← Christiane Amanpour Presents: The Ex Files
Christiane Amanpour Presents: The Ex Files
Trump, Epstein and conspiracy theories: how damaging is this for America?
00:42:15
Loading summary
Transcript81 lines
- [00:03]
Christiane Amanpour
This is a Global Player original podcast.
- [00:06]
Jamie Rubin
I have to say that as we sit here and faff around about how we're going to start. Jamie, I cannot believe we're talking about Epstein. I have not been into it as a, you know, international anchor. I haven't been really paying that much attention, thinking it's just a typical crazy MAGA US Conspiracy theory ruction that will soon blow over. But clearly it hasn't blown over. So we are going to do what we can on various issues around it in this episode. Here's our take on it.
- [00:39]
Christiane Amanpour
Yeah, look, I find the whole thing, as someone who worked on foreign policy during the Clinton era, when these scandals come up that are basically about sex, I find it troubling that our country can be dominated by these kind of issues when much larger issues of our role in the world and the war in Gaza and Iran and Russia, Russia and China should be dominating our discussion, that we end up talking about this stuff. But it may have political significance and that's why it's dominated the news.
- [01:11]
Jamie Rubin
And just to be very clear, it's not just sex. He was convicted. He's a criminal, Jeffrey Epstein. So there is a huge amount of victims testimony that we need to keep in mind as well. Okay, so that's that. So this week we're going to ask. Yup, we are diving into the Epstein situation and we're gonna ask not to go over the nitty gritty of what's been dominating the media for the last week or more, but what does the focus on this mean in terms of our wheelhouse, which is foreign policy, and how we actually keep the focus on a lot of other things that matter as well? And more importantly, for those who have extreme views of Donald Trump, whether pro or Congress or against, is this something that is going to affect him in the short, medium and long term? All those who dislike Donald Trump are hoping that this collapses him and it's the one thing that he can't get over. All those who really like him are hoping that this is gonna blow over and he's gonna survive this like he survived just about every other, you know, slings and arrows and darts and charges and cases that have come his way. So we're also going to be looking beyond that, into the conspiracy theories more generally, from Qanon, Pizzagate, even the assassination of jfk. And later in the program, we will return to our wheelhouse and we'll ask, where exactly is the Ukraine situation right now? Where has Trump gone on this? Is it sufficient that he's turned A little bit frustrated with Russia. And most importantly as well, what about the Israel, Gaza war? Every time we look at a newspaper, look online, do some reporting, we see that it's getting worse and worse for the people of Gaza with no end in sight and no hostages being returned. So let's get started. Hello, everyone, and welcome to Christiane Amanpour presents the X Files with Jamie Rubin.
- [03:18]
Christiane Amanpour
I'm a senior official in the State Department. I was under President Biden and I also was under President Clinton.
- [03:26]
Jamie Rubin
And I've been a longtime foreign correspondent for cnn and I now host my own show where I interview world leaders on all sorts of issues and relevant people. But I haven't yet done it on Epstein in my program on cnn, and I wasn't going to do it, but here we are because it is dominating the news. So where are we today as we record? I thought this was going to blow over. A lot of people did. It's true that lot of MAGA base have come back to Trump because they don't want to see their, you know, their emblem grievously wounded. But it's also true that Trump can't get past this yet to the, to the point that as we speak overnight, Jamie, he has posted a blizzard. But I mean, a blizzard unlike many that we've seen before on truth, social, on everything except for this, on trivial stuff, on stuff that he wants people to focus on after his six months in office. Just a blizzard to try to change the subject. But it doesn't seem to be changing.
- [04:34]
Christiane Amanpour
That's Donald Trump's actually. His strength is by constantly and repeatedly and in a dramatic way, talking about every single thing that happens in the world. He keeps the media and the world moving to the next subject time after time, time after time. And the specifics of any one subject get lost in the, in the mess. And that is the horror of Trumpism, where substance is lost. It's all about what Donald Trump thinks today, what President Trump thinks tomorrow, and that's how he hopes to change the subject. But it may not be working in this case.
