>> "washington journal" continues. host: welcome back with gideon rachman, the chief foreign affairs columnist for "the financial times." he is the host of rachman review. welcome to "washington journal." guest: thanks very much. good to be with you. host: before we talk about your podcast, i want to ask about the munich conference. that was last week and you were there. can you tell us your impressions? guest: it was one of the most of the most a sore neck conferences i have been to. a lot of people knew we were on

the brink of this in carbo conflict, and -- incredible conflict, and a lot of important decision-makers were there. it was a matter of record. you had the heads of the u.k. intelligence, antony blinken, the u.s. secretary of state, vice president harris, and also president zelensky of ukraine. it was probably that time last week where i was sitting in the audience watching him speaking. somebody said to him effectively, are you afraid? and he said, no, i am going back to kyiv tonight to have dinner there. he was angry. he did feel the west had not supported him as much as he would like. i remember saying afterwards to someone next to me in the audience, you know, he could be dead within the week. they said, come on, you know? but it shows us within a few days, the russians had begun.

although the british and the americans were very certain that war was going to start, and soon, a lot of europeans were much more skeptical, quitting people who really know russia. i was talking to a guy who had come from moscow, senior diplomat, and he did not think so. host: that is interesting to read what do you think the reason is for that -- that is interesting. what do you think the reason is for that? as you said, american intelligence was sure this was going to happen. guest: i think a couple of things. firstly, i think that american and british intelligence lost credibility over the years because of the failure to predict the followed kabul, so a lot of people's reaction was, well, just because these intelligence services say it does not mean it is true. another thing is people looked at putin's record, and they said he has never rolled the dice like this. this guy has been around 20 years.

it is mostly a pressure tactic. we don't believe he will really do this. i think thirdly, the british and americans were giving people the assessment based on intelligence but not showing how they got to it. everybody could see the photos of all the russian forces around ukraine. i think the anglosphere in addition to that was more detailed intelligence and maybe signaled intelligence showing that order had gone out. host: just a reminder that viewers can call and ask questions of our guest, gideon rachman. the lines are republican, (202)-748-8001. if you are a democrat, you can call us on (202)-748-8000. independents, (202)-748-8002.

let's talk about your podcast. tell us why you started it, when you started it, and what is your mission? guest: the original idea was that -- my main job is writing a newspaper column. in the course, i talked to loads of people. we thought it would be interesting sometimes to record conversations that are interesting and put them on a podcast. we started doing that two or three years ago. the first one waited, which went well, was in moscow with a guy called theodore, who was one of russia's leading foreign policy intellectuals close to putin. speaks excellent english. quite smart. i thought it was interesting for westerners to get that view undiluted, let him talk, a style interview that is not super confrontational. i hope i ask intelligent

questions and push people but i don't cap them. i want to let them talk. i have done that all over the world, certainly before the pandemic when i had to switch to zoom, but i had done podcasts with chinese foreign policy people, russians, africans, resilience, you name it. the last weeks, we have been focused on the war in ukraine or the run-up to the war in ukraine, but i try to have an array of voices, russians from moscow, americans on the dovish wing with the rand corporation, and more hawkish voices, as well. i want to give people a sense of the debates at their, and access to the kind of people i talked through -- i talked to do my job and get a sense of how the world works. host: have you been able to talk to people inside moscow, inside

kyiv after the invasion? i wonder what they are telling you. guest: we began on thursday, and the invasion started thursday. normally record two or three days ahead of time, and we recorded on wednesday, but that was with a colleague of mine in kyiv, awaiting the invasion. and then of course, we had a foreign policy analyst who left moscow a day before, who i think was very interesting on how the mood shifted during the week they were in moscow and how people had that similar sense of incredulity i did not think putin would do it -- incredulity and did nothing putin would do it. she talked about, for example, not just the kind of policy people, but a friend of hers who decided she had to get her russian kid, boy, out of the country because she realized they were was coming and that he might be drafted. host: we have some people who want to talk to gideon, so let's

