ah, ah, is the aggressor to day? i'm authorizing the additional strong sanctions today. russia is the country with the most sanctions imposed against it. and um, but as constantly growing, i figure which of the problem was to call sure, as we speak on the bill in your senior mostly mine the we're will ship, we're banding all in ports of russian oil and gas, fuji. i mean, i know they plenty of those with info the literature can get away. but if you haven't gotten joe by imposing these sanctions on, russia has destroyed the american economy. you. so there's your boomerang self ah,

[000:00:00;00] with below and welcome to cross top, were all things considered? i'm peter lavelle. europe finds itself in a quandary. it is determined to punish russia for its military operation in ukraine . it's favored policy. instrument is of course, sanctions of all sorts, but alas, it's not so simple. sanctions and gender counter sanctions. this translates into economic pain. for europe. ah, cross ok in europe's fate. i'm joined by my guess. i'd real concern to in london. he is founder of a consulting and a foreign affairs analyst in paris. we have rachel mars than she is a political columnist and coast of unpredicted with rachel marston. and in prague

we crossed to brad blankenship. he is calmness at sea g t. n. a freelance reporter friction, why, as well as an rti contributor or a cross accruals and effect, that means you can jump in any time you want. and i will appreciate rachel, let me go to you 1st and paris. one of my favorite phrases over the years has been the law of unintended consequences. now, with the fervor of almost like a crusade or europe's intend to punish russia for its operations in ukraine are beginning to serve counterproductive. ends here. i mean, particularly in the area of energy and as much as nato and the u. e. you want to talk about unity. the more they talk about sanctions, the less unity there is. go ahead. rachel? yeah, what's interesting is french president, a mentor in like home faces written in the next few days at least the 1st round of the campaign and he's in a tight race right now against nothing. the been from the far right. and he's facing

a real problem because he flattered is said several times that nato is brain dead. that nato holds. any mission that need, oh, cannot just focus on russia. and yeah, he's done absolutely nothing, not only to reorient things in that sense, but also to stop this proxy war, which is essentially what we're seeing right now in ukraine. it's nato versus russia using ukraine as high and a mandarin mac home was doing a lot of shuttle diplomacy between moscow in the u. s. fire to all this popping off in february. yep. and only really had to do was just say france isn't getting involved in this, we're not sending what kind of ukraine wrote, getting involved in this. hey, if u. s. has a problem with russia, it's for you guys to do it by duping that. it probably would've deescalate the situation. instead,

what he's doing now is trying to play both sides of the court from mil. i'd like to say, he say on one side, look, i'm trying to say own independent position for europe. that's best for europe. that's best for the people in france. and the same time saying, ah, well, look, we're with united states, we're with nato. when we're united, huge, when should have done is adopted, the position that he sees himself as representing although he doesn't. and that is the position of former french president shuffled a good general from world war 2, who basically pulled france out of nato command and france stayed outside of nieto until nicholas are cosy. my office in to, well, you know, so rachel, the reason why my crown didn't do it because he has no courage. that's his problem . ok. he can talk all he was, but he didn't have any. great, i'm glad rachel brought this up because i was going to go to this here. let me go to address on this here. mac chrome defends dialogue with russia. continuing,

cox with moscow can build, quote, a new architecture a piece. well, where were you in december, january, february, when the russians were talking about a new architecture for security in europe, pedro, this is laughable here, so he's gonna laugh at this man. adrian, go ahead and i'm not quite sure with the history law for this. if we understand how the politics in europe are governed, we need to bear in mind that this politicians told no hold no power when it comes to the internal decisions within the european politics. i mean, the real decision makers in washington d. c. and this has been said already 1927 by a famous french put po valerie, that europe is currently governed by the united states. and these, these, these are the effects of, of being covered and being

a lot sovereign entity. so obviously i'm on my home trying to portray him so as a war time leader. and he's trying to get the best of both worlds, you know, playing as a mediator between the west and president, what he may put in the same time. he's contradicting his own internal and foreign policy by leaning towards being instead of having a europe european security autonomy, i would say i would call it a european security dependence on the united states. and what i would like to say is stuff is quite significant to bear in mind that what is happening in europe is a repercussion of, of, of the united states strategy to somehow put in place the offshore balance. a strategy here in europe to somehow engage

a russia in fighting or we can call it a military mission to denies of fi, a ukraine. but at the same time, on tuesday, for the executive of, of nato, just sultan burke set up and now, and nato is looking towards asia in order to have, you know, have a closer ties in, with, with, with asian partners. so in my understanding is that they are trying to offshore balance the power that is russia here in europe. while at the same time the united states can concentrate off, somehow containing, as they say, a china in, in asia. but it is a self defeating a strategy because you can't, you know, fight to main eurasian powers of the same time we shall see. but in my opinion, it, this will lead to a massive tragedy yet. well, in the way i look at it,

