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a hearing on circle big oil to determine whether the country's largest companies are meeting climate commitments. this off to the i m f. ones of serious global economic consequences following the russian invasion of ukraine. and as several nations tried to isolate russia from the world economy, with russian oil exports under fire. well, joining me now from chicago's economist, political scientist, professor james robinson of global conflict studies at the university of chicago harris school of public policy. thank you so much sir. at professor robinson coming back on so away from obviously there was a bombing of yemen this week that the bombing of damascus this week. but there's only one story, obviously, as regards some, well what's in your title of your rub chair, but the best job global conflict is ukraine. given now that a, it appears mosque, who may be cutting off energy supplies or threatening to, why didn't they just try that to avenge the 14000 killed in lieu hands can don't yet go over the buster since 2014. then

a full scale invasion. and i think there was some people in the hoover institution saying, why didn't he try cia activities, destabilizes and ends. he government, why send in armored personnel carriers in the military? and as we witnessed the pictures of, of death and destruction of civilians on all our tv screens. well i, you know, i don't think this is really about economics. i think it's about, you know, some national project nationalist project in putins mind. you know, that he wants to reclaim about a year ago. he wrote a ranting, a several 1000 word essay about, you know, how there was no basis in history for an independent ukrainian states. and this was part of russia. and so, you know, so i think i think that he's willing to tolerate the independence of belarus as long as that, you know, they're happy to kind of cody up totally up to him. but since, you know,

the regime change in ukraine, you know, as a much more independent, much more democratic pro western regime. then he just decided he couldn't tolerate that. so he's, you know, so, so i think it's not much to do with economics. i, i suspect that is going to have very negative economic effects on russia but, but i think he's willing to tolerate that because of his nationalistic agenda, if it's an old economic. and obviously russia says that it can replace all the demand for my western europe in the united states, from the global south, obviously, from china and india and other purchases. why did washington suddenly recognize the government of president maduro in caracas? this week of the years of saying that some other person was the president of the country with the largest no, no reserves enough. good. i'm not sure i have a lot of insights into that. so i think the attempt to recognize this other person

as the governor, as the president of venezuela, was not very successful international politics. so i think that taking a new that taking a new strategy a but, you know, as i got to do with oil, i don't know, you know, that you eso only 3 percent of oil imports into the nicest states come from russia . so, you know, so it's actually pretty easy for the united states to take a principal position and the russian import. so that's, that's a whole together, different thing. you know, i'm gonna go in here from europe and from the huntington. no, i understand it's a completely different thing in europe and it is in the united states. but i'm just making the point that, you know, i, i'm not sure that the venezuelan thing has anything to do with the oil because the russian oil is the very small thing in, in the united states. and, and, and, you know, but for the european union, the states are very different. it's a very different issue. but i think, you know, there's been a very, there's been a failed art policy in diplomatic policy with venezuela for the last few years. so

maybe they're just trying a different tack. i mean, obviously if someone else at the university of chicago, john mashaila said, what we are seeing now would happen because of nato expansion. we know the barack obama in 2016 in peace. it was interviewed for the atlantic. he said, whatever you, we do, we mustn't emphasize ukrainian nato membership because it will implied to create war. what is it about joe blinkin and sullivan that to put their foot down and said, this is our red line. after the red lines of for russia saying it must be neutral for so long. and the minsk accord saying, you must recognize these places which would not allow ukraine to be bought of nature. what is it about the by ministration. that is, that said, dug their heels and said they must be allowed to join nato if they want. yeah.

doesn't seem terribly sensible at the present and, you know, the present context, you know, in the sense that it seems quite plausible. or if it was, could go on for years in the ukraine and, you know, some sort of negotiated settlement needs to happen. you know, i think what we've seen in chechnya and other places that is, that puts in is willing to engage in hideous amounts of violence and destruction. ah, you know, if he's pushed so so, so, so you know, so, so we need some sort of negotiated settlement that seems to me and that likely involves some kind of commitment that ukraine will not join nato. and you know, this a better or worse to 10 sees this is part of russia sphere of influence. you know, in the same way as you know, in the past the united states is declared various types of doctrines that the america was it spare influence, central america, latin america. it's influence on it. you know?