go to larry in rochester, vermont, democrat line. caller: hi. my name is larry creach. kind of a student of history. i am quite surprised that people have not and do not understand history, you know, when hitler took over lance, everybody wanted to appease him. now we have a guy, putin and power for 20 years, who has taken over crimea, georgia, and other entities that he wants to bring back the old russia. i am surprised we have not set up a no-fly zone over at least kyiv in parts of western ukraine so we can resupply the poor people who are giving their

lives just to save their country . we also should think about the fact that nato should enroll sweden and finland so that we can have a consolidated block against this dictator who would like to take over most of eastern europe. i think he has designs of the old russia. and we don't stand up to him, it is going to be another world war ii. host: larry, let's get a response. interested to see what you think about the analogies, gideon, between hitler and putin. guest: like a lot of people, i would have dismissed them a few years ago, but i think the caller has a point that some of this is reminiscent. i think we have all learned to be a bit resistant with the munich analogy because it was used so many times, in the vietnam war, but there are

analogies here in the sense that putin, with ukraine, is making similar arguments to the one hitler made in 1938 that there are people who should be in his country, who are trapped in the wrong country, and i have to defend them, and that land should really be part of russia, and the use of transparent pretexts for flight operations and all of that. but, obviously, it is a matter of practical facts and differences. we live in a different technological age. although there was talk of a no-fly zone, i did hear some people advocate that in munich, the head of the british parliament defense committee, was saying that, that we should have a no-fly zone over the ukraine, but most people know. he was reckless and too dangerous because russia is a nuclear power and that we would

end up at war with russia, we have never been at war with the country with nuclear weapons. if you look to the cold war, which is perhaps more similar to the adversaries based, which i nuclear weapons, when they rolled tanks into hungary in 1956, we did not react actually because of nuclear war, and eisenhower was heavily criticized in 1956 for not doing anything, but he did not. he decided to advocate because the risks of war at a nuclear age are that much higher. host: let's talk to samuel in chippewa falls, wisconsin, independently. caller: good morning. my question is posed to you. i heard on news reports that president zelensky of ukraine was praising prime minister erdogan of turkey or his assistance in the black sea during this crisis. is not turkey a member of nato,

and could that involve article v if anything happens there? guest: really good point. i was just checking twitter before i came on because i only saw that half an hour ago. and it was a brussels correspondent who covers nato and is a former moscow correspondent who made the point you made that it is a striking act of solidarity, but it is a risk because putin has said he would take on any third country that impedes theirturkey is a mo if the russian navy tries to bust through the turkish navy, and go through the black sea, then they could be at war with a nato country and the need to get into article five territory, yes, this is a danger cold moment. -- dangerous moment. host: your recent column is

called putin's war will shake the world, can you explain what you mean? guest: there are some anyways it will shake the world but let us start with the fact that this is already probably the biggest land war in europe since 1945. the u.k. prime minister boris was saying in november that the era of tank war in europe is over. apparently not. there is also the kinds of risk that we have been talking about, a confrontation between a country although its economy is not much to write home about. the russian economy is the size of spain even though it is 150 million people compared to 45 million in spain. it is not like china. it is certainly a military that have myth -- behemeth. it pours money into the military, it is physically a huge country, the largest in the world, and it is now the biggest

and most dangerous confrontation in the west since the end of the cold war and the cuban missile crisis. that is big. you then look at the economic consequences. we are imposing sanctions on russia. they may well retaliate restricting the supply of gas to europe. well, why should that matter? the german economy, 40% of its energy comes from russian gas. the germans are looking at power shortages, factories running short of electricity and homes not being warmed. and a lot of people will say that is the price we should be prepared to pay, but if it tips germany into a recession, germany is the most important economy in the european union and that will be inflation and there will have political consequences. there is a french presidential election coming up soon and those are things to worry about, and then there are the risks

