← Christiane Amanpour Presents: The Ex Files
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This is a Global Player original podcast.
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Putin himself has dramatically tightened his personal security, fearing assassination. He is not doing as well as he thinks he is, as well as he likes to tell Trump that he is.
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The biggest threat to our world is this combination of Russian aggression and Chinese supremacy.
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He told his people it was going to be over in a few days. It has now lasted longer than. Than the Soviet fight against Nazi forces in World War II. I mean, isn't that something? Hi, everyone. This is the latest episode of the X Files.
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I'm Christiane in London and Jamie Rubin in New York.
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So two big questions, really. While the world has been focused on Iran, is Putin suddenly running scared of Ukraine? And as Trump prepares to visit Xi in China, will he help him to open the Strait of Hormoz? If that sounds like a Weir question, it might be, but here we are. So let's first start, Jamie, with the war that we haven't been focusing on as much, but which is still a massive war, especially for Europe, in terms of the future, in terms of security and in terms of who's backing who, and that is Russia's continued illegal invasion on Ukraine. Jamie, shall we start with the annual Russian Victory Day parade that it always holds? It's May 9 there, but it's May 8. A victory in Europe. Elsewhere, this year was very, very different. This year was very, very reduced. There was no big hardware. There was no, you know, missiles and tanks and all of that, just soldiers marching. And the general question, or the general analysis, is that Putin is running scared because of Ukraine's ability now to fire deep inside Russia and threatens something like Red Square. What do you think this for Putin's, I don't know, ability, stomach to keep waging this war?
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Well, Putin's stomach for the war is the threshold question. Someday, someday soon, I hope he will realize that he cannot win this war, that Ukraine has demonstrated its ability to defend itself dramatically. Europeans are helping Ukraine defend themselves and defend Europe itself, and the war is, in effect, stalemated. Putin can throw. Throw tens and hundreds of thousands of soldiers at Ukraine, but he's not really making any progress. And meanwhile, I think your phrase running scared is, Is close to, to my analysis, perhaps a bit strong, because these kind of guys don't really run scared, but they did worry about an attack on Red Square, and they apparently, some people told me that they even asked President Trump to intervene, to try to, you know, ceasefire for that day, and there may have been a prisoner swap, agreed to as well. So Vladimir Putin is not in the strengthened position he has thought he's been in. And the Russian people are clearly changing their attitude. I wouldn't say they've turned against the war because that would be a strong statement, but they've certainly tired of it, and they've begun to see how much damage it's doing to them and how much their economy and their country is weakened by this. Not only isolated, but also fundamentally weakened by it. And the fact that they cannot succeed in defeating Ukraine, who they thought they could rush through.
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You know, here's. Here's one little factoid of, you know, interesting sort of data. There was a sort of a. An analyst there who's quoted as saying, and I'll try to read it for you, that over the last few years of this war, it's always been our war. All the Putin, Putinistas, you know, have always been trying to back him and back the war and their great patriotic duty. And this our war, our operation, our. This, our victory. Now they are apparently increasingly saying, it's not just your war, but mentioning it. Putin's war, Putin's decisions, Putin's this. So that appears to really show that certain people in high positions are beginning to fall on one side or the other. And then CNN was reporting this past week, based on European intelligence, a dossier that Putin himself has dramatically tightened his personal security, fearing assassination, perhaps fearing a coup. There's a whole document which complains now that he's mostly working from bunkers apparently dispersed around southern Russia. Reuters reporting that his actual internal approval rating has fall into 65.6%, which is half of what it was. I mean, it's still over half the people, but the lowest since the war began. This is all, I think, indicative. Plus, as we were saying, a lot of people being increasingly angry at ordinary people, angry that Putin is doubling down on tightening control of the Internet, where they get their information, where they, you know, try to, you know, stave off boredom and disconnection from the rest of the world. And he's now really cracking down on that. So I think that's actually interesting.
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Right, Absolutely. The, the whole climate of Russia's attitude towards the war appears to be changing, and this was inevitable. I've always believed that, you know, someday, without any warning, without any real knowledge on our part, the internal workings of Russia still are very, very opaque. The famous phrase, an enigma wrapped in a riddle that CH used inside a
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mystery or somewhere like that.