and so i think you know it's back to coldwell politics. no, i would say and so it's very much logical coldwell politics that you have to make these compromises. so i think i think mish, i'm is right. yeah. i mean, you don't think the hideous destruction will be on a scale similar to what the 10s of millions killed, wounded or displaced by britain in the united states in iraq or 377000 killed in yemen, or is not the scale of nato destruction which will here or do you think puget will beat even the nato destruction from the i don't know, but i think, you know, what's happened so far suggests it could get, it could get very ugly. you know, he's, i think he's here, he's not going to be affected domestically by boy military casualties by destruction and ukraine. you know, he's control, he controls the media. you know, he managed to control a lot, you know, most, most independent media basically disappeared in russia. so what the average russian knows about this is going to be, you know,

is going to be limited. and also we don't actually know what the average russian thinks about this. you know, like i, you know, we don't know how much support brewton actually has for kind of annexing ukraine. you know, you didn't hear a lot of russians protesting about, you know, the dog boss, all these places in the east, the ukraine being effectively annexed or crimea, you know, did you see russia was complaining about crimea being annexed? well, i mean that there was certainly been massive arrest. thousands of russians been arrested demonstrations against putin's decision to invade and media well over since 2014. and the maiden revolution is continually said boot and should act. you say that we don't know. i mean, there been some opinion polling even quoted in nature, nation media, that is his popularity as often happens when leaders engaging will, has gone up and jumped by 10 percent. but obviously there's this, i mean, there is a media blackout in europe at the moment. no other side is loud. i mean,

as you may have heard russian catch a band, but more seriously, all media and journalists are being ban slowly across. i'm sure. in chicago, you can't turn on and hear a voice that supports the boot in invasion. i don't know, you know, there's some pretty ambiguous stuff on fox news about the putin invasion, you know. ok. so i, you know, i think, i think it's, it's thrown a bit of a wild card into the republican parts of republican party because president trump was a big fan. and so, you know, i think so the trumpet, trump put on for the fierce a sanctions on russia during his tenure to me. i mean, he but he also said complimentary things about puts in as a leader. yeah. so how far do you think individuals, way of processing history, you're talking about putin themselves work your academic field because i thought

that that kind of fashion of thomas carlyle, we lost that maybe 50 years ago or more? no, i think you're right. i think i think that the tendency in social science is definitely to down play the role of leaders, you know, and i think it's difficult. i don't think we have a really good sense of the extent to which puts in is kind of reflecting a more general russian sort of position. but that's sort of why i said, we don't really know how popular or unpopular this is. you know. sure, thousands of people are protesting because 150000000 russians, you know, so, so, so, so what does the average russian think about this and is pretend reflecting on this kind of post, soviet angst. or is he, is he really just a brilliant sort of dictates, of manipulating everybody i, you know, i, i personally think, you know, it's, it's hard to imagine that china would be the same, had it not being for thank shout, pings,

sort of political scales or singapore would be the same without leak one use of the project to transform the society. i think social science has a hard time dealing with, with the role of these individuals, but i think it's probably undisputable that they do play some role. yeah. but you don't think that george w bush and tony blair would dictate his in the west when the illegal invasion of iraq happened. overwhelming support by the people or differently had popular support the iraq invasion. when blair and bush did it. you wouldn't therefore say that they would dictators, would, you know, they weren't dictators, but they played an important role in sort of framing what issues were and you know what the options were and what the consequences of not doing something was so. so i think as individuals, they frame for people, they frame the debate in a way which, you know, 81 strategy much more attractive and politically acceptable than another. so, so, you know, i, you know, the, i, b, a, so, so,

so they had to bring people along with a more than putin has to, you know, he has more freedom to kind of do what he wants. i suppose. i mean, you don't think there are many in the global south which takes a very different view or you just have to listen to their media to realize how different they are. and that the media is free for you in the global south, obviously than europe to day, which is which bands descent or they don't think many feel at last. nature's getting a good kicking this kind of a hedge, a monic power, li vassals, states of washington in europe. finally, they are going to understand economically, if not militarily that there is now new age upon us, the age of china. yeah, i mean, i think, i think there's a lot of history that if you think about this whole brick concept, you know, there's this anti western kind of idea of development. you know, a lot of our own lines and development in our own way without and without sort of

