lead means that was not an issue because it was only a few hours between george's attack and the decision that i made as commander in chief, no consultations on the subject were held. there was an act of aggression and we reacted. had we taken our time with the decision, the consequences would have been much worse. and the conflict would have been drawn out, despite the fact that georgia's military power couldn't compare with that of the russian federation. as for recognizing a policy and sell the city out as independent states and subjects of international law, i discussed it with the security council. we weighed all the pros and cons and made the decision. and this decision has stood the test of titles on the way the international community was surprised by it. but at the same time, it was expected because everybody knew that there was no turning back, no rush, it had to protect those territories,

signed an agreement with the put military bases there, defends the interest of the people to guarantee peace and security. so those decisions were not easy to make, but today i met with the leaders of the republics. we discussed everything and confirmed that those decisions haven't done yet. so the test of time. no. so what everybody usually focuses on, what was it sharepoint, but it is also important to look at what's, what's prevented fish, and when you and the russian federation made the decision to get involved in this house, instead of the conflict, what sort of negative scenarios do we prevent and yet i think it's obvious that the most important thing we presented was more casualties. this is key in any kind of armed conflict or if we hadn't reacted militarily, use the massacre. the killings by georgia would have continued. there were already many victims at that point, including our peacekeepers since clearly russia had to react,

stopping the blood shit was the most important objective flashing it and securing piece of course, sell the set to you and deposit you have been peaceful territories since then. protected by russia. nice. yeah. well it's, it's just and now safety is light. so what do you think about the development of a policy and self of sets and to power versus relation with those 2 states sickness and do you think more countries would recognize their independence in the future with both of them. but we always want more. of course, but if we compare the situation in 2008 with what we see now in 2023, we can say that the republics are experiencing significant growth in agriculture and tourism. they're able to attract investment. there are talks about the partnership in transportation and logistics naturally was a big part of that growth can be attributed to russia support,

especially in the military sector, but more can and should be done. you have these republics are close neighbors and friends. we contributed to their establishment and the people living there have close ties with the rush of some even hold dual citizenship. so by helping the states, we are basically helping ourselves. there are no tensions in our relations. there cannot be any tensions. there are some issues that we can view differently, but this is normal and we discuss such discrepancies. the same happens inside russia when we talk about the development of different regions, and what should be done faster or more slowly, but we are close out us. i'll relations are special, so there are no major disagreements between those 2 um the prospects for recognition by other countries. so ask for the prospects for recognition by other countries. this is always a very delicate the issue that is tied to the general geo political situation. it

is clear that our decision to recognize them did not arouse enthusiasm in the west . they said they will not recognize the people, but let me remind you that from the standpoint of international law, the fact of recognition is necessary for the emergence of a subject of international law. that is the state. it is not stated anywhere that it should be recognized by a certain number of countries or by the un where some qualified majority of the very fact of recognition itself is important to us. the fact of recognition grants, international, legal standing. of course, we don't know what will happen next week, but i'm sure that sooner or later history will put everything in its place and the countries that want to recognize them and do not fear the opinions of their western comrades will be able to do so. not only a positive and south of city are in such

a situation, a number of other territories. for example, the republic of northern cyprus are also widely unrecognized. but this doesn't prevent them from being considered independent by turkey, a and some other legal entities. and i'm not even going to talk about the endless conversations over costs of oh here's, can you see what we got, what our costs are? and what role did the united states and western countries play at the beginning of the whole phase of the conflict? once this conflict inevitable, or did these countries external players push georgia to conduct that operation? singular. so they made in the usa played gets a turnover role. look the role of a probably cater mute. the successfully fulfill this role. especially when it comes to other countries and continence. what are they doing at the time? that 1st they entice seconds should really in every possible way, give us an appointment. i remember perfectly well how then us president george bush,