that although nato has said repeatedly that it will not go to war with russia over this that this conflict could spiral in an unpredictable way, and we talked about one of them, what if russia tries to blake the turkish naval blockade and another that you might see, the russian air force chases the ukrainian air force over into the airspace of the baltic space or poland, and there air force goes into the air and you get a tax between nato and the russian air forces. a lot of these are consequences for russia, and it is likely, i think that russia, the last vestiges of political freedom in russia, there were some, it was a country that we visited a fair amount. it is a freer place than china. there is some independent media, and intellectuals will be prepared to say things that they

would not in china. i think those days of relative freedom will come to a close. navalny this time last year and there have been demonstrations in russia, however. that is one of the big unknowns. one of the callers misjudged the russian youth and he may have. what happens there. will he simply be able to oppress that? i suspect he well, but it is a risk. the other thing he has misjudged is ukrainian nationalism. a lot of people say unfortunately, putin believes his own propaganda, that he might believe that this really is a nazi regime imposed on ukraine and that ukrainians will welcome a russian invasion and he has discovering that that is not the case. the russians might be locked into an insurgency and on the question arises does the west support the insurgents, and what

does that do to relations with russia and saving ukraine. doesn't turn it into a long civil civil war like syria? these are huge questions which lie just around the corner. host: let us go to montana and talk to jim on the democrats line. caller: good morning. it is cairo, missouri. host: sorry. caller: my point would be war is obsolete in a global economy. germans with their gas and russia needing customers, how can you build a war with somebody and disrupt the world peace, and then want them as your customer? another point that has long been a tradition not to take out the

leaders of an aggressive state or just the other side. and yet the president of ukraine is under personal threats. he says i am number one. the number one target for russia. if they take out the president of ukraine, can we take out putin? guest: well, both very good questions. on the economic front, you are right, this will be a disaster for the russian economy but i do not think putin really cares. i was talking to a russian friend who had been meeting -- would been in a meeting with putin a couple of years ago when people were talking about the problems of the russian economy and how it could be improved and he said that putin was visibly bored, he was not interested in the economics and the military question came up and he perked up and he talked about minute detail about military operations. i suppose that he can afford not

to be interested in the economy, he personally is an extremely rich man even if his assets are frozen. he will not go hungry, nor are the people around him. the ordinary people of russia could suffer badly as our economy slumps. it is a mentality. we went through a period when economics was king after the fall of the berlin wall when leaders really thought in terms of globalization and market share. sadly we seem to be going back to an era of armies and nationalization and putin exemplifies that. then, what was the second question? can you perhaps remind me? host: i wanted to ask you about sanctions. how excessive do you think sanctions are going to be? what will it take to tip the balance, and convince putin that this is a bad idea? guest: if you are trying to

reverse this policy i do not think sanctions will do it, to be honest. but, i think that now really sanctions are about punishment and sending a message. maybe not to putin, but to others that might be thinking of doing something like this. it is isolating you so that your economy will suffer and made into an international pariah. but for the reasons i explained, i do not think to himself will turn away now. he might be overthrown which brings us back to the question about which i had to remember, but that will be a little way down the road. i do not think economic sanctions will change his mind. but, i think that western leaders want to be seen to do something and sanctions, if you do not want to go to war, you try economic warfare.

the previous caller was also talking about the targeting of zelensky and he is right. normally people do not actually trying kill the leader of the country that they are in -- they are at war with. but, i think the russians see this as -- the russians are obsessed by the iraq war and say that they are not the rule breakers and they will point to the killing of saddam hussein. i think they see in a twisted sort of way that zelensky as their saddam hussein. so they will try and take him out. as for whether we could kill putin, i think we would not, because we get back to the question of nuclear weapons. but if you take out the head of state of russia, that is going to war with russia, and so i do not know. host: let us talk to brenda in

pennsylvania, on the independent line. go ahead. caller: good morning. host: good morning. caller: how are you? host: i am good, i think you need to mute your tv. caller: ok, hold on a minute. can you hear me now? host: that is much better, go ahead. caller: i am calling you that it is a shame that all of those neighboring countries around the ukraine will not help those people and everybody has their own voice of opinion about this war. i am going to tell you something. 10 and trump put their heads together on something but the west has too much to digest. thanks you very much. host: what do you think?