brad number one, since we've brought up a crown, i hope he's defeated in his presidential reelection bid because he's a coward. and for very reason, reasons i do have already heard here. and number 2, nato should just close shop because it can't keep the peace. all it does is bring war. let's go talk about the law of an unintended consequences. i mean, a year living in europe. i mean, a, do people understand the revenue, the repercussions of what's going to happen to the economy when you attack a g 20 country like russia, particularly in the area of energy. and you know, the over dependence on russia? well, they're looking for dependency on, on the, on the u. s. and it's going to be very, very expensive. go ahead, brand. yeah, that's exactly right. i don't think anybody here understands that. i mean, here in the czech republic, i, what i've noticed to this conflict is, is how much necessarily the, the national identity of the former warsaw pact, countries that are now members of the european union is like necessarily based on

anti russia in which they attached to their socialist pass, and it's almost like these voices were elevated and amplified by the united states after the ball, the berlin wall. and after the revolutions against communism, here in eastern europe to stand against russia and to prop up nato and us lead world order. people are so rabbit in their anti rushes in here that they don't realize that their houses are being heated by russian guy. i mean, as i'm sitting here in my apartment now talking to you, i'm in a pretty comfortable environment here. heated by russia, we have a majority of our energy of our liquefied natural natural gas in the czech republic from russia. and to me, this idea that we can de globalize russia, which is the term i'm seeing use more now. this attempt to de globalize, russia will have an antenna consequences when i'm noticing it also as well. people don't realize that for example, russia is the largest exporter of mineral,

natural mineral, like the food for animal fertilizer, a fertilizer organizer. yeah, right, mineral paralyzer. so we're going to see even more food inflation around the world . the entire african continent is based as it's wheat in ports from russia. this will be mass starvation in africa. if you know these countries in the west are selling after you need to have a response to the war in ukraine, ok, if that happens, everybody in africa is going to start again. it will be mass destitution and people don't understand this, that one won't show you about low. hi, brad. it's ago. this was brad left, but we should point out to that, you know, iraq is iraq, afghanistan, i began to send libby as libya. and though that how did that impact western lifestyles? not very much because they're very far away. but this is going to happen in the heart of europe. this is what people don't understand. rachel, let me go to you. you're very well aware of the concept of ca, cancel, come a cancel culture. now we're doing it to a major country. i mean, in every way,

financially, economically, socially, historically, musically, any way you want to do it. this is an amazing exercise of virtue signaling. go ahead, rachel? yeah, well, it is a virtue signaling, but we'd been in that kind of logic going back to years now. i mean, we saw it with the covey crisis night. get back and all, but i mean, we saw over distilling with respect to that, that was totally disconnected from scientific reality. we're seeing that now, people who probably can't even point a pointing ukraine or russia on a map, even though it, you could probably do a blind with the dark. i think you're going to miss with russia. then you have suddenly they've gone for being a health experts on line to being the best russia ukraine relation. but and william been paying attention to asian that's been going on of the last 20 years. i mean, i remember when i was living in toronto, canada back in around 20034. there was

a toronto based international political consultant who approached me because i was doing political consulting work at the time. and he said, would you be interested in working on ukraine campaign? i said, why would anybody year be interested in working on ukraine camping, but all right, it was in the works already. there is an intent to try to write to con there, i guess rearrange things or a to, to move ukraine into the north american column. and that's already been underway for, for decades now. so i mean, this is not a new issue, but yet people have an opinion, a very strong opinion about it, even though to them it's just something that that just happened like magic for no reason on february 24th. and yeah, yeah. so, so cancel a culture is really, is really nothing new. i mean, i had an independent show that was licensed to sputnik france and

for 6 years i hosted that show. and then suddenly, from one day to the next, it's going because the european union just unilaterally, without going to any regulatory bodies in the individual members. right? so i have to jump in here, wait to get what we have to go to a short break in europe. so the right, the due process of law seems to be disappearing. we're going to go to a short break. that's about short break. will continue our discussion on europe's fate state with our ah ah

ah ah edition with

with a is in yet. did you buy the wall oxygen this ah well connect across that were all things are considered. i'm peter a bell to remind you we're discussing the fate of europe. ah, let's go back a drill in london, a. rachel brought up a very good point at the end of the 1st part of the program. so anyway, tell me, in, in rough terms here, what you're living in london. so what did people actually know about ukraine before february 24th. and what did they know about it? now?