- [05:09]
Jamie Rubin
I have to say, as a journalist, I just want to pay tribute to the actual journalists over the years. And it started in the mid, you know, 2010s. In other words, around 2008, a phenomenal journalist by the name of Julie Brown, working for the investigative team at the Miami Herald, basically broke the scandal around the Epstein story in which she discovered that he had used all his contacts in the law, amongst prosecutors, in business, in all sorts of things to pretty much get A pretty lenient sentence. The first time around. He was allowed to plea to, and I'm going to get this right, he was allowed to plea to two counts of prostitution, one with a minor, which essentially, essentially got him an 18 month jail sentence, which was a very, very. Also in itself a lenient jail sentence because as Julie Brown reports, he essentially got his chauffeur to pick him up from the Miami jail every day and bring him back at 10pm at night. He spent the night at jail, but was able to pretty much live a free life. So she's the one who reopened this case and put it on the map also by going after the testimony of the victims. And that was incredibly, incredibly powerful. And then it moved to New York. And then we know what happened. He got a much stiffer sentence, he went to jail. And during Trump's first term, he committed suicide in jail. And that started the really important sticky.
- [06:47]
Christiane Amanpour
I don't think we know whether he committed suicide. That's one of the issues, actually. We assume it, but it's. That's one of the issues. Look, but that's one of the issues.
- [06:55]
Jamie Rubin
Amongst the conspiracy theorists, and that's why we're discussing it. I don't know. You're not a conspiracy theorist, are you?
- [07:01]
Christiane Amanpour
No, I'm not. But we're trying to address the fact that conspiracy theorists were behind the Trump presidency and they are upset by the way he's handled Epstein precisely because they don't think Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide. I assume he did. I don't know any better. But, but the issue is to what extent were Jeffrey Epstein's information suppressed? And that's where we get to the question of journalism. To me, you've given credit to one journalist and they deserve credit, but their journalism is.
- [07:32]
Jamie Rubin
And to all the journalists who then followed that reporting, absolutely realistically, all of them deserve credit.
- [07:37]
Christiane Amanpour
But journalism is one of the most important elements of a democracy. Thomas Jefferson said it's the most important of the Bill of Rights, the freedom of the press. So that means we hold journalists to a high standard, and I hold them to a high standard. And I think in the current situation, they are not meeting that standard. And I'll tell you why. There is an author who's won awards for a National Magazine Award, who's written books, who was a regular on national television and quoted widely in journalistic mainstream media, who's suddenly not able to publish, not able to appear on television, not able to tell the world what he knows. And that's a man named Michael Wolf who says that interviewed Jeffrey Epstein for 100 hours of tapes that he's got on tape of Jeffrey Epstein talking about himself to try to get Michael Wolf to write about him. But in those tapes, two things about it jumped out at me when I listened to Jeffrey Epstein discussed by Michael Wolff. One, that he believes that Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump were the best of friends, that each of them was their best friend over their lives because of what they did during the 80s and 90s, chasing women, hanging out in fancy parties, flying planes, making money, all of that. That's interesting to me that the man as, as Wolf puts it, who's considered the worst person on the planet, Jeffrey Epstein, who ended up thinking that Donald Trump was worse than him. That's interesting.
- [09:08]
Jamie Rubin
Let me ask you this, because this is the furore, right, that Trump ran and all the, well, a lot of the people who populate his cabinet and his deputies, like the deputy FBI, Bongino, like Pam Bo, like a whole bunch of people ran with this Epstein conspiracy. A the client list, which now Pam Bondi, the AG says doesn't exist, that it was on her desk, she said for review, but now she says there was no client list, or at least there's no there there. Bongino, the deputy FBI director, who was a podcaster, went on and, and, and also really ramped up this conspiracy theory, went on Fox at the height of this and was quite tearful. And he said, you know, now that I'm part of a cabinet, I actually have to do things that are considered best for my country and as a way to try to dodge MAGA fire, because MAGA is saying, how come you guys said that you were going to unleash all this stuff, and now you say there's no there there. And then the other question which people have raised is that if these pictures, documents, whatever you're saying Michael Wolff has, were in the possession of the FBI, they were there since 2018. That means they were there during the Biden administration. Why wouldn't the Biden administration, in some way or another, have used them for their own political benefit?
- [10:29]
Christiane Amanpour
CHRISTIANE that's easy. The Biden administration adopted the normal procedure for a president and a Justice Department, and that is to not interfere, to not tell them what to do, to not act like the FBI and the Justice Department are just lawyers who work for the president can do whatever he says.
- [10:46]
Jamie Rubin
You've described Michael Wolff saying that there are at least one, you know, embarrassing picture he said to David Remnick, it was around a pool. But you're not saying, because Maybe that's why the Justice Department didn't do anything with it under Biden, that there's anything illegal it might be. You use the word embarrassing.