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Something like that. Yes. And. And the point I'm making is that we won't understand why, when, how, but someday Putin is going to realize that throwing more soldiers at the Donbass is not going to achieve his objective, that Ukraine is developing better and better capabilities. He's lashing out at his critics. Obviously he's making life more difficult for the people of Russia. I don't forese a revolution. I just don't think that's the way Russia will operate. But I do think it's possible that at the elite levels there will be a shift, and the shift may be already happening. Whether he's fearing his security or not is very, very hard to ascertain from the outside. I'm not in the government right now, so I, I'm not able to see that sort of thing. I've tended to downplay the fear of, of him being assassinated because of the multiple protections that he's gotten. But I do think it's possible that the elite who are the ones who have suffered in their minds, lost their ability to travel, lost their ability to get their assets out of Russia, lost their ability to, to, you know, put their assets in long term benefit. These are the people who have the most likely influence on changing things.
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Yeah, and look, Putin, as we just sort of briefly suggested, was very desperate to get a ceasefire so that he was not humiliated at the, you know, at the, at the par. Because as we said, the Ukrainians are really, really, really figuring out now and they're unleashed. I mean, they are digging and firing deep inside Russia, particularly on energy installations and the like. And he was very scared about that. Now he had this ceasefire pretty much. And Zelenskyy said, well, yeah, but not on the front lines. They're still, you know, battling on the front lines. Putin kind of casually, it's been reported, suggested that the war is, you know, coming to an end. Who knows what's in his brain about that. But more importantly, Jamie, there's a lot of analysis suggesting and frankly saying that he is not doing as well as he thinks he is, as well as he likes to tell, you know, Trump that he is. His forces are making only microscopic inroads on the front lines. Now, this may change with the spring and what they, you know, the, it's always easier to fight in the spring and in the summer because you're not mired in mud and ice and snow and rain. And of course, the canopy comes out, that is, leaves you're more hidden, your forces on the ground. It's easier to actually potentially send troops. But at the moment, not doing nearly as well as he likes to try to tell Trump, in order to keep Trump sweet on his prospects. And Ukraine doing much better, despite all the obstacles that Ukraine has to battle against. Not least Trump's attention and his weird liking for Putin over them and his constant saying that Ukraine doesn't have the guards. Well, they do have cards. And I was just speaking to a senior official, British official, just happened to be talking to him about this. And he said, you know, to me, Christiane, the good news is that Ukraine is doing better than everybody thinks. And that's because of its massive development of the whole drone warfare and its ability and its willingness now to strike deep inside Russia. So I think these are interesting data points that show that things are beginning to change now. Where it goes, I don't know. But things are changing and they're not necessarily in the Trump Putin prism.
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And, and that's interesting that you point that out, because, remember, in the early days, Donald Trump, the president, was trying to end the war and was putting pressure on Zelensky, was trying to convince him to somehow give up territory, to give up their position. And President Trump has a different issue to on right now, two big ones. One is the war that, that he started in Iran, the war that is stalemated and that is not apparently any closer to a resolution. And now he's in China this week working with the Chinese. And we have to remember that one of the reasons that Russia has lasted as long as it has is because of the support from China. You know, all of this talk for the last months about the Iranian threat and the nuclear threat and all the Strait of Hormuz has allowed the world to forget what the real threats to our world are. And to me, the biggest threat to our world is this combination of Russian aggression as demonstrated in Ukraine, and Chinese supremacy, desire for supremacy, desire to turn the world into their image. That's not a world I think the west wants to live in, one where China and Russia are ruling the roost, where the power of China and Russia is growing, where the collaboration between Russia and China is growing. And that collaboration is dramatic. And one of the things I did learn in my, in my time in government is the degree to which China has enabled Russia's war. Without China, the Russians could not have lasted this long.