humiliating dependence on the united states or western europe. you know? but, but, you know, i find it extremely sure. i find that it's really my, oh pick i'm, you know, i'm sure that there's a lot in that, you know, the legacy of colonialism and all sorts of things. so, so, so, so you know, i think that's understandable whether coming from but, but i find, i find it a little surprising that india, for example, you know, would, would be, would be happy with what was going on in ukraine. you know, like in some sense, moving to a world older room where there are no rules. you know, that seems like a fairly frightening thing to me. and i would say, i would think it was fairly frightening to india. you know, after all, india was with china in the relatively recent thought. they have an ongoing port dispute at this moment. you know, so it seemed kind of all that india would think this was sort of so, so, so ok,

i mean press james robinson. i'll stop you that more from the economist, political scientist, professor of global complex studies at the high school, the public policy of the university of chicago up to the spray. aah! i the wes liberal world order is collapsed in the hedge of money inside to maintain and expand the conflict in ukraine as a proxy war. the real target is russia and indirectly china. the law of unintended consequences is in play. in the end, it will be europe that pays the highest price. mm . welcome back. i'm silly or james robinson, professor of global conflict studies of the mercy of chicago's harris school of public policy. as, as a scholar,

what do you think about the fact that even questioning the historical context of what the russians have done, is to make yourself be a put in apologise. it's as if, i mean, i don't know if you, if you look too much about the treaty of versailles and churchill serv, killing of maybe 250000 in the rhineland, in 1919 or something. and traced the roots of world war 2. you weren't called a nazi. why is it now that if you start to look at these contexts of global conflict, you watch a magic mirror calder, your putin apologise. yeah, well it's very emotional moment is this way. ah, it's like football teams or something. no, i. yeah, i don't, i, it's difficult to have a sort of rational discussion, perhaps about these historical roots of these conflicts, or, you know, territorial disputes in the middle of a conflict like this done where you draw the light in history also is varied,

is difficult and ambiguous. do you, do you think that china can replace demand that may be lost from nato countries from european countries? how can they replace all the demand for commodities and services? well, i think that depends on what happens. so china's economic growth over the next summer . what, what period of time we're talking about, you know, but, but i think most people would be expect, china, china's economic growth is likely to slow down more than anything else. you know, and there's many contradictions in, in the way the chinese system works, which, which, you know, which maker sort of reversal, all of this very dynamic economic growth over the last 40 years. much more likely than that kind of acceleration. so, so i don't know, china has some sort of strategic interest in buying up vast amounts of oil, natural resources. but i think if you just looked at the economic fundamentals and asked, you know, with, with the,

with the trajectory of the chinese economy make up for european to mod, i'd say the opposite is not. and well, i remember very well the foreign policy magazine front cover in 1999 saying there anything, all this talk about chinese economic development is exaggerated. china's actually just your average developing world, the country. but of course there is a relevance here regarding she didn't bring inclusions meeting at the winter olympics, in that john bolton was particularly concerned about it. on our show on saturday, the former national security adviser and us about the un that join a made a statement saying taiwan is not ukraine because taiwan is part of china. i do think that the china will take a more aggressive militarily aggressive strands as it lies. they're surrounded by m o u. s. bases and weaponry. yeah, i think that's quite possible actually. yeah, i mean, china does think about taiwan in a, in

a civil away to are russia thinks about ukraine. i would say, you know, if there's more, not far more historical precedent for ukrainian independence of the risk of taiwanese independence. you know, well, it depends how you think about it. you know, try one was independent for many years during the imperial kind of periods in china as a sort of, you know, it was a not really controlled by beijing or whatever. but, but i, i do think it's very worrying. yeah. because i think, you know what the chinese see is that nobody's going to really protect go to protect ukraine, neck and the st weapons. but nobody's really going to protect you grain or, you know, or do anything militarily, if russia annex is it. and i, you know, i suspect they think the same thing would happen in taiwan. but, but i, you know, i think the chinese are perhaps kind of more strategic and long, you know, kind of for cited then puts in this, you know, the chinese have an ideology,

