah, the real heart of Israeli support, not that different from what you see coming out of Washington, but there's also some dissent in other corners.
Hasn't the Prime Minister of Spain, I think a socialist, his name is now escaping me, Professor, condemned the genocide, and hasn't he begun the process for stopping arms from going to Israel?
Yeah, so you have Spain, but you also have a very fierce criticism coming out of Ireland, some of the Scandinavian countries.
So there is opposition to this.
And I think it's a frustrating thing
When you have solidarity around some very dangerous policies.
But for the EU, this is also quite a dramatic point in time because in the 1990s and the 2000s, the EU worked very hard to position itself as a very different kind of power.
So anyone who studied the EU in those days had to learn these concepts like a normative power, a civilian power, a moral power.
It was seen as having this...
Divisional labor with the United States, where the U.S. would have the military, so it would, I guess, make the dinner and the Europeans would do the dishes afterwards, which would be peacekeeping.
Well, again, it would be a non-geopolitical entity, something different from the past.
And now, of course, you have the European Union backing Jolani in Syria, even as they committed these atrocities, killing all the Alawites.
You see them giving support to Netanyahu even as it carries out the genocide.
So this is a very different EU than what we saw only a few years ago.
And of course, this is the same EU now that is with the...
Foreign policy chief Kaya Kalas arguing in favor of defeating Russia so it can be broken into smaller countries, stating she doesn't believe in talking to Putin because he's a war criminal.
This is, again, the key diplomat not believing in diplomacy.
It's a very, very different EU than what we saw a few years ago.
And I think this almost silent support of the genocide in Gaza, I think, is only making it much, much worse.
Here's President Macron very recently on what he plans to do about recognizing the state of Palestine.
We need to move towards a recognition of a Palestinian state.
And so in the coming months, we will.
And I won't do it for unity or to please this or that person.
I will do it because I believe that at some point...
It will be right.
And because I also want to participate in a collective dynamic.
That is, one must also allow all those who defend Palestine to recognize Israel in turn, something many of them are not doing.
Being clear about how to fight against those who deny Israel's right to exist, which is the case with Iran, and to commit ourselves to collective security in the region.
We aim to chair this conference with Saudi Arabia sometime in June, where we could finalize the movement toward mutual recognition.
Is he whistling in the wind or is he going to start an avalanche towards the recognition of a Palestinian state?
I mean, the UN has called for a Palestinian state for generations and there's only a half dozen votes denying it, principal among them the US.
Well, it's hard to say.
I mean, Macron, he changes his mind a bit from one day to the other.
Again, this is the same Macron who argued that it was a necessity to change the European security architecture unless we wanted conflicts with the Russians.
Then he turned around going against it.
Yeah, so he tends to flip on a lot of these things.
But he is correct, though, I think, on this, because the main problem we have now in Palestine is that if you don't have a Palestinian state, if you just have a greater Israel, how do you have an ethno-nation state if you're only 50% of the population?
So if you're 7.5 million Jews out of 15 million, what happens to the other half?
You can't...
It doesn't work.
So either you need an apartheid system, like you have in the West Bank, where they become secondary citizens, second-rate citizens, or you have it like in Gaza, where you have now a genocide in order to induce ethnic cleansing to, as Trump said,
move the whole population out and send them to other countries.
There's no other way.
How can you have...
Jewish nation-state when you only have the population and the birth rates of the other side is much higher.
That's not a democracy that can't even claim to be a democracy.
It's not sustainable.
Only options is either apartheid.
Genocide or ethnic cleansing.
I'm not sure what another alternative would be.
So I do think that a Palestinian state is a necessity.
But of course, if they can make a grand bargain and get the Iranians to recognize the right of Israel to exist, wonderful.
Then you can have a platform there.
But Macron is, again, he's not...
What he says this week, he might change it next week.
I mean, last week, Avigdor Lieberman, who's a member of the Knesset and a former defense minister under Netanyahu, posted on X that American sources tell him Trump is getting sick and tired of Netanyahu.
Yair Lapid, who's the opposition leader in the Knesset, said he fully expects Jews to be killing Jews.
And Abu Abbas, who was the head of the PLO, Cut number 11, Chris, said the following.
It's necessary for Hamas to end its control over the Gaza Strip and also hand over the weapons to the Palestinian National Authority.
Since October 7, we have said one thing, to stop the fighting.
Stop the fighting.
Of course, no one responded to us because they disregard us, because Hamas is happy and Netanyahu remains in power as long as there is war.
I mean, he's a tool of the Israelis, is he not?
I can't imagine anybody in Gaza paying attention to him.
No, they don't.
But on the topic of Netanyahu, I think he's correct on that aspect of that.
Yeah, that if the war ends, his tendership as prime minister will also come to an end.
So I think people don't appreciate how deeply divided Israel has become now.
It's becoming common to talk about the civil war.
You're having top officials from IDF calling, essentially IDF leaders as well, calling Netanyahu.
Effectively, a traitor is someone who should be removed.
So the divisions are very deep and growing.
So I know that it seems that it makes sense to keep the war going in order to stay in power, but I think the war will only continue to intensify some of these divisions by masking them temporarily.
Professor Deason, thank you very much.
Thanks for letting me go.
All around on all of this, from the Pope to Ukraine to Gaza, much appreciated.
We look forward to seeing you again next week.
Thanks for having me on, Judge.
It's always a pleasure.
Of course.
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