there is the school of thought that this would've never happened under trump. and that putin has taken advantage of a weak u.s. president. what do you think of that? guest: i do not buy it. it might not have happened under trump but not because trump was stronger than biden, but because trump was an enemy of nato. and i think that putin had reason to hope that in a second trump term, because of his relationships with trump and trump's view of nato that there certainly would not be any admission of ukraine to nato. but that he might to dismantle nato and the alliance. that he would do things that putin is demanding. when biden came to office you had a traditional approach to american foreign policy. biden actually when he was running for president said that

america's main adversary was russia and called putin a killer. so putin knew that he would not get anything via a diplomatic route. and then i think what is possible is that the chaotic withdrawal from afghanistan sent a message that american was -- america was getting out of military commitments and eight message of perhaps, lack of resolve. it is around then that serious planning for the invasion of ukraine looks like it began, but it probably began that there were before. were maneuvers in the spring before the american withdrawal from afghanistan. he may see a certain weak ness, but not just the president or afghanistan. a lot of foreigners look at january the sixth and the storming of the capital and they say this is a country on the brink of a civil war. it is not the america that we knew. it is not the strong, confident, stable country.

and that is really not to do with biden, it is to do with the internal politics of the united states. i am sure that putin made a calculation and he might have even been a bit surprised by how committed america has been to try to push back. but i do not think it is solely to do with biden. i think it is to do with the state of the united states in general. host: let us talk to felicia in des moines, iowa. are you there? caller: yes. good morning. so, my question, he was kind of just answering my question. because trump tried to disrupt nato, and wanted to put russia back in the g7. trump has always been on the side of russia, and i just wonder if when they said sanctions are not going to deter putin from doing what he is doing because he was prepared

for this. so if he was prepared to go to war, no one prepares to go to war and -- in nine months or whoever along biden has been in office. this has been something he has been preparing for since he made his way into crimea, and i think the fact that we have said we are not going to go to war with them at all to do anything to help the ukrainian people, it is just -- it just hurts my heart because we took their weapons away from them with the thought that we would protect them with nato, and i just feel like americans are on the wrong side -- republican americans are on the wrong side of history here, and doesn't it give putin more ability to attack when americans

like our last president are honoring him and saying that he is a genius? host: let us get a response. go ahead. guest: there is a lot in what you said, and i think you make a lot of interesting points. i think that trump's praise of putin, and as you said just recently in the last couple of days calling him a genius. that is part of russia's view of the world. they see america as very divided, not just america, europe is very divided. putin knows there is a consent she would see in the european continent and the united states that look at the kind of thing that tucker carlsen has said that sees him as an ally in the cultural war. he is a macho guy not interested in getting it -- and gay rights are women's rights or whatever.

he is a traditional christian, as he would say, but he makes a lot of his christianity. and so, he can play those divisions in the west. as to the point of how we let ukraine down? we will be arguing about this for a long time. let us look at two things. you said that we guaranteed them, we did and we did not. what is true is that when ukraine got rid of its nuclear ripens -- weapons there was the budapest memorandum signed in which the united states, russia, the u.k., and france guaranteed ukraine's borders and returns for them getting rid of nato -- nuclear weapons. this was brought up in the mute -- munich security conference. the current mayor of kyiv is a former heavyweight boxing champion, so she is a physically

imposing specimen to which the legalistic response was that it was a guarantee, but it was not a guarantee to fight for ukraine. it was a sort of we all accept this. ukraine never was a nato and nato is the thing that guarantees the defense or if you are invaded. we can get out of it legally because we can say we never promised a fight for you. i think the ukrainians feel that there was a moral statement of support that we have not lived up to. and the other thing which is this question of where we correct to say we were not going to fight russia over ukraine? i was talking to a prominent former western leader yesterday was lamenting the way this was handled and said that is a big mistake and was a big mistake. we should have said nothing is off of the table. i could understand why the current generation of leaders

