The Critical Hour: Talking US-Russian Tensions in Ukraine & US-Chinese Tensions Over Taiwan
by
Garland Nixon
The Critical Hour (March 28, 2023)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwryFOjnSPw

[partial Video Transcript]

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1:11 Garland Nixon: "So, the Orinoco piece continues, now getting its drones as close to Crimea as they can without getting caught, oops, is just another setup for a sketch on the mock news of Saturday Night Live. The U.S. sponsored headline is that Russia is warned to operate military aircraft with caution. Brian, there seems to be no rule, no standard, no law that the United States will not ignore and break and then deny, so long as it furthers its objectives."

1:41 Brian Berletic: "Absolutely. And we have to remember that this entire conflict began because the United States overthrew Ukraine's government in 2014 and pumped the country full of weapons and provided military training. This is what triggered it in the first place. Now they're flying their drones around the conflict, collecting intelligence and passing it on to Ukrainian forces to assist them in carrying out attacks in this armed conflict. So they are a party to the conflict. Those drones are there to threaten Russia. And so Russia is responding. Something else in that article is very interesting is they mentioned the Air Identification Zone around Taiwan and how American politicians constantly complain about Chinese warplanes violating it, even though they officially recognize Taiwan as part of China. And yet this situation with Ukraine and Russia is so much more serious. And this is the hypocrisy that the U.S. constantly demonstrates."

. . . Garland Nixon:

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3:28 Brian Berletic: "... when you really think about what U.S. foreign policy is based on, it's based on Might Makes Right. And that's fine as long as you are the mightiest, but it seems as if the U.S. military power is in decline. It is being eclipsed in some ways by both Russia and China. And now when Russia and China have the ability to assert their national security interests, now the United States doesn't like that notion of might making rights."

. . . 8:25 Brian Berletic: We continuously hear from Washington that this is about Ukraine's sovereignty and their agency and they have the final decision. But when this talk about a potential peace plan floated by the Chinese leadership, as soon as it was floated it was the United States that immediately shot it down. And it wasn't as if they consulted with Kiev to do that. And it's just further proof that this is not about fighting for Ukraine's sovereignty. It's sovereignty ended in 2014. The decisions being made for Ukraine's future are being made in Washington. That's what they have proved and this is also proof that this is nothing more than a proxy war being fought by the U.S. against Russia using Ukrainian blood and treasure. And as there's no cost for Washington, they pay no price for this, and so they have no incentive to seek peace."