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Yeah. So we're going to focus a little bit more later on the China thing with Trump going later this week. But it is actually important because, you know, it's also, you know, Iran and what China's doing, what Russia is doing for Iran is also important to discuss. Just a quickie because it's just you can't believe this, you know, this Military Day parade, you know, it's basically V E Day, but, but declared in Russia is because they have always been so proud of the heroic effort the Soviet troops made to defeat the Nazis, you know, in the Second World War. But guess what, Jamie? And I'm shocked. Honestly, I'm shocked. This war that Putin told his people, the illegal aggression of, of Russian forces into Ukraine, which Frankly started in 2014, full scale invasion in 2022, he told his people it was going to be over in a few days, that it was just a special military operation. Do you know that it has now lasted longer than the Soviet fight against Nazi forces in World War II? That is terrible. And the people there know that too, because this is a huge, big thing for them, this annual parade, this annual event, and they are getting tired of it. There are no questions, sorry. There are no answ that they're getting from Putin as to when this is going to end and is contributing to his polls dropping and they people there being more and more angry. I mean, it's remarkable to imagine that this war is longer than the one that they fought against the Nazis and expelled the Nazis. I mean, isn't that something?
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It's something. And in a way, if you want to switch it around, the great patriots who are fighting the war that are showing their strength, showing their grit, showing their determination to defend their homeland, it's not the Russians, it's the Ukrainians who are doing that and it's the Russians who have invaded them the way the Nazis invaded Russia. And I'm not sure, I'm sure that the Russian people recognize that distinction and recognize that they are probably also surprised at the degree to which, because they were led to believe the Ukrainians were welcoming Russia, they've been surprised at the grit of the Ukrainians and probably recognize that it's their grit, their determination, their patriotism, their bravery that has made this last so long.
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And I'm just also mindful, and it's, you know, a little counterfactual we need to put it in. At the beginning of the Iran war, basically the all the analysts, Russia itself, even Ukraine, were concerned that because of the spiking price of oil, because of the, I guess it's temporary easing of sanctions on Russia's oil by the United States, that this would help Russia more than it helped Ukraine. I mean, Zelensky told me that every day this Iran war goes on is another day that strengthens Russia and that, you know, is more, makes it more difficult for us. But again, when I put this to this senior British official. They, they were saying, well, yes, yes, but we don't know how long this spike is going to last. We don't know how long they're going to get the sanctions relief. In the meant militarily, the Ukrainians are doing much better than the Russians thought, the Americans thought and everything. So I still think we need to recognize that Russia does have some innate advantages, including the size of its land mass, the Number of people 4 times what Ukraine has, but also the other counter, counterfactual that they're losing more people on a daily basis than Ukraine. Ukraine is losing people. It also has, has very hard time recruiting new people for the front, but they have so much more motivation, apparently, than the Russians do. So this needs to be worked out pretty soon. Jamie, do you think that this war, Russia against basically Ukraine and Europe is bigger or not than the US Israel war on Iran and the global repercussions that's having?
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Well, bigger, you know, is a, is a tough question. I don't know. Bigger for the people involved, obviously. Both wars are big. I think, in a historical sense, yes. The invasion by Russia of Ukraine was the biggest geopolitical event of my life. It was a change in everything that we thought we had done after World War II to prevent war in Europe, to prevent a large scale ground war in Europe. Europe, where the deaths and wounded are over a million people, all responsible on the shoulders of Vladimir Putin. So in terms of its size, in terms of its geostrategic significance, yes, I think this was a dramatic turn of events where Russia turned into a genuine threat to Europe. And that has emboldened Europeans to change their behavior, change their spending on defense. And, and the combination of President Trump's seeming questions about the war have made them even more determined. While the war against Iran was something that, you know, let's face it, was going on over a long period of time. Not in this way. It's not a ground war. It's got these other qualities about the Strait of Hormuz and the, and the entire global economy and, but the global economy. And that's where it becomes somewhat similar because the effects of the war on the global economy, economy are starting to, I wouldn't say equalize, but they're getting there with the price of oil and with the difficulty of getting fertilizer and other goods through the Strait of Hormuz. You know, the world economy, if this isn't resolved, if this goes on for four years, the way the Ukraine war is going on, yes, it'll be just a big one too.