the instead sat gosh, really was a very good guy. i simply grinned at the time. i went to the white house, then has to be out of the administration and said, well, we'll wait and see about that. time has shown just what a good guy he is. he's just crazy. he said it's very dangerous. and the us methodically guided the situation into a conflict on russia's borders, nurtured in every possible way. a group of people who at the time we're pursuing this course, said by soft gosh, really immediately before the conflict, he will come to several americans delegations, including i believe, one with condo lose a rice. in all likelihood he was told to me and don't worry. there's been a change of leadership in russia and in a lot of other factors too, and nothing will happen to you for doing this. and then he rushed to execute this provocation at full speed. so the u. s. did not just add fuel to the fire or try to

put a puzzle together, they directly lend the situation to this clash. by the way, they then began to try to dig themselves out and portray a bad situation in a good light. i remember a conversation i had with the same george bush just a few days after the conflict began. i don't know where he was at the time either in america or the olympic games. but the fact is, he called me and said, keep in mind because we have military specialists in georgia and they may get hurt . like i said, it's, it's your problem if you've left them there. well, if you have nothing to blame us for you to say that was the conversation, didn't you know, it's just a few days after the conflict began. therefore, the united states provoked this conflict. they try to cement these kinds of conflicts in all areas of is a belief. you can bear fruit. in this case,

the goal was to contain the development of rush them, and that's a complete one of their geo political tasks. you've just said that the united states actually prevent this conflict conflicts. you can see the sancho. surely the medical tourism business reward does new responsibility align with george's, and top political establishment that that assignment as well as the nature countries on the united states. we have set for a long time. that's that, gosh, really is just the familiar with who bought into this whole story. a man with an inflated ego that eventually turned him into a political corpse. and he's responsible for everything that happened. not only he but the leadership of georgia at that time, what's, what's in political life? everything is arranged so that the final decision is made by the top in person. and he was the number one person responsible. on the georgian side, he made the decision to launch the aggression to view even taking into account the

role of the west. and this prob occasions. this was full timidly the decision of one person, the georgia head of state only. so that's why you cannot take the words out of the song here. but the fact is that he is a cycle paths, a person with an unbalanced cycle, who took stimulants during the conflict and we can small, but i don't know what he was sniffing or smoking, or what kinds of ties he was showing on. it was clear that he was not mentally stable and this also affected what transpired, but he is also responsible for the george and leadership of that period. it's, it's soccer certainly is now in prison. yeah. it's the perio typically claims that he has dined, and from time to time pump, so tough ballistic of oblivion, it's going to be closely with some risk to solve like attacking you. we've got to do things that gosh, really should be brought before an international trip. you know, or is george and just as enough, when it goes, it seems to me that history and the almighty and have already condemned him as

severely as possible and what i feel so he has become an outcast in his own homeland. despite the fact that he was previously its head of state, he went on the stupid political journey to crane, where he tried to serve another country ship. but what this is quite strange for the head of another state and unacceptable in principle. but nevertheless, he tried to do it, but he was thrown out soon because he showed his incompetence and propensity for squabbling. ultimately, under the influence of his political instructors from the west, from the special services, he tried to re enter the territory of his native, georgia, and deservedly went to prison. there. he has already been condemned by everyone. but most importantly, you know, he's been condemned by his own people. when do you believe there are any similarities between the events of almost a $1008.00 and what is happening in ukraine now, would you like to get with you?

why, in your opinion, the, the west, me not provide the kind of support to georgia by that it is cars they provide into ukraine because with a great, a, the old power levels are conditional. you can always try to build them, see what looks the same. and what looks different, it is obvious that these are links in the same chain. there is no doubt about that . the situation surrounding self a set to was a trial step touchstone. at the same time, they were trying to form a model that would affect the situation around rushes, borders while isolating us and creating a rooster phobic enclave. from that, it was an initial pro perfect video, but it was unsuccessful because we dealt with it quickly enough. and showed that the truth is on our side was in georgia, is a small country. there. armed forces are small, but for the americans were involved with them,