- [11:03]
Christiane Amanpour
That's right. But here's the point. The campaign manager, Steve Bannon, essentially the campaign strategist, when he met Jeffrey Epstein, and this was reported again by Michael Wolff because he was there when they met. And Steve Bannon said to Jeffrey Epstein, the only thing I was worried about in the 2016 campaign was you and what you could do to Donald Trump. Clearly, there is something that people in the Trump orbit are extremely worried about. I don't know what it is. Michael Wolf says it's these pictures, among other things. And all I can say is why suddenly the people that demanded government all these information about Jeffrey Epstein, why suddenly they're saying they can't. And I think Jeffrey Epstein's explanation and Michael Wolf's explanation is the first plausible one I've heard that there are embarrassing pictures about Donald Trump that they don't want to release.
- [11:59]
Jamie Rubin
Now, just to be clear, and I know this, but also David Remnick brought it up in a, in a friendly but journalistic, you know, account holding way, he said to Michael Wolf in his interview, he said, look, Michael, you have also faced quite a lot of controversy in your, in your writing. He wrote four books on Trump. I think one was called Fire and Fury, the other one was called Siege, and then a couple of others whose names I've forgotten. But of course, a lot of the details have been vigorously disputed, notably by the Trump, Trump and his allies. But that's one of the reasons why in this moment he's probably finding it difficult to tell his story.
- [12:38]
Christiane Amanpour
Right. But here we have an easy answer to that. It's on tape. These are tapes editors.
- [12:45]
Jamie Rubin
And that's what he says. We haven't heard the tapes.
- [12:47]
Christiane Amanpour
He says, right. So it's easy to figure out whether there's something false about his charges, his claims, his assertions. Listen to the tapes, hundred hours of them. Figure out whether it's really Jeffrey Epstein on the tape. And we can do that. There's voice of Jeffrey Epstein in court. Technology can confirm whether this is really him. Listen to the tapes, then let's make our judgment.
- [13:09]
Jamie Rubin
I'm going to read the latest poll because the Epstein story is a big liability. CBS YouGov finds that 75% of Americans disapprove of the administration's handling of matters related to Epstein. And 89% want the Justice Department to release all the information it has on the case.
- [13:28]
Christiane Amanpour
And that's probably why I feel a little better this week, which is when the polls move, you find the cowardly politicians suddenly get more spine and maybe both on the Democratic side and the Republican side, seeing that the country is interested, the country won't penalize them for focusing on it. Maybe Democratic senators, Republican senators will lose their fear and gain their spines and begin to ask harder questions and demand answers and we can get just get this thing answered.
- [14:02]
Jamie Rubin
So is Trump asking AG Pam Bondi, Attorney General Bondi to release grand jury testimony? Is that going to answer?
- [14:11]
Christiane Amanpour
No chance. That's very targeted and very simple stuff. That is intended to avoid answering all the questions. That's another diversion. We heard Trump, as you said, wake up this morning and try to divert the world by talking about all sorts of other things. The grand jury testimony is another diversion. People want to know what's in the files.
- [14:30]
Jamie Rubin
We're going to talk more about actually how Trump is a big conspiracy theorist himself. You remember he was the one who started the whole was Obama an American born citizen? All the rest of it, the so called birther conspiracy before that election or around that election. That's when we come back after a break. Okay, Jamie, this segment we're going to try to broaden out on the bigger part. Conspiracy theories have played most particularly in American history and politics and to an extent also around the world. But in the point a question of how damaging could this be for Trump, this Epstein kerfuffle. Let's play something that I think all of us were shocked by that Trump said and announced before he was elected the first time, I think it was in 2015 during the first election campaign.
- [15:28]
Christiane Amanpour
My people are so smart. And you know what else they say.
- [15:30]
Jamie Rubin
About my people, the polls?
- [15:31]
Christiane Amanpour
They say I have the most loyal people. Did you ever see that where I.
- [15:35]
Jamie Rubin
Could stand in the middle of Fifth.
- [15:36]
Christiane Amanpour
Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose any voters. Okay.
- [15:39]
Jamie Rubin
It's like incredible. So I'll never forget that he was quoting polls, but it was still, and it's repeated over and over again this statement because up until now, Jamie, he has been Teflon really, to the extent that he was able to deflect everything any other politician probably would have been felled by. And he was reelected. Do you think this is going to damage him?