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And that, that point on the European deterrent, which obviously all Europeans are really, really conscious of because of the war, because of Trump's, you know, fickleness in terms of, terms of does the American security umbrella even still exist? So Spain has just said that Europe needs its own deterrent. The EU must build its own military force, because otherwise how is, is, is Europe going to be secure? And remember, this is an argument that's been going on between Europe and the US for very, very long time, as long as I've been covering wars, because the US has always said, no, we don't want you to, we want to be in charge, etc. Etc. And of course it has the, the, the biggest, you know, lift and capacity and all the rest of it. But, you know, the Foreign Minister of Spain is saying we need a military common defense capacity. The US has been making their army stronger and stronger. No one thinks that weakens NATO. In other words, why can the US Keep doing that and Europe can't? So obviously now it is that time and he's saying we absolutely have to make Article 5 be a real deterrent because the reason nobody messes with us is because they know that there's an Article 5. And if there isn't an article, take note President Trump, then it will make us even more vulnerable. So I think, Jamie, we're going to just sort of transition into our next segment because we're going to talk about bigger pictures from one dictator, authoritarian Putin, who wants to have his way with Trump, to another one who may very well get his own way with Trump. We'll discuss it. And that's Xi when Trump visits him in, in Beijing at the, at the end of this week or midweek week. We'll be back in just a second.
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If you work in university maintenance, Grainger considers you an MVP because your playbook ensures your arena is always ready for tip off. And Grainger is your trusted partner, offering the products you need all in one place, from H VAC and plumbing supplies to lighting and more. And all delivered with plenty of time left on the clock. So your team always gets the win. Call 1-800-granger. Visit granger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done.
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All right, we're back. Trump finally is going to see Xi in Beijing. I'm sure the Chinese will pull out all the stops, red carpet, all the rest of it. He'll love it. He had to postpone it because of the war in Iran. And the question is Is he any better off? Is he in a more strong place vis a vis the war, war, you know, on Iran or not? And how is Xi going to treat him? Is he going to, you know, voluntarily try to help him open the Strait of Hormuz? I kind of doubt it. Jamie, what do you think?
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I have watched the Chinese play roles in diplomacy for decades now. And even the strengthened China, the more powerful China, the more confident China, they are very risk averse when it comes to diplomacy. They don't put themselves out for anybody except themselves when it comes to things like Taiwan or human rights or the South China Sea. Otherwise, they play a very, very careful game. So, no, I don't see China, unless some dramatic deal is made between the United States giving away a lot of the trade issues that Xi cares about, playing a big, big role. And remember, China wants this resolved as well, because they need to get the oil not just from Iran, but also from all the Arab states. They get most of their oil from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, you know, uae. They get a large portion of Iran's oil, but that's not a large portion of their oil that they're importing. They want this resolved, they want the Strait of Hormuz resolved. And, you know, that's something that they're going to talk about. But the real business of this summit is going to be something else. It's going to be the degree to which President Trump makes arrangements with China on trade, the degree to which he changes, and we certainly hope not any of the signals about Taiwan, about supporting Asian countries. So I'm doubtful that this is going to cause a breakthrough. I would like to see it happen. China does have leverage, they can use it, but it's not been their pattern in the past.
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We should point out that according to all the analysts and people in the know around the ceasefire, that apparently it was China that persuaded the Iranians to accept the ceasefire when Pakistan, Egypt, Turkey and the others first suggested it with them as mediators. So we're now talking four weeks ago or so, but apparently it was China that told Iran, listen, go for it, see what it's all about, but go for it, don't hold out. So it obviously does have influence and there's all sorts of reporting about what China's providing to the Iranians and also what Russia was providing to the Iranians, and not just targeting information Russia, but maybe even weapon system and certain drones that can evade a jamming by the United States and all the rest of it. And we'll see what China is willing to Say, but, Jamie, if we go back to the first 1.0 and the meetings between Xi and Trump, then there was this whole trade thing. There was some tariff action as well. Well, this time it was really, really much worse. And Xi, it is generally accepted, came out better. He basically said to Trump, okay, you've slapped all these tariffs on us. Well, here we're going to stop the critical minerals to you, which you really need. So that caused a bit of a fold by the White House. And now Trump goes there with the Supreme Court having struck down the whole idea of US Unilateral tariffs by the president on anybody, frankly, including China. So, so with the war being a huge thing that's overhanging now, this is the Iran war and the trade thing, neither of those going well for Trump. He didn't do well out of his meeting on trade with Xi the last time, remember, about soybeans and this and that, and it wasn't very good for American farmers. Where's his leverage now with Xi?