did not say that because i did not want to frighten the public. nobody wants nuclear war. if they had said nothing is off the table which implied that you might go to war with russia over ukraine you would have had peace marches and people would've gotten scared. in the ways of reassuring the public they felt it was the right thing to say. on the other hand it sends a signal to putin, the only thing you will faces economic sanctions and he has already had a round in 2014. i was looking back at what angela merkel said when sanctions were imposed after the annexation of crimea and he said -- and she said we are -- he is crazy to do this and we will cripple the russian economy. and four years later russia held the world cup. putin has written that through, so he felt that he has seen what we have got and it was not that impressive. host: we have one more thing, which is the swiss banking system. explain what -- the swift

banking system. explain what that is because president biden is under criticism for not cutting russia off from that. guest: that may change because the european opposition to that is crumbling as we speak. let us back up and explain what it is. when you transfer money internationally, and that is whether it is you or me as an individual or if you are a business transferring hundreds of millions, you do it via an interbank system called swift, which is based in belgium. and we discovered when we sanctioned iran that you can really damage a country's economy by cutting them out of the swift system because suddenly they cannot do international trade. i cannot make international financial transactions. if you cannot pay your counterparty you are really in trouble.

at that time i remember saying swift is not an american organization and it has russians on the board but it is nongovernmental. i was saying to people why did you go along with the sanctions and basically it was because america said if you do not do this the entire board of swift will be liable to arrest if they ever come to the united states. if you are in the international financial business it is unconscionable that you cannot travel to america so they folded. it was an effective sanction on iran. there is, however hesitancy to applying this to russia. i remember writing at this as the surest way to get russia's attention, financial sanctions. the concern is that we need to do trade with russia, the germans and the italians do. as i mentioned earlier they get 45% of their gas to cut -- to power their economy from russia. the people opposing the swift

saying are the germans in particular because they are worried that the first thing you -- that will happen is if they cut russia out of swift's that the russians will say i am sorry but you cannot pay for the gas so no more gas for you and then they will have an economic crisis and that is the argument going on. i was talking to an italian government member this morning and he said look, we do not like it but we can see the way it is going in europe. opposition to the imposition is crumbling and it will probably happen. if it happens we will just have to find energy sources elsewhere. you were saying that they were going to restart coal-fired power plants and try to import liquid national gas from qatar and we might have to ration. host: rick in missouri on the independent line. good morning. caller: thank you for having me. i wanted to call in and talk about trump but with semi people questioning him i have to say a

couple of points. trump made his money as a businessman, dealing with russia and countries across the world and joe biden has made a lot of money by using our political influence. i think trump was alien and from the standpoint of when we were in iraq, take the oil, so we go in there and we are spending all of the money on war and we did not take control of the oil. as far as geopolitical powers and this was before he was in office. china wanted -- trump wanted nato members to pay their fair share. i do not realize he was trying to destroy nato. but, for your guest today, i would like to move over to wiki, and i see that he has written a book that deals with the asian century, so western domination is ending and china is rising. so, how do you feel and what do

you think china is doing now? how does this with the turmoil that we have in the ukraine, what is their game in the long run? guest: that is a great question. i should say the comment i made at trump wanting to destroy nato, that was a bit controversial. he said things that hinted at that and european officials i know where very concerned that something -- that that was something he would do but it is not totally on the record that that was going to happen. it was an inference. coming to china, look, i think -- a lot of people debate and their arguments about this and some people were saying that china will be uncomfortable about this because they do not like violation of sovereignty, they are very big on this. i do not believe that and i am of a different view which overall, china is ok with this

because china has a similar worldview to the russians in the sense that they do not like a world dominated by american power. they also have territorial ambitions on taiwan. if russia gets away with invading ukraine, and effectively manages it and manages the aftermath, then i think the chinese will feel like ok, our time is coming and we can invade taiwan. because they too have to deal with the question of american power. maybe that tells you something about what they do with china attacked taiwan. even if russia gets bogged down, that is not so bad for china because what you see is an increasing american focus to try to rebuild their position in europe, and that is good for china because they want continuity between -- the odd continuity between trump and biden's foreign policy is that