- [16:01]
Christiane Amanpour
I know that the MAGA base, so to speak, the leaders of the MAGA base are starting to say some pretty aggressive things about Donald Trump. You know, you've seen people like Joe Rogan and others say things like you're not The Pope, dude, you know, you still need to be transparent. You need to tell the truth to us. You're not the Pope, bro. Is what Alex Jones said on his podcast that famous activist Laura Loomer has said that she thinks this could consume, quote, consume his presidency. I don't know. But I know that the power of Trump flows directly from the loyalty of his base, which scares other Republicans from doing their jobs. And we've seen that over and over again. They're afraid of being primaried, of being targeted by Trump. If he loses that power, that politics is based on the power to scare his fellow Republicans and to some extent the Democrats, then it will change his presidency. Whether it will consume it or whether it makes him a lame duck or anything worse than that, I kind of doubt. But I think it does reflect the fact that Donald Trump somehow took over the Republican Party with these crazy conspiracy theories. They let him do it. They started changing all their policies across the board on foreign and domestic policy to satisfy Trump. Maybe they won't do that anymore. That will change American foreign and domestic policy. That will change the way our country operates if MAGA starts moving away from total loyalty, loyalty to the president.
- [17:43]
Jamie Rubin
And that's a big if. Because then who, by the way, who would be the next emblem for maga?
- [17:50]
Christiane Amanpour
That may be what this is about, is people looking beyond Trump. I don't know.
- [17:54]
Jamie Rubin
But then let's talk about the big, you know, the big issue of conspiracy theories. Because to be fair, Trump did start. Well, he was a huge proponent of some of these huge, you know, conspiracy theories, like the endless. What was it called, Bertha, really foul accusations against Barack Obama, suggesting that he had not. Well, saying that he had not been born in the United States, that he was Kenyan born. And I remember being at the White House correspondence dinner in whatever year it was, 2010, I think. Were you there too, Jamie, when Obama together.
- [18:26]
Christiane Amanpour
Yes. Yeah.
- [18:27]
Jamie Rubin
Yeah, I was with abc then brought his. And I actually. Actually we were on the table and I could see where Trump was. He was sitting with Lally Weymouth, who was a friend of yours at the time. Well, still the daughter of the late Kay Graham, who was the owner of the Washington. And Trump was her guest. And I remember being able to look straight down at him and he was going white and mottled when Obama was.
- [18:55]
Christiane Amanpour
Because they were making fun of him.
- [18:57]
Jamie Rubin
Yeah. And showed him the birth certificate. Finally, Obama had to bring out his birth certificate. But, you know, that stuff has a seriously corrosive, corrosive influence because it never dies and it Just removes trust from any government official. And you know better than I do that the Clinton administration, the first Clinton administration, was really plagued by so many conspiracy theories and special counsels. And I don't know what on things that turned out a lot of them to be just that, conspiracy theories and fake news.
- [19:32]
Christiane Amanpour
I think this is an interesting topic. I am not an historian of American obsession with conspiracy theories. I was born in 1960. The first conspiracy theory that I grew up with was John F. Kennedy's assassination. And I actually believe that caused a profound change in our country and the world because John F. Kennedy was so respected and loved by so many when he was shot and killed. And people didn't believe that Lee R.V. oswald did it alone. It destroyed a trust in government that had existed prior to that time, throughout the 50s and certainly after World War II and during World War II. Government, society, journalism, culture, all had a certain unity based on the war, World War II, which brought our country together. And frankly, the long twilight struggle with Communism brought our country together with its excesses on both sides. But there was a unity. I believe that unity was destroyed by the conspiracy theories surrounding John F. Kennedy's assassination and everything that has flowed since that. Because once that happens, once you think maybe the Vice President and the CIA conspired to kill their President, you lose trust in government.
- [20:50]
Jamie Rubin
And guess what?
- [20:51]
Christiane Amanpour
That's a trust that can never be regained.
- [20:53]
Jamie Rubin
And guess what? That was a nifty piece of Soviet disinformation. I just interviewed Tim Weiner, the wonderful journalist who's been writing and chronicling about the CIA. He's got a new book called the Mission, and It's about the CIA post 9 11. And you remember there were conspiracy theories about that too. Did, did America cause nine, et cetera, et cetera. But on the Kennedy assassination, you know, of course this is FBI purview, but a majority of Americans at that time, tens of millions, he reminded me basically believe still that the CIA killed jfk, which he explained was Soviet disinformation. If I'm not mistaken, they planted it in an Indian publication, the country of India. And from there it morphed. It was the KGB who did it in 1967.