go ahead. well, they know the same answer. they were knowing in 2014 or 2013, i had to, you know, you have to bear in mind that in 2014 i went to, i was sent by the house of laws to, to do the report. and also in 2015, i published a report on the sanctions on russia. where are we clearly. ready states in the report that this sanctioning or russia will backfire because sanctions are not a free meal. and also it will accelerate a russia shifting towards a global south or towards east. and it's already in 2015 already had a discussions with briggs countries and especially with china aware day sign a significant a deal concerning gas and did this was perceived by

a research is contributing to the report are mentioning to, to a threat, to, to the west, but no one has listened to that, although it was by the center for the policy studies and k parks. it was this cause of the house of lords, but people were ridiculous that because people are still seeing russia through the western lenses. they perceive russia as a country i'm capable to, to stand on its own. and the very fact that russia is perceived by, by the western, as, as, you know, standing on its own and, and as broadly mentioned to, somehow the west will be able to the couple. russia from the world. it's only approve of western, particularly they, they see or perceive, well as the west, they don't see the world as india, south africa, brazil, and china. they don't comprehend the fact that russia has a lot of friends around the world,

and these friends are happened to be very powerful and emerging poets. while in europe we, the europe is a decadent country. we have a problem with a population. people in countries are the populated, especially italy. we dependent heavily on russia and on the united states where the united states promise quite written. the true jo biden's lips that they will somehow sufis the gas limits or gust reduced by seizing transpose of gas from russia. but people were paying close attention and who on the stand, the political economy of energy know that this is impossible, even because i really just said the euro will be unable to find another

one of the piece for that. what we've seen here is seizing of yachts. i suppose that makes europe a safer place on these deals. when's yacht without any kind of due process here? you know, i guess these are western standards that the world needs to really having europe was heavily hit by the log downs of through the pandemic, and not not through seizing and peer a tearing, especially u. k. they're trying to make up the numbers. so they are stealing, i mean, but let me, let me go to brad here. let me go to brad here in prague. i mean, you know, all this virtue signaling, i mean, how does it actually help the average citizen of the e u. i'm really mystified by this. i'm glad that with the lock downs were mentioned . i mean, we had a lot of economic dislocation. now we have even more here, and the people that spout off about at the most or the elite and they don't suffer at all from these things at all. okay. they're more disconnected from their, their citizens than ever before. go head bread. it's right. i think that, of course,

the sanctions against russia are just going to compound all the inflationary pressures right now that are the greatest assertion, inflation in 5060 years that it's disproportionately a hurting average people. and you hear so much from people like joe biden or other western leaders that oh well we have the courage we're willing, we're able to, to make this sacrifice. well, who are they talking about me talking about themselves? are they talking about the billionaires, that bothered campaign? these people are completely insulated from all the economic damage that these things are bringing. average people will suffer. as i mentioned, with the example of natural gas here in europe. if they decide to unplug natural gas in europe, that will be absolutely devastating. people's rents going to go up. utilities will go up. probably 2 or 3 times. i mean, it will be ridiculous, an idea that the american can substitute russian national liquefied natural gas is absurd. and the whole thing about globalization, it's about reducing, reducing friction. that is the barriers in people, services, and goods,

and adding just the giant, essentially a wall between russia and europe, which is an extra part of europe, politically and economically. and then saying, okay, we're going to do more business with this country, cause the atlantic. this is, this is counter logical to the idea of globalization itself, and i just don't see that it can be done in the possible, globalized rachel, rachel, you live in paris? so, i mean, i'm sure the average per reason is just waiting with baited breath for refugees. from ukraine to come or correct me if i'm wrong. i just heard today that apparently spaces in daycares will be free of charge for ukrainian refugees. and suddenly, there is a lot of french people who are turned very right away as result of measures like that, that they can't understand when we're offering homes, as generous as it is for the state to do that, to refugees. when there are french people living in the street,

it's hard to explain to french people why that is the case. and one thing that is really interesting that i'm noticing, i don't know if anybody else is, has ascertain this as well. but there seems to be a narrative coming from the top down from elite within each country. they all seem to be seeing from the same hymn book on this issue. and that is that under the pretext of this conflict, it is necessary mandatory for the average citizen of europe and perhaps other western countries to pay the same, but expect much less. yeah. and that goes to the energy issue. and i think i don't like where this is going, i don't know what condition in us to accept which is increasingly less for the same price and who wins? they do? well, people, right, well rachel, rachel, i like to say to all of you,