but not on the same scale. your brain is an entirely different situation. having learned from their experience in georgia, i'm the americans as our main geo political opponents built the lines of attack in various directions ranging from economic sanctions to direct supplies of lethal weapons such that people as a supreme commander in chief, you're more well informed about the tactical and strategic challenges that existed in the to solve and, and i do think that experience has been useful and become conflict. of course it has gotten, i'll be frank, even that small and short term conflict showed both in our capabilities and our weaknesses. as supreme commander in chief, i took a number of decisions, for example, to develop certain branches of the armed forces, communications, some other areas that allowed us to strengthen the army. it was obviously a powerful catalyst for so that allowed us to rethink our entire military strategy

. so it was certainly useful was much strong that you had a good relationship with president brock obama. do you see any similarities between of almost policies and those of his former vice president? now president joe biden? no, i'll tell you how it is. things make sense in context and back when we're rock. obama wasn't office. we saw more pragmatism from future just as a reminder, when the george and conflict broke out and george w bush was president. so that's a different page we're talking about. i looked initially cuz then came president obama and there weren't tensions over the developments. and ukraine should then crime me or returned to the russian federation and sanctions were introduced against us. but that was then dealt with like presidents proved him to. the fact is that in terms of pragmatism, obama had more sense than joe. by whom couple. i think there are 2 reasons for that

is something 1st to put it bluntly, it is a matter of intellectual capacity, which is higher in the case of obama difficulty than in the case of joe white and my to secondly, the currents, us president, who was vice president at the time, is deeply entangled with in your training and affairs. no, it is a disgrace for a leader of such a big country, a great power, even like the united states of america. ms. vice president. he was actually tacitly by obama to work with the prince. and what work did he do? the 1st he kept giving the ukrainians allows the instructions. and secondly, he sent his son hunter to ukraine to make money. and he made a nice and quickly lux there to use a colloquial term. and that's why joe biden is now so involved, they're mentally, politically and economically combined with the 1st factor,

i mentioned the intellectual capacity. it completely tied him up, made him a hostage of ukraine, and it became his policy that a set of course, both for the us and for ukraine, which has to continue this difficult struggle as a result of sending masses of soldiers to their certain depths. the only reason for this, as i've said, is the deep involvement of the binding family in you create a new agreement, but it took them all of you don't weston, political, strategist, decision makers, the democratic party. you see the involvement of dividing family in ukraine as to weakness? i guess the steve, serious every body sees that every body's writing about it's interesting, but the u. s. although it's not what we're talking about right now has become a rather peculiar state. they have started indicting their own former presidents

and why not to ensure that justice prevails. what to prevent donald trump from running for president. again, they're not even trying to hide it. that is the 1st thing. and then secondly, there is a huge clash between different buildings, the conservative republican establishment, and the liberal segment of the democratic party that has torn the us a part of the u. s. as in boy, held an internal strife at odds with itself. and i think there are some elements in this conflict that make it to your reconcile level. so i'm going to go to this kind of internal conflict. one might say, often ends in civil war. i don't know what's in store for the us, but that is the level of conflict. that's what it looks like right now that we've been meeting the same can be said about the binding families affairs and involvement in ukraine. everyone can see it,

but the democrats are giving their president and blanket support. never mind that he's on the state of progressive dementia, while the conservative republicans are having a field day, exposing the ugly state of affairs. of course, everyone has their own interests, and the republican party is also anti russian, but they have more pragmatic members, or how to code the ways, i sure responded to the georgian expression in the youngest of 2008 i was suppose to send the direct signal to the us, the nature of the most because concerns i'm not to be dismissed. but judging from the developments that followed, the rushes message fell on deaf. these new solution. do you think that perhaps we should have been even tougher in 2008, and instead of listening to mitigate is gab the time trolling, or is a doubt no matter how loud our signals are not getting through to the collective west. let's be clear, had the actually listen to us,