- [21:41]
Christiane Amanpour
And the KGB is very intelligent. They use intelligent sounding things. I learned this during my struggle on information warfare in the Biden administration. They connected the CIA to the Mafia. And the Mafia and the CIA were working together. They wanted to kill Castro. There was a split, they fought. The CIA wanted to fight the war in Vietnam, so they hired the Mafia to kill jfk because Johnson would fight the war in Vietnam in a way.
- [22:07]
Jamie Rubin
That I can't even keep up with this.
- [22:10]
Christiane Amanpour
Well, I can, because I saw dozens of movies about it, read dozens of books about it. And of course, that was, as a young man, something that you couldn't help but listen to because you wanted to believe in the. In the glory of the Kennedy years, which I do and still believe in. And they were destroyed. And I think the birther conspiracy, the Clinton conspiracies, all of these conspiracies are something that Hollywood is definitely a purveyor of. Movie after movie after movie is about governments perfidy, governments, lying, government conspiracies to kill. To kill their opponents, to kill Americans. Things that, having worked in government for, you know, almost 16 years, you know, I consider impossible. But yet most people believe that. I still often in my personal life run into very intelligent people, and I have to persuade them that, you know, government couldn't do that because they couldn't get away with it.
- [23:08]
Jamie Rubin
But the sad thing is, we just finished on this, the Kennedy thing. Cause it's really unbelievable that all these years later it persists that it was the KGB who planted it in 67. But Weiner likens it to a virus. And I think that's really interesting. You know, it's a virus, and in the absence of good journalistic reporting, which we're getting drowned out now by all these influencers and social media and podcasters and this and that, you know, it's. It's. It's really difficult. And in the absence of good governance by. By officials, too, because sometimes there's bad governance, and that leads and lends credibility to conspiracy theories. So. And it obsesses. And, you know, of course, the CIA and others have had plenty for us to obsess about all their interferences overseas and coups and backing of, you know, military juntas and things like that, the thing that I think is interesting about this one, the Epstein thing and all the other ones is it was kind of explained that a conspiracy theory is not just a lie. It's a kernel of truth or questioning that then becomes, you know, the obsession of people who believe that there's one rule for the elite and another rule for everybody else, that there's, you know, people in high places who, you know, help those who are in trouble sort of get out, get out of trouble. And there. There are real reasons why people obsess about it. They. They drag all these little threads out of a teeny kernel that they. Then they get led. Led to the led to the. Well, so to speak.
- [24:48]
Christiane Amanpour
What I find troubling and interesting and worthy of consideration is the way in which social media and conspiracy theories merge their powers. Because prior to social media, the conspiracy theorists had trouble meeting each other, talking to each other, and building their own.
- [25:05]
Jamie Rubin
Networks of conspiracy theories in the exponential way that they can. But believe me, they really could, even before.
- [25:12]
Christiane Amanpour
Right, but I think, I think you've used the word that I was making the point in the exponential way that they can now that the conspiracy theorists can find each other very easily on social media, on, you know, going back for the last 20 years. And that is built up both on the right and the left in a more powerful, more significant, more unified theories of right and left conspiracy theories, because they can meet each other and they can spin each other up and make things more significant. So those conspiracy theorists could find each other in the old days, but they weren't as significant. And since the social media era has damaged the uniformity of a set of facts that our country believes in, these right and left people can spin each other up. And that's why conspiracy theories have such an impact on our politics, because they build the hatred by the right of the left and the left of the right. And that troubles me. And that's how it's exacerbated. That hatred has been built up over many issues, but the conspiracy theorists become the most intense. Like the ones who thought there was Pizzagate, all of that stuff.
- [26:23]
Jamie Rubin
Yeah. And for some reason, the modern conspiracy theorists are obsessed by pedophilia now. It is really good for people to be really careful about it. And clearly the, you know, the investigations and the trials have shown what the Epstein, I mean, his horrendous history with minors and his groomings and this and that, I mean, absolutely horrendous. And the victims testimonies. But that is something that really motivates a lot of modern conspiracy theories. For instance, as you just said, the. The Pizzagate thing, and that was directed against Hillary Clinton. I don't know the answer. I just. I really don't know the answer. I don't know whether there is an answer.