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A
Well, this is a really, really important question because remember President Trump. Trump, in his first term was the one who raised the alarm bell about China. He's the one who raised the alarm bell about China, not just the way in which they've taken advantage of us economically through trade imbalances, but also the danger that China poses to the world. That was President Trump 1.0. And President Biden then followed up on that, agreed with President Trump about it. And now that's changed. And that is what worries the China specialists, the people that I speak to, they're very, very worried that President Trump, in his desire to get progress on the economic side of the offense, on the trade side of the fence, may make changes in the way the United States deals with China geostrategically and the determination we have to prevent China from dominating Asia. And we've always talked about how President Trump possibly believes that, you know, Asia's China's backyard, Western hemisphere is America's backyard, and Putin can sort of play around in the Eurasian landmass. I worry about that. I worry that President Trump doesn't understand that China's aspirations are global. They're not just inside Asia. There have been huge stories about the degree to which they're taking over very, very important installations in South America, in our backyard. So this is a global competition. And right now, although China's economy is very confusing, it's very hard to see precisely how they're doing. What they are doing is protecting their advantages in AI, in technology, in all of the rare Earths that you mentioned in this, the critical minerals they were mentioning, they are creating a structure of autonomy where the critical minerals, the critical assets, the critical capabilities are protected for China. China. And they are not as vulnerable to the United States dictating terms in trade. They're responding to every one of our attempts to use trade restrictions by imposing equivalent restrictions. And so they're playing hardball with the United States right now. And that's why I'm concerned. What's going to come out of this. I don't know what's going to come out of this. I wouldn't deem to predict it, but what I can say is that I'm worried.
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Yep. And look, I'm just reading some Politico, you know, Asian diplomat, they, they talked who said there's some fear he might be persuaded by Xi, as you said, to shift positions, you know, from ambiguity to outright opposition to Taiwan's independence. This diplomat apparently says Trump is Trump off script all the time. Let's pray nothing disastrous happens. But as I say, if you want to figure out what might happen, let's just look at what has happened. President Trump appears to be all over the shop when it comes dealing with the Iranians. One day it's one thing, one day it's the next thing. You just simply don't know. One day the war's over, the next day we're going to start again. One day it's, you know, a one page document, the next day it's, I'm not going to accept. It's all totally unacceptable what Iran sends back. So it's very, very difficult. So these people who are quoted by Politico concerned that Beijing may offer to broker, you know, an end to the Strait of Hormuz crisis, reopen it in exchange for US Concessions on Taiwan. They now the thing that the White House people and supporters say, listen, you've all been predicting for, you know, years that Trump is going to, you know, give up Taiwan. He hasn't done it. So, you know, there's a lot, there's a lot to wait and see what happens. But I think you're right in terms of trade, that who gets the upper hand in terms of trade. Given that Trump goes in with quite a lot of disadvantages, including that said, the striking down of the tariffs by the Supreme Court and the fact that he's at war. Let me just read you, Jamie, what Timothy Snyder, you know, he's a very prominent professor of, of history and he focuses very heavily on authoritarianism and totalitarianism. He was At Yale, he's moved. He's at, he's currently on sabbatical or permanently, I'm not sure. But at, in Toronto, at the Canadian University, he basically has written an article, article called Superpower Suicide. He's saying the guiding principle of Trump foreign policy, superpower suicide. It's not that empires don't rise and fall. He says they do. But never in modern history has or in any history has he been able to point to any superpower, I. E. The United States, the currently only superpower, which is voluntarily or not voluntarily, but anyway way bringing down its own unique strengths and superpower status. What do you think about that?
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A
Well, I think Tim Snyder is on to something. You've. Those of you who've listened to us over this last year know that I believe that the United States has and can continue to be a force for good in the world, provided that it takes advantage of its unique weak asset. What makes America a superpower are its alliances. Its alliances in Europe, its alliances in Asia, its basing rights throughout the Middle east, throughout the world. There's never been a global power with this level of alliance support, both voluntary and through basing rights and through other legal arrangements. And that's where suicide comes in. This is on purpose because President Trump and his administration don't seem to appreciate the degree to which our alliances are what make us strong. They are damaging our superpower status by damaging our alliances every day. In many, many ways, it's a matter of extreme. It's troubling in the extreme. Europe and Asia want to be friends with the United States. They want to be allies with the United States. They want to trust the United States. And we have, for our own reasons, in the mind of this administration, undermined that trust. And that's why the phrase suicide in the sense of it's on purpose and it's damaging the motivation. I, I will never understand, but the facts are clear that we have weakened our superpower status by weakening our alliances dramatically in ways I never thought were possible.