new things would have been better. no question about it. at the very least, we would not be facing the threats of a 3rd world war as we are now. our adversaries are effectively pushing the planets towards a new global conflict, and they refuse to listen to us as for the actions that rush it to back then, i believe they were necessary and they were adequate because on the one hand we punched back against an aggressor and succeeded in restoring order as you know, ultimately georgia's political leadership changed. and on the other hand, we avoided a full fledged confrontation with the rest of the world. securing a peaceful respite during which we continued to develop, grow, improve our armed forces and prepare for further trouble. the question about the scope of the ongoing ukraine conflict. multiple experts have described it as

a x, the statute for i shifted. what do you say that it is just as existential for the united states and the west, the most president clinton and myself have commented on that several times. yes, this conflict is very much existential for our country as we're faced with an existential choice. either we survive as a major history defining global power, or we're going to be torn apart toward the parts and by our enemies, and by the yapping little months running around under their feet to us. this is a question of russia's continued existence. that's how this conflict must be perceived, and that's precisely the way rushes leadership views. but even more importantly, that is exactly how our people see it, including the ones now fighting on the front lines defending our homeland to me, you know, i meet with a lot of them as they are preparing to go into the conflict zone. in fact,

recently i've been directly involved in the manning and equipping of our armed forces on instructions from the president. so i often get to spend time with them talking, drinking tea together. so when i ask them, what drives you to keep fighting? and these are all experienced battle hardened soldiers over 40 or even 50 years old . and the answer is at home. else, if not us, it is a matter of survival. and that is what matters most. i have been in the conflict zone for a year and a half myself since and i agree with you completely. our boys are fighting not for the 3 a little bit, not for money, but for the reason that you quoted who else if not us. but going back to my questions, we've concluded that it is an existential thread for russia. but is it for the west? yes, now for the 2nd part of your question, which is,

i believe they themselves do not see it that way. what they like to do is add fuel to other people's fires, which is especially true for the americans. this is how they look at it. oh, someone else's place is burning to what is old right. it will never reach us any way, not even in the cannot make sense for us. and that is true to an extent. somebody just think about it. who stands to lose from this conflict? euro before we talk, which was robbed of a massive market in russia to has suffered economic losses and who has gained the united states. they were able to put everyone under their thumb. economy was, they dictate which sector of the economy will grow, and in what direction of the course other countries into buying their energy resources, including natural gas. in the past,

the europeans were least able to resist arguing that russian, oil and gas were much cheaper. but now they are too scared to even mumble anything and response. but they are now part of an orchestra with a u. s. as the conductor. so they can only play and seeing what the conductor orders. as a result, the u. s. makes a profit. europe keeps losing, and the whole world is on the edge. if we look at the whole situation from this angle, the conflict takes on a planetary scale. all. it is a conflict between 2 worlds and an existing shall crisis for the entire world. many political scientists and politicians are now saying the same thing, okay? the fact that the europeans failed to see it and the americans refused to acknowledge it, is a very bad thing. and for one simple reason, they believe that they can control the conflict at the expense of others. this

proxy war, as they call it. i mean, it is a way of breaking up the fire with other people's hands. in this case, the ukrainians, the americans are sending them to the slaughter and they couldn't care less about the loss of life to all that just to achieve their own goals. i think that ultimately this is a problem for the entire world to deal with. and get everybody's award to the last ukranian, like some put it. there is also a concern to the united states. my tried to ignited new conflicts and the confidence that border russia do share that concern. how well in your view is russia prepared to handle in writing such conflicts in the us will certainly try to insights, even more confrontations with the whole history of the united states, at least in the 20th and 21st century fios is