you know, and they have a kind of institutional set up that couldn't, doesn't really have you know, put in this one man show, you know, and, yeah, present. she, he, you know, he's a, he's a very kind of, you know, he's a jewel thing again professor. i think that's different in china. i think, you know, i think it's much less individualized in china than this is in russia. you know, i mean, that's actually the good. you see that in some sense, once putin goes, it's hard to sort of see one can, you know, it seems more difficult to imagine that this agenda will continue. whereas the chinese, the gender is much more deeply seated and institutionalized than, than good sense. agenda. white are in them. obviously the russian duma in its entirety supported, supported the decision of vladimir putin. and i think russians would beg to differ about it being some monolithic place where everyone just worshiped this cult of pigeon. similarly, as you say, obviously in china, but how quick was china to immediately replace visa and mastercard with union pay

the credit card 2nd biggest credit card in the world? how quickly were they just say we will start to take wheat and how quickly are they stopping bank systems to enable moscow to enter a parallel economic system? you said it wasn't economic daily. every analyst you talked to in china or russia says, this war and you grant is economic because it may presage the end of the dollar. well, i mean, it's a, it's not economic in the sense i don't think it's motivates. it's not motivated by economics. you know, it may have economic consequences, you know, but i, you know, i think it's much too early to see, at least for me, it's too early to see what those economic consequences are. you know, could be, you know, china could make russia dependent on its technology or its institutions or whatever, you know, that maybe they'll be able to make rush or a client state of china. i don't know. i mean, i do think you're the china, china,

china is very sophisticated technologically, in many ways. you know, it's been competing on many margins with western technology in western institutions . and this, another instance of it. and it creates a kind of pretext for them to, to do things that perhaps they, they didn't think of doing before. but you know, but i think it's hard, it's hard for me at the moment to see what the long run economic consequences are. my point was just, it's not motivated by economics. i think the economic consequences are russia should surely go to their economic consequences. and ukraine are surely going to be disastrous. i think the economic consequences to russia are going to be disastrous to what are they going to be for china? i, you know, i don't know. he's only russia was tired and the sanctions, all the sanctions have gone on for so many years. and just as iran is tired of the sanctions venezuela's day to the sanctions a, my impression is that there thanks didn't really have much impact or anything in

russia. yes, russian elite went, went, went, went on with their business and their life styles. and you know, they capital selling natural resources and guten ear. so i, i, it doesn't seem to it, it didn't seem to really have a big impact on what was going on. so i'd be surprised if that was what precipitated this. i mean, i was, he, china's been annoyed about sanctions against china too. but the only way to alternately evade sanctions is to destroy the power clearly of, of the dollar. so i was one other aspect of this is sadie arabia could it fill the gap in terms of energy resources that is being removed from the market and resulting in. i don't know what the gas prices are like as a petrol pump, as we call them over here in chicago, in a working class is a pangs, or with their lives in new grain and, and has come to the ask and they're paying price. now not being able,

having to choose between aging and eating, as we often say on this program where you live or 40000000 can only tonight by virtue of food stamps. yeah, i, i, i'm not sure what the, the centers of the saudi arabians. i'm sure that the, you know, the united states government will be leaning on them to, to, to increase production. but i expect the saudis a very happy to see the oil prices increase. you know, so, so, and it's very good, you know, for some governments like venezuela, we were mentioning you mentioning earlier, you know, because the venezuelan government does well when the oil price goes up, they have money to spread around and i support and popularity so. so i didn't know that there would be a big enough increase in production to actually maybe it'll ameliorate the price rise, but i expect oil prices are going to go up and we'll be stuck with that. you know, so is this conflict a global conflict? i wouldn't say, yeah, that's a good question. you know, is having global repercussions, you know, going to go repercussions politically,