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B
So I would urge people to read this, this, this, this paper, this article op ed by Timothy Snyder. He lists 13 points that make a superpower. You've listed some of them, but it goes on. It's science, it's, you know, it's, it's education, it's the foreign service, all, all these things. And also crucially says the idea of victory. And I'm going to read this, a superpower, says Snider, some, you know, wins in confrontations. At least some of the time. This administration loses again and again and is seen to lose by others. The Russian Ukraine war, he says, is case. It would serve the interests of the United States in prosperity and stability for Ukraine to win. But under Trump, the United States has switched his policy to one of support, you know, for Russia. So it's lost in that way. But since the United States made that pivot, Ukraine has performed ever better in the war and Russia has performed ever worse. It's, it's, it's pretty incredible what he says. And then he starts this article by saying the following. The United States has just spent billions of dollars to lose a war that enriches its oligarchs, impoverishes the citizenry, sabotages its alliances and strengthens its enemies as justification for the self destructive mindlessness. The White House gestures towards Jesus and genocide. That's his opening gambit. Timothy Snyder and it's pretty, it's pretty real.
- [31:58]
A
But he's clearly onto something, that this is self sabotage. We've sabotaged our, our power, we've sabotaged our reputation. You know, I used to fondly say that America was a mixture of a country that was admired, that was respected and that was feared. Right now the admired and the respected has dropped and unfortunately the feared has, has increased.
- [32:23]
B
Let's just end this little bit with a couple of more points on China and the United States. Basically, since Nixon went to China, which is huge, how have successive Chinese general secretaries, you know, leaders of the Communist Party, treated visiting American presidents? And have they ever been successfully, you know, incorporated into helping America figure out some of the dreadful international binds that certainly they seem to have got themselves into this time?
- [32:54]
A
I think in the early days, Henry Kissinger and Nixon believed that China would be helpful in ending the Vietnam War and helping to, even though it was mostly supported by the Soviet Union, they thought it would be helpful. They often thought it would be helpful in confronting the Soviet Union. That was the famous triangular diplomacy of Henry Kissinger. But we have to remember that the Chinese are, you know, they see themselves as the center of the world. They don't help anybody. They may make an arrangement that's in their interest for a particular purpose. But it was extremely, extremely rare to see the Chinese joining the world in some, you know, positive way. I remember when Madeline Albright was UN's ambassador and the Chinese were being cooperative back then, and Russia was being cooperative back then, and we used to try to get unanimous votes in the Security Council. The Chinese off most of the time just abstained. And one day she asked him, you know, he was playing with a machine to strengthen his, his hand. And she said, what are you doing? He said, well, I'm trying to strengthen my arm so I can vote yes. The point was that they don't do things other in the UN in the world that aren't related to Taiwan, their national security interests in the South China Sea, or preventing the world from interfering in their human rights policies. That's been China's approach right now. They have a lot of interests around the world and I do think they want the Strait of Hormuz open. I do think they will help. But the idea that they are going to intervene and save Trump, Trump's bacon, as people have suggested, that there's somehow some grand bargain in the works where China is going to help open the Strait of Hormuz and solve the nuclear issue with, with Iran, I don't believe that's very likely.
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B
It is really, it's really fascinating because this is always, you know, again, don't forget we're talking about it because rising superpower, you know, maybe declining superpower, but it's definitely the Athens Sparta situation. I think that's clearer than at any other time. Right. Right now. So let's take another quick break and when we come back, we'll have our recommendations.
- [35:14]
C
If you work in university maintenance, Grainger considers you an MVP because your playbook ensures your arena is always ready for tip off. And Grainger is your trusted partner, offering the products you need all in one place, from H vac and plumbing supplies to lighting and more. And all delivered with plenty of time left on the clock. So your team always gets the win. Call 1-800-granger. Visit granger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done.