a series of attempts by america to get involved in someone else's conflicts in order to pursue its own interest. and like i said before, washington's goals are very much practical in nature. wherever there was a war or an armed conflict and people die. and the americans are making money out of it. and i mean, one of the reasons they can do it is because they had successfully altered the course of economic development in europe. and now their companies are making money, both by selling goods and by shipping american made weapons by they will happily spend billions of dollars. the joe biden is now squeezing out of congress. i know the debates. there are moving at a snail's pace, but the money is still flowing. we're talking hundreds of billions of dollars. and while it's actually all money taken out of the us budget as biden's own, critics rightly argue the american companies are the ones that profit america's

military industrial complex is booming. they've got their hands full of contracts. in that sense, they're very much interested in prolonging this war and making sure that it's flame and doesn't die out for a very long time. american soldiers are not the ones dying after rolling. it is some other people know, some place far away, where all the fighting has happened to the bookstore. they have absolutely 0 sympathy for them. and the prospect of fighting a war to the last ukrainian doesn't scare them in the slightest point with the cranium crisis still unfolding judges, car and leadership has had to make a number of tough decisions. how would you assess the current state of relations between rushing georgia, georgia, and i'm has here in georgia and south of a c area. it's not well, i think it is best if the parties involved in this triangle did the assessment

themselves. although we are watching the developments closely in politics, everything is possible and having a pragmatic approach is a central point and what we all have a motion. but when making decisions, we must put emotions aside to the current iteration of georgia and leadership has a remarkable sense of pragmatism, which is why we're building stronger relations with georgia. and which is why we have allowed at georgia nationals. these are free access to rush as well as restarted air, travel with the country. clearly, there are still some on hinged and outright crazy people over there and some with a very strange ideas. some of the currents and george and president. i don't even know if she speaks georgia. all i know is that she's a french woman. so my tele, in the background, who's adamantly opposed to developing the economy of her own country. but in modern and georgia, politicians of her caliber don't really make the decisions. the country is

a parliamentary republic and the role of the president plays is marginal. i hope that the georgia in government has enough pragmatism to face the facts, including the existence of independence, south, a city a and a positive, and build relations with them. because historically, their peoples have been very close to speaking of pragmatism, refreshing judge and relation haven't been particularly woman to rest. and yes, despite the clear economic potential of the georgia now positions is absolutely step we take such as introduce and these are free travel. all restoring direct lies as a publication doesn't atrocious economic contribution. the tories who make up one searches of george's gdp match or told their loyalty to their overseas most as seems to come to us store knows it's very simple. if you take an average george and citizen on the street and ask them if they want georgia to have russian taurus, well,

if it's an ordinary person, they will say yes. but if it's a politicized figure, someone who's making money for scoring political points on this issue, then you'll get an emotional outburst. of course, the consequences of the russian georgian conflict are still being felt, despite the extensive support and assistance that our people once gave to georgia for its development. without rushes care, who knows what would have happened to the georgian people and whether the state would still even exist at all today. so ordinary people, their support cooperation, but political lunatics are against it. i would know how do you personally feel about georgette? it's culture and traditions. of course i feel positive. they are an ancient people with an ancient culture that is very close to us because we live close to each other and we have a big george in diaspora in russia. how many elements of georgian culture are

perceived as part of our own culture? if you look up, shush, leak or something like that, most countries don't see it as george and they see as part of russian quizzing. that's just one example that the same can be said about music, cultural and political elites. so the sooner our political relations can be fully normalized, the better i'll have to come across. do you think the day will come when russian georgie, i can be friends again to restore the history works over long periods of time. the day will certainly come, but i don't know when, but i am sure that it won't be too long. the, [000:00:00;00]

the, we have a full refund policy is on a month, so i'm a lot favoring potential intervention. i'm the 1st time in the boxes in the country as relation to the powers published to anything below as i wrote be investigated. so allegations of abuse is the relatively young woman, let's just think killed by u. k. so just in, in yet. and so i think 126 progress and then long struggle foreclosure since had deaf. we haven't been seeking justice, but nothing has happened so far. i think the british soldiers on actually the criminal ones they haven't faced and they've just digital leave enough to doing bad