but it's all worth it because it's ukraine's democracy. i drilled. does anybody in europe have a clue about what the state of democracy is and, and ukraine? i do. i been watching it closely. for years there isn't much there, but we're told otherwise. go ahead in london. this is about, this is about the ideology. people don't, don't on the stand until this high prices will not hit them and they will not be able to uh, to pay for the or to let the bills they will not be able to afford the fancy. i tended to fancy restaurants and eat before that they used to like so obviously as rachel, write me said this is the tax being put on the average citizens of for they are paying this tactful ukraine freedom. but really and truly this will have a massive shift within the societies in the west. the people who are generally speaking a liberal progressive they will turn radical and, and,

and right wing. because these are the repercussions of the. busy liberal policy and some people are just, you know, fed up with the thing that the, so far as i mentioned during the make that, you know livelihoods but you know, a significantly diminished. and now we are having this wall which could have been prevented in the 1st place if, if, if someone would really strike the deal with russia in good faith regarding the means agreements and telling the. busy busy which is now known to everyone. president junior, he said him, so they told him that ukraine will not be admitted to nato buck in the public. they will still, you know, push this low rate if there's a certain possibility of you being admitted. so someone is just clearly making a very big jump out of a huge population in the west, especially here in europe. so it will backfire, it will,

but it's back flying already. you know, brad in this all explains, this whole program explains the fact that why london and the u. s. is not pushing for some kind of negotiated end to this conflict. they actually want to keep it going on for all the reasons that all 3 of you have said on this program. go ahead, brad. let's right, i mean, 1st of all there's, there's internal mechanisms we know in place like the military industrial complex. and the fact that bus members of congress are invested in that to keep the, the war drum beating to keep it all going. and also benefits united states politically because it creates more dependence on the united states, both for you know, natural resources, but also other economic things where russia could get cut out. but i also, i just want to stay here that you know, and whatnot. i guess we're talking about about, you know, people coming in accepting, replicate me, can we open our i give it here in the czech republic. i give it like 6 months. i get 6 months between we love the premiums to the come to the earth again. be

because before the war, that's how they were treated here. they were treated a 2nd class citizen, and that will happen again very soon. well, brad, you know, i'm glad someone else said it so i can say it now. i lived in poland per 10 years. the sentiment is pretty much the same there. okay. i'm sorry. ok. that's why this is all such a fiction. ok. rachel? rapidly running out of time here. what comes next? i mean, what, how is anything the west helping ukraine? because i've said ever since the, because when 2014, the more the west helps ukraine, the more the smaller ukraine gets, go ahead. rachel will see the tolerances of people living in the west. and granted, there is a buffer on the atlantic ocean to prevent the ins and everybody over there from feeling the pinch like we are here in europe, but we'll see how hard your alright, i have to germany, we're almost out of time. we're almost out of time if you will give me,

give me 15 seconds. go ahead. jump in. oh, well, ok. rachel was saying, but i couldn't hear. very woke up. yes. i think that but people will not be tolerant. i mean, the, and now we are seeing, you know, this enters the awesome, because this is a new thing, you know, as same as my squaring and i recovered jobs. but all of a sudden, a same as you've said about poland. i mean, about poland. people will soon realize that this is unfair and. busy once they're, you know, the increase in payments for, for the utility bills and they, alex, life expectancy will, will kick in. they will realize that they've been treated unfairly because someone from the ukraine is being given something for free and you are supposed to be paying for of them. okay, well i haven't been it run out of time, but the law of unintended consequences is definitely in play here. many thanks and i guess in london, paris in prague and thanks to our viewers for watching us here at

r t c next time. remember cross i pro ah ah, is your media a reflection of reality? ah, in the world transformed what will make you feel safer? high selection for community. are you going the right way or are you being led somewhere? direct. what is true? what is faith? in the world corrupted, you need to descend, ah,

to join us in the depths, remain in the shallow. ah, who is the aggressor today? i'm authorizing the additional strong sanctions. today. russia is the country with the most sanctions imposed against it. and number those constantly growing. i figure which of the problem was to call sure, as we speak on the bill in your senior, mostly mine or wish you were banding all imports of russian oil and gas new g i. g, with regard to joe biden, imposing the sanctions on russia, has destroyed the american economy. so there's your boomerang self

with disturbing images, and this breaking news in international moscow say the key i've told you mr. has killed dozens and injured more than a 100, a don't yet region train station as ukraine's president. and he's only advisor contradict each other in a bit to blame russia. also ahead with the plot of correspondent mar, down to have reports from the heart of the besieged tonya,