- [27:01]
Christiane Amanpour
Actually, no. And the connection to our work in foreign affairs, as you mentioned with the kgb, is that in this era, with these ability to get the right fighting the left, the left fighting the right, what the Russians and the Chinese to some extent have learned how to do is to play into those animosities by finding good examples that fit those conspiracy theories and inserting them into the information domain. That's what I fought for. Two years at the State Department. And it's very, very difficult once those ideas are inserted into the information domain. And the only way to fight them is to do two things. One, begin to talk to each other and listen to each other. And one of the things we don't do anymore is listen to each other. We talk to each other very loudly, but the moment somebody's saying something you don't like, then you turn off. And I think that's one of the solutions, is to teach kids and parents to teach their kids how to listen to each other. And my favorite story about this is from my friend Christogradtsev, who's a journalist. I asked him what it was like to live in communist Bulgaria and how did he survive when there were lies told to him all day long and told to the people all day long. And he told me, well, when I grew up, my parents told me, whatever happens during the day, if something you hear and you're not sure what to think, ask us at the end of the day and we'll talk to you about it. And that's how kids and families dealt with totalitarian, extreme pressure to conform. And I think it's what we need again today. Families need to talk to each other and help kids sort out their thinking so that we can get back to a set of facts from which we're allowed to disagree on, but what to do about it, but without the agreed facts. As Daniel Patrick Morning said, you can have your opinions, but you can't have your own facts. And one of the ways the conspiracy theories have ruined our country is because people now do have their own facts.
- [29:03]
Jamie Rubin
They certainly do in this world. I mean, right over to vaccines and everything. So look, let's take another break and actually let's focus now on some of the stories around the world that are perhaps not as much in the American attention span. And of course, remember, this is all also about what some people quote as the attention economy. I mean, nobody has any attention span. So this is just such a way to deflect and not focus on Ukraine, Gaza, the terrible, awful things that are happening in parts of the world like Afghanistan and Africa since USAIDS has been killed. Let's take a break. We'll be back.
- [29:50]
C
Let's be real. Life happens. Kids spill, pets shed and accidents are inevitable. Find a sofa that can keep up@washablesofas.com starting at just $699. Our sofas are fully machine washable inside and out. So you can say goodbye to stains and hello to worry free. Living. Made with liquid and stain resistant fabrics, they're kid proof, pet friendly and built for everyday life. Plus, changeable fabric covers let you refresh your sofa whenever you want. Need flexibility? Our modular design lets you rearrange your sofa anytime to fit your space, whether it's a growing family room or a cozy apartment. Plus, they're earth friendly and trusted by over 200,000 happy customers. It's time to upgrade to a stress free mess proof sofa. Visit washablesofas.com today and save. That's Washington. Washablesofas.com offers are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply.
- [30:54]
Jamie Rubin
Jamie, everybody, we're back with the last part of our discussion for this episode. And that's on basically what's going on in our wheelhouse, which is Ukraine, Israel, Gaza, the rest of the world, as America seems to be obsessed by the Epstein files and whether Trump is going to survive or not, he is going to survive it. That's my prediction. So, Jamie, last week the president did something. He made a U turn, which we've discussed, and that is said that the Europeans could buy, as you talked about on one of our early podcasts, a way out of this no weapons to Ukraine nonsense from the Trump administration. Could be that the Europeans buy them and then they give them to Ukraine. So that's all well and good, but Moscow now is insisting that it's going to achieve its goals for Ukraine before any ceasefire talks. Zelensky, the president of Ukraine, is saying that he's ready for ceasefire talks now. And the British are in the middle of chairing a group of allies to try to surge weapons into Ukraine in the next 50 days. And that's because Trump has given Putin 50 days to get serious about ceasefire talks or else face sanctions. And there would be secondary sanctions as well on people who are buying things from Russia. So what does that mean, Jamie, as Putin gets ready to really have this summer offensive with more than 100,000 troops, according to reports Mass, to try to get as much territory as he can?
- [32:23]
Christiane Amanpour
Well, I think it's two things. Number one, Putin's relentless attacks on Ukraine will continue both in the air, on the ground for the foreseeable future. But we should remember that, that a lot of Russians die for very little ground gained. It is relentless, it is damaging, it is terrible for Ukraine. But we shouldn't exaggerate the gains on the ground. They're very small, very insignificant really, compared to the number of people dead. Remember, we're talking about Russia having lost a million people dead or wounded in this War, soldiers, those families are.
- [32:56]
Jamie Rubin
You know that he doesn't care. And you know he doesn't care.