- [35:47]
B
Okay, we're both back with our recommendations and we, both of us, are going to pay tribute to the late Ted Turner. I can't even begin to believe I'm saying the late Ted Turner because as a friend of mine said, I cannot imagine a Tedless world. He was the founder of CNN, founded it in 1980 to do good, to try to do good for the world, changed completely and transformed the media and information landscape of the whole world by inventing the idea of 247 news and of course television and then broadcast it around the world. So history as it happens. So I would like to recommend the really excellent New York Times long obituary titled a. Well, a wild mannered media mogul who transformed tv. And Ted was ahead of his time and ahead of the curve on just about everything. Goodwill games to bring the Soviet Union the United States together in the 80s at the height of the Cold War, conservation and philanthropy. You know, he was a champion sailor, won the America's Cups and successfully defended that. He's just done everything, was the biggest single landowner in the United States, private landowner, in order not to develop land but to conserve it for all time, Brought back the bison population from extinction in the United States and so much more. And the FT helpfully points out that he was also obviously pretty eccentric, but you needed to be to, to, to make a CNN and do everything he did. But he was also very, very fond of the ladies. He was fond often of his drink in his younger days. And yet he got away with everything. And, and in a last interview with me, he quoted from one of the Richards, as he said it to me, Shakespeare. And it was all about honor. And he said, nobody has ever been able to tarnish or criticize my honor. And I just thought that was an amazing thing for a billionaire, a massive media mogul to focus on as his legacy. Honor and cnn. We saw him together, didn't we?
- [37:51]
A
We did meet Ted and Jane together. We had a very interesting dinner. And before I mention that, just that one of the things that Ted Turner did that was dramatic through CNN is I remember throughout the first Bush administration and the Clinton administration, CNN was effectively a place through which facts were transmitted. And governments trusted the facts to be reported accurately and often got their signals from foreign governments more quickly and more easily and more effectively by watching what leaders said or reported to cn. And diplomacy was often conducted through the CNN effect by either bringing attention, as you often did when you were reporting for cnn, or when government spoke through cnn. You could see diplomacy in action because they were a trusted source of news and the governments knew that everyone would be watching it because they were unique and had a monopoly at that time in those days. And so Ted changed international diplomacy in that way and real powerful interest in the subject of nuclear weapons. And yes, when the four of us had dinner, Jane Fonda, Ted Turner and the two of us, I think it was in Atlanta, and we talked for a long time about climate and other issues. But then Ted had an understanding that the nuclear threat was the gravest threat that could really destroy our world in a matter of hours as opposed to the slow damage that climate change will do. And he in his TED way sort of said, you know, maybe we need to have an explosion somewhere so someone will realize how dangerous these weapons are because they had been forgotten at that time. And people often forget. And that's why Recent movies have reminded people of the incredible danger we live under, the nuclear threat that we live under every day. And the fact that Ted could talk about that over dinner almost. Not in a funny way, but in a charming way and in a special way. I remember it vividly when the four of us had dinner.
- [40:02]
B
Yes. And, you know, some people rightly know that CNN became very famous for covering wars, you know, the first Gulf War, for instance. But what they don't, you know, latch onto is that our founder was all about peace and ending wars, particularly any nuclear threat. To which, you know, he made the Nuclear Threat Initiative, which was designed to corral loose nukes and as you say, you know, just try to dissipate the tension between the Soviet Union and the United States. Right. We're nearly at the end. You have another quick recommendation.
- [40:35]
A
Literally, just a quick one, a very quick one. This is called the Pocket Stoic. Stoicism.
- [40:42]
B
You've been talking about the Stoics since we started.
- [40:45]
A
I know, and I want to just bring it up again because stoicism is about understanding what you can change and what you can't change and not allowing your emotions, emotions to be affected by what you can't change. And as you everyone knows who's listened to me for the last year, it's been painful to watch my country's policies change in ways that I'm troubled by. And the Pocket Stoic is my way of keeping control of my emotions so that I know what I can change and what I can't. And Donald Trump was elected president. He's going to do what he's going to do for the next several years. And until that, there's another president, that's the way it's going to be. And having the stoic mentality can help you get through your day.
- [41:30]
B
Well, on that note, thank you all for listening. And don't forget, you can also watch us on our YouTube channel. You just go to Christiana Monpour presents the X Files. Jamie and I will be back later this week on Thursday with our next episode, the Q A episode. Meantime, you can listen to all our podcasts for free, free on Global Player. And as I said, you can always watch them on YouTube. So keep your questions coming in for our Q A episode, and we will answer them to the best of our ability. For the moment, it's me saying goodbye
- [42:01]
A
from London and Jamie saying goodbye from New York. This has been a Global Player original production.