economically, you know, i think it's actually having the rather good effects of, of making european western european countries realize that, you know, many of their institutions have atrophied and you know, and that's probably probably a bad thing, you know, and so it's going to make the, i think the european union is reacted in a way which is much more which of us more, which is much stronger than people anticipated. and perhaps, you know, they understand. now they understand they can't rely on the united states. there, the united states is sort of turned out, much more isolationist. now, after the call, the humiliation in iraq and afghanistan. and, you know, and domestic politics is so overwhelming in the united states and disputes about domestic issues that the european union is going to have to think differently about, about politics and an international politics. and so there's also, or is it the way the opposite, or is it quite the opposite? the european union in swapping their a gas terminals be able to take in l. n g from the united states refract gas there,

that europe will do whatever the united states tells him to do. they will send weapons into ukraine to fight a war that ukraine will be defeated in allowing the cannon fodder of ordinary ukrainians in a war that they are obviously going to lose. at the same time has now become wholly reliant on fossil fuel energy resources from the united states. they like, literally just following everything, washington tells them, i don't think that's united states driving these decisions by, by, by germany and the european union actually to starts to start sending weapons to the ukraine. i think that's, that's it. just a change in european policy, which is, which is independent of the united states. i think, i think germany has been realizing, you know, for the last few years that you can't rely on the united states. and so, you know, i mean, that's part of the, the sort of a time to kind of reach a new, a new relationship with russia, which you could say would be a total failure. but, but nevertheless, you know, that doesn't mean it wasn't a good idea to try and,

and i, you know, i, i think, yeah, i think, i think they'll be, you know, where else in the, what else in the short run do you do in terms of buying energy, you know, so you have to turn to the united states, but i, i, yeah, i don't agree without assessment. i think i think the european union as understood that it, it needs to take a new path. now without the m a so might say ridiculous idea of a no fly zone, even without that zalinski has said that what has happened has in terms of the violation of ukrainian sovereignty, means that the agreement to get rid of the nuclear weapons is also invalid. and that, of course, got a retaliation from the russian saying, and nuclear war, nuclear weapons are now on high alert. they put it to a higher let their a tactical nuclear weapons that to russia has. what so given that nuclear war is now mentioned, i think on every news program in every nation country about once an hour. how

likely do you think are a limited nuclear war may be marsh i my room, you mentioned earlier said that if russia really wants to choose ukraine is a line in the sand about the dollar about economics, about all the rest of it, about the new world order of new countries, the killing may resemble the u. s. fire bombing of tokyo in the 2nd world war. what scale of killing a we can we expect? yeah, i don't think he's talking about nuclear weapon. so easy. i mean, i think, as you know, with the eventual, thankfully, i mean, everything is bad obviously. no, absolutely, absolutely. i think, i think, you know, i think he's making analyses to what, what pigeon has been willing to do before you know, in chechnya, wherever so. so, well, i sort of all, do you know, because i don't think kitchen thinks the chechens are russians of but, but, but somehow he thinks the ukrainians attach and warmer settled quite a while ago, which is why church and special forces of fighting alongside russian really that he

managed to put a puppet regime in place and a very kind of brutal, autocratic puppet regime in place. yeah. who is now supporting him in ukraine. i, i think, i think profession miss ramirez, right, you know about, about the by how terrible it could get. but i, you know, about nuclear war. you know, i'm not an expert on that. he's much more an expert on that. i, you know, i think, i think in, during the cold war at least, ah, you know, they managed to avoid any sort of even limited nuclear war. the either of it's an oxymoron, the notion of a new, a limited nuclear war. that seems unlikely to me like so far they're stopping short of things, which i think would move to that so. so, so i, i yeah, but i'm, i'm not, i'm not an expert on that. professor james robinson. thank you. and that's it for the show will be back on saturday, 31 years to the day to job announced a cutting oil production of 1000000 barrels a day to support world oil prices until then keep in touch, why all our social media, and if it's available in your country and let us know if you think europe will cut

off it's russian oil supply and remember all episodes going underground are available to watch it out. tito ah ah ah ah

with ah ah ah! with hello and welcome to cross top where all things are considered. i'm peter lavelle, the west liberal world order is collapsed in the hedge of money. it's hard to maintain and expand the conflict in ukraine as a proxy war. the real target is russia and indirectly china, the law of unintended consequences is in play. in the end it will be europe that pays the highest price. ah.