- [32:59]
Christiane Amanpour
We know he doesn't care, but that's not the point.
- [33:01]
Jamie Rubin
The point is that is the territory and the pressure on Ukraine.
- [33:05]
Christiane Amanpour
Let me try to answer that.
- [33:06]
Jamie Rubin
I know, but you're trying to say that Putin gives a damn about his Russian, Russia.
- [33:09]
Christiane Amanpour
I didn't say that. I never even implied it. And I wouldn't say that. And I've never said that. And I wouldn't say that Putin doesn't give a damn. Right. We can take that as a given. But a million dead Russians or wounded Russians is a significant number. And in Russia, there is a thing called the Russian mother. It's a very real phenomenon. It had an impact in Afghanistan. I believe over time it will have an impact in Russia. And I think when we talk about Russia's military offensive, we should point out how much suffering goes on on the Russian side for them to gain very little territory. Now, as far as the weapons concern.
- [33:45]
Jamie Rubin
I want to say how much suffering goes on on the Ukrainian side, because.
- [33:48]
Christiane Amanpour
Then we all talk about the receiving.
- [33:51]
Jamie Rubin
Well known, yes, but it's well known. But just like everything else, every other story is pushing it off the airwaves right now. It's really bad.
- [33:58]
Christiane Amanpour
Of course, it's terrible. But the Ukrainians are determined to fight. They are not going to be intimidated by Russia's relentless off. And that's what Europeans and Americans need to appreciate. The Ukrainians are doing the fighting and dying, and they're not going anywhere. All they want is the weapons to defend themselves. And finally, at last, the Trump administration has figured out a way to provide some of those weapons, not all that the Ukrainians need, but some. And yes, they're doing it in a way we talked about on this program 10 weeks ago, which is have the Europeans buy those American weapons that the Ukrainians need so much. And that is a result of Putin dissing Donald Trump over and over again, talking nicely on the phone. Apparently, it's Melania Trump who's reminding the president that after they get off the phone, the Russians launch another attack on Ukraine. Remember, she's from Slovenia. She probably has some real antipathy towards the Russians, as most East Europeans do. And so she's reminding the president that he's being dissed. That has helped turn him around, but not nearly far enough. The Europeans are stepping up, up. I think it's significant that they are doing so. The British in particular. The British also. There's a report today that much of the Liquefied gas that's going around the world is going on British insured tankers. So the British should do a lot less bragging and a lot more focusing on the British insurance industry.
- [35:24]
Jamie Rubin
Do you mean, wait a minute, do you mean, do you mean Russian gas?
- [35:27]
Christiane Amanpour
Russian gas being delivered all over the world on tankers that are insured by British insurance companies and registered under British insurers companies. And that is something the British can do something about instead of holding all sorts of meetings about pretending to re enter Europe as a leader. They can focus. Remember, the British government is one of the reasons the Russians were able to dominate Europe. Remember we lived in London and Russian oligarchs had financed the industries of tax and lawyers and real estate and they had brought great, great income into London. And the British government turned a blind eye. They're suddenly realizing you may see in last weak identifying the spies, they're putting them in jail. They're realizing the extent to which Russia has infiltrated the country. Well, here's a concrete example for the UK to step up and stop these oil tankers and other liquefied national gas delivering ships from being insured by British insurance companies, which keeps the Russian war economy fueled by money. And that would be just as important as organizing the meeting for sending weaponry to Ukraine. That weaponry is important and Ukraine will get it. But I think the sanctions that Donald Trump talked about that you just mentioned, it's a cumulative sanctions is a weird thing. It doesn't work until it works. It's frustrating because it doesn't seem to have an immediate impact. But one day, in some way, somehow the system suddenly can't handle it anymore. And the way we do that is by making sanctions enforced. Trump has mentioned one way. I'm giving you another way. We talked about on this program, sending US weapons through Europe. Let's get British to lead a real sanctions enforcement effort and I bet that will have an impact on the Russian economy.
- [37:15]
Jamie Rubin
Of course, the British got very, very serious after the full scale invasion and even before, do you remember the Novichok poisonings? And I mean they got really serious.
- [37:24]
Christiane Amanpour
It's taken a while though to turn around the British economy.