they wanted to concentrate on china, and that is not great for china if american power is focusing on beijing. if america pulls back towards europe that students china. it is interesting that at the un security council everybody was looking to see what would china do on this vote to condemn russia, nobody thought that they would join the vote to condemn russia and some people they thought they might vote alongside the russians. they abstain. i think that would've been a great disappointment in moscow. putin and xi had a long meeting during the winter olympics and they have a close relationship. i think even the chinese may have been taken by surprise by the extent of the russian invasion. and they are probably watching to see what happens. i do not think they want to be go -- they want to go all in with russia if putin miscalculated. if we are starting a new cold war as some call it with russia,

complete with all economic sanctions if china goes out there and says we are russia's ally, that drags them into it and they become a target for secondary economic sanctions. the moment, if the chinese are sympathetic to the russians they do not want to find their relationship with america dictated to by russia. they do not want to be used as the tale of the dog, and finding that they are having their relationship with america dictated by crazy things that putin has done so they are keeping a bit of distance for now. host: richard in kansas city, kansas on the democrat line. caller: well, i am struck by the fact that putin referred to neo-nazis and my people came from that area as a group in the

1880's and settled in kansas, western kansas in a little town called chinchin, and i give a shout out to all of my old relations, if i have any left. host: your people came from ukraine? caller: right along the volga river. i read a deal on this some years back they were show -- sold land along a river called the little smoky which does not exist anymore, and you can see the sequence of the villages that were created here in kansas like -- they all have german names and they are in the same sequence as the villages they were brought from on the volga

river, and as you go up the smoky river, you will see that these same towns are duplicated over here in kansas. host: so, let us get a response because we are running low on time, gideon, the remark by putin calling the ukrainians neo-nazis, where did that come from? guest: it is a part of russian out of -- ideology although putin's ideology which goes back to the second world war. because of the hideous treatment of ukraine in the 1930's under the soviet union, there was a massive famine, millions died. when the nazis invaded, some ukrainians, nationalists and people who hated stalin and the treatment of the ukrainians fought with the nazis against the soviet army. and what putin argues is that current stain -- day ukrainian

nationalists are the heirs to the people who fought with the nazis against the soviet union. however, i think that is a deeply unfair slur. that was almost a century ago. ukraine has plenty of reasons to want to be an independent state now that have no connection to that. and indeed, you have to give -- the biggest push for the idea that neo-nazis, the current president of ukraine is jewish. what kind of neo-nazi state would have a jewish president? host: about the reaction is -- in the u.k., is there any daylight between boris johnson's views on this and president biden's views, are they really in sync? guest: they are. the british have been hardline on russia for reasons that you

can go back to the 19th centuries and certainly the cold war. relations have been bad because they attempted to murder a person in britain and there was the expulsion of diplomats and we are not as economically dependent. so for all of the reasons the british have been with america, and we have a similar view of what was about to happen because there was a special intelligence sharing relationship between the u.s., u.k., australia, and canada. so they are pretty close. on this policy and actually, you know, the europeans are beginning to move closer to where the white house is. a lot of the divergence before was because of a difference in analysis. they did not believe would do this. i do not think you can underestimate the normative sense of shock.

if you are in berlin, you are closer to western ukraine and paris. this is not that far from them. they are pretty warned by what is happening. host: thank you so much for joining us on "washington journal." that is it for today's " washington journal." join us tomorrow morning at 7:00 a.m. eastern. have a great saturday. ♪ [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2022] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] ♪

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buckeye broadband support c-span as a public service, along with these other television providers, giving you a front row seat to democracy. >> today is day three of the conservative political action conference. our coverage begins with ohio congressman jim jordan at 3:15 p.m. eastern. donald trump addresses the group at 7:00 p.m. watch live on c-span, online at c-span.org, or full coverage on our video app, c-span now. >> next, taiwan's minister of foreign affairs and former u.s. defense secretary mark esper talk about china's relationship with taiwan and the rise of global authoritarianism. hosted by the mccain institute , this is about an hour. hosted , this is about an hour. >> i am a former united states senator defense and a distinct fellow at thca