- [37:28]
Jamie Rubin
I have to point that out because Russia actually attacked people on British soil. Absolutely. Also, it is time, Jamie, for the American administration to demand and use all their powers to get a ceasefire, whatever threats, whatever leverage, whatever they can do in Gaza every single day now. And it looks crazy. It looks like it's just gone to a level that we can't even understand from bombing. You know A Catholic church, you know, which then, then Netanyahu had to apologize for last week to. Now there's reports of people having been killed just trying to get food near a border of Gaza to Israel. They're just desperate. And apparently the reason was there was just too much crowds. Well, yeah, desperate people are going to want, you know, they're going to want food, and it's going to get very, very difficult. Their reports from Gaza, from the Gaza officials, the health officials, that at least 20 people have now died of what they say is starvation. And we have a new Israeli air and ground offensive into a place called Deirbala, which is in central Gaza, after having been dropped leaflets and told to evacuate. I mean, seriously, what is going on? Last week we talked with your former boss, Antony Blinken, who said they, the Israelis have achieved their military aims a year ago, and now they're telling starving people that they have to pick up again and move to other overpopulated zones. Why? To get a Hamas commander, I don't know, but this is now going completely crazy. Where are the hostages? And no end in sight for the hostages either.
- [39:13]
Christiane Amanpour
There's an odd silver lining here. I saw in one of the more odd things, White House officials actually expressing frustration about the Israeli government in the sense of their bombing in Syria. And I think this could be a way for the Trump White House to begin to finally realize their problem with Netanyahu is that all he knows how to do is support military objectives in Gaza, support military objectives in Lebanon, support military objectives in Iran, and now interfering completely out of order with the internal affairs in Syria. Syria is, interestingly, something that Trump is proud of. Of. Remember, he did something that I give him credit for, is he met with the new leader of Syria. He ignored the leader's past history with extremist terrorist groups and said, okay, I'm going to give you a chance. And he did something I doubt a Democrat would have done so quickly, which is lift all this or suspend all the sanctions on Syria. So he's now invested in progress in Syria. Trump actually gets credit because, as I think, you know, during his first term, he saved the last piece of Syria in Italy, when he threatened Putin and Assad not to go in there, and they didn't. And that's the place from which Alshara came. And the Syrian revolution succeeded in overthrowing Assad. So Trump has an investment in a way in Syria moving in the right direction. Israel is making that extremely difficult. What business it is of theirs between the Druze and the Syrian government, figuring out how to live together and protect each other and avoid a civil. Why are the Israelis interfering in that? They say they're arrogant.
- [40:59]
Jamie Rubin
That's protecting their Druze. They're loyal Druids.
- [41:02]
Christiane Amanpour
They're just doing what their Druze are asking them to do. That's arrogance. Israel doesn't rule in the Middle East. Israel shouldn't rule in the Middle East. They are not the arbiters of what should happen.
- [41:12]
Jamie Rubin
Yeah, but they've taken that position, Jamie. They bombed all over the Middle East.
- [41:16]
Christiane Amanpour
That's my point.
- [41:16]
Jamie Rubin
And everybody's been praising them as far.
- [41:18]
Christiane Amanpour
As I can see, and now they may have done. What often happens is you take your arrogance one step too far and then you get a comeuppance. And I am hoping, because I like to find silver linings, sometimes they turn out to be true, that this may be their comeuppance where Trump actually gets infuriated with Netanyahu because all they know how to do is to use military force. And they're very bad at turning that military force into a success through diplomacy. They can't do it in Iran. They can't do it in Gaza. They can't do it. The only place they did it was in Lebanon because we, we insisted on it. And Biden succeeded in ending the war in Lebanon through intense diplomacy that the Israelis eventually acquiesced in. Now it has to happen in Gaza. It should be happening in Syria and it should be happening in Iran. And maybe, just maybe, this bombing in Syria was a step too far for the Israelis.
- [42:10]
Jamie Rubin
I'm hoping, let's hope that the Trumpies can get angry at that and have some humanitarian, you know, care and motivation for what's happening in Gaza. 20 plus months on it is, well, it has been for a long, long time, unconscionable and self defeating and they won't let us in to report it. It's just a nightmare for those people. Thank you all for listening. Make sure you're following the feed so that you never miss an episode and we will see you as usual on Thursday for, for our bonus Q and A part of it. Keep them coming as we do like to hear from you and we do like to answer you. So email us@amanpourpodlobal.com find us on social media at amanpourpod and you can listen to Christian Amanpour presents the X Files on Global Player. Download it from the App Store or go to globalplayer.com see you next time. Bye bye, bye, Jamie.
- [43:12]
Christiane Amanpour
This is a Global Player original podcast.